Morning Joe - Fmr. Prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor arrested

Episode Date: February 19, 2026

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It's coming straight from the horse's mouth. When you see it on Truth Social, you know it's directly from President Trump. That's the beauty of this president and his transparency and relaying this administration's policies to all of you and to the rest of the world. That is the beauty of this president. If you see it on Truth Social, then you don't come straight from the horse's mouth. That's what Carolyn Levitt told reporters yesterday. Now, let's get this straight. You see it from the president.

on a true social post. That's coming straight from the horse's mouth. That's coming from the press. Not Stephen Miller. Nope. Nope. Nope. Not some nameless aide down the hall that wandered in

and took his phone at the middle of the night and started tweeting Lion King videos. No, my friends, we are assured. Blessed assurance. Jesus is mine and blessed assurance that when you see a social, to his social posts, you know that's coming straight from the president himself.

Isn't that right? Yeah. President Trump. Somebody slipped and missed a very small part. Now, by the way, again, it take off one, I guess. I didn't do it, by the way. This was done by somebody else.

This was a re-truth. That was not done by us. Wait, okay. Oh, wow. But he said he didn't do it. But she, what? I don't help me. I need direction here.

Those two, those two seem inconsistent, Mika. Yeah, kind of. It's for an administration that's never, never hedged or been, that seems inconsistent, doesn't it? Yeah, it sort of does. I mean, that was his response after that racist post that showed the, I mean, really horrifying image of the Obamas that literally everybody across the board said, no, no can do, that is racist.

It's racist. Of course it's racist, but he said he didn't do it. Yeah. But anyway, well, today, today, who knows? Who knows what fun and frivolity is before us today. The president goes down to Georgia today looking to make a deal. He's way behind and in a bind. But he's going to talk about the economy. He says he's going to talk about the economy. but he is going to be doing that in Marjorie Taylor Green's former district. So is this going to be about the economy or is this going to be about grievances? We're going to dig into that. Plus, it could be about when you know what he said, they kill birds. They kill a lot of birds, he says.

Plus, we're going to go through new reporting on the Trump administration's failed attempt to prosecute six lawmakers who appeared in the video, exercising the First Amendment rights, saying the same exact thing that the Secretary of Defense had said about Donald Trump a few years earlier on Fox and Friends. When they were saying, hey, guys, listen, you know, as it says in your military guidelines, you don't follow illegal orders. But Janine Piro decides she's going to throw senators, try to throw senators in jail for exercising their First Amendment rights. I do wonder where people like Janine Piro think this story ends? I wonder how they think they're going to spend their days after the Trump administration, what's going to come. Do they think really that they can literally try to throw senators in jail for doing something that senators always do, speak on current issues and exercise First Amendment right? and nothing's going to happen legally to them or through bar,

bar associations or are through, through lawsuits coming back to all of these. I just, do people not understand we're in America and not Hungary? This is, this is Washington, D.C. and not Minsk, Belarus. Do they not? I just, the stupidity. the short-sightedness, the lack of imagination to just look forward to see what happens in three years. I just, it's mind-boggling to me, and yet, they just keep doing it.

They just keep putting their hands on the hot stove, Mika, and it's, I pity them. I actually pity. I know not a lot of people pity these. I just, they're being so short-sighted all to try to please one man. And when the music stops, things are going to get rough for them legally. Things are going to get rough for them in civil court. Who knows? For a lot of these people that think, you know, they're making a few extra dollars working for ICE,

a lot of those people probably going to end up in criminal court. And that's what those senators were trying to say also to the military. Hey, protect yourself. Take care of yourself. Don't do anything that's going to get you in trouble. Follow the law. Follow what your military manual says. Anyway, also ahead.

We have the latest on major developments in Middle East where the U.S. military now has the most air power in that region since the 2003 Iraq invasion. Good thing forever wars are at an end. With us today, we have co-hosts for the rest of politics podcast. the BBC's Caddy KMS Now's National Affairs analyst John Heilman. He's a partner in chief political columnist at Puck. Investigative reporter for the New York Times, Michael Schmidt is here.

