Todd Blanche (3:40)

I represented President Trump in the Manhattan DA case and in Jack Smith's prosecutions. Why is there objection to sending ICE officers to polling places? Illegals can't vote. We see our most activist judges that we lose to every single day. There's a lot of ways that we can work within that to get some of our cases where we want them to be.

MSNow Host (4:07)

Ms. Now reports that the President is considering a short list of candidates to replace Bondi. And the list includes EPA head Lee Zeldin, Republican Senator Eric Schmidt, and U.S. attorney Janine Pirro, who is currently overseeing a controversial case against Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. Joining me now to discuss all of this is Molly Zhang, fast New York Times opinion writer and the host of the Fast Politics podcast. Also with us is Andrew Weissman, former FBI general counsel, former Mueller Prosecutor, and an MSNow legal contributor. Andrew, let's start with you AG Pamela. Joe Bondi is now out. What's your reaction?

Andrew Weissman (4:49)

So I think there's a temptation in these kinds of stories to focus on the person who was fired. What did they do right, what did they do wrong? And I think that in this instance, that is going to be going straight for the capillaries. I think she is a symptom of what is going on in the White House and specifically the Oval Office. This Department of Justice was a plaything to Donald Trump and moving the deck chairs around, shifting who is in charge is not going to change the policies and practices that are so antithetical to the rule of law. So while she is out, I think that is really not the story. I think they'll, I don't see them putting anyone else in who's going to adhere to the longtime values of the Department of Justice under Republican and Democratic administrations of being independent of the White House about who gets charged and who does not get charged.

MSNow Host (5:57)

Molly, what's your take on this? So Andrea has basically said that the whole corpus is rotted. It doesn't matter who's at the head. What's your take? That's a fundamental indictment of the Department

Molly Jungfast (6:07)

of Justice from someone who knows the Department of Justice is supposed to look like. I would say what's meaningful about this is not so much that she's gone, but how she's gone. Remember, Donald Trump made a real point in Trump 2.0 of not firing people, and he would. Even Christie.

Sky Perryman (6:23)

No.

Molly Jungfast (6:24)

Was moved to a really great fake job. Right. The Shields of America, which sounded like

MSNow Host (6:29)

something from the Marvel Universe.

Molly Jungfast (6:30)

Yes.

MSNow Host (6:31)

Apparently is a real thing.

Molly Jungfast (6:32)

Right. A real thing that they clearly made up. But, you know, so I do think it's important that this really happened. They did not move her. They just fired her. He fired her via tweet. You know we're already seeing leaking, right? She spent yesterday. How do we know she spent yesterday begging for her job? Because someone leaked it. So we're already seeing leaking. And remember, one of the reasons why Trump tried not to fire people this time is because when he did last time, all anyone did was leak. So the fact that he has done this, done this so quickly did not give her a fake job. Even Mike Walls got another job. So I think that is very meaningful. Look, I don't know how he gets someone Senate confirmed again. I guess he's gonna have to take another senator. But the actual movement and this sort of inability to keep someone, I think that's meaningful.

MSNow Host (7:21)

So, Andrea, going back to your bigger point about the rot at the doj, one reasons the president was apparently so frustrated with Bondi was that she had not done enough, in his view, to secure wins against his perceived enemies. Given that so much of her tenure was spent trying unsuccessfully to prosecute the president's perceived enemies, what's the nature of the legacy that she leaves behind? And what will her successor have to achieve going forward to live up to this president's expectations?

Andrew Weissman (7:54)

Well, I sort of view that as the president being unwilling to look in the mirror and understand that he had unrealistic expectations, saying that, oh, she's not effective because she wasn't able to re indict and then re indict again. Letitia James, or to indict six members of Congress for doing the unspeakable, which is speaking the truth and doing so protected by the First Amendment. Those are not failings of the Attorney general, other than the attorney general should never have approved them. But another attorney General is not going to do any better. The problem is the President, not the Attorney General. I mean, obviously, the attorney General should not be subservient. They are professional. They should be saying no. But it really, to me is the president thinking, oh, there is no such thing as a rule of law. And if I can just get somebody more effective, they can sort of trample on the rule of law better than Pam Bondi did. And I think that ignores the fact that you have gray grand jurors and you have judges in the system and they can push back and have pushed back on illegal practices.

