← Deadline: White House
Deadline: White House
“The gears of democracy creaking back into action”
00:41:45
Nicolle Wallace covers how the justice system is beginning to limit the federal government’s immigration authorities’ impunity. Federal judges have picked ICE apart for violating nearly 100 court orders in the name of Trump’s aggressive crackdown on illegal immigration.
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- [00:00]
Narrator/Announcer
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- [00:19]
Nicole Wallace
Download Today home to the Rachel Maddow Show, Morning Joe, the Briefing with Jen Psaki and more voices you know and trust. Ms. NOW is your source for news, opinion and the Our name is new, but you'll find the same commitment to justice, progress and the truth that you've relied on for decades. We'll continue to cover the day's news, ask the tough questions and explain how it impacts you.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Ms. Now.
- [00:47]
Nicole Wallace
Same mission, new name. Learn more at Ms. Now.
- [00:57]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Hi there everybody, it's Bob. Four o' clock in New York. With pro democracy forces now wide awake and surging in terms of their numbers and courage dug in on one side and Donald Trump with his band of autocratic enablers on the other, the country in some ways feels like it's engaged in a game of chicken, waiting to see which side's going to blink first. A stare down, if you will, where the stakes are nothing less than the future of American democracy today, though, following the fatal shootings of two people in Minneapolis at the hands of federal immigration officers, and subsequently, the breathtaking durability and scope of protests from ordinary citizens braving the bitter cold to protect their neighbors, hitting the pavement in protest all across our country day after day. It is the Trump side doing the blinking. Now why could that be? Well, because the gears of democracy, cobwebs and all, are finally creaking back into action on three separate but important fronts today. First, in statehouses from coast to coast, New York Times reports this quote. Ever since the second Trump administration embarked on its large scale deportation efforts, Democratic leaning states have proposed and passed in some instances, countermeasures, such as banning masked or unidentified law enforcement officers. Last month, a dozen legislators from seven states announced that they would coordinate legislation in 2026 to complement the litigation already being used by Democratic attorneys general to challenge immigration policies. But after the killings of both Mr. Preddy and Renee Goode, a resident protesting ISIS presence in the Twin Cities, those endeavors have gained more urgency. That's according to lawmakers and immigration rights groups. The jet fuel possibly animating that urgency happens to be the second of those three fronts we talked about that is us, the American people at large, in growing numbers, because voters right now are making it abundantly clear that they are not interested in waiting the nine months between now and the midterms. They're using their feet, they're using their body. They're putting Donald Trump and the Republicans on notice that they do not approve of what they're doing, especially the extreme immigration measures being carried out against human beings, including American citizens, in the name of the American people. Tomorrow at this time, it's possible it is likely that we could be covering widespread protests and possibly there's some talk that we could also be covering some general strikes in some parts of the country. There's a third front, our justice system. Just in the last 24 hours, judges in separate cases have acted decisively to try to rein in the seeming impunity of Donald Trump's immigration policies and authorities. In one instance, a federal judge in Minnesota ordered the government to cease detaining and deporting refugees who were lawful admitted to our country and immediately release those currently held for reexamination of their cases. In another, a federal judge picked ICE apart. That judge said that ICE has violated nearly 100 court orders as part of with our branding as an aggressive crackdown from that ruling. Quote, this list of violated court orders should give pause to anyone, no matter his or her political beliefs about who cares about the rule of law. ICE has likely violated more court orders in January 2026 than some federal agencies have violated in their entire existence. ICE is not a law unto itself. ICE has every right to challenge the orders of this court. But like any litigant, ICE must follow those orders unless and until they are overturned or vacated. These three buckets, these three avenues of pressure are clearly registering with Donald Trump and the White House. As part of that game of chicken we talked about, Donald Trump is going about some subtle changes to his immigration language and his enforcement policies as the pro democracy forces in America muster their might ahead of tomorrow and whatever comes next. That is where we start today with some of our most favorite reporters and friends. Publisher of the Bulwark, host of the focus group podcast Sarah Longwell is here, my friend and colleague, senior political analyst, contributing host of Pod Save America, host of the podcast Runaway Country, Alex Wagner is back with us. And former top DOJ official legal analyst Andrew Weissman is here as well. Sarah Longwell, let me start with you. What do you see happening in the country in terms of the public mood?
