← The Rachel Maddow Show
The Rachel Maddow Show
Maddow: U.S. profoundly changed by authoritarian leader; 'We're beyond waiting and seeing now'
00:44:03
Rachel Maddow points out that the thing most Americans were dreading has come to pass, and the United States has changed profoundly in only six months of authoritarian rule. "We have a consolidating dictatorship in our country." With freedoms likely to continue to be curtailed in deference to Donald Trump's power, that means Americans have the most tools for democratic resistance right now.
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- [00:01]
Nicole Wallace
MSNBC presents the chart topping original podcast the Best People with Nicole Wallace. This week she sits down with MSNBC reporter Jacob Soborov.
- [00:11]
Jacob Soborov
It's about the connection that you and I have and our colleagues have, but it's also about the connection and the trust that people place in us at a time when trust in media I think is at all time lows.
- [00:20]
Nicole Wallace
The Best people with Nicole Wallace Listen now for early access, ad free listening and bonus content. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts for early access, ad free listening and bonus content to all of MSNBC's original podcasts, including the chart topping series the Best People with Nicole Wallace. Why is this Happening? Main justice and more. Plus new episodes of all your favorite MSNBC shows ad free and ad free listening to all of Rachel Maddow's original series, Ultra Bagman and Deja News. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [01:00]
Rachel Maddow
Really, really happy to have you here. Four years ago, 2021, the Episcopal Church in New York scored a bit of a coup. New York is already a really important diocese. In that church they have the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, which is just a magnificent, massive thing you can't believe is in America. It's up in Morningside Heights in Manhattan. It is supposedly the sixth largest church of any kind in in the whole world. The interior space is 600ft long, which is like two football fields minus the end zones. It's massive. They've also got this beautiful historic church, Trinity Church, down at Wall street. And it really is beautiful. It is also just completely incongruous with its surroundings. You almost can't believe it's there, even when you're standing right there looking at it in the midst of all these Wall street skyscrapers. There's about 50,000 parishioners in New York's Episcopal diocese. And it's a really diverse group of people. There are Episcopal and Anglican churches all over the world. And since people from all over the world end up in New York, which is the cosmopolitan hub of the universe, the result for a church entity like this is that the Anglican and Episcopal church in New York is just tremendously diverse. And in 2021, four years ago, the Episcopal Church in New York, they scored a coup when they brought in a new priest, a big deal, an international pioneer to serve New York parishioners to serve in their Asian community's ministry. South Korea is one of the countries that has a big, influential, important Episcopal Church. The first woman ever named to be an Episcopal priest in the capital of South Korea, in Seoul. She was recruited by New York in 2021. She was recruited in 2021 to leave South Korea and come to New York to serve Korean parishioners in New York and other Asian parishioners here in New York City. The Episcopal Diocese in New York has about 500 priests, women and men. They bring over this pioneering Episcopal priest from Seoul in 2021. They told her, you know, come work here. We need you here. We'd love to have you here. Bring your family. And she did. There's a special kind of visa for that. It turns out if you are a priest or some other kind of religious worker, you get an R1 visa. And if you are the spouse or child or other family member of the priest, you get an R2 visa. And an R2 visa is how Yong Soo go came over with her mom from South Korea. She came over with her mom, the priest, when her mom went to work for the Episcopal Church in New York. And Yong Soo enrolled at Scarsdale High School. She did great, made lots of friends. She got good grades, graduated from high school. She got into Purdue University in Indiana. In this past year, she enrolled there as a freshman. She's enrolled at the Purdue College of Pharmacy. And like I said, she's on an R2 visa as the priest's daughter. Family says the visa is valid. Her visa is in effect. It's legal. She has done nothing wrong that anybody knows of that the government has alleged. She's done nothing wrong. Again, she is here as the daughter of a priest. She's 20 years old. She has reportedly never been in any trouble of any kind. On Thursday, the Trump administration sent five federal agents to arrest her in New York. They arrested her. They then denied her bail. They denied her visiting privileges. They first put her in this facility where they have been holding people in lower Manhattan, which is not a prison, not an immigration detention center, but they have been using it as one. She was then reportedly flown from there to the Trump immigration prison in Louisiana. As of tonight, local ABC7 in New York is reporting that her attorney tried to get a virtual visit with her at the Louisiana facility and was told that Yong Soo is not there and they won't say where she is. So now no one knows where she is. On Saturday in New York, Episcopal clergy and Yongsu's friends and friends of the family turned up outside the federal building in New York to demand that she be