MSNow Host (9:05)

Now, this is a great point, Molly. I mean, it wasn't that, Pamela, Joe Bondi didn't try to launch these prosecutions. It's that judges were like, no, that won't fly. Or jurors would say, like, we're not going to issue a bill in that case. The New York Times reports, though, that this particular attorney General was a real loyalist. According to the New York Times, Bondi was, quote, like a radio built to pick up only one channel tune to Mr. Trump's demands. Ms. Bondi gained and maintained her position through her attentiveness, loyalty, and obedience. And that makes her uniquely vulnerable to shifts in the president's opinion. Well, I mean, what to say?

Molly Jungfast (9:45)

Well, this is the Trump 2.0 problem.

Sky Perryman (9:48)

Right.

Molly Jungfast (9:48)

There's a cabinet filled with people who have their jobs because of their fealty to Trump and not much else. I think it's very hard for women to do maga. We've seen this again and again. This is something I think we've talked about.

MSNow Host (10:02)

We have talked about this. Yeah, yeah.

Molly Jungfast (10:03)

Because part of MAGA is this rage, is this ability, like Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearings, this ability to turn a question on a questioner, to sort of be so angry. And American women, our culture has not embraced the angry woman as of yet. And MAGA is this hypersexualized mar a Lago face, you know, a certain aesthet, which really runs contrary to pushing back against a questioner quite that way.

MSNow Host (10:31)

Well, let me push on this. It strikes me that the only two people who have yet to be ousted from this cabinet are women. And there weren't a lot of women to begin with. And there's some rumblings that maybe the third will be Tulsi Gabbard, the DNI head of dni. What does that say about this administration's interest in protecting and defending women, letting women have a real seat at the table, as it were?

Molly Jungfast (10:58)

Yeah. Remember in Trump, 1.0 where they couldn't, they didn't have enough women and they kept bringing in like they have Ivanka. I mean, everyone here is like a non playing character except for Trump. So everybody has been sort of put in there because they're actors. And that he even says such, you know, that he was impressed with Pete Hegseth because of the way he was on television. You know, these people are actors in sort of Trump's, you know, president reality, reality show presidency.

MSNow Host (11:27)

Andrew, the DOJ has obviously much changed after Bondi's tenure. Is there any hope that this ship will right. What will need to happen, whether it's in the next Attorney General's tenure or even beyond that to make the Department of Justice the entity that we have always known it to be in both Republican and Democrat presidents past.

Andrew Weissman (11:50)

That's a nice small question there. I mean, that is a huge, huge issue.

MSNow Host (11:54)

Please answer it in one minute.

Andrew Weissman (11:57)

Yes. So first, don't have any hope for Todd Blanche. In many ways, this is not just the firing of Pam Bondi, but it's the snubbing of Todd Blanche. I mean, the normal process would have been to elevate him and propose that he will be the next Attorney General. And so essentially the sins that we've been talking about that that are against her are against him as well. And so also I can't imagine a confirmation hearing for him because it would be very much a bloodbath and would put front and center issues like Epstein, which we'll talk about. And so another Justice Department is really going to have a hard time because once you've broken those norms, there are going to be people who really think that that's something you can do. There's going to be a lot of pressure. As we know, the Democrats are very wanted to say let's look forward and not back. I am not in that camp. I think that if there have been crimes, the only way to deal with them is not to say if there are crimes. And if they're serious, obviously is not to say I'm going to look forward and ignore them. Because the message then is you can get away with it. We would never do that for any serious crime. And so I know that there it complicated, more complicated than this sort of minute can get into. But I do think we have to rethink the sort of Obama generation of let's just look forward and bygones will be bygones because we've seen what happens.

