← The Beat with Ari Melber
The Beat with Ari Melber
DOJ Subpoenas WSJ Reporters over Iran Coverage
00:41:50
The Department of Justice has subpoenaed Wall Street Journal reporters over Iran coverage. MS NOW's Ari Melber reports and is joined by Marty Baron, former executive editor for The Washington Post.
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MSNOW Announcer
Download today, Sunday, June 14, from Washington, D.C. a special live taping of MSNOW's hit podcast the Blueprint with Jen Psaki. Join her as she talks with actor and author Billy Eichner. They'll explore the power of humor in the face of adversity and Eichner's new audio memoir, Billy on Billy the Blueprint with Jen Psaki live with Billy Eichner. Get your tickets today at 6th and I.org
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Ari Melber
welcome to the Beat. I'm Ari Melbourne. We're following a truly new development in Donald Trump's often flailing but quite serious legal attacks on the press. This one is not about Jimmy Kimmel or jokes or late night comics. This is about the heat on Rupert Murdoch's conservative empire. DOJ vet Andrew Weissman is standing by and will give us his view and analysis. He will assess a huge shot across the bow tonight. The DOJ now trying to pressure war coverage at Murdoch's Wall Street Journal. That's, of course, Fox News sister outlet. They're using subpoenas and the government is claiming illegal leaks to, according to many experts, abuse power to shape or stifle critical war coverage, which of course the country is aware of because it is partly the press and information about the war, its reality, that's made it a very unpopular war. Plus the economic fallout. And I have more on that part of the story later tonight. It is a problem for Trump and the midterms, but this story is one where journalists must actually also kind of weigh how we, in this case, our colleagues at the Journal, peers, competitors, whatever you call it. But how journalists report on something that Trump has done more than any other administration since Nixon. How do we report on the government trying to make us our reporting or our colleagues and competitors reporting part of the story? Well, the Journal has decided to report on unusual subpoenas that its own journalist reporters received from the Trump doj. As you see here, the masthead is the Wall Street Journal. This story is about the Wall Street Journal. This is reporting about how they are reporting and being potentially intimidated or punished through this government that they're reporting on now, to be clear, this has been a losing revenge streak in legal moves by Trump. And you probably, if you follow the news, have heard about them. We've seen these efforts against people. James Comey was a big story. He did an interview on Ms. Now in the Cold just yesterday. We're also seeing it against institutions and journalism itself. That article I just put on the screen notes that the paper received grand jury subpoenas for records covering records of its reporters covering this war. Now this is a huge deal. This is about war which is one of the obviously most important and grave powers a president wields. And remember, this war, which has proven so unpopular, is being waged unilaterally. The president did not work with Congress. President did not address the nation up front or leave any time for any kind of meaningful dissent or protest. He launched a proactive attack on Iran. The strait that was once open for our energy needs is now closed. The ceasefire exists. We don't know what comes next. But I mentioned that brief war history to say that with Congress cut out of the loop and the American public cut out of the loop, one of the only other measures left is journalism, reporting how the war is going and the facts about the war. And the facts have been, to put it fairly mixed, negative. Plenty of them look bad for the Donald Trump administration, for the war planning and obviously for the gas prices in the economy. We're all living through and against that type of accurate or shall we say evidence based information. This government, your government is responding by trying to intimidate, legally stifle and potentially jail the people doing that report. You know, I always try to talk to you. I mean, I'm talking through a camera, right? But I always try to talk to you directly about what we know and don't know and what's happening. This is what's happening and we know it's a problem. We also know that our Constitution, the 250 years that we're celebrating, argues exactly against any leader, I don't care what party who would try to rule our government and crush the First Amendment, it's the first for a reason, and crush this type of free speech. So that's why this matters. Andrew, as I mentioned, joins me shortly. I want to tell you about the methods because it's really something. Trump delivering his message on a sticky note with the word treason in Sharpie placed atop a stack of printed articles that he handed to the acting Attorney General. That's how some of this got started. According to a very detailed account from CNN's reporting. Now, that official is, of course, Todd Blanche, and he's under this public pressure by Trump to take measures that, I want to be clear, might ultimately, if he takes them, see Mr. Blanche investigated, sanctioned or disbarred. He knows with his law degree and his experience that if he actually is going out and pursuing baseless false claims against journalists or others