released. They are planning more demonstrations and rallies in her hometown this week in Westchester County, New York and Scarsdale, people are doing what they can to try to get her out. This weekend in Springfield, Ohio, where President Trump and Vice President J.D. vance made up bizarre horror movie stories about immigrants from Haiti during the campaign. You'll remember this weekend in Springfield, Ohio, church groups there held an event they called Love Thy Neighbor to show support for their Haitian American neighbors. This weekend in Los Angeles, LA teachers marched in big numbers to demand that the kids in their classes be protected from Trump's federal agents when they come back to school in the LA Unified School District next week. This weekend in Philadelphia, people turned out at the site of the President's House. You will recall history wise New York was actually the first national capital of the United States. Then for about 10 years, the national capital was in Philadelphia. When George Washington lived in the President's house In Philadelphia from 1790 to 1797, he had his slaves there with him. And this weekend in Philadelphia, people protested at the President's House Historic site in Philadelphia to stop the Trump administration from taking down the exhibit at that site that acknowledges the fact that the people who were enslaved to George Washington lived there with him when he was President of the United States. Standing up for that history not being taken down. This weekend there were a bunch of protests all over the country under the banner of Rage against the Regime. And lots of these, interestingly were in red states. Protests along these lines this weekend in Fayetteville, Arkansas and Birmingham, Alabama and Huntsville, Alabama and Atlanta, Georgia and Boise, Idaho and Land o' Lakes, Florida, Tulsa, Oklahoma, one of my favorite cities in the country, Dalton, Georgia, Salt Lake City, Utah. But they were all over Charlottesville, Virginia, Sacramento, California, Rock Hill, North Carolina, Raleigh, North Carolina, Escondido, California, Colorado Springs. This was last week in Oregon. The local Republican Party was selling T shirts at the Lane County Fair in Oregon. T shirts that celebrated Trump's so called Alligator Alcatraz prison camp in the Everglades. And locals in Lane County, Oregon turned out at the state fair, excuse me, at the county fair to protest, holding signs that said Alligator Alcatraz is a concentration camp and Lane County Republicans support it. In Wausau, Wisconsin, Republican Congressman Tom Tiffany turned the sprinklers on to chase away protesters who had turned up outside his office. This time they came back in beach gear and snorkels and pirate hats. So this time when he turned the sprinklers on them again, everybody was prepared and in enjoyed it and cheered. Once Mr. Tiffany's office realized of course, that the protesters were enjoying it, naturally they turned off the sprinklers no more fun for you in Alabama. This billboard's making news. It says, what's the big secret, fellas? The photo of Trump with Jeffrey Epstein. This was put up by the group Bright Blue Dot on the side of a busy highway in Alabama of all places. Big Blue Dot says they had financial support from local Democrats and local Republicans to put that up. In Birmingham tonight, two women who were victims of the President's longtime friend, the convicted pedophile and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, have written letters to the court as part of the proceedings in which a federal judge is deciding what can and cannot legally be released to the public about Epstein's criminal case. These letters from Epstein's victims are just scalding. Dear Judge Berman, as a suffering victim of Epstein and his co conspirators, I would like to highlight some things that stand out to me on the latest memo written by an anonymous member of the doj. This would be the memo from Trump's Justice Department stating that there's nothing of interest in the files from Epstein's case and saying that nothing from those files will be released. The Epstein victim says in her letter, quote, first, I am not sure the highest priority here is the victims. Justice for the victims or combating child exploitation or at least I do not feel this way. If there was justice for the victims, we would see some kind of accountability for the years they allowed this horrible human being to prey on underage and young girls while jet setting around the world with high profile individuals and or entrapping his victims in his various mansions and or his notorious private island. Rather, I feel like the DOJ's and FBI's priority is protecting the third party, the wealthy men, by focusing on scrubbing their names off the files of which the victims know who they are. To learn that our own president has utilized thousands of agents to protect his identity and these high profile individuals is monumentally mind blowing. That is their focus. Wow. End quote. This of course follows reporting from Bloomberg last week, which you might have seen under this rather unforgettable headline. The FBI redacted Trump's name in the Epstein files. I mentioned there were two of these victims letters sent to the court tonight. In the other letter from one of Epstein's victims tonight, she directs some of her remarks. In this letter to the government of the United States, she says, quote, why not be completely transparent. Show us all the files with only the necessary redactions. Be done with it and allow me and us to heal you. Protect yourself and your powerful and wealthy friends, not enemies.
