Morning Joe - Is Artificial Intelligence a threat to humanity?

Episode Date: September 10, 2026

September 10, 2026 – 7am:Is Artificial Intelligence a threat to humanity?Four Americans in semifinals at the U.S. OpenDemocrat John Fetterman makes cameo at GOP convention: Britt Miller packageGroup of Democrats head to Dallas amid GOP midterms conventionBattle for U.S. Senate seat in Nebraska: Independent candidate Dan Osborn discusses his run 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.

The fact is in some, and I have to say this about Ken, it's so insulting, you know, I hope he doesn't get insulted. They said, sure, you can't say that. I said, I have to. I said it once before, and he went through the roof. I got to say it again. So they just said how wonderful he is and how we have to. But I said it a little differently because the fact is that some may not like the way he dresses. I don't.

Although tonight he looked very spiffy in his blue suit. I must tell you, rude. But they may not like the way he talks. I can see that. May not like the way he looks. But here's the news. In the history of Texas, he is the single greatest attorney general you've ever had.

The first part, I check, check, check. The last one is like wrong. It got impeached, right? Oh, yeah. Impeached, indicted. By Republicans. By Republicans. His former staffers are doing ads for James Tala Rico.

That kind of tells you. Do what you're saying, he was the worst Attorney General in history. Many people are saying. That was Trump trying to endorse Ken Paxton. He doesn't dress well. Patty Kay is still with us. I mean, the president obviously called him a slobs. I didn't like how he talks.

Or looks. Didn't like how he spoke. Join the conversation, we have MS now contributor. Mike Barnacle, who, who just about two weeks ago, officiated a wedding. Yeah, what a guy. Yes, he did. For whom? For our stage manager, Meg. Meg.

Meg, congratulations. And there's the beautiful bride. Now, was Mike, did he, was he okay in this? Look at Meg, so beautiful. What a happy day. And then Mike was the officiator of the wedding. How did he do, Meg? He was fantastic.

He was so funny and warm. Mike's actually beautiful. Mike's great at that stuff. He actually makes me cry in moments like that. I want pictures of Mike. Congratulations, Meg. Mike's there at the wedding. Oh, we have Steph Ryder at the Atlantic, a man that no one would ever ask to officiate their wedding.

Mark Leibovic. Wow. Just because you're so witty. I have never officiated a wedding. Do you think that's it? I know, that's really cool. Right? I think they're intimidated because of your laughter, your warmth, your wit.

Yeah. There's not a groom that could stand next to you without distracting the bride. It could be. And so it's like, him? Oh, really? That's like, why don't you ask me to bring Robert Redford in 74 here? No, I'm not going to do that. That explains.

That's what they say. We also have a professor at history at Tulane University. The great. The great historian, historian Walter Isaacson. Walter, we were talking about AI. You have a lot to say about that. And you spend a lot of time with Elon Musk, a guy who has been warning since 2014, at least, that AI could end humanity. What are your thoughts on the conversation?

You heard what Jim Fanta I was saying. I know there's some things you agree with, some other things that you may not talk about this issue. that really more Americans should be talking about. In 2014, when Open AI was founded by Sam Altman, Elon Musk, and others, it was because of a great fear that AI could become misaligned with human values. You know, as a kid, Musk used to read all the Asimov science fiction books and the robots turn against them. So how are we going to prevent that? And it was supposed to be a non-profit and an open. Obviously, there was a huge split there when Sam Altman decided to make it no longer an open source and no longer open weights and no longer a non-profit,

must then started his own company, X-A-I, and it was supposed to be aligned with safety. But if you talk to people now, you've got to race to the bottom because it's hard to be totally aligned and put guardrails on yourself when the other companies keep doing whatever they want. So there's a competition among the companies that allows a race to the bottom, a president's and a competition on the U.S. versus China. I really agreed totally with Jim Van de Haas said in the first segment, last segment, but I don't think it's all that easy.

He says, well, bring the greatest minds together and let's get some regulations. Well, I'm not sure even the greatest minds know what's the best way to regulate this other than to make it go much slower, and that's going to be difficult to do in a race. You also have the problem of asking people who are making, you know, billions and billions of dollars and who want to raise the next trillion dollars for their company to slow down. Because they're all racing for the trillion dollars. Yeah. And people say, Musk says, if we have this, we'll have universal income.

