Senator Adam Schiff (4:50)

We're talking about over 40,000 jobs in the United States. It's 450,000 jobs. Who are we hurting? It's 500,000 jobs, $110 billion worth of work, which means 600,000 jobs. You're talking about over a million jobs.

News Anchor (5:15)

I mean, from 40,000 jobs to over a million jobs. That was in the span of just 7 months, by the way, all those clips. Now, in the end, Saudi Arabia didn't even purchase the whole $110 billion worth of weapons that Trump announced in the first place. In fact, they actually spent less money on American goods and services than they did during Barack Obama's second term. It was all kind of a big shell game. And that appears to be exactly what we're seeing this time around as well. I mean, by now you have definitely heard that one of Trump's biggest agenda items on this Middle east trip is to accept a big $400 million luxury plane as a gift from the nation of Qatar. He wants the plane to become the new Air Force One, but only for the duration of his presidency, after which ownership of the plane would be transferred to Trump's presidential library. How convenient is all of that? Now, the whole thing is obviously super shady. We're going to talk to a bunch of people about it tonight. And even a lot of conservatives don't want Trump to accept this plane. But Trump says it's too good a deal to pass up. In a post on his social media site, he called the new plane a gift, free of charge, in all caps, Internet shouting style, which is definitely not true either. I mean, look at this reporting from Politico. They say a private contractor would have to rip the jet apart to turn it into a flying White House for the President with secure communications and classified upgrades. That is certainly what is on Air Force One, an expensive and complicated prospect that could cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Add to that the significant cost of sweeping the aircraft for software modifications or embedded foreign tech. So Trump's big, free of charge gift plane looks a lot more expensive when you factor all that in. And bear in mind, the U.S. government is already spending billions of dollars on building two new Air Force One planes right here in the U.S. made by an American company. But Trump doesn't care about these costs for the American taxpayer. Obviously he doesn't. What he really cares about is his new palace in the sky. And, of course, big checks for his billionaire buddies.

Senator Adam Schiff (7:26)

As you know, we have the biggest business leaders in the world here.

Ben Rhodes (7:30)

They're going to walk away with a lot of checks.

News Anchor (7:34)