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Kathy Hochul
Over the victims.
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Rachel Maddow
Why? The victims know the truth. We know who are in the files. And now so do you. Do you really think the public is that ignorant of the truth? Further, redacting the names like yours will only cause the distraction you say you don't want and the conspiracies that you in fact, are stirring over the weekend. The latest UMass Amherst poll on President Donald Trump's approval rating shows that he is now minus 20. In terms of the public's approval of him, he is underwater by 20 points. 38% of Americans approve of the job he's doing, while 58% disapprove. That's about the same as the latest Gallup poll on Trump, which had him down at 37% approval. Minus 22. 37% approval is almost as bad as where he was right after January 6. After January 6, he was at 34% approval in the Gallup poll. Now he's above that. He's not at 34%. He's at 37%, but that's not much of a difference. And you know, you can fire the person in charge of putting out the economic statistics because you don't like that the economic statistics show that you're tanking the economy. And you can bizarrely try to sue a pollster here and there like you did with the pollster at the Des Moines Register, because you don't like how you look in the polls. But you can't make the underlying truth go away. You're not going to be able to fire and sue your way clear of the American people being revolted by you as a president. There's no way to make us unknow what we know. There's no way to make us unsee what we've seen. Nobody believes that the priest's daughter, the 20 year old South Korean pharmacy student, is a trend gang kingpin or whatever. Nobody believes that a foreign country invaded MacArthur park in Los Angeles and that's why you had to call in the Marines. Nobody believes that. There's nothing to see here when it comes to the President's years long involvement with Jeffrey Epstein during the years he was running a child sex trafficking ring, including at least one teenage girl who worked at Trump's club, who the President now laments publicly was stolen from him at the time by Jeffrey Epstein. Nobody believes any of this stuff. But when nobody believes the lies you have to tell to justify what you're doing, you have to then decide if you're going to try to come up with new lies or whether you're just going to go for broke and try to get away with all of it anyway. And that is what we're going to talk about tonight. I should tell you, Governor Kathy Hochul of New York is going to be here with us live tonight. She is hosting in New York some of the Democratic legislators from Texas who have left their own state to try to block Republicans from taking over five Texas congressional districts. Texas Republicans have now sworn out arrest warrants for these Democratic legislators. The Texas Republican attorney general is saying these legislators should be hunted down and arrested. Texas Republican governor says they should be charged with felonies and anybody who donates money to support them should be criminally charged as well as the Texas governor says he plans to remove all of these Democrats from office. And none of that is going to happen. But that's the kind of political environment Republicans want to be in now. And it is coming from the top. And you know, listen, you can narrow or widen the aperture as much as you want. You can look at the very big picture or the small local picture anywhere in the country. And we try to do as much of both of those things as we can every week here on this show. But whether you're looking at small scale local stories or the biggest picture stories about what's happening in our country, the story is the same and it is now an undeniable thing. We have crossed a line. We are in a place we did not want to be, but we are there. The thing we were all warning about for the last few years is not coming. It is here. We are in it. This is what it likes, it turns out. This is what it's like, right? I mean, it's August. It's a Monday every day. The sun rises and the sun sets and there are sports and movies and there are new hit songs. There are scandals here and there. There are crimes. There's everybody's personal quotient of family drama and health worries and money worries and falling in and out of love and in and out of faith. Life has not stopped and none of our personal lives have stopped. But also at the same time, life in the United States is profoundly changing, is profoundly different than it was even six months ago because we do now live in a country that has an authoritarian leader in charge. We have a consolidating dictatorship in our country. And it sounds melodramatic to say it, I know, but just go with that for a minute, right? Think in melodramatic terms. Think in cinematic terms. Imagine the cartoon level caricature of what you think A dictatorship looks like. I mean, it's secret police, right? A massive, anonymous, unbadged, literally masked, totally unaccountable internal police force that apparently has infinite funding but no identifiable leadership. And they act in ways designed to instill maximum fear and use maximum force. I mean, when you imagine an authoritarian country, right, what you imagine is masked secret police breaking people's car windows and snatching people off the streets and out of church parking lots and courtroom hallways and taking them away with no charges, no notice, no paperwork, no explanation, not letting them see lawyers, and then moving them secretly to what are effectively black site prisons where they won't tell you who's there and where no one's allowed in to see what's going on. In that kind of a cartoon caricature of an authoritarian country, the one you might have imagined in melodramatic and cinematic terms ever before we got here, you would expect, right, that you'd have a scapegoated minority group blamed for all things, in our case, immigrants and the new extraordinary powers and shows of force by the secret police, among other things. All these extraordinary powers and shows of force will be framed as necessary to stop this terrible internal, internal enemy. Frame everything as immigration enforcement. Because for immigration enforcement, not only is all force justified, but maximum force is preferred. And they're trying to make