Morning Joe - Morning Joe 3/22/23

Episode Date: March 22, 2023

Trump not arrested Tuesday, despite social media posts

Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe. It is Wednesday, March 22nd. Donald Trump's prediction that he would be arrested yesterday did not come true. We will have the latest timeline for the Manhattan grand jury's investigation into hush money payments and how the former president is reportedly feeling about the possibility of a perp walk. Meanwhile, there is new reporting from ABC News that Trump may have lied to his own attorneys about the classified materials he had after leaving the White House. We'll dig into that in just a moment. Also ahead, we will break down the important developments to come out of the second day of meetings between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russia's Vladimir Putin. Also, TikTok picks up an ally on Capitol Hill with one lawmaker defending the app

ahead of a high stakes hearing tomorrow. Along with Joe, Willie and me, we have the host of way too early White House bureau chief at Politico, Jonathan Lemire, former aide to the George W. Bush White House and State Department's Elise Jordan and bestselling author and NBC News presidential historian Michael Beschloss and political investigations reporter for The Guardian, Hugo Lowell. And with all the legal developments, not just on the Stormy Daniels hush money case yesterday, we have Dave Ehrenberg coming up in just a few minutes as well. Well, I mean, because Willie, everybody's looking at Manhattan and suddenly you have Jack Smith

going to a court saying, hey, Trump lied to his own lawyers. We have reason to believe. And then a federal judge making pretty remarkable ruling. And we got a window into that yesterday. We'll talk about that in just a second with special counsel Jack Smith now apparently finding that Donald Trump, surprise, surprise, lied to his own attorneys about what he had in terms of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, saying he didn't bring anything with him back to Mar-a-Lago. And of course, the FBI found more than 100 classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. Yeah, that, the FBI found more than 100 classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. Yeah, that's crazy. We'll follow that and also look at Republican reaction. They're so focused on this misdemeanor. We'll look at what a misdemeanor actually means and who gets prosecuted for what. But also there's a lot of other legal walls actually closing in. Well, and also you hear one lie after another coming from Republicans who get in front of microphones and say nobody gets charged with this. There's

no way he'd be charged with this, except for the fact that he's Donald Trump and they hate Donald Trump and they're going after Donald Trump. My gosh, we're going to be showing some examples coming up of how this statute has been used. This felony statute has been used for for as small of an item as a couch. Somebody shopping and bringing back actually goods that they didn't buy and getting store credit for them, getting caught for that couple of thousand bucks and getting store credit for them, getting caught for that. Couple of thousand bucks. And they get charged with this felony. And so somehow lying about $130,000 to pay off to a porn star,

them saying, oh, this is much ado about nothing. When people are getting charged with this same thing for a couch and for a couple thousand dollars of store credits. They're lying. But of course, that's not a shock. And you're going to hold the line on that. You're going to hold the line on that while you have Georgia and the documents getting more serious and more serious. So every second, it's interesting watching these Republicans sort of they're on a sinking ship.

I really don't understand it. We've never understood it, but they love losing. And so they're going to get their they're going to get their wish. So despite claiming over social media over the weekend that he would be arrested on Tuesday, Donald Trump remains a free man for now. As expected, yesterday came and went with no movement in the Manhattan district attorney's investigation into a hush money payment the former president allegedly made to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016 to silence her about an affair the two allegedly had a decade earlier. Trump denies any affair and any wrongdoing in the matter. The issue is the payments.

But today could be a different story with the grand jury in the case set to meet again to possibly vote on whether or not to hand down a criminal indictment. Republicans, meanwhile, as we have said, continue to defend Trump on this one charge and rail against the Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg. President Trump announced he was going to run for president again and suddenly here they go now they're coming after him for some alleged bookkeeping error you've got to be kidding me. This I believe is the epitomization of the weaponization of the federal government and departments against political opponents. The fact that the Manhattan DA thinks that indicting President Trump is his top priority, I think, just tells you everything you need to know about the radical left in this country.

They're making stuff up that they've never used against anybody because they hate Trump. Making stuff up. Again, Willie, you can sort through everything that was just said. Again, I don't know how stupid they think we are. I don't think it's us. They actually think their own voters are stupid. And that's what's so insulting when you have Jim Jordan saying, oh, Donald Trump just announced and suddenly they decide to discharge. No, Donald Trump announced because he knew he was going to get indicted. We talked about it on this show for months. Is he going to announce that he's running

just so he can move forward? You know, that false claim. And Lindsey Graham, I mean, Lindsey Graham, he was a prosecutor in the military. He knows better than that. He knows that people have been arrested for this, for doing far less. And Elise Stefanik, she doesn't even believe, none of these people believe what they're saying. It's just like Lindsey, all of them,

they all trashed Donald Trump until they figured out that that their grift would be better. Their scam would be better if they supported Donald Trump. They don't believe any of what they're saying. And for good reason, because it's stupid. It doesn't it's not consistent with facts. It's not consistent with the law. They're just playing to their base and they're insulting their base, thinking their base is too stupid to actually read the news. Well, it's a reflex, isn't it? When they're asked about Donald Trump to quickly race to his defense, whether you're Jim Jordan or Lindsey Graham or Elise Stefanik. And the fact of the matter is this investigation into Donald Trump in Manhattan has been going on for a long time.