There'll be money will be meaningless. We'll have such a great economy that nobody will have to work and will just give out money or something. And this is sort of a fantasy. The reason that's a problem is you'll have. going to have to tax these companies and they want to keep the money. You're not going to have it be so that these companies will create these things and then just distribute the profits fairly. They're the most hostile, any form of taxation. And you have the backlash against data centers. People are talking about it. I think you talked about it in the last segment,

Oren Kass has a really good piece in the New York Times today about that. But data centers are just sort of a proxy for people being instead of AI. Okay, so help us out here. If we can't trust the people that are running the companies because they are self-involved and want to keep making hundreds of billions of dollars, we certainly can't trust bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., who don't even begin to understand the concept of this. This reminds me an awful lot of 2008,

where we had an economic crisis because nobody on Capitol Hill could understand credit default swaps and all the other instruments, financial instruments that banks and Wall Street were putting together to hide the crisis that was about to melt the economy down. So how do we do it, Walter? There has to be what's right now, if the president of the United States called you up, and said, Walter, we need to put together a commission and we need to figure out a way to stay competitive with China, but also to keep a fence around the worst element. I said, it's kind of hard to know what to do. I would say you put a pause on it right now that puts you to disadvantage with China. But one of the charms of your show and most Americans

is they believe every problem has a solution. And this one doesn't have an easy solution right now. We have what's called the Prometheus myth, when somehow we snatch a technology from the gods like fire, and we come down and then we get punished for it. It happened when we created nuclear power. mentioned that earlier, our nuclear weapons. We were able to guard that pretty well because you can't build nuclear bombs that easily in a basement. Likewise, gene editing is another fire of the gods things we've snatched. You could work with China and say you can't do it because that's something easy to monitor. These AI systems are not easy to monitor. All right, so we need a solution. And I know you say we have the show, we talk, and people like solutions. I think everything has a

solution. Well, maybe everything doesn't have a great solution, but you wrote a book called The Wise Men at one point. Let's just pretend we had Wise Men. And so at the end of what? Let's just pretend we had We had wise men in Washington, D.C. right now, that we had people like George Marshall, that we had people, you know, like Everald Harriman, that we had George Kennan, that we had Wise Men in his big new Presensky, Henry Kistner. Let's pretend we had Wise men in Washington. What would they do? Looking back, at history, what would a commission, what would it approach to this possible, you know, humanity ending technology, what would the best approach be?

That's a great question because we have the evidence of what happened. In 46, after we drop the atom bomb, we decide that we have to make this an international situation, find ways to control both nuclear power and nuclear weapons. We set up a whole lot of multi-lettered agencies that would do power. that would do bombs. We set up verification. And then we made it an international process that somewhat surprisingly has lasted for maybe 80 years

when we haven't since Hiroshima and Nagasaki used a bomb in wartime. Now, can we do that? Can we pull it all together in this time where Congress makes everything partisan? Right. Well, we've lost the trust of our allies, where we're in trouble with Canada. Right.

You know, we used to do NORAD defense systems with Canada. It was so easy. So it were not perfectly positioned, but I think this should be, and something will happen. In the next 12 months, something bad's going to happen. Something's going to really escape, like the hugging face thing sort of did. You quoted all those things that happened when they were conspiring to get escaping. Once that happens, it may be the wake-up. call we need. What would be the incentive at this port, Walter, for Sam Altman and people who

created this technology and are now putting up these red flags about it? What is the incentive for them to slow this down? And they're saying the right things in public hearings, but why would they want to slow this down? It'd have to be they'd all hold hands and do it. You have six or seven frontier models, and then you have the Chinese models, and nobody's going to want to be the one say, hey, we'll put our hand behind the back. We'll tie our hands, but everybody else can go ahead. So how do you gather them all together? And that's what I think a group of wise leaders would do.

You say, let me take all seven of you, put you in a room, and then we're going to go meet in China and do it. But we're going to have to have these restrictions. So, Walter, you're talking about the peril and the promise, and we've seen what happened in history. And you mentioned World War II and the A bomb, dropping Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The peril and the promise and the potential of coming out of the end of that,

of any construct that poses a threat to the country, it's okay if you have leaders capable of doing it. But at this particular moment in time, in Washington, D.C., who are you going to ask to help? You have people who don't understand it in the least. You have people who are in their 80s getting reelected and have no clue about this. You have everything being made partisan.