MSNow Host (13:33)

All right, Andrew Weissman, Molly Jungfast, stay right there with me. Rest of you we will be back in just 90 seconds. She, from the get go, royally fouled up the release of the Jeffrey Epstein documents. And it was just such a rolling disaster all year and was handled so poorly that that was one of the biggest problems, despite her obvious loyalty and her background. We are back with the breaking news. Donald Trump firing Attorney General Pamela Joe Bondi. According to the New York Times, among the reasons for Bondi's ouster is the President's dissatisfaction with her handling of the Epstein files, which, quote, has become a political liability for Mr. Trump among his supporters. Early in Bondi's tenure, she fanned expectations of bombshell revelations from the files. Take a listen.

Andrew Weissman (14:38)

The DOJ may be releasing the list of Jeffrey Epstein's clients.

Paul Rykoff (14:42)

Will that really happen?

Pamela Joe Bondi (14:44)

It's sitting on my desk right now to review. That's been a directive by President Trump.

MSNow Host (14:49)

I'm reviewing that. Six days later, Bondi's DOJ staged this flashy stunt, handing MAGA influencers binders that were supposedly filled with new Epstein information. The stunt backfired spectacularly. The binders contained nothing new, angering the very influencers they were meant to impress. The Department of Justice that suddenly says, there is no client list, there's no blackmail operation. Epstein definitively killed himself. You're not getting any more documents. Thank you. Goodbye. No more questions. You know, my reaction is, what are you talking about?

Paul Rykoff (15:25)

They trotted us out right in front of the press pool, which I didn't appreciate. Once we looked at it, we realized we didn't have anything that anybody else didn't already have. Why am I giving more transparency than the FBI and the DOJ are giving?

MSNow Host (15:38)

Bondi then went into damage control mode, signing off on a memo disclaiming the existence of an Epstein client list, reversing her previous statement. In the meantime, behind the scenes, Bondi reportedly told Trump that his name appeared in the files. The confusion and contradictions fueled a MAGA revolt. Eventually, Trump was forced to sign the Epstein Transparency act, which required the files released. But the DOJ rollout of the files was scattershot and incompetent, failing to redact some survivors identities while redacting information about those who the FBI once called co conspirators. Congressman Jamie Raskin said that in the unredacted files, Trump's name appeared more than 1 million times. When lawmakers pressed Bondi for an explanation, she gave this now infamous response.

Pamela Joe Bondi (16:35)

This administration released over 3 million pages of documents. Over 3 million. And Donald Trump signed that law to release all of those documents. You know why Because Donald Trump, the Dow, the Dow right now is over. The dow is over $50,000. I don't know why you're laughing.

MSNow Host (17:02)

We're back with Molly Chung, Fast and Andrew Weissman. Molly, what is the DAO today?

Molly Jungfast (17:09)

I think it's not 50,000, but, but yeah, I look she you see when you watch her how hard it is to do that maga masculine.

MSNow Host (17:19)

Was it just the style thing or was there something about the Epstein files that was just especially hard for her to get her hands around? Remember, this is someone who campaigned for Florida AG on her record of combating sex trafficking.

Leah Litman (17:31)

Yeah.

Molly Jungfast (17:31)

And it' I mean, I think that when you watch the videos of her running for reelection in 2014, she does a whole video about sex trafficking and how she's really committed to stopping it. Fast forward. She is. When she testified in front of Oversight, they were all of these Epstein survivors in the back row and they and she wouldn't look at them. So it is such a good example of how a lot there's the Faustian bargain that people make when they go to work for Donald Trump.

MSNow Host (18:01)

Andrew speaking of the Faustian bargain, there's going to be a new AG in town for a while. It may be Todd Blanche. Who knows who it'll be afterwards. The Epstein files show no signs of evaporating. Is any attorney general going to do what the president wants, which it seems to be is to simply make these all go away.

Andrew Weissman (18:21)

So look, the Epstein files right now the Department of Justice is in violation of the law. They were supposed to return over all of it. They are claiming privile that the law does not allow them to claim they have released things in, it's true, a completely incompetent way, but that's not the problem. All of this would make some sense if a new attorney General came in and we all said, oh look, the new attorney General is competent, is now releasing all of the Epstein files, all of the ones that have not been released. But as sure as we're all three of us are sitting here, that's not going to happen. And that's because the issue here is not the Attorney General just to beat a dead horse here, but it's the issue is the White House. It is true Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche were incompetent in the way it was rolled out. But the reason we do not have all of those is not the Attorney General, it is the Oval Office. And I can't believe we're going to see them under this administration. And so lashing out from The White House to the Department of Justice is not going to make the problem go away because the documents will still be under seal.

