Morning Joe - Chaos and name-calling in tense meeting after Trump cancels bipartisan bill signing

Episode Date: June 25, 2026

June 25, 2026 - 6am: Chaos and name-calling in tense meeting after Trump cancels bipartisan bill signing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Kyiv is preparing a new phase of the war Venezuela rocked by two large earthquakes Steve Rattner breaks out his charts to show how much Iran is gaining from Trump's deal To listen to this show and other MS podcasts without ads, sign up for MS NOW Premium on Apple Podcasts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Mr. Mr. you just had a colorful lunch on the Senate. Would you be open to a compromising measure that had provisions of the same act into a representation? Not really. No, the same act should be a disqualification. It's voter ID. It's proof of citizenship. And it's also the mail-in ballots. Look, the housing bill is, I made billions of dollars with housing. I know housing better than anybody may be anywhere. It's all about the interest. A wild day in Washington yesterday with the president refusing to sign a bipartisan bill for affordable housing, using it as leverage for his highly criticized voting bill. It comes as the head of the U.S. Postal Service told lawmakers yesterday that mail carriers would not deliver mail-in ballots to states who refuse to hand over sensitive voter information to the federal government. That's just a thuggish.

For a rat, I can't believe there's a single federal judge out there that would uphold the federal government trying to seize state voting rolls. We'll go through all of that. Also, the fallout from one of the races in New York's primary election as the 32-year-old Democratic Socialist, who defeated an incumbent congressman is facing scrutiny for her past statements and social media posts. Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe. It's Thursday, June 25th. With us, we have the co-host of our 8 a.m. hour, staff writer at the Atlantic, Jonathan Lemire, co-host of the rest is politics podcast, the BBC's Caddy Kay. Columnist and associate editor of the Washington Post, David Ignatius, is with us this morning, along with the managing editor at the bulwark, Sam Stein. And Jonathan, Jonathan, we'll hear really quickly just to touch on a couple of the things that the president talked about off the top there. of all, it was a bipartisan, it was a bipartisan housing bill that not only Republicans were trumpeting and saying was incredible, but also the White House delivering statements that

finally working Americans were going to get relief for the price of rising at the cost of houses. Then the president, weirdly at the last second, backs out Republican senators and house members deeply disturbed and theoretic behavior. Then the president trying to tie it to the Save Act. By the way, it has nothing to do with voter ID because 45 out of 50 states, according to a recent report, couldn't even use their driver's licenses, right? So, and then on top of that, it causes a lot of problems for women who got married and actually have a different name from their name of birth.

You can go on and on. That is, it is a voter. repression bill. It has nothing to do with voter ID. I've always said, I support voter ID, about 80% of Americans support voter ID. But this is a voter suppression bill. Number two, then he made some weird statement sounding like he wanted to protect landlords. Some weird statements, something, you know, I want people who have money in there to be able to make more money. That's how I made billions. So Republicans have to be scratching their head, even at this point, that Donald Trump is so desperate not to give workers a break.

Yeah, President Trump had quite the day, and we'll get into it, but you're right. I mean, there on the hill, Republican lawmakers already had a podium set up. They were ready to go for the bill sign, for this housing bill. It had bipartisan buy-in, which is rare in Washington these days. And as you say, President Trump out of nowhere scuttles it for the SAVE Act, which is remains DOA. Republicans have told him over and over, this isn't. going to happen. We don't have the votes and we're not going to blow up the filibuster. Trump then goes to the Capitol later in the day and gets into a shouting match with Senator

Cassidy and others there about the War Powers Act, though there was a late reversal. We also had Trump tell, as you say, Joe, I mean, housing, we all know the crisis the country is right now, how expensive housing is. And yet there's reporting from Punch Bowl and others that the president told Speaker Johnson that, you know, no one gives a, Crap, you didn't say crap, no one gives a crap about housing. You can see it there. And then last night we had what was going, supposed to be, a celebration of America's 250, that ended up into a relatively short and grievance-filled Trump speech, as per usual.

So, yeah, this is not what Republicans are trying to get right here, is they try to find some footing ahead of a midterms that looks really daunting for them. Not helpful when the president blows up an accomplishment and then tries to stick them with an act that is deeply unpopular. And then just talking about awkward. It was so awkward at the Republican meeting, a lot of shouting going on. Of course, capitulating in the end by, you know, the same senator that ended up giving you RFK Jr. Thank you so much, Senator Cassidy.

Great job, as always. I'm glad to see. Glad to see you've learned your lesson. Wow. And then you just, you had the president screaming to the senators. It was grievance filled. He was reportedly talking about impeachment. I was talking about his perfect call with Zelensky.