Also, senior writer at the dispatch and a columnist at Bloomberg opinion, David Drucker. And the first story tonight this morning is former Prince Andrew has been arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office. That's right. Prince Andrew has been arrested. in Sky News reports. Police had been assessing claims against a former Duke of York or turned 66 today that emerged in the Jeffrey Epstein files. Police haven't named the person arrested, quote,

as per national guidance, according to the Crown Prosecution Service, misconduct in a public office refers to serious, willful abuse or neglect of powers relating to the role. Andrew has denied any wrongdoing. Caddy, I think it's hard sometimes for Americans to understand London's culture, how tight it is, how close people are, how, and so, you know, we see people, you know, royals, and we think, you know, they're far afield, they're rarely seen by people. But this, for you, you actually grew up in and around, you know, places where Prince Andrew would go,

where people that run London go. And I just, this has to be particularly shocking to you just as somebody from London that grew up with the royals, around the royals. I'm just curious, your thoughts this morning on this extraordinary news breaking out of London. Look, this has never happened before. We have a prince, the son, favored son, of course. Queen Elizabeth, much-loved Queen Elizabeth, now sitting in a jail cell with, we're told, a bed and a toilet in the cell. He can be held there for, I think the statutory maximum is 96 hours. People say it's likely to be 12 to 24 hours. And I was just checking, but there has been no member of the British royal family who has ever been arrested. His sister Anne was given a criminal charge for having a dangerous dog back in 2002. That is the closest this comes. A couple of other minor royals have had drunk driving charges leveled against them, but no one in the royal family has ever been in this

position. So whether you know the royals or you don't know the royals, this is incredibly shocking. And yet almost inevitable. The net was tightening around Andrew. He was no longer a prince. the king, his brother, had said the criminal investigation has to run its course. We will, of course, cooperate, was the language that he used. So now the question is what happens to Andrew, what's the knock-on effect to the royal family? And I think perhaps most importantly, what does this mean for victims of Jeffrey Epstein, who are seeing that in the United States, there is little accountability outside the private sector, but in Britain you've had now three members of the UK government and a prince facing very serious consequences

because of their relationship with Epstein. And this makes that contrast and accountability as stark as it's ever been when you have the brother of the king of England now sitting in jail. Let's go straight to London. Bring an MS now international reporter, Inez DeLiquiterra. Inez, what more are we learning this morning? Hey, yeah. I mean, a really remarkable turn of events.

as Katty just mentioned, this is the first time a member of the royal family has been arrested, at least in recent history. So the former Prince Andrew arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office. British police were seen arriving at his residence in Sandringham earlier today. That's according to local media reports. We know, of course, Andrew has always denied any wrongdoing, but this comes after Thames Valley Police had said it was investigating claims that he may have leaked leaked confidential information to Epstein while he was trade envoy for the UK. We did get a statement from police. So they're not naming him. That's typical for British police. But they say they did arrest a man in his 60s from Norfolk. We know that Andrew is 66. It's actually his birthday today.

They say on suspicion of misconduct in public office and they are carrying out searches at other places, other addresses in Berkshire and Norfolk. They say the man remains in police custody at this time. We also got a statement from the assistant chief constable Oliver Wright. He says that following a thorough assessment, we have now opened an investigation into this allegation of misconduct in public office. It is important that we protect the integrity and objectivity of our investigation as we work with our partners to investigate this alleged offense. Now, we know that Buckingham Palace, just about a week ago, had said that it would be cooperating with this investigation. That is also remarkable. We had heard, you know, the members of the royal family also speaking out about this, the king, the prince and princess of Wales, putting out statement saying that they were deeply concerned by these allegations, that their thoughts remained with the victims. And, you know, of course, we know that back in the fall, Andrew had been stripped of all his royal titles because of his ties to Epstein. And as you guys just mentioned, this comes as there's been this real push for accountability in the UK, whether it has to do with the royal family or members of the government as well, with, you know, two of the British Prime Minister's

AIDS having to resign over the Peter Mendelsohn's scandal. Mandelson also believed to have leaked confidential information to Epstein, the prime minister, really fearing for his political future at one point. And we did hear from Starmer just this week, actually. He was asked about, you know, the Epstein scandal. And he said that basically no one is above the law, not even Andrew. And he is calling for Andrew to testify before both UK and U.S. authorities. Wow. Annette de la Quatera live from London. Thank you very much for your reporting this morning. John Halman, to her point, the UK drawing quite a contrast with the U.S. this morning. In those words, no one is above the law in the U.K. That appears to be true. Yeah, Mika, I had a call a couple nights ago from a solicitor, who I've

