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The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
House Dems introduce ‘Nobody Elected Elon Musk Act’
00:40:43
Tonight on The Last Word: 19 states sue Donald Trump over Elon Musk’s Treasury access. Also, Vladimir Putin is capitalizing on Trump’s national security chaos. Plus, federal courts are blocking parts of Trump’s extreme agenda. And a Democrat flips an Iowa State Senate seat in a district Trump won by 21 points. California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Rep. Melanie Stansbury, Amb. Michael McFaul, Joyce Vance, and Iowa State Sen.-elect Mike Zimmer join Ali Velshi.
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- [00:01]
Ali Velshi
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Commercial Insurance. Business owners meet Progressive Insurance. They make it easy to get discounts on commercial auto insurance and find coverages to grow with your business quote in as little as 7 minutes@progressivecommercial.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company coverage provided and serviced by affiliated and third party insurers. Discounts and coverage selections not available in all states or situations.
- [00:29]
Rachel Maddow
Okay, business leaders, are you here to play or are you playing to win? If you're in it to win, meet your next mvp. Netsuite by Oracle netsuite is your full business management system in one convenient suite. With Netsuite, you're running your accounting, your finance, your hr, your E commerce, and more all from your online dashboard. Upgrade your playbook and make the switch to NetSuite, the number one cloud ERP.
- [00:52]
Unknown
Get the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning at netsuite.com podcast25netsuite.com podcast now.
- [01:01]
Andrea Mitchell
It'S time for the Last Word with Ali Belshi. Good evening, Ali.
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Unknown
She's still hitting the road this week. She was in Panama last weekend with Marco Rubio. And you know, I've traveled around the world with her a lot. We've covered a lot of the same types of things and I, I sort of pride myself on not necessarily the smartest or best looking in the room, but I can work a lot. I can, I can, I can work for a long time. And Andrea Mitchell can always work longer and harder than I can. She's up earlier, she's on TV later. This woman has been unbelie to work next to and be around the world and cover some of the biggest, most important breaking news stories where you don't get to set your own schedule. This isn't the world of old where you show up and you have dinner with some famous people. You are working all the time. And that is Andrea Mitchell.
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Andrea Mitchell
Yes.
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Unknown
It's gonna take four people to fill her role.
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Andrea Mitchell
And Ali, I would say that would be true even if she weren't. The time that she's been doing all of this globetrotting and all this correspondent work. Also doing a daily show on msnbc.
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Unknown
That's right.
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Andrea Mitchell
And on top of that, she really has been an incredible mentor. I can just speak from personal experience when things are tough, when things are rocky, you know, on a corporate side, when stuff is difficult, behind the scenes, when people are going through stuff. Andrea has been there for me almost more than anybody. And I gotta say, I just, I owe her a lot and I hope she gets from our viewers, the respect that she deserves and that I hope that you can all see among us who have worked with her. She really is something else, the admiration.
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Unknown
That we all share for her. Thank you for saying that tonight, Rachel. Appreciate it. You have yourself a good weekend. We'll see you next week. All right. Well, we got breaking news tonight. 19 Democratic attorneys general have sued Donald Trump to stop Elon Musk and his associates from accessing a key Treasury Department payment system. The lawsuit warns, quote, this new expanded access policy poses huge cybersecurity risks that put vast amounts of funding for the states and their residents in peril. All of the state's residents whose personally identifiable, identifiable information and sensitive financial information is stored in the payment files that reside within the payment systems are at risk of having that information compromised and used against them, end quote. The states want a federal judge in Manhattan to reverse the Treasury's unlawful and unconstitutional policy change granting access to so called special government employees like Musk and his surrogates. As the lawsuit chronicles, Donald Trump has empowered Elon Musk to illegally access our most sensitive information in service of their plan to dismantle, slash and restructure their words, federal programs and services. In a moment, I'll ask California's attorney general when he expects the next action on this lawsuit in federal court because it can't come soon enough. Today, a government contractor expert who's worked on classified information security systems told the Atlantic, quote, this is the largest data breach and the largest IT security breach in our country's history. At least that's publicly known. You can't unring this bell. Once these Doge guys have access to these data systems, they