MSNow Host (19:33)

Andrew, before we take the break, you made this really important point, I think, about what the way forward might look like if someone was interested in writing what has happened at doj. I want to play some tape. This is Todd Blanche, who made a quite revealing admission last week when he talked about what people inside the administration are actually afraid of. Take a listen.

Todd Blanche (19:56)

Everybody's afraid that the next administration, if we don't win, we're going to all be investigated and indicted. Think about that. This is not a third world country. This is America. And the existing administration is afraid that they're gonna get indicted.

MSNow Host (20:11)

Think about that. This is not a third world country. This is America. Is it off the charts to even think about the prospect of actually prosecuting individuals if they have committed crimes in the service of this president?

Andrew Weissman (20:25)

Can I just step back for a moment and just say that Todd Blanche is saying that at a time that he sought the indictment of of Congress for speaking the truth. He sought the indictment of Letitia James three times. He is greenlit issuing a grand jury subpoena that was quashed by a federal judge to Jerome Powell. You could go on and on. The idea that he is saying that with no sense of irony on his part is remarkable. Now, it is fair to say that an administration has to be incredibly careful in deciding to go after people, a prior administration and not have a sort of endless cycle of tit for tat. But the answer to that is the law and the facts. And so one of the reasons you didn't see the same thing happening under the Biden administration is because they followed the law and the facts. And the reason you're seeing so much happening now and you're seeing judges, including judges appointed by Donald Trump in the first administration, pushing back is because they're either violating the law or they're not adhering to the facts or unfortunately, both.

MSNow Host (21:40)

All right, Andrew Weissman, Molly Jungfast, thank you for getting us started on this big news night. Later in the show, I have a special guest who will talk about what it means to have Pamela Jo Bondi fired and how that will impact legal challenges over the president's overreach. Also ahead, I'll get into the quadruple whammy facing the Donald Trump in court, from the Supreme Court to his ballroom plans and so much more. But first, we have the brutal reaction from the right to the president's Iran speech last night. Donald Trump's rhetoric on Iran now confronts a harsh reality. This morning, hours after his primetime address defending his decision to enter into an armed conflict with Iran, the conservative National Review issued this blunt critique. Quote, trump's speech didn't make the case. The New York Times noted that the president's failure to, quote, define a clear path out of the conflict was determinative. And the Wall and Wall street also experienced volatility in both oil and stocks after the president bizarrely claimed that the Strait of Hormuz would open. Quote, naturally,

Trump Supporter (23:01)

the strait will open up. Naturally, that will resume the flowing, and the gas prices will rapidly come back down. Stock prices will rapidly go back up.

MSNow Host (23:14)

Many nations do not appear to share the president's confidence that the strait will open naturally. Today, diplomats from over 40 countries met to discuss a plan to reopen the strait. The AP reports that the United States did not attend. In his speech last night, President Trump also doubled down on threats to attack civilian infrastructure in Iran, a potential war crime. The president said, quote, if there is no deal, we are going to hit each and every one of their electric generating plants and, quote, we're going to bring them back to the Stone Ages where they belong. This afternoon, Trump posted a video of a strike on a major bridge near Tehran with the caption, quote, much more to follow. Just to recap, Iran's regime remains in place. Iran continues to have a stock of enriched uranium, and Iran continues to choke off access to the Strait of Hormuz. New polling shows that Americans disapprove of the President's handling of this war by a 2 to 1 margin. Joining me now to discuss all of this is Paul Rickoff, national security and political analyst, the host of the Independent Americans podcast, and the founder and CEO of Independent Veterans of America. Paul, help me understand, how is the Strait of Hormuze going to open? Naturally? How does that work?