They didn't suddenly discover all this information. The possibility that he could be indicted is relatively new, but the investigation is not. So this didn't just come out when he decided to run for president. We should point out that despite what you heard from Senator Graham there, the possible charge of falsifying business records is not, quote, something never used against anybody. In fact, a new study from the left-leaning blog Just Security found just last year alone the Manhattan DA's office charged 11 people with that crime. Trump, for his part, reportedly downplaying his predicament behind closed doors. According to the New York Times, the former president has told friends and associates he welcomes the idea of being paraded around by the authorities

as long as he's surrounded by the media. He also reportedly mused openly about whether to smile for the cameras during that possible perp walk and described the potential situation as a fun experience, Joe. So that might be fun in front of the cameras for him, but I think it's different when you get in there and you're having, I could be wrong, but you know, I wouldn't know, But having your fingerprint taken and picture taken. You know we call that, Mika. What?

That's called whistling past the graveyard. He's not looking forward to any of it. He's horrified. He's just talking big. The walls are closing in. As has been said before this time, my God, look at all of it they have. Now, I want to get back to the Republican lie. The main Republican lie right now is they're only charging Donald Trump. This is the

politicalization of this statute of data. No. Let's give you some details on people who were charged with what Trump may be charged with falsifying business records in the first degree by the Manhattan Manhattan D.A.'s office. The same charge any potential indictment of Trump is likely to include. Here's some examples. A married couple charged for, quote, attempting to recover the cash value of various items of property that were lost in a house fire. They claimed $5,000 for a leather couch they had purchased for $1,900. Do you see that? They claimed $5,000

in insurance for $1,900 and they were charged with this. It's unbelievable. Also, a woman charged for this for returning unpurchased items to a Lord and Taylor store in exchange for a store credit. Are you listening? Are you hearing this? People charged for a couple of thousand dollars here, a couple of thousand dollars there for store credits at a Lord and Taylor's and Donald Trump pays a porn star $130,000, lie $130,000, lies about it. The guy who paid that $130,000 hush money check sent to jail, they lie about it on their business records. This isn't a couch. This isn't like $ thousand dollar like difference in what you paid for the couch and what you claim the couch was worth. This is one hundred and thirty thousand dollars before a presidential election. And you lied about it on your business records.

Also, a teacher for using fake covid-19 vaccination cards in an attempt to get the day off of work due to vaccine side effects. Oh, wow. Now look at this. Just just look how small these things are. Jonathan Lemire, Republicans, of course, this is no surprise. They're shameless, but they're also stupid to think their supporters are so stupid to not understand. They go, oh, well, this this is nothing. This this this charge, how dare they charge him for paying a porn star one hundred and thirty thousand dollars to cover up an affair a couple of days before an election. Well, nobody would be charged for this unless their last name was Trump. They charge somebody for like a couple of thousand dollars of items. They charged somebody a couple of thousand dollars for claiming five thousand dollars for a nineteen hundred

dollar couch. What Trump did is so much bigger than this. And yet they lie to their Republican base and claim that this is somehow a political witch hunt. And what these Republicans are hoping is that their base never finds out that they're not going to be presented with this evidence. They're not going to be presented with this information from conservative new outlets that gloss over it, that repeat the lies, that amplify their false claims about this probe. We just well documented, Joe, this is a charge that happens and we can set aside the political debate. And we know there are some Democrats fretting about the sequence of these investigations and wishing that the Manhattan DA probe weren't going first because it is that charge perhaps less serious than election

interference in Georgia or the mishandling of classified documents or, of course, January 6th. But I mean, the question is, Jonathan O'Meara, what charge is not less than trying to steal an election and overturn American democracy? I mean, come on. I mean, this is a hundred and thirty thousand dollars paid to a porn star to cover up an affair right before a presidential election. Like, I don't know what these Republicans do, like with their money or with their campaigns. That's not a small thing. That would be a grade A scandal for every one of them. Yeah. And we also have to keep coming back to the same point. And this is why nervous, there are nervous Democrats, but the counter to them is no man or woman is above the law. This is if he committed a crime, he should be held accountable for a crime.

