Morning Joe - Morning Joe 10/3/22

Episode Date: October 3, 2022

Ukrainian troops recapture key Eastern city, while CPAC Twitter account deletes a tweet parroting Russian propaganda

Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe. It is Monday, October 3rd. There is a lot happening this morning. The largest ever federal search and rescue operation is now underway in the wake of Hurricane Ian as the death toll from the storm nears 90 and is expected to climb. We'll have a live report.

Plus, more violent rhetoric from Donald Trump targeting Mitch McConnell, making a racist slur against his wife with little to no pushback from Republicans. He just he just out and out in all caps, attacked McConnell and said he had a death wish and then made another racist slur against Mitch McConnell's wife. Wall Street Journal editorial page talking about how even by Donald Trump standards, this was dangerous, violent rhetoric. We'll have the latest on that in light of everything that's going on. Also, CPAC tweets out Russian propaganda and then backtracks, claiming the post was not authorized. We'll tell you what the conservative group is saying now and a lot of news in the sports world.

But we're going to begin this morning in Florida, where historic rescue and relief efforts are underway. Five days after Hurricane Ian battered the state and left massive devastation in its wake. The U.S. death toll from the storm is now at 87 people, according to an NBC News tally. First responders are still searching the hardest hit areas for survivors. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says more than 1,000 rescues have been made across the state since the storm hit. FEMA officials say this is the largest search and rescue effort they have ever launched in Florida and that U.S. federal response is likely to be unprecedented. We prepositioned the largest amount of search and rescue assets that I think we've ever put

in place before, bringing together all of the federal family, our FEMA urban search and rescue teams, the Coast Guard, the Department of Interior, the Department of Defense. More than 700,000 people still without power in Florida and several counties are under mandatory evacuation orders right now. This as residents grapple with the colossal damage. Rebuilding could take years. Now I've lost everything, all everything, my life savings, my tools, everything. I was just devastated seeing what was happening to the property and to my neighbor's place downstairs. And it was hard to comprehend. You know, it's so heartbreaking.

And a lot of times, you know, people will look at these hurricanes and they'll look at the big things. Oh, look at the boats out in the harbor. Oh, look, their house has been smashed in. I had dear friends in Pensacola that I've known for a long time. things oh look at the boats out in the harbor oh look their house has been smashed in i had dear friends in pensacola that i've known for a long time and i hear this story time and again after terrible hurricanes when we got just pounded by hurricanes after hurricane back in 2004 2005 you know a husband was telling me uh about i asked how you guys holding up? And she said, well, you know, my wife this morning, I had to pull her away because she was going through the sand, just looking for pictures,

looking for children's pictures, looking for wedding pictures, looking for pictures of her parents. And it was all in the sand, all blown away. It's just so heartbreaking. So yeah, we look at these pictures and we look at the structures and we look at the property damage. But there's so much personal loss that goes along with all of those devastating, obvious property losses. And people who, like the gentleman that was talking, they lose everything that was dear to them as far as memories go so often. And their ability to continue the tools to work with. And also, beyond a community being decimated like this, as it fans out, even one to two to three inches of water can cause unbelievable damage to a community.

Well, and unfortunately for so many homes that were in this area, they didn't have flood insurance. And for anybody that's lived in Florida over the past 10 years, you'll you'll you get notices constantly that insurance companies are canceling your flood insurance. Sometimes your homeowners insurance because they're just pulling out of the state of Florida because of these hurricanes. That will be the story and the debate in the months to come. Meanwhile, communities in central Florida continue to face rising flood waters due to the hurricane. Officials in Seminole County warned residents over the weekend that flooding could continue there for several days. City officials in Orlando asked residents to limit water usage because the storm damaged the sewer system. Other central

