“Crossed a line”

Summary

Podcast Summary: Deadline: White House – “Crossed a line”

Date: August 25, 2025
Host: Nicolle Wallace, MSNBC

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Overview

In this gripping episode, Nicolle Wallace and her panel examine the unprecedented actions by the second Trump administration, specifically focusing on the weaponization of federal power against political adversaries. The show zeroes in on the FBI's search of John Bolton’s home, the deployment of National Guard troops in Democratic cities, and revelations in the Ghislaine Maxwell interview transcript. Featuring legal experts and journalists, the discussion delves into the erosion of democratic norms, the targeting of critics, and the administration's continued trampling over civil liberties.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Weaponization of Government Power

• The FBI Search of John Bolton

  • Context: John Bolton, Donald Trump's former national security adviser, had his home and office searched by the FBI (01:41).
  • Editorial Reaction: Washington Post described the search as having “crossed a line”. (02:55)
  • Quote (Wallace):
    “Trump’s promises of retribution and revenge make the government’s motives suspect… it is a valid fear that the case against Bolton is a fresh instance of the old Soviet saying, ‘show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.’” (02:55)

• Political Retaliation and Chilling Effect

  • Chris Christie: Criticized the administration's move as a blatant political act.
    “Donald Trump sees himself as the person who gets to decide everything. He absolutely rejects the idea that there should be separation between criminal investigations and the politically elected leader…” (03:37)
  • Miles Taylor: Former DHS official, discussed the personal implications of being on Trump’s enemies list.
    “That’s what is so surreal about this… we can all be so certain of the President’s revenge campaign…” (04:55)

2. Intimidation of Political Rivals and Critics

• Mark Elias (Voting Rights Attorney) Perspective:

  • Trump’s repeated threats to revive investigations into opponents as intimidation strategy.
  • “What we all need to be saying is John Bolton is being targeted because he’s a political opponent of Donald Trump and Donald Trump targets his political opponents.” (07:20)

• Bolton as a ‘Diabolical Choice’

  • Wallace suggests Bolton is targeted to divide opposition responses:
    “It’s a diabolical choice for one of their first targets for retribution, because the left might be uncertain about how loudly to defend John Bolton… and the right will say, well, that’s why they may make fun of me on MSNBC, but that’s why I fall into line every time.” (12:18)
  • Kim Atkins:
    “For Donald Trump, you’re either for him or he attacks you. That’s plain and simple… This is about Autocr is looking you right in the face and you cannot ignore it.” (13:07)

• Andrew Weissmann (MSNBC Legal Analyst):

  • Considers Bolton’s search as part of a broader pattern.
    “This is a continuation of the degradation of checks and balances… one of the reasons to target John Bolton could be because… he needs to send a message, don’t do that.” (15:54)
  • On previous retaliation: “John Bolton was the subject and is the subject of a death threat for doing his job. And the President of the United States pulled his security team… Just think of the depravity of that.” (17:09)

3. Use of the Military in Civilian Cities

• Deployment in Chicago, D.C., LA

  • Legal Legitimacy Questioned: Weissmann details the legal and constitutional hurdles, noting the executive order is “quite expansive” and that use of military force domestically requires a true emergency—which governors say does not exist (21:23).
  • Authoritarian Tactics:
    “The idea that you have the National Guard and the military being called in without a true emergency over the objection of local states is an act of an authoritarian…” (23:40)
  • Kim Atkins, on daily life in D.C.:
    “It is gut wrenching to see videos of mostly black and brown people being detained on the street in broad daylight by masked agents… Donald Trump is attacking cities with large black and brown populations.” (24:32, 26:29)
  • Historical Parallels: Atkins likens current events to Jim Crow-era oppression:
    “What I am seeing happening in D.C. right now is Jim Crow… bringing Jim Crow all across the country.” (26:29)
  • Mark Elias:
    “The tyrants govern through fear… Dictators take their power from the acquiescence of… the good people… It is the obligation of all of us as citizens… to take a step forward, not a step back.” (28:33)

• Goal: Suppressing Democratic Voting

  • Elias claims Trump wants to normalize military presence in blue cities to undermine free and fair elections (29:22).

4. Ghislaine Maxwell Interview and Epstein Fallout

• Transcript Release and Victims’ Outrage
  • The Deputy Attorney General’s (Todd Blanche) interview with Maxwell is seen by victims’ attorneys as a staged attempt to secure a pardon for Maxwell in return for exonerating statements about Trump.
    “What Maxwell received in exchange for what she delivered is a down payment on her pardon, a transfer to a federal country club while she waits for her trip home.” (32:13)
• Victims’ Perspective
  • Families accuse the Justice Department of providing Maxwell with a “platform to rewrite history.” (32:23)
• Panel Analysis
  • Vicki Ward: Condemns Maxwell’s self-presentation and Blanche’s questioning as detached from reality.
    “She conducted that interview in her bubble wrapped distortion reality… as if she wasn’t in prison, convicted of any sex crimes. This was all some ghastly mistake.” (38:15)
  • Glenn Thrush: Notes DOJ’s ongoing focus on defending Trump’s interests and using distraction tactics.
    “The White House deals with stuff is to start a bigger fire or to start a bigger issue… they’re never really going to be able to [move past the Epstein case].” (43:57)
  • On institutional integrity: Thrush raises alarm at the DOJ’s devotion of energy to exonerating Trump-connected figures over pursuing broader justice. (45:05)
  • Wallace concludes:
    “What does it say about crime when they had thousands of agents going through the old Jeffrey Epstein files, but they’re now sending troops to the streets of American cities?” (46:03)

