← The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell
Lawrence: Trump could not finish his first week as president ‘without violating the law’
00:38:59
Tonight on The Last Word: Donald Trump violates the law in his mass purge of inspectors general. Also, the Justice Department fires the officials involved in Jack Smith’s Trump probes. Plus, Democrats condemn Trump firing inspectors general. And a new book, “The Sirens’ Call,” tackles the world’s most endangered resource – attention. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Brendan Ballou, Andrew Weissmann, Rep. Jamie Raskin, and Chris Hayes join Lawrence O’Donnell.
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- [00:01]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Last year, Americans ate 32 billion chicken wings. Who knows just how many helpless sides of celery were heartlessly thrown away. But this year, celery neglect can stop with you and irresistible Jif peanut butter because you can make a snack to make a difference. You can buy a jar of Jif to save the celery. So please don't let celery be decoration for wings. Tap the banner to save the celery.
- [00:31]
Andrew Weissmann
The last thing you want to hear when you need your auto insurance most is a robot with countless irrelevant menu options. Which is why with USA Auto insurance, you'll get great service that is easy and reliable, all at the touch of a button. Get a quote Today, restrictions apply. Well, the right wing Trump supporting website, the Daily Caller, ran a happy headline for them saying that Donald Trump as president takes more questions than Joe Biden did as president. And they're right. They are very right to use the verb takes instead of the verb answers. Donald Trump takes more questions publicly than any president in history, but he answers fewer questions than any president in history because a lie is not an answer. To be a member of the White House press corps now is to become practiced in taking Donald Trump dictation of lies, which Donald Trump does with a casual confidence, knowing that the White House press corps will never scream at him the way they could scream at Joe Biden whenever they felt like it, whenever they had a chance, whenever they were close enough. And so when Donald Trump told his lies about firing 18 inspectors general late on Friday night, I mean, happened late on Friday night, he didn't tell his lies till later in the weekend. The White House press corps could do nothing but write down the lies and report them. Donald Trump in effect, said that he had no personal knowledge of why he fired the inspectors general. He said, quote, some people thought that some were unfair or some were not doing the job. It's entirely possible that some people who Donald Trump talks to thought that some unnamed inspectors general were unfair. But who are those people who thought that and what was the unfairness they imagined? There was no chance, zero chance of getting any answers about that. When Donald Trump told the White House press corps the lie, that it was, quote, a very standard thing to do, they all reported that, quote, and the good ones would say in the next line, as the New York Times did, that is not true. Richard Nixon was the most corrupt president in history prior to Donald Trump. And after Republican Richard Nixon's corruption forced him to resign from office in 1974, Congress spent the next few years coming up with Ways to prevent the next Richard Nixon. One of those anti, Nixon, anti corruption ideas was the creation of inspectors general in the government departments. Richard Nixon corrupted the Justice Department to the point that his Attorney General, John Mitchell, went to prison. And so to shore up the integrity of the Justice Department, there would now be an Inspector general of the Department of Justice and of every other department in the government. Richard Nixon abused the Internal Revenue Service by ordering tax audits of people on his enemies list. Congress then made that illegal and created an inspector general in the Treasury Department to keep an eye on that. The Inspector General act of 1978 passed the United States Senate unanimously. Zero opposition. And one of the things that Republicans really loved about it was that inspectors general were charged with investigating waste, fraud and abuse in every department of the government. Waste, fraud and abuse was one of the Republican battle cries that Ronald Reagan was using then in what would become his successful campaign to be the next President of the United States. And Republican senators of that era were as outraged and offended by Republican President Richard Nixon's corruption as Democratic senators were. Outrage at presidential crime did not become partisan until the Trump era. After the corruption and impeachments and indictments of Donald Trump, Congress once again turned to the inspector general law to try to add a defense against the next Donald Trump, who turned out to be Donald Trump. In 2022, Congress added specifics to the section referring to presidential removal of an inspector general, saying that a president needed to provide 30 days notice to Congress of the intention to remove an inspector general and provide, quote, substantive rationale, including detailed and case specific reasons. Donald Trump didn't do either of those things when he did his late night, Friday night firings. And so Donald Trump could not finish his first week as President of the United States without violating the law.
