MSNBC Highlights — Aug. 5

well we managed to get through a few weeks without a massive ethics Scandal surrounding the Supreme Court I guess good for us but that streak ended today because today we learned that Justice Clarence Thomas failed to disclose even more private flights provided by conservative billionaire Harland Crow Senator Ron wien detailed in a letter today how the Senate Judiciary Committee obtained international flight records showing that back in November 2010 Justice Thomas and his wife flew from Hawaii to New Zealand on Mr Crow's private jet before flying back from New Zealand to Hawaii on the jet a

week later the letter goes on Mr Crow was also a passenger on these F flights to date Justice Thomas has never disclosed this private jet travel on any Financial disclosure forms even though Justice Thomas has amended disclosures to reflect other international travel on Mr Crow's private jet if you'll recall prop public had exposed a 2019 trip Thomas took to Indonesia and several others provided by Haron Crow and the outcry resulting from that story prompted Thomas to formally disclose those trips in financial filings submitted this year so that begs the question why did he fail to

disclose the Hawaii New Zealand trips over a decade ago maybe because he thought he could simply get away with it of course what might be helpful here is a Code of Ethics with some teeth like the one President Biden proposed last week and on that point here's what Justice Neil Gorsuch told Fox News in an interview that aired just yesterday when the spotlights on you when the government's coming after you and don't you want a ferociously independent judge and a jury of your peers to make those decisions isn't that your right as an American and

so I just say be careful now I don't want to overd dramatize but I mean be careful sounds a little like a thinly Veiled Threat from a Supreme Court Justice to the president of the United States Cheryl and Eiffel who will have thoughts on this I am sure and I can't wait to hear them joins me now she's the former president of the NAACP legal defense fund she's now the Vernon Jordan endowed chair in civil rights at Howard University so I want to ask you about gorsuch's comments but I to start with with Thomas I

mean he didn't disclose those flights from 14 years ago he only disclosed the Indonesia trip I I'm not saying we should be surprised here necessarily and I'm not going to ask you to get into his head on what how to explain his thinking but it just feels like there's this pattern of the belief that there's no consequences and I just wondered we've talked about this before what can happen to change this Behavior well at this point they're not wrong there are no consequences uh and what we're seeing I think in the in the in the

drip in the steady drip uh is the way in which uh the court really doesn't think that they are obligated to share all of this information as fully as possible uh we should never have had to request this information that was initially not disclosed but then to to drip out some of the information but not all of the information and to have these continual reports telling us about more trips all quite lavish trips with the same individual is deeply concerning this is an actual kind of Scandal uh or at least would be if we were

in normal times and we're not in normal times right um you know when Abe foris had to step down from the Supreme Court it was Democrats who lean on him he was Lyndon Johnson's close friend and Johnson had to call him up and say listen you got to step down for something that pales in comparison to the revelations that we've had about some of these um Financial dealings and so we're we're not in normal times we have a dysfunctional Congress uh we have a Republican party that will not engage on this issue of ethics and

so um essentially there are no consequences that doesn't mean that this is not deeply troubling um and really quite concerning in terms of the Court's Independence which ironically Justice Gorsuch was just talking about so let me add that's a perfect segue because you know I don't want to overd dramatize what he said there where he said be careful but it it does sound a bit I mean he was asked about Joe Biden the President Biden's Supreme Court reform proposals that's what he said in response what did you make of that you know Jen I didn't

I didn't take it as a threat I took it as condescension to be honest no one is cavalierly approaching the idea of Supreme Court reform I I think I've shared with you I've had my own very slow Evolution on this issue but I always felt that there would have to be a responsible process one of the reasons that I joined President Biden's Supreme Court commission when I was asked to join in 2022 I guess at this point um is because I believed that should reform happen at some point in the future there needs to be

a process a careful process and so I'm not sure how um it would seem Cavalier for the president to have several years ago assembled a group very prominent lawyers and legal minds and Scholars a bipartisan group and created a commission not asked for recommendations but just asked for study of the issues wait another two years amid conversation among people who are asking for significantly more drastic change than the president has proposed and in the midst of Revelations that have come as a result of the press from propublica about these violations that um several of the

justices have engaged in we've had also the upside down flag at Justice alito's home we've had Jenny Thomas at the stop the steel rally we we've had all of this stuff happening we've had um you know the the uh one of the uh Republican religious uh individuals who was trying to Lobby the court kind of confessed that he' been lobbying the court and had purchased a building across the street from the court to have better access so so much has happened in the two years since the commission that certainly has moved me but I think

