Morning Joe - Fact checking VP JD Vance's statements on Iran war, oil crisis

Episode Date: September 4, 2026

September 4, 2026 – 6am:o   VP JD Vance refuses to call Iran war a ‘war’ or give timeline for end to fightingo   POLITICO: Republicans accept that Iran war will last past electionso   Work on Trump’s arch to begin within two weekso   Trump to Supreme Court: Allow mail-in voting restrictionso  ‘American Scoundrel’: New biography of notorious political fixer Roy Cohno   Fox Business Host Maria Bartiromo ‘parts way’ with network 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.

America has fought a lot of wars since I've been alive, 42 years, and we have won almost none of them until Donald J. Trump became the President of the United States. Will this war be over by the time of the midterm elections? Well, Caitlin, again, I don't, I wouldn't call it a war. Right now, there is no active shooting. I recognize there have been places where this is flared up. Major combat operations, again, major combat operations lasted for about six weeks. Vice President J.D. Vance playing press secretary at the White House yesterday, praising President Trump for winning a war, then moments later claiming it's no longer a war. Good morning. Welcome to morning, Joe. It's Friday, September 4th, with us,

the co-host of our 8 a.m. Our staff writer at the Atlantic, Jonathan Lemire, MS Now, Senior National Security Reporter, David Road, managing editor at the bulwark, Sam Stein, and White House correspondent for Bloomberg, Jeff Mason. A lot to get to this morning. David, I want to start with you just to pick through a little bit of what we heard. There's a lot to go through with what Vice President Van Settysed yesterday in the White House briefing room. But let's start with the idea that we are not currently engaged in a war. The word war is one that's been used many, many times by President Trump over these last seven months. But there has been active fire just in the last couple of days.

Look, there are 50,000 service members serving across that region right now. Just give us the scale of this. There are 19 naval ships. There are several squadrons of airplanes. There's air battery units. There's thousands of paratroopers. And so you can get into a legalist, a guardian, but this is obviously a war. And then what was extraordinary was that he sort of mentioned flare-ups so that there's no active shooting.

Two days earlier, the United States carried out attacks and retaliation for Iranian efforts to mine the Strait of Hormuz. And the Times had a very deep dive on us. We don't have this confirmed ourselves. But it does look like an American bomb hit. and I believe it was a mistake, a house where a wedding was occurring, five people were killed, some of them children, it's my understanding, and dozens of people were injured. So to sort of call that a flare-up, you've just had this whole, you know, the experience of the Lincoln, the longest ever deployments, the only, sorry, there's no American aircraft carrier. We had to send the one we had

near Taiwan into the strait to replace the Lincoln. So to play this down, to say we're not at war, stunning to me. And then just lastly, the point about we're not at war, but by the way, the president now are winning wars because of President Donald J. Trump. George H.W. Bush would disagree. He, in terms of no presidents ever winning wars, recently at least, you know, he successfully drove Iraqi forces out of Kuwait. He invaded Panama and arrested that country's leader. I'll leave it there. But it's just extraordinary to say we don't have a war and then say every past president for the last 40 years has been a failure. As long as we're talking about wars, going back to 84, the Cold War comes to mind as well.

18 American service members so far killed in this war with Iran. Hundreds more have been injured. Our Gulf neighbors have been attacked across the region and on and on and on. So as you heard there, Vice President Vance yesterday did reject the use of the word war to describe what's going on in Iran. Those comments came hours after Iran fired at U.S. ally Kuwait in retaliation for American strikes on Iranian targets earlier this week. The vice president also refused to provide a timeline for when the conflict may end and steered clear of predicting when rising gas prices may return to pre-war levels. Will this war be over by the time of the midterm elections? Well, Caitlin, again, I don't, I wouldn't call it a war. Right now, there is no active shooting.

I recognize there have been places where this is flared up. Major combat operations, again, major combat operations lasted for about six weeks. And since then, we destroyed, of course, their nuclear facilities with midnight hammer. With Epic Fury, we destroyed their defense industrial base for producing weapons and also a lot of their conventional military. And then we made it harder for them to rebuild that nuclear program. But when you ask, when will this end? You're asking me a question, like, when will the Iranians stop shooting at ships? I think the reality is, I don't know the answer to that question.