that are only designed to intimidate, to do selective prosecution or to shape war propaganda, yeah, you can lose your law license over that. And if you look at these polls, it's not clear that Trump's friends are going to be in office forever. Trump shared a literal enemies list as well that demands that Blanche indict John Brennan, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. So it's someone else's post, as you see, and it's Donald J. Trump, the sitting president, who shared it, reposting that. The idea of the Trump DOJ indicting Barack Obama may sound far fetched, even after everything. But the evidence we have shows that in his demands, Trump is serious. It was once far fetched to think he would abuse legal powers against so many sitting lawmakers. An FBI director, a CIA director, the current Republican leading the Fed. That's already happened. I keep showing you this chart because it's a fact and it is a problem if our country lets this become normal or memory hold. Like so much other civic amnesia that we have, this is our current situation. So you can't just look at the new next effort by Trump to turn up the heat on a supplicant like Blanche and say, well, he won't. He won't go to Clinton or Obama. They very well may try. Remember, this list of faces were already pursued, most of them under an Attorney General that Donald Trump just canned for not doing enough. In his view, that's why we have Blanche instead of Bondi. Now, the guardrails have still prevented any of these efforts from succeeding. Depending on how you count, he's O for 20 or O for 25. O and 25. But none of these cases have led to any conviction. Many of them, as you saw, have been tossed. But Trump views Blanche as. As his enforcer.
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Donald Trump
We have a man who's doing a great job. I'll tell you. I knew it because he kept me out of jail for years. Acting Attorney General, carte blanche. I said the other day that some of that stuff should be looked into. They said, weaponization. He's a terrible human being. Weaponization. Right. Cash. They blame me for weaponization.
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Ari Melber
He is not the communicator he once was. Indeed, Donald Trump, who used to be pretty good at pr, knows that you don't just repeat the attacks on yourself. They blame me for weaponization, he says, reminding everyone that he is weaponizing the government using a term that even the right has said is bad because he is weaponizing the government. You can call it weaponization, you can call it lawfare, the actual term in the law, when you prove that the government has gone after a person for illicit reasons rather than just investigate the facts where they lead. It's called selective prosecution. Gets your case tossed. It can get the prosecutors, of course, sanctioned, as I mentioned, which is something that Mr. Blanch should think about. It's not my job to give him legal advice, but we'll run this clip later if we have to. If Mr. Blanch ultimately not only discredits himself, but loses his law license or worse. Because if he goes forward with some of these things, like going after Obama and Clinton because the president asked for it, yeah, that would look like selective prosecution without at least clear evidence to the contrary. Now, Trump is taking these legal weapons well beyond the Obamas or the Democrats that he's called out or the critics. He is. Now, as I mentioned, the lead story that we're going to bring Andrew in on, going after the conservative institution of Murdoch's Wall Street Journal. Now, previously, you may recall, he sued them over their Epstein coverage and lost in the civil courts. And I want to be clear, anyone in this country can afford themselves the civil courts, including government incumbents. So that is something he can do. He lost, so he had no case, but he can do that. But after failing, what we're seeing now, and why I mention it, to bring us up to speed to tonight, is Trump's doubling down with this criminal probe, which is much more serious, using a criminal investigation and those kind of subpoenas for journalists, which carry the implied threat of potential jail time if you don't cooperate. And using the part of our system that is strong, when you say to the courts, well, this could be national security or this affects war, there might be illegal government leaks. That can matter. And by the way, the DOJ is allowed, of course, to pursue illegal government leaks. That usually means going after the person in government who broke the law. The journalists didn't if they only reported something that came from the government, but they can do that. The question here is whether this is abuse of power, leaning on that type of power to silence and censor the war coverage. Now, Rupert Murdoch is a big figure. He has a complex history with Trump, but he still runs Fox News, which nowadays Trump and MAGA see as a very friendly place. But just like Putin started with the biggest opposition critics, but moved on to other people that used to be in his inner circle. Trump will go after you even if you own Fox News. Nobody is really safe if you start publishing or airing things he disagrees with. Remember, Rupert Murdoch is such a kind of big political figure. They had that whole show and character based off him in HBO's Succession. Now, this is fiction, echoing perhaps some view of reality, but they cast Murdoch as someone who was tough and willing to fight anyone.
