← The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
Lawrence: Caroline Kennedy invokes her father Pres. Kennedy to condemn RFK Jr.’s nomination to HHS
00:40:40
Tonight on The Last Word: Caroline Kennedy urges senators to reject RFK Jr.’s nomination. And a federal judge blocks Donald Trump’s plan to pause federal aid spending. Norm Ornstein, EJ Dionne, Rep. Brendan Boyle, and Rep. Jim Himes join Lawrence O’Donnell.
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- [00:01]
Patrick Adams
Hi, my name's Patrick Adams. You may know me as Mike Ross.
- [00:03]
Sarah Rafferty
On the TV series Suits.
- [00:05]
Lawrence O'Donnell
And I'm Sarah Rafferty and I play Donna Paulson on Suits.
- [00:07]
Patrick Adams
And we have a podcast called Sidebar.
- [00:09]
Sarah Rafferty
Where every week we watch and discuss.
- [00:11]
Patrick Adams
An episode of the show.
- [00:12]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Because here's the thing, neither of us have really watched it.
- [00:14]
Sarah Rafferty
That's true, at least until now.
- [00:16]
Lawrence O'Donnell
So we're gonna cover all nine seasons.
- [00:18]
Sarah Rafferty
Share behind the scenes stories and talk.
- [00:20]
Lawrence O'Donnell
To our co stars and friends like.
- [00:21]
Patrick Adams
Gina Torres and Aaron Korsh.
- [00:23]
Sarah Rafferty
So look, if you love Suits Amazing.
- [00:25]
Patrick Adams
This podcast is for you.
- [00:26]
Lawrence O'Donnell
And if you've never watched Suits, also Amazing, you can join us and we'll watch it together.
- [00:31]
Patrick Adams
I think we're gonna have a listen.
- [00:32]
Lawrence O'Donnell
To Sidebar wherever you get your podcasts.
- [00:34]
Patrick Adams
And don't forget to follow the show.
- [00:36]
Sarah Rafferty
So you never miss an episode.
- [00:39]
Rachel Maddow
Dear old work platform. It's not you, it's us. Actually, it is you. Endless onboarding, constant IT bottlenecks. We've had enough. We need a platform that just gets us. And to be honest, we've met someone new. They're called Monday.com and it was love at first onboarding. Their beautiful dashboards, their customizable workflows got us floating on a digital cloud nine. So no hard feelings. We're moving on Monday.com, the first work platform you'll love to use.
- [01:11]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Now it's time for the Last word with Lawrence O'Donnell. Good evening, Lawrence.
- [01:14]
Patrick Adams
Rachel, you're on Blue Sky.
- [01:16]
Caroline Kennedy
I am.
- [01:17]
Patrick Adams
I am, too. LAWRENCE O'DONNELL, Blue Sky Whatever it is, I don't know, msnbc.com, that thing, that whole thing I don't have, I didn't get one of those little things to stick on the screen. So, you know, if you follow, if.
- [01:29]
Lawrence O'Donnell
People follow me, if they use the, you know, hit the back button on your remote, go back, take the picture. If you follow me, look at the people who I'm following. I' Lawrence, you can then follow Lawrence on Blue Sky.
- [01:38]
Patrick Adams
Rachel, this is when we need team coverage more than ever. There are things you covered in your hour that I'm not going to be able to get to in this hour. And I knew you were doing it, so I now just consider it part of the division of labor that Rachel's got that Rachel's got that. I'm going to take this, I'm going to go deep into where you just left off on The Robert Kennedy Jr nomination, his cousin Caroline's statement today, Rachel, I'm going to show it in Full. I'm going to show the video of it in full because it is not just the most important thing said publicly by a Trump nominee. It is historic. This is the daughter of President Kennedy painfully and not eagerly, but dutifully invoking her father, President John F. Kennedy, invoking her uncle Robert Kennedy, invoking her uncle Ted Kennedy, and saying that they would be disgusted by Robert Kennedy Jr. S nomination. And not a word of that was easy for her to say. Not one word of it was easy for her to say.