You would have to ask the Iranians. We're not going to set an artificial timeline because, let's just say, hypothetically, let's say I told you three months. Let's say I told you three days, okay? And then the Iranians start blowing up oil and gas ships, and the United States is the only country with the capability to ensure that those oil and gas ships get to market. Well, what I would say is it would be irresponsible for us to write out our strategy in our timeline for an Iranian nation that simply cannot honor its commitments and cannot stop shooting

at commercial ships. On July 2nd, Treasury Secretary Bessent was asked when Americans could see $3 gas again. And he said, maybe by Labor Day. Things haven't worked out that way. But do you have a new timetable for Americans on when they could expect lower gas prices? And should they not expect to see $3 gas again until at least 2027? Well, in defense of Scott, he said maybe by Labor Day because we're talking about things that are inherently unpredictable. And I think it's important, you know, I'm a strong believer that the American people are our fellow citizens and we should speak with them honestly about these things.

And the fundamental reality is that the reason gas prices are so high right now is because the Iranians are shooting at commercial shipping. Gas, frankly, could have been much, much higher were it not for our efforts. But I'm not going to make a promise about when it's going to return to $3. What I will say is that we have to remember, why are we doing this? Number one, it's so that Iran never has a nuclear weapon. And number two, what we're doing right now is protecting commercial shipping in order to ensure that we don't have a worldwide energy crisis. Well, this morning, the price of diesel fuel is at an all-time high. The average is 585 a gallon because diesel is the primary fuel for freight and delivery networks.

Consumers likely will face higher prices as businesses across all sectors have to pay for those rising transportation costs. while the average price for a gallon of gas, back up to $4.15. That's nearly a dollar more than it was at this time last year. So Jonathan Lemire, we had Secretary Besson a couple days ago blaming Ukraine for rising gas prices. This is the problem with JD Vance and others trying to explain away the war and try to put out this cloud of misinformation about what's really going on. Americans watch it every day when they go to the gas station. They see the price of gas and they know it's because of the war in Iran. Yeah, we've been chronicling this since the war began, whether it was President Bill Clinton or top members of Joe Biden's administration, they would say almost the first thing they would check

every day was the price of gas because it is so visible. It's on these billboards that dot the side of American highways, American major roads, consumers, drivers, voters, Americans know the price of gas because they're either actually filling up their car or at the very least they're driving by it. And they can chart whether it's going up or down. And it is definitely. up. And the vice president there, you know, is a bit of a show. He's certainly performative in the briefing room, combative at times. He also took a swipe at Ted Cruz, which I found interesting, considering in the wake of news that Cruz himself might be looking at a 2028 presidential run, which we certainly assume Vice President Vance will be as well. But Jeff Mason, he had no good answers about this war

because they don't have any good answers about this war. The president and his team have been trying to to wind this down for months. You know, we had a couple of days of violence earlier this week. It slowed some, but as the advance is right, it could perk up at any time. It does seem like they're focusing the Americans on the straight of Fomuus. They're like, that needs to be the goal. We need to get the straight open. It's true.

A little more oil is getting, fuel is getting through there than previously, but still nowhere near where it needs to be to actually have any meaningful impact on energy prices. In fact, as Willie just read, they're going the other direction. They're going the other direction, and they're going the other direction at the wrong time. And you can see the president and the vice president trying to shift a little bit into campaign mode heading into the midterm elections. We understand the president's going to do a lot more travel. The vice president is out auditioning a little bit in that briefing room yesterday.

But as you say, John, they don't have a strong answer on Iran. And Caitlin asked him about a timeline. I mean, the president sort of laid out a timeline at the very beginning of the conflict and said four to six weeks. and now we're more than half a year in. So there's a reason that people are asking. Promises were made at the beginning of this conflict by the administration, or at least forecasts were made. And the president used to say, I'm ready for a deal,

or we're going to get this wrapped up quickly, or I think the Iranians are going to make a deal. All of that has proven not to be true. That has had an impact on the markets. It's had an impact on energy prices, and it's going to have an impact at the voting booth. Sam's time. I'm sure you've been hearing what Politico has been hearing,

speaking with Republican campaigns, operatives. Reporting, many of them have come to grudgingly accept the Iran war will, in fact, last, well past the November election and that gas prices will remain stubbornly high. We're seeing a lot of this. We're hearing White House staff talking about lawyers that they're going to hire to get ready for the Democratic takeover, at least to the House of Representatives, all the investigations that may follow. But in terms of voting, this Iran war and these high gas prices now, Republicans are saying out loud, unlikely to go away by the midterms.

