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Deadline: White House
“Nothing to see here”
00:43:00
Nicolle Wallace on Republican’s continued flip flopping on what’s actually in the unreleased Epstein files, as Vice President J.D. Vance suggests the documents are being withheld to protect Democrats.
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- [00:00]
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- [00:31]
MSNBC Announcer
Saturday, October 11th from New York City, it's MSNBC Live 25. Join your favorite MSNBC hosts, Rachel Maddow, Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski, Nicole Wallace, Ari Melber, Alicia Menendez, Simone Sanders Townsend, Michael Steele, Chris Haynes, jen Psaki, Lawrence O', Donnell, Stephanie Ruhle and more. Visit msnbc.comlive25 to buy your tickets today.
- [01:06]
Nicole Wallace
Hi there everyone. Happy Monday. It's four o'clock in the east. Now, just as a general rule of thumb, if you are trying to convince the public that there's nothing to see here, nothing at all, it's a very good idea to get your story straight. Not that Donald Trump has ever been particularly consistent on the matter of Jeffrey Epstein. But today, yet another whiplash moment in the Trump administration having to do with what exactly the American people are being asked to believe. For starters, just so it's top of mind, recall the way Donald Trump himself spoke of the controversy not even one month ago.
- [01:45]
Charlie Sykes
It's all been a big hoax. It's perpetrated by the Democrats and some stupid Republicans and foolish Republicans fall into the net and so they try and do the Democrats work.
- [01:56]
J.D. Vance
This morning you mentioned past support supporters.
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Nicole Wallace
When you were talking about the Epstein issue.
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Andrew Weissman
Does that mean that you're effectively disowning.
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J.D. Vance
Any supporters who are now?
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Charlie Sykes
I lost a lot of faith in certain people. Yeah, I lost because they got duped by the Democrats.
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Nicole Wallace
Stupid Republicans. That's what Donald Trump called some of his most fervent supporters. That's who really wants answers on the Epstein conspiracy. And again, those are his words, not ours, about who bought into the conspiracy theories about Epstein. Remember that when you hear what J.D. vance has to say about this very same controversy.
- [02:36]
J.D. Vance
I laugh at the Democrats who are now all of a sudden so interested in the Epstein files. For four years, Joe Biden and the Democrats did absolutely nothing about this story. We know that Jeffrey Epstein had a lot of connections with left wing politicians and left wing billionaires. And now President Trump has demanded full transparency from this and yet somehow the Democrats are attacking him and not the Biden administration which did nothing for four years.
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Nicole Wallace
I laugh at the Democrats for some reason. I don't picture him like really laughing ever at anything. Can you imagine the sound of J.D. vance belly laughing? Me neither. All right, back to Epstein for those of you keeping score at home. One month ago, the Epstein controversy, according to Donald Trump, was a complete hoax perpetrated by by the Democrats. Today, though, the Democrats are apparently engaged in a cover up to obscure the truth about the real scandal, even though, again, there is no scandal, it's a hoax. If you're confused, don't worry, it's not you, it's them. In reality, the Trump administration's ongoing responses to Epstein related questions are a tangled mess of their own contradictions. In that interview we just showed you, JD Vance maintains that Trump's goal is to be, quote, as fully transparent as possible. Keep that in mind as we tell you about another major development. Breaking news on this story today. This morning, a federal judge denied the Trump Justice Department's request to unseal grand jury materials related to Ghislaine Maxwell's criminal case and criminal trial. As part of that ruling, U.S. district Judge Paul Engelmeier makes clear that the material in question, the grand jury material, does not identify anyone other than Jeffrey Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell as having sexual contact with a minor. And the judge adds this, that, quote, with only very minor exceptions, the evidence from the Maxwell grand juries is, quote, a matter of public record already and therefore would provide next to nothing new. More from that ruling, Quote, the one colorable argument under that doctrine for unsealing in this case, in fact, is that doing so would expose as disingenuous the government's public explanations for moving to unseal a member of the public. Appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials do not contribute anything to public knowledge might conclude that the government's motion for their unsealing was aimed not at transparency, but at diversion, aimed not at full disclosure, but at the illusion of such a judge said that a judge, the illusion of transparency, in that judge's words, is where we begin today with some of our favorite experts and friends. Former top prosecutor at the Department of Justice, MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissman's back. Michelle Goldberg is here. She's the columnist for the New York Times. She's also an MSNBC contributor and MSNBC columnist and contributor, author of the to the Contrary newsletter. Charlie Sykes is here. Charlie Sykes, I'm going to start with you. J.D. vance is in sort of the manosphere version of a Mud fight with Marco Rubio to inherit the Earth, to inherit the megaverse. This is not what Trump has been saying, that there is copious hidden material and in it is evidence of Democrats going to Epstein Island. Where did that come from?