And you're right. It's the timing of this, too. Not only do we just demonstrate that this is more money than some of those examples you just trotted out there, but it's the timing of it. It's the payoff done right before an election, an attempt to influence the election. And that's why this is being pursued. That's why this case was revived. And that's why Republicans are scrambling. And maybe it'll help Donald Trump in the short term with the GOP. It's certainly not going to help going forward with the general election. You know, let's bring in right now, Palm Beach County, Florida, State Attorney Dave Enberg. Dave, first of all, I want to show you these things that people have been charged with in this crime before. I know you already know this. It's common sense for everybody else, not for the Republicans who are lying to their base,

saying, oh, this is a political witch hunt. Nobody would get charged with this if they weren't Trump. A married couple filed a false house insurance claim for a couple of thousand dollars. A couple of thousand dollars, and they were charged with this felony. A woman tried to return items to Lord and Taylor that she didn't actually purchase and got store credit. Not Trump found out, not Trump for a couple of couple of thousand dollars. And what happens? She gets charged with this crime. A teacher used a fake COVID-19 vaccine card to try to get off of work one day. She was charged with this crime. And yet here you have Donald Trump a couple of days before a presidential election paying $130,000 to a porn star lying about it on his business records. And these Republicans are claiming this is much ado about nothing. Tell that to all the New Yorkers that have been tried and sent to jail for doing far less than Donald Trump. Here, once again, we have Republicans saying the law should apply to everybody but Donald Trump.

Yeah, Joe, I'm just a humble government employee. So Lord and Taylor sounds like a big deal to me. But aside from that, as far as this case, you know, I know a lot of people are saying it's small ball. And, you know, I've been a little bit critical thinking that maybe this isn't the one that should go first. It's the fourth out of four out there are the cases swirling around Donald Trump. But that doesn't mean it's a weak case. The hush money payment is what sent Michael Cohen to federal prison. And Trump was an unindicted co-conspirator back then, individual number one. He was likely saved by the DOJ internal policy against indicting a sitting president. And, you know, this could be bigger than we even think it is because Jennifer Weisselberg testified before the grand jury right there towards the end. Jennifer Weisselberg wouldn't know about Stormy Daniels.

She would know about the finances of the Trump organization. Her ex father in law is Alan Weisselberg. And so maybe there are going to be more serious charges added that we're not counting on. I mean, hell hath no fury like an ex-daughter-in-law scorn. And I agree with Jonathan. To those who think we shouldn't take this unprecedented action, really, there is a principle in our country that no one is above the law. Yeah, I mean, no one is above the law. And, you know, while we're looking at this case, Dave, could you talk about the extraordinary things that happened in the Jack Smith investigation for the Mar-a-Lago documents.

My God, it looks like that's getting worse. It took a turn yesterday that should cause Trump even more concern than what's happening with the D.A. in Manhattan. Yeah, Joe and Mika, I've been saying from the beginning that the greatest threat to Donald Trump's future freedom is the Mar-a-Lago document matter. And for those who say that, well, Pence did it, Biden did it, so that somehow insulates Donald Trump. No, it's not the possession of the documents. It's the refusal to give them back. It's the obstruction, 18 U.S.C., 15, 19, punishable by up to 20 years in prison. And it is so unusual to break through attorney-client privilege. That's what the court did here. They found that there was the crime fraud exception, that the lawyer, Evan Corcoran,

was used to facilitate a crime. And what crime would that be but obstruction? And so here you had Christina Bobb, who was one of Trump's lawyers, who sent a letter to the Department of Justice saying, we turned over all the documents. Well, that wasn't true. That's a lie. So is she guilty of obstruction? The grand jury heard from her or the DOJ heard from her, one of the two. And she pointed the finger at Evan Corcoran, said, I didn't draft that letter. It was Evan Corcoran. Of course, you should never sign a letter that the drafter won't sign himself. And now Evan Corcoran is being brought in and he's going to have to testify. And there's evidence apparently that says that it was Trump who instructed Evan Corcoran to make these false statements. So one of these folks is going

down for this, in my view. Is it going to be Trump? Is it going to be Evan Corcoran or is it going to be both? It looks like Evan Corcoran is starting to point this, in my view. Is it going to be Trump? Is it going to be Evan Corcoran or is it going to be both? It looks like Evan Corcoran is starting to point the finger at his client. So, Hugo Lowe, let's talk about the reporting we mentioned at the top of the show, which is yours, about Trump apparently suggesting that he wants to be handcuffed and perp walked in and become a martyr of some kind. I don't think anyone actually believes that. But where does the Trump camp believe this whole thing is headed in Manhattan right now? It's a good question because their understanding of this case has shifted. You know, we started off talking about campaign finance violations and whether that could be tied to falsifying business records. Now they think actually maybe the case is going to end up as a tax fraud issue because Trump never paid tax on the $130,000 that went to Stormy Daniels. And now they're actually starting to freak out a little bit. And I spoke to a couple of Trump

lawyers who are kind of connected to the case yesterday. And they actually think this is now more problematic than what they initially recognized. And it sounds like this is filtered back to Trump because Trump seems to think that indictment is very likely and he is determined to now go to 100 Center Street and be handcuffed. And he's been very specific about where he wants his handcuffs. He wants them behind his back. And so he's clearly thinking this through and he clearly thinks this is very imminent. So when you say that this is now worse than they initially believed, why so? What about it looks worse to them than they first thought? Well, it's because they thought they had a defense for the campaign finance stuff.