can ostensibly do what they want, end quote. The Atlantic reports, quote, what exactly they want is unclear and much remains unknown about what exactly is happening here. The contractor emphasized that nobody yet knows which information Doge has access to or what it plans plans to do with it. Spokespeople for the White House and Musk himself did not respond to emailed requests for comment. Some reports have revealed the scope of Doge's incursions at individual agencies. Still, it's been difficult to see the broader context of Doge's ambition. Musk and his crew could act deliberately to extract sensitive data, alter fundamental aspects of how these systems operate, or provide further access to unfettered actors. Or they may act with carelessness or incompetence, breaking the systems altogether. Given the scope of what these systems do, key government services might stop working properly, citizens could be harmed, and the damage might be difficult or impossible to undo. As one administrator for a federal agency with deep knowledge about the government's IT operations told us, I don't think the public quite understands the level of danger. Even if Musk eventually loses access to these systems owing to a temporary court order such as the one approved yesterday, say whatever data he siphons now could be his forever. End quote. Can't unring this bell. Today, Donald Trump woke up to this. Elon Musk behind the Resolute desk on the COVID of Time magazine. Is Time magazine still in business? I didn't even know that Elon is doing it. Great job. Now Donald Trump. Donald Trump's reaction to the idea that Elon Musk is really the President of the United States was to insult Time magazine as failing. People who are unbothered by things like that don't usually respond that way. But here's the funny thing. Donald Trump was crowing about being Times cover boy. Eight weeks ago. He was the Person of the year for 2024. That was a big deal for him. Now he wonders whether magazine's even in business. Today, less than 24 hours after 1 of Musk's hires resigned after being linked to extremely racist posts, Musk publicly vowed to rehire the 25 year old after receiving support from Vice President J.D. vance. So at least you can be assured only the best people are part of what experts describe as a reckless and dangerous breach of the complex systems that keep America running. Where are Republican lawmakers tonight? The ones who are concerned about privacy and government overreach? Not a single Republican lawmaker has stood up to say stop this. Not one Republican attorney general has filed a lawsuit to stop this. Today, House Democrats Jamie Raskin and Melanie Stansberry introduced the Nobody Elected Elon Musk Act. Here's what Congresswoman Stansberry said this week. We are not going to let an.
- [07:24]
Melanie Stansbury
Unelected private citizen steal our data.
- [07:29]
Ali Velshi
We are not going to let Elon.
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Unknown
Musk steal our country. And we are not going to let.
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Melanie Stansbury
Donald Trump dismantle everything that America stands.
- [07:42]
Ali Velshi
For, because this is our country.
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Unknown
We'll see if Republicans disagree that nobody actually elected Elon Musk. We'll see if House Republicans will even allow that this bill to come up for a vote. This afternoon, Donald Trump signed another executive order withholding funding to South Africa and to promote the resettlement of Afrikaner white descendants of Dutch and French settlers who are, quote, refugees escaping government sponsored race based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation. End quote. Now South Africa's Expropriation Act, a law that seeks to address past injustices 30 years after the end of apartheid rule by transferring abandoned and unused white owned land, is something a certain South African billionaire posts about obsessively. It's very convenient for Elon Musk that he doesn't actually have to sit behind the Resolute desk. He doesn't even have to win the vote of a single American voter to conjure his tweeted policy wish. The New York Times reports tonight that Congress is receiving 1500 calls a minute. Proud of you, America. Keep that going. A system that usually handles a few dozen calls per minute is straining to keep up with more than 1,500. And nowhere is the impact more apparently than the beleaguered Congressional phone system, a major conduit for citizens to contact their representatives in Washington that has in recent days been nearly crippled as it absorbs tens of millions of calls responding to the new Washington order. End quote. Good on you, America. The billionaire who wasn't on the ballot wants you to believe that what everybody in America has voted for is this. And 1,500 calls a minute proves that it's not. Leading off our discussion tonight is the California Attorney General, Rob Bonta. Attorney General, good to see you. Thank you for being with us. Tell us about this. 19 attorney generals have come together to file suit. And this is interesting because in a number of these various lawsuits we've seen in the last couple of weeks, there are lots of them filed by different people. Some of them have resulted in temporary restraining orders, some of them have been dismissed by virtue of the fact that whoever is bringing the lawsuit doesn't have standing. But in this case, you Attorney Generals on behalf of the citizens of your states, do have standing. We do.
