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Deadline: White House
“The bottom has fallen out”
00:44:42
Nicolle Wallace unpacks Trump’s falling approval rating and his latest threats to dismantle mail-in voting in clear violation of the Constitution.
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- [00:00]
Nicole Wallace
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 Ruhl and more. Visit msnbc.comlive25 to buy your tickets today. Start your day with the MSNBC Daily Newsletter. Each morning, read sharp insights from the voices you trust. Catch standout moments from your favorite shows.
- [00:40]
The second Trump administration has gone to.
- [00:42]
John Heilman
Unprecedented lengths to radically transform America.
- [00:45]
Nicole Wallace
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.
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Hi there everyone. It's four o' clock in the east this afternoon. Proof of an age old principle that you can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot, you cannot fool all of the people all of the time. Donald Trump. Take notes because right now the American people are mad at you. Call it a reckoning if you want, not just for Trump, but for those lawmakers who've hitched their wagons to the MAGA movement. Tomorrow will make it seven months since Trump's second term began. I know it feels like 11 years. His report card, though, is so bad, it's going to need a signature from a parent. Overall, according to Pew, his approval rating is in the dumps with just 38% of all Americans on his side. That compares to 60% who disapprove of Donald Trump's performance as president. It's a near record low for him on tariffs, which are the signature tool of his economic masterminding. He's 23 points underwater on tariffs, on foreign policy amid the pomp and circumstance, amid a flurry of meetings with European leaders, Trump is 14 points underwater right now. And on his administration's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein controversy, largely ginned up by his own coalition and base of core supporters, Pew says just 25% of all Americans approve of how he's handling that. And it compares to 70% who do not approve of how Donald Trump is handling the Jeffrey Epstein files. Before you write any of that off, as a small matter, go beyond the numbers. Look at what elected Republicans are hearing about the so called Epstein files. This is from Wyoming. Wyoming is a state Donald Trump won by nearly 450 points a few months ago.
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John Heilman
I don't, I don't know if that.
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Nicole Wallace
Vote'S going to come up on the floor.
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John Heilman
But what a lot of people don't realize is that is for the courts to decide.
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Tim Miller
So you're not going to give us an answer?
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John Heilman
It is for the courts to decide. Those files are sealed. It is for the courts to decide whether the files can be released. It is a separation of powers.
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Tim Miller
Grand jury, grand jury, grand jury transcripts.
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Molly Jongfast
Aren'T going to get released.
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Tim Miller
Right. There seems to be a lot of sentiment in the House on the right.
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Molly Jongfast
And the left to see what's in.
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Nicole Wallace
Those Jeffrey Epstein files.
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Molly Jongfast
Do you support the release of those files?
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John Heilman
I support. It's up to the courts to decide. It is up to the courts to decide. Thank you. It's up to the courts to decide.
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Tim Miller
Yes, ma'.
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John Heilman
Am.
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Nicole Wallace
Thank you. It's cute when MAGA is four judges after they're against them and then for them again. That was Congresswoman Harriet Hageman. She replaced Liz Cheney, being called a sycophant by her own constituents. Here's more from her town hall.
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John Heilman
We have to have mail in ballots. My question to you was, how do you feel personally of stripping Americans of those foundational tools of mail in ballots? Mail in ballots.
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Nicole Wallace
Mail in ballots are not foundational tools.
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John Heilman
You're fully capable of exercising your right to vote without a mail in ballot. You are absolutely fully capable of exercising your right to vote without a ballot.
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Nicole Wallace
Again, Wyoming is a state Trump won by almost 50 points. It is hard to find a non Republican person in Wyoming. And that's how her town hall went. It's just the latest, just the latest example of a Republican lawmaker being confronted by her constituents. It's certainly not an isolated incident, though, especially when voters turn on the TV and see stuff like this. A federal and militarized takeover of Washington, D.C. our nation's capital, in the name of stopping crime or masked federal agents in the name of ICE handcuffing and seizing, sometimes violently, people off the streets in American towns and cities big and small. And while the Trump administration in its own way has celebrated these images, Kristine Ulm said she loves watching ICE videos. The American people do not feel the same way. A new Reuters poll shows this, quote, just 42% of respondents approve of Trump's performance on crime and 43% thought he was doing a good job on immigration policy. On all policies, Trump's support came overwhelmingly from Republicans. So again, what about those Republican allies in Congress? Watch what happened to Congresswoman Elise Stefanik in Plattsburgh, New York, yesterday inside her own district, as she reportedly considers a run for New York governor.
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Molly Jongfast
Our congresswoman from New York, 21, Elise Stefani.
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Nicole Wallace
That's what it sounded like.