Florida cities issued voluntary evacuation orders due to the flooding, with homes and cars in many places still submerged. In just a few minutes, we'll get a live report from Florida's hard-hit West Coast. We also have major news from abroad. Ukrainian fighters are pushing deeper into Russian controlled areas in the east, threatening to cut off Russian forces from supply lines and to potentially deal another costly defeat to President Vladimir Putin. In a message early Sunday morning, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared the city of Liman, quote, fully cleared. This is incredibly important. It's positioned in the Donetsk region. Liman, along with the neighboring Luhansk, makes up the industrial heartland of eastern Ukraine. Its recapturing is just the latest in a series of

major victories for the Ukrainian army. Last month, Ukrainian troops made massive gains in the country's northeast, reclaiming virtually all the territory Russian forces had captured since the war began. That comes just after Vladimir Putin announced Russia's illegal annexation of the Ukrainian regions of Zaporizhia, Kherson, Donetsk and Luhansk. Putin repeatedly claimed that Ukraine's illegally annexed regions had voted to rejoin Russia during referendums, which saw results nearly 100 percent in favor of the Kremlin. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States will never recognize Russia's illegal takeover. The entire process around the sham referenda was a complete farce. The United States does not and will never recognize any of the Kremlin's claims to

sovereignty over parts of Ukraine that it seized by force and now purports to incorporate into Russia. And this was the scene out of Russia on Friday following Putin's signing off the official annexations. With us, we have former NATO Supreme Allied Commander James Tavridis. He is MSNBC's chief international analyst, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haass, and the host of Way Too Early, White House beer chief at Politico, Jonathan Lemire. Good to have you all with us this morning. Admiral, the news out of Ukraine for the Russian army, all bad. The news out of Ukraine for Vladimir Putin, all bad. There seems to be a quickening, again, of Russian troops

falling back, giving up. What can you tell us about where you've seen the events of the last five, six, seven days? Put it in perspective for us. Yeah, if you think about the war, Joe, as kind of a series of phases, phase one, this attempt failed by Putin to take the whole country. Phase two was kind of grinding warfare along the line of demarcation. We're now in phase three, where the critical mass of all of these weapons systems joining the Ukrainians with their fighting spirit are really starting to tell. We saw over the last four weeks some pretty striking uptick in takeovers by the Ukrainians. They're showing some great video of that right now. I think, however, the bad news is as the fall moves on here and as Russia compresses into a smaller area, it's going to get harder to simply

repeat those gains. Bottom line, it's been a very good month for the Ukrainians. And this takeover of the city you're highlighting, and I'll conclude here, Lyman, is a place that is a railhead, a logistic head, and is part of controlling the flow of goods, troops in and out of Donetsk, Luhansk, ultimately the key to Crimea. It's been a good month for the Ukrainians. This is a time for us to keep our foot on the gas pedal and keep supporting them. And Richard Haass, the admiral, told us about a month ago, winter is coming. It's significant for the Russians or the Ukrainians to make gains before winter sets in. It's the Ukrainians who've

had momentum on their side, the wind at their backs over the past month. I suspect they will continue making gains in the coming week or two before things really settle in. Where does that set us up throughout the winter and going into the spring? Well, it helps in several ways, Joe. And the most important might be not the battlefield, but in the battle for the hearts and minds of Europe. It makes it very hard now for European governments to essentially say we should back off helping Ukraine. They have no chance of winning. Guess what? They're doing OK. So even though energy prices will go up, it'll get cold in parts of Europe this winter, the economies there are contracting. I think this provides a backdrop where it makes it more likely

that Europe stays the course with the United States partnering with Ukraine. And then secondly, I think the pressure on Vladimir Putin grows. He's opened up an enormous gap between his goals on one hand and his capabilities on the other. And that is that always spells trouble in any foreign policy. And again, the criticism of him is coming now from both sides. You see people on the left voting with their feet or however you want to describe them, normal Russians not wanting to become cannon fodder. And you've got people on the right, these bloggers who are increasingly now openly criticizing the conduct of the war. So Putin basically is going to feel the heat at home, while, if you will, Europeans, I think, I won't stretch the metaphor about heat, but I think they're more likely to stay the course. So I think this sets Ukraine up fairly well for the spring.