Yeah, but you see, Willie, if you don't call it a war, it goes away. That's what you got to do. Wish it away. Okay. Yeah, just switch it away. Actually, this is a pretty remarkable, a press briefing by Vance. When he says things like this was inherently unpredictable and the U.S. is the only country that can have with the capacity to open the straits and we are doing this to protect

commercial shipping, he is alighting the fact that he was the one. who negotiated or tried to negotiate the memorandum of understanding to bring an end to the war. When he's talking about the, we can't have a time frame on this. There was a time frame. It was a 60-day time frame under the memorandum of understanding to end the war. And it failed. It was his diplomatic failure, which is why we are in this place. And at one point in the press conference, he said something akin to, you know,

it's irresponsible of the Europeans for not helping us reopen the strait because their energy prices depend on what's happening in the strait, too. and it's almost as if he's just trying to evade utter responsibility for being an administration that launched this war. This is a war of choice. And it's because it's a war of choice. It's because it's got no end in sight. It's because it is inherently unpredictable.

And it's because there is no defined purpose to it that it's becoming a political liability in November. It would be one thing if we could say, yeah, this is the objective, this is the time frame. We recognize their sacrifices to make, but here's why we're doing it. But he can't do that now. He can't even call it a war now. And that becomes impossible to sell politically.

And John, the president has come all the way back around to talking about regime change again and the people of Iran needing to rise up against now these more extreme leaders that have taken over the country after the United States and Israel took out the leadership all those months back. Also, the president has harped on the idea that Iran must never get a nuclear weapon. Well, yesterday in that news briefing, J.D. Vant said, we took out their nuclear capabilities with Operation Midnight Hammer a year and a half ago. Right. So if that is true, why do we go into this conflict in the first place?

And this is, I mean, as you just said, Willie, and again, this, from day one, the administration has not been able to offer the American people a coherent reasoning as to why they went to war with Iran. And it is indeed a war. The goals have shifted. David wrote, as I ask you to The SEC, Dave Road, has been chronicling since day one, how the checklist, have we've achieved none of it. None of the goals, and they changed by the day, it seemed, has actually been accomplished by the administration, which is partially why, A, it hasn't gone well because there hasn't been a real clear sense of directive remission. But B, why the American people don't like it. The poll, and polls suggest it has been unpopular since the beginning and continues to grow more so because voters across this country, and it seems like, Those in red and blue states simply don't know why we're doing this.

And they're only seeing bad consequences, rising prices, a more hardline regime in Iran, rather than anything good coming out of it, David. And it also points to right now a real spotlight on the Pentagon. Like this comes this week as Army Secretary Driscoll resigns. And while doing so, says to the president he's concerned about the readiness in the military. We have seen general after general either being fired or passed over for deserving promotions. We have seen Hegseff consolidating power. We've seen a lack of munitions. You know, and that's the part of this is as much as I think Trump politically doesn't want

to escalate hostilities. He kind of can't, even if he wanted to, because we may not be able to defend our allies and assets in the region from the inevitable Iran counterattack. We, that's the problem is that they're able to attack all these allies of ours across the region. And the broader theme here and, you know, Vance is the frontrunner for the next presidential race is to essentially try to lie your way out of the problem. I mean, he did that repeatedly. I was surprised on many different levels. One other fact check was he sort of said,

well, and last night, you know, 15 million barrels of oils, you know, are coming out of the straight and made it sound like that was happening every day. The estimate, before the war, it was 20 million barrels a day. 15 was a high. And the average, you know, in the last few weeks,