The legal argument that Susan Nichols, one of the Trump lawyers, made to the DA's office was, well, it's not going to be a crime because of this irrespective test. And the irrespective test is, well, if the money would have been paid irrespective of the campaign, just because Trump's a famous guy, he wants to avoid the embarrassment, then it's not a crime. With a tax fraud being tied to the falsifying business records, that's a much bigger issue to overcome. We have Michael Beschloss here, and so we should ask him to weigh in on what can we learn from history when it comes to approaching this scandal and Donald Trump? Do you think that it's just

another blip and he survives it and he actually can use the negative attention to further victimhood status and actually benefit from this? I don't think that's happening. And I think what Joe said about whistling past the graveyard, this really is false bravado. What else would he say? I think what this is, is that here's a situation where he could be in four major prosecutions or conceivably even more at the same time. So you got a guy who's not exactly Mr. Health and Strength in his late 70s. I think Joe, as an eminent lawyer here, would agree with me that even one prosecution tends to wear someone down, you know, fighting off people who can conceivably push you in jail, you know, to do conceivably for. Sorry to keep on saying conceivably, but we have to remember that this has not happened yet.

Four of them or more at the same time, that's going to run down just about anyone. And the other thing is that even Trump supporters who've stuck with him all this time, famously, you know, the thing about shooting someone on Fifth Avenue and so on. I think if they see him going into court and they see him fingerprinted and this goes on day after day and it's on cable TV and they see him arriving at the courthouse and going away, that's going to change the way they look at him. And the other thing is the astounding hypocrisy, which is, you know, Trump, who's claiming to his supporters, you're the powerless. I'm fighting in the elites on your behalf. Well, what speaks elite and special privilege more than paying one hundred thirty

thousand dollars to a porn star and expecting to get away with it. To a porn star you're having an affair with a couple of days before the election. Oh, yeah. Man of the people. I mean, what farmer has not had that experience? You know, right. Yeah. I mean, my God, man of the people.

No, nothing about it. But then again, the whole thing's been bizarre. But, you know, Michael, it's fascinating that you look at all of this. And in the past, Trump's always been able to say sort of, you know, come on. I'm not perfect, but are you really going to vote for Biden? I'm not perfect, but are you going to you're really going to vote for are you really going to vote for Hillary Clinton? And here we have basically, it's sort of equivalent of maybe one of the toughest GOP primaries since 1976, Reagan and Ford. And you've got DeSantis coming in and I'm not comparing him to Reagan. So please, everybody, save your little tweets for somebody who gives a damn. But you have somebody coming in, a Reagan

like figure to the Republican base. So suddenly, as you said, when people see Trump in front of, you know, getting arrested the first time, getting arrested the second time. If he gets arrested the third time, they're not going to go, yeah, I'll go with a guy who keeps getting indicted over Joe Biden. They'll go, Wanda Sanders, well, he's not been arrested and he actually won in 2022. He just, he was a Reagan-like figure in Florida. If you just look at the landslide, what Reagan was in 1966 in California. Big line. DeSantis was in 2022 in Florida, except the only difference then was 66 was a good year, as you know, for Republicans. 2022 is a hellacious year for Republicans, except for DeSantis and Florida. So really, are they really going to give another pass to a guy who's lost six years in a row?

Yeah, I agree with that. And the other thing is, you know, the next president and the current president, we've got some real problems. You know, China and Russia are getting together. There is a war in Ukraine. There are all sorts of complicated economic problems. God forbid another pandemic. Do you really want a next president like Donald Trump distracted by all of his legal problems and his financial problems after fending off prosecutions, possibly on all these fronts? I don't think so. So once again, historically, Donald Trump in as a category of his own,

if he gets invited, indicted, that will have never happened to any other president. And you've got every other president, one category, Donald Trump once again in his own category of the notorious. So, Hugo, let's game this out a little bit. The grand jury in Manhattan is meeting this afternoon again. What do we expect to see? How soon might there be an indictment? What are you hearing downtown? Yeah, so the way this is going to work is the grand jury convenes. At some point, they will take a vote on an indictment. If it returns an indictment, then the DA's office is going to call Trump's lawyers. Trump's lawyers then end up calling the campaign. They're going to call