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John Heilman
Outside the Government center building in Plattsburgh Monday, Stefanik stepped up to address the crowd twice.
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Nicole Wallace
Both times the protesters booed her. The Trump agenda and getting booed offstage Twice for Ms. Stefanik at least, is where we start today with some of our favorite experts and friends. Hawk News chief political columnist MSNBC national affairs analyst John Heilman is here. Also joining us, the host of the Fast Politics podcast, Vanity Fair special correspondent MSNBC political analyst Molly Jong. Fast fresh off a triumphant appearance on the Bill Maher program. And to round out our panel, host of the Bulwark podcast, MSNBC political analyst Tim Miller is here as well. Let me start with you, Tim Miller, on you know, we have data and as Matt Dowd says, when you have data and you can match it with anecdotal evidence of people having intense enough feelings, one, to show up at a town hall and two, to express their animosity, it's information, right? It doesn't predetermine the outcome of any election. It's not suggesting that Trump won't regain popularity or rise in the polls. But it is more than a snapshot seven months in. And to me, it illustrates something that I worried about in the first few weeks, that the freneticism would read as energy and work in progress. It seems that at month seven, the freneticism and chaos are clearly not matched with the perception that the results are what people voted for. What is your sense of where Trump is in this moment?
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Tim Miller
I think that's right. It's not like he's in free fall. You don't want to overstate it. But, you know, for a lot of voters, they're not seeing the change in their economic circumstances that they wanted. And then certain types of voters have complaints about certain types of things that he's been doing that in some cases upsetting his own base on issues like Epstein, in some cases upsetting, you know, kind of libertarian ish independent voters with the immigration regime, in some cases just more of his non political voters or hoping grocery prices would go down and they've gone up. And so you can have this confluence of factors of the political winds moving away from him. I mean, look, I, I promised myself I was not going to obsess over polls in 2025. Like we're a long way away from the next election. We've had a few poll misses recently. But the dramatic nature of some of those numbers, I mean, no matter how maybe they are off by 10, 15 points. And even still, Trump would be underwater on a lot of these issues, including Epstein, including immigration, including the economy. And then if you look at the situation in Wyoming, there, my co panelist, John Heilman will know the one place in Wyoming where you can find a Democrat, that's Jackson Hol. I was quickly looking at Google Maps here while you were talking to see how close we were to Jackson Hole in that town hall. It was about a two hour drive. So she was in real Wyoming. Okay. She wasn't in the ski towns. She was in Pinedale in real Wyoming getting shouted down about Jeffrey Epstein, about the big beautiful bill, et cetera. And you know, I'm sure there are a couple of Democrats in Pinedale, but I think that speaks to the fact that, you know, there's unhappiness out there that is cross partisan in the country.
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Nicole Wallace
It's interesting to me, John Halman, that some of the newest pieces of the Trump coalition seem to be his weakest. You've got, Let me just read this. Reuters has Hispanic voter support showing. Let me just read it. The latest poll showed Hispanics, a group that swung toward Trump in last year's election, have soured on the president. Some 32% approve of his performance in the White House, matching their lowest level of approval for Trump this year. And then the much belly hooed manosphere, here's Joe Rogan on how he feels about how immigration's going.
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Tim Miller
It was a visceral reaction that a lot of people had the idea of people just showing up and pulling people out of schools and pulling people out of Home Depot and pulling people that were just hardworking people that maybe snuck over here because they didn't have a legal way to get over here. But since they've been here, they've been good people and they're a part of communities, communities. And that's what freaks people out. Because when people thought about ice, they thought, great, we're going to get rid of the gang members. They didn't think, great, you're going to get rid of a landscaper.
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Nicole Wallace
Your thoughts?