- [10:10]
Rob Bonta
And the cases that we've brought thus far, we've had clearly had standing. And we've sought and secured restraining orders in court preventing Trump and his administration from unlawful unconstitutional conduct. And that's what we seek to do here with our case brought by 19 different states in the Southern District of New York. We have been flooded in our inboxes in California and all the states concerned. Americans wondering what's happening to their personal, sensitive, confidential information, wondering why a private citizen billionaire is accessing it. This is not information for Trump to share or Musk to mine. It doesn't matter how many companies you've started or how much money you have in your bank account, this is Americans private confidential information. And Doge, the Department of Government Efficiency, should not be accessing it. They certainly shouldn't. Be blocking it. This is critical. It involves critical payments to Americans like Social Security, Medicare, veterans benefits, tax refunds, federal employee salaries, and also critical payments to states, which is where our standing comes in. We get health care payments, child care payments, we get infrastructure payments, public safety payments, education payments. So Congress appropriated funding. It should not be blocked by Elon Musk and his Doge associates, nor should private sensitive, confidential information of Americans be exposed to Mr. Musk and his ilk.
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Unknown
Help me out. As a lawyer, as an Attorney General, do you need to have a theory of the case of why Doge and Musk and his associates and a whole bunch of people who are not really employed by the government, despite the moniker that they're a special government employee, want or need access to this information? Or is that secondary to the fact that they are simply not legally entitled to have it?
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Rob Bonta
Their lack of legal entitlement to have it is the key. The rule of law is our North Star. There are many privacy laws that protect Californians and Americans from having private citizens or special government employees from accessing their private sensitive information, like their bank account information, like their Social Security information. And if that law is, if those laws are to change, either Congress can change them or they can be changed through a process called the Administrative Procedures Act. If there's authority, if there's a reason that's not arbitrary, incapricious, and if they go through the process with notice and comment. We also believe that the stated reason for Mr. Musk and the DOGE employees or special employees to have access is to block payments, payments that have been appropriated by Congress. That would be a violation of the separation of powers and a violation of the take care clause, which requires the executive branch to take care to execute the laws of the United States of America.
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Unknown
Which, by the way, got Donald Trump his first impeachment. It was the same idea was Congress congressionally approved aid to, to Ukraine that he tried to stop. Have you heard from constituents? I'm fascinated by this. 1500, you know, calls going in at any given time, going into Congress. Are you hearing from people about, about concerns about this issue?
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Rob Bonta
1,000%? Absolutely we are. This is the thing that we're hearing from constituents most about. Our inboxes are blowing up. They're at cap capacity. People are calling, people are sending emails. People are rightfully worried, concerned, wondering what the heck is happening at the federal government where access to their private sensitive, confidential information is being given to a private citizen billionaire and, and his team. So, and, and I talk to other attorneys general regularly. Throughout the nation. And they are having the same constituent uproar about this issue. And so we're taking the steps that we must take and should take and ought to take to protect Americans privacy and prevent the administration from yet again violating the law and violating the Constitution.
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Unknown
So putting aside the analysis that I read in the intro that suggests this is a hack, this is a data breach, and one of the most serious, and the problem with that is once somebody's got information, you can't unring the bell. Putting that aside, what does success look like to you and your fellow attorneys general? How does this end? Well, and, and how soon can this end?
- [14:41]
Rob Bonta
Immediate and permanent halting of access to the sensitive, confidential, proprietary information of Americans. And, and any return of information, should it be being maintained and retained and being held by DOGE in an unlawful way and an ending of this improper access that is unlawful and unconstitutional to private, sensitive, confidential information.
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Unknown
Attorney General Rob Bonta, Good to have you on the show. Thank you for joining us. We'll continue to follow this closely. Joining us now is the Democratic Congresswoman, Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico. You saw her earlier. She's a member of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee. Congresswoman, good to see you. Thank you for being on the show tonight. This is this of all the things that are going on in the last 18 days, and there's a lot, and there are a lot of things to be worried about, and there are a lot of things that are possibly constitutionally constitutional violations, this one's got people very worried because of the scope and scale and what we don't know about it, how dangerous it actually could be. Tell me where you are on this.