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Charlie Sykes
Oh, it does make my head hurt. But, but, you know, the real mystery to all of this is what it could possibly be in these files that Donald Trump thinks will move the voters who have accepted so much. I mean, think about what Trump's base has been willing to swallow, what they have been willing to tolerate that has not budged his support. And yet there's something about these files that, twisting in circles, you know, diverting, coming up with all of these let's throw all the spaghetti against the wall explanations from J.D. vance. So, I mean, this really is the mystery because Donald Trump has been, you know, he has been immune from any consequences for any of his scandals. He's a convicted felony. He was indicted. You know, he is, he's a career criminal. He tried to overthrow the government. He was bragging about grabbing women by the private parts. He's been found legally liable for sexual abuse. And none of that hurt his standing with the MAGA base. So what makes him think that this is different? Because his behavior certainly would suggest that there's something in there that he either has to keep covered up or that he has to spin with maximum effect. So, I mean, J.D. vance's position. I mean, apparently he has been tasked with coming up with all kinds of, you know, putting out the chaff, putting out the blue smoke in the mirrors, convincing people that there's nothing to see. And if there is anything to see, it must be left wing Democrats. But again, coming back to it, what is in these files that has Donald Trump so in a bundle?
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Nicole Wallace
Well, and Michelle, let's go with J.D. vance's version that he says makes him laugh, which I do not believe. If it's all about Democrats going to Epstein island, why isn't it out like this morning?
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Michelle Goldberg
Well, I mean, I think that that's the obvious rejoinder. The idea that Donald Trump is trying to, is trying for sort of maximum transpar, transparently untrue. But I think that what you're seeing is that as the Trump administration tries to wriggle out of this, they're trying to redirect attention to Democrats. So you see them subpoenaing a bunch of people, you know, Hillary Clinton, not Alex Acosta, certainly not inviting Epstein's victims who have come, who are coming forward to testify before Congress, but trying to get a bunch of Democrats thinking that they're going to somehow embarrass Hillary Clinton at the same time. I mean, the other kind of big piece of this scandal has been the Trump administration's treatment of Ghislaine Maxwell, the meetings with Todd Blanche, moving her, we still have no idea why or what was promised to this minimum security prison that sex offenders are not supposed to be eligible to serve at. And so what did they want her to say? What did they want in exchange for that? And one possible explanation is that she were, they were hoping that she would point the finger at certain Democrats to take the heat off Donald Trump and give the base, you know, the base might not get full transparency, but part of their dream for this whole, the whole unfolding of this revelation is that their enemies would be humiliated and punished.
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Nicole Wallace
And on that front, let me ask you, Andrew Weissman, to pick up what the judge said in really stunningly stark words today about the goals of the request from the United States Department of Justice on releasing grand jury materials are, in his view, not about transparency at all, but about pr. Wow.
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Andrew Weissman
I would say that Judge Engelmeier nailed is absolutely correct. His phrase that it is for the illusion of, of transparency. He is obviously aware that this was going to be denied, that there's no good basis to turn over the grand jury material, and that the courts and he was going to be viewed as a fall guy. So they could say, oh, look, we wanted to be transparent, but the judges stopped us. That is a lot of malarkey, to use the former president's terms. And that's what the judge is calling out. He's like, anyone day of the week, if you want it to be transparent, you can turn over all of the non grand jury information, which the government has said is hundreds of gigabytes. And so the judge is absolutely right to call the Senate to say this is a complete sideshow and that if he actually did grant this, it would, all it would do is serve to show and prove up how disingenuous the administration is being. And everything that you're talking about with Michelle and Charlie is, is it's all the same, which is this is all a distraction because all of this could be made public any minute by this administration. If they wanted to prove Democrats were behind it all, they could disclose everything. So it really leads you to believe the big question is there has to be something in these files that is so bad for Donald Trump. I mean, that is really the key here. It has got to be something worse than I was involved in the Russia investigation. There has to be something there that Donald Trump is deathly afraid of.
