0:00

The last thing you want to hear while listening to your

0:02

favorite podcast is another gimmicky

0:04

ad. NJM feels the same way. It's

0:07

why they provide award-winning service without

0:09

the use of mascots or repetitive jingles.

0:12

And when you upgrade to NJM, you could

0:14

even save on your auto insurance. Better

0:17

service than possible savings? Sounds like

0:19

a win-win. No jingles or mascots,

0:21

just great insurance. NJM. mjm.com

0:24

slash podcast for a quote to see how much you

0:27

could save on your auto insurance.

0:29

Tonight on all

0:32

in. I have nothing to hide. I

0:34

have a constitution to uphold. NBC

0:37

News confirms Mike Pence has been ordered

0:39

to go under oath.

0:41

Mike was foolish and he was

0:43

weak. A former vice president is

0:45

compelled to give sworn testimony

0:48

about his boss's coup. Tonight,

0:50

Barbara McQuaid and Harry Lippmann on

0:52

what this means for the criminal case

0:54

against Trump and Senator Sheldon

0:56

Whitehouse on what it means for the rule of law. Then,

1:00

how do you stop gun violence from killing

1:02

kids in schools? It's a horrible,

1:05

horrible situation and we're

1:07

not going to fix it. Criminals are going

1:09

to be criminals. Tonight, the maddening

1:11

reality of a political party

1:13

that has given up the awful truth

1:15

of the cult of the AR-15 and author

1:18

Jeff Charlotte on his new book describing

1:20

what he calls America's slow

1:22

civil war. But all in starts

1:24

right now.

1:29

Good evening from New York. I'm Chris Hayes. Donald

1:32

Trump cannot stop losing the courts.

1:35

Today, yet another federal judge

1:37

ruling against the ex-president, and now

1:39

the man that Trump's angry mob wanted

1:41

to hang, is ordered to share

1:44

what he knows under oath.

1:46

This

1:46

afternoon, a judge with the U.S. District

1:48

Court for D.C. ruled that Mike

1:50

Pence must cooperate with a subpoena

1:53

from special counsel Jack Smith as

1:55

part of Smith's investigation into Donald Trump's

1:57

attempt to overturn the 2020 election.

2:00

Notably, the judge ruled that

2:02

Pence will not have to testify about

2:04

matters pertaining to his role as president

2:06

of the Senate on January 6 itself, but

2:09

he will have to provide testimony about Trump's

2:11

attempted coup more broadly, as well

2:13

as any potential illegal actions by the

2:16

ex-president.

2:17

Now, Pence has previously vowed to fight

2:19

this very subpoena all the way to Supreme

2:21

Court if need be, so it is likely he will

2:23

appeal the ruling that we'll see. But

2:25

as of now, it stands. And of course,

2:28

this order from a federal judge comes less

2:30

than a week after a separate federal judge

2:33

ruled that someone else close to Trump must

2:35

comply with one of Jack Smith's subpoenas. Remember

2:38

last Wednesday, a federal appeals court

2:40

took the rare step of piercing attorney

2:43

client privilege,

2:44

upholding that lower court decision, determining that

2:46

Trump's lawyer Evan Corcoran must testify

2:49

as part of Smith's separate investigation

2:52

into the ex-president's mishandling of classified

2:55

documents.

2:56

And that moved fast because Corcoran

2:58

then subsequently spoke with investigators

3:00

for more than three hours last

3:03

Friday. Mike Pence finds

3:05

himself in a similar position. Now it's a familiar

3:07

position for anyone around Donald Trump facing

3:09

down a subpoena. Now as

3:12

I've said many times in this show, Donald

3:14

Trump's efforts to subvert American democracy,

3:18

to end the constitutional republic as we know it,

3:20

culminating in the violent deadly insurrection in January

3:22

6th, was the most malevolent act

3:24

of a presidency full

3:25

of 11 acts. If there is one thing for which

3:28

he should be held to account, it is that.

3:31

And Mike Pence had a front-road seat to

3:33

nearly all of it. That is why

3:35

the special counsel's office is so doggedly

3:38

pursuing Pence's testimony. By

3:40

January 6, Pence marked the end of

3:42

the road for Trump's coup. Everything

3:45

else had already failed. His lawsuits were thrown out

3:47

of court. His efforts to pressure state

3:49

legislatures and election officials had gone nowhere.

3:52

Trump was becoming increasingly desperate, and that

3:54

is why, much like Corcoran,

3:57

Pence is such an important witness. In

4:00

some cases, and in crucial moments in

4:02

that period, Pence is the only witness.

4:05

Because the January 6 deadline got

4:07

closer and closer, Trump tried to pressure him

4:09

alone to go along with the coup

4:12

behind closed doors. There

4:15

is no doubt that President Trump's

4:17

pressure campaign on Vice President Pence

4:19

was significant. On the morning of

4:22

January 6, President Trump called the

4:24

Vice President from the Oval Office and demanded

4:26

that he overturn the results of the election. Numerous

4:30

witnesses told the Select Committee

4:32

about the invective that President Trump leveled

4:35

at his own Vice President.

4:37

Something to the effect, this is the

4:40

word he's wrong. I made the

4:42

wrong decision four or five years ago. And

4:45

the word that she relayed to you that the

4:47

President called the Vice President, I

4:49

apologize for being impolite, but do

4:51

you remember what she said? Her father called

4:54

him

4:55

the P word. By

4:58

that time, Trump knew his scheme to have

5:00

Pence throw out the results of

5:02

an election was illegal. John Eastman

5:04

had already told him so. Pence, to his

5:07

credit, had already told Trump he wasn't going to go along

5:09

with the scheme after some maybe initial waffling.

5:11

But Trump didn't care, right? He wanted any

5:14

means necessary to stay in power against

5:16

the will of the American people, against the

5:18

foundational conceit of the

5:20

American constitutional republic. And so he was pushing

5:23

it

5:23

anyway, both in private and in public.