known for 35 years in London, who's been doing law at the highest levels of the UK legal world for pretty much that entire time. He said he's never seen anything like this in his entire adult life and his entire legal career, the scale of the degree to which the British establishment, the political, economic, financial, and obviously the royal establishment have been rocked by the Epstein scandal is unlike anything he's ever seen. And of course, it begs the question you're talking about, which is, you know, obviously people like Peter Mandelson, people like the prince, former prince here are, are people who are very, who are to be very complicit in this and are facing consequences. How is it possible that in Britain,

which is not the epicenter of the Epstein scandal, which is not the establishment in which Jeffrey Epstein mostly moved, he gave extraordinary degree to which he was an international figure and people all over the world are caught up in this web. But here, at Ground Zero, there's nothing like that. And yes, there has been enormous, it's been a very large political story for us for the past eight months. But to your point about accountability, no one is being is being called to the carpet in this way, legally or politically. With story in the New York Times in Mike Schmidt's paper yesterday that basically said, Howard Lutnik, Secretary of Commerce,

who has been laid bare as having just lied, not just lied, but flagrantly lied, theatrically lied, lied in the most egregious way you could about his contacts with Jeffrey Epstein, had to go in front of a Senate committee and admit that he'd lied, is our House committee is now, is the word coming out

the Trump administration, no consequences for him, he's doing fine, the president's got his full confidence. It's really quite extraordinary. Well, it's extraordinary. It's also, the fact that the Republicans

really just don't care. It just don't seem to care at all about who is committed potential crimes against these young women. There's one or two that have, but other than that,

and Marjor Taylor, Green got ran out of Congress by insisting on it. But, Caddy, you look and see, and Howard Lutnik got caught in lying, time and again, lying in just the most egregious way. And yet, no consequences for him. You have a man who many people have considered to be at the epicenter of Jeffrey Epstein's rise and his growth and a guy who'd been around Epstein nonstop. James Comer calls a hearing for him, calls a deposition for him, and allows it to be in his home state of Ohio.

Not a single Republican shows up. They're doing a show trial with Bill and Hillary Clinton later and forcing them to come to Washington when the Clinton's asses that they come up to New York. But they're doing that show trial. but a guy who is at the center of all of this, who helped Jeffrey Epstein, who funded Jeffrey Epstein, and not a single Republican shows up at the deposition. They're all Democrats. So it really is, it is stunning how, as John Heilman said,

this is like a bomb that's gone off in London, and it's just really shaken the British establishment. And yet in America, the same party, that talked about the Epstein files and getting to the truth with Epstein files for years, now is the very one covering it up and basically giving anybody that was close to Epstein a free pass. Yeah, and it's not just London. It's Norway as well. You've got a crown princess who's now under a cloud because of her emails with Jeffrey Epstein. You've got a Norwegian ambassador who's had to resign. You've got a former Norwegian prime minister who's now under investigation

as well. In other countries where Jeffrey Epstein had contacts, where he may have had nefarious dealings with people in positions of power, or they may have given him information he shouldn't have had that helped him get rich, people are feeling the consequences of that. But here in the United States, as you say, the fact that no Republicans showed up to that deposition, the fact that Comer didn't show up to that deposition of Wexner. And without Wexner, you don't get Epstein. Epstein doesn't get as rich as he does without Wexner's help all over those years. suggest that they, that what, if you're a Republican, you're immune from this. We don't think you have any responsibility to bear for this.

I mean, it's interesting that you do, we've talked to on the show a lot, Joe, about checks and balances in America and the erosion of checks and balances. And you've made the point that there are lots of checks and balances out there outside the formal structures. And it seems that in private life, senior Americans who had in relationships with Epstein, even if there's no indication that they had illegal dealings with Jeffrey Epstein, they are feeling the consequences. But either the White House or the Republican Party,

and maybe the two are the same thing right now, they are protecting people that they want to protect. And they're protecting Republicans. And so, again, if you did something horrific or if you were extraordinarily close to Jeffrey Epstein, if you got caught lying time and time again about your relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, if you're a Republican, this same party that talked about getting to the bottom of the Epstein files, which we've been talking about in this show since 2015, when very few other people,

other than Julie Brown and Miami, we're talking about it. Yeah. Now, if you're a Republican, you're off the hook. In fact, Comer and his committee doesn't even care about the man who started this hellscape. They don't even show up for his deposition. That tells you how hypocritical and how morally bankrupt on this Epstein issue they are. All across the world, gravity still holds, moral gravity still holds. government. You know, J.D. Vance always looking down the end of his little nose at Europe.