it into a national entertainment to threaten to feed immigrants to alligators in South Florida. They're making them eat off dishes on the floor like their dogs. The Crumb Detention center in Florida, they want us to like that, right? The Republican Party wants to sell T shirts about that. And if you think it's only about immigrants, take the president's own word for it when he says the homegrowns are next. And then he starts musing publicly about which Americans he intends to strip of their citizenship in a cartoon caricature of an authoritarian country. Displays of military might are not just for the country's external enemies. They're for the country's own people, right? Because in an authoritarian country, you turn military force inward toward the people of that country. And so now we've got these large and expanding military zones in multiple states where they have extended the legal boundaries of nearby military bases to include hundreds and hundreds of miles of nearby land so they can give active duty US troops the power to arrest and search people on US soil. They're now doing that over 100 hundreds of miles of territory in multiple states. Both the Intercept and the New Republic in the last couple of days have had new reporting about Trump administration plans to Permanently integrate the active duty US military into, of course, immigration enforcement. So we will have our own U.S. military troops mobilized on U.S. soil. U.S. military force turn inward on us in an ongoing and permanent way for immigration enforcement. Right. And like they tried in LA to put down protests against the government because those protests relate to immigration enforcement. What else do you think of when you think of authoritarian countries? I mean, in the worst case, you think of death camps. We don't have those. What we do have are black site prison camps, including huge new ones that are designed to hold thousands of people. The biggest ones we've yet had have just been bidded out to contractors for construction. And they're building them now on US military bases and they say they want states to build them all over the country. In the cartoon character of an authoritarian state. There are secret police, there's prison camps, there's the scapegoated enemy on whom all things must be blamed and against whom all things are justified. Protests must be criminalized. Media must be intimidated into saying and doing what the leader wants, or they must be shut down. Or both universities must be intimidated into saying and doing what the leader wants, or they must be shut down. Or both law firms must be intimidated into not opposing him and saying and doing what he wants, or they must be shut down. And for institutions like that, it's not just the boldest or most strident critics of the President who must be shut down. It's the most mainstream, right, the most prestigious, the most credible, because that's what's so dangerous about them. There can't be any source of authority, there can't be any source of authoritative statements of fact that compete with what the leader insists must be the new truth. And so government departments will be stripped of their experts and he will fire his way through them until they tell him things that he wants to be told. If you want to be a four star general or admiral in this military, you must now pass a personal one on one interview with the President who personally will decide if you are to his liking or not to be a flag officer in this military. The intelligence agencies will say that his strike on Iran obliterated their nuclear program. Because he likes that word, obliterated, and he said it once, and therefore, because he said it, it must be true. And if you say otherwise, you will be fired. The Justice Department will say that the President won not just the last election, but he also won the one before that, the one he actually lost. And anybody who points out that Russia tried to help him win the one before that should be criminally charged for saying that even though it's true, we are not heading towards something like this. We are there, it is here. It is the environment in which we are now living. And so, given that you now live in a country with an authoritarian leader, the question is what can you do for your country? The question is no longer how to prepare for this risk or how to try to avert it, but rather how to fight it now that it is here and in effect, and you know, we're awake now, it's clear we're all living here. It's very obvious that this is not going to get better on its own. This is not going to fix itself. An authoritarian just seeks more and more and more power throughout, not just politics, but through all of society systematically trying to eliminate any effective means of opposing him. This is a one way ratchet if we leave it up to him, but that at least does give us some clarity for Americans who do not want to leave it up to him. Right. We're beyond waiting and seeing now. It is clear what is going on. It is clear now that the small d Democratic tools that we've got right now as a country, these are as good as it is going to get. We are never going to have more resources to fight for our country than we do right now. And so Americans are using those tools and it is worth paying attention to the ways they are doing it. They are filming the secret police and publicizing everything they are doing. Even when the secret police scream and threaten and say, you're not allowed to film us, they are filming them. They are following them everywhere they go. They are not letting them have the power to surprise. They are refusing to be afraid to watch them and record them show what they are doing. We have opposition politicians, Democratic politicians, insisting on being let in, going to the black site, immigration, prisons and demanding to be let into them. We have Americans protesting outside those facilities and showing up and calling the media and pulling every string they can when someone they know or someone they know of gets taken. Americans are making it as sticky and annoying and awkward and embarrassing as possible for these guys and that slows them down. Americans are badgering elected Republicans everywhere. They're willing to show their faces, including tonight in Nebraska, Republican Congressman Mike Flood holding a town hall with his red state constituents. Watch. Hi.
