← Deadline: White House
Deadline: White House
"The Marie Antoinette presidency"
00:41:35
Nicolle Wallace on 42 million Americans going without critically important food assistance and millions more struggling with huge increases in the cost of everything from rent to healthcare.
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Prices and participation vary while supplies last. Taxes, tips and FE. Hi there everyone. Happy Friday. It's now 4 o' clock in New York. It is officially, as of today, the Marie antoinette presidency. While 42 million Americans go without critically important food assistance and millions more struggle with huge increases in the cost of everything from rent to health care to what Donald Trump himself describes as, quote, the grocery. The president, who was elected in large part because of the price of eggs and Donald Trump's promise over and over and over again that he would bring the prices down, says, well, let them eat well done steak. Here's what he actually said last night in response to questions about the public's growing concern that the Trump administration is doing nothing to lower the cost of living.
- [01:55]
C
I called the Democrats. Con men and women, they make up numbers. But when you look at 25% reduction in costs for Thanksgiving between Biden and me, meaning this administration, that's a tremendous number. That's a tremendous. It's the biggest reduction in cost in the history of that chart or whatever it is. They do that. They do a synopsis of everything. They cover every element of Thanksgiving meals, 25% down. So I don't want to hear about the affordability because right now we're much less.
- [02:32]
A
None of that is true. But there you have it in a nutshell. Trump saying, in effect, just stop talking about it. As we reported right here yesterday, that specific thing he said about that specific meal at Walmart, the Thanksgiving basket that they market. Trump's talked about it now two days in a row, but either he's intentionally lying or nobody told him that. When you look not even at the fine print, but at the items in the basket, it has half as many items, including no pecan pie, no brand name items. Literally 29 items in last year's bucket basket when Biden was president, 15 in the Trump Thanksgiving dinner basket from Donald Trump. And so the reason it costs less is because it has literally half as many items. In other words, it's another example of what I guess we can now describe as Trump's economic policy. Make do with less. It's his policy for girls or boys and their dolls. It's his policy for Thanksgiving dinner. And the fact that he can't stop talking about it may actually be the bigger part of the story that we can now see his desperation and frustration. Trump can't spin the problem away. The rising cost of living, the rising cost of groceries, the rising cost of the things people need for their families is our new reality. And it's been going on for long enough that everybody feels it. Millions of people every day, whether they're at the grocery store or at Walmart or paying their bills or paying for their health care. Just ask Marjorie Taylor Greene. When the President says there's virtually no inflation and that grocery prices are going down, do you agree with him on that? No. I go to the grocery store myself. Grocery prices remain high. Energy prices are high. My electricity bills are higher here in Washington, D.C. at my apartment, and they're also higher at my house in Rome, Georgia, higher than they were a year ago. So affordability is a problem. But when I go back home and I talk to many of my constituents, I'm hearing stories of not only are we having a really hard time affording groceries and rent and things like that, but I'm also hearing stories about people maxing out their credit cards just to afford their monthly expenses. Marjorie Taylor Greene didn't have this on my bingo card, but she is one of the loudest and most prominent people in the MAGA world to now represent very publicly. She was in an interview there on cnn. A crack in that coalition, the facade of a unified Republican Party is a thing of the past, at least right now. There's a. There are cracks now in the face of voter rage, which translated into devastating double digit defeats for Republicans from coast to coast on Tuesday. Discontent is simmering inside the GOP against Trump and his very public embrace and displays an agenda of gilding things with gold and taking bulldozers to the White House to do a multimillion dollar renovation as Americans struggle to put food on the table. Former Republican Senator Jeff Flake writes in the Washington Post this quote, the political climate that once rewarded absolute loyalty to the president is shifting. The Democratic landslide in Tuesday's off year elections will only add momentum to that. The midterms, now less than a year away, clearly favor the Democrats, particularly in the House, where they are poised to take the majority. And if that happens, it will not be because Democrats have suddenly found the perfect message. It will be because the President's economic policies are fundamentally misaligned with both conservative principles and economic reality. The sudden and dramatic backlash to Donald Trump's deeply out of touch presidency and approach to the economy is where we start today. Host of the Fast Politics Podcast, Vanity Fair special correspondent MSNBC political analyst Molly Jong Fast is back. Also with us at the table, the Reverend Al Sharpton, President of the National Action Network and the host of Politics Nation on MSNBC and msnbc. Senior White House COR correspondent Vaughn Hilliard is here. Oh, Vaughn, we have so many things to ask you about, but let me start with you, Molly, and this incredible, incredible split screen. I mean, I think when you saw the policies, when you saw the tariff rollout, when you heard Trump acknowledge in the transition a year ago that the prices were not going to come down, you knew, unfortunately, that people's economic anxieties were going to worsen. But no one could have predicted the actual gilding of the Oval Office, the actual grifting for millions of dollars to make a ballroom for whom. Those answers in that story only creates a more enraging split screen for the American people.