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Donald Trump
Here's a safety briefing.
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Marty Baron
If you move against me, I'll put
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Donald Trump
a hole in the back of your head,
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Ari Melber
tough guy. That is a fictional character based on the real Murdoch. But plenty of folks said that that toughness and that style reflects the now aging patriarch of that conservative empire. What will Murdoch do next? What is the DOJ up to? I want to bring in Andrew Weissman, of course, DOJ vet and the author of the upcoming Liars Kingdom, how to Stop Trump's Deceit and Save America. That's out this month. You can get Liars Kingdom on pre order now, wherever books are sold. Andrew, I mentioned that while any selective prosecution is wrong, Murdoch runs American media properties that are overwhelmingly favorable to Trump in editorial on air. And yet here they are caught up in these same tactics. What do you see?
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Andrew Weissman
So here's the tension. If this was an investigation into the leaking of classified information, if it was the investigation into the leaking of information that, although not classified, could endanger are soldiers and the ongoing war effort, leave aside that the President says we're not at war, that is something that can be a legitimate investigation. The problem here is that the track record of this administration is that they have a war on facts. And with Todd Blanche, as they did with Pam Bondi, they basically have a choke chain on the acting attorney general. And you see him doing the President's bidding. And so the real concern here is that this is, as you said, a way to simply continue the pressure on sort of whitewashing the stories that come out. Whether we're talking about suing civilly, as you mentioned, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Kash Patel's lawsuit against the Atlantic, or, or the attack, as you mentioned, on Jimmy Kimmel or Stephen Colbert, or getting the FCC to threaten the media to whitewash the story here, that is a way of silencing the opposition and creating only a rosy picture. And there's nothing more important than having the truth about something as serious as, as A war that has not been declared by Congress, meaning that this war is not something that is constitutional, which this is something that Congress would have had to declare.
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Ari Melber
And the president, and I'll jump in and say, what do you think about Murdoch here as an adversary who didn't fold on a civil case? And the Journal is being clear. I said it's their choice to. To publish this so people know what the administration's doing, which seems to be an early clue. They don't necessarily fold here either.
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Andrew Weissman
So, you know, the Wall Street Journal, whatever you think of its editorial page, it has serious journalists. And this goes to this issue of whether this is a serious news organization that would have published something that they believed was going to threaten or risk the lives of our soldier. As you know, reputable news organizations don't do that. They think long and hard, and they usually actually consult with the government before they would run a story where they thought that was an issue. But whether Wall Street Journal, like the New York Times, like our own station, like the Atlantic, will run stories that they believe are truthful, that are sourced, and it is so important. This is getting news to the American public, and it's the last thing that the government should be doing. This is what it means to be in government, to be responsible, is like, you may not like being criticized. If you don't like being criticized, if you don't like people running stories about what you're doing, don't take the job.
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
Yeah.
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Ari Melber
Get out of the kitchen. Well, and. And you and I have discussed now years running how to handle this. What does it tell you that thus far, Murdoch has proven tougher on this issue, whatever the many other concerns with him than law firm leaders, some of whom claim they were for facts and civil rights and then weren't business CEOs who've talked about running media empires and Disney talked about the First Amendment and then responded to a lot of pressure. What does it tell you?
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Andrew Weissman
You know, Jack Smith said something when I interviewed him, he said something at the end that he said, you know, at this time, one thing that you learn is you really lear learn sort of not only who your friends are, but what their metal like, what they're made of. And this is a way of seeing. You can see a Jeff Bezos that, in my view, you know, has all the money in the world and is caving in a way that is just so disheartening in terms of what's happened to the Washington Post, one of the great news organizations of this nation. And whatever you think of The Wall Street Journal, politically, whether you agree with them or not, they are standing up for the First Amendment in a very, very important way.
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Ari Melber
Now, I'm over on time, but I'm going to extend another 40 seconds. Your view on if they fight where this goes because the courts and you've litigated tough cases, the courts do defer to anything they think is valid national security. And we've seen pressure on reporters. But if this is a trick, a ploy to censor war coverage, then do you think the Journal and its reporters have a strong winning argument here?