Susie Wiles, from what we understand, the chief of that campaign. And they will convene a conference call to figure out what comes next. And specifically what the lawyers need to do, because what the lawyers want to do is to arrange a voluntary surrender for Trump. They don't want Trump to go in in person with his hands behind his back in handcuffs. They think that's a terrible idea. But, you know, I think it remains to be seen whether Trump's will wins out. It sometimes does and it sometimes doesn't. But that's when we would learn about an indictment becoming public, unless Trump reveals it himself and leaks it, which he has done previously. You know,

with Mar-a-Lago, he likes to say that there's leaks across the Justice Department. It's not true. The reason why we learned about the Mar-a-Lago search was because he tweeted it. Right, right. And if he hears he's indicted, we know there'll be a true social post. Undoubtedly, I suspect we'll see you tomorrow or sometime very soon as we continue to cover this. The Guardian's Hugo Lowell. Hugo, thanks so much. Michael Beschloss, thank you as well. And state attorney in Palm Beach County, Florida, Dave Ehrenberg, thank you as well. Still ahead on Morning Joe, Russia and China showcasing their friendship for another day in Moscow.

We'll have the latest from President Xi Jinping's state visit with Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile, concerns in the U.S. over Chinese surveillance as Congress considering a ban on the popular social media app TikTok. We'll discuss that with the commissioner of the FCC. Plus, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, Bob Menendez of New Jersey, will be our guest. You're watching Morning Joe on a busy Wednesday morning. We'll be right back. They hold tight, they're coining They pray no one has to see them fall

I'm there, yeah, I serve them The one with the empty looking eyes Come closer, you'll see me Welcome back to Morning Joe. Live look at New York City, half past the hour. Your penthouse apartment up there has a beautiful view. It's only the first hour of four hours of morning, Joe, and you're already annoying. Welcome back, everybody.

That's kind of what I do. But tell me, can you see Schenectady from there? I mean, I've never been in a place that big. It is a Comcast tower. Ron DeSantis is doubling down on his criticism of Donald Trump. Florida governor sat down for a wide-ranging interview with Piers Morgan,

which Morgan previewed in two articles for the New York Post. According to the British broadcaster, DeSantis slammed Trump over his character failings, chaotic leadership style, and his handling of the COVID pandemic, which we do have some news on this morning. Morgan notes that DeSantis also criticized Trump's chaotic, self-obsessed and divisive management style, quoting the governor as saying in terms of my approach to leadership, I get personnel in the government to have the agenda of the people and share our agenda. You bring your own agenda in, you're gone.

DeSantis went on to say, the way we run the government, I think, is no daily drama. Focus on the big picture and put points on the board. The issue of nicknames also came up during an interview and Fox News got a preview of that moment. Take a look. What is your favorite nickname that Trump's given you so far? Is it Ron the Sanctimonious or Meatball Ron? Well, I can't. Even he went off Meatball Ron. I can't. I don't know how to spell the sanctimonious. I don't really know what it means, but I kind of like it's long. It's got a lot of vowels. I mean, so we go with that. That's fine. You know, you can call me, you can call me whatever you want. I mean, just as long as you, you know, also call me a winner.

You know, wow. Wow. Wow. Willie, I'd be curious what Lamir thinks about this, too. But Trump would rather be perp walked a thousand times then have Fox News, Piers Morgan, Ron DeSantis, all basically mocking him and laughing at him. And I mean, look at that. It's just it's such a nice, warm little family get together. And Fox, The New York Post, The Murdoch Empire, I mean, given Ron DeSantis whatever he wants and DeSantis sitting there laughing at Trump and then at the end, come whatever you want, just as long as you call me a winner. Yeah, that that hurts for a guy who's lost six times in a row. As you suggest, this is the coordinated effort. Here's the front page of The New York Post this morning. Ron hits Don with a picture of Pierce

Morgan and Governor DeSantis there. But you're right. I mean, that is exactly as we know over there. That is the tone that gets under the skin of Donald Trump the most, which is being laughed at. And that is the posture that Ron DeSantis seems to have figured out now over the last few days, at least, which is I don't have time for this. I don't have time to even a social media fight with a former president. I'm down here winning by 30 points, getting things done for the people of Florida. Some people who watch the show might not agree what he's doing for the state of Florida. But his posture is I don't have time for that guy. I don't even know what the nickname is. I'm down here doing my job. But I would point out that Ron DeSantis polling his head to heads with Donald Trump. It's gone down over the past couple of months and post midterms.