5:26

All Vice President

5:28

Pence has to do is send it back

5:30

to the states to recertify.

5:34

And we become president and

5:36

you are the happiest people. And

5:43

I actually, I just spoke

5:45

to Mike,

5:46

I said, Mike, that doesn't take courage.

5:48

What takes courage is to do nothing.

5:52

That takes courage. and then we're stuck

5:54

with a president who lost the election

5:57

by a lot And we have to live with that

5:59

for four more.

6:00

years. We're just not going to let that happen.

6:03

We're

6:03

not going to let that happen. Now, today's

6:05

ruling likely did not come as much of a surprise

6:07

to Pence's team. They've been making noises that they were expecting

6:10

this. Last week, sources presumably close

6:12

to the former vice president told the Washington Post,

6:14

quote, Pence's advisers have privately accepted

6:17

the possibility the former vice president

6:19

might have to testify against

6:21

his former boss and likely political

6:24

rival during an election season. And

6:26

Pence himself addressed the ruling just

6:28

a few hours ago.

6:30

How they sorted that out and what other testimony

6:33

might be required, we're currently

6:35

reviewing. But look, let me be clear. I

6:39

have nothing to hide. I have a constitution

6:42

to uphold. I upheld the constitution

6:44

on January 6th. I believe

6:46

we did our duty

6:48

that day under the Constitution of

6:50

the United States. And in this matter, I thought it was important

6:53

that we stand on that constitutional principle

6:56

again.

6:57

For those who were not counting, that was four

7:00

references to the Constitution, 25 seconds, which

7:02

I guess as far as justifications

7:05

go is good.

7:07

But again, as you heard, Pence is remaining tight-lipped

7:09

about how he intends to proceed, although he

7:11

didn't rule out the possibility of testifying. You notice

7:13

that. Of course, anyone

7:16

who has been following politics at all understands that

7:19

he's walking something of a delicate tightrope, obviously

7:22

Mike Pence, the people around him, Mike Pence wants to be president,

7:25

right? Understand that Donald

7:27

Trump not just being indicted, but

7:30

actually being convicted for his crimes

7:33

would likely help Pence's own political ambitions.

7:36

Certainly would, I think, clear the way of

7:38

the front-runner, the Republican primary. But of course,

7:41

everyone also understands, certainly Mike Pence, the

7:43

people around him, that he can't seem too eager

7:45

about it or he'll risk alienating Trump supporters,

7:48

who by the way are already alienated. So

7:51

it remains to be seen what exactly happens

7:54

next.

7:55

I'm joined now by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat

7:57

of Rhode Island. Senator, you know...

8:00

So there are some fairly

8:02

novel constitutional questions at

8:04

issue here. It's a relatively

8:07

unprecedented set of circumstances. Obviously

8:10

what Donald Trump did in the election

8:12

was unprecedented, the pressure he put on his

8:14

vice president, the vice president being subpoenaed

8:17

by a special counsel. What's your reaction to

8:19

this federal

8:20

court ruling saying you've got

8:22

to talk under oath?

8:25

I think it's a lot of good news. it signals

8:28

that the federal investigation

8:30

into the insurrection is

8:32

alive and well. It's not just the Mar-a-Lago

8:35

documents because it involves

8:37

Pence's role presiding over the Senate

8:40

on that fateful day. Second,

8:43

although the decision is

8:45

sealed, it appears that the only

8:47

protection Pence got

8:49

was under the speech and debate clause protecting

8:51

legislators, which is great

8:54

for the rule of of law because an

8:56

expansion of the executive privilege doctrine to cover

8:59

this would have a very

9:01

poor effect on congressional oversight. And

9:04

third, it looks a lot like if you're the

9:06

vice president and you're getting instructions

9:09

from Trump on what you're supposed to do,

9:11

that looks pretty executive. So

9:14

it's, I think pretty likely that

9:16

the testimony that Jack Smith

9:18

is seeking

9:20

will be available to him in the grand

9:22

jury and it won't be protected the speech

9:24

and debate laws protection that

9:26

the order apparently provided.

9:29

Yeah, we should say that there is some interesting

9:32

sort of constitutional

9:36

grafting happening in the complaint

9:38

by Pence's

9:41

people basically saying he's got one foot

9:43

in Article 1, where he's the president

9:45

of the Senate, he's got one foot in Article 2, wherever

9:48

you need him, he can skip over to the other side

9:50

so you can never touch him. If

9:52

it's the legislature asking, I got executive

9:55

privilege, if it's the executive asking, I got

9:57

speech and debate clause, Nobody can ask

9:59

me anything.

10:00

and that did not work. No, that's

10:02

exactly right. It was clever, you know, proper

10:04

for the attempt. But my next question

10:06

of you, I guess, is given your

10:09

feelings about this current 6-3

10:11

conservative majority in the court, I mean, there

10:14

are novel constitutional issues. It does seem like Pence

10:16

is likely to appeal to this. Do you have confidence

10:18

that this straightforward ruling will

10:21

stand?

10:24

Well, you know, he can continue to appeal

10:26

it, but we've seen the courts get pretty impatient

10:28

with the success of appeals in

10:30

an ongoing investigation. With respect to

10:33

Trump's lawyer, the appellate

10:35

court flipped that reversal, the

10:37

decision to uphold the district

10:39

court around in no time at all.

10:41

It's like an overnight ruling. So

10:44

I don't think he's gonna buy a whole lot of time.

10:47

And I can't really say much more about the decision

10:49

without reading it, except for the

10:51

fact that he has to testify being

10:53

really good news and executive privilege

10:56

not covering it, being good news for all

10:58

Americans because it allows separation

11:00

of powers, congressional oversight

11:02

to flourish. You said something I

11:04

want to come back to because it hinted

11:06

at a view I'd like you to sort of

11:09

say more about, about the

11:11

Mar-a-Lago case being important

11:14

and Jack Smith pursuing that, but

11:16

the sort of, I don't know, central

11:18

primary importance to the life of the nation,

11:20

to our shared understanding of what American

11:23

democracy is, to the rule of law, about

11:25

the ex-president's attempts to end

11:27

America's self-governance in

11:29

the form that we know it.