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Melanie Stansbury
I think this is one of the most significant threats to our democracy and our privacy that we've seen in the last two and a half weeks. But I think we have to understand that this isn't isolated within the context of what Elon Musk is doing in the federal government right now. Since day one, since Donald Trump took office, he signed over 200 executive actions, totally setting into place a process to dismantle the federal government and to empower his administration and Elon Musk to break the law, to dismantle these agencies, to withhold funds, and to begin the process of tearing down these agencies and firing federal officials. But the data breach and the infiltration not only of the treasury systems data, but also all of the federal agencies. Yesterday I was at epa. Every single federal agency right now, we understand, has DOGE operatives in it who are hacking those systems. They're hacking the sensitive data of federal employees. They're taking down sensitive data. We believe they may be downloading it to private servers and we don't know what they're doing with that data. But one thing I can tell you that is a common thread across all of this lawless behavior is that we know that not only are House Republicans not holding them accountable, they are prepared to put together one of the largest tax breaks for their billionaire buddies that they've probably ever done in history. And they're looking for savings. And we know that they're going to go after Medicaid. They're going to go after payments that our low income families depend on because they already tried it last week when they did the federal funding freeze. They shut down the Medicaid system. And so this was a precursor, we believe. And in fact, next week will be the first Doge subcommittee hearing where they're going after improper payments. All of this is laying the the groundwork for them to slash and eviscerate these agencies and federal funding so that they can put it into the pockets of their billionaire friends.
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Unknown
Except that there is a legal way to do this that doesn't involve nongovernmental employees. Right? That is what the budget process is in the United States Congress. That is what the appropriations process is. The appropriations process is the only thing that you at Congress have to do that's written into the Constitution. There's a legal way to do this. If you have regular order and you have committees and you discuss the budget. Every single American would argue that if I pay taxes, I would like my taxes executed as efficiently. The government funds that are funded by my taxes executed as efficiently as possible. Why do we need Elon Musk and his minions, who are not government employees without the necessary security clearances, in and about these governmental systems?
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Melanie Stansbury
Well, what they're trying to do is so vast and was outlined in Project 2025. They've been planning for this for years. And Russell Vaught, who was just confirmed as the OMB director director in many ways is the architect of a larger strategy that they want to test in the courts. They are trying to get themselves in front of the Supreme Court because they have a theory. And Stephen Miller's been all over cable TV talking about it, about executive power. And they want to test the theories of appropriations law and the impoundment law, which is put in place after Nixon tried to withhold funds and which of course was the basis on which Donald Trump was impeached during his first term. They want to take it to the court to dismantle the government and especially support systems for low income families at such a scale and such a rate that they know it would be politically untenable in Congress. And so why are they doing it by breaking the law and testing the court system? Because they know that the American people would reject this because it's cruel, because it would undermine our economy. And they are literally trying to re social engineer this country and our economy to benefit themselves, to, you know, make this country hate again and for their own benefit. And they can't do that using a normal order process. And so they're breaking the law and they're using the assistance of their billionaire friends and their technology to do it.
- [19:56]
Unknown
So you just brought up two things. You brought up Project 2025 and you brought up the Impoundment act and the fact that when Donald Trump got impeached the first time around, it was because he stopped congressionally approved money from being dispersed. This was Ukraine at the time. There's one thing Both of those two things have in common. Project 2025 and the empowerment Act. Russell Vogt, who's now the head of the omb, the same guy who did that back then and encouraged that idea and denied the success of the reality of the 2020 elections, is now in charge of the Office of Management and Budget. So it's that 922 page document that nobody wanted to read is now coming to fruition.
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Melanie Stansbury
And he is one of the architects of it. In fact, when he left the Trump administration in the first term, he and many of the friends and mega donors in their circles, you know, reached out to the Heritage foundation, they helped establish these other organizations and they literally wrote the document and put together the legal theories and by the way, the executive orders that Donald Trump signed on day one. So all of this is not. These are not isolated activities. They're all part of a learning strategy that this group of folks who've come back into office who are trying to steal our government and dismantle our agencies and steal our democracy from us, are executing on that. They've planned for several years.
- [21:19]
Unknown
There's this neat thing going on because a lot of people are kind of worried, where's the resistance of 2016 and where are all these people, these phone calls coming into Congress? Do you think that's having any effect on your Republican colleagues? Because I would assume most of the phone calls are going to their offices.
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Melanie Stansbury
I think so, no. Well, I'll say this. The phone calls are coming to all of us. We are receiving hundreds and hundreds of phone calls. And also I can tell you, on Monday, I did a telephone town hall out to my constituents. We had 12,000 New Mexicans sign on. People are terrified right now and hundreds of people are calling our offices. And while we do not see outward signs of resistance from the vast majority of Republicans right now, I am heartened to see that Lisa Murkowski and Senator Collins have issued even if mild statements calling into question what Elon Musk is doing. We have heard a lot of reports that Republicans are privately calling the White House and essentially asking them what the hell they're doing. So, yes, keep up the pressure. The American people need to continue to have their voices heard, continue to call your representatives. We have to stop them. And the Republicans are the ones who hold the keys here.