Donald Trump suffered because he was seen as the loser who lost the midterms for Republicans. Now he's had a couple of months of relatively quieter press. Now he's back in the news. But is he going to be able to successfully use this his victimhood narrative? He's been saying, if this can happen to me, it can happen to you, which is hilarious, but a lot better messaging than he has had at points in the past. And is that something that's going to pick up with Republicans? I mean, look at the split screen right there, Jonathan Lemire. I mean, Donald Trump just looks tired. He really does. This is not ageism. You know, there are times that he's in his mid 70s. He's looked tough, strong, aggressive. He's not confident. The crowds have dwindled. And here you have DeSantis. Again, DeSantis, a massive landslide win in Florida. Not only that, he made sure Republicans won across the state. They have a super majority in the legislature. I mean, again, on a night that Donald Trump was

blamed for losing Senate races and governor's races in Pennsylvania, Senate races in Arizona where his candidates were losing, Senate races in Nevada, Senate races in Georgia. I mean, Donald Trump, on all these contested races, lose, lose, lose, lose. He lost in 2017, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22. I really do think when you get out on the campaign trail, Ron DeSantis has got a very simple question to ask voters. Republicans, do you want to win or lose? Look what I did in 2022. Look what he did in 2022. Look what he did the six elections before that.

Hey, come on. Aren't you tired of losing? I know how to win. Follow me. Don't really care what the numbers are right now. That is such a compelling message. It's going to be hard for Trump to get around that. Yeah. And certainly right now, DeSantis is the beneficiary of all the anti-Trump forces coalescing around him. And it's this interesting moment for DeSantis, who up until this point has really held his tongue. Trump has been attacking him day after day after day, a lot of it relentless and unfair. And DeSantis has ignored it. And he's chosen now to start engaging. But to your point, doing so in a way where he's laughing at Trump, he's playing down at Trump, he's not hitting back with criticisms. But he is no longer ignoring him altogether.

We heard his comment from the stage the other day about the indictment and the porn stars. And now this interview with Piers Morgan. And we don't know if that's fueled by his slip in polls. And certainly it's early. But he's the one Republican who's doing it. He's the one Republican who's using this moment, which is clearly a perilous moment for Trump. And DeSantis is the one Republican who's breaking with him. All the others are falling in line. And it does seem like DeSantis is using this ability to try to create some daylight, at least on personality, if not the issues. Now, whether that will play when he really starts ramping up, whether what works in

Florida will work in states like Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, we shall see. But it's clear that DeSantis is gearing up for this. And in that same interview, made it very clear he's all but certain to jump in and run in a couple of months when the Florida legislative session ends. Yeah, he was asked directly about that by Piers Morgan. He said, stay tuned, suggesting there may be an announcement coming. Just to underline what Elise was saying about the polling a minute ago, last month there was a Monmouth poll that showed DeSantis and Trump tied.

Yesterday, the same Monmouth poll showed Trump up 14 points on Ron DeSantis. And I will also add, Joe, that coming off those comments where Ron DeSantis said, I just don't know anything about paying off a porn star. He said in that interview, the underlying conduct in the Manhattan case, talking about paying off a porn star. It's just outside my wheelhouse. It's not something I can speak to. That's a Donald Trump. I think he's finding his voice on all this. I know about how to handle the Florida water management districts. I know, you know, you got to balance those budgets. I'm pretty good at figuring out wetlands protection and, you know, where you just jut up to the line and the regs for that. Not quite as good at managing one hundred and thirty thousand dollar payoffs to porn stars and having an affair a couple of days before a presidential election to try to make that go away.

Yeah, no, he's sending he's sending that message. Now, let me just remind everybody here as far as how little polling matters right now. Willie, you will remember when Morning Joe started 47 years ago. Yeah, just a couple of just a couple of kids. Yeah. Well, actually, yeah. Right after the war. So maybe 65 seconds. Right. A couple of kids coming back. Yeah. From W.W. to the big one. The big one are for some reason, Giuliani and Hillary Clinton were running in the 1948 election as well. But you will remember in 2007, Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani were light years ahead of everybody in May, June, July, August of 2007. And you see these huge

swings one week before an election. So these numbers don't mean anything right now. What matters is whether DeSantis decides to run or not. Right. And how that election shapes up. And Willie, I just don't think the dynamics shape up well for Donald Trump at all. Yeah. And we have we're just at the very beginning of all these investigations, potential criminal charges against Donald Trump. We don't know where that's headed and we don't know what that might mean for him if he continues to run for president. That may add up to the benefit of Ron DeSantis. So we're just now on the brink, potentially, of something in Manhattan with January 6th still to go, with Georgia still to go,

with the Mar-a-Lago documents still to go and on and on. Yeah. All right. Coming up, a look at some of the other big stories from Capitol Hill, including what we expect to hear today from the head of Norfolk Southern as he goes before a Senate committee, plus an update on Mitch McConnell's recovery as he works his way back from a fall nearly two weeks ago. That and much more when Morning Show comes right back. I don't know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair. I just I can't speak to that. Our next guest has spent decades reporting from China, from the death of longtime Chinese leader Mao Zedong in 1976 to the massacre in Tiananmen Square following massive protests in 1989 to the United Kingdom's handover of Hong Kong to the PRC in 1997.