Well, I tell you what, it is remarkable the success that the Ukrainians have had. I mean, almost as remarkable as the Giants being three and one right now, Mika, but we'll talk to Richard about that. We can talk about all of that later. There's a lot of different issues with that sport. But no, it's incredible what the Ukrainians have been able to do. And over the course of many, many months as this gets longer and more difficult. Now, the Conservative Political Action Conference, CPAC, has deleted and backtracked on a tweet from Friday that had adopted Kremlin propaganda. The tweet, which was deleted three hours later, read in part,

quote, Vladimir Putin announces the annexation of four Ukrainian occupied territories. Biden and the Dems continue to send Ukraine billions of taxpayer dollars. Meanwhile, we are under attack at our southern border. When will Democrats put hashtag America first and give and end the gift giving to Ukraine? The tweet featured an image of a Russian flag and described the annexation of the regions you see here as official in an accompanying image that listed the territories. CPAC tweeted on Saturday evening that there was a delay in deleting the quote unapproved tweet because of a time difference as the organization is currently hosting a conference in Australia, it also acknowledged the post had belittled the plight of the innocent Ukraine people. You think? Oh, my God. supporting NATO, supporting whether you're talking about John Kennedy or Ronald Reagan,

supporting past presidents, past Americans' belief that Russian aggression must always be met with strength. And here you've had CPAC, and I've talked about it for some time. This was this was, believe it or not, not shocking to many of us, unfortunately, because whether the strong man is Trump or whether it's Orban who brags about pushing liberal democracy to the Trump far right. And we see it here. And I'm just curious, as someone who's fought for freedom, fought for Western democracy, fought against Russian expansion your entire life, I'll just ask, how does this tweet, how does this movement on the far right hit you as as a patriot? It's a colossal mistake for anybody to lean against freedom, democracy, courage, the stamina,

the true grit of the Ukrainians. It's just been remarkable to watch what they have achieved when the odds were stacked against them eight months ago at the beginning of this conflict. They are literally on the front lines of freedom here. And when they look over their shoulders, they're defending the values that we hold dearest. And so I am perplexed that any organization could stand up and be critical of this incredible show of courage and this display of doing the right thing, which is what we see the Ukrainians doing. Here's a shred of goodness in it, if you will. I do think there remains, despite this kind of far right criticism that is admittedly bubbling, there's still a great deal of bipartisan support that goes across the political divide. This is

one of those issues where we absolutely must stand together as a nation, because I'll close with this, Joe. Russia is watching. The Kremlin is watching. Our allies are watching. And when they see divisions here, the likelihood of them continuing to stand and support this valiant and worthy effort diminishes. So it hurts my heart to see that kind of tweet come out and imply a division that I don't think is truly there. Well, and for supporters of Reagan, it has to hurt their heart too. Ronald Reagan, his legacy is pushing back against Russian expansionism. We never considered it, quote, gift giving when we were helping Hungary, when we were helping Czechoslovakia, when we were helping Poland, when we were working for a generation in the long twilight struggle against Russian communism. And now there are actually some

people on the Trump right who call the support of freedom fighters, quote, gift giving. And, you know, Jonathan O'Meara, how unfortunate, I'll be polite this morning, how unfortunate that CPAC would put up a tweet, stayed up for 12 hours, by the way, complete with graphics. This wasn't some intern just shooting off a tweet, but they would keep up a tweet for 12 hours that would accuse the Ukrainians of, quote, occupying their own country. This would be like another country accusing the United States of America of occupying Texas. That wouldn't go down well with us. Sure as hell wouldn't go down well with Texans. And I'm sure this ain't going down well with the Ukrainians right now.

Joe, I don't know much, but in the year of our Lord 2022, don't tweet something with a Russian flag in it. That appears to be something we can all get behind, but apparently not there in CPAC. And you're right. This is an extraordinary moment in some ways. It just goes to show how far that conference and that political party in many ways has fallen. It was 2016, of course, where the Republican Party rewrote their platform of their convention to include a lot of pro-Kremlin talking points. That was largely the work of Paul Manafort, who was at the time Trump's campaign chairman. We know, of course, chapter and verse, how Trump sided with Putin and the Kremlin on many things during his time in office and how. Jonathan, you asked the question.