- [07:21]
B
If you had said to voters, he's going to tear down the East Wing, he's going to obliterate the legacy of Eleanor Roosevelt and all of the first ladies that came before her, people would have said you were crazy.
- [07:34]
A
Yeah. But if you told them eggs would be a buck fifty, they'd say, Right. The fact is they're $10.
- [07:40]
B
Right. And, and, and a lot of the inflation is because of his tariffs. Right. Like he is actually doing things to make it worse. Right. It's not that he's fighting it, it's also that he's making it worse. And I would say, like Marjorie Taylor Greene, who knows, you know, she's a, she's a politician, so she's an opportunist. But she sees an opportunity here and we haven't seen that before. And I think that is, and Jeff Flake writes about this in this op ed, which is like, she sees an opportunity because she sees a split between the populism and the Royal Ballroom.
- [08:14]
A
I think that that used to be a flank protected by Steve Bannon. The truth about Donald Trump's economy is that everyone, no one, will be spared from it. Right. Either your premiums are going to surge or you're going to be kicked off of Medicaid 11 to 17 million people, or you're pissed every time you go to Walmart or the grocery store. If you do your grocery shopping and your sort of, you know, whatever you buy for your kids or your family, everything is more expensive. And this Thanksgiving meal, he's talked about it two days in a row. We did the full fact check yesterday, and I welcome the opportunity to do it again. And every time he tells that lie, it's the most easily disproven lie. It literally. It had 29 items in it last year. It has 15 in it this year.
- [08:58]
C
And he tries to mislead people with misinformation, like, it won't be checked. So somebody needs to tell him, he's president. Whatever you say is going to be checked. But I think that what adds insult to injury. Yes, when you look at the $10 eggs. Yes, when you look at the fact that people are not given a fair share in terms of what they are used to with premiums and need, I mean, we're talking about people's health care now. We're not talking about a luxury. But to add insult to injury, on top of that, on top of government workers, on food lines, literally, you're going to throw a Great Gatsby theme party. I mean, this is how he responds. People are lined up for food, government workers, and you're having a Gatsby party for the rich. On top of you tearing down east wing of the White House so you and your friends can have a ballroom. So, I mean, I don't even think it's fair to Marie Antoinette to say, let them be cake. She didn't build a ballroom and she didn't have a Gatsby party while people were.
- [10:06]
A
I apologize to Marie Antoinette.
- [10:09]
C
This is a whole nother level. It's almost like you not only don't empathize with the people that are in need, which are most Americans now, it's like you hold them in contempt. I'm going to show you how unhappy, concerned, and insensitive I am. I'm a party hottie at Mar a Lago till I get my ballroom ready, y' all online. Well, that's Let me just explain that away and then sit up in the press conference while people take turns lying to back up his false statistics.