One of the small hopeful things is not all the Democrats are against AI and all the Republicans are for it. You're now seeing even in Texas, Ohio, many other places, as I said, the Orange Cass essay, you've got a lot of Republicans against it. I think one thing should be done is focus, as you say, on the promise. I just talked to Nubarakhean who runs Madonna. They've been able to use AI to make any folded protein you want so that you can now start curing melanoma.

You can do prostate cancer, all of these things. Somehow another, the AI companies not only are doing dangerous things, but they're doing trivial things, like chat pots and stuff. They should be focusing on climate. They should be focusing on curing cancer. And I think some of the backlash against what they're doing within. Well, Walter, is there any precedent in the last, say, 10 years even? for something like this coming together with the kind of central authority

that can actually make some immediate difference? Because it does seem like a fairly urgent suggestion. Yeah, the one comparable thing in the past 10 years, which is what you've asked me, is when we were able to make gene edits that were inheritable. In other words, you could use CRISPR and not only fix sickle cell,

but you could design your children. So they could be told you can make every generation of your family different. In other words, inheritable gene edits. And Jennifer Dowdenner, who won the Nobel Prize for helping discover that technology and many others, along with the Chinese, put together an international system to say, you can do what you want using gene editing technology, but not things that enter what's called the human germ line. That would be part of it. And that's been successful

so far. I will say also, government-wise, the one thing Donald Trump did that should be at the front of any of his presidential library. Library, Operation Warp Speed. Done in a year's time when people were saying it'd probably take six, seven, eight years. If they ever got a vaccine, they did it in a year's time. Caddy Kay, you have a question for Walter. Yeah, so Walter, Daria Amadee had a conference last week and there was a panel on security and people were asked about the budgets for security processes and they said, well,

at a moment we're spending about 5% on security. And should we be spending? We should be spending 100%. there should be a total pause on this technology until we have more safety measures in place. Do you see a scenario in which the government says, I guess a bit like nuclear weapons, you know what, this technology is so dangerous and so powerful

that we're just going to nationalize it? And then you have the risk that then you're very dependent on a government being benign. And I think the prospect for all of us looking at the next two years, when this is moving so fast, is you have a government with a White House with authoritarian tendencies,

in control of this technology, what does that look like to you? Well, you just made the best argument against your suggestion much better than I could, which is I'm not sure I want any particular government, including this one, to be in charge totally of all the technology. One of the advantages the U.S. has, and even China is now doing, is competitive private companies racing each other, and that's allowing it to get ahead. Had the government decided to do this, you probably would be one-tenth of the way along when it comes to AI.

Now, that may be a good thing. Maybe you say, no, private companies shouldn't develop this. But if we're trying to develop this quickly, it's become like a lot of things, including the space race, where private companies are able to get rockets into orbit like SpaceX and land them. Likewise, private companies would be able to push the frontier models of AI, something government can't do. I guess if you really need to be radical here, you just say government should shut it all down. But I doubt that's going to happen. Professor of history at Tulane University, Walter Isaacson.

Thank you very much for coming on the show this morning. All right. Still ahead on morning, Joe. We're going to talk about how Democrats are countering the Republican Party's midterm convention, the co-chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, Congressman Jason Crowe, joins us straight ahead for that. And later this morning, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will join us here at the table for a wide-ranging discussion on everything from the GOP convention, Iran, the midterms, and much more. You're watching morning, Joe. We'll be right back. Welcome back.

We're talking about who should be in the Hall of Fame and who shouldn't be in the Hall of Fame. Mike, who should be in the Hall of Fame? Dwight Evans. Dwight Evans. White Evans. Red Sox. We're talking about Del Murphy as well. I mean, why should how can it? Is this because those teams were so bad?

The brave, but that shouldn't matter, but Dale Murphy's a Hall of Famer. No, Murphy's a hell, yeah. Dale, automatic. You should be automatic. Yeah. Without about it. Without about it. Fred Lynn?

You know Fred Lynn had stayed in Boston. He had been to the Hall of Fame. He will tell you that. Fred Lynn would tell you that the biggest mistake he made was leaving the Red Sox as a free agent. And he could have used that wall. He could have been a lifetime 340 hitter. Yeah. Spectacular outfielder.

He would be in the Hall of Fame. He would tell you he would tell you he'd be in the Hall of Fame. I would tell you people always ask, why did you become a Red Sox fan? This is in 1975. It was Fred Lynn. I love the guy. Jim Rice, they were both rookies that year. Then game six put it over the top.

Gold dust wins. They were incredible. You know, who else was incredible? Biff Pocoroba. Atlanta Braves. Put him in the line. Just put him back up. Let me tell you.