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Notable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• Nicole Wallace:

  “Trump's threats to send the National Guard… is quite evident, not just in his command of the military, but in his handling of what should be a politically independent arm of the executive branch. And that is our system of justice.” (01:41)

• Mark Elias:

  “I don't even care what the charges are… John Bolton is being targeted because he's a political opponent of Donald Trump and Donald Trump targets his political opponents.” (07:20)

• Kim Atkins:

  “For Donald Trump, you're either for him or he attacks you… Whether or not [Bolton] committed a crime is irrelevant here. The real relevance is the autocratic response…” (13:07)

• Andrew Weissmann:

  “I think this is a continuation. It is a visible one. I think that one reason to target John Bolton could be because… he needs to send a message, don’t do that.” (15:54)

• Kim Atkins, on D.C. under military presence:

  “It is gut wrenching… to see… black and brown people being detained on the street in broad daylight by masked agents… Donald Trump is attacking cities with large black and brown populations.” (24:32, 26:29)

• Glenn Thrush, on DOJ's priorities:

  “It is extraordinary how much energy [Todd Blanche] has expended on this [i.e., Epstein/Maxwell]… What does the Epstein case… tell you about how they view the justice and how they view rule of law?” (45:05)

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• 00:39 — Wallace sets the urgent tone: "The second Trump administration has gone to unprecedented lengths..."
• 01:41 — Analysis of Trump’s threats in Chicago and the Bolton FBI search.
• 03:37 — Chris Christie’s condemnation of lack of separation between investigations and executive power.
• 04:55 — Miles Taylor discusses living under the specter of retribution.
• 06:20-07:20 — Mark Elias on the personal and civic responsibility to stand up against Trump’s targeting of political opponents.
• 13:07 — Kim Atkins breaks down the autocratic playbook and the trivialization of administrative penalties.
• 15:54 — Andrew Weissmann on the broad degradation of institutional checks and balances.
• 21:23-23:55 — Legal framework and authoritarian nature of military deployment.
• 24:32-26:29 — Personal account from Kim Atkins about D.C. under occupation; parallels to Jim Crow.
• 28:33-29:22 — Mark Elias warns about the normalization of military presence to influence future elections.
• 32:13-32:23 — Epstein victims’ lawyers eviscerate the DOJ for staging the Maxwell interview.
• 38:15 — Vicki Ward on Maxwell’s self-serving narrative and refusal to address her crimes.
• 43:57 — Glenn Thrush on White House distraction tactics and DOJ resource allocation.
• 46:03 — Wallace closes the loop on the dissonance between DOJ focus and street-level authoritarianism.

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Tone and Style

The episode maintains a somber, urgent, and at times incredulous tone. The panel does not hold back in their characterizations—“diabolical,” “autocratic,” “unprecedented,” “gaslighting”—and frequently invoke historical analogies, from the Soviet Union to Jim Crow, to clarify the magnitude of current developments. Wallace’s moderation sustains a sense of communal alarm and civic responsibility throughout.

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Conclusion

In “Crossed a line,” Deadline: White House delivers a sobering portrait of democratic institutions under siege: from politically motivated investigations, to authoritarian use of federal force, to the manipulation of high-profile legal cases for political gain. The guests urge vigilance, solidarity, and unflinching support for targeted individuals—even imperfect ones—if rule of law and democracy are to survive.

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Transcript

[Nicole Wallace]

I think that you have to have faith that in the end it'll all be okay, that no matter who wins a presidential election, we will live in a democracy. The First Amendment will govern what journalists can say and do. The Constitution will protect the rights of everybody if you can agree that most people want those things. Our show is about trying to bend the arc toward that end result.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

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[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

This is not about fighting crime. This is about Donald Trump searching for any justification to deploy the military in a blue city in a blue state to try and intimidate his political rivals. This is about the president of the United States and his complicit lackey, Stephen Miller, searching for ways to lay the groundwork to circumvent our our democracy, militarize our cities and end elections. There is no emergency in Chicago that calls for armed military intervention.

[Nicole Wallace]

Hi again, everyone. It's now 5 o' clock in the east on what is turning into a huge day of news. In the last hour, we heard from that man, Illinois Governor J.B. pritzker, calling out Donald Trump. Trump's threats to send the National Guard to his city or his state to the city of Chicago, which would be a repeat of what we are seeing right now on the streets of Washington, D.C. governor Pritzker's point there, that Donald Trump twists and turns his authority in the levers of government so he is able to intimidate his political rivals is quite evident, not just in his command of the military, but in his handling of what should be a politically independent arm of the executive branch. And that is our system of justice. The latest example being Friday's search by the FBI of Donald Trump's former national security adviser John Bolton's home and office. Bolton, who left the first Trump White House on bad terms, has been in Donald Trump's sights before. One of Donald Trump's first moves when he returned to office in January was to strip John Bolton of his security detail, despite Bolton being on the receiving end of a clear threat from Iran over the Trump administration's killing of a major Iranian general in 2020. Washington Post's editorial board said Friday's search crossed a line. They write this, quote, the government needed to show probable cause to get a judge to sign the search warrant. So it is possible there was a rock solid predicate for the search. But Trump's promises of retribution and revenge make the government's motives suspect. It is a valid fear that the case against Bolton is a fresh instance of the old Soviet saying, quot show me the man, and I'll show you the crime. One former Trump ally turned frequent critic, Chris Christie, slammed the Bolton search, saying this yesterday.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Donald Trump sees himself as the person who gets to decide everything. He absolutely rejects the idea that there.