- [05:52]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Do you think he violated the law?
- [05:54]
Andrew Weissmann
Well, technically, yeah, but he has the authority to do it. Sorry, but it's really one of the other. It's either technically, yeah, or he has the authority to do it. It cannot be both. Senator Graham got it right the first time. Technically, yeah, Donald Trump violated the law. Republican Senator Susan Collins was willing to portray herself as the only adult in Maine without enough common sense to figure out what Donald Trump was actually doing. She said, I don't understand why one would fire individuals whose mission is to root out waste, fraud and abuse. So this leaves a gap in what I know is a priority for President Trump. One of the inspectors General, Hannibal Ware.
- [06:48]
Senator Amy Klobuchar
Said this, well, the reason is actually the most alarming part. The reason was due to changing priorities of the administration. And the reason that is alarming is because IGs are not a part of any administration. IGs oversee how the priorities of the administration is being conducted. To make sure that there is transparency in government and to make sure that there's no fraud, waste and abuse in how taxpayer funds are being expended. We're looking at what amounts to a threat to democracy, a threat to independent oversight, and a threat to transparency in government. This is the statute isn't just a technicality, it's a key protection of ig. Independence is what it is. And just like you referenced just over two years ago, these things were put in to strengthen our independence, not to weaken it and treat it as if it's a technicality.
- [07:54]
Andrew Weissmann
The oldest member of the United States Senate, Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa, used to consider himself, maybe still does consider himself, a champion of inspectors general. And his enthusiasm for inspectors general was so contagious that the junior senator from Iowa, Joni Ernst, joined him in helping to create a bipartisan team of senators whose plan, until this weekend anyway, was to strongly support inspectors general. Chuck Grassley is a Republican Senator who I used to fully respect when I was the staff director of the Senate Finance Committee for the Democratic Chairman, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and Senator Grassley was one of the Republican members of that community committee. Chuck Grassley then was always a predictable vote because his positions were based on Republican Party principles of that time, including his very strong stance, along with all Republicans then, against tariffs in the committee that has jurisdiction over tariffs. Senator Grassley usually, but not always voted against what Democrats were trying to do on the committee. And I never once questioned the motivation for his vote or the motivation of any of the Republican senators who voted against what the Democrats were trying to do. If anyone other than Donald Trump did a midnight mass firing of inspectors general, you would have seen the Chuck Grassley who I knew and worked with all over television condemning that presidential action and immediately calling for an investigation in each committee of the Senate about the workings of those Inspectors General. But 91 year old Chuck Grassley has changed positions or silenced himself on so many issues, including tariffs in the Trump era, that it comes as no surprise that the most he was willing to come up with after something I know he deeply objects to, was this statement. There may be good reason that the IGs were fired. We need to know that. If so, I'd like further explanation from President Trump. Regardless, the 30 day detailed notice of removal that the law demands was not provided to Congress. Releasing that written statement meant that Chuck Grassley didn't have to handle the question. Lindsey Graham had to handle was it illegal? I really miss the pre Trump Chuck Grassley. There were times when I thought of Chuck Grassley as in Senate terms at least, courageous in his consistency and I personally disagreed with the policies he was so consistently supporting. Mark Greenblatt was the inspector general of the Department of Interior until this weekend. The key question here is who does the President appoint in the place of the IGs that he's removed? We are the so called watchdogs inside the federal agencies. So does he appoint true watchdogs or does he appoint lap dogs? If a member of the Trump administration is accused of ethics misconduct or some sort of criminal violation, will the IG be willing to investigate that in a fulsome and comprehensive manner? Will they be willing to come to findings, negative findings about that Trump political appointee? That is the key question. And so this morning, thanks to Donald Trump, when Pete Hegseth reported to work at the Pentagon today for the first time as Secretary of Defense, he had the pleasure of knowing as he entered the building that he wouldn't have to go through the metal detector. And there was no inspector general left in the Pentagon, no one in the Pentagon empowered to investigate. Pete Hegseth, the American people, if we don't have good and independent inspector generals are going to see the swamp refill. They're going to see rampant waste fraud, they're going to see corruption. It may be the President's goal here, when he's got a meme coin that's making him billions, is to remove anyone that's going to call the public attention to his malfeasance. Joining us now is Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. She's a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. And Senator.