It was just pure madness. Well, we'll get to all of that. But first, the big news of the morning, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Kiv is preparing a new phase of the war, posting a video message yesterday announcing plans for preemptive strikes on Russian facilities that support Moscow's war. The move comes as you. Ukraine intensifies attacks on Russian energy infrastructure. A recent drone strike reportedly caused

major damage to a Moscow oil refinery, knocking it offline and adding to Russia's fuel supply challenges. The Financial Times reports the Kremlin is increasingly bypassing normal budget rules as war costs there soar with deficits rising, reserves shrinking and mounting compensation payments linked to heavy Russian casualties. Meanwhile, Moscow has been pressuring Russia's close to his ally, Belarus, to get more involved in its war effort to help them. That triggered a warning from Zelensky, who said Kiv will strike drone stations inside Belarus if the country continues to allow Russia to use them. That threat apparently worked with Belarus, reportedly taking the equipment offline. Meanwhile, President,

Trump's tone on the war continues to shift. At the White House yesterday, Trump praised Zelensky as courageous, saying Ukraine is doing pretty well and holding its own despite heavy losses on both sides. Like winners, do you think President Zelensky is winning right now? Well, he's doing pretty well. Look, no matter how you look at it, he's doing pretty well. He's holding his own, at least. A lot of people dying on both sides.

But I think he's doing pretty well. You have to say he's courageous. He's got great equipment, but he's got great men. He's got fighters. I'm sorry, I'm confused. I thought he had no cards. David Ignatius, he has a lot of cards. And this is just, I was going to say, it's one of those weeks where, you know, a decade happens in a week.

It seemed like a decade was happening in an afternoon yesterday. His reports just continue to flood in about Ukraine's growth. strength. I remember, you remember earlier last week, Zelensky threatened Belarus's dictator and said, you either take your, your radios offline or we'll do it for you. He buckled yesterday, more afraid of Zelensky than Putin. We could go on and on, but it is remarkable how quickly things are moving on the Ukraine-Russian front. So Zelensky really is beginning to roll now. There's nothing succeeds like success. And as Ukraine pushes at the Russians at the front lines as it steps up its campaign against Crimea, really trying to turn, in the words of the Ukrainian defense minister,

turn Crimea into an island, cut it off so that it can't be supplied from Russia. I think the Russians are really beginning to see a very strategic campaign against them, against their key ally in Lukashenko and Belarus. I don't see any sign yet that Putin is willing to change his policies. But this campaign is becoming more and more costly for Russia as a result of really systematic planning by Ukraine. The campaign in Crimea is an example. Crimea is where this war started in 2014.

The Ukrainians are now going systematically after bridges and roads. So I figured that in the last 17 days, they've hit 21 bridges across different estuaries in Crimea, almost choking at Crimea for supplies. There's still one big bridge that's open, but they're going to try to shut that soon. So it's so interesting to see Trump, who scored Zeletsky when he seemed weak,

now deciding he's courageous and speaking favorably. That's the way war seemed to work. There's going to be a tough summer ahead. I don't think anybody should be under illusions that Ukraine is not going to roll forward in this war heading towards a happy ending. There's going to be heavy, heavy bombing of Kiev and other cities. But for the moment, Ukraine is really showing what organization, planning, a strategic campaign,

what that can do for you. Now, and Cady, President Trump, you know, was sitting there with the NATO Secretary General and made sure to bash many NATO members, took swipes in Italy, at the UK. The list goes on and on. The grievances he still has because he didn't get any help, he says, during the Iran war. but it was striking here. This is a warmer rhetoric towards Ukraine and Zelensky in particular than we've heard from Trump in a long time.

And one of the truisms we know about someone who shifts his view so frequently is Trump likes a winner. And right now, he can see where the momentum is in this conflict. It's with Ukraine. To David's point, a long fight ahead, to be sure. But it does seem like perhaps we're on the brink of America maybe helping out Keev more than we have in a while. No, you have those images, as David was talking about, of people flooding out of Crimea. I mean, the two images that I take away from this week are those columns of black smoke over Moscow because they've hit some of the refineries and then those traffic jams of people trying to leave Crimea.

And that gives you a sense of how the war is going. And Donald Trump sees that. And it's no coincidence that his Joint Chief of Staff, Dan Kane, recently called Ukraine the Silicon Valley of Warfare at the moment. there is a realization of what the Ukrainians have done. They've had this injection of European cash. They got extra $100 billion this year from the Europeans. That seems to have helped them as well. But boy, does it change the tone?

I've just been reading Maggie and Jonathan Swan's description, Haberman and Jonathan Swan's description of that awful meeting just over a year ago in February of last year that shocked the world when Donald Trump and J.D. Vance berated Vladimir Zelensky and told him he had none of the cards and what a change in tone there is now. And that is all done by the Ukrainians with help from the Europeans, but all done by the Ukrainians. Say Sam. So tell me politically, what do you think, Sam, where does this go from here politically inside Washington? Obviously, Republican senators have long supported

Ukraine. There have been some breakaways in the House and some breakaways in the Senate as well. For the most part, Republicans have wanted to lean into helping Ukraine. Does that happen now? Do they have more of a chance to work with the president to open the door to finally pressure Vladimir Putin to get to the negotiating table so this bloody war can end? I'm sure Donald Trump will never flip back. So, yeah, no. I mean, this is the problem here, right? It depends on the week with Donald Trump here.

and frankly, it feels like he's doing foreign policy based on vibes and video clips that he sees. There's no indication that I get, maybe David would know this better than I do, about the administration being more open to pushing more funding towards the Ukrainians, backing them with more weaponry. They continue to push all of the burden onto the Europeans. Trump's been very clear about that.