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Sarah Longwell
Well, you know, I listen to voters week in and week out in Focus groups. And I cannot overstate how big of a shift there has been on just Minneapolis. And one of the things I want to start out with is just the fact that everybody knows what is happening. You know, I talk a lot about what it takes to break through in this noisy information environment. You know, voters, often we will be talking about something on this show or in Washington and voters won't have heard about it. Not only has everybody heard about these shootings, but everybody's seen the videos, they've examined them for themselves. And people were already deeply uneasy after the shooting of Renee Goode. But to have a second shooting with Alex Preddy where, I gotta say, for voters, the Preddy shooting is just much more clear cut. They, they, they looked at the, the Renee Goode one and you know, people were able to tell themselves, well, she was in the car and how was the car turning? The, the mask agents, six of them, jumping on Alex Preddy, shooting him in the back, him clearly having his hands up, just trying to defend a woman that an ICE agent had. Sh has created a really different environment where people are now saying they are fed up with these sort of overzealousness of these ICE agents, the fact that they're paroling the streets in masks, the backlash. And look, obviously hardcore Trump voters, many of them will stick with him on this, but the vast majority of the country is just reaching kind of a tipping point on not only do they think this is wrong, what is happening, right? They hired Trump to secure the border, they hired Trump to deport dangerous criminals from the country, but they did not want this people in our streets. The other thing is Donald Trump is not doing the thing that voters hired him to do the most. Right. If the economy was booming and people's prices were going down, they might, sometimes voters can forgive Trump for a lot of the things he does in that context. But at a time when Trump is not addressing their concerns and, and he's creating chaos in the streets and they're shooting Americans, that's when you start to see public opinion really start to move.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Sarah Longwell the child separation practice has been, thanks to people like Jacob Soboroff and other great journalism and activists has been part of the Trump story. But to your point, people are now focusing in on the plight of young, young children like Liam Ramos, who was used, not just detained in Minneapolis, but used as bait to lure out other family members. At a time when, to your point, everyone has seen the images of how Alex Pruddy was killed. I wonder if the whole project of going after the worst, of the worst has now been blown apart as a lie.
- [08:31]
Sarah Longwell
Yeah, I mean, look, there's a few lies, actually that American voters understand. And again, I just can't overstate how interesting it is to me to hear Trump voters and many of the people we've been talking to have been Trump voters talking about Ramos, talking about. I mean, they know these stories and many of them are calling for Kristi Noem to be impeached or gotten rid of, which I was actually pretty surprised to hear Trump voters saying. Now these are swingier voters, people who went from Biden to Trump. But they say this idea of using kids as bait, of going into schools, of going into churches, these are the kinds of things that Americans reject. They say, yes, get dangerous criminals, but somebody who's been here for 20 years, like, don't come into our streets and start dragging our neighbors out. Like they want a policy solution to it, but they do want people to be treated humanely. Like the American people have not lost every sense of what is decent and what is right. And they think that using kids as bait is wrong. Separating kids from their families is wrong. That was true in the Trump first administration and it's true now.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Sir, I think we have some footage from your focus groups. Let me play that for our viewers.
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Andrew Weissman
Whenever there's a highly publicized police shooting and it's getting publicized because there's questions over whether it was a good shoot, I think in law enforcement there's usually a. Well, you have to put yourself in that moment. You have to understand they're making a quick decision. You have to understand, like law enforcement is usually quick to, I don't want to say defend, but kind of explain or justify why it was a good shooter, a bad shoot. And over the last few weeks, months, year, it's getting harder and harder for people around me to have like a good faith conversation about why something was a good shooting. I don't know anybody who saw the video. The most recent one in Minneapolis, isa single handedly set police back easily 100 to 50 to 100 years. Easily. I'm glad that I medicald out because I would kind of hate to be a cop right now. Because you're dealing with. Because what one badge does, everybody gets blamed for it.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Now, Sarah, explain who these voters are.