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Andrew Weissman
That is a great question. If the government cannot come up with a sort of bona fide reason for a leak of classified information or information that could endanger, you know, the war effort, I think that the Wall Street Journal has a very good argument that this is to harass and that there is a Supreme Court case that you cannot do this, that that is the basis that Judge Boasberg used to quash the subpoena of the Federal Reserve with respect to Jerome Powell, that these were grand jury subpoenas to harass. But people should know that is a very hard thing to show. Normally, as you mentioned, there's enormous deference to the government with jury subpoenas. And in many ways, this is sort of winning no matter what for the government because the, you know, this is the threat is there. What the message is to every news organization is think twice because you can get a grand jury subpoena, too. And to me, there's both the Trump story, but there's also the Todd Blanche story that you are seeing such brazen activity. And it's part of that is not just about him, but it's about idea that he is the acting attorney general. And so there really is this sense that he's on such a short leash that he's willing to do things that somebody who for years was a career prosecutor and knows very well the difference between sort of selective and vindictive actions and really bonafide good faith actions.
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Ari Melber
Right. And you're referring to that standard I mentioned, the selective prosecution, which. Right. Even if you're the acting attorney general, if that's what you're proven to have done, there are consequences later. Maybe he's just tried to live in denial of that. He's watched Pam Bondi, like others, fail to give Trump everything he wants, just like Mike Pence gave him everything except an insurrection and faced, of course, threats of violence. And so we've seen this pattern over and over. Here we have Blanche, as you say on the audition. Trying to do this as if, as if you don't deliver the next one that he wants the Clinton and the Obama and all the stuff I documented that you're going to be Gucci. You're not. Andrew, thanks for joining us.
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Andrew Weissman
You're welcome.
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Ari Melber
Appreciate it. Here's something I've never said on this program. Thou shall have no idols before me. Yes. Little biblical reference which is leading to Trump ridicule,
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Molly Jong-Fast
if I may say. It is a full grown cow.
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Ari Melber
That is a.
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Molly Jong-Fast
That is.
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Ari Melber
There's a golden cow. And Trump facing an economic gaffe.
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Donald Trump
I don't think about America's financial situation. I don't think about anybody.
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Jon Stewart
Yeah.
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Ari Melber
Why think about the people you serve. But we're back with a major development on Epstein in 90 seconds.
- [20:40]
MSNOW Announcer
Listen to your favorite Ms. Now shows anytime as a podcast. Enjoy new episodes of Morning Joe, Deadline, White House and the Rachel Maddow show.
- [20:49]
Jon Stewart
Every small d Democratic muscle that we have is flexing.
- [20:54]
MSNOW Announcer
Plus the Last Word with Lawrence o', Donnell, the Beat with Ari Melber, the Weeknight and more on the go wherever you get your podcasts for ad free listening to all of your favorite shows. Subscribe to Ms. Now premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [21:14]
Ari Melber
House Democrats are using their powers and that means Trump has failed to stem this Epstein scandal. Today the lawmakers actually went to Florida to hold what they call a field hearing and soliciting and basically bearing witness to sometimes emotional testimony from Epstein accusers.
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Molly Jong-Fast
He abused so many girls after 2009 at the same exact time that I was asking the government why he got the deal and why they violated my rights. The failures of those sworn to protect us, protect us have overwhelmed me. He made it clear that he held the cards. They used my dreams against me. I hope this never happens again to any anybody. Keep it in the history books.
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Ari Melber
Don't stop fighting hearing also featuring discussions of following the money
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
some of these men enabled.
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Andrew Weissman
Financial crimes follow the money.
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Molly Jong-Fast
Financial records are not secondary. They be the key to exposing the full network.
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
If we're serious about following the money, I believe that these SARS reports must be disclosed by the US Treasury Department. Now immediately today, financial crimes can open
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Molly Jong-Fast
the door and lead to real prosecutions.
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Ari Melber
We're joined by Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamurti, member of that House Oversight committee was at today's hearing. What was today about? What do you think it accomplished?
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
Well, thank you so much for paying attention to this extremely troubling saga where thousands, literally thousands of girls now women survivors of Jeffrey Epstein's heinous child sex trafficking ring have yet to receive a single measure of justice. And so today, for the first time in more of an official setting, they've been able to tell their stories and be asked questions about their particular experiences. And what they said was heartfelt, very moving, and it took a lot of bravery and conviction on their part to come and reveal what they did.
