Morning Joe - Morning Joe 3/8/23

Episode Date: March 8, 2023

GOP senators rebuke Tucker Carlson for downplaying Jan. 6 as 'mostly peaceful'

Last night, millions of Americans tuned in to one of the most shameful hours we have ever seen on cable television. Speaker McCarthy's decision to share security footage with Fox looked like a mistake from the very beginning. But after last night, it looks like a disaster. Speaker McCarthy has played a treacherous, a treacherous game by catering to the hard right. Conduct like theirs is just asking for another January 6th. That's of course Chuck Schumer, but it's not just Democrats who are calling out Fox News for trying to downplay the violence of January 6th. Some Republican senators did not hold back their criticism either.

We'll have their comments straight ahead. Meanwhile, Speaker Kevin McCarthy, making no apologies for his role in all of this, will tell you how he is justifying handing over thousands of hours of security video. Also ahead, the latest in the kidnapping in Mexico that ended with two Americans dead and two others in the hospital. Plus, federal investigators digging deeper now into Norfolk Southern's safety culture following two train derailments in Ohio and a deadly collision yesterday morning in Cleveland. Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe.

It is Wednesday, March 8th. It is International Women's Day and Mika is getting ready for her big event coming up in our next hour, including a conversation with Hillary Clinton, Joe. It's going to be just an absolutely fascinating conversation. Mika's calling it her iconic conversations. International Women's Day has started out today in an extraordinary way in Abu Dhabi. They've been getting together. Panels have been

meeting throughout the day. Women from 50 countries from all four corners of the world coming here and what many call the crossroads of the world. And in about 50 minutes now, Mika is going to be on stage for her iconic conversations with Hillary Clinton, of course, former secretary of state. Also, icon Gloria Steinem, Billie Jean King, sports legend and also a woman who 50 years ago fought and gained pay equality 50 years ago. Just extraordinary. Also, Madam Zelenska, who's been touring around Abu Dhabi over the past day or two. And we're going to find out exactly what's happened there and what's happening in Ukraine and her efforts, not only in Ukraine, but Abu Dhabi and across the world, fighting for humanitarian humanitarian help for her war-torn country.

So we have all that and a lot more coming up at top of 7 o'clock. Coming up just about an hour from now. We'll look forward to that. With us this morning, the host of way too early, White House Bureau Chief at Politico, Jonathan Lemire, MSNBC contributor, our good friend Mike Barnicle, and former chairman of the Republican National Committee and an MSNBC political analyst, Michael Steele. Let's dive right in here at the top of the hour. A growing number of Republican senators are criticizing Fox News for one of its primetime

shows showing select footage from the January 6th insurrection provided by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. That show tried to portray the deadly riot as peaceful, calling the insurrectionists, quote, sightseers. And the lawmakers who suggested otherwise had lied to the American public, even alleging some Capitol Police officers helped the insurrectionists. In a letter obtained by NBC News, Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger called the allegations that the officers helped any of the insurrectionists false and ripped Fox News for spreading, quote, offensive and misleading conclusions. Manger writes in part, quote, The program conveniently cherry picked from the calmer moments of our 41000 hours of video.

The commentary fails to provide context about the chaos and violence that happened before or during these less tense moments. He continued, quote, the most disturbing accusation from last night was that our late friend and colleague Brian Sicknick's death had nothing to do with his heroic actions on January 6th. The department maintains, as anyone with common sense would, that had Officer Sicknick not fought valiantly for hours on the day he was violently assaulted, Officer Sicknick would not have died the next day, end quote. You'll remember the 42-year-old Sicknick died of natural causes after the attack on January 6th. Washington's chief medical examiner said what happened during the attack played a role in his death.

More than 150 officers from a number of agencies suffered injuries on January 6th. A bipartisan Senate report found at least seven people, including three police officers, died in connection with the attack that day. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell reacted at a news conference yesterday following the release of Chief Manger's letter. With regard to the presentation on Fox News last night, I want to associate myself entirely with the opinion of the chief of the Capitol Police about what happened on January 6th. My concern is how it was depicted, which is a different issue.

Clearly, the chief of the Capitol Police, in my view, correctly describes what most of us witnessed firsthand on January 6th. So that's my reaction to it. It was a mistake, in my view, for Fox News to depict this in a way that's completely at variance with what our chief law enforcement official here at the Capitol thinks. And it wasn't just Leader McConnell. A handful of other Republican senators criticized the move as well. I think it's bulls**t when you see police barricades breached, when you see police officers assaulted, all of that, or you had to be in close proximity to it.