- [02:52]
Lawrence O'Donnell
You know, it's just this. I mean, she's also providing information about him that I think maybe it's cause it's from her, it will sink in. But even if all people know is, oh, he's the anti vaccine guy, you know, like maybe that makes you think about polio, maybe that thing makes you think about COVID or measles or one of those things. But for her to say, listen, he's telling other people to not have their kids vaccinated while he's vaccinating his own kids. And oh, by the way, one of his declared financial conflicts of interest heading into this confirmation hearing is that he makes money. He makes money from downgrading, from talking smack about vaccines. Essentially he's on the hook in litigation where the worse the vaccine looks, the more money he's likely to make. Essentially is her claim about that financial conflict of interest. So even if people only have ever heard one thing about him, which is the vaccine stuff, even on that, she's just absolutely hollowing him out in terms of his credibility on that issue. And he doesn't bring any relevant experience other than being a vaccine critic and being MAGA and whatever the thing is with the push ups in Venice beach, he doesn't bring anything else to the job. And so for her as a Kennedy, as his cousin, to take him apart on that, I just feel like she, she hollowed him out to nothing.
- [04:12]
Patrick Adams
Yeah, in so many details. And a lot of this is public information if you've been following it closely over 50 years. But she gets into the fact that he was within the family, the one who was luring others into drug use and that ultimately led to the death of one of his younger brothers. We've had Kurt Anderson on this program. He wrote about Robert Kennedy Jr. Being a cocaine dealer in Harvard Yard in his dorm room. This has all been public before, but to hear the way it was collected by Caroline Kennedy today and delivered was really something I could not have expected and I just think deserves the full attention that she has earned in the way that she has lived her life up to this point. She's earned the right to give this guidance tonight.
- [05:06]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Yeah, Lawrence, I'm looking forward to seeing it. Thank you.
- [05:08]
Patrick Adams
Thanks, Rachel. Thank you. Thank you. Well, it really is impossible, I mean, really impossible to describe the hole in America's soul at the end of the 1960s, the decade of assassinations. Civil rights leader Medgar Evers assassinated in his driveway in Mississippi with his children watching in 1963. Malcolm X assassinated in 1965. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Assassinated in April of 1968. The assassination decade was bookended by the two white assassinations in the same family. President John f. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, and his little brother, the 42 year old presidential candidate, Bobby Kennedy on June 5, 1968, just weeks after Martin Luther King was assassinated. If you lived it, if you lived all of that, you knew what that hole in the soul felt like. If you were born after that, you're lucky. The first and only time I saw the nuns at St. Brendan's Elementary School in Boston cry was when they told us President Kennedy had just been killed and they were sending us home. We were all crying in our orderly little lines leaving St. Brendan's School that day. And everyone we saw on the way home in Boston was crying. Police officers in uniform crying. Men carrying their toolboxes home and crying. Our mothers crying, crying. Grandmothers crying. And so, for millions of Americans and millions more people around the world, since that day in 1963, the word Kennedy has always had an edge of sadness to it, as it very much did today, when the only living Kennedy who can legitimately invoke her assassinated father, President Kennedy, and her assassinated uncle, Bobby Kennedy, and her only uncle who lived a long life, Ted Kennedy, to condemn her cousin, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. As a predator unqualified to serve as the Secretary of Health and Human Services. It was the most important and indeed historic public statement made by anyone about any Trump nominee. And at the White House press briefing today, Donald Trump's new White House press secretary, the youngest in history at 27 years old, did not get a single question about it. Not one. President Kennedy's daughter, who has served as an ambassador twice confirmed by the United States Senate, unanimously, twice invokes her father, President John F. Kennedy, her uncle, Senator Robert Kennedy, her uncle, Senator Ted Kennedy, saying that they would be unanimously disgusted by Robert Kennedy Jr. S exploitation of their memories and that they would be unanimously disgusted at the idea of Robert Kennedy, Jr. Serving as Secretary of Health and Human services. And the White House press corps doesn't ask a single question about that. Not one. Here's a sample of some of the things that the White House press corps said to the White House press secretary who was more than a week late in delivering her first so called press briefing. Welcome. You look great. This is true. You're doing a great job. I apologize for interrupting, if I may. Secondly, if you're willing, that's how they would do a follow up. Secondly, if you're willing. It was the most polite session in the White House press briefing room in, let me check, four years, because it is the Trump White House press briefing room. There will be no screaming. The