I think it's in Europe's backyard. And while he is more complimentary, of Zelensky there, there's no indication that he's any less frustrated by the inability for the war to come to an end. So I don't think this necessarily changes the equation in Washington all that much. I will say there are backers of Ukraine in Washington, D.C., on the hill, who are extremely more confident now about coming out and saying, hey, this was the path we should have taken all along. We can expedite this war if we just push more aid to the front lines. Vladimir Putin looks foolish for having launching.

war and this is a real opportunity to, you know, cause internal strife within Russia. I mean, that is essentially what the Ukrainians are doing here. They're trying to sow doubt inside Russia. And Katy's right, the images of the fleeing traffic from Crimea are remarkable. If you haven't seen them, you should look them up. But if you ask about the sort of macro political dynamics, I'm not sure much changes other than Trump being a little bit more complimentary here and there. Yeah, you know, new polling, David Ignatius, as we go from Ukraine to what's going

on in Iran. New polling from UGov shows only one out of four Americans think the United States won the war in Iran. You break it down by political party, just over half the Republicans, 54 percent, think the United States was victorious. Maga Republicans, weirdly enough, of course, around 70 percent, non-Maga Republicans, around 30 percent. Yesterday, David, the president was, of course, at the Senate, and as he was charging out, somebody asking about the war in Iran, and he just repeated his talking points, well, we won the war, we're strong, we're big, we're this, were that, the other. Americans just don't believe that. And with the Iranians publicly backing off one claim after another from the president and J.D. Vance, where are these

negotiations right now? Are they going, is there optimism that they're going to move forward and succeed. Well, Trump is always optimistic. It doesn't require evidence to support that. So where they are, Joe, is quite properly trying to frame a technical basis for going forward. In the last week, the attempt was made to put in place a sort of committee, in effect, that can oversee the mining of the Strait of Hormuzzi, so you reliably can tell insurance. insurance companies, ship captains, this is open, you're safe.

But then there have been signs that the Iranians may be pulling back from that. Similarly, there was an announcement that IAEA inspectors would be back in Iran, which is crucial to begin assessing and then removing or diluting the highly enriched uranium, and then the Iranians cast out on that as well. So there's still a cat and mouse game going on. And it's interesting that the president basically has said to the vice president J.D. Vance, it's yours. You take care of this. You'll see you later in terms of the actual negotiations. The basic premise of this deal is that the United States is going to work with Iran to solve regional conflicts in Lebanon, you know, in the Strait of Hormuz.

There's something implausible about that. We still haven't seen evidence that Iran, these super hard liners that are left in charge in Iran, really are prepared to work with the United States. But that is the premise of the administration in this peacemaking. I hope it succeeds. We all want to see stability there. We all want to see some transformation of Iran. But as we've said on this show before, what you see is more a wish list than any.

systematic pathway now to comprehensively ending the war and solving in particular problems of the nuclear program. So in a moment, Steve Ratner is going to have charts looking at how President Trump's deal with Iran compares to former President Obama's. But we want to turn quickly now to the back-to-back earthquakes that struck Venezuela last night, killing at least 32 people and injuring at least 700 more. The death toll is expected to rise. dramatically. The U.S. Geological Survey said the first earthquake happened shortly after 6 p.m.

with the second happening just a minute later. Both quakes collapsed dozens of buildings and toppled electric poles. The country's acting president declared a state of emergency last night. Schools have been canceled. The Ministry of Education saying that some buildings will be used as shelters and donation centers. The international airport near Caracas remains closed after earthquakes, interior, as can be seen in this video. International support for Venezuela quickly poured in with countries like Chile, El Salvador, and Ecuador offering aid. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also wrote on social media, America stands with the Venezuelan people during this difficult time. He went on to write, the State Department is immediately deploying search and rescue teams,

medical resources, and humanitarian assistance to Venezuela. The earthquakes are on among the strongest to strike the nation in more than a century, and could be felt as far as Brazil's Amazon, a thousand miles away. We'll continue to watch this. And still ahead on Morning, Joe, we'll take a look at how the U.S. Postmaster General is defending a proposal that would block mail-in ballots

for states that refuse to turn over voter lists to the administration. So the administration actually will seize unless the administration's allowed to seize state voter rolls, that guy says they won't accept mail-in ballots that the state legislatures approved? Saying the corruption out loud. Saying the corruption out loud and talk about unconstitutional. It's remarkable. I can't even imagine the most radical Trump-appointed judge would support that scheme.

And as we go to break, a quick look at that. the travelers forecast this morning from acuethers, Bernie Rayno. Bernie, how's it looking? Miko, we're tracking some spotty but gusty thunderstorms today. Detroit, Indianapolis, toward Pittsburgh and Buffalo. There won't be a shower with thunderstorm along the east coast, including the I-95 corridor until Thursday night. Now, southeast spotty thunderstorms, it'll be steamy. The heat continues to build in Texas. If you're doing any traveling, shouldn't be too many delays today, maybe. a few delays in Miami this afternoon.