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Sarah Longwell
Yeah, so we just did this group last night. And these are law enforcement officers, Some of them are correctional officers, many of them are beat cops, some of them are federal law enforcement. But they're all people who have operated in law enforcement communities and they were all, they did all vote for, for Kamala Harris. We are doing two groups. We're going to do another one tonight of people who, let's say are, are more Trump friendly and we'll see how different those are. But in this particular group, it wasn't just that they were all talking about how this made law enforcement look bad, how it broke trust with the people that they're supposed to be protecting. Could also just feel like they were sad, they were devastated by what was happening. Like they're cops who feel like their duty is to protect people. And I think watching, especially for law enforcement, and I think you're going to hear more of this, watching people who are not trained, who treat people horribly, who shoot quickly and thoughtlessly and taking American lives and creating chaos in the streets. They view that as something that is going to. Because ICE are not the same. Right. As the police officers that we deal with every day or border patrol is not the same. But they feel like what it is going to do is break the trust between the American people and law enforcement writ large. And that that's something that you can't just get back in a day.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Alex, the polling is so stark. I'll share with you FOX News version of voter sentiment on this issue. Voters who think ICE has been too aggressive since July. You've now got almost 60% of all voters think ICE has been too aggressive. Among moderates and independents, it's 70 and 71% and a quarter of Trump voters now think that ICE has been too aggressive.
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Nicole Wallace
Yeah, I mean, I think what we have seen, part of what is undergirding that is not just the horror of the video and the evidence that everyone in this country has probably seen or at least heard of at this point. It is the unusual alliances that have formed in and around this. And Sarah mentions law enforcement as being concerned about what this does to the American understanding of law enforcement more broadly. But I will tell you as someone who's just on the ground in Minnesota, there is a real understanding that ICE is not the police. And I will give you an example. I was at a vigil last night that was organized by a lot of nurses to honor Alex Preddy's life. And it was at the site where he was murdered. And the vigil grew to like hundreds of people. It was totally impromptu. It wasn't organized in any sort of hierarchical fashion. It was, you know, people playing trumpets and bagpipes. And it was equal measures, joyful and sorrowful. And as this thing grew, the cops that were at the end of the street, sort of looked at what was happening and said, you know what? We're gonna close the street down so that these people can honor his memory in peace and not be bothered by traffic. And you see activists on the ground, really, I think, and Minnesota is a specific case because of George Floyd and the ways in which that police department really tried to overhaul its practices and rethink its relationship to the community. But there is a very clear understanding that the police and in some cases the National Guard, who've been passing out hot chocolate and donuts to activists, are not on the side of ice. And I think when you see that alignment, coupled with the strange uniqueness of Alex Preddy as a character, as someone who was serving veterans, as someone who was a gun owner, a legal gun owner, and he, Dana Lash from the nra, is coming out and talking about why his death was wrongful and how you can't malign someone for being a gun owner. This unusual coalition of groups that have traditionally trended right, being aligned with either the victim or the movement itself, I think makes this much more of a bipartisan concern for the American voter. And that's maybe in part why you're seeing those numbers so staggering when it comes to independents who have moved away from Trump on immigration.
- [14:58]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
You know, Andrew Weissman, the scope of the political story is so unprecedented in the second Trump term that we haven't mentioned what would normally be the first thing we would all talk about, which is that ICE has ignored 100 court orders. What, what is the remedy for that?
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Andrew Weissman
So, you know, the two stories fit together. I mean, the idea of being lawless and the court pointing it out, and then people are reacting to basically two very specific instances. Ms. Good. And Mr. Preddy, this is where I, I actually. Well, I, I agree with everyone that there's a change in mood, there's a change in momentum. There's people who are waking up to this, but I'm afraid that people are not, and that. Let's just take the courts something. I know the chief judge who wrote the decision that said you're ignoring 100 orders. Well, he had ordered the head of the acting head of DHS to sort of an ICE to appear in front of him. And he said, but if you release this one person before Friday, you don't need to come. Well, I'm sorry. Did the guy, he, the judge was saying, he. That that ICE had violated a court order. You don't get to purge that by just releasing somebody if they have violated 100 court orders, the courts can do something about it. Lindsey Halligan is no longer the U S. Attorney because the judges in the Eastern district of Virginia took action. They said that is a form of fraud. They said if people show up in the U S. Attorney's office and have her name on the docket, there can be subjected to being disbarred. So I just don't think it is. It's fine to write in an order that says all that, we cover it, but it's not putting teeth into it. And just to continue on the note, teeth, what are teeth though?