If you were just a tourist, you should have probably lined up at the visitor center and came in on an orderly basis. So I just don't think it's helpful. I think that breaking through glass windows and doors to get into the United States Capitol against the orders of police is a crime. I think particularly when you come into the chambers, when you start opening the members' desks, when you stand up in their balcony. To somehow put that in the same category as a permitted peaceful protest is just a lie. It's really sad to see Tucker Carlson go off the rails that bad. The American people saw what happened on January 6th. They've seen the people that got injured. They saw the damage to the building.

You can't hide the truth by selectively picking a few minutes out of tapes and saying this is what went on. It's so absurd. It's nonsense. Clearly placating the base of my party is not the right way forward for the Republican Party or for the country. I think what happened on January 6th was despicable. In America, you can believe what you want, but you can't act on it in a way that constitutes violence. Well, I mean, I think it was, yeah, it was an attack on the Capitol. So in order there was Tom Tillis, Kevin C, I think it was, yeah, it was an attack on the Capitol.

So in order there was Tom Tillis, Kevin Cramer, Mitt Romney, John Kennedy and John Thune, all criticizing Fox News. As for Speaker McCarthy, he says he does not regret sharing the January 6 footage with Fox News, arguing the decision was made, he says, for transparency. Former President Trump, as you might imagine, also weighed in, posted on his social media site, praising Fox News, blasting the January 6th committee, and yes, calling for the rioters arrested on January 6th to be released from prison, Joe. So there you go again, promoting violence and praising those who committed violence against cops. This is, once again, the abandonment of the blue. It's once again the abandonment of police officers. And Michael Steele, you have you can't say the Republican Party. This is this is a segment of

the Republican Party in the House, especially that that are trying to grant absolution by lying about those people, those rioters that beat the hell out of police officers. How many police officers were savagely attacked on this day? The injuries lined up. So what an insult. But again, I almost hate to bring politics up here because it just it. This is such a serious breach by Kevin McCarthy to release security footage. It's just it's it's outrageous and it's dangerous. And it encourage all this encourages the next attack. But just politically, just for one second, Americans aren't going to back a faction of a party that support violence against police officers. Americans aren't going to support a faction of a party that support riots on January the 6th and the overturning of a peaceful presidential election. And for Kevin McCarthy to think anything less than that, it's outrageous. So so, Michael, what is the fallout of this eventually?

So I would disagree with you, Joe. Americans have backed an insurrectionist party. They reelected them to power in November. So, you know, this is what, this is what, you know, I would certainly among many warning about going into the 2022 election cycle. If Kevin McCarthy is not Speaker of the House, he's not beholden to Marjorie Taylor Greene and this faction in a way that these clips would never be released. That's the consequence of our voting. People into power who are anti-democratic,

who are narcissistic, very much like Trump in the sense that their own self-interest is the prevailing interest. So I agree with you that you would think on paper the American people wouldn't do this. But when you then layer on top of this in the upcoming election cycle, any downturn in the economy, you know, a gas, a tick up in gas prices or inflation or some other event, this issue gets suppressed. That's what these folks are counting on. That's their base bet, is that at the end of the day, when we get into this thing, Donald Trump is railing against the system. We can also talk about the failed policies at the border, which will be a huge issue. And a lot of these folks out here will go, that's more important than the fear

or concern I have about putting these people back in power. Because once they get back in power, I don't know, where is the border policy? Where's the health care policy? Where's the transportation policy? It's not there. But you know what is? Giving Tucker Carlson what he wants, giving him an exclusive, you know, anti-democratic, oh, we're going to drill down on the weaponization of government. I mean, so this is what we're getting here. So let's stop pretending that you're going to get anything different. Because when you give the power back to the people that it fomented insurrection, what the hell do you think you're going to get the next day? More of that. And John, we play to that long list of Republican senators

who criticized the move to release that video to Fox News and for Fox News to play edited versions of it. But there were Republicans who supported that move. Josh Hawley, as you might expect, who cheered the insurrectionists on his way into the Capitol that day before he was seen jogging out of there with some other senators, said, yes, I'm for this. This this exposes the lie, is what Josh Hawley said about what happened that day, despite the fact we all watched it happen on live TV. Yeah. A desperate attempt to downplay and whitewash the events of one of the darkest days in our nation's history. And I think it's also important to think of the backdrop to this. This comes at the same time

because of a lawsuit by Dominion Votings. We're learning about the inner workings and innermost thoughts of Fox News personalities, including the host who released this, about the election. We know that in the days after the election that they privately conceded that Trump's claims of election fraud were bogus, that there wasn't anything there, that they, you know, we know that on January 6th itself,

they condemned the violence in real time. They knew that they were saying they were spouting lies to the American people about the election. We know even, like Barnacle, they were sharing, Jared Kushner and Rupert Murdoch were having conversations about Biden campaign advertising strategy, which raises a whole host of questions as to what the White House will do for a reelection bid, if they would even do business with Fox News. But I also think it's worth noting this, and this text message came out last night from the host that was broadcasting the January 6th footage. He, on January 4th, two days before the riot, texted this to an associate, quote, we are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I hate him passionately. And yet here we are.