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Molly Jongfast
Well, you're putting your finger on the most important thing, Nicole. I mean, and I'm just going to try to like connect a few of these dots. Tim just said that, that Trump is not in free fall. He's not in free fall. His, his, he's been underwater in terms of his net approval rating, approval, disapproval since the middle of June. Okay. And it's been pretty constant bumps up and down a Little bit. But he's had this. He's got that net. He's been net negative underwater for now for two solid months on all of the issues that he was strong in on, on inflation and the economy. And obvious he was strong on coming into office on inflation, the economy. That's the first place he went underwater on the issue. He went underwater on that issue in February. He went under underwater on, on trade. He went underwater on trade in March. The only issue, that big issue that he didn't, they didn't go underwater on for a while, long while was immigration. And in the middle of June, he went underwater on immigration. His immigration numbers did tank, in fact, in June, that number tanking is part of why that's the moment when he overall went underwater, because immigration was the strongest issue he had. And to point to the thing that you just mentioned, one of the groups that he suddenly has where the bottom has fallen out, the bottom has fallen out for him with a lot of Hispanic voters who were crucial to his victory in 2024. And a lot of Hispanic voters had the same attitude as Joe Rogan right there, which was they were, to the surprise of some on the left, they wanted to see the border closed. And they're perfectly fine with seeing criminal gang members, actual criminal gang members, actual people who are doing harm to anyone anywhere. They're happy with seeing those people sent home. They are more upset than anyone about the notion of the ICE Secret police rolling up in front of Home Depot, rolling up in front of Circuit City, rolling up in front of wherever and just. And basically tossing people in the back of cars and taking them away. That is a group that makes some really clear distinctions about the kinds of immigration that they are for and the kinds of immigration that they are not for and the kind of deportation that they are for, the kind of deportation they are not for. And if Donald Trump's numbers with Hispanics are collapsing and his numbers with the manosphere are declining, that tells you the story of why he's been underwater all summer. And immigration is that the key is the key to it. He was still a little bit above water overall until the immigration numbers tanked. Once they tanked, that has been the story of why he's now been underwater persistently for two months. And that's the real story, is not that all of a sudden, just the last couple days ago, there's some bad poll where Trump has suddenly taken a dive. You can find polls that show that other polls show other people things. The real story is that Trump has been in Net negative territory now for two solid months. And nothing he's done in two months has changed the fact that there's a six to eight point gap between his approval and disapproval ratings.
- [13:48]
Nicole Wallace
Yeah, I mean, in Molly, this is where it becomes structural. And having worked in politics, I know a lot about structural deficiencies in the polls that can't be fixed. It always happens that a principal or chief of staff or pollster will go to the comms people and say, hey, we're underwater on xyz. Can you fix it? And sometimes you can, but most of the time it's a structural problem. And the structural problem they have is they're pouring gobs and gobs of money into ice. Not to deport the people in jails, to deport the people that Joe Rogan is pissed about them deporting. You don't need to increase ICE's funding tenfold and take agents off crime fighting from the FBI and other DOJ missions to deport people in prisons. They are almost strictly focused on people at work. Those are people with jobs who are. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess. Most organized crime leaders don't have jobs as landscapers. Also most so they are. Their structural problem is that all the money they've grabbed, all the gobs of law enforcement officials they've reassigned from fighting terrorism and crime and other priorities, they have put on the mission of deporting the very people who alienate Hispanic voters, men from the manosphere, independents. They're way underwater with independence. And all the people that attach to the coalition to deliver them their wins in November. How do Democrats take advantage of that structural deficiency for Trump and maga? Yeah.
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John Heilman
And I think your point is a really good point and we're hearing it anecdotally and we're seeing videos. Remember the ICE agent carrying the young student who turned out to be. She was an American citizen. She's very small, so he was carrying her. I mean, this kind of stuff is not the kind of stuff that you can that is going to support you when you're already underwater. And I think the most telling sign in my mind is Donald Trump's call to Greg Abbott. Greg Abbott would not be redistricting those five seats if Donald Trump thought that he had this keep, you know, if he had keeping in the house in the bag. Right. This is. Donald Trump sees what's happening here just as much because the reason you would redistrict to keep these five seats because you were really. Is because you were really worried you were going to lose the House. So I think the good news, and again, the good news for Democrats is, you know, none of this is good. Right. This is all just morally soul crushing. I mean, I was in the car today just thinking about my friend, you know, was hearing a story of a janitor who had gotten deported or is about to get deported. He's in an ICE facility. They hope that they deport him to his native country because if he gets deported to someplace like South Sudan, he will, you know, there are no choices. I don't know how, youyou know, I don't know how that happened. So this is all just so incredibly soul crushing in my mind and just horrible to watch as just a bystander. But, you know, these videos, I think they will keep coming and they will keep making the case here that mass deportation now where they wave the signs, you'll remember from the Republican convention, mass deportation now looks like, like, looks horrible. It looks like the kind of moral thing, the kind of, sort of moral degradation, the kind of, of just horror that none of us wanted even I think on the most craven side. I don't think anyone wanted what we're seeing now.
- [17:26]
Nicole Wallace
So, Tim Miller, to you and to all the smart conversations you have with smart people. How do you operationalize resistance to something that's so profoundly unpopular? That is all the things Molly just said, but that is now been written into policy that has now been funded by all the congressional Republicans laying over for Donald Trump.