has been, according to companies that track this, has been about 8 million barrels of oil. So there was just tons of false statements, yesterday from the vice president, and that's what was so surprising. Again, the most basic one is it's all the Iranians' fault that keep shooting at these ships. We chose, Donald Trump chose, and Donald Trump ignored J.D. Vance's advice. That's the other part of this, is defend the president, don't offend the president, you know, and also don't attack Pete Hegseth, apparently. But the president chose to kill the Iranian leadership, launch a war alongside Israel, and that's

why Iran has seized control of the Strait of Hormuz. and Jady Vance joined the President of the United States yesterday at that briefing and saying no, we control the straight report moves, something that's objectively untrue. MS now, senior national security reporter, David wrote, David, thanks as always.

Still ahead on morning, Joe. President Trump again is asking the Supreme Court to allow his restrictions on voting by mail. What, the latest in that legal effort ahead of the midterms. Plus, the administration is moving forward with plans for that 250-foot triumphs.

as they're calling it there in Washington. That's despite a federal lawsuit, they are ready to break ground on this thing, what we're learning about the construction. And as we go to break, a look at the Travelers forecast this morning and for the Labor Day weekend from Ackyweather's Bernie Raynow.

Bernie, how's it looking out there? Willie, one more steamy day before relief from the heat and humidity arrives this weekend, some drenching heavy thunderstorms. Washington, D.C., Richmond, into the Carolinas, spotty shower, thunderstorm, Philadelphia, New York City, fog will give way to sunshine in Boston, hot in Chicago with a spotty thunderstorm as well. Southeast, not much change, drenching thunderstorms across Florida this afternoon, just spotty thunderstorms in East Texas. Not many delays to talk about Boston this morning, Philadelphia, Miami this afternoon.

To help you make the best decisions and be more in the know, download Yakwether app today. Beautiful live picture of Washington at 620 on this Friday morning of Labor Day weekend. Construction on President Trump's controversial triumphal arch in Washington is set to begin within days. Interior Secretary Doug Bergam made the announcement yesterday on social media, writing preparations are currently underway to begin excavation work over the next two weeks. President Trump first unveiled plans last October to build the 250-foot arch near Arlington National Cemetery and the Lincoln Memorial, saying it would be taller than the Arc de Triumph in Paris.

The administration has said the monument is intended to commemorate the nation's 250th anniversary. Project facing a federal lawsuit, though, brought by three veterans and an architectural historian. They argue the administration lacks the required congressional authorization. The project was never approved by the Capital Planning Commission. The Justice Department is seeking to have the case dismissed. So Jonathan Lemire, this is kind of a whiff of the ballroom, which is just keep going, try to outrun the courts, break ground, start building. And by the time they catch up to you, it's halfway done and there's no turning back. But this is kind of the arch that no one asked for except for President Trump.

How do you suspect this is going to end? And how's it going over in Washington? I mean, this arch is an obscenity. That's a sacred place between Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery. the monument to President Lincoln and then across the river, where he's almost in conversation with some of the soldiers there who served him as commander chief and then subsequent commanders in chief. That is one of the, the cemetery, Willie, as you well know,

is arguably the most hollowed ground in these United States. And this arch will completely obscure views of it. It's not just taller than the Ark of Triumph. It will be twice the size of the Arctic Triumph. It is an arch that no one wants, except for President Trump. It is legally dubious whether he even has the authority to build this thing. I would argue it's far worse than the ballroom. The ballroom is really bad.

That's the people's house. And he has raised it down. And I think you're right. The strategy here is just build it and then claim it's too far along to stop. But Jeff Mason, I think this is something people were very angry about the White House. People will be very angry about this. I think people are missing that, first of all, the arched. there will completely change the look of Washington. It will be one of the tallest structures in a low-rise

city. It will change the view of the mall. It will change the view of these important, sacred places. And I would suspect that a lot of Democratic presidential candidates will say, yeah, when I take the oath of office on January 20th, 2029, were I to win? One of the sounds you hear in the background are the jack cameras knocking that thing down. I'll be real curious to see how Democratic candidates respond to that, because surely they'll be asked, what do you do about all the things that the president has changed. One of the reasons, I think, the strategy that the president has employed has been just go forward with the ballroom, with the arch, with the Kennedy Center, as he hasn't faced challenges. And in many ways, construction is different from domestic policy

or foreign policy, that a new administration can come in and just chart their own course and do their own thing. When he's building something like this ballroom, it's pretty hard unless, you know, a candidate comes in, really wants to tear it down with a crane. and with a wrecking ball, it's hard to undo. So that has, I mean, in some ways, that was part of, I think, the administration's argument when I went to the Supreme Court about the ballroom is, we've already got 65% of it built. You can't tell us to turn around. And now they're going to do the same thing with the arch.