- [10:43]
A
But Hillier, Donald Trump's wealth is a fascinating thing in the Trump story, right? For him, in the telling of Fred Trump and his memoir and Mary Trump, there was a seeming scarcity obsession, right? He always seemed to want more. In their telling, based on his rage against people who have reported on how much money his father gave him and how much he was worth and his lawsuits against Tim o', Brien, there was a pathological hunger to be described as wealthier than he was. He now seems to have his hands on the range steering wheel of the grift and is able to open spigots in foreign governments, open spigots in new industries like crypto. And it's all out in the open now. I'm not saying anything controversial or debatable. And until this moment, his base tolerated it because they believe things in their lives would be more affordable and they would get ahead. This was the pitch. If you go back and listen to some of his appearances ahead of the election in the manosphere space, it was a lot of sort of. You can almost feel the sense of striving, right? That that was. That was what they had him on for. We're all going to do great. Everything's going to be great. His inaugural dress is about a gilded age. I think that if he thought that turning the Oval Office actually gold, was going to be a big political wart, I think he still would have done it, because I think that the taste is also beyond dispute there. It isn't really. It's a very specific look that he strives for. But the idea that this is now such a political bruise that more people proudly and publicly associate themselves as members of the movement called no kings than maga, his brand now is a political bomb. Why is no one doing anything to address the ostentatious look of this presidency? The government happening, the grifting happening in full view, and the despair of the American people suffering under the Trump economy?
- [12:53]
D
Well, the president is not willing to admit any of this. I think Nicole and I just want to be also very clear. Every time we talk about how much money the president and his family have made over the course of the last nine months, we have no, frankly idea whether it's in the tens of millions, hundreds of millions, or billion dollars because of the crypto investments here. And I think that that especially where I think Mikey Sherrill statements on the campaign trail in the closing days, I think Almost in a way, hit this chord better than I could even articulate. Number one, she mentioned every time that folks look at their utility rates and the fact that they've gone up, electrical bills have gone up 5% according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the agency of this Trump administration, 5% over the last year. Think about the financing of big oil of the Republican Party here over last year to get him back into office. Every time that you look and that you're paying for more coffee, this is Mikey Sherrill. Think about the billions of dollars that have been made by Trump's orbit from the crypto industry. And I think that that is the dichotomy that is so easily understood by any American who is living on a daily basis. And in so many ways, while the White House is so representative of the gold additions and the tearing down of the East Wing, I think in a lot of ways it is the day to that. Right? If you go back to the Tea Party in so many ways, the idea that a political party is able, the Democratic party in right 2009 or the Republican Party here in 2025 are able to convince the American electorate that everything is okay. Frankly, the results of generations past when it comes to electoral politics would prove otherwise. And the president back in 2020 was trying to sell that Covid was no longer impacting America, right? And voters told him it was. He tried to claim that the OT industry was back up and roaring despite in 2020, auto plants in Maryland, in Michigan, in Ohio, all having shut down. And so really, you know, you can speak those words, but at some point, folks truly know what's happening in their communities. And I think electoral politics in so many ways has borne out those realities for the political parties, even when they try to suggest to Americans that their party has done everything in their power to try to make the world right by them.
- [15:23]
A
Let me put up the reality for the American consumer. This is these are the prices at Amazon. They are up 12.8% as of September 30th at Target, 5.5%. Increases at Walmart, up 5.3%. That's according to our friends over at CNBC. Beef is up 14%. Furniture is up almost 10%. Coffee is up 41%. That's according to the Washington Post. This is what Americans say they're paying how much more they're paying for things. Americans say they're paying 71% more for groceries. I had to read that three times because that seems like a stunning number. Utilities are up close to 60%. Health care is up 43%. Gas, 37%. In housing, 39%. This is before all of the economic impacts of the shutdown and the sort of cliff that people are going to fall off of on health care.
- [16:25]
B
Yeah. And you know, when you're talking about, we still haven't talked about SNAP. Right. Nutrition assistance programs. 40% of SNAP recipients are children. This administration and parents who work. Right. This administration and elder. 20% are elderly. This and 10% disabled. This administration is trying to not pay SNAP and they are fighting with the courts about not paying snap. This is like unprecedented. And by the way, it's not Trump's money not to spend. Right. It's there. It's, you know, that taxpayer, those taxpayer dollars are there. And I think, you know, I think back to like Jeff Bezos, remember Amazon that was reporting that they wanted to put how much the tariffs would make things more expensive on Amazon. And they never did that. There was big pushback from the Trump. So it's just, it explains to me so well, so many times there were wealthy people or big corporations who could have really protected consumers, who could have protected us.