I mean, he doesn't even hide it sometimes. They're going to walk away with a lot of checks. That's what the billionaires are getting out of this trip. The question is, I mean, he's there as the U.S. american president, what are the American people getting out of this trip? Because if this trip won't actually create a million American jobs, which it clearly won't, if the $400 million plane could actually cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, if all of Trump's stated reasons for making this trip, his first big trip abroad. If all of those stated reasons aren't really standing up even to the slightest bit of scrutiny, I mean, I've just like scratched the surface here. Then why is Trump really there? Well, for the same reason all those billionaires are there. Lots and lots of money. Not for the American taxpayer, but for Trump and his family directly. And remember, none of this is exactly new. I mean, do you remember how universally Trump was shunned after January 6? Banks cut ties with Trump. Social media companies kicked him off their platforms, just to name a few. AT&T, Amazon, Best Buy, Marriott, Walmart, Airbnb, Disney, American Airlines, ups, General Motors, Coca Cola. The list of companies could go on and on that actively distanced themselves from Trump after January 6th. And there was one type of company, though, that shunned Trump in a way that really, really stung him. The Professional Golfers association, the pga. They cut ties with Trump. Remember this? The league canceled their championship at Trump's Bedminster Golf Club across the pond in England. Their professional golf league dropped Trump as a potential host for their championship, which for the owner of a golf centered real estate empire was a pretty big blow. Now, at the time, Trump owned 17 golf courses around the world, some of them reportedly charging six figures just for the honor of being initiated as a member. And while some of the price tag there came from people trying to gain access to the President, remember in January of 2021, gaining access to Trump wasn't exactly a hot ticket. But right now, as Trump's Gulf empire was losing, but right as it was losing its biggest draws, an entirely new league filled the void. This is Liv Golf. When it launched in 2021, its slogan was Golf, but louder. Which seems like, who made that up in a room, I don't know. But that was its slogan. And while the PGA and the British League RNA were cutting ties with Trump, LIV Golf was making lots of deals. They hosted a tournament at Trump's Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, and another at Trump's Golf Club in Doral, Florida. The league used hundreds of millions of dollars to attract golf's top athletes and make those tournaments at Trump properties actually matter to sports fans. So who exactly was behind this brand new golf league that was saving Trump's golf empire? And probably his ego. Well, the Saudi Sovereign wealth fund. Now, if you're wondering where you remember the Saudi sovereign wealth fund from, you may be thinking of when that same fund gave Trump's son in law, Jared Kushner's venture capital firm, a cool $2 billion just six months after Kushner himself left the White House. Nice work if you can get it, I guess. But if that wasn't enough, last year a real estate firm with deep ties to the Saudi Arabian government struck a deal for a new development project, literally for a Trump Tower, Saudi Arabia. But of course, that is just some of the money that Trump and his family have received from one country on Trump's Middle east trip. That is just the money from Saudi Arabia. One stop. He's also set to visit Qatar and the uae. Now, just last month, Trump's adult son Eric Trump flew to Qatar to sign a deal to build yet another Trump branded golf course. This one, which will be built by a Saudi Arabian developer and will be located just north of Qatar's capital city, Doha, has a reported price tag of $5.5 billion and is reportedly set to include an 18 hole golf course, a theme park and beachfront villas. Now, that deal was just linked last month. Just last month. And that of course comes on top of the $400 million plane Qatar is reportedly planning to gift Trump. We'll come back and talk about that. More of the show for sure. So that's just some of what Trump is getting from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but he has a third stop too. What about the uae? What is he getting from them? Well, these are the mock ups from the new Trump International Hotel and Tower in Dubai. Again, just last month, Trump's adult son Eric inked a deal for the Saudi linked development company Dar Global to build this billion dollar, 80 story tower in the UAE. The plans boast a gym and a club called the Trump. What's being built is the highest pool in the world on the roof. So there's that. But most importantly, this joint that you see comes with 126 hotel rooms, 446 apartments with prices starting at just north of a million dollars each and penthouse is going for $20 million a pop. Again, all nice work if you can get it. Nice digs too. Now, I should say it's not really a new thing for foreign countries to shower U.S. officials with inappropriate gifts or try to. But this is different. For one thing, U.S. officials typically turn down inappropriate gifts. No sign of that here we can see. But beyond that, the scale of this operation, some of what I've just talked about, there's even more. Is something we have never seen before. Trump's money making scheme has only become more brazen in his second term than it was in the first term. And on his first foreign trip abroad, he is clearly demonstrating that he and his family are very much open for business. The question is what can be done about it and by whom? Lucky for us, I have just the person to ask. Democratic Senator Adam Schiff has a lot of thoughts on this. He just announced some actions in the last couple of hours and he joins me in just 90 seconds.

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News Anchor (14:38)

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Senator Adam Schiff (15:49)

Well, this acquisition of this $400 million plane really stinks to high heaven. Everything is wrong about this deal. And apparently even if you accept the administration's own account of this, it was offered directly to the Trump Foundation. They checked with their own counsel, and that would be illegal. It would violate the emoluments clause. It would be unconstitutional. So basically, they decided to launder it through the Defense Department to see if they could use the Defense Department, the Air Force, as an intermediary and launder this deal to see if they could somehow make something unlawful, unconstitutional, now, somehow copacetic. But it does nothing of the sort. It simply embroils the Defense Department in this scheme. And one of the things that, you know, I'm demanding to know from the DoD, and we'll find out these answers, whether we get it from the DoD or other sources, that is, what is it going to cost to retrofit this thing? How long is it going to take? And if this plane isn't going to be ready for two or three years, until Trump is basically on the way out the door. Basically, what this is all about is getting a $400 million aircraft for Donald Trump when he leaves the presidency. That's really what this is about. And I was struck in listening to your opening discussion about the fact that not only is this the first major trip of Donald Trump during his presidency, it was the first major trip of Donald Trump during the first Trump administration. And why go to the Gulf in both cases? Why make that your first presidential major visit? It's a little bit like that famous bank robber who said when he was asked, why do you rob banks? Because that's where the money is. Donald Trump is going to the Gulf not because it's the most important region for the United States of America, but because that's where the money is. And that's where the money is for Trump and his family. It's where the golf deals are. It's where the stablecoin deals are. It's where, you know, the enrichment of the family is. And meanwhile, the rest of the country is left in the lurch. We're paying more for our airfare. We're paying more for our baggage fees. But Donald Trump doesn't like having to ride around in Air Force One because the plane is getting too old for him. He wants this palace in the sky.