Let me tell you something. It's amazing how quick. Oh, yeah. DJ has that card. DJ has Bif Poceroba. But that was during the Pat Rocket era. Pat Rocket played shortstop for the Braves when they were losing 100 games every year. And they had chicken wheat in the infield.

I would watch the games again. They can't even do infields right. It was just the worst team. Didn't Ted Turner took it over? Yeah. Love Ted Turner taking it over. That was so amazing. And what was funny is the whole country is watching it on TBS.

They grew up in New Jersey watching those same games you were watching. It was very weird following a team that lost 100 games. a year that we would listen to on W.S.B. every night. And, and, you know, people are like, you're a who fan? What? And then suddenly, like, in 1981, 81, 82. I knew every player as a kid. Everybody went up knowing the Braves. Yeah, no, it's fantastic. Hey, we were talking about the U.S. Open earlier. Apparently, the tennis guys

listened to Willie guys. They have rearranged in the times of the men's methods. We want to issue a correction. Good for you. So we were talking about how these matches go too late. Right. They do in some cases. But the U.S. Open figured out a while ago, as I was reminded by a trusted source, on the men's semi-final night, the first match, the Zverat match, will be tomorrow at 3 p.m. And then the primetime match is the American Tiafo Sheldon at 7 p.m.

So even if that goes crazy late, it's midnight at the latest. So a correction to the U.S. A good idea. Congratulations. You might want to start a special service. It is tough. All right, can we actually talk about something, you know, with news? I have one more question.

One more question. I really do. I just so well. Kurt Schilling. God. Come on. He talked himself out of the Hall of Fame. Yeah, but it shouldn't be about talking.

It should be about playing, right? Yes, he deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. He deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. One final one. Yeah. Barry Bonds. Even before steroids, he was one of the great players in the history of baseball. And let me tell you something.

And I never liked Bonds. He was a surly guy. He was tough. But let me tell you something, even on steroids, there are a lot of guys on steroids that couldn't hit the ball. Bonds was an extraordinary ballplayer on steroids or off steroids. How do you not put one of the greatest ballplayers of all time in the hall and just put an asterisk by his name?

Because they ignore common sense. Put them in the hall and put it on the plaque. Put all of the contentious charges again. against him. Put it on the plaque. Put it on his plaque. And what we're talking about the red side, you got to put Roger Clemens in the Hall of Fame. Greatest pitcher of all time. Well, I don't know if I'd say it. I'm telling his picture. If you look at the stats, he's the greatest pitcher of all times. He's certainly one of the greatest pitchers. Certainly. Certainly in our lifetime. So how do you keep him out of the Hall of Fame?

Stupidity. Okay. Well, that answers that. Good. Okay. But that doesn't mean we can't talk about the opening night of football last night, really. We can skip it. There's a reason Lemire's not here talking about the opening night of football. The Patriots were up 13-0. It looked like they were going to roll to a win. Sam Donald, the Seahawks quarterback, injured on the first series. They're going with the backup, Drew Locke.

And then in the fourth quarter, Drake May, second in the MVP voting, led them to the Super Bowl last year. There was three interceptions in the fourth quarter, including an incredibly costly one. When he could have thrown it away, take a field goal, go to overtime. Patriots lose 13 to 10. You know, there really is something to the sophomore jinks. It really is. It happens time and time again where somebody to have a great rookie year. Second year always seems to be tough.

One thing never tough. One thing that always goes over smooth. Mike Barnacle officiating a wedding. I love that. And here's an example. I think we got a picture. Oh, my God. Father Barnacle.

Look at that. Thank you. Speaking words of wisdom. Let it be, baby. Beautiful. Let it be. Where did they have that? Madison Square Garden.

What a great thing. Yeah. Right after Taylor. Right after. They decided that's, we're so happy for you, Meg. Congrats Meg. The crazy thing is there are more people at that event than at the midterm convention last night in Dallas. So many Republicans are skipping President Trump's midterm event.

That was a good one. That's good work. Nice job. Great segue. But that didn't stop one Democrat from making an appearance. MS Now's Rick Miller reports. Oh my God. I bet this wasn't on your bingo card.

A big room of Republicans in Dallas. Yes, I'm Senator John Federman, Pennsylvania. Yes, I'm a Democrat. Pennsylvania's Democratic Senator, John Federman, popping up on the big screen at the first ever GOP midterm convention in Dallas, introducing the Keystone State's Republican Senator Dave McCormick on video. Dave McCormick is the kind of senator that gets the job done. And promise to partner with President Trump.