- [12:38]
Senator Chuck Grassley
Thanks, Lawrence.
- [12:39]
Andrew Weissmann
You remember the Chuck Grassley before Donald Trump, the Chuck Grassley who would have been all over this before Donald Trump.
- [12:47]
Senator Chuck Grassley
Well, as chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Grassley has an opportunity to still stand up on this. And I hope he, Senator Ernst, other Republicans who respect whistleblowers, have supported whistleblowers through multiple administrations, will do that because as you have pointed out, this middle of the night purge of these government watchdogs who protect, protect our taxpayer money was a complete abuse of power. Thinking of all these agencies, you point out the Department of Defense where you can now have kickbacks. No one's watching over it. Will contracts be awarded to the actual lowest contract? No one's watching it over it. And while Donald Trump's friends may be able to pad their pockets. There is going to be no one watching over for the cost for everyday Americans. So there is a straight line, as you know, between corruption, chaos and cost for Americans. And that's why we are standing up against this. The fact that these people, they reported to work this morning. They reported to work this morning, Lawrence. They were doing their jobs. And that 30 day notice was put in there by Chuck Grassley and others so that the Congress, the equal branch of government to the executive branch, could stand up and say, wait a minute, this is wrong.
- [14:08]
Andrew Weissmann
What happens next? Are these firings in effect? It sounds like some of them didn't show up today. It isn't clear to me.
- [14:18]
Senator Chuck Grassley
Well, obviously we've got to join with some of these Republicans if they're willing to join with us. Otherwise we're going to do it on our own and push this issue. It was a clear violation of the law in two ways. Not the 30 day notice. That may sound small, but I think your calm, calm viewers after reading Chris Hay's book tomorrow, understand that this hair on fire moment has to be handled methodically. This was against the law. And it also that he didn't give the reasons for doing it. This reason that we have changing priorities. What changing priorities? From this inspector general act that says we've got to root out fraud, corruption and kickbacks and bribes. Of course that's got to be a priority of the United States Congress no matter who's running it. So we will continue to push this, push for reappointments of these people and push our Republican colleagues to actually stand up against fraud and abuse.
- [15:19]
Andrew Weissmann
And Senator, this idea that just to underline it, that oh well, you know, we need inspectors general who agree with the president's agenda. There's not supposed to be an agenda in inspector general's office.
- [15:35]
Senator Chuck Grassley
They are independent, they are bipartisan, they have gone after fraud and abuse and kickbacks and bribes under both Republican and Democratic administrations. And that's why they are set up the way they were. And Senator Grassley was actually in Congress before this law even passed and understands how important it is. This is a full out purge. This isn't just one or two people that they felt weren't doing their jobs. What they did here is they did it an all out purge and literally stated in an email that it didn't fit with their changing priorities. I think that rooting out bribes and kickbacks and padding people's pockets because they get kickbacks, whether it's defense contractors, whether it's with health and human services, all of these under various administrations. Things have been found out and taxpayer money has been saved. Brookings Institute, if you remember one number, remember this, every dollar invested in inspectors general has brought back $13 to the American taxpayers.
- [16:43]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah, it's like money invested in IRS agents. It's a profit center. Senator Amy Klobuchar, thank you very much for starting off our discussion tonight.
- [16:52]
Senator Chuck Grassley
Great to be on. Thanks, Lawrence.