- [17:52]
Tim Miller
Yeah, this funding, that's an important part of it, Nicole, what I wanted to kind of talk about, to add on to all this, because Trump is only turning up the heat on this, the actions around immigration and ice. Just because he's gone underwater on this issue in the polls does not mean that they are going to slow down on their operations at all. Just the opposite. And yesterday they rolled out these new kind of fascist trucks and cars that have Trump's name on it with Defend the Homeland, these kind of blood and soil type cars that they're going to be sending to places. They have all this additional funding for deportation centers, all this additional funding for ICE police, new people that are not going to be trained that well. Something that my colleague Adrian Carrasquillo has been covering a lot at the Bulwark. We're going to have Dean Cain out there jumping out of vans and nabbing people. Apparently what he said he was planning on doing on fox. So this is not going to slow down. And so it is incumbent upon the Democrats to, I think, fight on this issue. And I think it's something that we've seen some change from over the past, like eight months with the Democrats where coming into the year they thought immigration was a loser. Trump was popular on this issue. It's not worth fighting on. And I think kind of a combination of things, just how extreme their policies have been, the blowback to what we saw with El Salvador, people like Joe Rogan going out there, I mean, no Democrat wants to feel like they're getting to the right of Joe Rogan on immigration. Right. And so I think there's a combination of things, things where Democrats have gotten some additional courage on this and realize that it can be a winning issue if they focus on the more extreme elements of it, the parts that regular people don't like, which is masked men jumping out of cars and nabbing people on the streets, you know, and nabbing gardeners on the streets, nabbing people who are even American citizens in many cases. You have George Reddes in California. It's that story of the veteran who got tear gassed and nabbed by ICE in California. So I think the Democrats focus on this, those extreme cases, they're going to have 70, 80% of the country on their side. You can see the number continue to move their direction.
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Nicole Wallace
There's so much to unpack because the idea that they were afraid of the politics, because I completely agree with your analysis, but I think they were slow out of the gate. And the fact that they're not going to follow Joe Rogan is, I think a lot of people would argue everything that is wrong in our politics broadly. But I have to sneak in a quick break before we have that conversation. Also ahead for all of us, Trump is once again casting doubt on the security of our elections without any evidence. Thanks in no small bar to comments made by Vladimir Putin, of all people. We'll talk to former Arizona elections official Stephen Richer, who was at the forefront of protecting the 2020 election and pushing back against Donald Trump's big lie. And later in the broadcast, Donald Trump's Epstein problem that just won't go away. The Justice Department has now reluctantly begun to hand over the Epstein files to Congress. Donald Trump's former attorney General Bill Barr testified behind closed doors for House Committee. We'll tell you about all of that, all those stories and more when Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere. Today.
- [21:06]
MSNBC presents the chart topping original podcast, the Best People with Nicole Wallace. Each week, Nicole speaks with some of the people who inspire her the most. This week, she sits down with podcaster John Lovett. The more you can make that big.
- [21:22]
Group of pro democracy Americans feel like.
- [21:24]
Stephen Richer
They'Re part of one big movement, the more powerful that gets and the more success we'll have.
- [21:28]
Nicole Wallace
The best people with Nicole Wallace Listen now wherever you get your podcasts.
- [21:35]
Tim Miller
Hey everyone, it's Chris Hayes. This week on my podcast, why Is this Happening? China expert Bill Bishop. They position themselves as look, we are country that cares about the most important existential issue most countries have, which is climate change. You know, we are the ones who are now in a position to help you deliver the goods and fix that. And it is very useful on several levels for them. It's also very useful in their ongoing long term competition with the U.S. that's.
- [21:59]
John Heilman
This Week on why Is this Happening?
- [22:00]
Tim Miller
Search for why Is this Happening? Wherever you're listening right now and follow.
- [22:04]
Nicole Wallace
Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts for early access, ad free listening and bonus content to all of MSNBC original podcasts including the chart topping series the Best People with Nicole Wallace. Why Is this Happening? Main justice and more. Plus new episodes of all your favorite MSNBC shows ad free and ad free listening to all of Rachel Maddow's original series, Ultra Bagman and Deja News. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [22:36]
Tim Miller
It's interesting the Epstein situation was not an issue during the Biden administration. Yes, I'm hoping by the end of this August recess that we get back.
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Molly Jongfast
In September the information will be available to us.
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Tim Miller
So we're very interested in the exiting files.
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Molly Jongfast
I think it's a bad look to.
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Tim Miller
Have this information suppressed, but there's also.
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Molly Jongfast
People involved in the way those files at some level need to be redacted.
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Tim Miller
So.
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Molly Jongfast
Beautiful answer.