And we'll work with President Trump. to fight and defend the steel way of life right here in the Steel Valley. The stunning video, intensifying Fetterman's fray with his own party. Democrats disappointed. John Fetterman is a non-factor in the midterms this fall. While other lawmakers unleash their opinions on social media, calling him lazy and Trump's favorite Democrat. Many people think that a senator who was persuaded to make this very political video

could potentially be persuaded to change his mind in the future. The surprise appearance, renewing questions about whether he'll switch parties. Federman reiterating, he's not going anywhere, releasing a new statement saying, quote, I'm a lifelong Democrat who votes overwhelmingly with my party. And should the Senate flip in November, I will still be the 51st vote. But in the past, Vetterman has said he would leave under one condition. If Democratic Party becomes official anti-Israel, then that's when I would force me out. While Federman's political future is unclear, the growing tension with his party is obvious.

He's commended Trump's staunch support of Israel in its wars in Gaza and Lebanon, backed the war in Iran, and voted to confirm Homeland Security Secretary Mark Wayne Mullen, even saying this about the Democratic Party just last week. The Democratic Party is. becoming having like an orgy of socialism. Now it seems Fetterman's popularity on the left is taking a hit. According to a new poll, his favorability among Democratic constituents plunged from 74% to 22% this August. It's the opposite among Republicans with his favorability jumping from 25% to 73%. To be beloved by the opposite party and to be shunned by your own party is a very dangerous place to be in politics.

And if Federman did switch parties, Democrats would have a much harder time taking control of the Senate. They would need to flip five seats to win a majority instead of four. Back to you. All right. John Federman, meet Christian Cinema. I mean, it sounds so much like... Let's bring in MS now, congressional reporter Michael Schnell.

Michael, what's the reaction to this, especially among Democrats? Shocking. I mean, this seems like it's something out of an Aronsorkin film. right? The RNC convention, something that was already being so criticized because it's unprecedented because we haven't seen something like this. And then John Fenerman, who, by the way, is already under the microscope after that Wall Street Journal report that said that he basically doesn't even do his job and scoffs at basic constituent services is now having a video introducing a Republican at the Republican convention. Shocking. I mean, Britt had read some of those responses from

Democrats. You had Brendan Boyle say, I called him Trump's favorite Democrat. This is the reason why Chris DeLuzio saying he was too lazy to even do it in person, a nod to that Wall Street Journal report. I think there could be real implications for this. Well, first off, he insists he's going to be a Democrat if Democrats take control in November. He insists he'll be the 51st vote in a majority. Obviously, he's broken from the party on a number of votes, so he may still be caucusing with them, but how he helps them will have to see. But he's up for re-election in 2028. And Chris DeLuzio and Brendan Boyle, they smell blood in the water here, particularly after seeing those approval ratings plummeting. I think it's very likely we're going to see a primary challenger here if he even

intends on running for re-election. And then we're talking about a really competitive race in a state like Pennsylvania in an election year, no less, which could be a marquee battle. Only 22% approval rating on Democrats. But as Mark said, you got to look at the cross. You got to look really. You got to look under the hood there. It may be a very intense 22%, which is a great pace to start a campaign on. Great passion. You know what's interesting about John Federman is that if you look at the numbers last time I check, he voted with Democratic Party 90, 91, 92, 93% of the time. Sethill will continue voting for him if he's a 51st senator. But I just, I think back to how much Democrats loathed, the activists loathed, having a West Virginia senator who is a swing vote.

And I'm thinking, if you had problems with him, you ain't seen nothing yet when it comes to John Federman. Democrats might find themselves in the same position where they're sitting there looking at John Federman begging him for the deciding vote. Yeah, I mean, 100 percent. This is what we saw with Joe Manchin. This is we saw with Kierston Cinema on all of these, those key votes, needing them on their side, and they were very, they were very firm about where they stood on a number of matters. John Federman is going to be like that. But the difference is that Kirsten Cinema and Joe Manchin knew they had power and they tried to wield it. They knew that they could ask for things in negotiations and try to get them. John Federman.