- [17:08]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
What does that look like? What would that look like to put teeth into it?
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Andrew Weissman
So what you can do is you can say you're going to be held in contempt, you can find them, you can have an injunction, you can put them in jail, you can, I mean, there's so much you can do. You know, one of the things that, that I think people should be focusing on is saying, where's the state investigation? Why is it, if Donald Trump really means what he says, that there's going to be some sort of reform, why is the state not being allowed to do an independent investigation? Why is I still seizing telephones from people? The only reason we know about this is because people use the weapon of a telephone to video. But ICE is still taking those in violation of the first Amendment. Why isn't that being changed? And Tom Homan is not exactly the greatest answer here when he still has not released the tape recording that apparently exists that records his allegedly taking $50,000 in cash. But he's supposed to be the person who's going to suddenly rectify everything. I mean there's, there's just so much that I'm concerned this is going to be, to the vernacular, lipstick on a pig. And it's not going to really be fundamental change and frankly the kind of change that would honor the lives of Ms. Good and Mr. Preddick.
- [18:34]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Well, and I think importantly the degree of attention to detail that the public is paying probably won't allow things that are half measures to be the thing that ends. So I think people, people have gotten the message that no one is coming to save anybody and so they're protecting their own neighbors. I want to press all of you on that. Glenn Thrush has some fantastic new reporting about the View on all of this from the so called Justice Department. I'll read that to you on the other side of a break. And we have Glenn here to talk to us about it. Also ahead, Democrats are asking what on earth was the Country's Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard doing at an election office in the swing state of Georgia. How the FBI raid of an election office that was the center of Donald Trump's election conspiracies is raising alarm bells today. And later in the broadcast from late night postings freeze to one European leader saying that he was, quote, shocked by Donald Trump's psychological state. The questions around Donald Trump's health and fitness are mounting today as the Trump administration mounts an all hands on deck effort to dismiss those concerns. Before we go to break, reaction continues to pour in from the sports world to the Trump administration's brutal immigration tactics and the shooting death of Alex Preddy. NBA star Donovan Mitchell weighed in earlier this week.
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Greg Bluestein
It's violence, like senseless violence, right? Like it's one of those things where.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
There'S a human element into all this, right? Like, you know what I mean?
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Greg Bluestein
And we were there for the first one and then to see it happen.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Again, like just, it's like it's become the norm. I have family who are came to this country, right. You know what I mean?
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Greg Bluestein
And they fear for their lives.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
They fear and they're legal citizen like, they fear. And I don't, I don't know the.
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Greg Bluestein
Whole situation of the people that got.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
You know, murdered, but I do know.
- [20:33]
Greg Bluestein
That this is, it's BS.
- [20:41]
Narrator/Announcer
As President Trump continues implementing his ambitious agenda. Follow along with the MSNow newsletter Project 47. You'll get weekly updates sent straight to your inbox with expert analysis on the administration's latest actions and how they're affecting the American people.
- [20:58]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
The American people are basically telling the.
- [20:59]
Nicole Wallace
President that they are not okay with any of this.
- [21:02]
Narrator/Announcer
Sign up for the Project 47 newsletter at Ms. Now, Project 47.
- [21:12]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
I want to bring into our conversation New York Times Justice Department reporter Glenn Thrush. Glenn, I'm going to read from your fantastic reporting on doj. But first, your sort of view on what we're watching, what we're covering.