To help you make the best decisions and be more in the know, download the Accuether app today. I just want their loyalty. We don't need their money. We don't need anything. We have the most powerful military in the world by far. But I just want loyalty. You know, we're so loyal to them. We're always fighting for them. We have

thousands of troops all over Europe. In Germany, we have 50,000 troops, and then you want a little give us a little nudge, give us a little kiss. We don't want much. And they say, no, we can't do it. All right, President Trump yesterday, when asked by reporters, what he wanted from America's allies in Europe, that coming during a meeting with the NATO Secretary General Mark Ruta at the White.

Asking for loyalty after Pete Heggseth trash NATO, goes out of his way to trash NATO. They talk about taking troops out of Germany. They talk about taking troops out of Poland. The president attacks the former leader of Britain, attacks the leader of Italy. The list goes on. Loyalty goes both ways, sir.

Let's ring in the author and Seth, writer for the Atlantic, and Applebaum. So Anna was just saying to David, the old, I know you like quoting Vladimir Lennon. Wasn't it Lennon that said sometimes a decade can happen in a week? Well, this week, we have Belarus backing down yesterday. We have Crimea in the act of shutting down. And now you have Vladimir Putin striking out. against the West, striking out against the United States, and Lavrov saying that Anchorage was only meant to buy more time so the West could arm Ukraine. Get us up to date with exactly what's going on

on the ground there. So what we are watching in Ukraine now is actually the result of more than a year's worth of work and investment. Small and large and medium-sized Ukrainian drone companies all working to change the way Ukraine fights the war. And the result that we've had that we've seen in the last couple of months is beginning to culminate. So the Ukrainians have cut off land and ferry links to Crimea. They've made it impossible for the Crimeans to the people who live in Crimea to have access to fuel. Food is running short. They have forced the Russians to move a lot of air defense away from the front line towards Moscow, because recently they've been able to hit a couple of big targets in Moscow, including the major oil refinery there.

There are now oil shortages, gasoline shortages, rather, all over Russia. You're beginning to see Russians talk about them on social media, which was not the case before, often in a very weird way, saying, hmm, there's something strange. We can't get petrol. I wonder why. Nobody's explaining to the Russians exactly why this is happening. But we are, beginning to see, as I said, this is effect of Ukraine's decision a couple of years ago to invest in its own drone industry. It's also thanks to European money, not U.S. money. The U.S. has not been investing in Ukraine for the last year. And it's mostly Ukrainian technology, as I said, European money that have created what is really a pretty important shift in the battlefield momentum.

And this is David Ignatius. I'm just wondering what a sense. you have about the effect of this stepped up, well-planned Ukrainian campaign on Vladimir Putin and on the basis of support for him in Moscow. Do you get a sense that there's greater fragmentation among Russians as they look at increasingly the damage that this war is causing for Russia itself? There's clearly an enormous amount of discontent, and we know already that there are people inside the Russian elite who dislike the war, want the war to be over. A few months ago, a kind of presentation leaked from the Kremlin. And this was, had been put together by a team inside the

Kremlin who were trying to propose a way to sell the end of the war on the current front lines or approximately as a great victory for Russia. So in other words, there are some people who are thinking about how to end the war and how to explain it to the Russian public. And we have to assume there are also people inside the mix who want the war to keep going, who might want to accelerate it. That can't be excluded. But there's now a clear battle for influence over the president and a clear, I mean, as clear as there can be in a state where so much is controlled and where people are afraid to speak the truth. There's a ripple of discontent that seems very authentic moving across the society. As I said, this could result in Putin looking for a way out. It could

also result in him looking to change the subject, attack a NATO ally, test the NATO alliance. We'll see. And are we starting to see European leaders recalculate how best to deal with Donald Trump in order to get the best possible? The thing that always held them up, of course, was Ukraine. They were worried that if they criticized Donald Trump too much, they wouldn't get much for Ukraine. And this week, we've seen two rather different pictures. We saw Georgia Maloney stand up and say, I don't beg.

Italy doesn't beg. This is a ridiculous way to treat your allies. And by the way, why you're accommodating your enemies so much. And then yesterday we saw Mark Rutter in the Oval Office with kind of gold-plated charts trying to make the case for Europe, but in a way that was incredibly flattering of Donald Trump. What's the feeling in Europe at the moment about the best way to handle this administration and to handle the United States right now? So I think Maloney's statement reflects the view of many leaders. In other words, Europeans get it now, that Donald Trump isn't interested in their security, that he hasn't helped Ukraine, that Ukraine, as it turns out, was able, together

with Europe to defend itself, even maybe to turn the tide of the war, we'll see. And although everyone understands what Mark Ruta is doing, he's the Secretary General of NATO, he does, he wants to avoid a big break. There's a big NATO summit coming up. I don't think that method of dealing with Trump is now perceived to be effective. And you will hear more and more leaders depending on their domestic politics standing up the way Maloney did and the way the Spanish prime minister did. You know, it's also important to remember European countries are democracies. Leaders care about popular opinion and public opinion. And Donald Trump is not popular. And the Iran war was not popular. And the raise the higher fuel prices were not popular. And so it's, you know, with

with a few exceptions, maybe Poland, Romania, a few countries where you still have big blocks of people who are very pro-American, you will see Europeans beginning to speak on behalf of their publics and saying, why should we put up with insults? Why should we put up with policies that are not, which don't take our interests into account? Why should we, you know, why should we pander to somebody who changes his mind every few minutes anyway? All right, and Applebaum, thank you so much for coming on the show this morning. We appreciate it. And then coming up, we're going to move to the issue of the Iran war. Steve Ratner is going to have charts on just how much Iran stands to gain from Trump's Iran deal as opposed to President Obama's Iran deal. We'll be right back.