They're not waiting for congressional approval. They're just going to go ahead and start. Sam's tie, just to give people some perspective, the Lincoln Memorial is about 100 feet tall. We're talking 250 feet tall for this. arc to triumph or whatever they're calling it here in Washington. But again, it raises the question, I guess it's now a rhetorical one or a fuel question. Where is Congress in this? Where is Congress when we start wars? Where is Congress when tariffs are levied? Where is Congress when President Trump unilaterally decides to kind of deface the nation's capital? And it's not a rhetorical question. It's also a

legal one because with the Supreme Court case in the ballroom, one of the reasons the Supreme Court basically said, yeah, you can go on and continue the construction of the bottom is that the people who were suing for its stoppage. They didn't have standing. They couldn't produce evidence they had suffered material harm from it. But Congress could have, because Congress is the one by law that has to authorize the construction of the bottom. And in this case, I imagine that would be the same with the arc. You know, look, is Jonathan right? Yes, it is grotesque. It's imperial. It is a manifestation of ego, all of the above. I would maybe dispute whether it's worse than bulldozing the East Wing, but it's close.

You know, it's right up there. Does it matter materially to voters? And I actually think it does, not because voters are going to look at this and say, oh my God, what's he doing? This is so ridiculous. He's ruining the D.C. skyline. It's a hollowed ground. He's messing up.

But because precisely the contrast that exists, where their lines, are not getting better. They're paying more for gas. They are suffering. They want affordability to be tackled. And he seems utterly distracted by all these vanity projects. And there was a story, and it might have been in the Atlantic, and Jonathan would know this better, but Dan Driscoll, who was resigning his Army Secretary, apparently went into the Oval Office to talk about all the things that he was witnessing at the Pentagon and the problems that he was seeing there in the low morale and and all the issues arising from Pete Hex at the firing all these people. And you got in there, he started talking to Trump.

Apparently Trump all just wanted to focus on the ballroom. And if you see that the president is distracted by renovation projects while you are struggling to make ends meet, that's the political problem. Not so much the building or the demolition. It's the contrast. No, I think that's right. I mean, obviously these projects in the ballroom, the arch, are things that are offensive to many people. And indeed, the conversation with Secretary Driscoll and others. There have been other

reports of meetings with President Trump about certain policy topics, and he keeps diverting the tension back to whatever his latest construction problem is. Our friend Maggie Haberman was with us the other day and said that, you know, she's been told by people around him that half or more of his conversation, seemingly his mental energy right now is based, is focused on these, on these projects. And to Sam's point, that to the voters indicates that he's distracted, that he does not have their priorities in mind. And remember, he was elected over anything else to bring the costs down, to bring prices down, and voters concede. That's not happening. And it seems like it's one thing to try and fail. If Trump was trying and failing to bring these

policies down, to them, it seems like he's not even trying. He doesn't even care. Because this is the easy stuff to sit at your desk and order sycophants to build things in your honor, ending wars and bringing prices down. That's the hard part about being a president. The Trump administration, meanwhile, is again asking the Supreme Court to allow new restrictions on mail-in voting, a move that potentially could affect millions of voters in the upcoming November midterms. The emergency appeal filed yesterday comes after a federal judge in Boston recently blocked parts of the president's executive order from going into effect. The Supreme Court, they'll remember, previously allowed the president's plan to move ahead, but has not to

decided whether it was legal. It was a question of standing in that case. The Trump administration is urging the High Court to intervene now due to the fast approaching midterms. Under the controversial order, Trump signed in March, the U.S. Postal Service would set standards for ballot mail envelopes and states must submit lists of verified voters. The Postal Service then can refuse to deliver ballots that do not meet the new rules or bear the name of a voter who is not on one of their lists. Sam, just to bottom line this, this administration comes up with a list of voters who they believe should be allowed to vote. They use the U.S. Postal Service stack with a board of governors.