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Narrator/Announcer
The question is, are we at an inflection point or are we kind of at a deflection point? Are we just going to sort of see the administration recede until the public outcry kind of, kind of lessens, or are we going to see a real recalibration? And I don't even with the polling that we've seen over the last couple weeks, I think that is very much an open question. We might sort of see things muted. Homan being in Minnesota changes the dynamic significantly. There is no love lost for Greg Bovino. But remember, for whoever is sort of running the day to day of these things, Donald Trump is president of the United States. And for all the talk of Stephen Miller and everyone else, this is Donald Trump's policy and he owns it.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
I mean, Glenn, to that point, it feels like one of the differences. And I don't know if this is the caliber of people around Trump that there's no, you know, not to lionize the people that were around him the first time, but there's no one grounded in reality. And so these people have allowed Noem and Miller to act in ways that Trump's approval ratings are now as low or lower than they were on the issues of immigration and economy than they were during COVID Yeah.
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Narrator/Announcer
And the difference here is Donald Trump's, for all the, for all the baloney about 2028 and the fantasizing about that, Donald Trump's never going to be on a ballot again and all of these other Republicans are going to be on a ballot. And that is a fundamentally different capitalist. And that's why you're hearing a different tenor off the Hill lately.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Okay, let me read from your new reporting on the doj. Bondi and Blanch have tried to refocus public attention on the aggressive tactics of the demonstrators. They've also pushed prosecutors and the FBI to turn up the heat on critics of the immigration crackdown. Politicians, protesters, even relatives of the victims. This strategy has left the U.S. attorney's office in Minneapolis, one of the most respected in the nation, in crisis. On Tuesday, prosecutors in the office's criminal division confronted The Trump appointed U.S. attorney Daniel Rosen and an aide to Todd Blanche, over concerns that they were being asked to execute orders that went against the department's mission and best practices. That's according to four people briefed on that exchange. Some of the prosecutors suggested they were considering resigning in protest, those people said, days after six others had quit over similar concerns. Their departures would exacerbate a staffing shortfall that has already forced the department to shift prosecutors from other jurisdictions to bolster the depleted ranks in Minnesota. If your ICE agents had done nothing wrong, why would DOJ be asking the FBI to, quote, turn up the heat on critics of the immigration crash, track down politicians, protesters and family members of the victims?
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Narrator/Announcer
Well, look, I mean, making this assertion sounds like an editorial opinion, but it is bolstered by fact and buttressed incident after incident after incident. And that is just a very plain fact that the FBI and DOJ have allowed themselves to be turned into a political tool by the White House. I just don't think there's any other way to escape that conclusion. If you look at Pam Bondi, Pam Bondi sent a letter, an extraordinary letter, to Waltz and other officials in Minnesota, essentially, you know, laying out conditions earlier in the week by which ICE would ramp down. And one of those involved turning over or allowing DOJ to have access to voter rolls. I mean, that was. Just think about that. That is absolutely extraordinary. And one of the things that we uncovered in our reporting was that that that was drafted, partially drafted by the White House. There was a tremendous amount of input. And if you needed any proof of that, Donald Trump basically cut and pasted Bondi's letter and put it up on Truth Social. So we're dealing right now. And again, every single time this happens, we've got to wrap our mind around this new reality, and that is DOJ and the FBI, which, for all of their problems, and these are profoundly flawed institutions, were fundamentally working according to a rule book. Now we're working now. They are totally in the service of Donald Trump's political playbook.
- [25:47]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Sarah, does that seem to be breaking through with voters? That it's all in Donald Trump's political mission and service and that there is no part of the federal government looking out for the American people?
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Sarah Longwell
Not sure that that specifically breaks through. I mean, Americans, man, when it comes to the institutions, the big institutions, they are often not following the minutia.
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Greg Bluestein
It.
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Sarah Longwell
I will tell you what has broken through, and this has been pretty striking to me. The fact that Donald Trump, Christy Noem, Stephen Miller all came out and lied about both the shooting of Renee Good and the shooting of Alex Preddy, but especially the shooting of Alex Preddy, that has broken through what the American people are. The fact that there was a video that directly contradicted the idea that he was a domestic terrorist. Terrorist, or that he had come there to do maximum damage. Those types of. That smearing of him is something that voters took note of. They're like, that's not what the video shows. I'm watching it with my own eyes, and I think that that is starting to break through. I. I don't want to say it's creating a legitimacy crisis, because I'm not sure how much legitimacy they actually had with voters. But it is causing people to say, well, we can't trust their. Their statement of events because we can see that they're lying to us.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Yeah. I mean, Alex, I think this is where the cracks in the foundation of their coalition put there by Pam Bondi and Kash Patel and Todd Blanche over their handling of the Epstein investigation and their treatment of the victims who had no political affiliate. I mean, they went to the Capitol, they were eager to meet with Republicans, they were eager to meet with anyone that would help them sort of in their pursuit of accountability and justice. I think that credibility, and I agree, I don't know that it's legitimacy, but credibility even within their own coalition seems to be badly damaged.