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Unknown
Congresswoman, good to see you. Thank you for being with us. Congresswoman MELANIE Stansberry. All right, we've got a quick update to a story we brought you at the top of the show last night. The Republican who lost a North Carolina state Supreme Court seat to Justice Allison Riggs lost again today in court. The Republican plans to appeal. So it's not over just yet. As Alison Riggs told us last night, it's going to be a long and expensive road ahead. But today she prevailed. Quote, Today's decisions denying Judge Griffin challenges of more than 65,000 ballots are a victory for North Carolina voters and for the rule of law. Voters decide elections and I remain committed to seeing this fight through and upholding North Carolinians constitutional freedoms, end quote. We'll continue to follow that story closely. Coming up, Vladimir Putin must like what he sees in Washington, D.C. these days because Russia spy agencies has made a pretty shocking overture to you, the American citizen. I'll tell you about that next.
- [23:29]
Rachel Maddow
Okay, business leaders, are you here to play or are you playing to win? If you're in it to win, meet your next mvp. Netsuite by Oracle netsuite is your full business management system in one convenient suite. With NetSuite, you're running your accounting, your finance, your HR, your e commerce and more, all from your online dashboard. Upgrade your playbook and make the switch to NetSuite, the number one cloud ERP.
- [23:52]
Unknown
Get the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning@netsuite.com podcast25 netsuite.com podcast25 this is.
- [24:01]
Ali Velshi
An ad from BetterHelp online therapy. We always hear about the red flags to avoid in relationships, but it's just as important to focus on the green flags. If you're not quite sure what they look like. Therapy can help you identify those qualities so you can embody the Green Flag energy and find it in others. BetterHelp offers therapy 100% online and sign up only takes a few minutes. Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H E L P.com It's.
- [24:33]
Alex Wagner
President Trump's first 100 days and MSNBC's Alex Wagner will be covering it all from the front lines.
- [24:40]
Unknown
What issue matters to you the most?
- [24:42]
Alex Wagner
Join her as she travels the country to talk to the people at the center of the president's policies and promises.
- [24:48]
Unknown
Do you think now that he's pardoned everybody he can count on this group of people again?
- [24:52]
Alex Wagner
Search for Trumpland with Alex Wagner wherever you're listening and follow subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts to listen ad free.
- [25:05]
Unknown
Tonight as Elon Musk and Donald Trump are working to cull America's national security agencies through purges and buyouts. The Kremlin spy agency he for the first time today released an English language video appealing to so called American patriots who are concerned about US Support for Ukraine to quote, get in touch with Russia. One possibility is Russian President Vladimir Putin is working to capitalize on the chaos in Washington. Former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul wrote about how Trump's first weeks are weakening America, quote, trump is fomenting deep divisions within the U.S. government and U.S. society as a whole. We will not win Cold War 2.0 if we destroy our national security state. We will not win if we purge talented and experienced national security experts from our government. If we're going to prevail against China and its junior partner Russia, we must get serious about devising a grade strategy. Alienating our allies, cutting aid, disrupting trade, abandoning our values and fighting among ourselves is not that. But there is another possibility. Trump has changed his public stance on Vladimir Putin from Putin's invasion of Ukraine being genius to Putin is destroying Russia by not making a deal to end the war. Yale's Jeffrey Sonnenfeld thinks he knows what Trump's about faces is about. Trump avoids association with losers like the plague or the pandemic, sonnenfeld writes, and he's quick to avoid feeling like he's on the losing end of a negotiation, smelling defeat from Putin's myriad military, economic and diplomatic failures. Trump does not see Putin as a worthy ally. Furthermore, he resents Putin presumptuously acting as if he is the puppeteer controlling Trump desperate for a deal. End quote. Joining us now is Michael McFaul, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2012 to 2014. He's MSNBC's international affairs analyst. I would take it that Ambassador, your recommendation to most Americans is don't get in touch with the Kremlin, don't call their tip line, don't phone, don't text them, don't do this.