Paul Rykoff (24:43)

It won't, and it's. And it's not working. And I think it's the flashpoint for kind of the world's gas station. And this, I think, is maybe the most important pain point for Trump politically. Obviously, gas prices are now surging toward $5. The entire world is facing a potential energy crisis. And I think it's the epicenter of how much he screwed this whole thing up. I mean, the world can see that he has not only failed to rally the world and failed to put forward clear objectives, he's losing control of the story. I think that's where you see some desperation. Last night was a total debacle. It was a thud. It was a nothing burger. And it was very unlike Trump because he didn't really make any news. He tried to snatch the microphone and ram his rhetoric and his rationale down the country's throat. But he looked old, he looked tired, he was meandering and unfocused. It was a moment where I felt

MSNow Host (25:30)

old and tired at the end of it.

Paul Rykoff (25:31)

I mean, the only good news was it was only about 20 minutes long. Right? So by his standards it was pretty short. But he didn't make any news on announcing ground troops, which is also some good news. We could have seen that. But I think folks who were hoping to get inspired, hoping to get moved, or hoping to hear it was over got nothing. And I would even argue that the networks should reconsider whether they give him airtime in primetime for a speech like that. But he's trying to rip back the narrative, he's trying to control the story. And the war is going sideways, the lid is off now and he can't control it. And even if he did pull out troops tomorrow and he stopped the bombing, which is what I think most of the country wanted to hear, this carnage and the violence wouldn't stop. And that's why he's totally lost control of it.

MSNow Host (26:07)

Well, to your point about him losing control of the narrative, 40 plus countries met today to figure out what to do about the Strait of Hormuz, which as you say, is a major conduit for the flow of oil throughout the world. So this is now a global energy crisis, not just something that's affecting us, although Americans are definitely feeling the pain of this. What do you make of the fact that, that our allies and other countries are banding together without us in order to address this problem?

Paul Rykoff (26:34)

I think this is a new normal. I think we have to face a new normal where America is not necessarily causing the shots, calling the shots. I mean, we are, we are causing the shots, we are causing the shots and causing the shock. But we're almost being treated like a rogue nation. I mean, we're becoming more isolated by the day. He didn't attack NATO last night full throatedly like they had previewed, which I think is important because the Italians have closed airspace to American assets, the Spanish have closed American airspace, closed airspace to America. So we've become more and more isolated. I think now what we're seeing is we can't drive the rest of the world and the rest of the world can move on without us. We're seeing that Israel is going to move forward regardless of what the US does and now everyone else is suffering. So they're going to put Donald Trump in a little corner and hope that he doesn't act up. The problem is we have 50,000American troops in harm's way. We've still got thousands that he could drop onto the ground. There's now reporting that he wants to do an operation to insert special forces and try to secure the Iranian. But every one of his objectives that he's tried to lay out, as you, as you illustrated, have all been left incomplete. So even as he continues to shift the goalpost and move the narrative, the world is calling his bluff. And I think most importantly, we're less safe, right? We're more isolated, we're less safe. And it's getting worse by the day.

MSNow Host (27:42)

So the president was supposed to clarify why we're in Iran and what the path forward is. Did he make the case yesterday? And if he didn't, what new questions do you now have?

Paul Rykoff (27:51)

No, he didn't clarify anything. I mean, even worse, he made it more murky. And I think that's really the problem, especially within his base where Republicans are jumping ship. I mean, this is his Hurricane Katrina moment. This is his Afghanistan moment for Biden, where his base is giving up. They said they've had enough. And now we've got a unifying moment where most of the country is actually united on something opposing the Iran war. And I think the real thing we have to ask is, is he still gonna try to go for Cuba? Is he still gonna continue a forever war? Because it is that. It's much bigger than Iran. It's a forever war. And that's exactly the opposite of what he promised when he ran for reelection.

MSNow Host (28:26)

This is not Donald the Dove.

Paul Rykoff (28:27)

No, no. I mean, this is a 2.0 on steroids that's mangled and meandering and most importantly, his base back and they've had enough. Everybody wanted to hear last night that he was going to stop, and he didn't stop. He said he's going further. And that's why especially conservatives are pushing back.

MSNow Host (28:41)

All right, Paul Rykoff, thanks so much for joining us and breaking it down.

Andrew Weissman (28:46)

You got it.

MSNow Host (28:47)

Still ahead, Trump's big losing streak in court. Also, how Democrats plan to fight the new Trump DOJ and wait for it, the Golden Throne in Washington. We're going to explain all of that is coming up.