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Nicole Wallace
Yeah, and I was with those Epping victims on the Hill. A lot of them were Trump voters.
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Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Right.
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Nicole Wallace
Like the coalition I definitely, I certainly believe is fraying. And it's not helped when someone like Kash Patel says he's gonna tap into signal chats on the part of activists cuz he wants to see if they're putting ICE agents lives in danger. I mean, first of all, this is a group of people that rode into office with paranoid conspiracies about the federal government reaching into the lives of ordinary everyday Americans. And now that the shoes on the other foot is murdering Americans in the street on videotape, lying about it, and then the sort of response to that their cleanup act involves further targeting ordinary everyday American citizens who are lawfully protesting the work of jackbooted thugs in their neighborhoods. You can't even. I don't think there's a pretzel that's twisted enough to account for this sort of moral equivalency that there the insane equivocation that's happening inside the Trump White House to justify these maneuvers. But I do think for a base that believes in transparency, that believes in curbing the overreach of the federal government that is aligned with second amendment principles and believes in the backing the blue. I mean this is just an extraordinary chapter in the Trump administration and its most fervent ally allies of the president. Upending all the norms. Right? Upending all the things, the principles that brought them into office and may I say, ham handedly so, I mean, does anybody believe what Cash Patel who live tweets bad information about his own investigations. Does anybody believe that guy's the sort of the competent one in the room? Or Pam Bondi who said she had all the Epstein files on her desk and then didn't have any files at all. I mean there's a clownishness to the ineptitude in addition to it being just a betrayal of all the principles of maga.
- [29:41]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
I mean there's all of that. Right. Wow. Glenn, I know you're leaving us. Thank you for your reporting and thank you for joining us. For the first half, everyone else sticks around a little bit longer. We will be right back.
- [29:56]
Narrator/Announcer
Start your day with the MSNow Daily Newsletter. Sharp insights from voices you trust, standout moments from your favorite shows, and fresh perspectives from experts shaping the news. Sign up at Ms. Now.
- [30:14]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
We're all back. Andrew Weisman, let me ask you to sort of talk us through the video that emerged last night that shows Alex Preddy engaging immigration officials. It was released, I guess, to show priority participation in the protest activity. And we should say that from our own reporting on the ground. The protesters aren't going out. Once they're out every single day. They're innovating their cold protection. They've got thermoses of I mean, many of them are out every day. But this was some video that emerged of Alex Predding. We'll put it up for our viewers who maybe haven't seen it. My question for you, though, is to Sarah Longwell's point that the country has seen the video of his what has been described by Michael Feinberg and others as execution style killing by ICE with their own eyes and attempts to somehow reverse engineer a motive for killing someone who was in the moment he was killed trying to protect a woman who'd been tear gassed. Seems like again, people have to look at it with their own eyes and reach their own conclusions. It doesn't in itself seem to justify anything that the public is reacting to, including Republicans.
- [31:32]
Sarah Longwell
Right.