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Rosina
I implore you to be quiet so that we can hear his responses. Remember, Mike's coming up for a re election and we'd really like to know what his responses are. I'm Rosina. I write you emails with concerns of your voting behavior regarding Trump and his actions. You support him, especially confirming the Cabinet. Your responses are riddled with misinformation and lies. I fact check you and then I send the responses back and I get crickets. If I am fact checking them because they are wrong in your response, I send them back to you and I get crickets. I get kind of bummed. And this is not about partisan, this is about issues because we're about to lose our democracy.
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Rachel Maddow
My question is fiscal. With 450 million FEMA dollars being reallocated to open alligator Alcatraz and 600 million taxpayer FEMA dollars being used to now open more concentration camps and ice burning through $8.4 million a day to illegally detain people, how much does it cost for fascism? How much do the taxpayers have to pay for a fascist country? That was in Nebraska tonight at a town hall held by Republican Congressman Mike Flood, him hearing from his constituents tonight. We have total clarity now on what Trump's intentions are for the country. But I mean it when I say we, the country gets it and is more against it than they've ever been. And opposing this administration and what Trump is trying to do is turning out to be the story of the century. Tonight we're going to talk with Governor Kathy Hochul, one of the Democratic governors who's helping Texas Democrats now that their governor is trying to arrest them. We're going to talk with another leader who has found a way to use the internal rules and governance of the legal profession to make some of these guys pay for what they're doing. There's so much going on, so much to get to stay with us.
- [28:12]
Nicole Wallace
Saturday, October 11th, from New York City, it's MSNBC Live 25. Join your favorite MSNBC hosts, Rachel Maddow, Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski, Nicole Wallace, Ari Melber, Alicia Menendez, Simone Sanders Townsend, Michael Steele, Chris Hayes, jen Psaki, Lawrence O', Donnell, Stephanie Rule, and more. Visit msnbc.comlive25 to buy your tickets today.
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Rachel Maddow
Hey everyone, it's Chris Hayes. This week on my podcast, why Is this Happening? Journalist and author E. Jean Carroll.
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Kathy Hochul
I came to love the process of the judicial system and I found it very exonerating. I got to tell my story in court. I got to tell my story when thousands and millions of people called me a liar. So it was very satisfying.
- [29:03]
Rachel Maddow
That's this week on why is this Happening? Search for why is this Happening? Wherever you're listening right now.
- [29:08]
Nicole Wallace
And follow start your day with the MSNBC Daily Newsletter Sharp insights from voices you trust, standout moments from your favorite shows, and fresh perspectives from experts shaping the news. Sign up now@msnbc.com.
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Kathy Hochul
I cannot stand by and let this happen while Donald Trump and his co conspirator Greg Abbott erode our democracy. History will judge us and how we respond to this moment. But here in New York, we will not stand on the sidelines with the timid souls. This is a war. We are at war. And that's why the gloves are off. And I say bring it on.
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Rachel Maddow
New York Governor Kathy Hochul speaking today after a group of Texas Democratic lawmakers fled to her state to try and stop Republicans from redrawing Texas's congressional districts to effectively unilaterally create five more Republican congressional seats in Texas. Tonight, Texas Republicans have issued arrest warrants for those Democratic lawmakers. They're threatening, in the attorney general's words, to hunt them down. They've gone to New York, they've gone to Illinois, they've fled essentially to blue state America, both for protection and also to make their case. Joining us now is Kathy Hochul. She's Democratic governor of the great state of New York. Governor, it's good to have you here. Thank you very much.
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Kathy Hochul
Thank you for having me back. Appreciate it.
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Rachel Maddow
Rachel, let me just ask you first, how this, how this came about, if your office and you have been in touch with these Texas Democrats, what the thinking was and the planning was to get them to New York essentially to safety?