[Nicole Wallace]

Should be separation between criminal investigations and.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

The politically elected leader of the United States. This is much different than it's ever been run before.

[Nicole Wallace]

But look, let me say candidly to.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

The American people who are watching, you were told that this was what he was going to do, and not by me, by Donald Trump during the 2024.

[Nicole Wallace]

Campaign, that he was gonna have a.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Justice Department that acted as his personal legal representation.

[Nicole Wallace]

Now, either wittingly or unwittingly, Donald Trump, in a post on social media, hours after Chris Christie said that on television, seem to prove Chris Christie's point. Trump brought up the 2013 Bridgegate scandal, to which Trump then asked, quote, for the sake of justice, perhaps we should start looking at that. A very serious situation again. Someone else already thinks he's Trump's big next target. Friend of this show and another critic, Miles Taylor, former official at the Department of Homeland Security in the first Trump administration. President Miles told my colleague on the weekend about how he felt after learning about the Bolton search.

[Andrew Weissman]

We expect it. I mean, really, we expect it. That's what is so surreal about this, is we can all hear, as we're talking about this, be so certain of the president's revenge campaign to know potentially who that next target might be or one of those next targets. I mean, when my wife and I woke up and saw the news, she basically said to me, it's coming. Folks don't have to play the violin for John Bolton or Miles Taylor. Maybe they don't like either of us. That's fine, because it's not about us.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

It's about the criminal justice system that.

[Andrew Weissman]

All Americans expect to be able to treat them fairly. It's about a president of the United States weaponizing the tools of his office to reshape our society. And he's doing that. He's making sure the scales of justice tip in his favor. And there's no telling where this could go next.

[Nicole Wallace]

It's all happening. It's where we start the hour with some of our favorite experts and friends. Former top official at the Department of Justice, MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissman's here. Also joining us, voting rights attorney, founder of Democracy Docket, Mark Elias is here, and senior opinion writer and columnist for the Boston Globe. MSNBC political analyst Kim Atkinstore is here. Mark Elias, I'm going to start with you because you've been attacked by Donald Trump in a speech he delivered at the Department of Justice. Do you feel the way Miles Taylor feels that it could happen to you?

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Absolutely. Look, I mean, I, I was Hillary Clinton's general counsel in 2016, and for that, for the privilege, and it was a genuine privilege of representing Secretary Clinton. Donald Trump created an entire, you know, criminal investigation that John Durham ran that went after me and others. It didn't indict me. It did indict others who got acquitted, but he has threatened essentially to bring that back in 2020. I represented Joe Biden and the Democratic Party in defeating Donald Trump more than 60 times in court. What does Donald Trump think about the 2020 election? He thinks it was a big fraud, and he has ruminated about criminal investigations of those of us who protected free and fair elections. And now I'm obviously a very outspoken critic, and I've caught his attention in a number of ways because I refuse to back down and be intimidated by him. So I think all of us who have accepted the responsibility as citizens to tell the truth and accepted the potential consequences, that that means that Donald Trump will target us have to be prepared for that and have our eyes wide open about it. But the question is not whether it will happen to Miles Taylor or it'll happen to me or happen to Andrew Weissman next, or it'll happen to Chris Christie or wherever. The question is, how do we all respond? And so when I saw that John Bolton was targeted, the first thing I said and I wrote about this for democracy docket is I don't even care what the charges are. I wish the Washington Post would stop with the we'll see what the evidence is. That's all a bunch of nonsense. What we all need to be saying is John Bolton is being targeted because he's a political opponent of Donald Trump and Donald Trump targets his political opponents. I don't care or need to know what the allegations are to know that this is the abuse and misuse of government power.

[Nicole Wallace]

J.B. pritzker seemed to call out what you're putting your Finger on. Which is that they will retroactively manufacture enough of a narrative so that enough people say, well, let's see what he did or didn't do. But here's what John Bolton did do on tv, loudly and often. Here's just a couple of his critiques of Donald J. Trump.

[Glenn Thrush]

I don't think he's fit for office. I don't think he has the competence to carry out the job. There really isn't any guiding principle that I was able to discern other than what's good for Donald Trump's reelection. What he was capable of was on a daily basis, doing something more and more outrageous than he had done the day before, all to the same end of staying in power. I think when you challenge the Constitution itself, the way Trump has done that is un American.

[Nicole Wallace]

Very quickly, do you agree with Mark Milley that Trump is a fascist?

[Glenn Thrush]

You know, I don't think he's smart enough to have an ideology.