has moved the president as well and so for justice Gorsuch to say be careful with a kind of tone of condescension as though something Reckless or Cavalier is being considered here that's how I took that remark and I actually think that the president shown tremendous care yeah that's such an important point and as as you just noted I mean he had a long long journey on this you know he had been former chairman of the Judiciary Committee been very thoughtful on this issue as you have been took him a long time to get to this

point and a lot of their actions prompted it let me ask you I mean vice president Harris she endorsed the reform propos proposal by President Biden she's spoken prior to him speaking about it about court expansion things like that on the campaign Trail what do you want to hear from her about the court as this campaign unfolds well I what I wanted hear from uh from the candidate and from the party from the Democratic party is um an explanation to the voters of how Supreme Court reform would happen because what I don't want is to

get on the other side of this election and even if the vice president is elected president to then have people say well change the Supreme Court this is not something that can happen by Presidential Fiat we would need to have both houses of Congress prepared to pass legislation to make any of these reform proposals really really happen and have some teeth to them and so I think it's important incumbent on the Democrats and the candidate to begin talking about the need for the Democrats to win the house and the Senate if what people want is

to have some kind of Supreme Court reform that's really not on the president it Congress holds the power over the Supreme Court to to decide their salaries to decide how many justices on the are on the Court and Congress has used that power in the past when Andrew Johnson um nominated his attorney general Andrew Johnson you know maybe the second worst president in the history of our country nominated his attorney general to feel an open seat on the court you know Congress was so annoyed that they eliminated the seat you know I mean Congress has

the power we started out with six you know in 1789 six justices so we had as many justices as there were Federal circuits we've gone up to eight at one point we had 10 um we're back to nine and we've got 13 Federal circuits it would be perfectly logical to have justices on the Supreme Court but all of that power including the jurisdiction of the Court sits with Congress the president can sign a bill but the president cannot make the bill happen so I think it needs to be explained to voters so that they understand

that when they get in that Booth if Supreme Court reform is what they want it's not enough to just vote for the president you have to also understand the importance of having the house and the Senate such an important reminder I feel like you need to do a Ted Talk on this for people cherylyn so that they understand the branches of government and every body's responsibility 2020 just as officials in Wayne County Michigan were about to certify the vote in that Year's presidential election two of that County's election officials both of them Republicans got a

surprise call from the president of the United States Donald Trump himself and the then chair of the Republican Party Ron McDaniel called them personally according to the Detroit News Trump and Miss McDaniel then told those two County election officials they needed essentially to take back their vote to certify the election results and those two County officials did actually try to take back their vote to certify then when it was time to certify the elections at the state level Republicans in Michigan again tried to block the vote total from being certified it was only after one

very brave Republican election official broke with his fellow Republicans that Michigan State results were finally able to be made official Republicans pioneered this in Michigan in 2020 now Republicans have kept trying this kind of thing in every election since including in Congressional elections in the primaries in the 2022 midterms Republicans in at least 10 counties refused to certify the vote in the general election in the midterms that year County county level Republicans in in Pennsylvania and in Arizona tried to block the certification of the results this year Republican elections officials in multiple jurisdictions have have

refused to certify lawful elections repeatedly and now they're laying the foundation to do it again for the next national election over the weekend Donald Trump held a rally in Atlanta where he randomly shouted out by name three members of the Georgia State Board of Elections those three officials have all refused to acknowledge that Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election they are now trying to push through new rules that would make it easier for county level officials to refuse to certify election results this seems to be part of a unified strategy encourage Republican elections officials

at every level to refuse to certify the elections no matter what the results are doesn't matter where it doesn't matter if it's a county that Democrats won or a county that Republicans won refusing to certify the election at the local level just sticks a wrench in the works right it makes it impossible to certify if you make it impossible to certify a county then you make it effectively impossible to certify a state and then ultimately that puts the whole tallying of the presidential election result into question veteran Democratic elections lawyer Mark Elias writes quote it

is worse this election than previous ones because this year the GOP is far more organized they might have tried to subvert the results in a handful of places in 2020 and 2022 but this year they will TR try to subvert them all setting the stage now for what is to come in November joining us now is Mark allias he specializes in election litigation he's the founder of democracy docket Mr Elias thank you very much for joining us tonight I appreciate you being here thank you for having me so we've been talking about this on and