Welcome back. Live look at Capitol Hill, a beautiful shot as the sun is up over Washington. As the United States and Iran negotiate an agreement to try and end the war, our next guest says the current state of place suggests an outcome that will deliver more benefits to Iran than the previous deal secured by former President Barack Obama that Trump has to ride it for years. I don't think it's actually even a close call. if you look at the half a trillion dollars that the Iranians are getting, if you look right now at the fact that they've already taken sanctions off of Iranian oil, which the State Department just a week ago was saying, well, they use their oil money to promote terrorism and to promote these terrorist proxy groups across the region.

They said that a week ago on the State Department. Now they've already released that. And now the Iranians are saying, no, we're not going to do anything the United States is saying. So, again, you just sit here and wonder, why would you release lift the oil sanctions when the Iranians haven't agreed to anything. There's an old saying when it comes

to negotiating with Iranians between the Iran and the United States nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to. President Trump was so critical to President Obama's Iran deal. Republicans were. We're the Republicans in the Senate.

So critical. Let's bring in former Treasury official on Morning Joe Economic analyst Steve Ratner. He's got charts looking at how much Iran stands to gain from Trump's deal. Steve, how much are we talking about? Yeah, well, you guys kind of did the charts for me, but let me show you the numbers behind what you just said, because the point is exactly right. This deal is clearly worse for Americans than the Obama deal, and in other respects, certainly no better.

But to Joe's point, so we've already taken sanctions off of Iranian oil during this negotiating period, not something Obama did. that is estimated to bring them $6 billion of extra oil revenue. In addition, we've committed during this period, before there's anything signed, to unfreeze $12 billion of Iranian assets, something that Obama never did. So $18 billion they get just for signing the MOU, so to speak. And then if you get a final deal, they have another $66 billion of frozen assets, and that's more than Obama.

I'll show you that in the second. and over the 2.3 years, which is equivalent to how long the JCPOA was in effect, they get another $66 billion of extra oil revenue. And then lastly, there's this $300 billion fund that Trump has been talking about. Nobody knows who's going to pay for it, whether the U.S. will be part of it, but it's potentially another big thing. So you can see here in terms of the oil revenue, this is simply a breakdown of that, and it shows you the difference between over the next couple of years,

between what they would have gotten for their oil and what they will now get for their oil. Again, a total of another $78 billion or thereabouts. So, Steve, to set up your next chart, let's first listen to the recent claim for President Trump about how much money he says the Obama administration gave to Tehran. Obama flew a Boeing 757, a plane I know very well. They took the seats out and they loaded it up with 1.7

billion dollars in cash from the banks in Maryland and Virginia and D.C. They emptied out the banks, and they gave them 1.7 in green, and they gave them tens of billions of dollars, just kept giving them money, and it didn't work. All right, Steve, let's fact-check that. What can you tell us about how Trump's deal with Iran compares to that previous agreement under Obama? Yeah, I'm going to get to that $1.7 billion, because that's particularly interesting. But before we do that, so obviously, Obama has.

had a final deal. Trump is still dealing with an interim framework. Obama had broad support in the international community. Trump, it's just the U.S. versus Iran. And then we get to this oil sanctions issue. Obama only lifted them after the agreement was signed and there was some verification of compliance beginning. Trump has already done part of it, as we said, has lifted the sanctions for now during the 60 period. Obama freed up no money up front. Trump is in the process right now of giving them $12 billion. Ultimately, Obama unsanctioned $50 billion of assets. Trump, we're talking about $78 billion of assets.

So here's this $1.7 billion that Trump loves to talk about. What that is is money that Iran put on deposit before the 1979 revolution for some purchases that were never made, and it's been frozen since then. And that's what that's all that is, is essentially giving them back money. they gave us 47 years ago. And then you have this rebuild fund, which we don't know who's going to pay for it, but potentially $300 million. And then, of course, as David Ignatius can explain better,

Obama had all of the inspections and the snapback. And Trump, they've been going back and forth, but there doesn't seem to be certainly any agreement on the Iranians part to agree to what they did under Obama. So when you add it all up, you can see that Obama provide $117 billion. and total relief once they signed the final JCPOA, and Trump is actually giving them a little bit more than that in both crude oil sales and in unfrozen assets, not to mention the $300 billion that's floating around out there. Yeah, I was just going to say, Steve, because the number is so

shockingly high, you accidentally said $300 million the first time you talked about it, and so if people were driving in their car, I'm sure now that they've heard it is $300 billion, they'll probably spill their coffee. But it really is remarkable. $1.7 billion versus about $500 billion at the end of the day. I mean, it's just absolutely astounding. Talk about your third chart. You mentioned that $300 billion, well,

I call it, it's a reparations fund, actually. It's like it's, it's just like the Germans had to pay at Versailles, except the $300 billion that we are going to be guaranteeing the Iranians is more than the, than what Kaiser Wilhelm II had to agree to at Versailles in 1919. What? It's, and this is a key provision of the MOU. He keeps saying no money for the fund is going to come from U's taxpayers, uh, the American government. Let's hear him say it. Okay.