White House press corps will all sound like reasonable adults and some of them will sound like fawning fans of the press secretary and the President because the White House press corps has a special standard of behavior that they reserve uniquely for the Trump White House. It is actually the standard that I really wish they would use for all other presidents. There really is no reason to ever scream at any White House press secretary. There is no reason to be constantly yelling over each other, which did not happen today. The White House press secretary was asked mostly softball questions, one of which allowed her to say that she, quote, commits to telling the truth. Having made that commitment to tell the truth, she lied about Donald Trump using the military to turn on a source of water in California. The California Department of Water today posted this saying the military did not enter California. The federal government restarted federal water pumps after they were offline for maintenance for three days. State water supplies in Southern California remain plentiful. So chalk that up as a Donald Trump and press secretary Lieutenant. When the press secretary was asked if Donald Trump's illegal federal spending freeze, which was blocked by a federal judge later in the day, applied to Medicaid, she clearly had absolutely no idea and there is no indication that she knows what Medicaid is. Not a single question about the detailed description of how unfit to serve Robert Kennedy Jr. Is a description offered today by his cousin who has known him her entire life. Life. Caroline Kennedy didn't want to do this. She didn't want it to come to this. She was surely hoping that the Robert Kennedy Jr nomination would go the way of the Matt Gaetz nomination and collapse under its own preposterous weight. Long before Robert Kennedy Jr. Made it to a Senate confirmation hearing which is scheduled for him tomorrow at 10am in the Senate Finance Committee. Caroline is the only one of the Kennedy cousins who lived in the White House. She was for those thousand days, the most famous little girl in the world. But she didn't know she was famous, and she never sought the bright light of fame. After her father's funeral, her mother, Jacqueline, took steps to protect her and her little brother, John Kennedy Jr. From what she saw as the dangerous influences that were loose in the Kennedy clan as the kids were growing up. And so, Unlike Robert Kennedy Jr. Caroline Kennedy was never arrested. Unlike Robert Kennedy Jr. Caroline Kennedy was never a heroin addict. Unlike Robert Kennedy Jr. Caroline Kennedy was never trying to lure her Kennedy cousins into drug addiction. Caroline Kennedy spoke of those poisonous aspects of the Kennedy cousinhood today, assigning her Cousin, Robert Kennedy Jr. The key role in luring his younger siblings into drug use with him. In her letter, Caroline Kennedy said, I watched his younger brothers and cousins follow him down the path of drug addiction. She did not mention names, but she did say that those siblings and cousins, quote, suffered addiction, illness, and death by following the example of Robert Kennedy Jr. Robert Kennedy Jr. S younger brother, David Kennedy, was found dead of a drug overdose in a hotel room in Palm beach in Florida in 1984. Today, Caroline Kennedy blamed Robert Kennedy Jr. For that death and thousands of other deaths because of his lies about vaccines and public health protocols. And there was not a single question about that at the White House press briefing today. There is a lot of public evidence and proof already available for everything that Caroline Kennedy said today. As I mentioned before, Kurt Anderson appeared on this program last year describing how Robert Kennedy Jr. Was his cocaine dealer. He bought cocaine from Robert Kennedy in Robert Kennedy's dorm room in Harvard College. I described once on this program last year being in a class with Robert Kennedy Jr. In college where he couldn't hold his head up in the classroom, could never hold his head up. And I had no idea then that he was a heroin addict, as he has since confessed being a heroin addict starting in high school, all the way way through college and law school, you know, that period when he could have gone to medical school and actually become a medical expert, he was a heroin addict instead. You don't need an FBI background check to know that Robert Kennedy Jr. Is a dangerous person who lives on the exploitation of his father's name and has never made an inch of progress in his life without cashing in on the currency of Kennedy fame. I never expected to hear that publicly from Caroline Kennedy, whose lifetime of public dignity has been flawless. Caroline Kennedy addressed her letter to the top Democrat and Republican on both the Senate Finance Committee and the Senate Health, Education, labor and Pensions Committee. Since Robert Kennedy Jr. Will have confirmation hearings in each one of those committees beginning tomorrow, because each committee has some jurisdiction over the Health and Human Services Department. Caroline Kennedy also released a video of her own reading of that letter to the Senate. This was yet another day of sadness for Caroline Kennedy, but her emotional control in reading that letter was strict and unflinching. If you know the Kennedy history, you wouldn't be able to read her words without crying. But she did. This is what Caroline Kennedy, daughter of President Kennedy, who would be so proud to know that she became Ambassador Kennedy, said to the United States Senate today.