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Kathy Hochul
Well, basically, we've been having conversations ever since this story emerged. You know, we look out for each other like Democrats across the country. But we actually realized that it was time the vote that they wanted to take and they were interested in going somewhere to break the quorum, which is a legitimate exercise of power. That's not illegal. They can do that. You know, we offered them to come to New York. I hosted them at the governor's residence this morning for breakfast and wanted them to walk the halls of a home that had once housed Franklin Roosevelt as well as Teddy Roosevelt, to draw some inspiration from those fights for democracy that precede us by many, many decades. So we brought them to the Capitol after that had a chance for me to hear their stories. And I want you to realize they're not just legislators from another state. Think of them as human beings. These are moms and dads who did what they had to do when they were packing their suitcases, not sure when they'd return. They might not be there to buy the back to school clothes for their kids. They're willing to make these sacrifices. And I said, These are the 20, 25 versions of profiles and courage, and I'll do anything I can to support them.
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Rachel Maddow
You described this as a war. You said, bring it on. You've talked about doing something extraordinary which is potentially paving the way for redistricting in New York, essential to allow Democrats to take seats that aren't currently Democratic leaning seats, the way that Republicans are doing in Texas. Tell me about whether you think it's going to get there and whether you think if the war is going to be fought in those terms, who ends up winning.
- [32:28]
Kathy Hochul
Rachel, if we refuse to fight for our democracy, then we're doomed to lose it. We don't want our democracy lost. And that's why I am sick and tired of fighting these battles with my hands tied behind my backs, because we have independent redistricting commission. We love good government ideas. They're fabulous. But you know what? It puts us at a political disadvantage to all the Republican states who are able to gerrymander at will. So look at the tip of balance in the Congress now and what the Republicans are attempting to do under the direction of Donald Trump to literally hijack five Democratic seats in Texas represented particularly minority communities. They're going to lose their voice and the effect of that on New York. Why I'm involved with this. If they stack it so it's almost impossible for Hakeem Jeffries to be speaker at any time in the near future, certainly during the Trump administration, then I have to deal with the onslaught of attacks on my residents, the loss of health care for millions of children starving because they don't have the snap benefits, and seeing the ICE raids with unfettered power, walking into our courthouses and our buildings and our schools, wearing masks and blaring guns. There's no way to stop this if we don't find a way to have some checks and balance in Washington because we do not have it now. And if we don't stand up and fight, we'll not have it for the entirety of Donald Trump's tenure. And that is what is so frightening to me. You know what? I'm a New Yorker. I'm from Buffalo. Fighting is second nature to us. I'm not afraid of this. That's why I said bring it on. Because Texas bullies in Texas are not going to intimidate us now or ever.
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Rachel Maddow
New York Governor Kathy Hochul, thank you for your time tonight, Governor. I know that you are still right in the middle of this. This is still an unfolding situation. Keep us surprised we'd love to have you back to talk about how this un unfolds.
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Kathy Hochul
Thank you. Thank you very much.
- [34:23]
Rachel Maddow
All right, more news ahead. Stay with us.
- [34:27]
Nicole Wallace
MSNBC presents the chart topping original podcast, the Best People with Nicole Wallace. This week she sits down with MSNBC reporter Jacob Soborough.
- [34:38]
Jacob Soborov
It's about the connection that you and I have and our colleagues have, but it's also about the connection and the trust that people place in us at a time when trust in media, I think is at all time lows.
- [34:47]
Nicole Wallace
The Best people with Nicole Wallace listen now. For early access, ad free listening and bonus content, subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts for early access, ad free listening and bonus content to all of MSNBC's original podcasts, including the chart topping series the Best People with Nicole Wallace. Why is this Happening? Main justice and more. Plus new episodes of all your favorite MSNBC shows ad free and ad free listening to all of Rachel Maddow's original series, Ultra Bagman and Deja News. Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts.