- [17:22]
A
Yeah. But, you know, Jeff Bezos won't get the last laugh because the consumer who bought, you know, a case of diapers a month ago knows what they paid. And so shame on Jeff Bezos for not informing his customers on Amazon. But the customers will know anyway.
- [17:38]
B
Right. And you can't bully the truth. Like, in the end, it's still what it is.
- [17:43]
A
Let me show you. I mean, Molly's right, that there's so many crises intersecting. And I think we saw the public's response Tuesday night. But let me show you sort of the experience of ending up at a food bank and having these problems sort of pile on top of each other. Between SNAP and the economic downturn, it's just impossible for us to make ends meet anymore. We basically robbed Peter to pay Paul's way. We've been doing, doing so like, if our, if my car breaks down, we got a dilemma. Do we pay a bill or do we get our car fixed in order for me to get back and forth.
- [18:20]
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To work and stuff like that.
- [18:21]
A
So this, this really affects us really bad right now with the economy and everything the way it is, Trump needs to do something. He needs to get off his butt. Instead of sitting there worrying about foreign.
- [18:31]
E
Countries and worrying about what's going on.
- [18:33]
A
Over there, he needs to worry about what's going on in this country and.
- [18:36]
C
Take care of the people that taken.
- [18:38]
A
Care of in this state, in this country. Right. Now, so my long and winding question to Vaughn was about the deterioration of the political brand. I mean, in 2016, MAGA stood for Make America Great Again. And his supporters believed that that meant to the exclusion of tending to things abroad. This is a West Virginia resident named Kim Perry who says instead of sitting there worrying about foreign countries and worrying about what's going on there, he needs to worry about what's going on in this country. He has completely abandoned his original pact with voters.
- [19:11]
C
I think that he has really become tone deaf to his own music. He forgot what got him there. What got him there was he was speaking for people like the gentleman that was just speaking. They felt, I feel, wrongly, but they felt rightly he understood them. He was speaking for them. And now he is not only not speaking for them, he's not even listening to them. Because don't take lightly. They're going into court to fight not to give the SNAP money that is there by law. This is why the money's there. Not only are we not going to give it to you, we're going to fight not to give it to you. We're going to fight to make sure you have to choose between the car getting fixed or having dinner. I mean, the contempt that he's showing his own base. I didn't expect him to do anything in communities that I work in and that serve, but this is his base. When you talk about snap, you're talking about many red states, you're talking about children of Republicans that are going to have to decide whether they're going to have breakfast today or dinner tomorrow. And you're talking about snap. You're talking about seniors and babies in his base. So even though people like me never thought he cared about us, he doesn't care about his own people. And that's why I repeat. And he's, on top of that, going to hold them in contempt by partying and by, I mean, you, in the middle of this, are going to build a remodeled marble Lincoln bathroom. What does that say to a guy in Appalachia, I'm doing a marble bathroom while you're sitting up there wondering how you're going to have paper towels in.
- [20:57]
A
Your bathroom and promoting it. I mean, I guess the other thing is, to your point, these aren't things being unearthed by brilliant investigative journalists like Vaughn. They're being promoted as things that he's proud of. All right, no one's going anywhere. We have so much more to get to when we come back. We've shown you Donald Trump's lack of empathy for the millions of Americans who he is willfully allowing to go hungry by ignoring a judge and people stranded at airports around the country. So you might not be surprised when you see how he reacted when a man collapsed literally right next to him inside the Oval Office. We'll show you that moment ahead. Also, could the politically motivated and inexperienced Department of Justice that Donald Trump has demanded punish his so called enemies be so chaotic that it gets in its own way? The answer is decidedly most likely yes. Today, new reporting signals that that terminal inside could be the undoing of some of these cases Trump wants most. And later in the broadcast, former President Barack Obama takes the stage once again celebrating the victories this week on the part of the Democratic Party, but cautions there is much, much more work to be done. All the stories and more when Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere.