Well, we'll hear him say it. And, of course, the Iranians have already said it's not true. Go ahead. The G7 summit. It's been reported that it includes a $300 billion dollar. It's false. Funded by Gulf allies. That's false.

People, you can invest if you want. I mean, what are we going to say nobody's ever allowed to invest? No, we're not investing. We're not putting up 10 cents. And people can decide to do that, but that's up to them. I mean, do you want me to say nobody's ever? allowed to invest in a country. We are not investing in it, and we do not have a fund. Steve, you say U.S. taxpayers are going to be on the hook here. And of course, since the

MOU has the United States guaranteeing this $300 billion, anybody that knows anything about treaties or knows anything about, well, basic contract law knows that if you guarantee the $300 billion, you're on the hook. Walk us through it. Well, let's talk about the total costs of the war because, again, the differences between what Trump is saying and what's going to happen are phenomenal. So so far, the Pentagon has put the cost of this war at only $29 billion. But yesterday, they asked for another $80 billion in defense money. So obviously, this is a ridiculous number. There are a bunch of private forecasts out there that go anywhere from $132 billion, but they go all the way up to a trillion dollars for this war. And again, this doesn't even include necessarily the $300 billion,

would it be, for that fund, but it includes all sorts of other costs like veterans benefits, interest on the extra debt that we're going to accumulate, rebuilding American facilities overseas that have been damaged in this war. So what has been talked about is a $29 billion war could end up being a trillion dollar war, which is very similar to what happened in Iraq. And then I want to just make one last point, which is, in terms of collateral damage, so to speak, we unfroze, or we allowed Russia to charge full market price for its oil during this period while the war was going on to get oil into the world economy. And the consequence of that is that the Russians got $22 billion more in oil revenue than they would

have gotten, had the cap on their oil price that we imposed on stayed in place. And so inadvertently, or as I said, as collateral damage, the Russians now have $22 billion, more to fight Ukraine with. David, when you see these numbers, I mean, up to potentially, according to Harvard, a trillion dollars for the war, you see the polling showing that the war is unpopular. And yet the White House's calculation is that people are not going to really look at the details of all of the charts that Steve has produced for us this morning. All they're going to look at is the price of filling up their car when they pass by the

petrol pump. Do you think Trump will pay a political price in the long run for what is a, what is a what has been something of a fiasco for America? I do. The polling is pretty clear that the country isn't comfortable with having gone to war and Iran, doesn't see the benefits. Trump, let's not forget, it was elected as a candidate who's going to stop these wars in the Middle East, would pull back from these adventures. And I think it's really going to cost him at the polls in November. It's going to cost the Republicans for some time now. People simply don't believe.

that the benefits are real. We've talked about the $300 billion that might be part of this cost. We should remember that's on paper. I mean, in a sense, it would be nice if there was a clear plan to actually spend money and have a plan for a different Iran. There isn't. I mean, that's a notional fund. Saudis have said they're not going to put money into it.

The Emirati is the same thing. but I think in terms of public perceptions, this is going to be seen as a war like Iraq, like Afghanistan, where we spent a lot and got a little. Yeah, I mean, this data that Steve's put together is pretty comprehensive and thorough and convincing, but has he considered Trump's counter argument that it was a great war? No, okay. I agree with David. I think this is problematic for Trump politically.

And honestly, we're in chapter one, right? I mean, this is a 60 AMOU. There's tons of negotiations that's still to be done. The first three days have been interesting, to be honest with you, because we have declarations for the American side that are within 12 hours refuted by the Iranian side. Everything from the straightforward moves to the IA inspectors. I think, and with stipulation that Americans

don't always rarely vote on foreign policy, I do think that we're going to have another inflection point when a deal has to be announced. because at that point, you can't really continue to, I mean, you're going to try, but you can't really continue to spin the specifics. Right now, Trump can say, well, this is just to get us to a point of conversation, and J.D. Vance can say that. But at a certain point, the Iranians will get the money. They'll do stuff with it that we probably don't like. We'll know if the straight-of-form was being told or not. The oil tankers will have to pay it. And I think the American public will say, fully informally, was this worth it?

And as of now, every polling data indicates that they don't believe it was worth it. One of the one that we showed this morning, he showed only 25% of Americans think it was worth it. I will say, for all of those who loves, oh, you know, Americans don't vote on foreign policy. I will just remind them, Joe Biden was over 50% in his presidency until the fiasco in Afghanistan, that fiasco of withdrawal. Then he dropped below 50%. Go back to 2004.

Republicans win the White House. Coral Rove talks about a permanent majority. Iraq goes sideways. Two years later in 2006, Nancy Pelosi becomes the first woman to be Speaker of the House, and the Democrats are swept into power. So much for that permanent majority. Why did it go? Because of Iraq. Why did Joe Biden go below 50% for good?