off for months we've been talking about it pretty intensively for the last few weeks let me just ask you as an as as an expert if not the expert in this field um am I getting any of this wrong or seeing any of this the wrong way around or am I presenting this in a way that you think basically captures the facts I think you captured entirely correctly I mean the fact is that when we talk about who won an election we're really talking about two things we're talking about the unofficial results that people get

on Election night which is what AP reports what NBC and NB and MSNBC use to call elections on Election night but then we are really talking about the certified results and these are the results that are first uh approved at the polling place and then at the county and as you point out then at the state and then ultimately in presidential elections that choose the electors and then those certificates from the governor go to the uh go to the Congress and Rachel if you think of it this way January 6 was the culmination of a

certification dispute which as you point out began among other places in Michigan at the county level and when Republicans couldn't achieve what they wanted to at the county level they went to the state level when they couldn't achieve that they launched a fake elector scheme which was just another way of undermining accurate certification of Elections when they couldn't do that they launched a series of frivolous lawsuits and finally they attempted to block what on January 6th the certification of the election so this has been on their radar screen for some time and I and it

would be on their radar screen for sure in 2024 we have seen them not just planning to do this for the 20124 election but trying it out um in multiple jurisdictions you among others have pointed out that this is a tactic at the County elections board level that was essentially unheard of before 2020 but now it has happened literally dozens of time sometimes in very off the radar like Municipal elections sometimes in primary sometimes in general elections there hasn't yet been another presidential election during which they've tried it but what have you learned about how

this process works how these um essentially concocted controversies can be resolved when they do this stuff at the county level yeah I mean look I have done more recounts and election post-election litigation than any other person ever um and I've never I had never seen it before 2020 in 2020 I represented President Biden in the DNC in 60 plus cases we saw it in Michigan but before that I had done recounts in for Al Franken in Minnesota for for various Senate campaigns Statewide uh campaigns and and the idea of tinkering with the certification at the

local level was be was was just out of bounds I mean that is part of the pageantry of democracy It Is What Makes Us great as a country that after a hard-fought election the election officials celebrate the results by by by certifying these election results and whatever takes place in court after that takes place after that in court but you know Rachel we saw in 2022 that they refused to certify the elections in coochi County Arizona and in several places in Pennsylvania I sued them we won the folks in cooches County subsequently got indicted for

it and you might think that would serve as a deterr for 2024 but you know as Donald Trump proved the loyalty to his crimes and misdeeds is stronger than people's Instinct for self-preservation briefly Mark what can people who are concerned about this do to try to make sure it doesn't happen yeah so we all play a role so first of all you know thank you for calling this out lawyers we go to court but you know making this public is the big part of the battle and I'd ask every person listening to this to to

speak out on this you know don't stay silent you know you all have a Town Square you don't all have millions of viewers like Rachel mattow but each and every one of you can post on social media you can attend these canvas board meetings you can file comments in Georgia uh before the state election board in your own counties you can know who is on these boards and you can attend their meetings every citizen has a role to play here and if we all do that I am confident that we will defeat these efforts and

Kam Harris will be sworn in as the next president of the United States Mark Elias lawyer specializing in election litigation the founder of democracy Ducket Mark I have a feeling this is the start of several conversations we're going to have on this uh thank you so much for your time tonight keep us surprised okay well KLA Harris was in the situation room today with President Biden while the laziest presidential campaigner in history was as usual doing nothing Donald Trump now the oldest Presidential nominee in history is Running Scared and lazy showing no idea how to

campaign against vice president kamla Harris Trump's only attempt so far to campaign against vice president Harris was to question her racial identity something even Lindsey Graham publicly advised him to stop doing Donald Trump's most enduring and reliable quality is his stupidity so it is possible that Donald Trump alone in America does not understand that black fathers produce black babies but Donald Trump's racist idiocy helped Donald Trump in one way last week it helped reduce attention to more important stories like the one we were just talking about the possible $10 million bribe that Egypt may have

paid Donald Trump when he won the presidency in 2016 we'll be covering that important story later in this hour just as Rachel did in the previous hour because that is a much more important story than anything Donald Trump has said and should not be overshadowed by Trump idiocy 49% of American voters now correctly believe that Donald Trump does not have the mental capacity to serve as president of the United States in a CBS poll released yesterday 49% say that Donald Trump does not have the mental and cognitive Health to serve as president even Donald Trump