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Ari Melber
Yeah, you mentioned using the process for that goal. Typically when the system works, it's the DOJ that does all this, that takes witness testimony. You and others have pointed out that that's failed and so you have a co equal branch doing that in the breach. I want to play some discussion of the DOJ's failures, negligence that accusers spoke about. Take a look.
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Molly Jong-Fast
These files displayed my name, my phone number, my old address, where I worked at the time where I was studying, and other identifying information. I woke up one day with my name mentioned over 500 times. I can only imagine the long term impact this mistake will have on my life.
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Ari Melber
How do you contrast something so glaring? Obviously hypocritical. When Donald Trump and others ran on transparency, then you guys had to pass this unusual law to force him to do what he wouldn't. And then there was great delay and care to protect things regarding political insiders, often men and Donald Trump and not these accusers, as the hearing showed today.
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
Well, I think the through line here is that there are corrupt interests that unfortunately are corrupting the administration of justice. In this particular case, you're absolutely right. There was a very important document that was displayed at this particular hearing showing that the DOJ itself back in 2019 identified numerous co conspirators to Jeffrey Epstein. But that very document came back to us produced with redactions of at least six individuals and none of them have been disclosed. They might be among us continuing their predatory practices. And among the others, the only two people who've been prosecuted in any way is Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. And Maxwell now is seeking a pardon and she might actually get one from Trump, which is completely unacceptable. So you see just a corrupt administration of justice here.
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Ari Melber
Yeah. Congressman, while I have you, the Epstein transparency law also requested information about the circumstances of his death in the custody of the then Trump Justice Department and the Bureau of Prisons. And we've reported on this. There was a lot of irregularities. The DOJ was not transparent or consistent on that set of history, both under Trump, but then under the Inspector General report which was released during the Biden administration. Now we've got more information, including this purported or possible handwritten note from Epstein's jail cell believed to be described to be by him as a suicide note. That's new. Took all these years to come out. Do you view that note as likely valid and do you think it makes it more likely that the government assessment that he took his own life was correct?
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
I read the contents of the note. It doesn't shed a whole lot of light for me on the particular situation at hand, except it's another indication that the government failed the survivors, as they pointed out today at the hearing. They allowed it was.
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Ari Melber
If you, you don't think it was valid or you think there might be foul play, what is your, what is your theory of the case?
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
I don't know. I'm still trying to understand the circumstances of his death. Can I just say one other thing which you pointed out before but which came out loud and clear at the hearing, which is that there's $1.5 billion worth of wire transactions contained in what are called suspicious activity reports that have not been produced by the Treasury Department and has been specifically blocked by Scott Bessant at Donald Trump's behest. I feel that that is an obvious and an incredibly important source of information to illuminate the scandal and bringing accountability for what was done.
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Ari Melber
And now I'm out of time. But do you have Republicans who would help subpoena that or they haven't joined that effort?
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Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi
Yes, we're in talks with Republicans as we speak. And stay tuned. This is going to be a big topic for my, my own office and some others to pursue.
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Ari Melber
Interesting. Well, yeah, no, you were, as I mentioned, central in this, especially the hearing today and we wanted to hear from you. So thank you for making the time. Congressman, let me tell folks what's coming up because there are new numbers on Trump's inflation and they're bad. And new polling that Republicans blame him for the prices. A warning inside the FCC about the Trump censorship agenda and the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Marty Barron on these censorship and free speech issues. He's a rare guest. We sometimes get him. That includes tonight. Coming up,
- [28:35]
MSNOW Announcer
listen to your favorite Ms. Now shows anytime as a podcast. Enjoy new episodes of Morning Joe, Deadline, White House and the Rachel Maddows Show.
- [28:45]
Jon Stewart
Every small d Democratic muscle that we have is flexing.
- [28:49]
MSNOW Announcer
Plus the Last Word with Lawrence o', Donnell, the Beat with Ari Melber, the Weeknight and more on the go wherever you get your podcasts for ad free listening to all of your favorite shows. Subscribe to Ms. Now Premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [29:10]
Donald Trump
If you see cnn, you think they're winning the war, if you read the New York Times, it's actually seditious, in my opinion. We get the radical left to say we're not winning, we're not winning. They don't have any military left. It's unbelievable. It's actually, it's actually, I believe it's treasonous.