- [16:04]
Caroline Kennedy
Dear Senators, throughout the past year, people have asked for my thoughts about my cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. And his presidential campaign. I did not comment, not only because I was serving in a government position as United States Ambassador to Australia, but because I have never wanted to speak publicly about my family members and their challenges. We are a close generation of 28 cousins who have been through a lot together. We know how hard it's been and we are always there for each other. But now that Bobby has been nominated by President Trump to be Secretary of Health and Human Services, a position that would put him in charge of the health of the American people, I feel an obligation to speak out. Overseeing the fda, the nih, the cdc, and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, agencies that are charged with protecting the most vulnerable among us, is an enormous responsibility and one that Bobby is unqualified to fill. He lacks any relevant government, financial, management or medical experience. His views on vaccines are dangerous and willfully misinformed. These facts alone should be disqualifying. But he has personal qualities related to this job, which for me pose even greater concern. I've known Bobby my whole life. We grew up together. It's no surprise that he keeps birds of prey as pets, because Bobby himself is a predator. He's always been charismatic, able to attract others through the strength of his personality, his willingness to take risks and break the rules. I watch his younger brothers and cousins follow him down the path of drug addiction. His basement, his garage, his dorm room were always the center of the action where drugs were available, and he enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in a blender to feed to his hawks. It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence. That was a long time ago, and people can change. Through his own strength and the many second chances he was given by people who felt sorry for the boy who lost his father, Bobby was able to pull himself out of illness and disease. I admire the discipline that took and the continuing commitment it requires. But siblings and cousins, who Bobby encouraged down the path of substance abuse, suffered addiction, illness, and death, while Bobby has gone on to misrepresent, lie, and cheat his way through life. Today, while he may encourage a younger generation to attend AA meetings, Bobby is addicted to attention and power. Bobby preys on the desperation of parents of sick children, vaccinating his own kids while building a following, hypocritically discouraging other parents from vaccinating theirs. Even before he fills this job, his constant denigration of our health care system and the conspiratorial half truths he's told about vaccines, including in connection with Samoa's deadly 2019 outbreak of measles, have cost lives. And now we know that Bobby's crusade against vaccination has benefited him in other ways, too. His ethics report makes clear that he will keep his financial stake in a lawsuit against an HPV vaccine. In other words, Bobby is willing to profit and enrich himself by denying access to a vaccine that can prevent almost all forms of cervical cancer and has already been safely administered to millions of boys and girls. During my time in Australia, I worked on the Quad Cancer Initiative, and I learned that cervical cancer is among the top three forms of cancer among women in a majority of countries. Tragically, every year, more than 200,000 children lose their mothers. They are orphaned due to a lack of vaccines and screening. Those are the real world consequences of Bobby's irresponsible beliefs. We are a close family. None of that is easy to say. It also wasn't easy to remain silent last year when Bobby expropriated my father's image and distorted President Kennedy's legacy to advance his own failed presidential campaign and then grovel to Donald Trump for a job. Bobby continues to grandstand off my father's assassination and that of his own father. It's incomprehensible to me that someone who is willing to exploit their own painful family tragedies for publicity would be put in charge of America's life and death situations. Unlike Bobby, I try not to speak for my father, but I am certain that he and my Uncle Bobby, who gave their lives in public service to our country, and my Uncle Teddy, who devoted his long, centered career to the cause of improving health care, would be disgusting. The American health care system, for all its flaws, is the envy of the world. Its doctors and nurses, researchers, scientists and caregivers are the most dedicated people I know. Every day they give their lives to heal and save others. They deserve a knowledgeable leader who is committed to evidence and excellence. They deserve a secretary committed to advancing cutting edge medicine to save lives, not to rejecting the advances we have already made. They deserve a stable moral and ethical person at the helm of this crucial agency. They deserve better than Bobby Kennedy and so do the rest of us. I urge the Senate to reject his nomination.
- [22:17]
Patrick Adams
We'll be right back.