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Play for free@chumbacasino.com let's Chumba. No purchase necessary. VGW Group voidware prohibited by law. CTC's 21+ sponsored by Jamba Casino. If you haven't seen this yet, we want to show you what happened yesterday in the Oval Office? Donald Trump and members of his administration, including RFK Jr. And Dr. Oz, held an event on the cost of weight loss drugs. And this happened. Man at the event collapsed rather dramatically, of course. I'm sure most people were scared, worried about him. Inside the Oval Office, we can tell you that the person who collapsed is okay. We found that out pretty quickly today. But he did need medical attention in the moment. And you can see right here on your screen that it wasn't at all clear what had happened to this person. And then this is how the President of the United States acted when a medical emergency happened within arm's reach of him in his own office. He looks at the man and then looks away and stands there, doesn't try to help him up, doesn't offer him any water, doesn't stop his event and intervene. Not would any other president who we've seen have this happen behind him at a rally or an event do so. We're back with Molly the Rebel and Vaughn Hilliard. Vaughn, what are you able to tell us from your reporting about why that was Trump's reaction?
- [24:55]
D
I think that the president, I think, responds in real time in the way that President Trump does. I can say that the Eli Lilly spokesperson said that this was a guest of Eli Lilly and that the person was overwhelmed by the events of the day and had a brief medical situation and that he was receiving the best medicine, medical care, and that they are grateful to him for his participation in the day's events. That's, I think, the best insight I can give personally. Here is the White House reporter on the president's response there, my friend.
- [25:27]
A
So then we'll just go with the picture. They are in this moment attending to him and they're holding his feet up. So in the moment it looked rather dire. This is one picture that I guess matches pretty well with what you're telling us, Vaughn, that there was no involvement or intervention or concern displayed at least while the cameras were in the room on the part of Donald Trump. Let me show you one more picture. He also maybe was tired yesterday. He seemed to fall asleep in a meeting. Can I show you these pictures and ask you if you have any reporting into what was going on yesterday? Was he, dare I say, low energy?
- [26:07]
D
We know that the president has a history now, of course, Nicole notwe know that we do see the president a lot more than some presidents in past. And there have been moments, including during his hush money payment trial in New York, in which we know that there were moments in which he was appearing to fall asleep as well here. This is a president that I think does at least publicly keep a pretty busy schedule there. And I think outside of understanding the exacts of any particular moment, I think that, I think the image is something sometimes play out in ways that the American public are able to capture. And I think that I should note that we're grateful for the White House photographers that are there through it all and capture all of these moments of what's taking place in the White House on a given day.
- [27:00]
A
I'm rev if Joe Biden yawned on a 30 hour flight. Fox News cut out all their breaks for a week. Wall to wall coverage about the presidential yawn. This is someone who's got some dissonance where a person, I mean we're New Yorkers. If someone trips in a crosswalk, like traffic stops in both directions, not only until the person is up, until all their belongings are back in their hands, but until an ambulance is called or a friend is called. I mean a human reaction in the middle of a busy city is to help someone who collapses. This is the Oval Office, he's the President of the United States. He's serving in that cap in that meeting as a host and he stands there. That is a real deterioration in his synapses from Trump 1.0.
- [27:51]
C
And it's an indication of the type of person he is. Maybe sympathy, empathy, relating to other people, it just is not.
- [27:58]
A
But reflexes, like he doesn't seem to.
- [28:00]
C
Reflexes, none of that is a part of who he is. So if I'm looking at this, this guy two, three feet away from him collapsing, not only did he not go and help, he didn't even lean over to see if those helping him needed help. I mean he's just standing there like, you know, get this out of the way. And if you're looking at that as a US citizen, this is the guy that's gonna decide your healthcare. This is the guy that's gonna decide the price of food for your family. This is the guy that's gonna decide snap for your senior citizens. Cuz if he can in real time ignore somebody that he doesn't know whether they seriously in danger or not, what do you think is his emotional makeup? And on top of that, I think you said it right. If Joe Biden was caught yawning, it would be national disgrace. This guy went to sleep. And I'm talking about over a period of time at a public function. We're not talking about Joe Biden in private, we're Talking about at a public function that he was hosting in the Oval Office. And he went to sleep while people were speaking about national policy. He went to sleep. And obviously they seemed around him, know he'll do it because nobody even kind of nudged and played, like, wake him up. They're used to this. He slept through. People are speaking. While he speak, people are addressing.