It's their appointees, many of them election deniers, and prohibit certain people based on their standards from voting in an American election. It's crazy. I mean, it's crazy that we would turn over this much election infrastructure to the postmaster general. I mean, what are we talking about? It's blatantly, seems to me blatantly unconstitutional, but beyond that, operationally, it's insane. And there's a recent whistleblower report that was uncovered by Democrats in Congress that said it gets even worse than that.

They're doing these batch of mail-in ballots and something like if there's 10,000 ballots a batch. And if one of them is erroneous or filled out wrong or the bar core code doesn't quite scan because, I don't know, the ink was blotted. Then all 10,000 of those ballots would be invalidated in that batch. This is chaos waiting to happen, but that's the point, right? Trump has this entire vendetta against mail-in-voting. He doesn't want people to trust the elections. He doesn't want people to vote in the election. And so what do you do?

You create chaos. You create confusion. You throw up roadblocks. And then when things don't go particularly well, you say, well, I tried to bring order. but, you know, the Supreme Court didn't uphold this directive I had for the Postmaster General, or Congress didn't pass the SAVE Act to ensure that only U.S. citizens are voting. And then you say, that's why I lost. And maybe we shouldn't seat these people because we can't trust this election.

Look, the Supreme Court did indeed allow this to go forward on standing grounds because the rules had not been implemented and they said no one had been actually harmed. The rules are now posted. I'll be eager to see what the court does here. is a real tinderbox. And if they were to allow us go forward, it could have incredible ramifications on our elections and our trusted democracy. I mean, Jeff, I think everything Sam just said there was right. And I'll note he did so with a snazzy new beard. Jeff, I mean, this is, you know, this is the point here. The point is to disenfranchise voters. It's to so distrust. And it is,

as Sam said, that, you know, he can even claim these results are invalid. if they don't go the way he wants. And certainly Republicans right now feel like, well, they're in some trouble this fall. The House seems lost privately. GOP aides and officials will admit that. And the Senate's a true toss-up. So this is the point.

It's a continuation of the big lie. It's a continuation of what Trump did in 2020 when he claims that elections can't be trusted. There, he was saying, well, they're stolen for me. I won. He didn't. And here, they're preemptively trying to get American voters to feel like, well, we can't believe in the process,

so maybe I shouldn't vote at all, or I shouldn't trust who wins. You know, there's a through line that goes even further back. The president raised concerns or false concerns about whether Barack Obama was a legitimate president. It's a constant theme for him. He throws out questions about the legitimacy of elections, and now that he has the power that he does,

is, as Sam said, is trying to create chaos with some of these policies. I would also add with regard to the executive order and the USPS. It's September. And the Supreme Court hasn't weighed in on the legality of this. I mean, talk about chaos. There's just not time to implement what would be a massive new electoral system, really, by handing that kind of power over to the U.S. Postal Service. And that is also clearly part of the strategy. Just throw it out there now, create this confusion. And by the way, there are some states, including my home state of Colorado, that use mail and vote.

writ large for the whole state, for the whole election. So what does that mean for them? And I think it also raises the question, and we'd need a legal scholar to talk about this, about constitutionality when it's states that are supposed to run their own elections. So how do you justify in any way handing over this kind of authority to a federal agency?

And, Willie, we, of course, had the Attorney General of Colorado on our air earlier this week who stressed, yes, as Jeff said, that so many voters there use it, but also stressed that for cycle after cycle It is safe and fraud-free. It is a reliable way to vote. Colorado, many other states, too.