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Michael McFaul
Absolutely don't do it. And don't click the button cuz they'll figure out where you're at. But it is extraordinary. Ali, I looked at that video and it is just, just a sign of our times. You wouldn't have seen this five, 10 years ago because there would have been no constituency for that here in the United States. But today there is an ideological struggle in the world and it's not just between autocrats and democratic countries, it's within them. And if you listen to the Putin propagandists, they talk very openly about it. They are delighted that Mr. Trump, President Trump and his people are destroying the national security state at home. They're delighted that they're destroying liberal institutions. And they celebrate the same kind of illiberal, orthodox, conservative values that Trump does as well.
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Unknown
Let me ask you, Ambassador, about what Jeff Sonnenfeld thinks might be growing distance between Putin and Trump. Trump has said things since he got elected to or about Putin that for whatever reason, he hasn't said in the eight prior years. What do you make of that?
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Michael McFaul
Well, first, you're absolutely right, he has said that just once. But that was the first time ever I've followed President Trump. And even when he wasn't the president, what he said about Putin very closely for a decade now, that was the first time ever when he said Putin, I'm paraphrasing, is ruining his country.
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Unknown
Country.
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Michael McFaul
I take that as a good sign. I think he's trying to create leverage to try to get involved into negotiating a deal between Ukraine and Russia. That said, I'm not that optimistic. Just one tweet doesn't mean he's changed his views. And what I worry is that when he actually does talk to Putin, Putin will praise him again. He'll say, what a great guy. He'll say, you and I, we're united against the liberal internationalists like McFaul. And as you know, Putin is good at that. He's a former KGB officer that ran informants in that kind of way. I've seen him do it, you know, in meetings with U.S. government officials. And I think when he begins to praise Trump again, maybe we won't see those critical tweets that we saw last week.
- [29:42]
Unknown
I have one quick question for you. Russia's Baltic neighbors are still attached to an electrical grid that's connected to Russia. That's coming to an end. Tell me a little bit about this. Why is this important and what are they worried about?
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Michael McFaul
Huge achievement. Remember, they are part of the Soviet Union. They are part of the Soviet grid. And it took them three decades to get off that. But it means it's another step towards independence. And all three of those countries, I was in one of them just last year, are very afraid that the war in Ukraine could some day threaten them. They need more independence from Russia to help deter them. Deter Russia from attacking them in the future.
- [30:22]
Unknown
Ambassador, good to talk to you as always. Thank you for being with us. Former ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul. Thank you. All right, coming up with Republicans on Capitol Hill seemingly all too happy to let Donald Trump and Elon Musk usurp their powers as they tear down parts of the federal government, judges and courts may be the best way to stop them. I'll discuss that next with Joyce Vance.
- [30:43]
Rachel Maddow
Okay, business leaders, are you here to play or are you playing to win? If you're in it to win, meet your next mvp. Netsuite by Oracle netsuite is your full business management system in one convenience suite. With NetSuite, you're running your accounting, your finance, your HR, your E commerce, and more, all from your online dashboard. Upgrade your playbook and make the switch to NetSuite, the number one cloud ERP.
- [31:06]
Unknown
Get the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning@netsuite.com podcast25 netsuite.com podcast25 this is.
- [31:15]
Ali Velshi
An ad from BetterHelp online therapy. We always hear about the red flags to avoid in relationships, but it's just as important to focus on the green flags. If you're not quite sure what they look like, therapy can help you identify those qualities so you can embody the green flag energy and find it in others. BetterHelp offers therapy 100% online and sign up only takes a few minutes. Visit betterhelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H E L P.com stay connected with.
- [31:48]
Alex Wagner
The MSNBC app bringing you breaking news and analysis anytime, anywhere. Watch your favorite shows live, read live blogs and in depth essays and listen to coverage as it unfolds. Go beyond the what to understand the why. Download the app now@msnbc.com app.