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Nicole Wallace
Let me follow up with you because I just want to close this chapter of what is in the grand jury transcripts. This is from the judge's opinion today, quote, contrary to the government's depiction. So again, fact checking the United States Department of Justice Contrary to the government's depiction. The Maxwell grand jury testimony is not a matter of significant historical or public interest. Far from consists of garden variety summary testimony by two law enforcement agents. And the information it contains is already almost entirely a matter of long standing public record, principally as a result of live testimony by percipient witnesses at the 2021 Maxwell trial. So just translate that into Opinions for Dummies for me, Andrew.
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Andrew Weissman
Sure. So a typical grand jury presentation is not calling firsthand witnesses and presenting days and days of evidence. You are allowed in the federal grand jury system to call an FBI agent and they can sort of give an overview and present documents and they just present what's needed for the grand jury to find what they need to find, which is probable cause of a particular crime by a particular proposed defendant. So this was not like a long term grand jury investigation that you might see in an organized crime case or when I worked on Enron where you have a grand jury sitting for, you know, it could be years. This we know for a fact that the Glenn Maxwell grand jury was initially just two days, just a two day presentation. That's not unusual. The Epstein grand jury also just two days. So this was never going to be the holy grail. And that's what the judge is saying here. By contrast, there are gigabytes of information that are not grand jury that the government has absolute authority to turn over without Judge Engelmeier or any judges saying so they could just do it and that that's what puts a lie to all of this and trying to say it's somebody else's fault, that there's some other thing there. The government has the keys to the kingdom here. They could unlock it all any moment if they chose to do so.
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Nicole Wallace
Yeah. And as I know from now, listening to hours of Men in the Manosphere on their podcast talking about this issue, they were never hunting for the two law enforcement testimonies. No one thought they were hidden and no one was asking for them. What they were asking for was the gigabytes of data, the videos, the exhibits and the victims are speaking out on that too. So let me play this for you, Michelle.
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Epstein Victim
Well, it continues to be a very upsetting matter and I Myself and probably the other victims. We didn't know that this would be ongoing for so long and in so many years. And now why can't they just release the files? Because they keep talking about it and Pam Body keeps talking about it since February. So if there is files and alleged pedophiles or people in them, then why can't I see them and the other victims? And we have a right to see that. So I don't know what they're protecting or if they don't want us to see that. It's, it continues to be very upsetting for years later.
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Nicole Wallace
So, Michelle, you've got Trump's own MAGA base, you've got his allies of convenience, if you will, the comedians in the manosphere, and you've got the victims who are not satisfied by any of this. I'm less fluent in what elected Republicans in Congress are saying about this. They seem to have fled with their tails between their legs and I don't know, maybe this is enough for them. I really don't know. But when you've got MAGA rank and file voters, the victims and the manosphere voices all saying, you know, line in the sand, this is bs, you are not making much political progress here.
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Michelle Goldberg
Well, and especially since one of the ways that this administration has justified not releasing the files is saying that it would be re victimizing these women. So to have the women out there saying that. No, what is victimizing them or what they feel is victimizing them is the process is the way the administration tried to exploit their, you know, these horrors that they've endured for votes and then refuse transparency once they had the power to do so. I believe I just saw that there's going to be a press conference with a, with Ro Khanna, a Democrat, and Thomas Massie, a Republican, and several of the Epstein victims calling for on September 3rd.
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Nicole Wallace
Yeah, yeah. It's an incredible coalition that's emerging, Charlie Sykes. And that in and of itself is sort of the man bites dog part of the story. I mean, as Michelle just said, September 3rd in Washington. So, you know, back to school and welcome back to your own man made political scandal with actual real victims. The women will be speaking in their own words and they'll be flanked by Democrats and Republicans. This is not going anywhere.