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Andrew Weissman
There's no question that it is legally completely irrelevant. You know, the real issue here, if there was a true investigation, would be whether the use of deadly force was justified. And you know, for the life of me, I can't figure out when they kept on shooting at his lifeless, motionless body on the ground how that is even remotely justified, let alone the first shot. And so this is the playbook that Glenn was just talking about, which is to smear the victim. You know, we saw this with Mr. Reaga Garcia where the lawyer, the Trump DOJ lawyer was told to go into court. He has sworn to this, what, he's now a whistleblower after he was fired. And he said, I was told to go into court and say that Mr. Abrego Garcia is a terrorist. And he said, what are the facts to support that? I'm not going to do it. The only reason to say that is to so that we will care less about the person and think he's not entitled to due process or why should I really care? That's the same thing that's being reported that is going on at the Justice Department where they're saying we Want you to investigate the victims. There's reports of investigating Ms. Good and Ms. Good's widow for. For God's sake. And so it's the same playbook. And that's why there this. Nothing's really going to change unless that changes where that is unacceptable. Putting in a new leader, swooping, swapping out like, you know, a deck chair on the Titanic is. You're still on the Titanic. You have to have that sort of fundamental discussion that that is wrong. And I just do need to note that while I understand why people are legitimately and I am really upset about what's happened, these are two white people and so much has happened to people who have been extracted with no due process, who have been shot, who have been thrown into planes and then taken to foreign countries and imprisoned without due process. The Supreme Court has said twice, nine to zero that has happened. And there's a certain amount that we do have to recognize that this is breaking through not just because of the video. And you can see it. I agree with Sarah. So you can see before you what's happening. But the fact that these are sort of upstanding white people is part of the reason that it is breaking through.
- [34:30]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Well, quickly, Alex, I mean, some of that is if this is how they're treating us citizens who happen to be white local residents, what in God's. And I keep trying to find the answer. What are they doing to people without cameras rolling or people, as Andrew's saying, who are, who are vulnerable, who are being targeted for deportation.
- [34:51]
Nicole Wallace
I was outside the Whipple Federal Building last night and I saw someone get released. And they're releasing people into the freezing cold with none of their information, none of their belongings, no phones. And there are volunteers out there who give them mittens and gloves and hats and burner phones and get them into a car and let them make a phone call to go meet their relatives. You have refugees, the New York Times is reporting, that are transported to Texas and then once they're released, because they've been ordered to be released, cuz they're in the country lawfully. They got no one, they got no money and they gotta figure a way home. Hundreds if not thousands of miles away. That's what's happening. That's the law and order part of the Trump administration.
- [35:31]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
An extraordinary moment. Alex Wagner and Sarah Longwell, thank you so much for starting us off today. Andrew sticks around a little bit longer after the break. Less than a week after Trump falsely claimed once again that the 2020 election was rigged against him, the FBI has raided an election office and election center at the heart of Donald Trump's lies about his defeat. We'll bring you that reporting next. There are details that are frankly insane even for Donald Trump today on what from the outside appears to be a fabricated effort to relitigate the 2020 election that Donald Trump lost. That is despite people like Bill Barr saying there was zero evidence of fraud there. The most bizarre development, we learned last night that for some reason, Donald Trump's director of national intelligence, a job created after 911 to look at all of the intelligence and threats abroad. The person who has that job now under Donald Trump, Tulsi Gabbard, was on site in Georgia during the FBI search of the Fulton county election office. According to new reporting in the Wall Street Journal. Tulsi Gabbard was there because she has, quote, spent months investigating the results of the 2020 election that Donald Trump lost. That's according to White House officials. Tulsi Gabbard is leading the Trump administration's effort to reexamine the election and look for potential crimes. The official said, not her job at all to look for crimes. As the dni. In a statement, Donald Trump or Trump officials told our network that Tulsi Gabbard has a, quote, pivotal role in election security. As for what was taken yesterday, one Fulton county commissioner says that the FBI took, quote, pallets of ballots from the office. I want to bring in Atlanta Journal Constitution chief political reporter Greg Bluestein, who witnessed the FBI while they were at the Fulton office. Andrew's still here. Greg, what's going on?
- [37:30]
Greg Bluestein
Well, a lot's going on, but there's even more questions that we don't know the answers to right now. But what we do know is about 700 boxes were, were obtained by the FBI, seized by the FBI at the Fulton county office yesterday. Fulton county officials have dreaded this for the last year. There were rumors a year ago that this would happen. So they've been on alert for a long time, although it came as a surprise that the day was yesterday even, even after Donald Trump has been repeatedly kind of hinting at this for a while. Even in Davos, he talked about some sort of, you know, action being taken soon. Now, we know at least one of those actions is, is this, this warrant? Georgia officials are trying to figure out what's next. Fulton county officials are, are in a state of somewhat shock, but they're also trying to plan out litigation. And in Georgia, there are serious concerns from Democrats that the end game here is for the state, the Republican controlled state Election board to take over Fulton county elections, which would be the most pop. Taking over the elections of the most populous county in Georgia and one of the biggest Democratic strongholds in Georgia.