- [29:29]
A
Wait, this. This one would be the front. This would be the COVID Like, we could. I mean, just give me one second. I know we gotta get to a break. If we. If this was Biden, go back one picture. That would be the image on the COVID of the New York Post, and it would be, you know, too old to stay awake for whatever this meeting is. Why don't they care that he's either too tired to do the job or that the people around him who seem to control the press with every tool in their arsenal or they're used to. I mean, if he can't stay awake, why is the camera still in there?
- [30:03]
C
And because they were doing a press conference. This was not a meeting. This was a press conference talking about obesity. And he fell asleep in the middle of the press conference for the whole world to see. And you didn't see one tabloid show this on the front page. If it had been Joe Biden, it would have been the front page and the centerfold.
- [30:23]
A
That's amazing. You have a quick last word.
- [30:26]
B
He's the oldest person ever to be president. Like, we don't talk about that. He called Joe Biden sleepy. Joe Biden. There were numerous books written about the conspiracy of Biden's age. This guy is falling asleep in a.
- [30:39]
A
Press conference in the most tightly controlled media environment that this country has ever seen. That's amazing. Molly and Rev and Vaughn, thank you all so much for starting us off today. After the break, DOJ incompetence is the best headline we can give this next block. It's on display this week. Today, there's a new report of another possible investigation into one of Donald Trump's seemingly political enemies. More on the DOJ suffering under the weight of some of the most inexperienced and chaotic leaders to ever work in that building.
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- [31:56]
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Up Chumba Casino play on your browser. No downloads necessary. No need to negotiate. Why wait on them when you can spin for yourself? Play now@chumbacasino.com let's chumba no purchase necessary. VGW Group Void where prohibited by law CTNC's 21/ sponsored by Chumba Casino I've never felt like this before. It's like you just get me. I feel like my true self with you. Does that sound crazy? And it doesn't hurt that you're gorgeous. Okay, that's it. I'm taking you home with me. I mean, you can't find shoes this good just anywhere. Find a shoe for every you from brands you love like Birkenstock, Nike, Adidas and more at your DSW store or dsw.com it turns out, or it may turn out, they're reordering the Department of Justice and FBI to prioritize Donald Trump Trump's retribution campaign and making clear that his top priority is to carry out his revenge tour might not be the right move for the department that is tasked with US national security and upholding the rule of law for everybody here. DOJ prosecutors were admonished by a judge this week in their case against former FBI Director Jim Comey for having a quote, indict first prosecute second posture. New York Attorney General Tish James is also expected to file a motion soon calling out the weak and politically motivated case that has been levied against her. DOJ even failed to get a misdemeanor assault conviction against the so called sandwich guy who threw a footlong sub at a federal Officer in Washington, D.C. the government had previously failed to persuade a grand jury to charge him with a felony, so the misdemeanor was their second try. They failed. And now the Justice Department's latest investigation involving a Democratic politician might be hampered by their own confusion and public chaos. The New York Times is reporting today this quote, federal prosecutors have opened a corruption investigation into Mayor Muriel Bowser of Washington, examining a foreign trip she took with members of her staff that was paid for by Qatar. The investigation, which is being handled by the U.S. attorney's office in Washington has been underway for months, but could face significant hurdles because of the known facts of the case and recent turmoil inside the Justice Department. This week, the FBI agent who was leading the investigation was fired by the Trump administration for having taken part in a criminal inquiry into Trump's attempts to overturn the 2020 election. We should note that the U.S. attorney for Washington, Jeanine Pirro, says in a statement today this, quote, mayor Bowser is not under investigation, nor is she the target of any investigation, end quote, whatever that means. I want to bring in former top official, the Department of Justice and MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissman. Also joining us, former assistant special in charge at the FBI. MSNBC national security and intelligence analyst Michael Feinberg's here. He's also a fellow at Lawfare. Andrew Weissman, what do you make of the reporting available on the mayor of Washington, D.C. muriel Bowser?