You were in Helsinki and you asked the question on whether Trump believed Vladimir Putin or believed the men and women in the U.S. intelligence community. And he chose Putin. Yeah, he clearly sided with Moscow that moment in Helsinki when I put that question to him. And it wasn't the only time that he sided with the Russian leader while in office. And that rhetoric has continued. Remember the early days of this war, he was pretty supportive of what Russia was doing, only to back off because there had been such blowback. But others haven't. The most popular host on Fox News in the evenings still touts some pretty pro-Russian stuff sometimes, which is then used, those clips

used on Russian state television. Right now, at this late stage in the war, that's still happening. And we know how the right wing has also embraced Hungary's far right leader. And that was given a speaking slot at CISPIAC not that long ago. But to the admiral's point, the admiral's point, there has not been at least yet much fraying of the bipartisan coalition in Washington. A few lone far right voices have questioned the aid, but they're pretty small in number. The fear would be, the House has if this conflict does extend for months and months into next deep in the next year, those voices could grow and stuff like this could lead to that fear. And also, obviously, the fear and Richard would speak to this, the fear in Western capitals and in Ukraine, the possibility that Donald Trump would ever be commander in chief again, because they understand that NATO would be gone by now if he were.

And this would have happened. And Richard, let's just be very clear here. I just let's we can't allow people to try to clean things up. Can't allow Donald Trump to suggest that he would have been tougher on Russia than Vladimir, than Joe Biden, when at the beginning of the war, it was Donald Trump that kept talking about how brilliant Vladimir Putin was for being able to go in and take over the Ukrainian country for, he said, a couple of dollars in sanctions. For weeks, he just kept talking about how brilliant the invasion was. No, I think under the previous administration, you had some tough policies towards Russia on the part of the administration, but not the president. And I think had this happened, there would have essentially been a backing away from NATO. I think right now Russia would control most of Ukraine if the United States had not taken the lead in galvanizing

the Western response. The bottom line is there is no Western response without the United States. It's interesting, Joe, and we just had in New York the opening of the U.N. General Assembly, and we had dozens and dozens of international leaders, presidents and prime ministers and kings and foreign ministers come through New York for the U. UN. To me, in all the meetings we had, the most commonly talked about theme was the importance of American leadership as a necessary precondition for others stepping up, whether it was Europeans against Russia, people in the Asia-Pacific against China. It just doesn't happen by itself. It's all about alliances. It's all about partnering. That's the only way to deal with these authoritarian threats to world order as we've known it. And that's my big takeaway. And if there are doubts seep in about our staying power, that will unravel things. And that's why it's important that we see this kind of bipartisan support that Jim was talking about. People have to have confidence, not just where we are today, but that we're going to still be there tomorrow. And what have we learned over the past 20 years? We've learned that America first,

which is used for an excuse to come home, to be isolationist, to pretend the world's problems are going to solve themselves, always leads to disaster we've learned that america can't lead from behind leading from behind doesn't work as well america is it is still uh it is still the power as richard said that the country uh the countries across the world look to for leadership we remain the indispensable power if you care about freedom, if you care about liberty, if you if you care about Admiral, let me let you finish here on this. We are indispensable. I mean, and for people who might be offended by that or consider that to be jingoism, just look at the numbers we fed and we freed more people than any country in history. It was it was the United States leading along with our allies that freed Central Europe and Eastern Europe from Russian oppression,

a generational struggle. And it's once again, the United States, along with our allies, but mainly the United States right now funding this effort in Ukraine? We don't have to imagine what would happen if the U.S. walked away from this position of leadership you just described so well, Joe. We did it at the end of the First World War. History shows us what it looks like. We walked away from the League of Nations. We pulled everybody out of Europe. We just came home. We erected big trade barriers. We came home and isolated ourselves. That was the right word from the world. How did that work out? Well, you can drop a plumb line from that set of decisions to the Great depression with a d not a recession great

depression the rise of fascism in the second world war we learned that lesson we did the right thing coming out of the second world war it would be a geopolitical disaster of epic proportion for us to step back from the world at this moment when autocrats like Vladimir Putin are seeking to run the table. Danger ahead. We need to stay in the game. Yes, we do. Admiral James DeVritas, thank you very much for being on this morning. Florida begins the cleanup process. There is new focus on whether there was enough advance warning to evacuate in some of the hardest hit areas. One county in particular is being criticized for its delayed reaction as the hurricane made its way toward Florida. Lee County, which includes the hardest hit seaside community of Fort Myers Beach,