- [22:19]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Hey, it's Mel Robbins, host of the Mel Robbins Podcast. Let's just cut to the chase. There is a change you want to make right now, but you're waiting to feel mot. You don't need motivation. You've got me. You can change your life anytime you want. And when you're ready, the Mel Robbins Podcast is here to help you with inspiration and simple science backed tools to help you create a better life. Listen to me and you'll feel motivated. All right, listen to the Mel Robbins Podcast now on the Sirius XM app. Download it today. Latte, anyone? We all have those little everyday expenses, right? But what if you could get something really valuable for the cost of your daily coffee? Greenlight's Money app for families helps teach your kids about money, savings, chores and allowance, even investing. Starting at just $5.99 a month. That's even cheaper than coffee these days. Energize your whole family with a subscription that unlocks lifelong money lessons. Try Greenlight risk free@greenlight.com podcast that's greenlight.com podcast to try greenlight today.
- [23:20]
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- [23:54]
Caroline Kennedy
Mr. Kennedy, do you have any response.
- [23:56]
Lawrence O'Donnell
To the letter released by Caroline Kennedy? Are you concerned about your confirmation hearing coming up? Are you confident you'll get Senate confirmation this week? What question are you expecting to hear.
- [24:21]
Caroline Kennedy
From senators at both your hearings this week?
- [24:24]
Patrick Adams
Robert Kennedy's first confirmation hearing is tomorrow morning in the Senate Finance Committee. The day after that, he will have a confirmation hearing in the Senate Labor Health Education Pensions Committee. That committee was chaired by his uncle, Ted Kennedy, who today, Caroline Kennedy said, would be disgusted by this nomination. Joining now is E.J. dion, an opinion columnist for the Washington Post and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Also with us Congressional historian Noel Mornstein. He's an emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. And E.J. i just wanted to just open this to your reaction to what you heard from Caroline Kennedy today.
- [25:07]
E.J. Dionne
I was very moved when you began your segment by talking about the decade of assassinations and remembering that time and the tragedy that has befallen particularly all the kids in this family. I'll never forget the day that Martin Luther King was killed, April 4, 1968, and Bobby Kennedy was campaigning in Indianapolis and he rushed to a black neighborhood because he wanted to try to keep the peace. And he said that I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man. And he ended the speech by quoting Aeschylus about taming the savageness of man and making gentle the life of the world. And boy, do we need that. Now look at what Robert Kennedy Jr. Did. And it's outrageous. It's also sad and tragic. And I thought to have Carolyn Kennedy do this was so powerful for precisely the reason you said that she is not somebody who has sought the limelight. I think you could tell that this pained her when she made that video. And I think there are many devastating things she said. But in some ways I thought the most devastating thing and something that I think will come up with in the hearing was her saying that he exploits the pain of families whose children have suffered and then hypocritically vaccinates his own children while telling others that they can't, they shouldn't do it. And I think that goes to almost all of the issues that his nomination raises, and I hope senators raise that at the hearing.
- [26:50]
Patrick Adams
And Norm, I think we know that of all the Kennedys who could speak out against him, this is the one Robert Kennedy was fearing the most.
- [26:59]
Norm Ornstein
Absolutely and for good reason. And she deserves her own special profile and Courage Award. Lawrence E.J. and I and you all know members of the Kennedy family, we know how close knit they are. We know how painful it is for them to do this. And they're doing it. And she's doing it because the future of the country is at stake. There are so many deplorable nominees that Trump has put forward, one already confirmed in Pete Hegseth. We have Tulsi Gabbard coming up. But actually this may be the most significant because it affects so directly the health and well being of everybody in this country. And for all that she said, the sadism that he's experienced towards animals, the not caring when people die in Samoa. But the, the disingenuousness, denying things that he said. Watching Casey Hunt, to her credit the other day, when he said, I never said that there's no vaccine that's safe, and then queuing up the video. I wish we'd see more of that. I wish we would see some pushback from the press corps on this and the consequences of it. And I still can't say for sure that he is going to be rejected by the Senate, which says too much about the Senate. But this is a pivotal moment. If Caroline Kennedy speaks up against her cousin, if his own siblings have spoken out, what does that tell us about his fitness for this office? It tells us he is unfit, dangerous and reckless.