- [35:29]
Rachel Maddow
As the Trump administration continues pushing around the nation's universities, suspending their funding and then shaking them down to comply with Trump's demands, some colleges have decided to do deals with the White House. Brown university coughed up $50 million. Columbia University paid over $200 million. So of course they can relax now, right? Confident that Donald Trump will definitely honor the terms of these deals and leave them alone from here on out. Sure. That's how it works, right? You only ever have to give over your lunch money once, right? Last week, there was reporting that an even bigger deal was in the works at Harvard University was prepared to fork over $500 million to appease Trump. Turns out no Harvard student newspaper, the Crimson, reports now that Harvard's president has told the faculty he is absolutely not considering such a deal. Quote, the university is seriously considering resolving its dispute with the White House through the courts rather than through a negotiated settlement. So we shall see. Watch this space. But then there's the law firms that President Trump has been pushing around. Nine big law firms struck deals with Trump after he started issuing these bogus executive orders targeting certain law firms. Nine firms did deals. Four firms refused to do deals. They fought back against him in court, and all four of those firms won their cases in court. Trump didn't even bother appealing them. But new reporting from Reuters finds that Trump's assault on law firms has nevertheless had what was presumably its desired effect anyway. All kinds of big Law firms are now scaling back their pro bono work for the kinds of people and organizations and causes that the Trump administration has tried to victimize or persecute, which is a dynamic that big law in this country will never, ever, ever live down as long as they don't fix it. At the same time, though, there has been some bravery. Smaller law firms and indeed some new purpose driven legal organizations being formed even now have been springing up to make up the moral difference, to do the work that these big law firms are too cowardly to do, to stand up for people who've been fired, for example, by Trump when they've done nothing wrong. The New York Times reports today on a new firm made up of just four lawyers, including two who were fired from the Justice Department this year by Donald Trump. The new firm is focusing on challenging the Trump administration in court, specifically with the aim of getting precedent setting cases before the Supreme Court that could curtail Trump's power. But then also, check this out. This is worth understanding, especially when we think about lawyers getting to the end of their lives and standing there deciding whether the elevator is going to go up or down. Another way that lawyers are trying to stand up for what's right is a means of using the legal profession's own standards, the legal profession's internal ethics and rules, as a way to stand up and push back against what Trump is doing. For example, the Freedom of the Press foundation has taken on Trump's FCC chairman by filing a disciplinary complaint against him with the DC Bar, Trump's FCC chair that has been bullying all these media companies. He's a lawyer. The complaint against him accuses him of violating professional conduct rules that he is bound by as a lawyer. Meanwhile, the D.C. bar's disciplinary board has just recommended that former Trump lawyer Jeffrey Clark be disbarred from the legal profession entirely for his role in helping Trump try to overturn the 2020 election results. That board said Clark should be disbarred, quote, to send a message to the rest of the bar and to the public that this behavior will not be tied, tolerated. On top of efforts like that, now a legal watchdog group has filed professional ethics complaints against three lawyers who currently work for Trump's Justice Department. A group called the Legal Accountability center is accusing these three DOJ attorneys of lying to the courts, of making false statements to a federal judge while trying to defend Trump's actions in court. The group's executive director, Michael Teeter, says, quote, the rule of law is under direct assault right now, and its greatest threat comes when those within the legal system failed to do their duties and stand up against the attack. The message that needs to be heard by all attorneys representing the government is that even though the Trump administration isn't interested in following the rules. We're watching. Joining us now is Michael Teeter. He's executive director of the legal accountability center. Mr. Teeter, thank you very much for being here. I appreciate your time.
- [40:14]
Michael Teeter
Good to be here. Thank you.
- [40:16]
Rachel Maddow
Let me ask you, how about my characterization of your efforts and the way that I've contextualized them against some of those other forms of pushback? Let me ask you if you think that's fair, if there's anything that I'm misunderstanding about your approach to these matters.
- [40:30]
Michael Teeter
I think you've got it right. I mean, since day one, the Trump administration has been in a concerted effort to target the legal profession and to disrupt and weaponize it. We've seen that they are attacking two hallmark features of our third branch, which is an independent judiciary and an adversarial system that ensures that people have access to the courts and that they can be represented and to ensure their rights are protected. And the Trump administration is on an attack, and so we need to go on attack as well.
- [41:00]
Rachel Maddow
Tell me about these professional misconduct complaints that you filed against these three Justice Department lawyers. Can you just talk about why you singled out these three, why you singled out their conduct as particularly egregious?
- [41:14]
Michael Teeter
I think it's important to understand if you're a lawyer within the government, you have an obligation to tell the court the truth and to represent the law, not just the administration's political interests. And so it was important for us to take a stand here, not because this was Pam Bondi, not because this was Todd Blanche, people who you would expect to be following Trump's dictates. These were career lawyers who have been in the Department of Justice for a number of years, who are nevertheless misrepresenting facts of the court, disregarding their rules of professional conduct. And so they need to be held to account. And we need to send a message to lawyers across the country that if you're going to represent this administration, you better do it with integrity and honesty. And the rules of professional conduct require nothing less.