11:31

Do you think

11:34

there is a central importance to that? Do you

11:36

think about these various cases and legal

11:38

threats in a sort of tiered fashion in

11:40

which that to you is the one that you

11:42

feel most strongly about?

11:46

Yeah, I think the New York one is the least

11:49

interesting. The Mar-a-Lago documents

11:51

one is more interesting. The

11:54

insurrection case is really, really

11:56

interesting and significant because not only

11:59

is it a very significant

12:00

a case on the merits because of what happened

12:02

that day. But you also have the overlay

12:04

of Fannie Willis's case in Georgia, which is looking

12:06

at the same thing.

12:08

And the evidence converges around that

12:10

funny little character, Jeffrey Clark,

12:13

who was operating in the

12:15

Department of Justice, apparently

12:17

on behalf of Trump, seeking to become

12:19

Trump's attorney general, if you can believe

12:22

it, by interfering more

12:24

in the Georgia election. So it gets

12:27

really interesting is if the Jack Smith

12:29

federal investigation and

12:31

the Fannie Willis Georgia investigation

12:33

end up supporting one another.

12:35

You've been very

12:38

outspoken about both

12:40

the Supreme Court and larger

12:43

structural issues you see at play, two

12:45

of them being the sort of lack of an

12:47

ethics code. Justices

12:50

don't have to mandatorily recuse or they

12:52

don't have to abide by the Article three

12:54

code of ethics that applies to other judges, and

12:57

two, that sort of dark money that has

12:59

flowed into institutions

13:01

around the court,

13:02

parties that are attempting to get favorable ruling

13:05

from the court. And I wonder, because of that, ask your response

13:08

to something I think you tweeted about today, reporting

13:10

that conservative actress group led

13:12

by Virginia Ginny Thomas, of course, the wife

13:15

of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, collected

13:17

nearly $600,000 in anonymous donations to

13:22

wage a cultural battle against the left over

13:24

three years, a Washington Post investigation,

13:26

found do you think we should know

13:28

who donors are to that kind of organization?

13:31

Yeah,

13:33

without a doubt, because there's more to it than

13:35

just that. The thing

13:37

that made much of those donations

13:40

anonymous was a thing called Donors

13:42

Trust, which has been called the Koch

13:45

Brothers Dark Money ATM. It's

13:47

where you go to launder your identity

13:50

off a donation.

13:52

So somebody is behind that

13:54

and the fact that it's donors trust is a pretty big

13:56

fingerprint. Trust also

13:59

shows up.

14:00

in the effort to pack the court

14:03

with the right-wing justices. For instance,

14:06

in 2019,

14:08

Donors Trust funneled $7 million

14:12

into the Federalist Society in one year,

14:14

in one year, $7 million into

14:17

the Federalist Society, while it was

14:19

the epicenter of the

14:21

secret, wheeling and dealing that took place

14:24

to get Gorsuch and then Kavanaugh

14:26

and then Barrett onto the court. So

14:29

the idea that this is not connected,

14:31

$600,000 to the justice's wife,

14:34

when the exact same group has done $7 million

14:38

to the court packing scheme, there's

14:40

a lot more here to look into. Senator

14:42

Sheldon Whitehouse, thank you for making some time with us tonight.

14:46

My pleasure. Coming up, what can

14:48

Gwyneth Paltrow's ongoing litigation about

14:50

a skiing accident teach us about the

14:53

many Trump investigations?

14:54

Barbara McCoy and Harry Lippmann join me on what we should

14:57

make of the latest details. Next.

15:00

There's

15:03

a trial going on right now. You've probably heard a bit about

15:05

it because it involves Gwyneth Paltrow and a

15:07

retired optometrist. It's

15:09

about a skiing incident that took place seven years

15:12

ago. Incident happened on a bunny

15:14

slope in Park City, Utah, back

15:16

in February 2016. Terry Sanderson

15:18

claims that Paltrow crashed

15:21

into it.

15:21

And he's suing her for $300,000 in damages. Gwyneth

15:25

Paltrow says that he skied

15:27

into her, and she's countersuing for

15:29

a dollar and legal fees. Both

15:31

of them finally have their day in court. They are

15:33

getting to tell their side of the story. And

15:36

there has been something really fascinating

15:38

about listening to people describe in detail

15:41

what happened in a few instances just

15:43

a moment seven years ago.

15:47

I was skiing, and two skis came

15:49

between my skis, forcing

15:51

my legs apart, and then there was

15:53

a body pressing against me and

15:56

there was a very strange grunting

15:58

noise.

15:59

I got hit. in my back so

16:01

hard. And I'm right at my

16:03

shoulder blades. And it felt like, and

16:05

was perfectly centered. And the

16:08

fists and the poles were right there

16:10

at the bottom of my shoulder blades. Serious,

16:13

serious smack. Never been

16:16

hit that hard. And I'm flying. I'm

16:18

absolutely flying.

16:20

Obviously, those are mutually exclusive accounts. What

16:22

happened? She says he went to her. He

16:24

says she went to him. Now, the

16:26

thing to keep in mind, again, This all

16:28

happened in 2016. It's

16:31

a lifetime ago. The same

16:33

year, coincidentally, that Stormy

16:35

Daniels got a hush money payment on behalf of Donald Trump.

16:38

Both events happened in the same year

16:40

and are just now being litigated.

16:43

It's a reminder, it can feel like there's a kind of time

16:45

vortex around Trump causing everything

16:47

to move at a glacial pace, but in some ways

16:49

it's an illusion caused by the

16:52

pace of the news on the one hand contrasted

16:54

with the pace of the American legal system.