News Anchor (18:11)

He seems emboldened, I think it's safe to say. Not exactly an outrageous thing to say. I mean, he did some of this in his first term, certainly plenty of it. But I've been thinking about this Supreme Court ruling on immunity and how much it may have emboldened him. And I know you think about this a lot. You and I have talked about this a lot. And what it could prompt. Do you think that that ruling has prompted him to be even more brazen in the second term?

Senator Adam Schiff (18:41)

Absolutely. I mean, let's not forget this is a convicted criminal who's now the President of the United States. You give a convicted criminal immunity and you make him the most powerful person in the world. And he's going to abuse that power in innumerable ways. You know, if we were concerned in the first Trump administration that Gulf nations were trying to endear themselves to Donald Trump by buying whole suites at his hotels, whole floors at his hotels, that is chicken feed compared to the open graft that is going on now. And we can thank John Roberts for that. You know, the most significant decision of his tenure as Chief justice is this terrible immunity decision. And to hear the Chief justice the other day bemoan the state of the rule of law in America. Well, thank you for that opinion that told Donald Trump that he can get away with just about anything. And of course, the people around him know they'll get a pardon from him on the way out the door, so they also feel immune. But in terms of your question earlier about what can be done about this, you know, among other things, among the litigation and other efforts to try to stop and expose this graft, we need to make the Republicans wear this corruption like an albatross around their neck. It will drag them down along with Donald Trump and making them pay a political cost for going along with this open graft, this $400 million latest, you know, corrupt gift from a foreign power trying to curry favor with the president. Making them own it is a powerful way to hold them accountable.

News Anchor (20:23)

It is quite a glaring, glaring grift here. There have been some. Now, comments are one thing, actions are another. Let's be honest. But Senator Ted Cruz, who I suspect you don't agree with that often, but he said this plane poses significant espionage and surveillance problems, which I'm betting you agree with. I mean, part of this is having to retrofit, remove potentially foreign entities from a plane. You're the former chair of the House Intel Committee. Talk us through. Help people understand what that looks like. And I assume you agree with him. What does that mean?

Senator Adam Schiff (21:00)

Well, you know, Qatar is very sophisticated in terms of electronic surveillance. They've had the money to invest in it. They can buy very sophisticated eavesdropping equipment, and they have. Could they put that in the aircraft? Of course. And even if they hadn't, we couldn't accept that as a, as an understanding. We would have to strip that airplane apart to determine whether They've embedded any bugs in that aircraft. Now, maybe for an administration that use signal to conduct military operations, they don't care, but they should care. We should care. So you're going to have to strip that aircraft down to do that kind of sweep. You're going to have to build in a lot of upgrades to make it the kind of flying fortress that you need for a president. And then, of course, we haven't even talked about what it's going to cost to cancel the contracts that exist for the Boeings that are made in America that are to be used for this purpose if they indeed get canceled. So this is going to be a costly venture for the taxpayer. It's just going to be an amazing gesture, as Donald Trump says, or offer for him personally. And that's what this is all about.

News Anchor (22:14)

Do you think I am not Pollyannish? You definitely are not. There have been a bit of an outcry from more Republicans in the Senate and otherwise than I've seen about a lot of things. Have you heard from privately from them about a willingness to say, support this effort to get the DoD IG to look into this or other efforts to stop Trump from attempting to get this $400 million plane?

Senator Adam Schiff (22:39)

I have not. And to be frank, I really don't expect to. It's one thing to express an occasional public misgiving. It's another to put your name on something that is a direct affront to Donald Trump. You see how personally stung he is when journalists raise this apparent corrupt act of his. It ishis reaction is proportionate to the size of the gift. The bigger the gift, the more irate you get from Donald Trump when you question him about it. So, no, I don't expect Republicans to voluntarily support Democratic efforts to investigate or oversee this. But we are going to try to force votes on this. We'll have to be creative about how we can do this, but we will force Republicans to to vote on this. And I have to think those that are in vulnerable races are not going to want to defend this and are not going to want to see those votes. So I have to imagine some of those Republicans are hoping this whole problem goes away, that maybe UAE reconsiders or somehow the deal falls apart because they don't want to go down on that ship, so to speak.