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Charlie Sykes
No, this is not going anywhere. And the women are not going anywhere. And I just, you know, briefly, there are survivors, but there are victims who did not survive. And I think we need to remember that Virginia Giuffre, one of the main witnesses against Ghislaine Maxwell committed suicide earlier this year. So the human toll is incredible. But you know, the point that has been made and you know, both Andrew and Michelle have made this point, look, the Trump administration tomorrow morning could release all of the files. If there is dirt about Democrats in these files, you know, who among us would doubt that they would not have a press conference? Just last week, Tulsi Gabbard came out and dumped all sorts of alleged new revelations about the Russia investigation that suggested that Barack Obama was guilty of treason. These people are not holding anything back. And secondly, if Congress is actually interested in finding any truth about all of this, why are they just subpoenaing certain people? Why have they not put out subpoenas for these women who not only have a story to tell, but are obviously quite willing and ready to tell that story? So there is an incredible reluctance to get at the truth. And this counter spin that JD Vance is putting out that it's all liberal Democrats, this is an administration that has shown absolutely no restraint whatsoever in smearing its opponents with real or fabricated information. So again, none of this adds up, does it?
- [19:03]
Nicole Wallace
It's such a good point. I mean, they have this guy that Tillis sank, what is his name? Ed Martin, whose whole job is is political prosecutions with nothing based in fact. So if they had actual evidence, if they had videotape evidence of actual crimes by actual Democrats, you'd think that Mr. Martin would have held a press conference and talked about it by now. I need all of you to stick around. There are more developments to show you from the weekend. Also ahead for us, remember when violent crime in our nation's capital seemed like it was at a peak and the president at the time refused to deploy help from the out of control mobs? Well, with crime back down to generational lows, the president is now sending in hundreds of troops. Go figure. And later in the broadcast, a corporate shakedown led by a president who again and again is exerting control over what was a free market and free economic system. And how yet again, the group paying the price won't be big business. It'll be us, the American consumer. All those stories and more when Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere. Today.
- [20:19]
MSNBC Announcer
MSNBC presents the chart topping original podcast, the Best People with Nicole Wallace. This week, she sits down with legal scholar Melissa Murray.
- [20:29]
Michelle Goldberg
If you're a person who's ambitious or you're a person who thinks there's something in the world to be solved, it's really hard to dial it down. And Sit it out.
- [20:38]
MSNBC Announcer
The best people with Nicole Wallace listen now. For early access ad free listening and bonus content, subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [20:48]
J.D. Vance
Hey everyone, it's Chris Hayes. This week on my podcast, why Is this Happening?
- [20:52]
Charlie Sykes
Journalist and author E. Jean Carroll.
- [20:54]
Nicole Wallace
I came to love the process of the judicial system and I found it very exonerating. I got to tell my story in court. I got to tell my story when thousands of millions of people called me a liar. So it was very satisfying.
- [21:10]
J.D. Vance
That's this week on why Is this Happening? Search for why is this Happening wherever you're listening right now and follow Start.
- [21:16]
MSNBC Announcer
Your day with the MSNBC Daily Newsletter. Each morning, read sharp insights from the voices you trust. Catch standout moments from your favorite shows.
- [21:25]
Nicole Wallace
The second Trump administration has gone to.
- [21:27]
Michelle Goldberg
Un unprecedented lengths to radically transform America.
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MSNBC Announcer
Stay up to speed with our latest podcasts and documentaries and get fresh perspectives from experts shaping the news. It's everything you love about MSNBC delivered to your inbox. Sign up now@msnbc.com.
- [21:47]
Unknown Commentator
It'S all enemies list. It's all political persecution all the time. I mean, nobody's talking about cracking down on terrorism. Nobody's talking about cracking down on organized crime. Nobody's talking about cracking down on human trafficking. We know, on the contrary, it's all about going after the perceived political enemies of Donald Trump. It's a massive and irrelevant distraction, obviously from the Epstein matter where they have completely painted themselves into a corner.