16:56

Legal system, as Gwyneth

16:58

Paltrow can tell you, moves pretty

17:00

slowly. Skiing incident happened

17:03

in 2016. The first suit was filed

17:05

three years later, and the case has been

17:07

winding its way through the legal system ever

17:09

since and now a trial in 2023.

17:13

When you are in the business of covering Trump,

17:16

sometimes on a daily basis, as I am, it

17:19

just seems impossibly attenuated. But

17:22

whether it is the Stormy Daniels payment or the January

17:24

6th investigation, the classified documents case

17:26

or the Georgia grand jury in the grand scheme of things,

17:29

court proceedings, that is, things

17:31

are actually moving quite briskly. Barbara

17:34

McQuaid is a former US Attorney for the Eastern District

17:36

of Michigan. She is now a professor at the University of Michigan

17:39

Law School, Harry Lippmann, former Deputy

17:41

Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department, and

17:43

a former US Attorney for the Western District

17:45

of Pennsylvania, and both join me now. I

17:48

wanna start on this basic

17:50

timing point, Barbara, because

17:53

I have been seeing the

17:55

viral clips from the Paltrow trial, which

17:57

are fascinating. and it

17:59

keeps... striking me how long a delay

18:02

there is between the incident that happened and now finally

18:04

working this way to court. Now, civil proceedings are different.

18:06

Obviously, what's happening with Donald Trump, particularly with Jack

18:08

Smith, is fairly unprecedented, an ex-president

18:11

being investigated.

18:12

But when you look at the time scope of these investigations,

18:16

does it feel to you like actually

18:18

kind of roughly normal, like fairly accelerated,

18:20

or does it feel like it's dragging on? You

18:23

know, it actually feels kind of normal to

18:25

me, Chris, but I think it's because I've been

18:28

jaded by years in the legal system

18:30

where things move so incredibly

18:33

slowly. That is one of the things that

18:35

friends say to me most frequently when they're watching

18:37

news about Trump is how incredibly slowly

18:40

it moves. I do think that Donald Trump has

18:43

deliberately tried to slow things down because

18:45

he knows that that can serve to his advantage,

18:48

appealing every decision possible, stalling,

18:51

delaying, refusing to cooperate. And

18:53

I think that from talking to jurors, they

18:56

recognize that the lengthy passage

18:58

of time can diminish the credibility

19:00

of witnesses in people's memories, the same common

19:02

sense point that you just made. So prosecutors

19:05

do not think of delay as their friend. And

19:07

I think that is the reason that some defendants

19:09

will work as hard as they can to drag things out.

19:11

And there's been lots of lots of efforts

19:13

to delay on the part of Trump on

19:16

in terms of the federal,

19:18

the sort of portfolio of Jack Smith, Harry.

19:21

It's pretty clear from the way that that

19:24

office moved on Corcoran, who's the lawyer who

19:26

was ordered to testify last week,

19:28

district court judge ruling, an appellate

19:30

court that was ready to move at breakneck speed, in

19:32

fact, requiring

19:35

a filing at 6 a.m. the next morning, and

19:37

then for Corcoran to come in, that there's

19:40

some sense, at least in the federal court system

19:42

and on Smith's side, that time is

19:44

of the essence. Do you anticipate something

19:47

similar with whatever happens with the Pence

19:49

decision here?

19:51

So first, lightning speed, just

19:53

as you say. I agree with Barbara that the pace

19:56

that we've otherwise seen is basically

19:58

not out of joint. And in

20:01

an interesting way, the legal system kind of, it

20:04

settles disputes, but an auxiliary function

20:06

is to almost provide like a social judgment on

20:08

the recent past. But it's a very

20:11

important question as to Pence. There are actually

20:13

two different claims, Chris, in Pence.

20:15

One was brought by Trump, it was executive

20:17

privilege. That one ought to go up and

20:19

down very quickly. It's already been

20:21

rejected four times. Pence himself,

20:24

at the end of the day, Judge Boseburg, the

20:26

new chief judge who by the way is

20:28

excellent, He has

20:30

to be essentially right. There can be

20:32

no speech or debate protection for

20:34

Pence's one-on-one discussions

20:36

with Trump on the 6th or even

20:39

weekly after the election. So

20:42

the line that he drew is gonna be upheld.

20:45

However, will the Court of Appeals or

20:47

the Supreme Court bite on just

20:49

trying to delineate it more clearly because

20:52

it is an area that there

20:54

isn't much learning in? That'll be the

20:56

question. And to compare again with Corker,

20:58

and that was a very progressive

21:00

panel, and you saw their exasperation.

21:02

The question is whether the court of appeals will say, hmm,

21:05

we wanna think about this, but at the end of the

21:07

day, they will hold against him, and he

21:09

will have to testify. Yeah,

21:11

the question is how long is the day that you

21:13

come to the end of? That's right, always. Which

21:16

is always the question. And there's also obviously,

21:18

as you said, Barbara, this isn't just, I mean,

21:20

part of it, I think, is the natural pace

21:23

of legal life, And

21:26

but as well, the fact that Trump always

21:28

seeks to delay exit. To that

21:30

point, his lawyers have

21:32

filed this motion down in Georgia, right? So we've

21:35

got the Georgia grand jury that sit there, they've produced

21:37

their report. The

21:39

DA there used the term imminently

21:42

in court to describe

21:44

when decisions will be made. We await

21:47

what that means. But they have now

21:49

until May 1st to respond to Trump's

21:52

lawyers' efforts to quash grand jury final

21:54

report into his alleged attempt

21:56

to overturn the 2020 election defeat. How

21:59

much is that?

22:00

sort of sticking point or

22:02

hurdle from moving forward down there?