knows he does not have the mental and cognitive Health to debate kamla Harris which is why in a move that for him was both wise and cowardly he backed out of his promise to participate in a presidential debate scheduled by ABC for September 10th vice president Harris responded saying I'll be there on September 10th like he agreed to I hope to see him there Donald Trump obviously fears debating con Harris more than any candidate has ever feared debating and so we might never see them debate I'll keep a chair open here any night for vice

president Harris to come by and debate tape of Donald Trump explaining his position on tariffs and taxes and repealing Obamacare and cutting Social Security and Medicare and cutting taxes for billionaires I would be happy to show the vice president tape of Donald Trump clarifying his policy on Israel and Gaza but he has not said a word about it KLA Harris has strengthened her campaign staff with some hugely important new hires David Pluff who was President Obama's winning campaign manager is joining the Harris campaign staff nothing like having another winning presidential campaign manager on the team

along with General Mali d who already has won a presidential campaign Stephanie cutter another winner from the Obama campaign is joining the Harris campaign staff as his Economic Policy adviser Jean Sperling who has been on the staff of every winning presidential Democratic presidential campaign since Bill Clinton and Jennifer palmary who served in the Obama Harris communic White House as the communications director has also joined the Harris camp campaign making the Harris campaign staff the single strongest group of campaign winners that we have ever seen on any presidential campaign staff KLA Harris was in the situation

room with President Biden today after Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel yesterday the president described today's meeting in the situation situation room this way earlier vice president and I were briefed in the situation room on developments in the Middle East we received updates on threats posed by Iran and its proxies diplomatic efforts to deescalate Regional tensions and preparations to support Israel should it be attacked again we also discuss the steps we are taking to defend our forces and respond to any attack against our Personnel in a manner and place of our choosing Donald Trump will never

be in that situation room again Donald Trump knows that his future next year is in courtrooms as defendant Trump unless he can find some way to take the Electoral College away from kamla Harris and he knows he cannot do that by debating her so Donald Trump will stick to the laziest presidential campaign schedule since the invention of jet travel by doing his one rally a week campaign this week it will be in the electorally unimportant state of Montana which Donald Trump won last time by 16 points and will win again this year and every time

Donald Trump speaks publicly he will slur some of his words as he always does he will mispronounce words he will get names wrong he will get names of countries wrong he will speak words that never come clear close to forming sentences and he will continue to prove to more voters that he does not have the mental and cognitive Health to serve as president meanwhile KL Harris's campaign for president is off to what has been universally declared to be a great start thanks at the beginning to the flawlessly smooth way President Biden h handed off the

control of their campaign to vice president Harris on the afternoon of Sunday July 2st President Biden's endorsement of Vice President Harris that day began a surge of enthusiasm for kamla Harris including campaign contributions thousands of new campaign Volunteers in a steady stream of important Democratic party endorsements and the refusal of any other Democratic candidate to even consider challenging kamla Harris for the presidential nomination according to a headline on the New York Times today some people at the Times think quote kamla Harris surprises everyone not everyone many of us have seen for a long time what

people are seeing in kamla Harris now 15 years ago in Los Angeles I was brought to an event where I was told I would see the female Obama that's what black people in the know in California politics called kamla Harris then when she was the San Francisco district attorney they believed and I believed when I listened to her that day that kamla Harris like Barack Obama could go all the way to the White House I for one have seen nothing new about kamla Harris in her so far brilliant presidential campaign she is not surprising everyone

and she is not surprising our first guest tonight who knew kamla Harris in California back in the days when only Californians knew that kamla Harris could go all the way United States senators do not get security details they don't get secret service or anything like that I've never heard of a United States senator being harassed in a public place like an airport when I was working in the Senate but the Trump era is different in the third year of the Trump presidency Senator KL Harris was harassed in an airport by a trump fanatic who is

now a member of Congress from Florida Republican Anna Paulina Luna whose first claim to public attention was as a swimsuit model the woman you will see protecting Senator Harris in the video you're about to see is our first guest tonight she was then a campaign staffer for Senator Harris and is now the junior United States senator from California Leons Butler Hi man how you doing today hi how are you hi I'm the Hispanic engagement rur Point USA I want to know about the children that you say that are at the right now real quick a