as well as the towns of Fort Myers, Sanibel and Cape Coral, did not issue a mandatory evacuation order until Tuesday morning. That's a day after several neighboring communities had ordered their most vulnerable residents to flee. By then, residents told The New York Times that they had little time to evacuate. And even though the storm's path did shift slightly, the National Hurricane Center on the Sunday before had said that area had a 40% chance of six foot high storm surge. Yesterday, the county's sheriff responded. I'm going to cut you off before you go any further. I don't know who you are, where you come from. Everyone wants to focus on a plan that might have been done differently. I'm going to tell you, I stand 100 percent with my county commissioners, my county manager.

We did what we had to do at the exact same time. I wouldn't have changed anything. There have been at least 42 deaths reported in Lee County so far, the most of any county impacted by the storm. More than 800 people there have been rescued so far. So rescued during the storm. Joining us live from Fort Myers Beach, Florida, NBC News correspondent Dasha Burns. Dasha, what are you hearing there? Hey, Mika, good morning. Well, yesterday we spent a good sense of the scale of devastation that we saw on that barrier island yesterday. Homes just battered and you'll also get a sense of the scope and the scale of the search and rescue and recovery effort that is ongoing right now. We watched as this Florida task force took, went to homes,

searched, did their preliminary searches and as they got deeper into the search, started to look at some of those homes where people have been reported missing, where they've seen things that are unusual, looking for any signs of life, Mika, or signs of death. And as we were there, we did witness the team call in what they call a human remains canine. This is a dog that is brought in to try to determine whether or not there might be a deceased individual there. And I'll tell you, one of the more chilling moments in the day was when you heard the dog bark, which means that the dog thinks there might be a deceased individual there. And the team went silent, began their search very quietly, very methodically. It wasn't bulldozers. It wasn't a big rush. They slowly began to peel back the layers of this battered home to try to find what they thought might have been a 90-year-old

woman that has been reported missing. We did find out that they didn't find her yet. So the search continues. But this just gives you a small example of what they're doing over and over again all day, every day here, Mika. NBC's Dasha Burns, thank you very much. Also, President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden will travel to Florida on Wednesday to assess the damage. The first couple will fly to Puerto Rico today to visit those impacted by Hurricane Fiona, which hit weeks before Ian and left at least 25 people dead. The president is expected to announce more than $60 million in funding for the island to strengthen flood walls and create a new flood warning system.

We'll take a look now at the headlines across the country in the morning papers. The Hartford Current reports conspiracy theorist Alex Jones will make a second appearance on the stand this week in his defamation trial in Connecticut. Jones is trying to limit the damages he will have to pay for promoting the lie that the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting was a hoax. We'll be following that. The Charlotte Observer reports the number of people dying by suicide in North Carolina prisons has reached an historic high this year. Since January 1st, nine inmates have ended their lives in prison, an average of one a month.

Inmate advocates suspect severe staff shortages inside the prisons are largely to blame. And the front page of the state newspaper in South Carolina covers a trial getting underway today over the state's new congressional map. The map was approved by the General Assembly in January. Lawyers for the South Carolina chapter of the NAACP argue the congressional map discriminates against black voters and must be redrawn. And in Rhode Island, the Westerly Sun is looking at a new program that aims to reduce food waste in schools across the state. The Rhode Island Schools Recycling Club is a grant funded program looking to recover hundreds of pounds of safe to eat food from cafeteria served lunches. One in four families with children in Rhode Island are food insecure, hungry. Former President Trump launched a new incendiary attack against Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. In a post on his Truth Social

website on Friday, Trump criticized McConnell for supporting legislation sponsored by Democrats, suggesting he had a, quote, death wish. McConnell had voted in favor of government funding that was set to run out on Friday night. The former president also went on to mock McConnell's wife, Elaine Chao, in racist terms. When asked about those comments, a Trump spokesperson said it was absurd to suggest the president's post could be construed as dangerous. Everybody knows it's dangerous. Every Republican that works with Mitch McConnell knows it's dangerous. But we're seeing now, here's your test. You can stand with a colleague. This is it.