22:05

Yeah, it's definitely going to delay things. I

22:07

mean, this is a blatant effort to throw sand

22:09

in the gears. I've never seen this before, where

22:11

somebody says the grand jury process is

22:14

illegal, unconstitutional, deeply flawed,

22:17

and requiring Fonny Willis to

22:20

move off everything she's doing and instead

22:22

of focusing on investigating the case, now

22:24

file a response to this. It

22:26

may very well be that she feels the need to resolve

22:28

this before she files an indictment because she

22:30

doesn't want to do anything that makes a

22:32

mistake now that could be a reversible

22:35

appeal years down the road. And so

22:37

it seems likely to me that this will put things

22:39

on hold for her, get this thing

22:41

decided before she seeks

22:43

an indictment. So imminence is

22:45

on hold.

22:47

So that's on hold. And then we've got this word

22:49

today about New York. Again, I think

22:51

there was a little bit of a psyching

22:54

out that the ex-president himself did saying I'm going

22:56

to be arrested on Tuesday, which was apparently

22:58

based on nothing, which again should not be surprising,

23:01

that he would just make something up ex nilo. He

23:04

does that all the time. He does it 50 times a day. It

23:07

did create a kind of expectation. Our

23:10

own reporting here at NBC News is that

23:12

the grand jury is not expected to meet on Wednesday. Expected

23:15

to return on Thursday. Here matters separate from the chart

23:17

hush money case, which puts us

23:20

in the Vladimir an

23:22

estrogen position of just sitting

23:24

and waiting, Harry. Yeah.

23:26

Although, yeah, so

23:29

first of all, I want to double back to Georgia because what Trump

23:32

has done so effectively over the last several years

23:34

is move for a stay from the Supreme

23:36

Court to freeze proceedings. He hasn't

23:39

done that in Georgia. There's no reason that Fawny

23:41

Wells couldn't bring an indictment tomorrow and

23:43

have this separate challenge,

23:45

the special grand jury process still go

23:47

forward. So his cunning has consisted

23:50

precisely in being able

23:52

to exploit and get stays, which now it doesn't

23:54

look that's what the Corcoran

23:56

actual litigation

23:58

was about. but you gotta stay.

24:00

No, Peter Navarro, remember him, old guy?

24:02

He just got ordered to testify

24:04

and the court said today, you may not get

24:06

a stay. So that is the effective

24:09

end of the line. With the DA, we

24:11

don't know what final housekeeping

24:14

details he's looking at. I just

24:16

want to reiterate that my basic

24:18

feeling is that none of them approach

24:21

with all we've had before, a serious

24:23

augury of reversing feel. That

24:26

case I think is moving to indictment. This

24:28

week, next week,

24:30

that's in Bragg's mind. All

24:32

right, Barbara McQuaid, Harry Lippmann, thank you

24:34

both. Still ahead, new

24:36

details on the weapons of war that were used to

24:38

kill six people, including three children

24:40

in a Nashville school. Congresswoman Alyssa

24:43

Slotkin joins me on the necessary steps to protect

24:45

America's kids, next.

24:49

The last thing you wanna hear while listening to your

24:51

favorite podcast is another gimmicky

24:54

ad. NJM feels the same way. It's

24:56

why they provide award-winning service without

24:58

the use of mascots or repetitive jingles.

25:01

And when you upgrade to NJM, you

25:04

could even save on your auto insurance. Better

25:06

service and possible savings? Sounds like

25:08

a win-win. No jingles or mascots,

25:10

just great insurance. NJM. Visit

25:13

NJM.com slash podcast for a

25:15

quote to see how much you could save on your auto

25:17

insurance.

25:19

The culture is diverse. The

25:21

culture is strong and resilient. The

25:23

Culture is AAPI Women.

25:26

Join MSNBC's Katie Fang as

25:28

she hosts a dinner party with groundbreaking Asian

25:30

American and Pacific Islander women who are shaping

25:33

American culture. Featuring political strategist,

25:35

Huma Abedne, award-winning novelist

25:37

Min Jin Lee, and an interview with comedian

25:40

and actress Margaret Cho. The Culture

25:42

is AAPI Women. Sunday

25:44

at 10 p.m. Eastern on MSNBC

25:47

and streaming on Peacock.

25:52

Today we got new surveillance footage from

25:55

police from inside a private elementary school

25:57

in Nashville, Tennessee. It shows

25:59

the moment. Yesterday morning, when a heavily armed

26:02

20-year-old former student shot through the

26:04

locked glass doors of the school and

26:06

started a room for the corridors.

26:08

Now, within 10 minutes of the first call to police,

26:10

officers were on the scene. Their

26:12

body camera footage seen here shows them

26:15

racing through the school, where they eventually confronted

26:17

and fatally shot the shooter,

26:20

but not before the shooter was able to kill six

26:22

people. Those people are Cynthia

26:24

Peek, substitute teacher Catherine Kuntz,

26:27

the head of school, Hill, the school

26:29

custodian, 9-year-old

26:30

Evelyn Deakhouse, 9-year-old

26:34

Hailey Scruggs, and 9-year-old William

26:36

Kinney. As you

26:39

can see in the footage, the shooter was carrying

26:41

two AR-style weapons, something that we've come

26:43

to expect in these situations. Coincidentally,

26:45

the same day that this atrocity

26:48

happened,

26:49

The Washington Post published two articles

26:52

examining the outsized impact the AR-15 has

26:54

had on American life.

26:56

One article uses three-dimensional renderings to show

26:59

exactly how AR-15s and

27:01

weapons like them are so much more destructive and

27:03

lethal than regular handguns.

27:06

The

27:06

other tracks how gun propaganda

27:08

has fueled the rise of the AR-15 to become

27:10

the best-selling rifle in the U.S.

27:13

And yet still, on the same day as well,

27:16

that a shooter was murdering children and

27:18

adults at school, the ATF was

27:20

in Georgia to conduct what appears to be a routine inspection

27:23

of gun store similar to what health inspectors do for

27:25

restaurants, only be confronted and

27:27

stopped by Georgia Republican Congresswoman

27:29

Marjorie Taylor Greene.