News Anchor (23:45)

It's quite a campaign ad. I can Visualize with a $400 million cuttery box plane just flying next to a person running for office. Senator Adam Schiff, thank you so much. Really appreciate you joining us. We'll be following this effort to get the IG to investigate very closely. And coming up, what are you supposed to do when a foreign power offers you a lavish gift? This is a question we really need to understand these days. Well, my friend Ben Rhodes has some unique insight to offer on that topic. And spoiler alert, I promise you he did not keep the briefcase full of jewels when he found found them in his hotel room in Saudi Arabia. But we'll talk about it when we come back.

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News Anchor (26:06)

Obviously never seen anything remotely close to a foreign country gifting an American President a free. It's not really free to the taxpayer, by the way. $400 million luxury plane, but big oil rich nations have been showering US Politicians with lavish gifts for decades. This goes way back. I mean, in 1985, Saudi Arabia gave Ronald Reagan a gold and enamel egg with a tiny bejeweled clock inside. You can see it right there on your screen. The country of Azerbaijan gifted the Clintons in 1997 a fancy rug emblazoned with their portraits on it. There you go. That's special. In 2008, Libya's leader, Munammar Gaddafi gave Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice a massive diamond ring. Massive. And a locket with an outline of the African continent and a picture of Gaddafi as a much, much younger man. You can see it there on your screen. It was well known he also had a bit of a crush on her, and it definitely shows with that gift. But government officials and even presidents don't get to keep those gifts unless they pay for them out of pocket. So unless Secretary Rice forked over a bunch of cash, she is not currently the owner of that massive diamond ring. It's the government's property. And the US Government can choose to donate, sell, or otherwise dispose of gifts like that if they see fit, or they can be loaned out to presidential libraries. Now, I remember this all made me think about one particular trip back in 2009 when President Obama went to Saudi Arabia and the king gave gifts, big ones, not just to the Obamas, but to several of his advisors, including Ben Rhodes, who wrote about it in his book, the World As It Is. And he wrote about what was waiting for him in his room on that trip when he returned from a day of meetings. Here's what he. When I opened the door to my unit, I found a large suitcase. Inside were jewels. Now, pivotally, he explains, no one kept them. It feels like this White House, I think it's safe to say, is approaching things a little bit differently. But it felt worth discussing how this is supposed to work. So joining me now is Ben Rhodes, former deputy national security Adviser for President Obama, and someone I trust as much as anybody to explain foreign policy stuff like this and many other things. Okay, Ben, I was not on this trip. I do remember it well because I think it was sort of shocking to those of you who received these suitcases, these surprise suitcases of jewels and other things. And I remember you all wanting to kind of get as far away from it as possible. So I just want to start there because I think it. It helps explain how abnormal what we're seeing now is.

Ben Rhodes (28:38)

Yeah, Jen, I remember it well. It was one of the first trips we took overseas in 2009. I had not slept on the plane. I was working on a speech that President Obama gave in Cairo, which was a high profile speech. And I come into this room I'm staying in. It was kind of like almost like a bungalow. And there's just a suitcase there right inside the door. And I open it, and it was full of these jewels kind of mounted on this suitcase. And for a minute, I kind of panicked because I thought, well, maybe they know I'm the speechwriter writing this high profile speech he's giving to the world, and this is some kind of, you know, extra special gift for me. But then I quickly found out that everybody had gotten these suitcases. And we were very quickly told by the State Protocol office that helps plan these visits to just give them the suitcases. I think this thing was in my possession for, you know, not even a night. And we were offered the opportunity to pay tens of thousands of dollars of our own money if we wanted to keep these things. We obviously didn't do that and didn't even think about it. Wouldn't even cross my mind to kind of take some of these jewels and. And, you know, slide it in my bag. Little did I know that if it had been a $400 million plane, maybe I could have kept it, or maybe a $2 billion investment in my fund as Jared Kushner got. But times seem to have changed.