pict you're getting behind you're saying that you're fighting wom no I'm not going to back off don't touch me don't touch me I'm asking her she's saying those ladies ask her take I don't care you're in my way don't talk me don't talk to me she is damaging what is happening to Hispanic women and children out the Border because she's promoting family but we begin tonight with fear not just fear of bears or like weird antia or candidates other kinds of fear fear is part of our evolutionary biological Heritage as high-end members of the animal

kingdom and it can be productive or destructive depending on the situation the instinctual fear of danger can save you from say walking into traffic or staying in a haunted house when the Ghost says get out it can also make you paranoid and angry about demographic or political change fear can keep you from trying new foods or traveling to new places or reveling in the advancements that we've made as a multicultural democracy it can make you lash out at immigrants or your political opponents in politics it can also Define your candidacy the most successful campaigns combine

a healthy fear of the other side with a positive message of Hope Donald Trump suggest selected his running M JD Vance at a moment of supreme confidence and zero fear he just knew he was going to finally defeat Joe Biden no matter who he selected or what he did or said or how long he rambled on at the Republican convention it just didn't matter because the race was in the bag but now that the race has shifted and he's facing a younger female opponent and a woman of color no less Trump is very publicly exhibiting

what sure reads like fear I mean he must be afraid of going to prison wouldn't you be and this weekend judge Tanya chuckin likely added to that fear by tossing out two of his lawyers attempts to vacate the charges that special counsel Jack Smith brought against him for trying to overturn the 2020 election through fraud and violence chuin denied his motions to dismiss the indictment based on statutory grounds and based on selective and vindictive prosecution for the latter she found that there was no evidence that prosecutors abused their Authority or behaved vindictively when pursuing the

case against Trump a reminder that the one way that Trump can ensure that he stays out of prison is to become president again so he can take advantage of Chief Justice John Roberts and his fellow fellow Supreme Court conservatives conferral of near absolute immunity a ruling they seem to design just for him but now what's standing in his way is kamla Harris former prosecutor and Senator and sitting vice president whose list of Grassroots supporters continues to grow tonight two of those groups progressives for Harris and comics for Harris will be holding Zoom calls and this

morning was the kickoff of Republicans for Harris a group that includes the former lieutenant governor of Georgia and former members of the Trump Administration the group is reminiscent of the 1964 Nelson rockafeller attempt to derail Trump's radical right-wing predecessor Barry Goldwater who in 1964 became the farthest right Republican nominee for president prior to Trump Goldwater who opposed the Civil Rights Act passed that summer and signed by Lyndon Johnson who inherited the presidency after President Kennedy's assassination was nearly as radical as Donald Trump though much younger and more eloquent I would remind you that extremism in

the defense of Liberty is no Vice and let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue Goldwater went on to be thoroughly thumped in the November election which Lyndon Johnson won in Landslide and Trump who like Joe Biden is old enough to have lived through that history is clearly so afraid of Joe Biden's vice president and successor that he is now officially backed out of the previously scheduled September 10 debate on ABC citing that he only agreed to it against Biden and that he has ongoing legal conflicts with the

network now mind you when Trump agreed to the debate it never specifically mentioned Trump or Biden's names but only candidates who appeared on enough State ballots to obtain 270 electoral votes and who reached at least 15% support in four separate National polls and to the ongoing legal conflicts Trump agreed to the debate two months after his filing his filing his suit against ABC and anchor George Stephanopoulos who's not even scheduled to moderate the debate it is an act of obvious raw fear including a fear of ABC after that Network's correspondent a black woman like kamla

Harris named Rachel Scott paned the elderly Mr Trump during the rather embarrassing nabj Forum that also featured an anchor from the network Trump prefers to host the debate you know the one that paid a 787 million doll settlement for lying to its own Audience by falsely claiming he won the election he would very much like that Network to host the debate instead with a nice big fox audience who can cheer for him and make him feel less old and weird standing next to to the pretty prosecutor lady who will remind people of his crimes please

and thank you Donald Trump is afraid and again you can see why given the stakes of this election for him personally not to mention for the rest of us in our freedom and democracy it's either he gets back into the White House and gets to be our dictator and do the bidding of the tech and oil billionaires who are funding his attempts to return to power or he doesn't get back in and faces Jack Smith and fonnie Willis in courts presided by rule of law judges like judge chuin and judge McAfee and maybe face a