- [29:28]
Ari Melber
Donald Trump talking about accusations of treason. DOJ opening the investigation that started our show tonight on the Wall Street Journal. There's a wider campaign of intimidating anyone, including the media and other entities that simply surface or publish opposing views. We're now joined by the veteran journalist Marty Barron, who was executive editor for the Washington Post, including during part of the Bezos era, and is a decorated journalist. Welcome back.
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Marty Baron
Thank you. Good to be here.
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Ari Melber
Your reaction to the Wall Street Journal's approach, which Murdoch has backed, resisting the civil lawsuits where others settled, and now from what we can tell, publishing kind of adding sunlight to this effort that seems to be potentially to intimidate war coverage.
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Marty Baron
Well, I'm glad the Wall Street Journal is resisting. They've done terrific reporting. There's been other great reporting by other news organizations. The New York Times, the Washington Post continues to do excellent reporting as well. I mean, this is part of an attack from all angles on the press. So you have these grand jury subpoenas against the Wall Street Journal. You had a raid on the home of a Washington Post reporter where they confiscated all of her. It was an unprecedented raid in the national security, seizing all of her electronic devices. You have the EEOC bringing a discrimination complaint against the New York Times because the white male reported didn't get a promotion he wanted. You have apparently the FBI apparently investigating the Atlantic magazine for reporting on Cash Patel and his alleged heavy drinking and his other behavior. So really, all across the board, you're seeing this administration use every weapon within its possession to attack the press, to harass the press and to endeavor to intimidate the press.
- [31:20]
Ari Melber
What tactics do you think have to evolve? The classic example of Pentagon Papers or the things we see books and movies about were a more genteel time. And when the court finally vindicated the press, that was seen as effective here. It's been well documented that the hassle is the plan. They don't need to win two years from now. So what else do you think outlets should do?
- [31:46]
Marty Baron
Well, I think you're absolutely right that the strategy is not necessarily to win, but to harass and to force the media outlets to incur enormous costs in defending themselves and just batter them with one lawsuit after the next. I mean, Trump of course, filed his own private defamation lawsuits against the press. And now, of course, they're using the regulatory agencies like the FCC to threaten to, for example, with regard to abc, to review all of their station licenses because they don't like the jokes that Jimmy Kimmel has made or they don't like what's said on the View, things like that. Now, what should the press do? It should do what it's doing, I think, and that is continue to report on this administration, regardless of this harassment. And I think the major news organizations, including the Washington Post, where I was executive editor before, continue to do that. I take a bit of exception to what Andrew Weissman said before, suggesting that somehow the Post was not doing its job. It's true. I mean, I've been very critical of the posture of Jeff Bezos toward Trump. But the news department continues to do exceptional work, and that's why the home of the reporter was raided. And by the way, they just won a Pulitzer Prize for public service, the top Pulitzer Prize for the coverage of the administration and what Doge was doing under the aegis of Elon Musk. So I think, look, what this administration fears more than anything are facts, actual facts, reaching the public. And what it's trying to do here is to keep those facts with regard to this war away from the public, outside of the public domain.
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Ari Melber
You mentioned the comedians, and with Colbert's show coming to an end, you had this pretty rare moment of unity. Take a look.
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Jon Stewart
The five of us being here right now, obviously it's dangerous because we represent so much of late night. Jon Stewart is Designated Survivor tonight. Someone has to. Someone has to survive for the President to be mad at. Is there anything that we have not touched on before we move on to this, I'm curious, the outrage that your
- [34:00]
Ari Melber
show is being thrown off the air. Yeah, I wasn't fisting. As the old saying goes, this is America. And the Colbert example is complicated. The Kimmel one was very clear and simple. The president got the government to scare his parent company and very close into canceling him over free speech. Your view?
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Marty Baron
Well, I think that's the broader point there, is that what the administration is doing is not just an attack on the press, it's really an attack on the First Amendment and freedom of expression. Freedom of expression by comics who make jokes, free expression by academics who want to report on their research, what's actually happened, scientists who are doing the same, by business executives who should be able to advocate for the policies that they genuinely believe in and who are now afraid to do so attacks on lawyers for merely representing their clients in the vigorous way that they should. This is an attack on free expression in every form. It's not just an attack on the press, although the press is one of the principal targets.