[Nicole Wallace]

Mark Elias, let me show you one more. Let me bring this current. This happened on August 10th over on ABC News.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

We're about to talk about Trump's retribution campaign.

[Glenn Thrush]

We're seeing at the FBI and the Justice Department. You're obviously on his enemies list, at.

[Andrew Weissman]

Least Cash Patel's enemies list.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Are you worried that they're going to come after you in some way?

[Andrew Weissman]

I mean, he's hinted at it before.

[Glenn Thrush]

Well, I think he's already come after me and several others in withdrawing the protection that we had for Iran from the Iranians for the attack on Qasem Soleimani. So I think, and I said in the new forward of the paperback edition of my book, I think it is a retribution presidency.

[Nicole Wallace]

So, Marg Elias, let me push on this, even for someone who understood Trump clearly when he was on my show, I pressed him about how you could understand Trump this clearly, understand the retribution and not back his opponent, not do everything to make that person not prevail. And he didn't budge. To my knowledge, he never supported Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, even if you know it's coming. Do you think there's a part of him that is still in shock that it's actually come to this, that the FBI has raided his home and office?

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Of course, I mean, there's a natural shock that something terrible happens, even though you know that something terrible may happen? And I also agree with you that John Bolton is an imperfect victim for those of us who care about democracy. He, you know, so he was in Donald Trump's inner circle at a time when a lot of us were calling out Donald Trump for what he was. He, as you say, refused to endorse Joe Biden and Kamala Harris over Donald Trump even knowing what Donald Trump is. But the fact that he is an imperfect victim doesn't mean that he's not a victim. And it doesn't mean that he deserves any less of the support of people like me who did work against Donald Trump in 2016, who did call him out in his first term, who did work for Joe Biden and for Kamala Harris in their election campaigns. Because here's the thing. Donald Trump wants to find for each of us a reason why defending the person next to us is unacceptable. You know, I don't like them for this reason. I don't like them for that reason. Maybe they did this that I didn't like or they did that that I didn't like. The fact is we all need to keep our eye on the ball. Donald Trump is an authoritarian. Donald Trump wants to be a dictator. Donald Trump is subverting the rule of law. Donald Trump is controlling the Department of Justice and subverting democracy. And will, as J.B. pritzker pointed out correctly, deploy military forces in order to undermine free and fair elections in 2026. And if we don't all find common cause in supporting everyone who is, who is part of that category of victims, then we're all going to suffer the fate alone.

[Nicole Wallace]

I said to someone on Friday who was covering this, it's a diabolical choice for one of their first targets for retribution, because the left might be uncertain about how loudly to defend John Bolton, who, Marc, as you just said, didn't jump into the fray the way Liz Cheney did and Adam Kinzinger and Jeff Duncan and other Republicans. And the right will say, well, that's why they may make fun of me on msnbc, but that's why I fall into line every time. And vote for tariffs, which I've never been for, and vote for Kash Patel, who I've never been for, and vote for Hegseth, who doesn't seem like the right. I mean, I think there is something, Kim, about why Bolton went first.

[Kim Atkins]

Well, I think that there's probably not that much more than the fact that for Donald Trump, I agree that he has no political ideology. For Donald Trump, you're either for him or he attacks you. That's plain and simple. This is someone who served in his White House the first term and who he had a falling out with years ago halfway through that term. He has since written a book that was critical of Trump. That spurred another investigation into whether he was leaking classified information. It delayed his book. The book came out, the investigation continued into the Biden administration and was subsequently dropped. So this is something that has been litigated. I agree. Whether or not he committed a crime is irrelevant here. The real relevance is the autocrat, the autocratic response to him now that they have them. But let's just go back. Sake of argument. There was some mishandling of classified documents, as we all learned with the investigation into the president. For that to be anything more than an administrative penalty, he has to have done it willingly, knowingly, and with the intent of keeping or disclosing that information. That's a pretty high bar. It's probably a low bar to get a judge, magistrate to sign off on the search. But trying to prove that would just belie the entire investigation that has already gone into this. And if it were just an administration made administrative penalty, that would be something like losing one's access to classified information or one's clearance. He's already had his clearance stripped from him. Trump pulled his clearance back in January. So what else can this be but seeking to punish enemies? Announcing that he's looking into Chris Christie. First of all, president is not supposed to announce any investigation. Neither is a FBI director or an attorney general supposed to speak to publicly about an investigation. Remember when we all got mad when Comey did that? It was wrong then and it's wrong now. There's so many norms that are meant to hold the threads of our democracy together that this administration is simply steamrolling over whether it's, you know, me having to walk past humvees here in D.C. to this. This is really important. And I agree that gets to what Mark was talking about, that this isn't about just whether some certain laws are broken or whether there's crime in D.C. or Chicago. This is about Autocr is looking you right in the face and you cannot ignore it.

[Nicole Wallace]

Andrew Weissman, you are also someone Donald Trump has tweeted about. He pardoned Paul Manafort, who you prosecuted. I wonder if you could just take me through your reaction when you learned of the search of Bolton's home in office.