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Nicole Wallace
Molly. There's people in the files whose names need to be redacted is not how you address a conspiracy theory deeply embedded in your own political coalition about names that have been hidden from public scrutiny. I mean, even when they're trying to blame Biden, they can't get out of their own way on this issue. And it's like month three. I don't remember the day that Elon Musk tweeted Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. That is the first day we covered it as a show as anything other than a heinous crime that happened during the first Trump presidency, but as a political scandal where the kindling was sort of created by MAGA and the match lit by Elon Musk. And now burning deep inside the Trump coalition, they cannot stop fanning the flames.
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John Heilman
Yeah. And remember there's reporting that says that they went through it. FBI agents went through the file, redacted a bunch of names, found Trump's name in that file. Again, having your name in the file does not mean in any way that you have committed a crime. But I would not hype it up if my name were in it. And so the question is, there's been so much talk. Pam Bondi said it was on her desk. So if it's on your desk, release it. I mean, the whole idea that they're gonna hide behind the courts, they're gonna say, we need this court documents. This is ridiculous. Right? There are thousands, tens of thousands of pages. They went, you know, they're at the doj, they are sitting there. They can release them, or there's a reason why they're not releasing them. And I think that binary has created a lot of problems for Republicans, right? Because either you're releasing it or there's a reason why you're not releasing it. And there's just not much middle ground to occupy there. And so you really have gotten in a real trap. And by the way, you know, you'll remember that Congress was sent home a couple of days early because Mike Johnson did not want to vote on the Epstein stuff. So to think that they're going to come back in September and this is no longer going to be an issue, I think is pretty optimistic.
- [25:45]
Nicole Wallace
It's so amazing, Heilman, that Democrats leave a legislative chamber to save democracy, Republicans leave to hide the Epstein files. Like, I feel like one of the dynamics in our politics for the last nine years has been that MAGA was this thing that MAGA members, if, you know, a Trump supporter, they think he's funny, they want to be at his rallies, they want to be around him. It's become quite buzzkilly lately. You know, let's leave before we do anything strong around the Epstein files. It shows us to be on the side that is against child pedophiles. I mean, these are sex criminals whose crimes were carried out against children, against young girls. But we're going to put our tail between our leg and go home and look weak and lame and get screamed at by our own voters in a plus 50 Trump state. They look not fun, they look not strong, and they look not on the side for going after pedophiles. Right?
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Molly Jongfast
And I think, Nicole, look, I'm not sure that a lot of these of the MAGA members of Congress ever were that much fun. They're certainly not fun to me. And I don't Think they're fun to you?
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Nicole Wallace
I don't think so or anybody else.
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Molly Jongfast
On the panel, but I even think a fair number of MAGA voters, it's not like they've been infatuated with their own congressmen or their own congresswoman. They've just, they're just, they're, in fact, they've been infatuated with Trump. And, and so anybody. This is why, you know, you're loyal to Trump and so you get the benefit of, of that with that constituency. But it's not because, like, you know, a lot of these people are more fun than the barrel of monkeys or that, that the people show up at the MAGA rallies because, you know, if you took Trump out of a MAGA rally and you just put up, you know, four congress people from Alabama, four congresspeople from Arizona, or two congresspeople, one congressman from Wyoming, it's not like there'd be a giant crowd for Harriet Hageman except to yell at her last night. I think the thing that's the reality is that the real question. I agree with everything Molly just said. I don't think this is going to go away, this issue, the Epstein issue. And I don't think that the reality of, and what's been exposed here, the reason why his followers look so weak is because he has looked so weak in response to this issue. Right. And they don't. They always just look to him. They look to him. They look to him as a weather vane. Oh, Trump's giving us the line we're supposed to follow. We just follow that line, we'll be okay with our voters. We don't have to be particularly charismatic. We don't have to be particularly intelligent. We don't have to have a particular backbone. But if we do what Trump is doing and say what Trump is, is saying, we'll be safe. And you looked at the way Trump reacted to the Epstein files, to the Epstein scandal, and it was. He was himself looked weak, looked indecisive, changed his story constantly, didn't do the forthright thing, didn't make good on the promises. He looked, he gave them no clear direction. And so that, I think, explains as much as anything, even more than the fact that he didn't want to take a vote on releasing the files. They were just, like, looking to the way they always look. They looked to the North Star, Donald Trump, and he was not there effectively for them, because there was no way to say, oh, well, Trump's got it, got it. Trump's got it handled. Trump's Got an answer for this? We'll just say what Trump's saying and that'll shut him up. That didn't really work. And so their hope was that they would buy themselves some time, run back home, and this issue would disappear from the headlines and so therefore would disappear from their districts. Unfortunately, the reason this issue is potent is that this is not an issue, as we've said a hundred times, that was driven by media coverage. This is an issue that was driven by the conspiracy theory. Right. And it was organic. It was coming up from the bottom. So the fact that there haven't been as many Epstein headlines in the last couple weeks has nothing to do with the way that people who care about this issue. Care about this issue. They cared about it when the media wasn't covering it and in fact thought that was part of the conspiracy and they care about it now. And that's what a lot of these Republicans are hearing when they got back home, which is, oh, God, this isn't a safe harbor. And we still don't have an answer from Donald Trump. What are we going to do? Where are we going to go? Try somewhere offshore, guys. Maybe in the Bahamas, but not anywhere in any magna. Any MAGA districts in America right now.