Yeah, we've seen that in study after study after studying. To Jeff's point about the urgency of this, mail-in ballots went out in North Carolina yesterday. The process has already begun. White House correspondent for Bloomberg. Jeff Mason, Jeff, thanks so much. We always appreciate it. Coming up, our next guest is profiling someone he calls a scheming con man

who could always escape the consequences and helped to shape the modern political era. Pulitzer Prize-winning co-author of American Scoundrel, Roy Cohn's Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump joins us straight ahead on Morning Joe. I want to be prepared to the teeth. If I have a witness on a stand for an adversary, I want to know everything about that witness from the year one,

every application he filed for a driver's license to show inconsistencies, to show tendencies which demonstrate lack of creativity, which demonstrate lack of credibility. I don't go for this theory that my magnetic personality or my puffness is going to win over a jury or a judge. There isn't anything I would not do because I believe there's only one answer

in an adversary profession like law, and that is winning. That is a clip from a 1979 interview with Roy Cohn described in a new book as a street fighter, a self-promoting hustler, and a scheming con man. The new biography, American Scounder, Roy Cohn's dark journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump details the life of the notorious political fixer and attorney and sheds new light on a key figure

who has been called the mastermind behind the current arc of American political life. Because that includes the rise of Donald Trump, Cohn's impact still being felt today. Joining us now, the author of American Scoundrel, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian biographer Kai Bird. I'm so glad to have you on the show this morning. Boy, when you read through your book, And you look at the way Roy Cohn did business.

We see it playing out every day, including this morning and many of the stories we're talking about under the Trump administration. So Roy Cone's life, obviously we know about the red scare, the lavender scare. He was kind of at the center of all these moments in American history. But he meets Donald Trump in 1973. What did he see in a young Donald Trump that made him think he could shape this person? Well, that's a good question. They met in October of 73 at LaClaude, a private dining establishment here in Midtown Manhattan. And Trump went over, the young 27-year-old Trump went over to Roy Cohn and introduced himself.

He recognized Roy as the mob lawyer. And Trump was involved in a lawsuit at that point. He was being sued by the feds for racial discrimination in the Trump organization's apartments in Queens. And Roy told them, well, you know, you should fight it. You should sue the feds. Sue them for $100 million defamation. And of course, Trump loved that advice. And they bonded.

And he, you know, Roy saw in Trump ambition. He saw the same sort of narcissistic, ruthlessness that he shared himself. and he became his lawyer for the next 13 years and shaped his, you know, helped him to get his tax abatements for Trump Tower. But also, you know, at one point he was the guy who went to his old friend and classmate from Horace Mann, Cy Newhouse, and he persuaded Cy to get a book contract. Cy owned Random House at that point. And so he said, you know, you should give a book contract to,

Donald Trump to write a memoir. And this, of course, became the art of the deal. And the art of the deal launched Trump's career. He made him into a national figure. And then that led to the apprentice. And then that led to his political career. So it's an extraordinary story. And Roy Cohn, of course, even prior to linking up with Trump,

wielded remarkable influence, whether it was close to Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, the Reagan's, as you chronicle here in the book. But it does seem for a man who, who died in 1986, that his legacy is only growing. As we see, he was sort of the master of the dark arts, the politics of division. And he taught those lessons that Trump seems to have learned really, really well. Yeah, extremely well. Roy was a fixer. And, you know, he loved, he was a transactional dealmaker. He loved doing favors for people. He would host his own birthday party every year at Studio 54 or the New York Armory. And he would invite two or three hundred

of New York's richest, most influential judges and politicians and journalists. And they all knew who Roy Cohn was and what he had done. But Roy would have Joey Adams, the comedian, come and emce these events. And Joey would quip, if you're indicted, you're invited. So it was brazen. Everybody knew that indeed Roy had been indicted three times in the 1960s by Robert Morgenthau, the DA here in New York. And three times New York juries had acquitted it for bribery and corruption and fraud.

And the evidence was pretty overwhelming that he had committed these acts. Hey, Kai. It's Sam Stein here. I don't know if you're a psychologist, you are a biographer, but I'm curious, the degree to which Roy Cohen's personal life, obviously, Jonathan referenced that he died young. He died young from AIDS-related disease. Yeah, that age of 59. And fairly well established that he was gay and obviously closet and denied it vehemently until basically he died. I'm wondering the degree to which his discomfort with his own identity, his inability to just be out there and open gay, fed what you describe as scoundrel behavior? Well, yes and no. I mean, yes, he was a closeted gay man all his life.