Well, at least they have shame in Europe. If somebody was hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein, there are consequences. No consequences here. And again, I keep saying it. Republicans are too stupid to listen to me because they've always been too stupid to do what's in their best interest. This is your own base you're screwing. This is your own base you're ignoring. This is your own base that you're saying, hey, don't trust anything we Republicans say. You're doing that to yourself and all the money and all the campaign stops by the president. All of that, that doesn't help.

That actually makes things worse for you because you're covering up for people who can sorted with Jeffrey Epstein. Good luck with that. And still ahead of the morning, Joe, we're going to talk to Michael Schmitz and his new reporting about a case against six Democrats. It lacked urgency, but then came a swift bid for an indictment. Plus, we're going to be talking to David Drucker about his new piece on how new independents are actually making politics more partisan. He'll explain the hollowing out of the middle in America, certainly in the political, parties when we come back. There are new details this morning about the Justice Department's failure to secure an

indictment against a group of Democratic lawmakers who issued a video reminding service members of their duty to refuse illegal orders. The New York Times cites six people familiar with the matter who say federal prosecutors were genial when they first reached out about the case, saying the inquiry was in its early stages and not identifying a specific law that had been brought. broken. Less than two weeks later, the Times writes, everything changed. Quote, for reasons that remain unclear, Janine Piro abruptly instructed her team to seek an indictment of the lawmakers. Her prosecutors then faced a decision that many in the department under

President Trump have confronted, comply or resist. They chose the first. That effort, of course, failed last week. And as the Times reports, Piro now has backed away from the case. It's part of a pattern of prosecutors pursuing weak or questionable cases against the president's perceived political foes, cases often met with resistance and ultimately failure. Last summer, for example, grand jurors in Washington rejected three separate efforts by federal prosecutors to obtain indictments stemming from Trump's law enforcement surge. And we're joined now by Michael Schmidt of the New York Times who wrote this piece. So Michael, let's talk about this dilemma, as you put it, where you have someone like Janine Piro, the U.S. attorney there in Washington, who believes she's doing

what the president wants. She views the first part of her job, the priority of her job, to please the president. And by doing so, she pursues a case that is a dead end that ends up embarrassed by it. Yeah, I mean, I think the question here that we really don't have a full understanding of is why is it that they go to the grand jury? Do they go to the grand jury? Do they go to the grand jury because they believed that there was enough evidence here to indict six members of Congress, or did they do that because it was easier to pass the buck off to the grand jury? So instead of standing up and fighting within the department or resigning, can do these prosecutors run their own sort of play in a sense where they can say, well, we went to the grand jury

and the, you know, the judicial branch is rigged. And that's why we can. couldn't get a case. What we're trying to say in this story and trying to explain is that this investigation started in a very informal way. And within just a matter of days and weeks, you're at the point of indicting six members or trying to indict six members of Congress. And in any other time, I know that we're way beyond trying to compare this to anything else, if a Justice Department was going to move to indict six members of Congress, that would be a painstaking investigation, a painstaking process. It raises a lot of constitutional issues. You have a different branch of government that comes with a whole set of constitutional issues

with it. And the Justice Department would really have to think, okay, well, how big of a decision is this? What does this mean? Would it survive an appeal? Those are things that the Justice Department would take months, if not years, to figure out. And in this instance, you went from the prosecutors calling the defense lawyers and basically saying, look, we're not even in the first inning yet. We're just sort of, you know, getting off the ground here to a potential indictment in a matter of days. And that is an example of how the Trump Justice Department functions on a day-to-day basis. So, Mike, here's the question. It's like that you brought me right to the place that I wanted to talk about because you guys write that, you know, there's that sudden, there's that abrupt shift

from casual and isn't it very serious. We don't think this might not be going anywhere to moving to an indictment. And you say it's for reasons that remain unclear, right? In the cases of the Jim Comey indictment and the Letitia James indictment, we know exactly, well, there was nothing unclear about it because we saw Trump's intended to be private, but ultimately public messages to Pam Dhani saying, go do this, right? Is it, A, is there no, sense of what the actual TikTok is on how Geneem Perrault made that change. Like what caused that? It may be unclear, but we have a better, you know, guys have a decent sense of what it was, if there was a precipitating event. And B, even if we don't have a sense of it, given history,