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Nicole Wallace
I think that the importance of this story, Tim, is that any way you try to say you cannot get away from the fact that girls were sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, and the fact pattern has gotten worse since Trump became president because Ghislaine Maxwell went from a low security prison to a much more comfortable prison that's so comfortable they allow the inmates to train service animals. But she's such a heinous criminal that all the programs at this lower security prison are not available to her. She's an outlier at her own prison. So anything that Trump or the Republican sycophants want to do to protect Trump from Jeffrey Epstein can't really be accepted by anyone with a brain or with eyes or ears because the facts are still playing out. Ghislaine Maxwell is still around. And since Trump has been president, her circumstances went from being in prison to being in a much, much less strict prison. That's a fact.
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Tim Miller
Yeah. And because of the way they've handled this, the facts are going to continue to play out all the way into 2027. And, you know, because to John's point, a lot of this is driven by people on the right and by right media, a lot of interest. So not all of them are going to be like waiting with bated breath for what a Democratic Democratic House potentially would do from an oversight standpoint. But I was interviewing Hakeem Jeffries last week and I asked about this. I was like, if you get the gavel, will you guys do a oversight hearing on Epstein? And the answer is obviously yes, right? They will have to, because there's a cover up. We know for a fact there's a Microsoft share file that has a list of all the times Trump was mentioned. We don't know how he was mentioned or what, or whether it's significant or insignificant, but they covered it up. And so if the Democrats ever gain power again, they will obviously want to look at that information and that will reveal other information about maybe other people. And, you know, the media cycle will continue again. And so they've handled this in such a way that it's not going to go away. And I think, interestingly, they've handled it in such a way that the House Republicans, the Congressional Republicans, maybe more broadly, I think are carrying the biggest political brunt because they don't have that shield of Donald Trump where the voters are mad at, kind of mad at Trump, right? But they're like, oh, well, is it Pam Bondi's fault? Is it the House Republicans fault? Like, we can't get mad at Trump over this, the core Trump supporters. And so what you have here is this, these Congressional Republicans who just look so weak, like they're not doing what they've, what they promised their voters they would do, what Mike Johnson promised voters he would do over and over again. And they're running away at this time where you see Trump kind of out there, you know, he's at least doing stuff. He's doing the Putin summit, he's doing various other things where he's at least staying visible because he's Donald Trump and he won't ever go away even for a second. And so I've seen this in MAGA media outlet. They're like, where is Congress? Congress has been gone hiding because of this Epstein story for weeks now. They're doing nothing. They're not advancing any of our interests and they're not giving us this Epstein information. So Trump has really put them in a pickle. In particular, I think.
- [33:13]
Nicole Wallace
Tim, Hugh and Molly stick around. John Howman, thank you for starting us off today. We will see you soon, my friend. Coming up next for us, Donald Trump chooses to believe Vladimir Putin again over many of those who served him in his first term as president. This time it's about mail in voting. We'll show it to you next.
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- [34:21]
You know, Vladimir Putin.
- [34:22]
Tim Miller
Said something, one of the most interesting things.
- [34:25]
Nicole Wallace
He said your election was rigged because you have mail in voting. He said mail in voting every election.
- [34:32]
Tim Miller
He said no country has mail in voting.
- [34:35]
Nicole Wallace
It's impossible to have mail in voting.
- [34:37]
Tim Miller
And have honest election.
- [34:38]
Nicole Wallace
But Vladimir Putin, smart guy, said you.
- [34:42]
Tim Miller
Can'T have an honest election with mail in voting.
- [34:45]
Nicole Wallace
And he said there's not a country.
- [34:47]
Tim Miller
In the world that uses it.