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Nicole Wallace
So I played that because I know the big story today, the big announcement from Donald Trump at the White House, the bizarre press conference was the federal takeover of Washington, D.C. but I agree with Jamie Raskin and I've covered Trump for 10 years, I'm embarrassed to say. And it's all a distraction. And I guess my question, Andrew Weissman, is it's not a case where the truth isn't knowable. The truth is knowable. My question for you is how much more does he burn down to do what Raskin's talking about distractions from the scandal he can't control.
- [22:57]
Andrew Weissman
Well, look, the Epstein scandal will be fascinating to see how this plays out for the reason that for the first time you have a sort of MAGA conspiracy theory that's called out as phony and by the MAGA itself, where they feel like they have been lied to and that Donald Trump has been duplicitous for sort of caught by or what the old fashioned expression is hoisted by his own petard. And so it's not us. It's not sort of People who are sort of saying, you know, Trump is a threat to democracy, who are calling this out. And so that to me is sort of the thing that may lead to gravity finally taking hold with respect to sort of what Jamie Raskin is talking about, which is sort of looking at what in fact is going on. The fact that the FBI has been basically gutted, that, I mean, you could say that about all sorts of agencies. You know, my own particular concern is, is the CDC and the epa, the ftc. I mean, there's so many different agencies that have been cut down. And there, I think the way that Donald Trump is approaching that is to make those facts unknown, that the issue is making sure that he is in control of the facts. It's why you have the Bureau of Labor Statistics head being fired in the same way. Just it's reminiscent of COVID where he said the problem is not our response to Covid and showing that there's this is an ever growing pandemic, it's that we're counting and if we just stop counting, we wouldn't have a problem. Right, exactly. And so to me, that is the strategies, if we take over, the ability to know what's going on and true sort of Orwellian 1984 manner, that sort of one strategy. But I don't see with Epstein that working because there is their own conspiracy theory that is being called to task and people feeling like, wait a second, you told us this conspiracy was true and now you're not living up to it. And I think that's the thing that seems to be making it really unique. And you see this incredible cover up and for the first time you're seeing people who were MAGA loyalists saying, wait a second, you know, we're not stupid, we are following what you're doing.
- [25:47]
Nicole Wallace
Jury's out on whether or not they're proven stupid. We'll see. I'm going to put a pin in that one, but I take your point. So, Charlie Sykes, these are the things they've done since the Epstein crisis has spiraled out of their control. They called their own voters week, they federalized the police. They've taken over the District of Columbia. They have accused former President Barack Obama of treason. Tulsi Gabbard has fabricated some sort of or declassified some sort of. I don't even want to call it a report. It was a previously classified draft of a report done by the Republican led House Intelligence committee back in 2017 against the wishes of the CIA. John Ratcliffe, Weeks before that also mischaracterized a report and analysis of the 2016 assessment to Russian interfering. They have sent federal troops and active duty troops to the streets of Los Angeles. All this has happened not as a plan for what they were going to do over the summer, not as a replacement for the 90 deals in 90 days. Tariff Palooza. All this has happened since. Since the Epstein story spun out of their control.
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Charlie Sykes
Yeah, we haven't even talked about going after Coca Cola for the sugar that they use or going after Rosie o'. Donnell. I mean, it's just like RFK might.
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Nicole Wallace
Have done that anyway.
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Charlie Sykes
Yeah, they were throwing so much out there. But, I mean, two things are true. I mean, obviously, all of these things are distractions, but at some point, the distractions become the substance as well. The fact that you now have troops on, you know, you have active duty troops on the streets of two American cities, and this is obviously just a test case of the possibility of doing the same in places like New York and Chicago. So these are major, major initiatives. And to Jamie Raskin's point, this is a diversion from Epstein. But think of all the resources that are diverted from things that the American people actually care about. Think about the law enforcement resources that are being diverted from fighting terrorists, from going after human traffickers, from fighting against the drug trade. These FBI agents who are being tasked to walk the streets of the city of, you know, of Washington are being taken away from other duties, being given jobs they were not trained for. And it means with the gutting of the FBI, that there are a lot of these important jobs that are not being done. So one of the price tags we're going to see, leaving aside the politics, is, you know, what? Things that are necessary for Americans to be safe, secure and healthy are not going to be done because Donald Trump is so determined to distract from whatever it is he wants to distract from. So, you know, to Andrew's point, you're having the gutting in the EPA and the CDC across the government, but I think it's in law enforcement there's a real particular vulnerability for Donald Trump because he is a law and order president. He is the one who's going to keep us safe from the criminals, the bad guys. Well, who's looking after the bad guys if they're chasing around his own personal agendas? And I think we, you know, that's a big question mark. We don't know the answer to that yet. But it's not going to be good. It's not going to be favorable either for Donald Trump or for Americans who expect the Federal government is going to protect them, enforce the law, and keep us safe.