[Andrew Weissman]

So I have a slight difference, I think, both from your take and from Mark's take in that I think that this is a continuation of the degradation of checks and balances. In other words, I don't think of John Bolton as first. I think of him as a continuation. I think it happened with law firms. I think it happened with universities. I think it happened when FBI agents were fired, when DOJ career people were fired, when the President said he's going to investigate Jack Smith and his team. I think this is a continuation. It is a visible one. I think that one of the reasons to target John Bolton could be because if it's somebody who was in his administration who is viewed as a, quote, turncoat, he needs to send a message, don't do that. For the same reason he has said that with respect to many people who have left his administration in disgust. And he needs to send a message to keep them in line. I do think one thing we do know for sure is that there's been retaliation, severe retaliation against John Bolton in the past. I mean, just, I would ask people to just think about this. This John Bolton was the subject and is the subject of a death threat for doing his job. And the President of the United States pulled his security team who would do that. Just think of the depravity of that. When you think about the retaliation, that's an important thing to think about. And it certainly suggests strongly reasons to doubt that there's any there there in connection with this ongoing criminal search. The other thing we know is Kim alluded to is it is totally wrong for people to be from the government to be talking about this publicly, to have the Vice President of the United States saying it. John Bolton, like any of us, is entitled to have all of that be kept secret and not suffer any opprobrium. Even the vice President seemed to suggest there may not be a there there and sort of seem to walk back whether there's anything that really justifies this substantively. And the thing that we don't know and only can speculate about it, is whether he did anything wrong at all. So he's entitled to the presumption of innocence, that there's nothing there and there's substantial reason from the government's own conduct to think that this is something that is, no pun intended, really trumped up.

[Nicole Wallace]

All right, no one's going anywhere. We'll have much more on this topic on the other side of a very short break. Also ahead for us, a down payment for a pardon. That's how multiple victims of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell are responding today to the newly released transcript of Maxwell's interview with Donald Trump's former personal attorney. The very latest on their outrage and continued bid. And please, for accountability. Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere.

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[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts. What President Trump is doing is unprecedented and unwarranted. It is illegal. It is unconstitutional. It is un American. No one from the White House or the executive branch has reached out to me or to the mayor. No one has reached out to our staffs. No effort has been made to coordinate or to ask for our assistance in identifying any actions that might be helpful to us. Local law enforcement has not been contacted. We have made no requests for federal intervention.

[Nicole Wallace]

None.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

We found out what Donald Trump was planning the same way that all of you did. We read a story in the Washington Post.

[Nicole Wallace]

We're back with Andrew Mark and Kim. Andrew Weissman drill down on the quote, this is illegal part of that for me. Explain how how Trump even imagines that he has the legal authority to do something that the governor of the state says is clearly illegal.

[Andrew Weissman]

Well, first start with the fact that the two places where this has happened and people should just take a breath and remember we're talking about sending in armed people, armed in uniform to deal with a civilian population. That has happened in Los Angeles. There is a current litigation over that. There is a trial held by Judge Breyer in San Francisco on that issue, on the legality of it. And the second place, D.C. two places that are viewed as Democratic, not Republican in terms of who is there and the vast majority of the people. And now we're talking about Chicago. And the executive order that was issued today is quite, quite expansive. There's substantial legal issues. One has to do with the use of the military domestically. The other has to deal with the fact that there has to be a true emergency to do this. There's a little bit of broader authority for the president to act in D.C. because it's not a state, but that is, that doesn't hold true when we're dealing with actual states like California and Illinois. But I do think for most people, the big issue here is, yes, this will be challenged in a court of law, but the big issue is for people to react. What is the military? What is the National Guard doing on our streets without a true emergency to justify it? This is a sign of authoritarianism. I'm old enough to remember Kent State when students were shot. We're seeing a sort of very similar thing with sort of this huge immigration roundup, rounding of people who are in fact innocent. Enormous abuses of power. And this, this is, I really do think this is where in complete agreement with Mark. This is what you see in authoritarian regimes. And people shouldn't be lulled into complacency by the fact that it's happening. Sort of drip and then drip and then drip. And it's like the story about boiling the frog, which is if you do it slowly, it gets boiled. But if they jump into a hot water all at once, it jumps out. Well, here if there were sort of boiling slowly, we have a problem if people don't react to this. The idea that you have the National Guard and the military being called in without a true emergency over the objection of local states is an act of an authoritarian who, as Chris Christie noted, does not believe in checks and balances.

[Nicole Wallace]

Kim, you're in D.C. as you alluded to. Just tell us what that's like. How has it changed? What can you see?

[Kim Atkins]

Well, I was felt quite safe in the city before all of this. But again, crime is not the point. Whether there or not there was crime in D.C. it was dropping precipitously. So that's one thing. But I find it heartbreaking that I walk and see Humvees and armed guardsmen on the streets of Washington D.C. when I'm going about my errands and trying to live day to day seeing children going back to school. While this is happening, it is gut wrenching to see videos of mostly black and brown people being detained on the street in broad daylight by masked agents and taken away to who knows where as bystanders videotape it and ask these people what their names are, because otherwise their families might not even know where they are. And that's a big part of this too, that we cannot ignore. Donald Trump is attacking cities with large black and brown populations, with a lot of immigrants and with Black mayors, all three D.C. chicago and Los Angeles. I do not think that that is by accident. That has been part of his entire political message, that these cities are out of overrun. He got rid of the dog whistle a long time ago and is just proudly stating that outright, especially. And this force being all but led by ice, who is led by someone who keeps putting white nationalist imagery on their social media sites, tells you exactly what this is. So, as a black woman living in D.C. right now, a place that I've been almost 19 years and that I've grown to love, it is absolutely heartbreaking and it is something that should shock every American who witnesses it.