prison sentence and since Joe Biden left the race and BP Harris entered it and became this super phenomenon among all sorts of Voters from black women and men to white women and white dudes and cat ladies and South Asian voters and lgbtq voters and now Republicans for Harris and with polls showing Harris erasing the leads that he held over President Biden in the polls fear is clearly taken over here's Trump this weekend Kam you know there's about 19 different ways of saying it she only likes three she wants the government to stop people from eating

red meat she wants to get rid of your cows No More Cows she doesn't want anybody saying Merry Christmas now she's denying it you go to the store I want to buy a loaf of bread darling you come back ma'am I'm sorry but your husband's been killed if Kamala wins it will be crime chaos and death all across our country she doesn't want anybody saying Merry Christmas joining me now is Simon Rosenberg Democratic strategist and author of The hopium Chronicles substack David Jolly former Republican congressman and MSNBC political analyst and Wanita toer Democratic strategist MSNBC

political analyst and co-host of the what a day podcast and what a day indeed Simon I do want to start with you though Donald Trump is clearly freaking out okay you can see he's kind of melting down but here is the I mean there's a reason why let's look at these polls he was consistently beating Joe Biden across these um important swing states that has now changed Michigan tied Pennsylvania tied he's only up one and that's within the margin of ER in Wisconsin Arizona tied Georgia he's up three also margin of era Nevada Harris up

two North Carolina Trump up three and that's before the convention talk a little bit about these polls and how they're looking yeah listen we've had a remarkable couple of weeks I mean this has been an historic election but you know just using the 5 38 average we've seen a five-point shift in the election Trump was up 3.2% uh before Biden dropped down and now the vice president is up by about two points there's been a huge shift some of the national tracking polls that we all follow have seen five six point shifts towards her in

the last few weeks she's now very competitive in the Battlegrounds and I think where the race is today right is that you know we're we are we have momentum as you pointed out we haven't had our VP pick we haven't had the convention we haven't had our what is going to be an unprecedented Grassroots campaign kicking in in the fall and I think there's more upside for us and I think that's why Trump is melting down and freaking out he had a he had one of the worst weeks on the national stage since he's been

in this business in 2015 since he got into this game um and I think is because part of what happened is that when she went ahead in the polling it removed the central rationale of his of his campaign which is that he's strong he's leading she's weak that's no longer true and I think they're really struggling now yeah I mean David it it you know saying I don't want to do this debate I'm cancelling he pulled out of the debate formally and then saying no I want a fox debate like that's running to a safe

space that's what they used to say that's they used to say about you know liberals wanting to be in a safe space he literally feels like the only place that he would be comfortable debating is on the network that lied for him about the big lie meanwhile on the other side you've got Jimmy Carter saying I'm literally just trying to stay alive to vote for for vice president Harris there is not a living former president former presidential candidate the only one out of all the living former either presidents or presidential candidates who's supporting Trump is

Sarah Palin not a single other one and whereas Jimmy Carter's like I will just stay on this Earth alive just for her look I agree with Simon i' take it a little bit further Donald Trump has had one of the worst chapters for a presidential candidate in modern political history ever since vice president Harris Got In You could argue actually starting the night of his RNC speech he has done everything wrong and his team has failed to prosecute the case against kamla Harris and he has reminded the American people why they're tired of Donald Trump

why they don't like him and look he is scared to debate the vice president but I would also say a lot of people who read that tweet from Donald Trump saying the debate is no longer with ABC it's Fox something that screamed off their screen was the power Dynamic it was somewhere between misogynist childish and and borish that Donald Trump was telling the sitting vice president I'll tell you where to show up because I'm making the call unless Donald Trump forgot his address is now Mara Lago and KLA Harris is is the Naval Observatory she's

the sitting vice president and so look I think she is right to say I will debate you at ABC and if you want to have a second one perhaps we could have a second one Donald Trump's doing everything wrong right now his campaign is in freefall it is spiraling and he has no additional ceiling even if he corrects whereas the vice president has an enormous ceiling that we continue to see her push through Aon you've been covering Harris vep Stakes day in and day out we hear this roll out is going to be major how

do you think it's all going to unfold I mean look this is a process that she knows well I mean she just went through it herself four years ago right um right now it's just a whole lot of us sitting around waiting for the big news it's high stakes we're all kind of trying to read the tea leaves here and and so what's it going to come down to I think uh you know the campaign has said that there's going to be you know this digital roll out at some point tomorrow that's not unlike uh