- [16:53]
Andrew Weissmann
Thank you. Coming up today, Donald Trump fired or tried to fire all of the career prosecutors at the Justice Department who worked on Jack Smith's investigations of Donald Trump. That's next with former federal prosecutors Andrew Weissman and Brendan Ballew. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is trying to get a vote in the Senate this week on a simple one word resolution. Resolved that the Senate disapproves of any pardons for individuals who are found guilty or of assaulting Capitol police officers. Couldn't be simpler, a resolution disapproving of the pardons of the people found guilty of assaulting Capitol police officers. All 47 Democrats in the Senate support that resolution and it might even pick up a Republican vote or two. I fear that you'll get more violence. Pardoning the people who went into the Capitol and beat up a police officer violently, I think was a mistake because it seems to suggest that's an okay thing to do. On Thursday, our next guest, Brendan Ballew, resigned from the Justice Department after serving as a prosecutor of January 6th defendants. In an essay for the New York Times, he described the prosecution of Jaleese and Mark Middleton, a married couple from Texas who proudly announced on Facebook, we fought the cops. One moment from their trial has stuck with me. Sitting in the courtroom in the awkward minutes before their verdict was announced, I noticed that Mr. Middleton was wearing Trump socks with the president's face stitched into the side. That small sign of fealty struck me as incredibly sad. The Middletons were ready to go to prison for a man who quite likely didn't care about them at all. Today, Donald Trump, through his acting Attorney General James McHenry, fired prosecutors who worked on Jack Smith's cases against Donald Trump. The New York Times reports acting Attorney General James McHenry on Monday fired more than a dozen prosecutors who worked on the two criminal investigations into Donald J. Trump for the special counsel, Jack Smith, saying they could not be trusted to faithfully implement the president's agenda. A Justice Department spokesman said Justice Department veterans called the firings an egregious violation of well established laws meant to preserve the integrity and professionalism of government agencies. What made it all the more jarring, current and former officials said, was that such a momentous and aggressive step was initiated by an obscure acting attorney general operating on behalf of a president who with a stated desire for vengeance and few advisers with the stature or inclination to restrain him. The department did not name the fired prosecutors, but a person who worked with some members of Mr. Smith's team said many of the dismissals appeared to target career lawyers and most likely violated civil service protections for non political employees. And the letters to the prosecutors, which were transmitted electronically. On Monday afternoon, Mr. McHenry claimed that Mr. Trump had constitutional authority over personnel matters under Article 2 of the Constitution to fire career staff members. And the email said, given your significant role in prosecuting the president, I do not believe that the leadership of the department can trust you to assist in implementing the president's agenda faithfully, the firing memo said. Joining our discussion now is former federal prosecutor Brendan Ballew, who worked on the prosecutions of six January 6th defendants. He resigned from the Justice Department last week. Also with us, Andrew Weissman, former FBI general counsel and MSNBC legal analyst. Andrew, I want to begin with you on these firings and saying in an email, a Justice Department email to a career Justice Department official, we don't trust you with the president's agenda in a department that is not supposed to carry the president's agenda.
- [21:13]
Brendan Ballew
So you're absolutely right. So if it came to the president's policy positions, for instance, the president saying, I want you to focus on drugs or I want you to focus on the border, that's fine. But a position which is prosecute these people and not those people, that is the norm that Republican and Democratic administrations post Watergate adhered to precisely because that maintains our democracy. You do not want any president to be able to do that. The idea that you have the acting attorney general, that is the head law enforcement officer, sending out that email and starting his career off by doing something that by all appearances violates the civil service protections on the theory of the president says it that's legal. You know very well a president who said that who had to resign from office here there's civil service protections for career people for very good reasons. This is so much in keeping with your segment with Senator Klobuchar. It is really sort of the beginning of the end of the rule of law with, you know, the DOJ purge that is going on.
- [22:28]
Andrew Weissmann
So they will sue. What will they do?
- [22:31]
Brendan Ballew
So if you're a career prosecutor who has not been fired for cause, this does not appear to have any of the indicia for cause at all, you can bring a lawsuit. I don't envy these people. That's not why you went to the Department of Justice to bring a civil suit. Just like Andy McCabe, who was the acting deputy, acting head of the FBI, he did the same thing and he won his lawsuit. These people, it seems to me, and.
- [22:57]
Andrew Weissmann
He got back pay from.
- [22:58]
Brendan Ballew
He gets back pay, etc. But from Donald Trump's perspective, the message is sent out, their lives are hurt. The message to all other people is to toe the line or else you're not put in this position. But, yes, I think these people have a very good lawsuit. I think they will, you know, get back pay and, you know, their names sort of reinstated in terms of, you know, they're being noble and good career servants, but the damage is already done. But just to put a fine point on it, this is the Acting Attorney General of the United States who took this step. That is the head law enforcement officer who's doing something that completely violates, in my view, civil service rules.