Because of Afghanistan. So to think that only 25% of the people support this war and think we won the war. and think we won this war, and you have the numbers that Steve's showing that the MOU says, and we're going to give them up to half a trillion dollars, the Iranians, that that's just politically toxic. All right. The Washington Post-David Ignatius, thank you very, very much for coming on this morning. And still ahead on morning, Joe, there is growing controversies surrounding one of the winners

from Tuesday's primary elections in New York. We'll go through the past statements from Democratic Socialist Daryalisa Avelas Chivalier, Now being scrutinized and the criticism she's facing. Morning, Joe, we'll be right back. Ooh, so pretty New York City this morning. 65 in the morning, welcome back. One of the biggest upsets. In Tuesday night's primary elections came in New York's 13th congressional district

where a 32-year-old Democratic Socialist, Darya Alisa Avila Chevalier, managed to beat incumbent congressman Adriano Espelat. But Chevalier, who is backed by New York City, Mayor Zoran Mamdani has been facing scrutiny now over previously articulated stances and numerous social media posts that she's since deleted. Plus her appearance at a rally the day after Hamas's attack on Israel on October the 7th, 2023, where attendees reportedly suggested the attack was justified. In now deleted social media posts between 2018 and 2022, Chevalio also used expletives to refer to former vice president Kamala Harris and the Democratic National Committee

and expressed support for abolishing police, prisons and borders, as well as seizing private property, and calling into question Israel's right to exist. Other reports noted she called former President Joe Biden a rapist and disparaged white people in some of her posts. Chevalier has said she regrets the posts and says she has, quote, grown considerably since writing them, I'm thinking a little bit of Graham Platner.

There are posts for everything, but are Democrats running into a world where they are nominating candidates who are exciting the base, but have a history that may come back to haunt them. It's possible, but we also live in an age of Donald Trump being president, and he has said, more things than I can count

that would have disqualified candidates of the past. Perhaps we're moving into a new era, certainly in the New York Post, gives its thoughts about these candidates. The Wall Street Journal, another Rupert Burnock-owned organization, their editorial board, has a new piece headlined, The Socialist Democrats of America. And it reads in part this way. It's tempting to dismiss Tuesday's primary sweep

by the Democratic Socialists of America, the DSA, as an artifact of weird New York City. It is that, but also more. The victories by Mayor Zohran Mamd Donnie's slate of leftists will change the Democratic Party and perhaps the politics of the country. It's hard to overstate how far to the left the Mamdani slate is. Abercois, who won the primary for a state Senate seat, has said she found it reprehensible to apologize for 9-11 when America hasn't apologized for its system of capitalism and racism

and white supremacy. We guess she won't be going to the 25th anniversary ceremony at grounds Darya Lisa Avila Chevalier, who ousted Rep Adjano Espayat, was a leader of the anti-Israel protests at Columbia University after the 2023 Hamas massacre. She was for Hamas. She has called for abolishing police, prisons and borders. She called Joe Biden a rapist, a war criminal, and says the U.S. has occupied Native American land and called the country an effing disgrace. She favors seizing private property.

The DSA is a growing force and has already kept. captured the mayor's office in Washington, D.C., New York, and maybe soon Los Angeles. Bernie Sanders is closer to achieving his dream of capturing the Democratic Party for the left through a younger generation. Republicans may gloat about this far-left Democratic turn, but that is a mistake. Perhaps it will help them keep some House seats this year, but it bodes ill for democracy when the party of the center left swings even harder left, and many Trump Republicans are also dabbling with socialist ideas. So, Joe, we talked about this for a little bit yesterday, too.

I mean, certainly the Post and Journal have their opinions. But, you know, this is candidates for certain communities, certain districts, certain states do not necessarily represent the national party. And we should, again, reflect on the idea of how far to the right Republicans have swung in the age of Trump. This isn't just the phenomenon for one party here. No, no, it's certainly not a phenomenon for one party. And of course, Republicans attacking Democrats for shocking social media posts from four or five years ago, of course, would be exactly what they would do. Democrats would do the same thing.

But still, it's not just the Wall Street Journal that is expressing concerns. Sam Stein, I want to read you. This is Michelle Goldberg from yesterday in her column. She said last week in interview with the New York Times editorial board, a group of veteran journalists who questioned local and civic leaders asked the candidate whether she opposed all deportations. She said she opposed all deportations. Even those of violent criminals, she's a prison abolitionist. She could, she couldn't or wouldn't answer repeated questions about whether even murderers should be incarcerated. Sam Stein, call me crazy.

This doesn't look like the way forward for Democrats, not only in middle America, but in New York City. Yeah, I mean, murderers should be incarcerated. I don't think that that's controversial. You shouldn't. He'll just say it. Look at Sam. That's courage.

Was that, are you? Courage, as Dan Rather would say. You go, man, you go. Thank you. Maybe I should just leave the set on that high note. Also, I would say don't cheer Hamas the day or week after what happened on October 7th. It's deeply problematic and reprehensible to a lot of people in this country who are Jewish and who are legitimately fearful about what's happening. So obviously there are positions being taken here that are troubling. And if you look in a larger sense, they're going to be used to paint every single Democrat in the House. That would be disingenuous, of course. But it's true. It will happen. I will say this, a couple things.