- [35:17]
E
Well, first, I think we have to give some credit to Jeanine Pirro. If there is, in fact, a false story about her being under investigation, then what Jeanine Pirro has done is what you're supposed to do, which is, you know, she would be somebody who you really need to speak up and say that this is wrong and there is precedent for doing that. Unfortunately, with this administration, you know, there's a lot of questions about whether, you know, what is going on and whether we should take that at face value. I think the bigger issue here, though, is that you have the gutting of the FBI that is the premier law enforcement agency in this country, of people getting the job done. You know, there takes a certain number of horses to pull the wagon along. And when you take out senior, experienced people and career people and you also have the threat of being fired, suspended, demoted over your head just for doing your job, it makes it that much harder to protect the country in terms of all sorts of cases. And I just think to add to the litany that you put out there, Nicole, you have to remember that during the investigation of the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the FBI looked like the Keystone Cops. We all got lucky because he turned himself in. The, the alleged assassin turned himself in. But the FBI was not the FBI that we all know and where I worked, because they didn't have, and they do not have the, the kind of leadership that the public should be entitled to.
- [37:10]
A
I mean, Michael, color me, I guess, holding my breath to see how the story shakes out, because we've already, since we've been on the air, quoted Marjorie Taylor Greene on the politics of the terrible Trump economy. And I'LL take Andrew Weissman at face value that we should credit Jeanine Pirro if she's really the one clarifying things. But this is where they stand on gifts from Qatar, just as an administration since they got there. This is off from the Times. Quote, it wouldn't be the first time a politician's dealings with Qatar have invited scrutiny. In May, the Trump administration formally accepted a 747 jetliner from Qatar valued at $200 million. The plane is meant to be upgraded to serve as Air Force One, making it one of the biggest foreign gifts received by the government. A political firestorm ensued, but no criminal investigation was known to have been opened. Also, Pam Bondi previously worked as a registered foreign agent and lobbyist for the government of Qatar. And then the reporting of the Washington Post and the Times points out that the FBI agent who was handling the investigation into the cutter piece of this was one of the agents fired. And I think you were on with us covering that story. What do you see from the outside?
- [38:23]
F
So if Andrew defending the U.S. attorney of Washington D.C. caused you to be a little bit surprised, I fear I'm going to surprise you even more. This is one where I am going to hold fire and wait to see what more facts come out.
- [38:39]
A
Yeah, it's weird. Yeah.
- [38:43]
F
I spent my entire career working counterintelligence matters and it was an evergreen concern for ours when non executive branch government officials, whether Congress people or state local officials, would travel to foreign countries and essentially mingle and engage in two way lobbying with foreign governments. The fact is, outside the executive branch, a lot of foreign officials and a lot of government officials don't have the knowledge to protect themselves from foreign government perception, management, lobbying and corruption efforts. They just don't have the background. So it's not unusual to me that this sort of thing might be looked into, Even though the U.S. attorney is telling us now it is not. But let's still take it with at least one grain of salt. This is not an administration that is known for following solely predicated facts. I'm just a little reluctant to come down on one side or the other at this point.
- [39:52]
A
No, I mean, then look, if this is a stage with the curtains closed, it's not like they've been opened for us. Right. We peaked in and what we see seems to invite more questions. You also can't ignore the history of Eric Adams. You can't ignore the reality you're articulating that why are mayors going to Qatar? And you can't ignore all the ties that Trump himself and As a trained general have. So, you know, in that, in that just barely open curtain, what we see is more of a fog machine than any clarity. I appreciate both of you for. For making all those points. I mean, ask both of you to stick around. And I want to circle back to something we've all talked about this week, and that is the Comey case sort of colliding with the rule of law. That's next. I'm going to turn with both of you to the Comey case. We talked this week about the judge ordering the government to turn over what the story was, what the evidence was that was presented to the grand jury to invite the indictment. And they haven't done that yet. And they seem to be mounting a case to not do that. I mean, Andrew Weissman, what's going on here?