[Nicole Wallace]

Kim, I need you to say more.

[Kim Atkins]

We cannot believe. Listen, we do a lot of evaluations and comparisons to other places, right? Places where autocracy has marched in sort of slowly, in a way that a lot of the residents accepted it, places like Turkey. But we don't talk enough about what history right here in the United States of America has shown us. What I am seeing happening in D.C. right now is Jim Crow. It is the force, the force, implementation of the kind of segregation attack, xenophobia that we are seeing against black and brown bodies who dared to live freely in a city, let alone a city that is the nation's capital. To live, to be. To be free, to have drum circles happening and to have a genuine diverse place. And the President did not like walking here in the time that he was actually living here and not in Bedminster or Mar a Lago. He did not like seeing that. He did not like the black Malesmatter Plaza. So what's the first thing he did? He bullied Mayor Bowser into removing it. He did not like that right at his front door, the same way that he left New York City because he couldn't stand the fact that, you know, things like the exonerated 5 being exonerated actually happened there. He has been this way from the beginning. So don't think that that is not part of the purpose of this. It's the autocracy, too, but the cities that he's targeting, he's doing purpose. And either he believes that there's enough of his base, we're clamoring for that, or it's just something that he genuinely believes. But this is a rollback. This is like reconstruction or the. The destruction of reconstruction all over again. This is Jim Crow happening. And it's reminding me that D.C. is not above the Mason Dixon Line. It is a part of the South. But they're bringing Jim Crow all across the country. And Chicago's next, apparently.

[Nicole Wallace]

Mark Elias. The other bet is that people are numb or will be numb or will be afraid.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Yeah. Look, the tyrants govern through fear. They govern by assuming that people will not stand up for each other because they would rather not call attention to themselves. Dictators take their power from the acquiescence of not the bad people, but the good people, the people who know that what is happening is wrong, but yet don't speak out. And so it is the obligation of all of us as citizens, whether we fear for ourselves or we fear for our neighbors, or we fear for our communities, it's all of our obligations to take a step back, not a step, take a step forward, not a step back. When the big law firms refuse to do the right thing, it's the job of all lawyers to say we will double down and do more. When large institutions crumble in fear out of Donald Trump, out of the ashes of that, we all need to stand up and do more. I do want to add one thing, though, that J.B. pritzker, in the first clip you showed at the top of this hour, got it 100% right. Donald Trump is sending the military to these blue cities because he wants to undermine free and fair elections in 2026. He is normalizing the idea that there will be members of the military on the streets in blue cities, exactly as was said cities where there are large numbers of black voters. And he is doing it because he believes that his way forward is to prevent those folks from voting. And what was once literacy tests, what was once guessing the number of jelly beans in a jar, what then became more respectable is various laws that made it harder to register to vote, made it harder for people to find their polling place for black voters to have to wait in hours, long lines when that without food and water. When that failed, he is now bringing forward his next weapon to demonize mail in voting, to say that he is in charge of the counting and the tabulation of voters voting and to deploy the military in the cities that he thinks will make the difference between Democratic and Republican victory.

[Nicole Wallace]

Thank you for coming on and having this conversation. It gets increasingly more uncomfortable, I guess, the farther down Trump's enemy list they seem to make their way. So I thank all of you from the bottom of my heart, Andrew Weissman, Mark Elias and Kim Atkinstore. Still ahead for us, attempting to rewrite history, outraged today from dozens of victims of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell following the audio and transcript release of Ghislaine Maxwell's interview with the number two at the United States Department of Justice, Todd Blanche. What they're saying we'll bring that to you next. I think that you have to have faith that in the end it'll all be okay, that no matter who wins a presidential election, we will live in a democracy. The First Amendment will govern what journalists can say and do. The Constitution will protect the rights of everybody if you can agree that most people people want those things. Our show is about trying to bend the arc toward that end result.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Deadline White House with Nicole Wallace, weekdays from 4 to 6pm Eastern on MSNBC.

[Glenn Thrush]

The sex convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell goes into this interview undoubtedly told by her attorney, unless you completely exonerate the president, you're going to spend most of the rest of your life in prison.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

So she wants a pardon. She says exactly what her lawyers tell.

[Glenn Thrush]

Her is going to be necessary to get a pardon. It all stinks to high heaven.