But he became a national figure at the age of 27, a powerful lawyer. His image was on the cover of Time magazine when he was 27. as Senator Joe McCarthy's chief counsel during the Army McCarthy hearings. And in the 1950s, no closeted gay man who was a public figure felt that he could come out and talk about his sexuality in that way. And so Roy was a product of that.

And you could say that maybe this drove some of his nastiness that he had to suffer being in the closet like that. But on the other hand, you know, there were plenty of powerful closeted gay men in the 1950s who did not become Roy Cohn. So I think it's a, you can't attribute this too much to his closeted gay life. He taught Roy Cohn, Donald Trump, the playbook, never settle, never surrender, counterattack, and counter sue immediately. And we could add never apologize.

And boy, do we see that playing out every single. single day in the White House. The new book is American Scoundrel, Roy Cohn's Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump. It's available now author and Pulitzer Prize winning historian, Kai, thanks so much for being with us this morning. We appreciate it. Thank you, Willie. Still ahead. Two state Supreme Court's hand Democrats a win in redistricting fights. We'll run through those decisions, one out of Missouri, the other in Maryland. Plus, we'll take a look at new reporting from the Wall Street Journal on Democratic Senate.

John Federman, apparently dodging constituents, alienating fellow Democrats and showing, frankly, little interest in his job on Capitol Hill. That story straight ahead on Morning Joe. Longtime Fox business host, Maria Bartaromo has left the network. Fox News Media made the announcer yesterday writing, we thank Maria for her work over the last 12 and a half years and wish her all the best on her next chapter. Maria was the host of three programs, which now will be renamed and passed on to a rotating group of anchors. Although the network did not provide a reason for her departure, the news and media site status is reporting

Bartaromo was fired for allegedly sharing with the Trump administration instructions she had received from the network's bosses to not cover the president's false claims of China election interference. In a social media post, President Trump wrote, Barter Romo was a total professional and a true warrior saying her fans of which there are many will

not be happy. Yesterday, Vice President Vance laughed off speculation that Maria Bartaromo could be the next White House press secretary. At the core of this, John, I'm thinking about your book, The Big Lie, is the fact that Maria Bartaromo was kind of the face from the Fox side of it of the Dominion lawsuit that cost Fox $78 million spouting openly on the air. Conspiracy theories about a stolen election in 2020 saying there are intel sources telling her it had been stolen, it would be reversed. We saw in discovery and private messages her refusing to call Joe Biden the president-elect because she believed it had been stolen. This was someone for many years going back to CNBC was a well-liked and trusted financial

reporter, came over to Fox, and then in the Trump years became sort of drenched in all the conspiracy theories that cost Fox a lot of money and ultimately cost her job. Yeah, an extraordinary change for her in her career. And you're right here that this is even, you know, look, Fox is very Trump-friendly most of the time, but this shows the price of that lawsuit, the Dominion lawsuit, and not just the $787 million they had to pay out then, but also fear that they might have to again, and that they are a little more careful, certainly, about some of these unfounded conspiracy theories, which we know Trump spouts consistently. It's also striking, again, just how Trump has hijacked so much of the conservative media ecosphere,

where Maria Bart Romo, her instinct here, when she gets this directive from her bosses, is to go to Trump, to, like, provide the administration with, you know, obviously sort of confidential private corporate communications to say, hey, I can't talk about this stuff anymore because my bosses are saying, no, really remarkable all around.

She's been off the air, Willie, actually, since early August. You know, Fox put out this news yesterday. And yes, I think a lot of people, when the state press release came out that she was done, wondered if her next job would be in the Trump administration. Vance denied it. I have heard also there's no plans for that. But of course, President Trump is a real fan. So maybe that wasn't in the works, but maybe now that she is available, that could change. We'll have to see. Yeah, I wouldn't put it past him. We'll see. Coming up next, we'll explain why former NFL players may get the chance to suit up again in college football. They run NFL rosters. They might play in college. college games next weekend. Pablo Torre will be here to explain a big ruling last night from a judge in Louisiana. Morning Joe's back in a moment.