the way that we've gotten a lot of other news uh I believe that might have been how we got the news about her uh four years ago the the announce I mean it was a it was a very tightly uh closely held um um decision that uh then candidate Biden made and and we you know a lot of us found out there was no leak there was no scoop on that uh you know vice president uh n the Vice Presidential nominee kamla Harris uh was named and you know then there was there was all the

excitement so I think that she's maybe trying to replicate that um I think it's going to come down to sympatico and and who can help her win and so you have those uh apparently a white man maybe is one of the things that that that it takes to win that's something that we saw in our Poll for the 19th news and Survey Monkey that Americans felt like she might have a better chance winning with a white man so I guess we'll find out who the winner is in just a few more hours somebody who can

deliver a state perhaps somebody who she has some patico with and somebody who frankly can help her win and has chemistry with her Susan we've seen it sort of laid out because the process of picking a running mate has exposed the Divide between Democratic progressives and moderates can you lay it out what the concerns are we know it's a big tent party and they've now made it clear all the different factions their priorities well you know this is definitely played out in full public view although in a very uh compressed and accelerated timetable I think

you know one thing is that you've seen on a positive side you've seen all these possible vice presidential candidates uh racing to the airwaves uh uh getting out there as surrogates for vice president Harris in the effort to show what a good vice president they would make in a way you wish the Democrats could keep that going I imagine they would uh you know enjoy having all of these very aggressive accomplished circuits out there on the campaign Trail and they got to find a way to make the losers tomorrow still engaged in the campaign uh

but to your question I you know I am wondering once a choice is made right then that's where Democrats start doing their Democrat thing and uh you know start fighting with each other in public again uh Josh Ziro as the presumed front runner for this vice presidential nod has taken a lot of the arrows so far uh you know both you've seen some dumps of uh opposition research against him but also on the the substance side on the policy side you've seen a lot of push back from uh some of the pro Palestinian protesters and

their Advocates on social media uh but then the flip side is you see a lot of Centrist say that's why he would be perfect uh you know and that let's let's beat him up a little bit on the left and that will convince centrus who actually might hold the key to this election that Shapiro was a good choice so he's drown a lot of the the lightning so far Mark Kelly uh you know we've also seen uh some reporting about him in recent days that suggests that people are uh letting loose some damaging information maybe

to test how damaging it would be or not uh I you know we'll know in a few hours as Erin said it's important to keep this in mind vice presidential running mates have not really proved decisive in recent elections I saw one analysis suggesting you're looking at maybe uh half of 1% uh perhaps impact in key places remember that uh it was Barack Obama who won Paul Ryan's District back in 2012 when he was chosen as the vice presidential candidate for Mitt Romney in the key state of Wisconsin but Susan can I just push back

on one thing we don't know that Democrats are going to start airing their dirty laundry after she makes that VP pick we all thought that would be the case if Joe Biden stepped aside we thought it would be a Democrat food fight and that the convention would be an allout war and that's not at all what happened yeah no I totally agree with that I'm interested to see whether we see a reversion to the norm or not seph I I don't know what's going to happen because in so many ways this election is off the

script right now and uh you know Democrats seem to have made uh an extraordinary Choice really uh many of them United to push out the incumbent president of their own party in the effort to win win this election so they may be willing to obscure differences that in a primary uh might have assumed Paramount importance we just don't know the answer we'll know a little bit more tomorrow ree Republicans answer to this big Harris campaign push is to send JD Vance on the road spending your summer with JD Vance that is how you have been

uh spending the last few weeks how do you think this is going to go you've been his traveling companion yeah it's been a couple days with him last week on the traveling the west coast and this is kind of what the Trump campaign kind of wants to happen they want to send JD Vance out as this quote unquote policy attack dog um towards Harris and towards the Democratic party and that's something that they're really trying to do you've seen that I mean he has kind of come out and really talked about policy and my interview

with him that was something that he I mean a lot of the questions were geared towards policy but that was kind of the thing that he really was more forthright and talking about when I was asking questions about policy and you also saw his interview with the N boys um well what I asked him about um the border wall and border security and kind of what he would want to talk about that he said that the border security will be a main stay in the election I asked about Obamacare and they talked about overhauling Obamacare