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MSNow Host (30:39)

It's been a tough week for Donald Trump. In court, he suffered what Newsweek calls a, quote, quadruple blow. That means losses on multiple fronts, from his bid for a White House ballroom to his attempt to bar funding for NPR and pbs. All losers in court. But the biggest loss came yesterday. A judge ruled that the president's January 6 speech at the Ellipse is not immune from civil claims. But it's not just the lower courts where the president has long been struggling. Yesterday, the Supreme Court justices seemed noticeably skeptical of the Trump DOJ's arguments to upend birthright citizenship. Trump himself attended oral argument. This was a first for a sitting president, and he attended alongside now fired Attorney General Pamela Joe Bondi. The chief justice scoffed at the DOJ's arguments regarding what they termed so called called birth tourism. Take a listen.

Paul Rykoff (31:45)

We're in a new world now, as Justice Alito pointed out to where 8 billion people are one plane ride away

Range Rover Advertiser (31:50)

from having a a child who's a U S citizen.

Paul Rykoff (31:52)

Well, it's a new world.

Andrew Weissman (31:53)

It's the same Constitution.

MSNow Host (31:56)

Sick burn. But it wasn't just the Chief Justice. In fact, all three justices who were nominated by the president also cast doubt on the administration's arguments.

Andrew Weissman (32:09)

It's striking that in none of the

Paul Rykoff (32:11)

debates do we have parents discussed, we have the child's citizenship.

Andrew Weissman (32:16)

The absence is striking. You've mentioned several times the practices of other countries. I Guess I'm not seeing the relevance as a legal constitutional interpretive matter.

MSNow Host (32:26)

I can imagine it being messy on some applications.

Apple Mac Advertiser (32:29)

What if you don't know who the parents are?

MSNow Host (32:32)

It's definitely tough sledding for the administration, but the case may not be a slam dunk. ACLU lawyer Cecilia Wang, who argued for the plaintiffs, also faced some tough questioning. But after the argument, she said she remains confident that the justices will leave the meaning of the 14th amendment intact. Here she is.

M (32:53)

I come out of the court today with the thought of my parents and so many of our parents and ancestors who relied on the rule that we've had in this country for 150 years, that everyone born here is a United States citizen, all alike. And I am confident that the Court is going to turn back this president's effort to radically rewrite our 14th Amendment rule of birthright citizenship.

MSNow Host (33:27)

Joining me now to discuss all of this is Leah Litman, professor of law at the University of Michigan and my co host on the Strict Scrutiny podcast. Leah, what are the top lines from yesterday's argument? Is this a loss for the President, in your view?

Leah Litman (33:40)

It is definitely going to be a loss for the president. I think the only question is whether it's going to be unanimous. I think almost every justice was deeply skeptical of the administration's arguments and rightfully so, basically saying, sir, have you read the 14th Amendment? Because the first sentence says all persons born and naturalized in the United States, citizen in the United States, are citizens

MSNow Host (34:01)

thereof, reading is fundamental, except when it's not. Leah, I want to go back to just the procedural posture. We heard earlier, a challenge to the executive order that would have rescinded birthright citizenship last year. But it was focused primarily on jurisdictional questions, namely whether the nationwide injunction was an appropriate remedy for district courts to issue. At that time, the plaintiffs had asked the Court to take up the substantive question about the scope and substance of the 14th Amendment citizenship clause, and the court declined to do so, even though three justices said that they should have answered it clearly at that point in time. What does it mean that the court waited to take up that substantive question now and allowed this whole question to percolate and then are now hearing it and will decide it later this term?

Leah Litman (34:49)

I think people shouldn't lose sight of the fact that the only reason the justices are even entertaining these arguments and we're talking about this them is because they allowed it to get this far. I think people who just dropped into the oral arguments yesterday or are reading the headlines might think, oh, this is a court that actually recognizes the rule of law and that is inclined to check the president. But that would be missing the entire broader context in which again, they declined to take up the lawfulness of the executive order, allowed the president to begin drafting guidelines for how it could be implemented, and then they even heard oral argument rather than just issuing a few sentence opinions that says not only see the 14th amendment, the CR 1898 opinion in Wong Kim Art.