- [23:41]
Andrew Weissmann
Pam Bondi has to be very happy that she hasn't had her final Senate confirmation vote yet. So she didn't have to do this.
- [23:47]
Brendan Ballew
As someone else's watch. Absolutely.
- [23:49]
Andrew Weissmann
Brendan, you were still working in the Justice Department on Monday when the pardons were issued. What was that like for you in the building that day? Where were you the moment you heard about the pardons? What did you feel?
- [24:03]
Jamie Raskin
You know, obviously, it was a devastating moment for anybody that was working on these prosecutions for years. And I should say that obviously I was a small part of a very large effort. But my first thought was not so much about the prosecutors in these cases, but the victims. I think that this administration would like to characterize this as a fight between the President and the prosecutors, but I don't think that's a fair characterization. What this is really a fight is between the President and the victims of January 6, the officers who were attacked, who were dragged into crowds, who were amazed, who were killed. And the President's agenda kind of depends on those people being forgotten.
- [24:45]
Andrew Weissmann
And it seems an attack on the judgments made by the judges in this case, including all many statements they made during sentencing.
- [24:55]
Jamie Raskin
Absolutely. You know, it was interesting. All the prosecutions happened in the District of Columbia, and the judges that we worked with became intimately familiar with the attack on the Capitol, knowing very specific parts of the building, you know, individual officers and so forth. I think at some level, they too, were emotionally involved in what happened that day. So you see that in some of the statements that judges are making, even as they dismiss some of these cases, saying that the memory of January 6th can't be forgotten. And I think it's important for not only, you know, former prosecutors to be saying that, but for judges on the bench.
- [25:33]
Andrew Weissmann
So you stayed after the Trump inauguration. What I'm now gonna say is all the way to Thursday, which is like a long run for someone who was already there. Did it feel like day to day this, a firing order might come?
- [25:49]
Jamie Raskin
Oh, absolutely. You know, as soon as the orders were coming in on Monday, it was obvious, at least for me personally, that my tenure there was very limited. And, you know, you were seeing, you know, news unfold by the hour as the new leadership at the U.S. attorney's office came in. I think, as Andrew said, you know, this is a real attempt at attacking the integrity and independence of the Justice Department and in a broader sense, the entire rule of law. So I think the work that you guys are doing to draw attention to this is really important because it's the only way we're going to stop it.
- [26:23]
Andrew Weissmann
Brendan Ballou, thank you for your service. And I know people in our audience want to thank you, too. Andrew Weissman, thank you for joining our discussion tonight. And coming up, Congressman Jamie Raskin put his objections to Donald Trump's firing of inspectors general in writing. Congressman Raskin will join us on that. And the firing of Justice Department officials today. That's next.
- [26:48]
Mel Robbins
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, but 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.
- [27:19]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Last year, Americans ate 32 billion chicken wings. Who knows just how many helpless sides of celery were heartlessly thrown away. But this year, celery neglect can stop with you and irresistible Jif peanut butter. Because you can make a snack to make a difference. You can buy a jar of Jif to save the celery. So please don't let celery be decoration for wings. Tap the banner to save the celery.
- [27:50]
Andrew Weissmann
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, but we're moving on. Monday.com, the first work platform you'll love to use. Our next guest is one of the co signers of a letter to quote the Honorable Donald J. Trump. We write to express our grave concern about your recent attempt to unlawfully and arbitrarily remove more than a dozen independent, nonpartisan inspectors general without notice to Congress or the public. And in the dead of night, your actions violate the law, attack our democracy and undermine the safety of the American people. Joining our discussion now is Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland. He's a ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee and a former member of the January 6th Committee. And Congressman, as Chris Hayes is going to tell us later in the hour, Donald Trump knows how to get attention. He knows exactly what he wants to get attention for. He wants you to get wants to get attention to Greenland. Would love to have us talking about that when he's doing something in the dark of night, as you put it. That's the thing he doesn't want us to talk about.