One is on the issue of social media posts. She should be held to account for them, but we also should recognize that in this modern day and age, it's not just that everyone has social media posts that they're embarrassed by, but young people, a lot, have social media posts that they're going to be embarrassed by. It doesn't negate your responsibility for them, but I do think we need to contextualize this. And then secondarily, I do think the journals, um, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, are a lot of On the sorry their editorial, and this is largely correct.

I will say this, though. It leaves out some context that I think is important, which is that this is somewhat, and if not totally confined to major cities, right? It's D.C., where we are at currently, and New York City, which had these elections on Tuesday night. But there are plenty of examples where the Democratic Party in this election cycle has not veered heavily left, like the editorial implies, including in New York City. Ritchie Torres won his primary, for instance. You go across the Hudson.

Mickey Sherrill's the governor. That's not DSA Democrats, right? Even on Tuesday night in other states in Utah, for instance, there was not a, you know, a DSA Democratic uprising in Salt Lake City. That would be kind of remarkable. But the Democrats have been somewhat pragmatic in places outside New York. It doesn't mean that Zoroamandhi doesn't have a power center. Doesn't mean that it is interesting and noteworthy. and potentially problematic that the party's veering to the left.

But I think holistically, you can't jump to conclusions right away. Yeah, and in fact, to that point, Sam, in just a few minutes, we're going to be joined by the Democratic candidate, a veteran, who was their nominee to challenge Mike Lawler in his upstate New York district here. So certainly one size does not fit all. Let's bring into the conversation, opinion writer at the New York Times, Mara Gay. Mara, your thoughts, I mean, certainly some of these stances that she has expressed in the past are abhorrent, and or nonsensical.

But speak to us about what you're seeing here, this energy from the left, and that includes in New York City, whereas Zohran Mabdani is playing a bit of a kingmaker. Yeah, I mean, first of all, those statements are indefensible and she knows it, which is why she's apologized. Yes, she was younger. But at the same time, and you hope to see more, frankly, from congressional candidates, from people serving in Congress. But I also just want to say that, as you pointed out, in this environment of Trump and Trumpism, people say a lot of offensive things and you also have to look at what they do. I think I want to pull back here. I want to push back against this idea that New York City's electorate is somehow exceptional from the rest of the country. Certainly, every district is not going to be representative of the entire country. You could say the same thing about a district in Iowa. Okay. But the voters did make a decision. And Chivalry, won college-educated voters. She won young voters. She won black voters. She lost Hispanic voters and lower-income voters, but won 40 percent of them. And so there is something to be said for

letting the voters have their say. At the same time, you know, these are not voters who are interested in prison abolition. I think the larger context here is that many Americans, not just Democrats see that the Democratic establishment has failed to win elections in a way that makes their life better and to prevent Donald Trump from gaining power. And they feel that Democrats have failed, establishment Democrats have failed to serve them in their everyday lives. And so they're taking a chance on something new, on a different option. And I think the DSA, you know, while I'm certainly not a socialist at the same time, they are introducing competition into Democratic prime elections where there was very little competition. And that's what voters are interested in.

That's what they're responding to. Right now in the Democratic Party, the competition is coming from the left. That's especially true in New York, also in Michigan with Abdul-Sayed. You know, there are other places in the country where competition may not come from the left, but more competition is good for democracy. And I think we should let the voters have their set. All right. So Steve joins us at the table now. You have a chart looking at how the three primary winners, backed by Mayor Mom Donnie, underperformed among voters who are less educated and less wealthy, to sort of the point that Mara was just making, take us through it. Yeah, so this is interesting and maybe counterintuitive in terms of how the voters chose

between the insurgent candidate and the establishment candidate. What you find when you look at this chart, which is up on the screen right now, and I'm going to try to explain it from here, is the vertical access is the percent of people who had bachelor's degrees or higher. And this, by the way, incorporates 1,100 different precincts across New York in terms of the data. So all three of those congressional districts that we're talking about. Across the bottom, you have median income. So all the way from no income to the right $250,000 of income. And the blue is the places where the insurgent won by large margins and then as in the light blue, they won by smaller margins and the same with the red. So what's interesting here is that

the insurgents did least well among the people who you would expect to be the most supportive of them, i.e. people with less education and less income. And the biggest support for the insurgents came from people with more education and higher incomes. And the only other thing I'd point out in the upper right corner, if you can see a little tiny bit of light blue, those are the highest income, highest educated precincts like Fifth Avenue, for example. They still supported the insurgent, a much smaller margin. So at the two extremes, you have less support for the insurgents, and so much of it is coming from basically people who are well-educated and make a good bit of money. And the people who you would expect to get the most benefit from it are, in fact,

least likely to support these insurgents. And this, of course, mirrors a little bit, Donald Trump and the famous white working class voters who supported him, at least then, even though there's not a single thing in Trump's policies or practices that actually help them. All right, Morning Joe, economic analyst Steve Ratner. Thank you very much. And coming up, as Jonathan mentioned, the Democratic nominee for the race for New York's 17th U.S. congressional district, Kate Conley, is standing by. We'll discuss her bid to unseat Republican Congressman Mike Lawler this November. Morning Joe is coming right back.