doesn't seem like he wants to be the power player in a similar fashion. So he can go into a high-stakes negotiation with Democrats who need their vote. And he doesn't seem like he's going to the table asking for things with Republicans, with Democrats. We saw him vote for a number of controversial cabinet nominees. We've seen him vote for other Republican proposals. So yes, he could have that power and he will be a key player. But how he wields it and how he uses on Capitol Hill seems drastically different from the other swing votes that we've seen in previous Congresses. Let's bring into this conversation, Battleground co-chair for the the D-T-Triple-C, Democratic Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado. He is in Dallas this morning with a group

of Democrats looking to counter the message we saw last night at that Republican midterm convention. Congressman, thanks for being with us. Let's start with the fact that Texas is a battleground state. You were in a place where James Tala Rico is doing well, according to polling, at least in a dead heat, up a little more according to some other polls. What are you hearing on the ground from Democrats, from independents in that state, and what do you make of what you saw last night at the arena in Dallas? Well, I got here last night, Willie, and I walked into the hotel lobby, and there was a young Republicans party going on. So my first reaction was to turn around and walk out. My second reaction was, hey, I got to help these guys, you know?

Like, you're too young to go like this, right? Like, you have a whole life ahead of you. I can help you. But I actually ended up just coming to my room and ordering room service and it's worth it. The whole Good Samaritan thing, you're like, nah, no. Never mind. Well, I thought to myself, I'm the Battleground Co-Chair. I got 99 problems and helping this young Republican group ain't one of them right now.

So I'm trying to stay focused on the prize. But there's a whole fantasy world here, right? I mean, the whole thing is just beyond weird. You know, I've been an Army Ranger. I've been a paratrooper. I've been to Iraq and Afghanistan, I've been a member of Congress for eight years. So to come into an environment where I feel like this is one of the weirdest places I've been, is saying something.

What's weird about it? What's weird about it? Yeah, it's the alternative reality, right? The idea that everything is great. America is hotter than ever before. The feeling that you can't afford anything that is actually not true. We're winning.

There's so much winning. The war in Iran, we're winning that. It's pretty wild. And, you know, Donald Trump is doing what he always does, making it about him. And what struck me the most, what actually made me really mad was last night when he was talking about how he needs to get something out of the war in Iran. So maybe he's going to rename the straits. You know, we have 50,000 service members over there right now. 18 have given their lives. Hundreds have been wounded. We're coming up on the 25th anniversary

of 9-11 on Friday. And once again, Donald Trump, it's all about him. It begins and ends with Donald Congress, there was also something that occurred last night that I thought was beyond weird when I heard it earlier this morning. And there was a United States Senator Tim Scott in a rather hysterical address to the crowd there. And among his remarks, he said, Democrats hate America. And he said it quite loudly, expressing it with a lot of body movement. And I want to ask you, you once belong to a uniquely apolitical outfit called the 75th Ranger Regiment. And you didn't know whether the men under your command were Democrats, Republicans, atheists, you just did not know. All you were worried about, I assume, was their capability in combat.

And how does it strike you that the cultural change in political language is such that the United States, state senator can stand up and scream that Democrats hate America? Well, it shows you, you know, where this party, where Donald Trump has brought you, where the Republican Party has brought this country right now. And I don't relish saying that, actually. I wish there was a healthy independent Republican Party. It would make it easier to legislate. It would make it easier to govern. It would make it easier to do a lot of things. Our system is a two-party system. So I want a healthy party to debate with, they have a back and forth and create better policy ideas. But when you have, you know, the center of gravity of that party is about hating the other side, saying we're evil,

you know, labeling us with absurd labels, where do you go from there? You know, where do you go? So I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to, you know, use those terms because that's counterproductive. But it just shows you where they've come. And more specifically, it shows you where Donald Trump has brought them and where they have allowed themselves to go. Let's not let members of Congress off the hook here. They have allowed this to happen. Donald Trump set the conditions that they could have stopped it and they decided not to. Yeah, Congress, let me ask you about $6 a gallon diesel. Let me ask you about rising gas prices. Let me talk. Let's talk about interest rates going up. Let's talk about the high price of rent. The fact that many people can't even get a mortgage right now,

because mortgage rates are skyrocketing much more than the economic growth. The fact that Donald Trump has actually contributed far more to the federal debt than he has to the economy since he got back into office, people are suffering. You look at health care, health care costs are going up. We've been asking this question this week. I'm curious, among your constituents, among the people, people you're talking to on the ground, what is stretching them economically the most? What is the bill that is hard? Is it gas? Is it groceries? Is it diesel? Is it rent?