- [32:09]
Unknown
A federal judge appointed by Donald Trump today temporarily blocked a planned to put thousands of USAID employees on administrative leave. Now, the ruling comes just hours after another, different federal judge signed an order forbidding anyone in Trump's government from putting the lives of thousands of FBI agents involved in the January 6th investigation at risk by disclosing their names to the public without giving those agents two days notice to try to prevent the release of that list. Trump's Justice Department had to be pressured through litigation to enter into an agreement that would protect the lives and privacy of its own agents. And that's just for the time being. Yesterday, in a similar pattern, the Treasury Department had to be pressured into putting some temporary guardrails on how Elon Musk's Doge surrogates handle our private data. So far, most of the victories have been small and temporary. But important. They don't put those FBI agents, USAID workers, or our collective privacy out of danger, at least not yet. But from Seattle to Boston to Washington, federal judges appointed by Democratic and Republican, Democratic Pres. Republican and Democratic presidents have stopped, slowed, or thrown a wrench into Trump and Musk's attacks on everything from immigration to privacy to civil rights, on birthright citizenship. As we mentioned yesterday, a conservative judge, one appointed by Ronald Reagan, told Donald Trump, no, the president cannot change, limit or qualify the constitutional right via an executive order, end quote. But even so, the courts should be an absolute last resort. The real check on power should be political voters and Congress. In a recent article for her substack, our next guest, Joyce Vance writes, quote, what we've seen over the last two weeks and accelerating over the weekend looks like a coup. A hostile, undemocratic takeover of government. Merriam Webster says a coup is a sudden, decisive exercise of force in politics, and especially the violent overthrow or alteration of an existing government by a small group. No violence so far because this is a coup fueled by Tech Bros. Not the military. But we're watching the alteration of government happen before our eyes, end quote. Joining us now is Joyce Vance, former U.S. attorney and a distinguished professor at the University of Alabama School of Law. She's an MSNBC legal analyst, a senior fellow at the Brennan center for justice at NYU Law. Joyce, I'm intrigued by your theory of the game here, here, because there are lots of questions about what exactly are they going for and what data do they want and what happens when it gets in the wrong person's hands. But I think fundamentally, it's important for some of us to simply think of the alteration of government that is underway both by Donald Trump and some of the executive orders he's undertaking and by Elon Musk and these quasi official people going in and getting access to things that we as citizens believe only government officials with the proper clearances should have access to.
- [35:25]
Joyce Vance
Right. What we're seeing appears to be a real accumulation of power in the hands of the President. Something that goes beyond the balance between the three branches of government that the founding fathers intended, where Congress would prevent a president from growing too powerful and the courts would act as a check on both branches. What we're seeing here is a Republican led Congress that's just essentially decided to be a bystander as Donald Trump tries to do things that Congress is supposed to do, like decide how federal money will be spent. You know, Congress has the power of the purse. Donald Trump is trying to take it away from them. Again, with these efforts to shut down usaid, Trump is shuttering a federal agency. That's something only Congress can do by a vote in that body. So we're watching this very unique change in our structure of government and only the courts appear to be positioned to withstand it until and unless we get to an election two years out, where of course, as you point out, that will land in the hands of voters.
- [36:32]
Unknown
Let's think about this. So for, for as long as you and I have been working, there have been critiques of government spending. We have had sort of an unfair disdain for the civil service for about 50 years in this country. But these are things that Congress can determine. If they don't like how USAID spends its money, Congress can determine that. And a Republican majority in Congress can have an influence over that. What's the benefit of doing it this way to Donald Trump? Having Elon Musk and a bunch of guys getting in there, meddling with our systems and perhaps risking our information versus doing this the political way.
- [37:10]
Joyce Vance
Right. So it lets them do precisely what they want to do, to act quickly and extra legally. Taking steps to disassemble agencies that they, for whatever reason, don't like. And that could be for a good reason or it could be for a bad reason. There's been some reporting talking about some of the government structures that Musk is interfering with, that perhaps we're looking into some of his business conduct. Certainly when you own three major companies, there's the possibility that you could have a conflict of interest when you're involved in policy making. That's why traditionally government employees are hired and they go through disclosure of financial interests. And there are measures in place for how you handle conflicts of interest. We don't seem to be seeing any of that happening here. But something I want to be really clear about is, as you say, there is policy. There are policy differences over spending or perhaps over these memos that we've seen the new attorney General Pam Bondi issue. You and I might disagree with some of those, but that doesn't mean that there's anything wrong. In fact, in fact, elections have consequences. And one is that the folks who win get to make these policy decisions. What we're talking about here are not policy decisions. This is conduct that goes beyond what the law permits, for instance, taking away the power of the purse from Congress. And that's why this is such a pivotal moment in American democracy.
- [38:37]
Unknown
We'll keep a close eye on it with you, Joyce. Thank you for your writing and your analysis. Joyce Vance, all right. Coming up, the first election since Donald Trump took office has already been held. And the result, well, it was bad news for Trump's Republican Party. The newest Democratic winner of a statewide race joins us after a break. There's some big news last week that was lost in all the other news. In the first election since Donald Trump took office, Democrat Mike Zimmer. This man won a race For Iowa's District 35 state senate seat in a district that Trump won by 21 points in the November election. Mike Zimmer was elected to represent District 35 after spending more than 40 years as a public educator. He ran on a platform of raising the minimum wage and more investment in public schools. Here's one of his campaign ads.