- [34:48]
Nicole Wallace
Now. A veritable litany of lies can be found in those comments. The 2020 election was not rigged. Donald Trump lost. And many, many other countries also have mail in voting. The comments are also a really important and revealing look at just how much sway Putin has with Trump, just how imprinted every word he says becomes on Donald Trump's mind. He seemed to recite exactly what Putin said. Putin is clearly looking to Donald Trump and using this misinformation as a tool to sow chaos here in the United States ahead of our next election. So not only is Donald Trump taking election advice from an autocrat who won 88% of the vote in whatever Russia calls an election, he's repeating those lies and undermining a method of voting that helped him win the presidential election in November. According to Politico, quote, republicans poured tens of millions of of dollars last year into convincing their voters that casting ballots by mail was safe after Trump spent years bashing the practice and baselessly insisting it was rife with fraud. And it worked with Republican voters closing or even reversing the mail voting gap with Democrats in several states. Joining our conversation is former county recorder of Maricopa County, Arizona, senior fellow in American Democracy at Harvard University University. Steven Richer is here. Molly and Tim are with us as well. Stephen, thank you so much for being here. I just, I wonder how you, how you feel sort of having to protect democracy from American disinformation, hearing an American president amplify and repeat and spread Russian disinformation. What does that do to your very informed synapses well, you don't have to.
- [36:44]
Stephen Richer
Be terribly well informed to know you shouldn't take your election administration cues from a dictator, especially from a dictator from Russia. But I've been coming on this show for four years and I'll say what I've always said, which was the 2020 election wasn't stolen. Mail in voting is not rife with fraud. The 2024 election had mail in voting, and the 2024 election wasn't stolen and Donald Trump won it. So I don't know why he's talking about this now, other than, I guess, Putin talked to him. But the next thing you know is Putin's gonna say, hey, you know, what's even better is just not having elections at all. And maybe you should try that.
- [37:23]
Nicole Wallace
Stephen, I just wanna continue to put the facts out there, as you always do when you're here. This is from the New York Times reporting about how much Trump benefited from mail in voting. The Times reports this quote. Pennsylvania, widely seen as the most famous important presidential battleground, had one of the greatest swings in male voting. Its share of male voters who were registered Republicans jumped to 33% in 2024 from 24% in 2020. In deep red, Oklahoma, Kansas and Iowa. Republicans made up a majority of male voters in last year's election after Democrats dominated those states in 2020. And in Arizona, the swing state where a vast majority of voters cast their ballots by mail, Republicans had an eight point advantage over Democrats in mail voting. What does it say that a tool that benefits not just Republicans, but Trump is something that he'll so easily cast, you know, overboard because Putin says so?
- [38:23]
Stephen Richer
I don't know. But it's got to be very frustrating to Republican political strategists who, as you noted, spent many millions of dollars in 2024 convincing Republicans just to vote, vote in any way possible, Vote by mail, vote in person. But I'll tell you, actually, political strategists like it when you vote by mail, when you vote early, because then they don't have to spend those depleting resources, those last minutes, convincing Republican voters to show up on Election Day. So a lot of strategists really like it. Again, it's been around for a long time. These are not new practices. President Trump himself has voted by mail in many past elections. And so I don't know what triggered this in his brain. It seemed like 24 worked out pretty well for him. Confidence in American elections was at a very high level in the beginning of 2025. So why he's revisiting this now, again, I can't point to anything other than his conversation with President Putin, which is alarming on many levels.
- [39:24]
Nicole Wallace
And since this is sort of in your sight line every day, where are your greatest and gravest concerns about the state of American democracy today?
- [39:35]
Stephen Richer
I think a lot of people are looking at cybersecurity within election administration because of the President's defunding of CISA and his efforts to reform the Election Assistance Commission. But I'm looking at the same thing that I've been looking at for the past four, four years, which is the accuracy of information about elections. And the president obviously just derailed us again with respect to that because he said that tabulation machines aren't used in any other country. Well, they're used in lots of other countries. And you can figure that out with a 5 second Google search. He says that tabulation machines are slow, expensive and inaccurate, when in fact, every single study has found that these same tabulators that are used to grade SAT tests, where you would fill in the ovals, are the same tabulators that are being used just to read the ovals on your ballot. They've been used for many decades. They're fast, they're inexpensive, and they are very, very, very accurate because they have to be in order to be certified by his US Elections Assistant Commission.
- [40:43]
Nicole Wallace
Stephen, can I ask you to stick around? I want to bring Molly and Tim in on this conversation on the other side of a very short break. We'll all be right back. We're back with Stephen, Molly and Tim. Tim, I think for a lot of democracy watchers, this is the nightmare scenario. Attacking our elections, rigging our elections. It's not just the gerrymandering, it's the attacks on the actual way people vote. What are your thoughts on how vigorously or not vigorously it's being protected?