- [29:19]
Chris Hayes
Well, hundreds of billions of dollars have been saved by the inspectors general who are blowing the whistle on corruption and fraud and sweetheart contracts and inside deals in the federal agency.
- [29:31]
Andrew Weissmann
I thought that was going to be Elon Musk's job because no one was doing that job.
- [29:35]
Chris Hayes
Yeah, well, he's going to stay very closely abreast of the situation, let's put it that way. The sacking of these IGs means that there's nobody there to be a watchdog against any of these semi criminal elements that are moving into the federal departments and agencies. It's an absolute takeover of the US Government and the money of the people.
- [29:58]
Andrew Weissmann
What will you be looking for now as a result of this? I mean, at some point there will be maybe not inspectors general appointed, maybe not. Who knows?
- [30:08]
Chris Hayes
Well, they watchdog not just money, but also policies. Right. So we have this avian flu, the bird flu, which is now taking over, you know, hundreds of different farms and zoos. Billions of animals already have been lost to it. And there's already been a human victim. It's moving over. Well, if, you know, Bobby Kennedy Jr were actually to become the secretary of HHS, only the IG would be on the inside of the department to watch what's going on, to see whether we are actually getting the policy advice and precautions that the people need to survive the next epidemic.
- [30:47]
Andrew Weissmann
Another concern of yours, this firing today of the Jack Smith prosecutors also appears to be illegal.
- [30:54]
Chris Hayes
Yeah, full blown assault at the Department of Justice to sack the prosecutors who've been upholding the law. These are career prosecutors, part of the civil service, absolute professionals with complete integrity. And they're sacking the ones who participated in the special counsel investigation just for being put on that team. And at the same time, the U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia is actually investigating its own prosecutors for participating in the cases against the January 6th insurrectionists. So, you know, people have been saying for a while that in Congress the inmates have taken over the asylum. It's like the criminals are now running the Department of Justice and the criminal investigative apparatus of the United States.
- [31:45]
Andrew Weissmann
You know, I'm impressed that those prosecutors, those Jack Smith career prosecutors stayed. I mean, they knew this kind of heat was coming in their direction. They could have decided weeks ago. You know what? I'm going to get myself to the safety of a law firm in private practice as soon as possible. They stayed indicating to me they wanted to stay in this department and still try to do the work in this department.
- [32:06]
Chris Hayes
I mean, these people believe in the mission of the Department of Justice. They believe in that very old fashioned institution of the rule of law, and they want to be part of it. A lot of them also may be a year or two away from earning their federal retirement after devoting their entire careers to federal prosecution. And it's scandalous what's taking place against the career prosecutors. We're not talking about, you know, Joe Biden appointees. We're talking about people who went in there just to enforce the rule of law.
- [32:37]
Andrew Weissmann
Congressman Jamie Raskin, so nice to have you in the studio here in New York. Thank you very much for joining us.
- [32:42]
Chris Hayes
My pleasure.
- [32:43]
Andrew Weissmann
And Chris Hayes has written a wonderful new book which I happen to have right here that is important for all of us, including your kids. Yeah, there's politics in the book, but it's actually about nothing less than the inner workings of your own mind. That's something you want to know about. That's next.
- [33:04]
Mel Robbins
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 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.
- [33:36]
Lawrence O'Donnell
Last year, Americans ate 32 billion chicken wings. Who knows just how many helpless sides of celery were heartlessly thrown away. But this year, celery neglect can stop with you and irresistible Jif peanut butter because you can make a celery snack to make a difference. You can buy a jar of Jif to save the celery. So please don't let celery be decoration for wings. Tap the banner to save the celery.
- [34:07]
Andrew Weissmann
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. Our next guest writes. Public discourse is now a war of all against all for attention. Commerce is a war for attention. Social life is a war for attention. Parenting is a war for attention. And we are all feeling battle weary. This book is an attempt at finding peace. Joining us now is our 8pm MSNBC friend Chris Hayes. He's also host of the podcast why Is this Happening? And his brilliant new book available tomorrow. And in my hands right now is the Siren's How Attention Became the World's Most Endangered Resource. I love this book.