- [28:38]
Patrick Adams
And ej, there's so many levels on which her statement works and has import, those personal details that she revealed about growing up with him. But, but the qualifications issues, which are the ones that the committees are gonna pay attention to the most, and her making the point that he's just been an exploiter in this arena, something that his Uncle Ted, as chairman of the second committee that will hold his confirmation hearing, absolutely would have abhorred. There came a point in Teddy Kennedy's career, as we all know, where he decided healthcare was the issue for him. That was his number one issue. And he spent the last couple of, of decades of his time in the Senate with health care being his number one issue. And so for him to be running a confirmation hearing of a nominee for Health and Human services like this would have been unthinkable.
- [29:33]
E.J. Dionne
I think that's right. I think it is very important to underscore the role that Ted Kennedy played in fighting for universal health care. And he tried in every which way to get there. And yes, it's so ironic, and I don't think that's a strong enough word that Robert Kennedy Jr. With the views that he has, is now the person who has proposed for hhs. I think of all the nominees, he and Tulsi Gabbard are probably the most vulnerable, probably the two who could draw the four plus Republican senators that you need. You have Mike Pence out campaigning against him because of his stand on abortion, and you have, I think, some of the drug companies who are very uneasy with him for reasons that we can understand. But I think that this testimony from Carolyn Kennedy, again, I think it's the hypocrisy and irresponsibility and the grifter ness, if that's a word, of the grifting that all of this career represents, I guess he fits in well with this administration on, unfortunately. But I got to believe, or at least I hope, that there will be a sufficient number of Republican senators who will say even if they voted for Pete Hegseth and Lord knows more, Republicans should have voted against him. Who will look at Kennedy's record and say, we can't do this. This is too dangerous. Kids should be vaccinated. We want to keep polio out of our country.
- [31:12]
Patrick Adams
And Norm, one of those vulnerabilities might just be for some Republican senators. Robert Kennedy Jr. S past affiliation with.
- [31:22]
Norm Ornstein
Democrats and his pro choice stance, as EJ Mentioned. There's one other thing that we have to emphasize, Lawrence, which is if you think about where bird flu is going now, we're going to have a big pandemic. And it's not just the vaccinations. They've cut off funding for children's cancer, for clinical trials for cancer. Taking hope away from people who are desperate. If we take away from the cdc, the center for Disease Control, the ability to act in a public health matter as serious as another pandemic, and this is going to reverberate in so many places. It's not just his position, it's the other people at the Centers for Disease Control and the FDA and Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Everybody in this country is gonna be vulnerable to disaster. And we cannot allow this to happen. It just cannot happen. But it's gonna be close. God help us.
- [32:24]
Patrick Adams
Yeah. And the day after Donald Trump tried to turn off the switch on Medicaid, Robert Kennedy Jr. Is gonna be in a confirmation hearing about him being in control of Medicaid. We'll see how that goes. E.J. deon and Norm Orenstein, thank you both very much for joining our discussion tonight.
- [32:39]
E.J. Dionne
Thanks. Thank you.
- [32:41]
Patrick Adams
And coming up this afternoon, a federal judge blocked what House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries called the illegal Trump funding freeze. So did every other lawyer who knows federal law. The top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Brendan Boyle, will join us next.
- [33:00]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Hey, it's Mel Robbins, host of the Mel Robbins Podcast. Let's just cut to the chase. There is a change you want to make, right? You're waiting to feel motivated. You don't need motivation. You've got me. You can change your life anytime you want. And when you're ready, the Mel Robbins Podcast is here to help you with inspiration and simple science backed tools to help you create a better life. Listen to me and you'll feel motivated. All right, Listen to the Mel Robbins Podcast now on the SiriusXM app. Download it today. Latte anyone? We all have those little everyday expenses, right? But what if you could get something really valuable for the cost of your daily coffee? Greenlight's Money app for families helps teach your kids about money, savings, chores and allowance, even investing. Starting at just $5.99 a month. That's even cheaper than coffee these days. Energize your whole family with a subscription that unlocks lifelong money lessons. Try Greenlight risk free@greenlight.com podcast that's greenlight.com podcast to try greenlight today it's time to have your high five moment with high five casino. The top social casino where the action and real never stop. Fun spins and big wins are right at your fingertips. With over a thousand games, including High Five Casino exclusives, High Five Casino is always free to play with free coins given out every four hours. Sign up today for a free welcome offer that can get you spinning and winning right away. Visit high5casino.com high5casino no purchase necessary. Void where prohibited by law. Must be 21 years or older. Terms and conditions apply.