we can kind of adduce the notion that Gene Piro became convinced through some mechanism that this is what Trump wanted. And that's what caused the abrupt change. She's just doing his bidding, like so many other people in the DOJ. Yeah, look, I think that her office, more so than others, has tried to straddle this sort of like playing federal prosecutor while meeting Trump's demands. And their version of trying to deal with that is different than the Eastern District of Virginia, where they pushed out the U.S. attorney after he refused to even go to the grand jury and bring a case. So what we're seeing here is how are different prosecutors that are politically appointed by. the president dealing with this highly unusual thing. Back in the first term, you know, folks in the Justice Department, folks in the White House were stopping this type of stuff

from getting off the ground. Folks like John Kelly, folks like Don McGahn. In that instance, the conveyor belt was closer to the president. But because of the fact that there are no John Kelly's or Don McGahn's around in this instance, you get things that get further out from the White House and they get deeper into the Justice Department. You have someone in Pam Bondi who's much more willing to go along with what Trump wants than his previous, you know, Justice Department officials. And let's not forget, at the time, people were extremely critical of how folks like Rod Rosenstein dealt with Donald Trump. So we're trying to show how much things have changed here and how different they are. And that's what this story we think shows.

David, David Drucker, I'd love to get your insight on this. You know, Mike and I have talked for some time about how the Trump administration's first six months was a lot like my first 100 days in Congress with the contract with America. Everything went great for 100 days. We had it all, Newt had it all planned out. Then on the 101st day, all four wills seem to come off the car at the same time. It seems to be happening here. I mean, you look at how everything seemed to run according to plan the first six months.

But, you know, this fall, Donald Trump, everything just sort of seemed to explode where he said, we've got to start arresting these people right away. Times running out. They've been embarrassed on Comer. They've been embarrassed on Letitia James. They've been embarrassed on Lindsay Halligan. They've been embarrassed on Lena Haba. They've been embarrassed now on these six senators.

I mean, really quickly, just comment. First of all, again, how we kind of. I feel like we need to stop right here and say, this is extraordinary. You have a president trying to arrest six senators in the other party for doing nothing. But exercising the First Amendment rights as senators, that's number one. That's extraordinary and extraordinarily dangerous. And I would say extraordinarily stupid for those trying to do it. But the second thing here is just how ineffective and how inefficient these prosecutions have been

and how they are just being spit out by the criminal justice system, whether it's judges or grand juries. Yeah, look, Joe, I mean, I think part of this is that immediately following Trump's reelection, the Democratic Party was stunned and didn't really know which way it wanted to go in terms of creating a lot of the pushback in opposition that we later saw and continue to see, right? That's number one. Number two, you know, the president starts out and it's all, you know, wine and roses with executive orders that everybody sort of agrees with or think might be okay.

And then the consequences start to come down the pike and people start to experience those consequences. And voters are like, you know, this isn't exactly what I voted for. I think the number one reason the president has so many problems is because he is misread this idea of a mandate, which politicians often do. And he believed that the people around him, continue to believe, at least the way they talk, that, well, you won the election, so everything you've ever talked about doing or ever might want to do, you get to do and everybody's going to be okay with it. And they haven't really gotten it through their heads that that's just not the case. Had they been able to deliver on reducing inflation and making people feel

much better about their personal economic situation, had they not misdiagnosed what the public's appetite was in terms of a mass deportation program and how you go about doing that? people, you know, whether we like it or not, might simply just say, well, some of this stuff makes me uncomfortable, but everything that I wanted, I've gotten out of this president. So, you know, it just is what it is. But they find themselves in a place where they're overreaching and they're not meeting basic expectations on the things that matter most. And that's why presidents always get themselves into trouble.

All right, David, and also investigative reporter at the New York Times, Michael Schmidt, thank you very much. His new piece is available to read online right now. And coming up on Morning Joe, governors from across the country are set to gather in Washington for the meeting of the National Governors Association. But many Democratic governors are boycotting as Maryland Governor Westmore and Colorado Governor Jared Polis are blocked from joining. Governor Polis is standing by. We'll discuss the move from the president and much more. That's coming up on Morning Joe. Live picture of a little bit foggy United States Capitol 639 this morning.