- [35:08]
Ari Melber
Really appreciate you as always, Marty Barron. Thank you. When a fit and break. And when we come back, why Republicans blame Trump for rising prices. Donald Trump started a war that's raising prices. Something apparently everybody agrees on. There are new numbers that show inflation is up almost 4%. That's a three year high. Price hikes wiping out any wage gains. So people are comparatively worse than when Trump took office, which is very different than what he campaigned on.
- [35:45]
Donald Trump
Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again. One of my top priorities will be to quickly defeat inflation and make America affordable again. You notice what word have you not heard over the last two weeks? Affordability. Because I've won. I've won affordability.
- [36:08]
Ari Melber
Fact check. False. Affordability is not just a word or a catchphrase. You can see the headlines, the tariffs, the war, prices up gas to food. People are upset.
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Molly Jong-Fast
Erica has become completely unaffordable. Chomp pointing.
- [36:23]
Ari Melber
But he needs to be like, I did that.
- [36:25]
Donald Trump
Look at these big, beautiful, expensive gas prices.
- [36:29]
Molly Jong-Fast
I'm not doing anything. I'm not going out because gas is $4 in Iowa.
- [36:32]
Andrew Weissman
Oh, my God, look at these prices.
- [36:34]
Molly Jong-Fast
Is everyone like internally panicking at checkout or is it just me?
- [36:38]
Andrew Weissman
25.99 a pound. Donald Trump, you're really making America great.
- [36:42]
Molly Jong-Fast
What is this economy that we are all living in right now? It makes me so mad.
- [36:48]
Ari Melber
That's real people sharing what they're going through. They call that, you know, person on the street or anecdotal. But the Wider numbers show 70%, 77% of Americans say Trump's policies are raising prices. That includes a majority of Republicans. I repeat, a majority of Republicans blame Trump for these prices. All those narratives about the MAGA base fact free. Well, on some issues, Reality I call it, he can't escape. Meanwhile, what's Trump focused on? Well, among other things, a golden statue of himself on one of his own golf courses, which is how, you know, he approves a golden calf moment if we ever had one.
- [37:30]
Jon Stewart
He's also engaging in some recreational idolatry because last week Trump celebrated a new 22 foot golden statue of himself at his Miami golf club.
- [37:38]
Molly Jong-Fast
I don't want to suggest this is actually a case of false idolatry. If it was, God would probably be punishing us the same way he did in the Bible with a plague. And I mean, that's not happening.
- [37:52]
Breaking tonight, the deadly outbreak of a rare rodent virus.
- [37:57]
Ari Melber
Molly Jong Fast is here on Truth Stranger Than Fiction.
- [38:00]
Andrew Weissman
Next.
- [38:08]
Jon Stewart
He's also engaging in some recreational idolatry because last week Trump celebrated a new 22 foot golden statue of himself at his Miami golf club.
- [38:17]
Molly Jong-Fast
I don't want to suggest this is actually a case of false idolatry. If it was, God would probably be punishing us the same way he did in the Bible with a plague. And I mean, that's not happening.
- [38:30]
Breaking tonight, the deadly outbreak of a rare rodent virus.
- [38:36]
Ari Melber
Can't make it up. We are back with Molly Zhang Fast. Her book is out in paperback, how to Lose youe Mother, right after Mother's Day here. Welcome.
- [38:43]
Molly Jong-Fast
Thank you.
- [38:45]
Ari Melber
It is strange and it is the ultimate contrast. Donald Trump looks out of touch, elitist, smug. We played sound earlier him saying, well, I don't think about Americans position. And then you have the ballroom of it, the statue of it. It's not even like they're pretending. And you could say, well, that's Trump. But he did pretend in 24. He talked about prices then.
- [39:07]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah. And he actually really ran in 24 on prices. His whole thing was that Biden world wasn't sensitive to inflation and he was going to bring prices down. He even said things that like normal politicians might not say, say because they were impossible to do, like I'm gonna make bacon cheaper. Like we all know it's very hard to make prices go down once they've gone up. And in fact, what we've seen, I mean, what's so interesting about Trump is that he's done the exact opposite of what he said he was gonna do. Right. Everything that he has done, like the tariffs and the war in Iran, they have made things more expensive and people put it together, they've connected it in the polling, you see that, right?