- [39:31]
I'm Mike Zimmer, husband, dad and runner. I was raised with Iowa values of hard work and fairness. And I'm running to be your voice in the Iowa Senate. As a career educator, I know public schools are the heart of our communities and will fight to ensure they are fully funded, protect our AA's and work to make our schools the best in the country. Again, I'm Mike Zimmer. I'd be honored to earn your vote on January 28th.
- [40:01]
And here's the thing. Deep in Trump country, that worked. But in Iowa, Mike Zimmer asked voters if they wanted better public schools for his community. Voters said yes. So joining us now is the former teacher, coach, principal, school board president and Iowa state senator elect Mike Zimmer. He will be sworn in on Monday. Mike, welcome to the show. Congratulations on your victory and thank you for joining us tonight.
- [40:31]
Ali, thanks for having me on.
- [40:32]
Pretty back to basics campaign. You were talking to people about what you believed they cared about most and something you had experience in. Tell me A bit about how this campaign went, considering that it was in the shadow of the sort of one of the most important campaigns we've ever seen in this country.
- [40:52]
Well, it's always interesting to run a campaign in Iowa in the middle of the winter, in January, when it's 10 degrees out, out. But we, when we made the decision to run, we had a lot of support, and quite frankly, I had no idea how to run a campaign. And without the support of the Democratic Party Chair, Rita Hart and Minority Senate Leader Janice Weiner, they sent over some support. Tyler Renbaugh basically coordinated the campaign. And it was just back to basics. It was door knocking, it was phone calls, it was postcard writing. And then every opportunity that I had to answer questions from our local newspapers or to conduct interviews with our local television stations, I took advantage of those.
- [41:43]
Tell me what, what you thought most resonated because you were talking about some basic things. Raise and minimum wage and the strength of the public school system, which, by the way, in the last 18 days, the Trump administration has been under attack in various executive orders, including one that targets the Department of Education. What were your conversations like with people about these two issues, wages and schools?
- [42:09]
Well, the opportunity to talk about policy basically took place indoors, and that would be at 2 of our public forums that we had the door to door conversations. Ali, I'm going to be honest with you. When, when it's that cold and people you're talking to people at the door, it's like, yeah, I saw your picture on television, I've seen your ads, that kind of stuff. Stuff. So I'm going to be honest with you. There's not a lot of conversation going on when it's that cold out. But when I had the opportunity to talk about the policies that we're looking at addressing. The funding of public schools in Iowa is based upon a school funding formula. And a lot of that comes on a per pupil basis. And when the legislature does not fund that, that area of finance, it is very, very hard for school districts to keep up with just salaries, paying bus drivers, paying food service workers, custodians, the like. And we have been under attack at that part of the school funding formula for years.
- [43:10]
Is that a partisan issue in your state, or did you find that you were able to get people out to support you who just agreed with you, regardless of partisan politics?
- [43:21]
Well, the partisan part of it, I would say, is that when people actually had an opportunity to hear what I had to say or ask me questions and I could give a coherent answer, that at least reflected that I knew a little bit about what I was talking about, that that resonated very well with my Republican, Republican colleagues that I work with every day, that I also served on a school board with. And quite frankly, I mean, in this, this particular district, I've lived and worked in this district for 40 years. So when people have an opportunity to put a face to a name and they can get past traditional politics of demonizing someone and they actually have to look at somebody in the eye, it makes a difference.
- [44:04]
I agree with you. I think it really does. Congratulations once again to the Iowa state senator elect, Mike Zimmer. Thank you for being our guest tonight.
- [44:12]
Thank you. Thank you.
- [44:13]
We'll be right back.
- [44:17]
All right.
- [44:17]
I'll see you tomorrow on velshi. While the Republican Party stands by and allows Elon Musk to gut the federal workforce and access government computer systems, there are some Democrats fighting back. I'll speak to the Democratic congresswoman, Mass of Massachusetts, Ayanna Pressley, and the Colorado attorney general, Phil Weiser, One of the AGs who sued Donald Trump and the treasury tonight. That's tomorrow, 10am Eastern. And that is tonight's last word.
- [44:40]
Rachel Maddow
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- [45:03]
Unknown
Get the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning at netsuite.com podcast25 netsuite.com podcast25.