News Anchor (29:57)

It's quaint, almost remembering these times. It was like a hot potato wanting to get rid of the suitcase of jewels back in the day. I mean, one of the things just watching this, I've thought a lot about how much we thought about President Obama's first foreign trip, President Biden's first foreign trip. And what's striking about this, watching all of this, is the Gulf states seem to love how transactional Donald Trump. Trump is. I mean, Qatar seems to love it, and BS Seems to love it. Why wouldn't he? Trump basically seems to want deals for him and his buddies. But my question is, what are they? If you're thinking about it and you're sitting in the sit room, you've been to more meetings like this than I have. What are they expecting in return?

Ben Rhodes (30:39)

Well, they're expecting something in return. The reality is this is how they do business. It's a highly transactional culture. They have kind of unlimited wealth given their oil and gas resources. It's not uncommon for them to do business this way with other foreign governments. And, you know, there have been issues over the years. I think the Saudis made something like a billion dollar contribution to the Malaysian prime minister or something in that neighborhood. So it's a. It's a transactional culture. But the reality is that this is what Trump likes. He would like the entire world to function the way the Gulf Arab states function, in which there's the possibility of immense personal enrichment, which we've seen you know, Saudi Arabia investing money and Jared Kushner. That's not because of Jared Kushner's investment acumen. We've seen the United Arab Emirates buying significant amounts of Trump cryptocurrency, including just a few days ago, a few weeks ago, when I think one of the Trump kids was out there, and now Qatar with this airplane. So all three of these Gulf states, they're going to want their interest to be protected, right? They're going to want something in return for this. Trump likes it because it's how he likes to do business. He gets rich. Everything is a transaction. There's not a values proposition involved. There's not rules of the road when it comes to how the American president operates or how nations operate. It's the kind of transactional world in which might. And actually, in this case, wealth makes right, that he wants to be in. But that's a world without values and rules, and that's why you give back the jewels.

News Anchor (32:08)

I know what I was thinking. I was wondering what you were thinking, given how many trips you've been on and how you've written books about this, when you saw that video today of Trump and MBS and Elon Musk basically yucking it up, what was going through your mind?

Ben Rhodes (32:28)

I mean, that we're in a totally new world of kind of oligarchy. I mean, you know, what do they want? I mean, for one thing, remember, Mohammed bin Salman was under a lot of international scrutiny and pressure when Jamal Khashoggi was killed. Clearly, according to the U.S. intelligence Committee on MBS, his orders. And look where he is today. He has, you know, in the first year or two after that happened, people didn't want to show up at these conferences in Riyadh. There he is today, with the world's richest man sitting right behind him. This room full of American businessmen and tech luminaries, the Gulf Arabs would like to buy as much American technology and artificial intelligence as they can. These people would like to sell it to them. And it just kind of feels like we're in a world in which the kind of American capitalist motive for profit is kind of blended together with this Gulf interest in kind of prestige and being on the cutting edge of things. And really, that's the engine that is driving American foreign policy. And it's not necessarily what's in the interest of the American people. It's what's in the interest of Donald Trump and his associates and kind of those business people that are in the room in Saudi Arabia. Like, that's the world order that they want, where there's a kind of oligarchy on top of billionaires and business people and royals and the Trump family and the rest of us are just kind of on the outside looking in.

News Anchor (33:52)

Ben Rhodes, I always love talking to you. Every time I talk to you, I think people know what it was like to call you when we were working together. It's always helpful. Thank you so much for joining me. Really appreciate it. Coming up, her name is Dr. Alondra Nelson, and today she announced she is resigning in protest from her positions at the National Science foundation and the Library of Congress. She says she will not sit idly by as the White House threatens the foundational tenets of our democracy. And she joins me live for her first TV interview to talk about all of it. When we come right back.

Ben Rhodes (34:33)

The president.

News Anchor (34:33)

Fired the Librarian of Congress.

Ben Rhodes (34:35)

Why did he choose to do that?

News Anchor (34:36)

Ms. We felt she did not fit the needs of the American people. There were quite concerning things that she had done at the Library of Congress in the pursuit of DEI and putting inappropriate books in the library for children. So that was the answer that the White House gave last week when a reporter asked why Trump had fired Carla Hayden, the long serving Librarian of Congress. Now, despite what her answer seems to suggest, the Library of Congress is not a lending library. While it holds tens of millions of publications and manuscripts, presidential papers and other material, it doesn't loan books out to children. And if Caroline Levitt really doesn't understand why the Library of Congress holds books she doesn't like, here is quick, a quick civic education film to bring her up to speed. Courtesy, of course, of the US Government.