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Nicole Wallace
All right, I need all of you to stick around a little bit longer because ahead for us to quote our friend Michelle Goldberg, when you're maga, they let you do it, at least in Trump's Republican Party. We'll explain next. It has been a very ugly year. Well, we could stop there. It's been an ugly year, but it's been a particularly ugly year for one Florida Republican Congressman Corey Mills. He represents the district in Congress encompassing parts of Orlando and Daytona Beach. Back in February, D.C. metro Police announced that they were investigating an alleged physical assault of a woman by Mills at his luxury penthouse. According to the police report, the alleged victim stated that Mills, quote, grabbed her, shoved her, and pushed her out the door. Mills was not arrested because the alleged victim recanted details of the incident. Now Mills has been hit with new allegations. Lindsey Langston, the reigning Miss United States, who has accused the Republican lawmaker of threatening to share sexually explicit photos and videos of her and threatening violence against her future boyfriends. From that police report, quote, Since February 20th of 2025, Corey has contacted Lindsay numerous times on numerous different accounts, threatening to release nude images and videos of her to include recorded videos of her and Corey engaging in sexual acts. Congressman Mills has denied claims in the police report. Now, in normal times, our friend Michelle Goldberg points out that any elected official using revenge porn as a weapon would be political suicide. But that's not the world we are living in anymore. She writes, there was a time when just the pileup of serious accusations against him would have been a problem for Republicans. Many of these allegations, after all, are far uglier than the misdeeds of George Santos, which were a major political story during Joe Biden's presidency. That, however, was a more innocent moment before Trump's reelection destroyed many of Washington's remaining norms. We're back with Andrew, Michelle and Charlie. Michelle, the piece stopped me in my tracks. The sadness for the women again, and with shame, I guess, at all that, that I feel complicit in normalizing. Talk me through your piece and how you came to write it.
- [31:41]
Michelle Goldberg
Well, I would, I should say those are, those are two of the most recent scandals. But they're not the only scandals attaching to Corey Mills. And the second woman. The woman who filed the police report only found out about Mills Washington girlfriend when she saw on the news that the police had been called to their apartment. The owner of that apartment has also tried to evict Mills because he apparently at one point owed $85,000 in back rent, which he said was due to a computer glitch. The website notice has reported that on stolen valor accusations against Mills, he has a Bronze Star. And on the application for that Bronze Star, it listed incidents where he had apparently saved two people's lives, two men's lives. And those men say that he was never there. And so there's. And there's other stuff, too. He's under investigation by the House Ethics Committee. I think in another world, everybody would at least know this person's name, right? He would be famous. It would be a big problem for Republicans in Congress, kind of what to do, what to do about him. And in this environment, it's barely made a ripple, right? I mean, he's been able to fade into the background in a way that George Santos never did, because George Santos, of course, was during the Joe Biden administration when there was. There wasn't this deafening barrage of other scandals to keep up with.
- [33:08]
Nicole Wallace
I mean, Michelle, I also thought of Roy. Was it Roy Moore? Was that his name? Who ran? Who was so bad? How bad is he? He was so bad, he couldn't get over the line, even in the time of Trump. Do you think we're in a. I mean, I think it feels like you're writing and arguing that we're in a bleaker place than Trump 1.0.