27:31

As all this happens, Republicans appear to

27:34

be shrugging their shoulders and

27:36

moving on. While Democrats are

27:38

increasingly loudly and forthrightly specifically

27:41

calling for a return to the assault weapons ban of the

27:43

1990s. Congresswoman

27:46

Alyssa Slotkin is a Democrat in Michigan, as well

27:48

as a candidate for Senate there in 2024. She

27:50

is reintroducing gun violence legislation

27:52

tomorrow, and she joins me now. Congresswoman,

27:57

I have noted the President's calling

27:59

for an

28:00

assault weapons ban, this is seems

28:02

to be reaching

28:04

a kind of consensus crescendo among Democrats.

28:07

Where do you stand on it? I mean,

28:09

we voted on an assault weapons ban

28:11

in the last Congress. It was actually bipartisan

28:14

at that time. There were two Republicans who voted with

28:16

us. Neither of

28:18

those congressmen are still in Congress now.

28:22

So I think, to

28:24

be honest, I grew up in Michigan

28:26

with guns. I grew up on

28:28

my family farm. We always had guns. I

28:30

carried a Glock and an M4, a semi-automatic

28:34

in three tours in Iraq. So

28:36

I grew up in that world.

28:39

But I think at this point, there

28:41

just has to be a decision made by everybody.

28:44

Right now, the number one killer of kids under 21

28:46

in America is gun violence.

28:48

We either decide to do something about that

28:51

as a society or we don't. We

28:53

either decide to legislate.

28:54

We either decide to sort of say we're not going to accept

28:57

that kids are being killed in their sanctuaries or

28:59

we say publicly we don't care. And

29:01

I think for me, as someone who's

29:04

had two school shootings in her district

29:06

in 16 months, I know where

29:08

I stand on this and I certainly know where most Democrats

29:10

stand. What are

29:11

your conversations like with the folks

29:13

that survived those two incidents?

29:15

I know that you have had to.

29:18

I've talked to many members of Congress who have

29:20

very profound and I think in some cases

29:23

kind of transformational relationships with people that

29:25

have survived these sorts of incidents. and I'm curious

29:27

what your experience has been.

29:28

Yeah, I mean, to be honest, I have a press

29:31

conference tomorrow when we have young people

29:33

from Oxford High School here with us

29:35

and their family, and we have people

29:38

from Michigan State University coming with

29:40

us to be with us. And I think, you

29:42

know, I think we're just gonna come to a point where

29:44

so many Americans have had a personal experience

29:47

with gun violence, either they and themselves

29:50

or someone they love, that it's just gonna

29:52

change the feeling on the

29:54

ground about this issue and push it where it needs

29:56

to be. In the meantime, I challenge

29:58

any of my...

30:00

colleagues who are rejecting

30:02

any kind of conversation on gun safety, to

30:04

have a conversation with a 17-year-old who

30:07

survived a gun, you know, an incident

30:09

in their school or in their community, and

30:11

who are saying, like, what are you doing to protect

30:14

me? What are you going to do to protect

30:16

me in my school? And the answer

30:18

is nothing, because if I do anything,

30:20

it somehow threatens my political career.

30:23

I dare them to have the actual conversations, because

30:25

when you are engaging with real people, It's impossible

30:28

to ignore the issue.

30:30

Do you think it is an issue that there's

30:33

possibility for persuasion on? I

30:37

do. I mean, I think I really felt things change after

30:39

the Michigan state shooting in Michigan

30:42

because we have 50,000 students. That means, you know, 100,000 parents,

30:46

thousands

30:46

of more family, so many

30:49

alumni in our state, right, who

30:51

had been there. And so I started to get calls from

30:53

my Republican mayors and local representatives

30:56

from people who said, look, if someone

30:58

comes for my gun, I'm going to push back

31:00

and I'm not going to accept that. But please, let's

31:03

find something to do to protect our babies. And

31:06

I think the feeling on the ground is

31:08

changing. And the last people to get the memo

31:10

are the elected representatives in Washington. I think

31:13

that they're not reading the situation. They're not feeling

31:15

how things are changing. And I know in Michigan, we're

31:17

about to pass actual gun safety

31:19

legislation. So it's going to play

31:22

out in real time in my very

31:24

sort of swing, politically divided

31:27

state.

31:28

Congresswoman Alyssa Slocken, who does

31:30

represent Swing District, is a statewide

31:32

candidate for office now for Senate. Thank you very much. Thank

31:35

you.

31:36

Still to come, Republicans revealed their strategy

31:38

to combat gun violence in America, which is

31:40

just do absolutely

31:42

nothing. If

31:44

you think Washington's going to fix this problem, you're

31:47

wrong. They're not going to fix this problem. They

31:49

are the problem. It

32:00

is time for us to move

32:02

beyond thoughts and

32:06

prayers. Remind

32:09

our lawmakers of

32:11

the words of the British statesman

32:15

Edmund Burke, All

32:18

that is necessary for

32:21

evil to triumph is

32:25

for good people to

32:28

do nothing. This

32:30

morning, the Chaplain of the United States

32:32

Senate opened the day's session with a pointed

32:35

message that it is not acceptable

32:37

to shrug your shoulders at the murder of children,

32:40

which has become the kind of go-to move

32:43

for most Republicans, not just in

32:45

this one, in the wake of mass shooting after

32:47

mass shooting in this country.

32:49

The reaction has been no different after six people,

32:51

including three nine-year-old children,

32:54

were gunned down at a Nashville elementary

32:56

school yesterday.

32:58

In fact, a lawmaker from Tennessee, Republican

33:01

Congressman Tim Burkett, even took

33:03

the rhetoric a step further.