- [39:45]
Ari Melber
And it's if it were a movie or Jon Stewart made the biblical reference, of course, if it was a parable, you know, some orange fox and always lies so up is always down. So when he runs on, hey, one thing I'm going to do is lower prices or have no forever wars or release the Epstein files. Every last big promise, with the exception perhaps of hardline immigration, has been contradicted.
- [40:15]
Molly Jong-Fast
And where we've seen Trump, I think really lose a step is if you look at like 2018 coming into the midterms, even though he didn't do well in the midterms and his party lost a lot of seats, including in Iowa, where they lost three seats to Democrats, which I think could happen again. If you look at these polls, then he was still able to sort of stay on message. It was different messages, but it was. He was able to do it. Now, what you really see, and I think the thing that's really upsetting Republicans and really scary for them is that he gets out there and he starts talking about the ballroom, or he gets out there and he starts talking about painting the Lincoln, you know, painting the fountain in the Washington Monument. Like, these are things that are just unforced errors. Like, if he were with it, he could go out there and say, look at what we're doing. We're taking down the gas tax. Now, the gas tax happens to only be 18 cents, and gas is up like a dollar a gallon. But he could at least point to something that was a talking point. And what you see with MAGA is when MAGA starts to get in trouble, they can't message succinctly. Like when they are. When they're in their sweet spot, they have, like, messaging discipline like you can't believe. And what happens when they start to get into trouble is that they're messaging all different things, right?
- [41:25]
Ari Melber
And the President, out of whatever it is, some people say fatigue, some people say, well, he's in his last term. He knows it. We don't hear any fantasies about a third term anymore because it would just draw attention to the fact that in addition to it being illegal, you couldn't win a third term on these numbers. So we don't hear about that. But his messaging has been troubled with that said, there was this fertility event at the Oval Office, and obviously we wanted to end tonight with that. Take a look.
- [41:54]
Jon Stewart
We have, as Dr. Oz pointed out, a fertility crisis in this country.
- [41:58]
MSNOW Announcer
One in three Americans are under babied.
- [42:01]
Donald Trump
These reforms will give states more flexible, lower costs.
- [42:05]
Jon Stewart
We had a. A series of presidents that were trying to discourage childbirth and motherhood in this country. We now have a president that is
- [42:15]
Ari Melber
trying to encourage it.
- [42:16]
Donald Trump
But I became the father of fertility.
- [42:22]
Molly Jong-Fast
I just want to point out that Democrats had, under Biden, this thing called the child tax credit. It took, like, a huge number of children. I can't remember, you know, like 40% of children out of poverty. It was this amazing thing. And you know what happened? It was allowed to expire. And Republicans. So, like, they can talk about how much they want people to not be under babied, which is not a thing. But if they want to increase fertility rates, if they want people to have babies, they need to make it more affordable. And the child tax credit did exactly that. And it was allowed to expire.
- [42:58]
Ari Melber
Yeah. I mean, it's a great point because again, you have all this spin and then you have the actual policies. We actually had Rosa Delario on the show when, when they did extend it because it's one of the biggest movers of social mobility in the federal tax code in history. And that's a real thing. Whereas as you mentioned, being under babied may not even be a real thing.
- [43:19]
Molly Jong-Fast
Right. And it's just like this administration does lots of showy stuff. But what really needs to happen is the kind of legislation that gets people, makes having children more affordable, makes healthcare more affordable, makes prenatal care more affordable. That's what needs to happen.
- [43:36]
Ari Melber
Yeah. Molly, great to see you. The weeknight starts now.
- [43:41]
Chris Hayes
Artificial intelligence is moving very, very fast, and it's raising new questions just about every day about what it is, what it isn't. When all is said and done, what is the end game? I'm Chris Hayes, and as part of my podcast, why Is this Happening? I'm speaking with leading experts each week to help ground that conversation.
- [43:56]
Molly Jong-Fast
We're right now in a situation where it's very difficult to understand what is real and what's not real.
- [44:02]
Chris Hayes
Why is this happening? The AI End Game, a special miniseries from Ms. Now, start listening today wherever you get your podcasts.