- [35:21]
Chris Hayes
No, that means a lot.
- [35:22]
Andrew Weissmann
It's one of those things that is, I was like an inch away from thinking or if I had the attention span to get to it, I would have said, wait a minute, what's happening to our attention span? And I think I've had some instinctive feelings about this. But to see it all laid out and then presenting attention as currency, presenting it as an objective, presenting it as a obvious Trumpian objective, a musk objective. It's just fascinating to pull it all together.
- [35:51]
Chris Hayes
Well, thank you. I mean, it was partly, I think the product, you know, the gestation of it is the work that we do, which is, you know, you gotta keep.
- [36:00]
Andrew Weissmann
You're trying to get a little attention at 8pm yeah, right, exactly.
- [36:03]
Chris Hayes
That's like, we're, you know, we're in the mines. Like, that's what we gotta do. So I think part of it too, of just thinking about it as fundamentally as a resource, that attention is a resource, that it has value when it can be extracted and pooled in the aggregate, and that that value of that resource has become kind of the defining resource of our time, both in private life, in commercial life, and certainly in public life, as we've seen that. And there's this moment as this book's coming out. I'm writing it, and at the inauguration, you've got. It's like Donald Trump, who, of course is. His entire public life, is to dominate the attentional space. And then Elon Musk and Tim Cook and Zuckerberg and all the tech CEOs who monetize attention to make their fortunes sitting in a row next to him, all in the same frame at the inauguration, like, completely on the nose of what the commanding heights of both public and private commercial life are right now.
- [36:59]
Andrew Weissmann
When did you start writing this? When did you start worrying about what was happening to our attention?
- [37:04]
Chris Hayes
You know, it's been. I think it's been happening over a long time.
- [37:07]
Andrew Weissmann
You started last week.
- [37:09]
Chris Hayes
Right.
- [37:09]
Andrew Weissmann
And got it done.
- [37:10]
Chris Hayes
Like.
- [37:10]
Andrew Weissmann
Like, it's so Okoran.
- [37:12]
Chris Hayes
You know, I started. I've been thinking about a long time. You know, I was actually thinking about this the other day, that when we were covering ISIS back in 2013 or so, 2014, I was very aware of the fact that they were doing something intention to get our attention.
- [37:25]
Andrew Weissmann
Yes.
- [37:25]
Chris Hayes
Right. And there was something. There was a trap they had laid.
- [37:29]
Andrew Weissmann
Right.
- [37:29]
Chris Hayes
It was both newsworthy.
- [37:31]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah.
- [37:32]
Chris Hayes
And also clearly a propaganda effort to capture Mindshare.
- [37:35]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah.
- [37:36]
Chris Hayes
And I remember thinking about the conundrum they had put us in. And that conundrum, obviously, in less horrific and violent terms, is a conundrum that sort of stalks us out about so many. So many things that are compelling attention almost against our will, and in so doing are taking away some fundamental part of our agency.
- [37:54]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah. So I had a small bore experience of that in this job when I. The one thing I. And I really couldn't do when I started this job was cover school shootings.
- [38:03]
Chris Hayes
That's exciting.
- [38:04]
Andrew Weissmann
I actually said the first time it came up when I was new at this job, I said, I can't do it. You have to bring someone else in that night. Sadly, I'm now professional enough to be able to do that. But what I noticed when I was sitting at home was I noticed these pictures of the shooter and the name and all that. And the one contribution I had for myself when I started doing it was I said, I'm never going to say the name. They did it to be on tv. They did it for this attention. I'm not going to give them that with the name. And I realized through the book. Oh, I see what I was doing. I was trying to pull back some attention that was being demanded in the most evil way.
- [38:42]
Chris Hayes
In the most evil way. The sort of mass shooter is the most. The darkest nihilistic endpoint of exactly this kind of, you know, desire to compel attention by any means necessary. And what you do with it, I mean, I talk about it, you know, the troll, right? A much less horrific and dark version of this. Who's just a jerk in public space, right? That jerk in public space, you know, you pay attention to him, someone's screaming on the subway, someone's being a bore at a party, right? Like that. But that, that negativity ends up being a shortcut to hack our attentional circuitry. And we see it with the troll in chief, right? I mean, the president and the co president, this is both how they practice politics.