Joining us now, longtime foreign correspondent Mike Chinoy. He's now a non-resident senior fellow at the U.S. China Institute at the University of Southern California and author of the new book, Assignment China, an oral history of American journalists in the People's Republic. Thanks for being on this morning. So great to have you with us, Mike. My God, what you've seen through the years. Why don't you tell us what we're going to see in the book? The book is based on over 100 interviews I did during the past 15 years with people who've covered China for the U.S. media from 1945 and the start of the Chinese

Civil War right through the covid pandemic up to the present day. The idea is that most folks who watch the news or read the news don't have any idea how that news got there. But as anyone who's in the news business knows, the process by which people report and write and transmit the news is central to what folks see. So I thought it would be interesting to get people who have been on the front lines, the people who've told the China story, to tell their own story. What was it like to be in Shanghai when the Communist army rolled in in 1949? What was it like to go on the press plane to China with Richard Nixon or to be in Tiananmen Square as I was in 1989, or to try to cover China under the very, very tight repression and restrictions that exist today? So that's the premise of the book.

And there are many, many household names that people will have read or watched telling kind of behind the scenes stories of how they did what they did. I mean, you know, it's been such a remarkable, such a tumultuous history, a violent history under Mao. But even as they move beyond Mao, you talked about Tiananmen Square, the handover of Hong Kong. Of course, the last couple of years, the crackdown in Hong Kong, COVID. What did they tell you? What did you learn about how difficult it was to I mean, we look at Janice McAfee Freyer when she reports out of Beijing, a totalitarian government. It seems at times you have to measure your words, but it takes a certain type of reporter to cover the news there. Well, the central theme in Assignment China has been this endless struggle that American and other foreign journalists have had to go through to sort of penetrate the secrecy that the Chinese

Communist Party has imposed. The Communist Party wants to impose its own narrative on both the foreign press and the Chinese people, and now increasingly with China's global clout on the rest of the world. So it's been an endless battle to try and penetrate that. It's ebbed and flowed depending on internal conditions in China, which have gone from extreme repression to relative relaxation and then back to now to the very, very tight controls that the Chinese leader Xi Jinping has imposed. So I think today conditions for the American and foreign press in the People's Republic are more difficult than perhaps at any time since China began its so-called reform and

open door policy of market oriented changes in the late 70s, which went along with opening diplomatic relations with the U.S. It's a very, very tough beat, but it's crucially important, given especially the deterioration in relations between China and the U.S. So, Mike, I look at China through a lens of a personal experience, I think over 40 years ago, was it? Dating myself. But when my father had Deng Xiaoping to our home in McLean, Virginia for an estate dinner that happened in our private home, working on normalization of relations with China. Can you talk about how things have changed, even digressed since that important moment.

Well, Deng Xiaoping was on the Chinese side, the architect of the establishment of diplomatic relations with the U.S. And I think to many Americans, he was kind of the cuddly communist. He came here, he wore a cowboy hat at a rodeo in Texas. And at that time, the sense in the United States was that China was a potentially valuable strategic partner in the Cold War against the Soviet Union and a potentially important economic partner. And one of the things that I think is really complicated in the tensions that have developed between the U.S. and China today is that unlike the Cold War, there's this extraordinary interconnectedness between the United States and China now. There's millions, billions of dollars of American investment in

China. There are thousands of Americans living there. There are thousands of Chinese living here. There are all kinds of connections linking the two societies, even as the governments are increasingly at loggerheads. And that makes the notion of a conflict much more troublesome, both in terms of its impact on the people involved and in terms of managing it from a policy point of view. Mike, as you've been talking, we're showing pictures of President Xi standing in solidarity with President Putin. Their extended visit in Moscow continues today. What should an American audience make of these images of the Chinese president rushing to Moscow to be seen with President Putin at this time, a year in now to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, where the West, of course, is on the side of Ukraine and funding and backing President Zelensky while Russia is

attacking civilians, Russia is attacking infrastructure. What does this mean for our relationship with China? It's Xi Jinping's embrace of Vladimir Putin is not going to help his China's relationship with the United States. The Chinese and the Russians, I think, see themselves as allies in trying to to counter and push back against what they see as the U.S.-led world order. And while we don't know a lot of details about the Xi visit, I think it's fair to say that certainly on the economic front, there'll be expanded cooperation. On the sort of strategic front, how far it will go militarily, we don't know. But it's complicated because China is very economically dependent on its trade with the West, on its trade with the United States.