- [38:35]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
I mean, but Greg Trump supporting Governor Kemp and Trump voting Trump supporter Republican Brad Raffensperger are the Republican officials who certified the state's election. They're the two people who said there was no fraud in Georgia, including in Fulton. What is their role in all this? I mean, they're the last signatures on the certification.
- [39:00]
Greg Bluestein
Yeah, we know that Secretary of State Brad Referensperger, who, as you mentioned, rejected Trump's effort to overturn the election. He's running for governor now. He's been pretty quiet the last couple days, but he has rebuffed Trump's attempts to the Justice Department's attempts to get sensitive voter data earlier. So, so he's, he's staked his claim. His Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. Bert Jones, whose Trump endorses, called him an ever Trumper. So you can see those divisions playing out on the Republican side. You, Governor Kemp, also. No comment that I know of today. I've asked his office. I haven't seen a public statement from him quite yet either. So, you know, he's happy that that feud between him and President Trump has been at least there's a truce. And he's kind of taken the same stance as a lot of Republican officials focusing on Georgia and not on Donald Trump's agenda.
- [39:51]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
I mean, Andrew Wastington, the problem is Donald Trump is focused on them. They are his agenda. What is Tulsi Gabbard doing there?
- [39:59]
Andrew Weissman
So, you know, this is where the Wall Street Journal basically gives us the answer, and it's a warning. It says that we should anticipate that she will issue a report and that we may also anticipate further presidential executive orders. I remember being on the show repeatedly with you, Nicole, when we talked about her claims about 2016 in Russia. And you know how it was. It was absolutely loony. There was no evidence to support what she was saying had been disproved up one side and down the other. And so it should be very concerning to people if she writes a bogus report about fraud in the election when there's no facts to support it. But that's the basis for executive orders. Now, we don't know what those executive orders would be or if there will even be any. But you could imagine the federal government, through Donald Trump, trying to play a role in state elections. They could seize ballots. They could say that they're the ones who need to be the ones who are counting the vote based on some bogus allegations that the DNI puts out. And again, I'm basing this on the story that the Wall Street Journal has signaled to all of us as sort of the reason that we're seeing this activity. In other words, there's, there's a real reason and a plan behind it.
- [41:34]
Host/Interviewer (Nicole Wallace or another main host)
Unbelievable. We'll stay on top of it with your help. Andrew Weissman and Greg Bluestein, thank you for joining us today. For the latest on this story and the rest of the legal stories we've covered here on the show, scan the QR code on your screen to have the Deadline Legal newsletter delivered to your inbox every Friday after the break. For us, the Trump administration displays a stunning disregard the sacrifices that have been made by our allies in Afghanistan. An embarrassing and disturbing slap in the face to our allies. Out of the U.S. embassy in Denmark this week. Officials there removed the 44 Danish flags honoring each of the Danish soldiers who were killed fighting in Afghanistan. They had been placed in planters outside the building. This is video shared by Danish broadcaster TV2. It shows a security guard removing those flags. A spokesperson for the US embassy in Copenhagen told TV2 that there was, quote, no malicious intent in removing the flags, end quote. The flags have been placed there after Trump downplayed the role of non US NATO troops in the war in Afghanistan last week, saying they had, quote, stayed a little back, a little off the front lines, end quote. And this, quote, we've never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them, end quote. We should note that Denmark had the single highest per capita death toll among all of the coalition countries who joined the United States of America in Afghanistan. Coming up for us, stunning photos out of Minneapolis show how ICE has become a militarized force in the streets of American cities. We'll bring you that reporting next.
- [43:21]
Narrator/Announcer
Ms. Now presents the chart topping original podcast the Best People with Nicole Wallace. This week she sits down with former policy advisor Susan Rice.
- [43:31]
Sarah Longwell
We are an incredibly resilient country and nobody has ever won over the long term betting against the United States ability to to renew and grow the best.
- [43:41]
Narrator/Announcer
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