33:06

It's a horrible, horrible situation, and

33:09

we're not gonna fix it. Criminals are

33:11

gonna be criminals, and my daddy fought in the Second World

33:13

War, fought in the Pacific, fought the Japanese, and

33:15

he told me, he said, He said if somebody

33:18

wants to take you out and doesn't mind losing

33:20

their life There's not a whole heck of a lot you can do about

33:22

it. What should be done to protect

33:25

people like your little girlfriend being safe at school?

33:28

Well, we homeschooled But

33:30

you know, that's our decision. Some people don't have that option

33:32

and frankly some people don't need to do it They don't

33:35

have to It just

33:36

suited our needs much better

33:39

What can you do really right? That

33:42

attitude, well, bad things happen, nothing you

33:44

can do about it. It's become

33:47

a sort of perverse default on

33:49

the right in the face of the just ongoing

33:53

incomprehensible tragedy that is gun

33:55

violence in America. I mean, there

33:57

were more than 20,000 gun-related deaths. the

34:00

U.S. last year, and that excludes

34:02

suicides. We had nearly 650 mass

34:05

shootings, the second highest number on record

34:07

after 2021. We are, and

34:09

this has been said a million times on this program and others, unique

34:12

among our peers. The U.S. has far and away

34:14

the most firearm homicides among high-income

34:17

nations, 4.4 for every 100,000

34:19

residents. The

34:22

problem has been getting worse in recent

34:24

years. deaths hit a 30-year high

34:26

in 2021 before seeing, thankfully,

34:29

a slight decline last year. And now,

34:32

guns are the leading cause of death for

34:34

American children surpassing car

34:36

accidents and cancer. We

34:38

know that gun violence has also played a role

34:41

in the precipitous decline in life expectancy

34:44

in the U.S. Between 2019

34:46

and 2021, life expectancy dropped by a total of 2.7

34:49

years. And that's not

34:51

just gun violence, right? This has been

34:53

affected by a whole bunch of other factors, from

34:55

overdoses largely driven by fentanyl,

34:57

primarily, to of course the COVID

34:59

pandemic, to an increase in maternal mortality,

35:02

a rocketing up in

35:03

car crashes. Second,

35:07

only to the urgency of our climate crisis, which

35:09

is the number one priority. This, that

35:11

chart, this decline in our

35:13

life expectancy is the central challenge,

35:16

I believe, for our representatives, indeed for all

35:18

of us as citizens. It is an astounding

35:21

scandal, the richest country

35:23

on earth,

35:24

a country that views itself as the

35:26

greatest country on earth. It's just sitting

35:29

back and watching this happen,

35:32

especially conservative Republicans who have adopted

35:35

this attitude that basically

35:38

American life is cheap. I'll

35:42

never forget Governor Mississippi, Kate Reeves, one

35:44

of the few Republicans to just come out and say this worth

35:46

rightly. During the pandemic in August

35:48

of 2021, we had these fights again, about what

35:51

we should do to keep Americans safe.

35:53

Much of the country grappling with precautions

35:55

and sacrifices to try to protect vulnerable

35:57

people. Governor Ries told attendees at a fun

36:00

is your quote, when you believe in eternal life,

36:02

when you believe that living on this earth is but a

36:04

blip on the screen, then you don't have to be so

36:06

scared of things.

36:09

You die, you die. Conservative

36:13

Republicans like Tate Reeves and Tim Brackett of Tennessee

36:15

really do seem to think that's fine. Whether

36:18

the cause is a deadly respiratory virus that

36:21

preys on the sick, the elderly or

36:23

AR-15s, mowing down

36:25

children in their classrooms.

36:27

What should be done to protect people

36:30

like your little girl from being safe at school?

36:33

Well, we homeschool her. But

36:35

that's our decision. Some people don't have that option

36:37

and frankly some people don't need to do it. They don't

36:40

have to. They just suited our

36:42

needs much better. You good?

36:43

Yeah. Thank you.

36:46

The last thing you want to hear while listening to your

36:48

favorite podcast is another gimmicky ad.

36:51

NJM feels the same way. That's why

36:53

they provide award-winning service without the use

36:55

of mascots or repetitive jingles. And

36:59

when you upgrade to NJM, you can even

37:01

save on your auto insurance. Better service

37:03

than possible savings? Sounds like a win-win.

37:06

No jingles or mascots, just great insurance.

37:08

NJM. Visit NJM.com

37:11

slash podcast for a quote to see how much you

37:13

can save on your auto insurance.

37:15

Hi, I'm Tom Yamas, and for

37:17

me, the news is so much more than a headline.

37:20

It informs and inspires and

37:22

it still matters to cover you

37:25

have to be in it will take you to the front

37:27

lines of the story where it's actually happening

37:29

with NBC News journalist on the ground

37:31

from all over the world we cover what

37:33

you need to know and bring your news feed

37:36

to life in prime time and streaming

37:38

live it's your news playlist join

37:40

me for top story weeknights at 7 Eastern

37:43

on NBC News now.

37:48

It's weeks

37:50

like this where the fetishization of guns

37:52

in right wing politics seems even more ghastly

37:54

than normal.

37:56

this obsession has become so fully normalized,

37:58

It's an unremarked. a remarkable part of conservative

38:01

politics. Here's just one example

38:03

to choose among many. Republican

38:05

Congresswoman Lauren Boberg, her claim

38:07

to fame, the thing that helped launch her into politics,

38:10

was her ownership of Shooter's Grill

38:12

in Rifle, Colorado, a restaurant where staff

38:15

carried firearms openly.

38:17

Writer Jeff Charlotte visited Shooter's before

38:19

it closed last year for his new book, Undertote

38:22

Scenes from a Slow Civil War.

38:24

A chapter is excerpted in a new Vanity

38:27

Fair article, which recounts, among

38:29

other things, conversation with a fellow shooter's

38:31

customer, David G. Things,

38:33

said David G, are going down the hole fast.

38:36

How will I know when things are going down the hole,

38:38

I asked. You get into city areas,

38:40

you'll see the people, which people? The instigators.