Governors from across the United States gathering in Washington this week for the annual winter meeting of the National Governors Association. But there is confusion swirling around the traditional White House events after a series of mixed signals from the president and NGA leadership. A group of Democratic governors say that. They plan to boycott both the White House business meeting and dinner with President Trump after governors initially were told only Republicans would be invited, breaking with longstanding bipartisan practice. President Trump later pushed back on true social, saying all governors were invited

except for two Democrats, West Moore of Maryland and Jared Polis of Colorado. And Governor Polis joins us now. Governor, good morning. So what reason were you given for being one of two not invited to these White House events? No reason, but certainly a badge of honor that apparently I'm getting under their skin in some way, shape, or form. But it really more and more feels like, you know, one of those fifth grade birthday parties. Everybody's speculated who's invited, who's not invited. It just seems like utter chaos over there at the White House.

Clearly you and Governor Moore have done something perhaps speaking out against this administration. What do you suspect it was? Was there a specific policy stance you've taken that perhaps is preventing you for? from attending that fifth grade birthday party? Well, you know, I'm the most recent chair of the National Governors Association. West Moore is the vice chair. He's going to become the chair.

He's effectively the chair elect. So to a certain extent, it's a blow against the governors as a whole when they try to exclude certain governors. We have three days of meetings here in Washington, D.C. The White House piece is a small part of it. As usual, the president inserted himself to try to become the center of a story. What the real story is,

is governors from across the country, Republican and Democrat, are talking about the issues that matter in our states. There's a lot more that's similar. There's no Republican or Democratic way to pave roads to improve school performance, to improve health care. And that's the substance of the discussions over the next few days. I'm excited. 41 of us from across the country are here.

And I'm very much excited to roll up my sleeves and learn a lot from our other states. So, Governor, the president actually posted out why he's not inviting a youth unfairly incarcerated in solitary confinement, a 73-year-old cancer woman for attempting to fight Democratic voter fraud. how much does this, when the president inserts himself like this, and now he's also going after Governor Stitt for trying to have this bipartisan dinner, how much does the president's language and tone and the way he interacts with people make it harder for you to do what you said you're just trying to do, which is work with your Republican colleagues on everyday business? Does it cast a pall over it?

Does it make them more afraid to be seen to be talking to Democrats? does it have no impact whatsoever how the president conducts himself? Well, we're going to find out over the next few days because we have, for instance, a very important discussion between governors on immigration today, an issue where states want to work more closely together, all the requirements of HR1 for health care and how states are administering that, the workplace authentication, is there a way to scale the IT to kind of share solutions in common across states?

I at least can only answer as to how I handle it. I try to tune all that stuff out. I just focus on the work at hand. How can I make life better for the people? people in my state. I think that's the way most governors think. They try not to get caught up in this Washington, D.C., political, partisan Nielstrom, because we all actually have to deliver for the people of our state. Yeah, I'm asking the question, because I spend a lot of time talking to European leaders, and one of the things that they say to me is that relationships with the White

House are pretty terrible at the moment, relationships with America are pretty terrible, but a kind of a country-to-country-to-country level or a city-to-city-level, things actually work reasonably well. Are you finding that the kind of American system of government actually at a state level is still working in the way that it's meant to work, that you can have conversations across states with your colleagues? Or has something changed? Has something changed in this very toxic environment that the president is helping create? Not only are states generally a much more functional version of democracy, meaning bills pass regularly. We don't have these shutdowns. We, Colorado's never ever to shut down. I mean, it's very rare that a state would ever have a shutdown. we many bills signed by Republican sponsors in our legislature. They're the minority party become law.

I sign them. I veto bills sometimes a Democrat sponsor. I mean, it's not nearly as partisan a setting. And when governors get together, as we're going to have 41 here meeting over the next few days, we find that the issues that we face really aren't partisan in our states. We're really just trying to figure it out on how to deliver, because that's what voters hold governors accountable for.

Are you delivering to my state? What's the cost of housing? What's the cost of automobile insurance? What's the cost of health care? How are the schools doing for my kids? And really working on with governors did, our chair, reigniting the American dream and entrepreneurship, building off some of the work I did on how we can get ready in our schools

at better results for kids, make sure that kids can graduate high school with real skills that help them get a good job if they're not going on to college. And that's something that excites, really every governor across every state and territory. So David Drucker, your latest opinion piece for, Bloomberg argues unhappy voters who are leaving the Democratic and Republican parties are perpetuating the rise in partisanship that they're trying to escape.