What's most difficult for Americans in 2026? For me, it's health care. I spend a lot of time with my constituents, a lot of time with Coloradans and the destruction to our health care system by taking the ACA, subsidies, cutting the health care system and taking that money and using it to give tax breaks to the top 1% in the largest companies in America on the back of working class Americans' healthcare. I commonly hear folks say that, you know, $2 to $300 monthly premiums are now $13, $1, $1,500. They've gone up threefold, fourfold. And what makes it so devastating is this isn't just an inability to pay a bill. People are losing their care. Right? They have sick

children that they can't provide health care to. They can't buy their prescription drugs. When people go without health care, that suffering is uniquely acute and it's immediate and it's devastating to see. Democratic Congressman Jason Crow of Colorado, thank you very much for coming on the show this morning. We appreciate it. And Mark Leibovic, your thoughts on the candidates, especially leading up to the midterms are going to be talking a lot about affordability. But what tangible promises can they make? actual policy that can actually change the reality for Americans. Should they be speaking more specifically? Well, I mean, Donald Trump spoke pretty specifically last night

when he promised, what, $5,000 dividends if Republicans win the House and Senate. That's not possible. I don't see that happening. I think it's too late. I think Republicans at this point have kind of squandered a lot of goodwill and a lot of time. And I think Americans, if you look at the polling and if you talk to enough, of them would say that, like, look, they're out of patience and this is not what we voted for, and that's why all the trend lines are headed where they are for Republicans right now.

Michael, what about you? I mean, I can tell you, Republican lawmakers feel that the White House at this point has sort of tossed up their hands and given up on the chances of taking the majority. He's focusing on these vanity projects. He's talking about renaming New Mexico to New America. He's not spending that MAGA ink money, at least a large majority of it. And he's not helping them when it comes to this affordability theme. So Republicans are sort of saying, we kind of think he has.

come to the conclusion that this isn't happening and he has given up, which not a good idea for him, because at the same time, he sees himself on the ballot. He said it last night, pretend like I am running. I think it's for two reasons, one, because he knows he can turn out the vote, so he's trying to rev up the base. But also, he feels that his legacy is on the line here, which is why it doesn't make sense that he wouldn't be engaging more to help Republicans. His legacy of the next two years, if Democrats take the majority, he knows subpoenas are going to be flying. They're going to be investigating every part of his administration, every member of his family. So there's a lot on line for the midterms. He doesn't seem to care, and Republicans are sort of taking note of that

and wondering why. They don't have a good answer because it's such an unprecedented situation. All right, the Atlantic's, Mark Liebevich, and MS now congressional reporter Michael Schnell. Thank you both very much for coming on the show this morning. And coming up, Hillary Clinton will join the table in just a few moments. She has a new piece this morning for the Atlantic on what the aftermath of 9-11 taught her. We'll dig into that and much more. But, First, our next guest is looking to unseat Republican Senator Pete Ricketts in Nebraska. Independent candidate Dan Osborne is standing by how he plans to win his election this November. Morning Joe will be right back.

Want to jack up the cost of prescription drugs? A new war? Yes, war. Ricketts. A tax cut for the rich paid for by a tax hike on us. They're spending millions lying to keep me out of rooms like this. That's okay, though, because I prefer places like this anyway. I'll never take a dollar of corporate pack money or an order from a party boss.

No smoke-filled backrooms either. Okay, that's part of a new campaign ad for Dan Osborne. He's the independent candidate challenging Nebraska's incumbent Republican Senator Pete Ricketts. The Nebraska Democratic Party chose not to run a candidate in the Senate race, effectively coalescing its support behind Osborne. And Dan Osborne joins us now. It's good to have you. Thank you for being on.

So how would you describe just how much you contrast from your opponent, Senator Ricketts? Oh, it's wild. It's the story writes itself. It's a shop floor mechanic versus the son of a billionaire. And, you know, we got them scared. You know, they're not just afraid of me and me being a mechanic. They're afraid of all the mechanics, all the pipe fitters, all the nurses, all the teachers, all the teachers who are angry right now

because they see politicians like P. Ricketts have sold out the American worker to the corporations and their donors and their lobbyists. Why run as an independent? Well, I'm a lifelong independent. I've been an independent from the time I could register to vote when I was in the Navy. I've never really accepted that I got to accept a set of values and policies and principles and reject the other one.

because for me, you know, like when I was going through the straight of whore moves, there's no Republicans or Democrats, right? We're just all Americans at the end of the day. When you talk to voters, when you knock on doors, when you're at town hall meetings, and they're telling you about their lives. What are they talking to you about how difficult the costs are? I mean, we've heard people complain about groceries, gas, diesel, going to hit $6,

rent, health care. What are you hearing mainly out there on the campaign trail? Yeah, it's, you know, Nebraska's first and foremost in agriculture state. We're third in corn. We're fifth in soybeans. We're first in beef.