Senator Adam Schiff (35:24)

Have you ever heard of the Library of Congress, Tim? It's the most important library in the.

News Anchor (35:28)

Country, and one of the things it.

Senator Adam Schiff (35:31)

Does nowadays is keep records and proofs of all the copyrights that are issued by the United States. Two copies of almost every book that is published are sent to the Library at Washington.

News Anchor (35:43)

That's right, the copyright office is part of the Library of Congress, so it has a whole lot of books, including ones the Trump administration may not like. That's part of its purpose. It also houses the Congressional Research Service, an agency that works exclusively for Congress to provide confidential policy and legal analysis to lawmakers regardless of party. That's why it was pretty notable that yesterday Trump named his former personal attorney and current deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche as the acting Librarian of Congress. But then when Blanche's deputies tried to enter the building yesterday morning, they were stopped at the door. According to the New York Times staff members of the library balked and called the U.S. capitol Police, as well as their general counsel, who told the two officials that they were not allowed access. Thankfully, they left without incident. But the fact that Trump is trying to install an executive branch official to lead a legislative agency is incredibly concerning, especially given the privileged information that the Library of Congress holds. As an expert pointed out to Rolling Stone, we know that when Trump and the Doge people have gone elsewhere, the first thing done is they exfiltrated their data. How can a member of Congress ask the Congressional Research Service for legal advice or other advice when the administration can get their hands on it or they can direct the answer? So it sure seems like Trump's attempt to take over the Library of Congress is about perhaps a lot more than just books he doesn't like, I think. In an op ed today announcing her resignation from the National Science Board and the Library of Congress Scholars Council, Dr. Alondra Nelson is sounding the alarm. She writes, the dismissal of Carla Hayden represents not merely personnel change, but a statement about what kind of knowledge stewardship is deemed acceptable. And Dr. Alondra Nelson joins me for her very first interview since announcing those resignations. When we come back, here are some incredibly powerful words written today by Dr. Alondra Nelson, who this morning publicly resigned from her advisory positions at the National Science foundation and the Library of Congress in protest of Trump's attempts to take over those two agencies. Here's part of what she said. Quote, Even as the White House threatens the foundational tenets of constitutional democracy and continues to slash funding for essential social services, it is tempting to hope that the public institutions charged with promoting and protecting knowledge will nevertheless soldier on with their mission. I did. But she goes on to say that perseverance has its limits. The erosion of these institutions integrity and the growing realization that it is impossible to fulfill their missions and in good faith has made the cost of continuing untenable. What then is the responsible course of action? For me, the answer now lies in refusal, the withdrawal of participation from systems that require dishonesty as the price of belonging. My resignation represents such a refusal, not a surrender of responsibility, but an assertion of it. Joining Me now is Dr. Alondra Nelson, professor and Social Sciences Chair at the prestigious Institute for advanced study. Dr. Nelson, thank you so much for joining me. I want to start by I just read a number of very powerful parts of your op ed piece that I have here. I've highlighted all of it as well. But I want to start by asking you just to talk about why you decided to resign. And of course, what did I miss in describing some of the reasoning that you laid out in this op ed?

Jen Psaki (39:21)