- [41:02]
E
Well, lest you think I got too soft in the last segment, I'm not going to disappoint you, because let me just tell you what I think is going on here and what I have, what I'm looking for. I am looking for. What exactly did Lindsay Halligan say to the grand jurors? She had no experience as a criminal prosecutor. I am interested in what she told them. The alleged false lie was. That was not specified even in the indictment. And I'm looking to see exactly what time period she said they could rely on, because there's a very set time frame for which the evidence is useful, and you can't use evidence before or after that. The brief that the government submitted tried to do that, just sort of. It was a kitchen sink. But there's only a very distinct, distinct time period. Second thing that's going on is there's something called the attorney client privilege. James Comey had lawyers at the time. And you have to be very careful as a prosecutor that you do not look at material that is covered by the attorney and client privilege. And I suspect it remains to be seen that they were not careful. Let me give you a very quick example. When we did the Paul Manafort search as part of the Mueller investigation, a separate team of agents did that investigation. Not on the Mueller investigation. They did the search. They put it in a separate room we did not have access to. And until Paul Manafort's attorneys looked through that material and flagged anything they thought was attorney client privilege, only then could we look at it, because we wanted to make sure that we didn't taint our investigation and we didn't violate Paul Man Manafort's rights. It does not appear that any of that was done here. And both of those could be fatal, fatal to this, this actual prosecution.
- [42:58]
A
Michael Feinberg, what are you watching for in Ms. Halligan's early dealings with the judge in this case?
- [43:06]
F
Pretty much everything that Andrew just talked about for the simple reason that what he's describing, it's not out of the ordinary. It is not a huge burden or obstacle for the FBI and the DOJ to through these procedures. You know, I had very few cases in the entirety of my own career. We did not set up a taint team very early in the process to review what was and what was not attorney client privilege. The fact that this may not have occurred at the outset and the fact that DOJ may now be rushing to put something in place to sort of mimic this in some sort of retroactive fashion is a testament to how inexperienced the people running this matter are.
- [43:55]
A
And let me just say, you were both here because you call balls and strikes. I appreciate your nuance and your care and your concern for the facts. That's why we're all here. Andrew Weissman and Michael Feinberg, thank you both so much for joining me on these two stories today. Up next for us, another deadly strike carried out by the United States government on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean as the legal justification for the attacks remains unclear to the public. We'll have that update next. We're learning that the Trump administration has conducted another strike on a boat in the Caribbean, killing three people, according to Pete Hegseth, bringing the death toll in the Trump administration's campaign of targeting boats allegedly carrying drugs up to 70. Dozens of those people remain unidentified, according to a new MSNBC investigation, as governments in the region say little publicly. Mindful of the potential for retribution by Donald Trump, the Associated Press interviewed relatives of some of the men they were able to identify from the reporting quote, relatives and acquaintances said they have confirmed the deaths through word of mouth and in explicit social media posts. I want an answer, but who can I ask? Said a relative of one of the men. I can't say anything. Last night, the Senate failed to pass a bipartisan measure seeking to block Donald Trump's military actions against Venezuela. We'll stay on top of all these questions after the break. What the Democratic Party is doing to keep Tuesday's momentum going after the sweeping victories this week. The next hour deadline White House starts after a quick break. Hey, Riley herbst here with 2311 racing, waiting for the bus, staring at traffic crawl hard pass. I rev up Jumba Casino instead. Fast spins, blazing winds, all fun, no downloads needed. Why Let the clock drag when you can Let the reel spin. Next stop, jumbacasino.com let's Chumba. No purchase necessary. VGW Group Void. We're prohibited by law. CTNC's 21 plus, sponsored by Jumba Casino.