MSNow Host (35:32)

Well, so let's, let's push on that. I mean like by having oral arguments, like they took an off the wall idea, an idea that would not have been entertained by anyone other than kooks and cranks 15 years ago. And they made it the focus of the entire nation for the last three months. And now yesterday it's all anyone talked about. Is the court really exhibiting the kind of independence and standing in up to this president that some people are arguing that they're doing? Like everyone thinks that he's going to lose. And that's a win for the court. But is it really a win for all of us?

Leah Litman (36:06)

I don't think it's a win for us, for the country, because the court allowed the president to politicize this key foundational constitutional principle that has structured our constitutional democracy for the better part of a century. In addition to the president and now former Attorney General Bondi being present at the argument, so is John Eastman, you know, a disgrace and disbarred lawyer for his role in the January 6th movement. And that disgraced esparred lawyer is actually the father of the idea that birthright citizenship does not actually protect the children of people without lawful status. So it is a crazy kook theory.

MSNow Host (36:40)

Leah, when will we expect a decision from the court on this?

Leah Litman (36:43)

By tradition, the court releases opinions and argued cases by the end of June. My guess is this one will take until the very end of the term, in part because it's being argued late and also because unfortunately, I don't expect it to be unanimous. Another strike against the court. Court.

MSNow Host (36:59)

All right, Leah Litman, thanks so much for joining us tonight. Up next, I will be joined by a special guest who is currently going head to head and toe to toe with Donald Trump in court. That's after this break.

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MSNow Announcer (38:13)

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MSNow Host (38:49)

We now return to that breaking news from the Trump Department of Justice. Pamela Joe Bondi is out as Attorney General, and Todd Blanche is now the Acting Attorney General. Blanche inherits a DOJ that is facing hundreds of lawsuits and legal actions on many fronts, including some that are brought by my next guest. Sky Perryman is the CEO of Democracy Forward Forward, and Democracy Forward has filed more than 400 legal actions against the Trump administration. Sky, let's get right into it with Todd Blanche, now at the head of doj. Does your legal strategy at Democracy Forward change in any way?

Sky Perryman (39:28)

Not at all, because it seems like Todd Blanche is just another page out of the president's playbook. He's a Trump loyalist with his own personal attorney, as we know, and has really been overseeing so many of the policies that we have been challenging in court work.

MSNow Host (39:43)

So, sky, you've been doing this work for a long time. How is it different when the people in DOJ are these loyalists who are the President's former personal lawyers? Like, does it change the nature of the work in any way? Has it changed the way the DOJ operates? What's the difference between 1.0 and now?

Sky Perryman (40:02)

It's been a big sea change. I mean, first you have attorneys who are not always candid with the court. You have a number of instances, so many that it's become normalized. But this is really abnormal where you have the Department of Justice making misstatements to courts showing up not prepared, not able to even say what their clients with the federal agencies are even doing. And so that's one thing that has been a really marked change. And we've started seeing federal judges now be quite skeptical of the Department of Justice when they appear in court, which you didn't normally see before. I think the other piece of this is that the way in which the Department of Justice is being weaponized against people, I mean, the Department of Justice is there, it's there to keep us safe. That means that they do have to investigate and prosecute people, and we all support that. But now what you're seeing is the politicization of the department, where this is not really about justice or law enforcement, it's about a personal vendetta. And that's what you saw with Bondi, and I think you'll see that with Blanche as well. Right.

MSNow Host (40:59)

So let's talk about that. One of the things that happened at the DOJ is that they tried to install a number of US Attorneys throughout the country who would press for these prosecutions of the President's perceived enemies. Those prosecutions were not successful, but it also opened the bread and butter work of those districts to real scrutiny. So, for example, if an indictment is brought by someone who is not Properly appointed as U.S. attorney, the defendant can challenge it and ultimately the indictment and any charges could be wiped away. Can you talk a little bit about how the administration's unorthodox approach to appointing personnel and their need to appoint personnel that's loyal to the president has actually made things less safe on the ground for people in these districts?