- [34:35]
Patrick Adams
Memos from the Office of Management and Budget in Washington usually go ignore in Washington today, but today one of them shook the world, including funding around the world. The memo from the acting director of the Office of Management and Budget was an order and it said the executive branch have a duty to align federal spending in action with the will of the American people as expressed through presidential priorities. That is legally false. They have a duty to carry out the spending programs enacted by Congress. They must follow Congress's spending orders has nothing to do with the outcome of presidential elections. The memo order went on to say federal agencies must temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all federal financial assistance by the end of the day. A federal judge blocked that order. Joining us now is Democratic Congressman Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania. He's the ranking member, meaning the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee. Congressman Boyle, it has been quite a day for you.
- [35:52]
Sarah Rafferty
Yeah, that, that certainly is the case. Began about 10pm or so last night after this extraordinary OMB memo. Just to be clear, though, as extraordinary as the power grab that Donald Trump and Russ Vote are attempting to pull off, they won't get away with it. What they're attempting to do is blatantly unconstitutional. Article 1, Section 9 makes clear that Congress has the power of the purse. That's number one. Number two, the Empowerment Control act of 1974 further clarifies that what the president is doing is illegal. No president can exercise this sort of authority to just simply refused to send out checks that have been legally obligated by Congress. And then lastly, the United States Supreme Court actually ruled on this matter. They ruled unanimously that what President Nixon first attempted and what President Trump is now attempting is flat out unconstitutional.
- [36:50]
Patrick Adams
You know, when I finally got my hands on the full memo and read the whole thing, and I see that it's written by the acting director, who's actually a holdover from the Biden administration, career Office of Management, budget person. He's been there a very long time. It actually reads like someone who's trying to get caught. If his mission was to sit down and say, I am going to write the most ridiculous, politically loaded version of this memo so the courts will have no choice but to rule it unconstitutional, this is what you'd write.
- [37:28]
Sarah Rafferty
Well, I have to say, though, if the Senate approves the OMB director nominee, Russ Vote, and I certainly urge them not to ratify his nomination, but I sincerely doubt there's going to be four Senate Republicans who are willing to stand up to most of Trump's nominees. Russ Vote coming in. He is the most powerful and dangerous of the Trump nominees and perhaps the most anonymous. He is, after all, one of the principal authors of Trump's Project 2025. He has made clear that he has very detailed plans that he put down on paper to go down this empowerment route as well as do other sort of extreme actions to essentially scale back the government back to what it was before the dawn of the 20th century. So I think that unfortunately, we're going to see more extraordinary times ahead like we've experienced in the last 24 hours.
- [38:28]
Patrick Adams
Russ Fog is also the only nominee for OMB director in history who, in the course of his Senate confirmation questioning, has said that he does not believe that the presidential election of 2020 was a fair election. He says he believes that was a rigged election. So the first one not to accept the results of a presidential election election. This memo does seem to reflect exactly what we know to be the incoming directors thinking.
- [38:59]
Sarah Rafferty
Yeah, that's exactly right. By the way, for Russ Vote and the other election deniers who persist from 2020, I always want to ask them, if the election was rigged in 2020, why did we House Democrats lose nine seats? So, I mean, are we just not good at rigging elections? We forgot about the Congress. Of course, no intelligent person really believes the 2020 election was rigged. It just shows you how far rather serious people are willing to go to debase themselves and debase the institutions of our government in order to suck up to Donald Trump so they can get their positions. That is truly dangerous.
- [39:40]
Patrick Adams
Congressman Brendan Boyle, you have long days ahead. Thank you very much for joining us tonight.
- [39:46]
Sarah Rafferty
Thank you.
- [39:47]
Patrick Adams
Thank you. Coming up, after a federal judge blocked that Donald Trump order, the spending freeze, many states, 22 states filed separate lawsuits that are still pending against that order, including Congressman Jim Himes, state of Connecticut. Congressman Himes will join us next on what Connecticut has already experienced as a result of the Trump freeze. That's next. The funding for emergency disaster relief has been suspended. It appears that money going to our elementary schools to help pay for books and teachers has been suspended. Literally, the lifeblood of our communities, the programs that keep us alive, that educate our kids, that protect our neighborhoods, all disappeared overnight. And why?