Because the death threats are already, I'm sure, going to be spiking against Mitch McConnell and his wife. Who worked for Trump. Yeah. Or you can continue to pretend that there's nothing wrong because you're a coward. And Republicans, some of them, continue to show that there is just no bottom. But the damage here is that Americans become more and more desensitized to this behavior, which should be condemned. Senator Rick Scott, the campaign chair for Senate Republicans, was asked about those comments from Trump. Take a look. Trump said, quote, he has a death wish

for supporting Democratic sponsored bills. He also mocked McConnell's wife and his own former transportation secretary, Elaine Chao, as, China-loving and Coco Chao. You're a member of the Senate GOP leadership. Are you OK with this? Well, I can never talk about, respond to why anybody else says what they said. As you know, you know, the president likes to give people nicknames. You can ask him how he came up with the nickname. I'm sure he has a nickname for me. I don't condone violence and I hope no one else condones violence. Nicknames are one thing, but this appears racist. Is that okay? It's never, ever okay to be a racist um um it's you know like i think you always have to be

careful you know if you're in the public you know i how you how you say things i just can't and this is no bottom no bottom the wall street journal editorial board is out with a new piece on trump's rhetoric and it writes writes in part this. This continues Mr. Trump's attacks on Elaine Chao, Mr. McConnell's wife, for being Chinese-American. Her real offense was resigning as transportation secretary after Mr. Trump's disgraceful behavior on January 6th. There's Wall Street. Oh, there's Washington Post. No, no. Wait, I think that's the Wall Street Journal editorial page, is it not? We'll check that. Yeah, this is the Wall Street Journal editorial page. Bad graphic. But the death wish rhetoric is ugly even by Mr. Trump's standards and deserves to be condemned.

Mr. Trump's apologists claim he merely meant Mr. McConnell has a political death wish, but that isn't what he wrote. It's all too easy to imagine some fanatic taking Mr. Trump seriously and literally. In fact, that has happened. We've seen this happen. And attempting to, you know, attack Mr. McConnell. Many supporters took Mr. Trump's rhetoric about former Vice President Pence all too seriously on January 6th. Five weeks from Election Day, Mr. Trump could be working and spending money to elect a GOP Congress or to help his home state of Florida recover from Hurricane Ian. And instead, he's attacking Mr.

McConnell and his wife as part of a personal political vendetta and putting every Republican candidate on the spot to respond to questions about Mr. Trump's rant. Mr. Trump always puts himself first. And with this rhetoric, he may put others at genuine risk of harm. That again from the Wall Street Journal. But again, it's really painful to see a Republican sit there and kind of about about a hibbity jibbity about whether or not it was wrong. It's a colleague. So Donald Trump, we know that what Donald Trump does is he tries to stir violence up against political opponents. He's tried to do it against people in the media who he doesn't like. And he tweets abusive things. And suddenly their names start showing up on kill lists that the FBI finds and arrests those people because they're drawing out plans to kill

people that Donald Trump is attacking publicly. Most dramatically, on January the 6th, Donald Trump kept attacking publicly, most dramatically on January the 6th. Donald Trump kept attacking Mike Pence. In fact, when he found out that Mike Pence was fleeing from the chamber, he tweeted again, putting his life more at risk. And so Mike Pence and his family rushed out. And for those who don't think that Mike Pence's life was in danger that day, you really, really have to be a cult member of the first order to not think Mike Pence's life is in danger. Just talk to the Secret Service agents around him who were calling home to their wives and loved ones and saying goodbye to them because they didn't think they were going to get out of the U.S. Capitol alive.

Ask them. They were there. Jonathan O'Meara. This is just more of the same. He targets he targets people in the media. He targets Democrats. He targets members of his own party. And he does it with violent rhetoric.