Leah Litman (41:42)

Districts?

Sky Perryman (41:44)

Well, of course. I mean, it's made things less safe because the justice system isn't operating the way it needs to because of these false and faulty appointments. We've also seen that it's undermined the American people's confidence in the legal profession. Confidence in institutions overall, we know, is at a low. But the, the judiciary and the legal profession has always been typically the institution that people have the most confidence in. And of course, people don't have confidence in this DOJ and the way it's been operating. But the other point that highlight is one we want all Americans to understand, is this president is losing far, far more than he has been winning in court. And the prosecutions, the fear mongering that we see out of the White House, that we have seen out of the Department of Justice, we'll never forget some of those scenes with Pam Bondi, you know, threatening individual lawyers, threatening judges. Those haven't worked out well for the President. And so you really see the President, I think the rubber hitting the road here with these losses mounting up in court and he's really, I think, trying to do damage control.

MSNow Host (42:45)

So for democracy forward, you have a full docket. What are the cases that are most occupying your attention? What are the most pressing cases against the administration that you're bringing right now?

Sky Perryman (42:55)

Well, you know, we are very committed to making sure that people's votes are going to count and that this president and this Department of Justice doesn't use the mechanisms of the federal government to undermine our elections. Right now, we are litigating in court where the Department of Justice itself has admitted that Doge team members accessed sensitive data last year. The Department of Justice was not truthful with the court about the that last year. But they've since, you know, they've since come out and said it. And DOGE team members had a voter data agreement with third party, a third party group that's involved in trying to question election results. So we are getting to the bottom of that and we'll be working to protect the right to vote. We also protecting people and communities every day. In communities where the president continues to weaponize federal funding, trying to cut off essential services like child care for people. We've had a bunch of big wins on that. And then of course, continuing to confron what we think is a rapidly accelerating autocratic playbook. The incursions on due process, on freedom of speech. I mean, all of those things we're in court on, they're going to be really important. They're really important every day. But they're quite important this year as the president continues to mount really a campaign against the American people.

MSNow Host (44:05)

All right, Sky Perryman, full docket, full hearts. See you soon. Thanks so much for joining us tonight. Up next, a golden throne on the National Mall. We will discuss discussed on the other side of this break. There's been so much news this week that you may have missed this. A massive golden toilet placed on the National Mall just steps away from the Lincoln Memorial. The plaque reads, quote, a throne fit for a king. This is a satirical art piece that was placed just days after millions of people turned out nationwide for the no kings protest. Trump is acting like a king because he wants to be a king in both substance and style. He has renamed the Kennedy center for himself. He's placed his signature on US Currency. He's added his portrait to a gold coin. Coin. He's building the so called Arc de Trump. He's also plastering his face on federal buildings. It's a lot. Just compare Trump's vision of the presidency with former President Obama's take a listen.

Trump Supporter (45:25)

They say we don't need him. Freedom, freedom. He's a dictator. He's a dictator. A lot of people are saying maybe we like a dictator. So the line is that I'm a dictator, dictator, but I stopped crime. So a lot of people say, you know, if that's the case, I'd rather have a dictator. They say he's a horrible dictator type person. I'm a dictator, but sometimes you need a dictator.

Range Rover Advertiser (45:45)

If I was a king, we'd be

Trump Supporter (45:47)

doing a lot more. I'm doing a lot, but I could be doing a lot more if I was a king.

Andrew Weissman (45:51)

I am not a dictator. I'm the president.

Paul Rykoff (45:55)

What I can do is I can

Andrew Weissman (45:56)

make the best possible case for why we need to do the right, right thing.

MSNow Host (46:02)

We'll leave it there. That does it for me Tonight.

MSNow Announcer (46:04)

Subscribe to MSNow Premium on Apple Podcasts for early access, ad free listening and bonus content to all of MSNOW's original podcasts, including the chart topping series the Best People with Nicole Wallace, why Is this Happening? Main justice and more. Plus new episodes of all your favorite msnow shows ad free and ad free listen listening to all of Rachel Maddow's original series, including Rachel Maddow Presents Burn Order. Subscribe to Ms. Now Premium on Apple Podcasts.