- [33:27]
Michelle Goldberg
Yeah, I think that that's right. I actually can't imagine Roy Moore not getting elected today because I think that both. The information environment is so different, so that so many on the right are not even hearing these stories in the first place. But there's also just much less shame. There's, you know, part of what happened with Roy Moore was during the height of MeToo, there were people in the conservative movement who wanted to say, you know, sort of. Of we're better than this, even in Alabama. And I just don't think that anybody on the right anymore, or at least anybody who's kind of a supporter of Donald Trump, feels any compunction about the misdeeds of the people around him or feels any need to say this far and no further.
- [34:13]
Nicole Wallace
Michelle, I want to read a little bit more from your piece. You write that, of course, it's possible that even amid the tsunamis of sadism and obscenity that constitute the Democratic daily political news cycle, the sheer squalor of the Mills story will eventually grab voters attention. Maybe it will become, if not an embarrassment to Republicans, at least an irritation to them, forcing them to act. For now, though, Mills embodies America's ruling ethos. When you're maga, they let you do it. I mean, I thought of Pete Hegseth, too, and all that was reported and all the investigative threads that were being worked on as Republicans just voted him through, to say nothing of his sheer lack of qualifications to lead the Pentagon. Credible accusations of domestic partner, you know, abuse. I mean, a rape allegation that was investigated by the Monterey police. What is this moment right now for women?
- [35:08]
Michelle Goldberg
I mean, it's a moment of, like, extreme backlash. And so Pete Hegseth, who, you know, he says that he's not, that he's innocent of sexual assault, but we know that he paid that woman for her silence, he says, to protect his family and his job. There's other people in the administration who've been accused of either domestic violence or violence against women. And yet even like Corey Lewandowski, for example, who was accused of groping a woman, the wife of a major Trump donor, at an event and was sort of of briefly cast out of Trump world, but then. But then brought back in. I just feel like the culture of male impunity is so much a part of the promise of Trump 2.0. So I think, you know, and that's part of the reason, again, that Corey Mills, as extreme as this story is, it doesn't really stand out.
- [36:07]
Nicole Wallace
Charlie, what's, how do we fix this? I mean, I've listened, as I said, I'm doing some research of my own. I listen, listened to an hour of Shane Gillis's comedy after he hosted the ESPYs. I wanted to understand who he is. He's sort of in the Rogan orbit. He's a comedian. And all the jokes are about feeling sexually inadequate because his girlfriend's ex was a Navy seal. I mean, I guess to his credit at least, he's talking about his penis insecurity. But how do you. How do we. How do we fix men so that one of the two political parties in our country doesn't tolerate women, Physical abuse of women from members of their political party?
- [36:45]
Charlie Sykes
Well, I'm sorry, I really can't provide great insight into how he can cure his penis insecurity, but I will say this.
- [36:53]
Nicole Wallace
He's a comedian. I don't know.
- [36:56]
Charlie Sykes
I think there's a lot of that going on around there. But, no, to Michelle's point, you know, Corey Mills is deeply fortunate that in the year of our Lord 2025, he is a Republican, because at any other time in any other political party, this conduct would not be acceptable. And I think she's also right. How quickly this has happened, how quickly we have moved into the Trumpian post shame world for the entire political class of people that support him. I was trying to remember the Florida Republican congressman back from 2006 who was, he became a national figure because he was sending suggestive texts to mail pages. I don't know if you remember this. This became a national issue. It hurt Republicans all across the board. It was a big deal. Fast forward to 2025. Right? Exactly. I had forgotten his name, but Rick Foley was. It was a major issue. Corey Mills doesn't move the needle at all. Nobody knows who he is right now. This is a major, in any other time, in any other circumstance, this would be a major story. But this is where we're at here. Now. How do we fix this? I think it runs deep. I think the cultural rot that Donald Trump represents and that he has created runs very deep and it's going to be very difficult for us to pull out of it.
- [38:18]
Nicole Wallace
Yeah. It's not just the rot he created, it's what he tapped into as well. And I think until you untangle repetitive Republican politics from misogynistic culture, you're here. You're here. Where a politician like this isn't a news story until smart people like Michelle lift it up and write about it as compellingly as you did. Michelle, thank you so much for being here with us today and thank you for the piece. Michelle and Charlie, thank you for spending time with us. Andrew sticks around a little bit longer because ahead for us, as Trump searches for an off ramp, a compelling distraction and anything but that headline in the news, he has announced that the federal government, as we've been discussing, will take control of the Washington, D.C. police force. His latest escalation and what it really means.