- [41:57]
Rachel Maddow
Let me ask you, Mr. Teter, about what we've seen from the Trump administration in terms of trying to intimidate lawyers and law firms and what we've seen in reaction from big law firms and lawyers. It's been a pretty wide range of reactions, including from the biggest and best research resourced firms A lot of cowardice and a lot of effort to appease Trump, to make handshake deals with him that I guess they think are going to be binding despite everything else we know about every other deal Donald Trump has ever done in business and elsewhere. I have to ask, given the way that he's focused on lawyers and given the way there's been, it's been so inconsistent in terms of the way the profession has responded, do you worry at all about being a practicing lawyer, about doing this as a legal organization, about getting lawyers to work on these complaints and work on these cases with you, given the way the legal profession has only sort of half stood up against this kind of bullying?
- [43:02]
Michael Teeter
Honestly? Yes, I do. I worry about it. I think a lot of my colleagues do as well. But there is a large group of lawyers who are dedicated to the principle, not about policy. It's not about left versus right. It's about the principle of fairness, about an independent judiciary and the importance of ensuring that people have representation in a, in a neutral judicial system. And so I think that what you're seeing are large firms who are beholden to clients, who are doing a short term risk analysis for themselves, losing the larger picture, which is that each of these battles by the Trump administration, each of their attacks is not designed to, to win. They are moving the ball forward. And they recognize is that even when they lose, they have changed the game, they have changed the field that they're playing on. So we need to stop worrying about engaging in asymmetrical constitutional warfare and engage with them the same way that, you know, New York and California are thinking about doing it with regards to redistricting. And I think that you're going to see a lot of lawyers willing to stand up. There's a reason why so many new groups are forming, Legal Accountability center being one of them. And we're going to fight back and we're going to go on offense in defense of democracy, not just be reactive.
- [44:11]
Rachel Maddow
Courage is contagious, as they say. Michael Teeter, executive director of the Legal Accountability center, thank you for helping us understand your work. Thank you for being here tonight. Appreciate it, Rachel. All right, we're going to take a quick break right now, but I have to tell you, since we have been on the air, something has happened. We've got an update on the story we started the show with tonight. You are going to want to see this. I'm going to have that update for you as we come out of this next break. So stay with us at the top of the show. We brought you the story of an Episcopal priest from Seoul, from South Korea, the first woman to ever become an Episcopal priest in Seoul. She, in 2021, was recruited by New York's Episcopal Diocese to come here and be a priest here in New York to serve the Asian American ministry of the Episcopal Diocese in New York. Her daughter came with her from Seoul on the visa that they give to family members of priests and other religious workers. Her daughter here on that Val visa went to Scarsdale High School in New York, was an honors graduate, got great grades, got into Purdue University, was there attending the School of Pharmacy with her valid visa, she was nevertheless arrested. The daughter was arrested by Trump's immigration agents on Thursday, which prompted a huge outcry from the Episcopal Diocese and from her friends and family in New York. Again, an honors graduate of Scarsdale High School and a current student going into her sophomore year at Purdue University in Indiana. Well, we brought you that story at the top of the show. We have now just gotten in this video showing that that young student, Yong Soo Go, has just been released from federal custody after having been arrested by Trump's immigration agents last Thursday. Yong Soo Go was taken in by ICE despite residing in this country legally on a special visa and never being in any trouble of any kind. Again. She came to this country due to her mother's work as an episcop priest in New York. But as you can see in the video, her mom was there as Yong Soo was released this evening. Tonight, she told reporters after having been released that it feels, quote, surreal to be free this evening after so many of her friends and community members and family members and her church advocated for her to be released. We'll be right back. One last thing before I go. There are apparently still tickets available for that live thing we're doing in New York in October, Saturday, Oct. 11, in New York City, MSNBC Live. I'm gonna be there. And so will Lawrence and Nicole and Jen Psaki and Chris Hayes. Lots of us goobers are gonna be there. Tickets are on sale@msnbc.com live25, or you can scan that little QR code thing on your screen, and that will just take you to that website. I cannot promise an exact repeat of me trying awkwardly to get Lawrence to twirl on stage, which did work. But I can promise whatever we do, it will be fun and probably just as awkward as it was before. USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day. Like superheroes and sidekicks or auto and home insurance. With usaa, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10%. Tap the banner to learn more and get a'@usaa.com bundle restrictions apply.