How about are farmers getting hit? They're getting hit hard. They're getting hit real hard. You know, it's starting with, first of all, we can't pass a farm bill. The farm bill is outdated. We're from 2018 subsidies, crop prices. and then you add in a blanket tariff policy.

I was talking to a row crop farmer. He farms 2,000 acres. He was telling me for 2025, he was out. They closed the market. We bailed out Argentina with $20 billion. They take off their tariffs from China. China buys to them. Our guys just want a market to be able to sell, too.

Well, why are we bailing out Argentina? Why are we giving sweetheart deals to China? Why are we leaving American farmers in the dust? If I knew that, I'd write a book. I don't know. But it doesn't seem to make any sense. No, it doesn't make any sense at all. And now his inputs with this war in Iran are up.

He had to write a check for $50,000 more. So our guys get bailed out with $12 billion. And I asked him if that's supposed to help him. And he said, well, yeah, it's supposed to help for my inputs for 2026, but those are unaffordable now. So we're in a crisis. Our farmers are aging out. Farmer suicides three and a half times the national average.

I was talking to a 911 operator who stays back. busy morning and night trying to deal with farmers because they can't pay their bills a lot of them. So it's being consolidated. Bankruptcies are up. And, you know, where's the help coming, right? Well, President Trump said he'd give $5,000. Farmers don't want $5,000. They want a market to be able to sell. Yeah. That's part of the reason you've gained traction as an independent is because people are fed up with politicians. And it's almost like they see an R or D next to the name. They say, you're a politician. You're one of them and they want to talk to somebody they can relate to maybe. Have you found that when you're talking to voters now? They don't care what party you're with as long as you'll help them.

Yeah. It's, you know, really what it boils down to is talking about our paychecks, right? Because that's how I've lived my whole life is paycheck to paycheck. And sometimes you're a medical emergency away from going into bankruptcy, right? And there's a lot of people that are right now, that are there right now. myself included. So, you know, it is about dialing back. A lot of the damage, the Big Beautiful Bill Act has done to rural health care, to our farmers, and tax credits for ethanol. I mean, the list goes on and on and giving people a fair shake. What do you say to people, you know, you come up and get someone, you're talking to someone,

they said, they have two little kids. And one of them's sick, and they can't afford to take them to a pediatrician because their health care costs are just skyrocketed. And they can't afford a health care plan now. What do you say? Yeah, I say I'm going to go fight for them, right? And, you know, the health care system has been vertically integrated. You know, they own every step of the way. That's certainly a big part of the problem. And you look at United Health Care, you know, from the time you get a snuffly nose, from the time you're driving through to get your prescription, they own every part of it. They negotiate with each other.

And then they post record profits every quarter. Oh, you know, Paul, Politicians like Pete Ricketts, they love that, right, because they're making money off that. They shouldn't profit off of us getting sick. So it's about going back to the way we handled the robber barons in the 1900s, breaking up the industries and creating a true free market that favors competition. Because right now, it's a controlled market. So many aspects of our lives from youth sports to health care have been consolidated. So you have said we're proudly and independent and you have said that if you win, you won't necessarily. caucus with either party, Democrats or Republicans. So what does that look like? How do you, if you're not on any committees, if you're not accumulating a seniority, how do you deliver for the people in Nebraska? Yeah, well, I think you only need to look to 2024 since we're

developing in hypotheticals. You know, if I would have beat Deb Fisher in 2024, the Big Beautiful Bill Act wouldn't have passed. I would have been the tiebreaker because J.D. Vance came down and broke the tie. So that's leverage. That's leverage for Nebraska. And, you know, And that's going and knocking on the majority leaders, door, minority leaders, doors. Because they're going to need to come to me to get my vote. And if they want my vote, you know, then, you know, we have to deliver. I'm going to deliver for Nebraska.

All right. Independent candidate for U.S. Senate in Nebraska, Dan Osborne. Thank you very much for coming on the show. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Up next, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joins the table for a wide-ranging conversation,

including her reflections on 25 years since the 9-11 terrorist attacks. Morning Joe will be right back.