38:43

I'd see them fighting in the streets. When I say it's

38:45

going down the hole fast, I'm talking about that.

38:47

I'm talking about those of us who have less tolerance

38:50

for the instigators. So some will

38:52

resort to, let's just say, other

38:54

methods. Jeff Charlotte,

38:57

author of that fantastic new book, joins me

38:59

now. Jeff, this book,

39:02

which is a remarkable piece of work, I'm working

39:04

my way through it, one

39:06

of the central themes is the

39:09

obsession with violence, this kind of apocalyptic

39:12

waiting for violence, and the view of

39:14

guns, not in the context of sports,

39:17

certainly, and not even the context, really, of I need to protect

39:19

my own home, but explicitly as

39:21

arming oneself

39:24

a violent struggle to come? Yeah,

39:27

I've been reporting on right-wing movements in the United States

39:30

for 20 years and traveling back

39:32

and forth across the country. Since January 6,

39:34

I've seen more guns than in

39:37

all the years before that. And

39:39

it's not just places like Shooter's Grill,

39:42

which is sort of leading with guns, but churches, churches

39:45

that have their own militias. The first militia

39:47

church I went to, I thought was a fluke.

39:49

And then I started to realize that churches were arming

39:52

up with the expectation

39:54

of civil war. But

39:56

I think that's different than the gun

39:59

culture of the past. Doomsday prepper of

40:01

the fringe has become a mainstay

40:03

of right-wing culture

40:05

the subtitle of books scenes

40:07

from a slow civil war was a very evocative

40:09

phrase and I You know, I always

40:12

I'm worried

40:14

about calling something into being by naming

40:16

it right? I think

40:18

Why that term did

40:21

you wrestle with using that on the books cover what

40:23

do you mean by a slow civil war I?

40:25

I did. I've been resisting

40:27

terms like civil war and before

40:30

that fascism for a long time. I'm cautious.

40:32

History moves slowly. Yet,

40:35

I think at the moment, the slow civil

40:37

war, you could call it a kind of cold war, but

40:39

there are casualties. In Nashville, Tennessee,

40:41

there were casualties. Women who are

40:44

bleeding out for lack of reproductive rights

40:47

are casualties. nearly 20 states

40:49

that are criminalizing queer

40:52

kids like my own. Those

40:55

places are making casualties.

40:57

In terms of the gun culture, when you have

41:00

weekly skirmishes where oathkeepers,

41:04

3%ers, Proud Boys

41:06

showing up with AR-15s outside

41:09

of libraries, schools, hospitals,

41:13

we're at a simmer now. We are at a simmer.

41:16

That doesn't make it inevitable. I don't think we have to call him

41:18

to being. But I think we have to be aware

41:20

of the threat level,

41:23

as some of the right wingers would say.

41:25

You have a chapter

41:28

in there about Ashley Babbitt, who of course

41:30

is the woman who was shot and killed as she

41:32

attempted to vault through a broken window

41:35

into the chamber of the house by a Capitol

41:37

police officer. She has become a kind

41:39

of martyr figure for many on the far right,

41:41

including to Donald Trump, who

41:44

has celebrated her. The

41:46

mother of Ashley Babbitt met with Representative

41:49

Kevin McCarthy's staff. Tell me about what you

41:51

learned about the sort of culture

41:53

around

41:54

Ashley Babbitt and her death. Well,

41:57

as soon as I saw Ashley Babbitt killed and...

42:00

And she's often spoken of as unarmed, but

42:02

she wasn't. She was carrying a pretty

42:04

nasty little knife. That's the knife on the cover. That's

42:06

the evidence photo. As

42:09

soon as I saw her death on January

42:12

6th, and you could see the hands of the

42:14

police officer who killed her, and he was a black man.

42:17

And because I'm an American and I study American

42:19

history and mythology, I knew what the right was going

42:21

to do with that. And sure enough, within

42:23

days, they were telling the same old story,

42:26

the lynching story. They were aging

42:28

Ashley back, making her a martyr.

42:30

They would say she was smaller, younger,

42:32

almost as if whiter, as if a

42:34

little white girl. There's a lot

42:36

of people speak of the right as a death cult. But

42:38

I think in some ways, we can understand it as

42:40

an innocence cult. They want to be innocent of history,

42:43

innocent of race. And Ashley Babbitt

42:45

served as this whiteness martyr.

42:48

So now you have this situation where the Proud

42:50

Boys hand out challenge coins with Ashley's

42:52

face on it. There are Ashley Babbitt flags. And

42:57

one more in the name of love tweets Representative

43:00

Paul Gosart, retooling a

43:03

U2 song for Martin Luther King for

43:05

Ashley Babbitt. Hashtag say her name,

43:07

they say, retooling a hashtag

43:10

created for black women for Ashley

43:12

Babbitt. I went to a rally where

43:15

Ashley Babbitt's mother spoke, turned into a brawl

43:17

between Proud Boys and counterprotesters. Black

43:20

Lives Matter protesters were chanting Black

43:23

Lives Matter. It was the birthday of Breonna Taylor.

43:26

And the Ashley Babbitt crowd started

43:28

counter-chanting,

43:30

Ashley Babbitt. And that was their answer

43:32

to Black Lives Matter, one white

43:34

woman. Jeff

43:36

Charlotte, as you said, you've been reporting on this.

43:40

You're one of my favorite nonfiction writers anywhere.

43:42

Just an incredible writer and incredible reporter.

43:45

And this book is, I think, among

43:47

your best work ever. It's called The Undertow,

43:50

scenes from a slow civil war. You can get it wherever

43:53

books are sold. Thank you so much.

43:56

Thank you, Chris. 8 o'clock

44:00

on MSNBC. Don't forget to like us on Facebook.

44:02

That's Facebook.com slash All

44:04

In With Chris.

44:06

weeknights

44:33

at 7 Eastern on NBC News Now.