So on the one hand, Xi and Putin want to stand up against Washington. On the other hand, Xi needs to have functioning trade ties with Europe and with the U.S., especially because the Chinese economy is in trouble now. So it's not quite as simple a calculation as it looks. Do you think, Mike, that China and the President Xi has the juice to influence Vladimir Putin as far as the war in Ukraine goes. He says he's brought a peace proposal with him, whatever that means. Putin says he's reviewed it with great consideration. Does President Xi have the influence over Vladimir Putin to bring this war in some way to an end?

I don't know that he does, and I don't know that he wants to, because I think there are some benefits to China end? I don't know that he does, and I don't know that he wants to, because I think there are some benefits to China of the war continuing. It's distracting for the United States. The U.S. is pumping military hardware into Ukraine, which it might otherwise be using to beef up Americans' position in the Pacific, giving concerns about the possible conflict with China over Taiwan. The peace plan, I think, is widely seen as a nonstarter. She hasn't spoken with the Ukrainian leader Zelensky yet in all the months that they've been the conflict has been going on. So I think that's really kind of posturing that a lot of people will see through.

The book is Assignment China, an oral history of American journalists in the People's Republic. Mike Chinoy, thank you very much. Congratulations on the book. And thanks for being on this morning. Thanks for having me. And staying in the Pacific, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff say North Korea has fired multiple cruise missiles this morning toward the Sea of Japan. The launch has come as the U.S. and South Korean

militaries complete the last 11 days of joint military training and war games. Joining us from Rodriguez Live Fire Range in South Korea, NBC News foreign correspondent Josh Letterman. What's the latest there, Josh? Well, Mika, those cruise missiles launched by North Korea are the at least sixth round of missiles launched by the North just this month. And coming in the middle of these massive U.S.-South Korea military exercises, they're a real reminder of what's at stake here, of why the U.S. keeps some 28,500 troops here in South Korea, including about 800 who took part in these military exercises over the last week and a half or so, the largest in about six years, ever since former President Trump scaled these exercises back. COVID then

made it difficult to hold them on this kind of a scale. And throughout the day today, we watched as an immense array of military hardware was put to the test, including tanks, howitzers, other forms of artillery, as well as Apache attack helicopters, attack aircraft and even strikers like the one just behind me. And I had a chance here to speak with Lieutenant Drew Scott, who comes from New Canaan, Connecticut, has been serving here for about six months, and he told me why this matters. Take a listen.

How does it feel to be practicing for a potential conflict just 20 miles south of the DMZ? So, you know, we got to go up to the DMZ and kind of look into North Korea and essentially see all their defenses. It brings a to go up to the DMZ and kind of look into North Korea and essentially see all their defenses. It brings a lot of gravity to the table for sure. But I think especially with the men, they really understand that, you know, while we're

here, there's a very serious mission and that any sort of aggression that comes from the North is really what we're here to counter. Do you feel ready if conflict were to break out here tonight? 100 percent. Absolutely. A lot of Americans may have taken their eye off the ball of this conflict, this this ongoing tense situation here in the Korean Peninsula, given just how frequent we're seeing these launches from North Korea, more than 70 alone last year. And the Biden administration, frankly, has not made this a huge diplomatic priority, given that there are not a whole lot

of great options for dealing with the North Korean threat. But the U.S. military here certainly has not taken their eye off the ball. And even though the North Koreans say that exercises like these are a rehearsal for an invasion and a U.S. provocation, military leaders here say that this is defensive, that if they're going to be ready to fight tonight, as the catchphrase is here, they need to make their preparations and rehearsals as realistic as possible. Joe. All right. Thank you so much, Josh. NBC's Josh Letterman live in South Korea this morning. Thank you so much. Elise Jordan, we hear about it a good bit from Admiral Stravitas and other military people telling us about how the United States is really flexing their muscles in Asia. Finally, that Asia pivot that every president over the past 15 years has been promising. But you look at our increased presence in Guam, what's happening in the Philippines, the fact that we've got Japan now to agree to massively expand their military budget, our nuclear deal with Australia. You just go down

the line now, these military exercises in South Korea, which we've been doing, but taken all together, China's starting to feel hemmed in. For a while, the United States was distracted in the Middle East. I think we can turn the page on that for now, at least. There is an Asia pivot and China's getting real pushback. This is a region right now that, you know, getting a little tense. Joe, and I would just like to see the Asia pivot continue and President Biden should revisit the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. I wish that we would reach out and do some kind of deal like that, be part of it, because

let's do whatever we can to actually hem in China economically.