- [39:24]
Andrew Weissmann
So your final chapter, like in all good medical textbooks about the cure is fascinating, is what do we do about this? Let me tell you what I have intuitively done about it without before I ever read the book. And I started doing this, I think, before Trump, and that is Saturdays and Sundays I consume absolutely nothing, zero. I have no idea what happens in the news on Saturday or Sunday. If I run into somebody, you know, if I'm at a dinner Saturday night, hey, this thing, I go, I don't know. And literally this is how big it has to be. The one Saturday news event that I can remember, or Sunday news event, I guess it was last year, was President Biden saying, I'm gonna step out of the race. That got to me.
- [40:10]
Chris Hayes
It managed to find you.
- [40:12]
Andrew Weissmann
I mean, people in the stores, in the little town I was in started running around. So that reached me. But that's how removed.
- [40:20]
Chris Hayes
Why are you doing that?
- [40:21]
Andrew Weissmann
I am doing that. I was doing that, I believe, because I simply intuitively felt there's just way too much vibration here. And I've got to. The rpms are running too high on this. I can't look at Twitter, I can't look at. And so I just intuitively felt something was happening to me that you have now described to me exactly what was happening to me. And I kind of self medicated that way. So that as the staff here can Tell you, there's a lot of stuff I have to be informed about on Monday afternoons that they thought I would have known by Saturday morning. But that's one method by one person.
- [40:59]
Chris Hayes
And partly, I think what I write about this in the book, being alone with our own thoughts.
- [41:05]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah.
- [41:06]
Chris Hayes
Is a really important part of the human condition of being alive. And we have become acclimated to ever more diversion. Blaise Pascal is writing, you know, in the 17th century. He says, think about the king. The king has every diversion available to him and yet he needs, he needs evermore.
- [41:23]
Andrew Weissmann
Right.
- [41:23]
Chris Hayes
So that thing that you're doing yourself, which is like, I'm going to preserve some space for my own inner life is actually like crucial to being alive.
- [41:31]
Andrew Weissmann
Yeah.
- [41:32]
Chris Hayes
It's also crucial to focus. I mean, that's the other thing. I think we all feel that in a distracted age, focus is power.
- [41:39]
Andrew Weissmann
Right.
- [41:39]
Chris Hayes
And we're fighting, particularly in this first week. I mean, it's to focus.
- [41:43]
Andrew Weissmann
Right.
- [41:44]
Chris Hayes
And that's another thing I think we're learning to kind of hold on to. That's important.
- [41:48]
Andrew Weissmann
And I've also become a much more intense long form reader of history. Like take big ponderous history books and just read them for hours on end. And I have real trouble putting them down. Whereas I'd say decades ago, certainly in college, I would have had trouble picking them up. But could. There's something therapeutic and I feel completely removed from this and doing it.
- [42:10]
Chris Hayes
Yeah. The delight of writing the book has been forcing me to go back into long texts and really engage.
- [42:19]
Andrew Weissmann
The control room is telling us our time is.
- [42:20]
Chris Hayes
I know, I'm trying to be a good boy.
- [42:22]
Andrew Weissmann
You've been very helpful. But the new book is the Sirens Call. How Attention Became the World's Most Endangered Resource. It's available everywhere tomorrow. Get it. It's important. You need it, your kids need it. We haven't even get to the stuff about parenting, which is here, which is very important. Chris Hayes.
- [42:39]
Chris Hayes
Thank you, Lawrence. I really appreciate it.
- [42:41]
Andrew Weissmann
Best parent in Brooklyn. I know that's very good of younger kids because I know too many parents in Brooklyn. Chris Hayes gets tonight's last word. The last thing you want to hear when you need your auto insurance most is a robot with countless irrelevant menus options. Which is why with USAA auto insurance you'll get great service that is easy and reliable all at the touch of a button. Get a quote. Today, restrictions apply.