- [40:37]
Caroline Kennedy
Why?
- [40:38]
Patrick Adams
The answer is simple. Donald Trump is seizing power. That was Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut. Joining us now is Democratic Congressman Jim Himes of Connecticut. He's a ranking member, meaning the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. So where were you when you heard about this? This is one of those shaking moments in Washington.
- [41:01]
Rachel Maddow
It's been a couple of days, right? So, so Save the Children and americares are two global aid organizations that are feeding children, addressing aids, inoculating refugees all over the world, spent much of the phone on the weekend, much of the weekend on the phone with them because they had to shut everything down, everything down. Now, maybe you don't care about that, right. Maybe you don't care about, maybe you care more about the fact that I'm trying to build two bridges in my district, one in Greenwich and one in Bridgeport. Those processes have been shut down. My district was badly hurt on 9 11. We're probably more sensitive to terrorism than most districts. New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, we lost dozens of people for a brief period over the weekend. The people that we were paying to guard the ISIS refugee camps in Syria. These are camps that have battle hardened ISIS terrorists. The guys were walking off the job from guarding these guys because they weren't getting paid. So, you know, I'm in D.C. i hear, oh, he's a disruptor. Isn't that great? No. There's elements of the federal government that could use a little disruption. But what you see right now is wholesale stupid brutality.
- [42:05]
Patrick Adams
And so federal judge got in there, stopped it early, but it's not over. It wasn't the definitive ruling stopping this at this point. Yeah.
- [42:14]
Rachel Maddow
And look, you know, like everything else, like the 14th amendment, I'm not a lawyer, but you know what? I did do? Sixth grade civics class. And if you did Sixth grade civics class. You know that the Congress has the power, power of the purse. But, you know, the Trump administration will fight this out and it'll get delayed and a lot of people will get hurt. And eventually the courts, maybe it'll be, the Supreme Court is going to say, no, it's not constitutional. 14th amendment. Not a lawyer, but I can read the language of the 14th Amendment. All of these things are going to get litigated. We hope the courts move fast because again, there's a lot of MAGA people out there saying, oh, well, this is what he promised to do. He promised to disrupt something. Now the American people are getting a little bit of a taste of what it means, means to disrupt energy assistance in the wintertime. Imagine if you're in North Dakota right now and you were wondering whether you should buy that load of fuel, what it means to disrupt food stamps, what it means to disrupt the protections against terrorism abroad. It's just America's getting a little taste of MAGA disruption right now.
- [43:07]
Patrick Adams
Meanwhile, all of Medicaid in all 50 states gets shut down today. And they're claiming, the White House seems to be claiming, oh, no, Medicaid's not part.
- [43:16]
Rachel Maddow
Yeah, well, they seem to be claiming that. And you know, it's the classic Trump thing. We saw this in term one. It is, you know, a perfect mixture of brutality with incompetence. Because again, if you read that memo, you see, they didn't want to touch Social Security or Medicare or Medicaid, presumably. But yeah, I mean, and again, what's Medicaid doing in this country? Medicaid is providing health insurance to tens of millions of very vulnerable people. But hey, we're disrupting it. That's what we asked for and that's what's happening right now.
- [43:45]
Patrick Adams
Well, Medicaid is also paying for nursing home care, probably for some members of Donald Trump's club in Florida who have managed to hide the assets of their mothers in such a way that qualify them for Medicaid in nursing homes. It's a huge payer for nursing homes.
- [44:04]
Rachel Maddow
The only, and I hate to put it in these terms, you may be right about that. But you know, this is so broad based, so broad brush, that a lot of deeply red areas are going to get hit. Farmers right now, farmers that produce the food that we eat, not only are they losing all their laborers, and that's a whole other conversation, but, you know, the brutal enforcement that we're about to see is going to basically harm our farmers. Not a lot of farmers voting Democrat. These days. You know it's going to hurt everybody. It's going to hurt. And by the way, you know, I heard Speaker Johnson say, I totally support these spending. I represent Connecticut, one of the wealthiest states in the country. Louisiana, not one of the wealthiest states in the country. So the speaker who was elected by people who are being brutalized by this right now is saying this is just fine.
- [44:51]
Patrick Adams
Congressman Jim Himes, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Thank you.
- [44:55]
Lawrence O'Donnell
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