- [39:13]
MSNBC Announcer
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- [40:23]
Nicole Wallace
So that's what violent crime in D.C. looks like. And Donald Trump sat in the White House watching that happen for hours and did nothing. Police officers were brutally beaten as America's tradition of a peaceful transfer of power was ended. On that day, January 6, Trump supporters chanted to hang Trump's own Vice President, Mike Pence. Yet today, a very peaceful day in Washington that looked nothing like that. And amid a 30 year crime low in the nation's capital, Donald Trump decided to claim that now is the time. Today is the day that violence in D.C. needs to be addressed, saying he will be asserting federal control over the U.S. capitol and taking control of Washington D.C. s police department. Protesters took to the streets of D.C. ahead of Trump's announcement, calling BS on his claims that this is anything other than an act of authoritarianism.
- [41:19]
Unknown Analyst
Trump does not care about D.C. safety. He cares about control. What we know from history is that authoritarians always want to control the Capitol and the people in the Capitol city. It's because it's the fastest way to silence dissent and to accelerate their agenda. And I want to be clear, this is not about crime. This is about what Trump is trying to do to D.C. in order to take over D.C. and silence us. This is the story of a ruler who is trying to oppress a people and who's causing real harm to real communities in the process.
- [41:59]
Nicole Wallace
We're back with Andrew Weissman. Andrew, this is, I know for a lot of people, a really scary day. I checked with a few law enforcement sources who were wary about what would happen, but suggested this could be performative, that there are 30 days. What are your thoughts, what are your concerns and what could this be leading towards?
- [42:27]
Andrew Weissman
I know there's a school of thought that this is a distraction. This is a way of changing the story in the headlines from Epstein. But even if you thought that it still, I think, is incredibly scary. The idea of using federal law enforcement and the federal military is in ways that we have never seen in any administration, Republican or Democratic, should be, and I think correctly is called out by in the clip that you played. I just think we've had it in Los Angeles. We have it at the southern border with the military being called in. Now you have Pam Bondi with the Secretary of Defense at a press conference talking about the imagined problem here when the excuse for doing this is so paper thin. And so I do think that the concern goes directly to the very first clip you played, which is just remember what Donald Trump was trying to do to stay in office. But this time he has control of all of the levers of power. He has control of so much, including, as Liz Cheney and Secretary of Defense Esper warned, of the military. And so even if this is sort of the timing of this is a distraction, it is incredibly worrying in terms of, of what it could portend for somebody who I think is desperate to cling to power in ways that we don't have to guess at. We know from history that that's true.
- [44:16]
Nicole Wallace
I just think in a break, I want to ask you what people can do, what Congress can do, what Democrats or Republicans who don't think this is a good idea can do on the other side. Stay with us. We'll be right back. Andrew, you referenced a paper thin pretext for doing this. I mean, violent crime is, is way down, including in the District. What is the legal opportunity or pathway to fighting against this?
- [44:52]
Andrew Weissman
Two things. One, D.C. is sort of a unique animal because it's sort of under the control of the federal government, but it is not under control unilaterally of the president. Congress has the first word here and has various statutes. And so for everyone who is listening to this, if you think this is a real concern, you know, make your voices heard, even if your local politician or your national politician is a Democrat who you think knows this already, speak up. People really do care and listen. They want to know how much certain issues are resonating and where people have concerns. So we're lucky to be able to speak here about it. But everyone else can do the same thing by making their voices heard in myriad ways about this issue.
- [45:46]
Nicole Wallace
Yeah. I mean, it is their classic tactic to grab at power without cause and then to have the desired impact of making people feel helpless and afraid. I mean, if you're just a little more reluctant to go out and protest or a little unsure of your rights, then in their view, they've achieved their objectives. Andrew Weissman, thank you for that. Thank you for the whole hour. Up next for us, Donald Trump taking a cut out of a private company's revenue. Some might call it socialism, the very transactional global trade war getting a little more complicated politically today. Quick break. We'll be right back.