about how that will what that would look like and how they would want to pursue some reforms and also about the tax credits they want to they want to cut the corporate tacc back down to 15% as Trump has said um they also JD Vance also big advocate for child tax credit which is also ined with some Democrats as well and so those were some of the policy things they're to send hold on hold on hold on when did JD Vance become a big advocate for expanding the child tax crit he may have changed his

tune and said I think I may vote for it but that's certainly not JD Vance being a big advocate for it when did that happen I guess we I guess when I was talking to him he was pretty he that was something that he did say he supported that he does would like to see a big child tax credit with his words and that is somethingone that he does support all right Aon Donald Trump weighed in on Harris's VP candidates and here's some of what she said excuse me some of what he said all of

the people that she's looking at are considered much better than her these were people that were thinking about running they would have run except that they didn't want to go through this roadblock with her and you know cuz you're the vice president so they wanted to go pick them and and I think virtually every one of them is considered better smarter uh would be a better president than her but we can't allow her to be president she's going to destroy our country she'll ruin it Erin what is your take on this response that all of

these potential VPS are better than her well I mean all of those potential uh other names that were out there quickly lined up behind vice president Harris in the days after I mean literally hours after she said that she was going to earn and win this Democratic nomination which you know she secured that nomination with support from delegates within the first 32 hours and as you said at the beginning of the hour she managed to uh secure the necessary delegates to become the official nominee as of this evening so if these candidates were better than

her they certainly didn't uh seem to think that they had their chance were better than hers because they they are endorsing her and you know just uh to go back to something that that Reese was saying I understand that JD Vance is out here trying to talk about policy but that's not what the headlines are the headlines are around you know childless cat ladies and you know dunking on someone bows pulling out of Tokyo so uh you know it sounds like the Trump Vance campaign is pretty much on defense and kind of scrambling to get

back into the headlines as Harris seems to be poised to head into yet another week of momentum with this VP pick her delegates secured and you know trying to shore up even more volunteers supporters and voters headed into the Democratic National Convention in a couple of weeks well let's talk about one of those policy issues it's the first thing Reese mentioned immigration JD Vance wants to go on offense when it comes to immigration and there's this idea that it could be a weakness for the VP but NBC is reporting that VP Harris wants to go

on offense and she wants to do it this week Susan what do you think we're going to hear from her on this yeah she R tested uh this this line of argument uh a little bit last week Stephan I thought it was quite successful essentially rather than just accepting the idea that this is a big vulnerability of hers she's using the fact that Donald Trump uh basically sank the bipartisan immigration deal that very conservative Senator Jim Langford had negotiated in the Senate with the blessing of Republican leaders Donald Trump then sank that deal rather than

give uh Joe Biden then the candidate uh an issue to use against him in September but then he handed him an issue by doing that and I think that I thought Harris's use of this line last week was very crisp uh and it essentially said like wait a minute here let's you want to talk about immigration great there's a bill it's on the table I've endorsed this I'll sign it as president where are you Donald Trump and I think that that is a very effective way the other point that I would make about immigration is

that for most voters for whom this is the top issue they are already very likely Trump voters in this election uh immigration has been the most Salient issue for Trump voters Donald Trump himself believes this is the reason that he became president in 2016 is because he emphasized this issue uh it's one of the reasons he goes back to it again and again and again so in many respects uh when Donald Trump talks about immigration he's already talking to the converted in this campaign and I think that Harris is likely to uh use that line

and then move on to issues that might actually uh prove more decisive with the swing voters for the last two weeks or so Donald Trump has been trying to distance himself from Project 2025 but now one of its key Architects a man by the name of Russell vote is reportedly still getting ready for Trump's return to the White House and him potentially having a big role in it reys I thought that the Trump team wants was trying to get rid of the plan what is your take on votes still being so closely tied to this

campaign and the transition team yeah it's not just vat either it's John mckinty as well who is a key Trump a in the white house um I think the whole thing of them trying to separate themselves from Project 2025 might just be kind of them trying to separate themselves from The Playbook while still trying to keep some of these allies that worked on the program close because a lot of these people that worked on the program are either alumni of the Trump White House or they are still pretty close to the former president and so

I think that it's just I mean he is just trying to get his have his cake and E A two where he's able to say oh no I don't really agree with product 25 I'm gonna get away from that but also some of the people that are working on it I still support and are likely going to still play a role in the second Administration if that does happen for