Jen, first of all, thank you for having me. It's nice to see you and it's great to be here. Before I say anything else, I just want to pay tribute to all of the civil servants working all over the United States who are trying very hard to work in a system that in some regards is disrespecting their work, is dishonoring their work, is saying that they're not doing their work well. And so my resignation, which I'm happy to have the opportunity to talk about, is just a small gesture. I have another these were volunteers roles that I had, advisory roles that I was appointed to by President Biden in the Library and of Congress. But these are people's lives. And so I really just want to begin by paying tribute to all of those colleagues who continue to work in government and do this really important work. So for me, I think it was two things. I mean, and they all happened in the course of a few days. So, you know, National Science Board had a meeting last week, and it was clear during that meeting that really consequential decisions had already been made. The National Science Board, as far as federal oversight bodies go or federal boards go, is a really interesting one because the statute that establishes the National Science foundation says that the National Science foundation consists of is comprised of the National Science Board and the director of the nsf, Right. So not the agency itself. So the National Science Board actually has a pretty big statutory role in what the agency is. It is the kind of like cornerstone for the agency. So, you know, one would expect to be sort of looped in, into decisions, even if the leadership of the agency is making the decisions. And so it was really clear that without the consultation of the board at this meeting that decisions were being made about things like research grants by people who are unqualified to make these decisions. So members of the NSF staff made it known to us during this meeting in various ways that it was really doge that had oversight about whether or not peer reviewed, approved grants got out the door, whether or not they were distributed to high achieving, deserving, you know, people, researchers who had applied for them. And moreover, at this National Science Board meeting, we were that was closed only to members of the board who are appointed by what's a bipartisan board appointed by, you know, in our case, President Trump, President Obama, I think probably still one or two people remaining, and President Biden. We were joined by a member of doge. We did not invite a member of DOGE to join our deliberations. I believe that, you know, he invited himself to kind of observe us. So that was for the National Science Board and then, you know, for the being on the Scholars Council of the Library of Congress, you know, is a great honor because, as you described at the top here, the Library of Congress is our kind of national treasure. You know, it holds everything that we create and build, that we create as books. We make this investment and this sort of heritage of the nation and sort of making sure that we have all these books. Also sitting within the Library of Congress is the U.S. copyright Office. And in addition to the Librarian of Congress being dismissed, the directorate, the Copyright Office was dismissed at a time when it were having a kind of struggle or, you know, a sort of political struggle over copyright and what copyright means in the age of AI. We know that a lot of AI models were made by kind of trolling the entire Internet for the data that's there. The question is, do they get to do that also with copyrighted resources? And, you know, does it abide the fair use? It fair use, or is it not fair use? So that's an active thing that that's being kind of debated and adjudicated right now. And there certainly have been concerns that the sort of firing of the director of the Copyright Office was an attempt, another data grab on the part of members of the current administration, in this case, to sort of accelerate the creation of AI models by using copyrighted material.

News Anchor (43:22)

I mentioned, and it's so helpful for people to understand all these pieces and what all of these agencies do. So thank you so much for explaining, explaining all of that. I mentioned you have this very powerful op ed, and a number of things you said in here, I think, apply quite broadly, I would say. I mean, one of the things you talk about is how the takeover, Trump's takeover of the institutions is an attempt to limit knowledge and silence voice. You've talked in specifics about these two words, but how do you see that happening under Trump? As somebody who clearly is a believer in knowledge and in some science and in information?

Jen Psaki (43:57)

Part of why I wanted to talk in my, the essay, the piece that I wrote about my resignation together about the Library of Congress and about nsf, is that a lot of our conversation about NSF has been only about science, even though NSF does a lot more. And what I was trying to say is that to the extent that we have freedom in this country, to the extent that we, you know, one of the you know, we might think about the, the nsf, all of our research agencies, the Library of Congress, all of these things together as the kind of crown jewels of American democracy. Right? Our science and technology leadership, our research leadership in the United States is about the freedom, academic freedom, the freedom to do research, the freedom to have innovation and discovery, not to have people tell you what knowledge you should be seeking, what data you should be using, et cetera. And moreover, a recognition that the private sector does incredible research, but they're not always going to do the kind of research that we need our federal research agencies to do. They will not do the basic science and the basic research they will not do. Part of what the National Science foundation supports, as I wrote in my piece, is telling us about ourselves. That is partly through things like the Science and Engineering Indicators, which is a regular sort of biennial report that the National Science Board releases that tells us all about kind of the STEM fields and STEM research and education. But also we invest in researchers who create data sets that tell us how we're doing on democracy, how we're doing with getting more opportunity, more health care, et cetera, to more people.

News Anchor (45:34)

And So I think, Dr. Nelson, I don't want to cut you off. I want you to come back and talk to me more. My show is just about to end, so I don't want to cut you off in the middle. Thank you so much for joining me. I hope you'll come back and talk to me more about all of this. I really appreciate it.

Jen Psaki (45:47)

Thanks for having me. Jen, nice to see you.

News Anchor (45:49)

That does it for me today. You can catch the show Tuesday through Friday at 9pm Eastern on MSNBC. And don't forget to follow the show on Blue sky, Instagram and TikTok for now. Goodbye from Washington and we'll see you next week.

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