[Nicole Wallace]

That was Senator Adam Schiff. But he is not alone in condemning the Trump administration on this front. There is widespread outrage today, felt especially deeply from Jeffrey Epstein's victims and their loved ones, over the Trump Justice Department's move to release the transcript and audio of the deputy attorney general of the United States, a man named Todd Blanch. His interview with convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell, who's serving a 20 year prison sentence on those sex trafficking charges. An attorney who represents 20 of Jeffrey Epstein's victims tells NBC News this, quote, I am left with the impression that the encounter far more resembles a carefully scripted and choreographed dance than the interrogation of a convicted felon and accused perjurer. What Maxwell delivered to the defense lawyer of the man who is walking around with pockets full of get out of jail free cards was exactly what that man wanted and would expect his defense lawyer to deliver. What Maxwell received in exchange for what she delivered is a down payment on her pardon, a transfer to a federal country club while she waits for her trip home. And the family of one of Epstein's accusers, Virginia Giuffre, says the Justice Department provided Ghislaine Maxwell with a, quote, platform to rewrite history. Joining our coverage is New York Times Justice Department reporter Glenn Thrush and investigative journalist Vicki Ward. Vicki profiled Jeffrey Epstein for vanity fair in 2003 and has been reporting on this story ever since. Thank you both so much for being here. I guess. Glenn Thrush, let me ask you how you think Todd Blanche feels this is going to.

[Glenn Thrush]

I don't know. I mean, Todd Blanche has made it very clear through his actions and through his public statements that he views Donald Trump as his boss. And there's Been very little differentiation with all of the Justice Department folks, but Blanche in particular between their role of defending Trump and Blanche was obviously the head of his defense team when he faced various criminal charges and running the Department of Justice. Blanche is the walking embodiment of the lack of boundaries between these two institutions. And, you know, when we covered this on Friday afternoon, and I should say White Houses don't tend to dump exculpatory and flattering information on a Friday, in August, on a Friday, but I would have to say that we just greeted this with tremendous skepticism. And while I don't know we would go as far necessarily, as the families have said, in terms of the kind of choreography, the one thing I would say is that it very much resembled a direct examination under oath from an attorney to a friendly witness without a cross examination.

[Nicole Wallace]

Well, in defense of the victims and their families who aren't here, let me just play what they were responding to. I think it was. It supports their assessment. So I never saw an aggressive move. I never saw anything that was non consensual. Well, thank you. Okay. I never saw anything that was non consensual. Tran was always very cordial and very kind to me.

[Vicki Ward]

And I just want to say that.

[Nicole Wallace]

I find and I admire his extraordinary achievement in becoming the President now. And I like him, and I've always liked him. I actually never saw the President in any type of massage setting. I never witnessed the President in any inappropriate setting in any way. The President was never inappropriate with anybody in the times that I was with him. He was a gentleman in all respects. Glenn Thrush.

[Glenn Thrush]

Well, I mean, one thing, you know, I've listened to that several times. You can really hear the apprehension in her voice and you can really hear from her timbre, her sense that this is an opportunity to get something to make her case. I think that is extraordinarily clear and is compare it in the political context. Obviously what she's talking about is very different. But when she's praising the President, doesn't it sound to you an awful lot like a Cabinet meeting, the kinds of things that his Cabinet says about him. It's a chilling encounter all the way through, both in Maxwell's desperation and also when I'm reading these transcripts on Friday afternoon and hearing her audio, the thing that struck us all, and there were four or five reporters going through it so that we could. Could move through it as quickly as we could, was how the family is going to view this. This woman has been accused of orchestrating a lot of the damage that has been done in their lives. And in one instance, one of the victims of Epstein claimed that Maxwell herself laid hands on them. So I just can't imagine the pain that the families are going through a having this visit by Blanche taking place in the first place. And then to have, in an apparent effort to exculpate the president and to move past the scandal, to have all of these wounds reopened, it has to be just an excruciating process for these folks. And I like you, I mean, it's just enormous sympathy for them.

[Nicole Wallace]

I mean, Vicki, this is palling around with a child sex predator. I mean, this is a solicitous love fest to the ear. I mean, if we are still left to believe our eyes and ears, is your sense of where the trauma on the continuum of trauma stands after the transcript release for the victims and their families.

[Vicki Ward]

Well, what struck me, Nicole, and obviously, you know, I knew Ghislaine Maxwell as well as having encountered Jeffrey Epstein when I wrote that article for vanity fair in 2003, is how she conducted that interview in her bubble wrapped distortion reality field as if they were sort of sitting at Buckingham palace. And she was reminding Todd Blanche at every possible opportunity and he didn't stop her of her once social status as the heiress daughter of a very powerful media mogul. And she reminded everybody about how powerful her father, Robert Maxwell once was and how well he and Trump and Ivana Trump had got on. And it was as if she wasn't in prison, convicted of any sex crimes. This was all some ghastly mistake, beginning with, I mean, you know, you know, I was even struck by the fact Todd Blanche asked her at the beginning about her family and about her family's millions. And you have to remember her father, when he was found dead, floating in the water, having fallen or been pushed off his yacht, it emerged that he had stolen the. Stolen the equivalent of a billion dollars from the employees, from the pension funds of his employees. And yet when Todd Blanche asked her about the Maxwells and their money, she said no, no, her father had no attachment whatsoever to money. He was a peasant. So if you start with that, and that's her own view, her narrative in her own head of her father and of her family. What on earth rubbish is she going to talk about? The sex crimes that she was involved in of underage girls?