- [41:18]
Tim Miller
Well, I think it needs to be protected much more vigorously. And I think we need to learn from 2020. Look, none of us can get inside Donald Trump's brain, thank goodness. I'm open to the theory that maybe just Vladimir Putin just has some magic spell over him and anything Vladimir Putin says, he reiterates. I think that could be one theory, but I think that there's another likely reason why he's targeting mail in voting or other types of voting right now. And it's something that we've all lived through. It's something that Stephen lived through most acutely in 2020, which is laying the groundwork for contesting the election. If it goes away, he doesn't like, and I think that this is as simple as that. We're re looking at stop the steal 2.0. He's starting it early. He started that early, really back in 2020. It's just a lot of us didn't take it that seriously in 2019. But he's throwing this chum in the water now. He's laying the groundwork. And so if hypothetically, I don't know, the Democrats win the House by three or four votes next time in a close election, and there's some close races in states with mail in voting, like Arizona or Colorado or California or Nevada, that he will do what he did in 2020 and try to contest the election and prevent those elections from being certified. I think it's pretty clear that that is what is at least an option that they're keeping open. And I think that threat, to me is the most acute. I think actual protection of the elections is very important too. But I think that post election 2026 time is what we're already seeing. Kind of a Groundhog Day preview of Molly.
- [42:51]
Nicole Wallace
It's so interesting because you can make an intellectual argument to a Trump voter that how can it be rigged if Trump won and was, you know, how is it handled differently in 2020 than 24? They only have an emotional reaction to the outcome. And so I wonder how you walk through this strange new world we live in where a good sort of 30%, 40% of the electorate only trusts elections in which their chosen candidate prevails.
- [43:24]
John Heilman
Yeah. And I think the question is, what happens with the rest of America? Right. Who stands up for American democracy when it doesn't go the way they want? And, you know, we have not seen a lot of bravery from pretty much anyone. Right. Billion. From billionaires to, you know, Republican politicians to the Supreme Court, everyone has basically rubber stamped anything Donald Trump wants to do. So there is going to be a moment where we're gonna need for democracy to keep going, people are going to have to stand up. And that's gonna mean people who are Republicans, members of the Supreme Court, they're gonna have to say, like, this election was free and fair and certified. And you'll remember this Supreme Court did in fact do that in 2020. They did not take up Trump's many, many cases. So I think there's a real question about whether that moment will happen. And that is perhaps the most, if you're going to be concerned about anything, that would strike me as the most disconcerting.
- [44:30]
Nicole Wallace
Stephen, what's your advice for the pro democracy side? In this moment.
- [44:37]
Stephen Richer
You know, I spent the last four years trying to win people over with facts and with logic and with arguments. I don't know how successful that was. And so I would say bring them in, befriend them, build roads, build bridges, show them the machinery, show them the mechanics, get them working the process. I'm a bit at a loss because everything that we seem to do didn't have much of an impact on confidence. The one thing that did have an impact on confidence in the election process was Donald Trump winning. And so now I'm simply trying to point out when his lies about elections are as clear as day so we can start building that narrative and say, see, he lied to you on something as simple as whether other countries allow mail voting. They do. He said they didn't. So when we get closer to November 2026 and those lies become more meaningful, we'll hopefully have this whole track record built up and maybe, just maybe, some people will find it more believable. I bet Tim's very skeptical of that.
- [45:50]
Nicole Wallace
Well, we'll continue to have this conversation because I think on the profact side, if it's all we've got, we just have to keep repeating them. Stephen Richard, Molly Jongfast and Tim Miller, thank you so much for having this conversation with us. One more break for us. We'll be right back.
- [46:09]
John Heilman
The speaker made an announcement and said that any Democrat who had denied quorum would only be allowed to leave the building if they signed a permission slip agreeing to be under the custody and control of dps. I refuse. I just had enough. I've had enough of this bullying tactics that they use against those who are part of the minority party in terms of being the Democrats. They just continue to bully us.
- [46:44]
Nicole Wallace
That was Texas State Representative Nicole Collier speaking to a producer for the Rachel Maddow show last night. She was explaining that she is now refusing to leave the Austin State House chamber because Republicans are demanding that Democrats agree to a round the clock security escorts in order to be released from the building. The Democrats returned yesterday to their state after holding up the special legislative session meant to redraw congressional maps for weeks. They have now set up an around the clock live video feed and are bringing their colleague food and snacks as she passes the 24 hour mark. She has said she will sleep on the House floor until Labor Day if she has to. She tells NBC News this today, quote, I see it. The writing is on the wall. They want power at all costs and you're not taking it from me without a fight. The Texas state House reconvenes Wednesday morning. We'll keep you updated on how she's doing coming up in the next hour of deadline. White House A bombshell from a House Democrat today that Donald Trump's former AG Bill Barr, did not clear Trump wrongdoing in the Epstein case. We'll bring you that story next. Don't go anywhere.