And I remember seeing this after reading it first time, just flinching because death wish was in all caps. There was no political death wish attached to it. It was very clear, given his violent rhetoric in the past, the fact that he loves political violence and has bragged about it at campaign rallies. The second I read it, I thought, oh my God, Mitch McConnell is going to have to double his security now, along with his wife, because that's exactly what Donald Trump is trying to stir up. Yeah. And let's set aside, first of all, this is political malpractice. Five weeks until midterms, you're attacking minority leader of

your own party with the Senate hanging in the balance. This is far more serious and dangerous than that. We know there has been violence committed in Trump's name frequently. January 6th, of course, the most grotesque and largest example. But there have been other moments. There have been other people who have threatened politicians, who have threatened members of the media. I know you guys have been threatened. I've been threatened by people who were Trump supporters. Law enforcement had to be involved in those cases. We already know that we're at a time in the wake of that Mar-a-Lago search, an unprecedented rise in threats against law enforcement, FBI, the Department of Justice, and members of the intelligence community and those police departments

across the country are deeply worried about the injection of political violence into our discourse as the midterms approach, that you're seeing members of Congress travel with security they've never had to have before. And moments like this, moments like this only add to that. And then you add, then of course you have Republicans refusing to condemn it, refusing to condemn the threat, refusing to condemn the racist rhetoric. There's, it's only going to get worse from here. That's why, that's why I've got to say when, when people were suggesting Joe Biden apologize for calling Trump and a lot of his followers, more violent members of this Trump movement, semi-fascists, said, yeah, you should apologize because you're mislabeling Donald Trump. He's a fascist. Pulling back too much. He's a fascist. When you look at him using violence, the way he uses violence, glorifying violence, using violence in his rhetoric, talking about, you know, taking people a member of Congress beats the hell out of out of a reporter for asking a question about health care reform.

Donald Trump praises that member of Congress for beating the hell out of a member of Congress for simply being asked a question about health care reform. And again, yes, we have seen it just like Jonathan's talking about. He's seen it. You see security at times having to go way up because the threats are put out there. And and the people that he wants to respond violently respond with violence or with threats of violence. And this is not just impacted politicians or members of the media. You look what happened after the Moralago search. You had a federal judge, federal magistrate. You had you had members of the FBI that Donald Trump deliberately released released their names because when DOJ didn't, because they didn't want their lives to be at stake, at risk, Trump made sure

that they were released. His supporters made sure they were released, thereby putting them and their families' lives at risk. And if you look at this, Mika, it's spreading out now across all members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike. Exactly. Both sides of the aisle. Members are experiencing a rise in threats and confrontations amid the surge in violent political speech that we've been talking about. It comes from Donald Trump. The New York Times reports that since the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol, Republicans and Democrats have faced stalking, armed visits to their homes, vandalism and assaults, part of a chilling trend that many fear is only intensifying. Republican Senator Susan Collins told the paper, quote, I wouldn't be surprised if a senator or House member were killed. What started with abusive phone calls is now translating into active threats of violence and real violence. The number of recorded threats against members of Congress increased more than tenfold to nine thousand six hundred and twenty five in 2021. That's according to figures from the Capitol Police in the first quarter of 2022, the latest period for which figures were available. The force opened one thousand eight hundred and twenty cases.

If recent history is any guide, the pace is likely to surge in the coming weeks as the election approaches. The paper notes that despite the torrent of threats, few cases result in arrest. Let's bring in the president of the National Action Network and host of Politics Nation, Reverend Al Sharpton, associate professor of political science at Fordham University. Christina Greer. Well, you know, Rev, when you're having The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times write the same day on a growing threat of violence in the political system fueled by Donald Trump, you know there's something serious going on. No, this is very serious. And let me use this example because you and I have had these conversations candidly, privately, but I want to use it publicly. I remember back in the 80s, we would use language that would in many ways could be interpreted by fanatics whichever

way they wanted. And it was Mrs. Coretta Scott King, Dr. King's widow, that said to me, Al, if you're going to be part of the nonviolent movement, you've got to stop saying things that could even be misinterpreted. And she was right. I mean, she reprimanded me. I used to use slang words, the N word, calling whites names or whatever. She said, you can't do that. This is 25 years ago.