The piece is titled, All These New Independence are Making Politics More Partisan, and in it, you write in part, despite what independence might see as the Democratic and Republican parties dispiriting stranglehole on American politics, the parties as institutions have never been weaker. They've lost considerable control over fundraising and resource distribution, are virtually powerless to block ideologically extreme or worse candidates from winning primaries and have shrinking influence over their own policy platforms. These developments have coincided directly with the rise of partisanship in American politics.

Indeed, the two phenomena are intertwined. Explain more how this is playing out. I mean, I also see that in terms of people are able to get their support on social media and in many different places, not traditional ones. Yeah, it's kind of ironic, right, because so many people are unhappy with political parties. They believe they're too partisan. They believe that partisanship has led to government that's dysfunctional. And that's one of the reasons they're fleeing both of the parties. And we've really seen this trend beginning with Generation X, My Generation, during the time that Barack Obama was first elected president in 2008, and then continuing with Millennials and Generation Z. And the result, it's not that the

Declaration, the Declaration is the cause of the party's partisanship, but when people unhappy with the partisanship leave, and it's understandable, what you have left are the truly committed voters. And what's funny about that is the parties have never been weaker. They don't have the ability to keep out extremists, to keep extreme ideas at bay. And so it's sort of like a

doom loop. And, you know, Governor Polis, your reputation in Colorado has been one that is, you know, firmly Democratic capital D as a politician, but somebody who does occasionally tell his party, hey, like, cool it with this and will work with Republicans. And I'm wondering how much your experience in Congress contributed to your approach to governing in Colorado, where I'm sure Republicans get angry with you all the time. But, you know, you talk to Colorado voters and you look at the different policies you've supported and opposed, and it's hard to simply, you know,

pin you with a predictable, this is what he's going to do, this is what he's not going to do. What's been your approach? And what do you think the result has been for you? Well, it's fun to get into this political theory type discussion. I mean, the politicians you get are, to a certain extent, going to be a result of the rules that allow them to get there. So in Colorado, we have open prime.

meaning unaffiliated voters, not Democrats, not Republicans. That's half our voters in our state. They can vote in either primary, Republican or Democratic. They can stay unaffiliated. They can be moved by a candidate. They don't have to be a member of that party. So there's always that appeal to that half of Colorado voters who are unaffiliated. Other states have another good method of top two or top three going on in the general, regardless of party.

When you have these closed party systems, as you talked about, especially people fleeing both parties, you have the remaining candidates appealing to a smaller and smaller base, generally speaking, for the sake of Congress, in districts that are overwhelmingly Republican or Democratic. So you might have 10% of the voters, effectively it's using a member of Congress. So I'm glad that Colorado has those open primaries for an affiliated. I'm glad other states have top two or top three. I've always focused on results. And I think that no matter what that system is, if you can get elected, say what you're going to do and do it. I ran on free preschool and kindergarten for every kid. We got it done in my first two years. Ran on 100% renewable energy by 2040. We're well on our way.

ran on reducing health care costs. We've got a number of things that we've did, including capping the cost of insulin and reducing the cost of insurance in the exchange. Those are the kinds of things that really matter to people. All right. Governor Jeropolis of Colorado, thank you so much for coming on the show this morning. And senior writer at the dispatch and columnist at Bloomberg Opinion, David Drucker. Thank you as well. His latest piece is available to read online right now. And still ahead on Morning Joe, we're going to turn back to the major breaking news overseas. The Trump administration is appealing a ruling by a federal judge earlier this week,

ordering the Interior Department and National Park Service must restore slavery-related exhibits at a site in Philadelphia by Friday. Put them back. The administration filed the appeal on Tuesday telling CBS News in a statement that it disagrees with the ruling. And adding that the National Park Service was preparing to install updated interpretive materials providing a fuller account of slavery at Independence Hall in the coming days. We'll be following that. And coming up, we're going to have the very latest.

No, they can't. They can't. But let's get back to our major breaking news of the morning. The very latest, the arrest of former Prince Andrew in connection to his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Plus Politico's Jonathan Martin joins. with his takeaways from the Munich Security Conference, including what he says was a focus not just on present dangers, but what's to come. Morning Joe will be right back.