[Nicole Wallace]

If only I could say rubbish like you do. I just, it's like such a perfect point and it's, it's, you know, BS is the word that keeps coming to my mind. But there's such an absolute gaslighting. And what's extraordinary to me, I mean, I think the reason I started with you, Glenn, is like, what did Todd Blanche think he was going to achieve in terms of where the MAGA movement's interest in exposing the whole ring, they're not just interested in Donald Trump. They're wedded to the exposing of the whole ring of corruption and crime. And he's in there just cherry picking among gaslighters like Elaine Maxwell. I want to press you on that on the other side of a very short break. Well, I'll be right back. Rebecca, Glenn and Vicki. Vicki, let me actually follow up with you quickly. What do you think exists in terms of what the government the Trump administration is keeping hidden from the victims, from lawmakers, from their own supporters, in terms of how much the federal investigation examined?

[Vicki Ward]

No, I think, I mean, look, there's stuff that was taken from Epstein's houses that I think, and I think we haven't seen all of that, but I don't think that in the papers that the government has. We are going to get the answers to the questions that the MAGA base has because they are questions about soft power. Then they're all riled up about, you know, what they refer to as the deep state and how it, you know, they want answers to the very reasonable question, actually, which is how did Jeffrey Epstein evade justice for so long? And that has to do with the men and the money. You know, we still don't know. Ghislaine Maxwell gave no satisfactory answer as to what it was that Jeffrey Epstein was actually paid hundreds of millions of dollars for by all these plutograts. You know, she went in to this idea that he was some sort of bounty hunter that got paid a fee for money that was stolen from them. Okay, well, what was stolen from them? And so I am skeptical that we're ever going to know how Jeffrey Epstein made his money and how he used what I call soft power to evade justice. One solution would be to subpoena Alex Acosta, the US Attorney in Florida who gave him the sweetheart deal in 2009, meaning he could evade the state charges, the federal charges, and take a deal with the state instead. They haven't done that yet, interestingly.

[Nicole Wallace]

Any sense, Glenn Thrush, that, I mean, you're right, the move reeks even for the Trump administration, burying information, not exonerating their most important client, Donald Trump, with the Friday dump. But any sense of where sort of the heat, not in Congress, but inside the MAGA movement. Folks like Joe Rogan where the story's heading.

[Glenn Thrush]

Look, the way that the White House deals with this stuff isn't to play defense or to play defense for a minimal period of time. So even releasing this document, even releasing the transcript came out during a week in which they essentially up the ante in terms of deploying National Guards troops and federal agents in Washington, D.C. you know that I don't know the discussion that went on in the White House over that. But the same cluster of people that made that decision to the same cluster of people who are doing damage control on the Epstein case. So the White House deals with stuff is to start a bigger fire or to start a bigger issue. Right. So they feel at the moment that they're moving past this. But this is like I'd liken this to the oil spill during the Obama administration. Obviously, there's a greater human toll with the Epstein case, but it's just one of those things that they can't turn off the spigot on. They're never really going to be able to. So I think the way that they're going to continue to deal with this is through distractions and through policy moves that push the base in another direction. And there's just one other thing I want to say. I've covered the Epstein case a bit, but my, my main job is to cover the United States Department of Justice and to cover rule of law in the United States under the Trump administration. The Epstein case, while it is extraordinary, is of great interest to people and is of great import historically, is a very small subset of what this administration is doing. And I think the notion that the number two official in the Justice Department, Todd Blanche, runs the day to day operations, essentially gives marching orders both in terms of policy and in terms of specific decisions to US Attorneys around the country, to all the component parts in the Department of Justice. It is extraordinary how much energy he has expended on this. And I think you've got to ask yourself, what does the Epstein case and the way that the Trump White House and the Trump Justice Department has dealt with the Epstein case tell you about how they view the justice and how they view rule of law?

[Nicole Wallace]

It's such an important point. I mean, and just to add to that, what does it say about crime when they had thousands of agents going through the old Jeffrey Epstein files, but they're now sending troops to the streets of American cities? One of those things does not go with the other. Glenn Thrush, Vicki Ward, a really important conversation. Thank you both for your reporting on this. One more break for us. We'll be right back.

[Glenn Thrush]

If you're touched by the kind treatment of immigrants in the Amsterdam episode, for example, by this wonderful organization that tries to assimilate them to their new homelands, imagine they're not locking them up and throwing them out, they're helping them assimilate. And when you help people assimilate to their new land, what does that do? It certainly makes their lives better, but it makes our lives better.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Better.

[Glenn Thrush]

Because here's the other thing I'm learning.

[Nicole Wallace (Promo Voice)]

Everywhere I go in the world, for.

[Glenn Thrush]

The most part, immigrants make wherever they immigrate to better, not worse, better.

[Nicole Wallace]

That was Phil Rosenthal. He, of course, is the creator of Everybody Loves Raymond. He's also now the star of Somebody Feed Phil, a Netflix super hit that takes viewers inside other cultures and destinations, and importantly, food around the world. He is my guest on this week's episode of the Best People. My family and I have been big and devoted rabid fans, if I may say, of Somebody Feed Phil. From the beginning, Phil will make you laugh, he will make you think, and he'll definitely make you hungry. Scan the QR code on your screen to take a listen or download wherever you get your podcasts. That does it for us today. Thank you so much for letting us into your homes on this rather extraordinary Monday. We are grateful.