And when a few years later, when a guy stabbed me, I forgave him in the spirit of Dr. King and said that publicly. As late as George Floyd, we had to unequivocally say, yes, we want justice. Yes, we think the police are guilty, but we do not condone and in fact denounce the violence. You can't walk on both sides of the street at the same time. And Donald Trump knows if he didn't know before. And I know he did. But if he didn't after January 6th to even go to the edge is either intentional or insensitive. And to use racist language against Mitch McConnell's wife, he knows what he's doing. At some point in your life, you have to make a choice on who you are and what you stand for. I made my choice. I wish the members of the Senate like Scott and others would make their choice. You can't stand in the middle of the street without getting hit by traffic on both sides, i.e. Wall Street Journal and New York Times editorial page.

Yeah, I mean, you did you did make your choice after talking to Coretta Scott King. And it is it's moving hearing you and others talk about that choice. And I see every time after George Floyd, after after other other tragedies that happened. The first thing you say is we cannot have violence. We cannot have violence. We can protest, but there's no room for violence. Christina Greer, it's interesting. goes after the Republican leader of the United States Senate at a time Republicans desperately want to take control of the Senate. You talk about a political death wish. It seems that he did this in Georgia. He's now doing it when Republicans need his support more than ever. It really does seem like he doesn't want any Republican to succeed except for himself. And he's probably really angry at Mitch McConnell for agreeing

to reform the Electoral Count Act that will stop January 6th from happening again. Absolutely, Joe. We know that Donald Trump works for a party of one. He does not care about the Republican Party. You know, he has no value system, as we've seen time and time again. And so there are a few things operating at the same time. One, the fact that the Republican Party, you know, at the congressional level, at the local level, has not come out and unequivocally said that Donald Trump is wrong, that his comments were racist, inappropriate, dangerous, and inciting violence. The fact that we've been met with such silence from so many Republican leaders speaks a lot about the party, where they're going, who they're willing to sort of walk off a cliff

with in the words of Donald Trump. I think what's also really important is that this is a former president who does not care about this republic. We have to be honest now. I mean, the fact that Donald Trump will only support people who go along with his mission to prop up Oath Keepers and Proud Boys and people who really sort of represent the most base factions of our country. But the fact that he's going to go on stage literally on a national tour denigrating not just Democrats, but people in his own

party. He does not really care if the Republicans succeed. He wants to succeed. And I think what we're seeing as this train gets closer and closer to the station is that the type of violence that Donald Trump is trying to incite, he is bellicose, but he's also a little bloodthirsty. You can't put in full caps about Mitch McConnell, that he has a death wish. We know that he's essentially calling his supporters to behave as though they did on January 6th or worse. And so I think it's really incumbent upon the entire Republican Party to denounce this man. I know November 2022 is coming up. I know they want to win seats in gubernatorial

races and Senate races all across the country. But this has to be there has to be some sort of moral line that the Republicans won't cross. And sadly, we're being met with silence. Because there really is a through line here. If you look at what Donald Trump said in the past, you look at the fact that his approval numbers are going down. It's becoming obvious to him he cannot win. He knows. He knew he could win in 2016 when everybody else didn't think he could win. And he now knows he can't. He understands, and I've talked to people around him, he can't get back those suburban

voters in Atlanta. He can't get back those suburban voters in Atlanta. He can't get back the suburban voters in the Philly suburbs. He understands he can't win. So what is he doing now? His rhetoric's becoming more violent. He's embracing QAnon conspiracy theories. He's actually boiling down his supporters, not doing what any politician who would want to win would be doing. He's boiling

down support to find people that will support him for an overthrow of the federal government. That's my belief. And oh, wait, that's what he tried to do on January the 6th, just a couple of years ago. Just look and see what he's doing and ask yourself, why would he come out and try to get the Republican leader of the U.S. Senate killed? Why would he talk about a death wish in all caps?

Why would he make a racist slur against a former member of his cabinet who happens to be Mitch McConnell's wife? Why would he embrace QAnon conspiracy theories? Why would he keep, again, getting more and more radical when he knows that will only drive down his support? The clear answer, as he supports all these election deniers, Mika, is he wants to succeed in 2024 in the way he failed in 2020. And he's obviously ready to use violence to do that. Associate Professor of Political Science at Fordham University, Christina Greer.

Thank you very much for being on this morning.