He's doing his bidding yet again. Yeah. You know, this I agree with Joe to a certain point. This is no longer about politics. This darkness, this constant deception, this fraud that's coming out of one particular TV network, it's about us. It's about America. It's about who we are. It's about where we're going. And the idea that one particular unit of the Republican Party, not all of it, is led by a man who says, I am your retribution. Look up the meaning of the word retribution. Is that what he thinks this country is all about? Anger, divisiveness, danger, constant threats, the destruction of the news media in effect. Lies here, truth here, democracy here, anarchy here. That's our choices.

And we've got to come face to face with facts here. This isn't going away. What we hear from one particular candidate, Donald Trump, what we see on our TV, that happened. What you're looking at now happened. All of us here know people who were there that day. They were frightened. They were in danger. Elected officials as well as ordinary people working on Capitol Hill. Their lives were placed in peril. I don't know how many people out

there watching this morning have had, even for a moment, their life placed in peril. You remember it. You live with it. And the idea that it's twisted now is just another aspect of we've got to figure out who are we and where we're going and what are we going to believe. And ask the cop at the bottom of the pile here in this video we're watching if it was all a lie as he was beaten. Some of them, Officer Fernone, for example, to within inches of his life. He had a stroke in that moment and started thinking about his own children. To Mike's point, Michael Steele, about Trump not going away. We got a new poll yesterday out of New Hampshire. Look at this. This is an Emerson poll.

So for all the wishful thinking about Ron DeSantis being the savior that's going to turn the party away from Donald Trump, Donald Trump, 58 percent, Ron DeSantis, 17 percent. The sitting governor of that state, Chris Sununu, who has said he may get into the race at 7 percent. So what does that number tell you, Michael Steele, other than this guy? Not only is he not going away, he is the prohibitive favorite to be the Republican nominee. And Willie, Donald Trump hasn't even engaged in this political cycle yet. What's he done? What's he done? A few tweets here and there, you know went to CPAC. Okay. He? Yeah, you're going to take him out to your nearest bar where everyone in the room is going to applaud him and stand up.

And then what are you going to do? I mean, we saw the footage where, you know, where Fox is in the diner in the morning asking people, oh, you know, thinking this is all going to be a DeSantis thing. And everybody was like, Trump, Trump, even the woman wearing a DeSantis T-shirt was like, yeah, Trump. So, I mean, that's what the party has to face. That's its reality. And I go back to the baseline question for everyone who's thinking about getting in this race, including Nikki Haley, who's already in it. When are you going to take him out? What are you going to do? When are you going to go toe to toe and tell him to shut up and sit down? I got this. We are not an authoritarian, anti-democratic party. We're a pro-democracy, pro-free enterprise. Right. Marketplace driven freedom party based party.

Right. We're going to go in that direction. Y'all want to come with me. Follow me. But who's going to do that? Not DeSantis. He's at 17 percent. Haley is at four. So, yeah, numbers change, Willie. They go up and down. But when you're starting at 58 percent and everybody else is double digits behind and the base is giving you and this is important, the base is showing you no signs of moving off of that 58 percent. All right. So now we just prepare for Donald Trump versus Joe Biden. And John, if you're Ron DeSantis or another candidate thinking about getting in the race and you're looking at poll numbers like that, there has to be some discussion of

it's just not worth it this time. This guy is too big of a force in this party. Ron DeSantis is touring the country with his book right now, going to important states, make the speech at the Reagan Library. He is talking national themes for sure. And he very well may get in and maybe he does suddenly dazzle a bunch of people and give Donald Trump a run for his money. But you have to believe he looks at some of these numbers and the strength that Trump still has and says, maybe I'll wait till next time. Yeah, he gave his State of the State address in Tallahassee yesterday. And there are some of the Republican Party who say, Ron DeSantis, why don't you look to 2028 when Trump's off the board? This week, I think, is the moment we're going to look back

upon it where it's sort of this did begin the 2024 Republican primary field, Mike. And Donald Trump is way, way, way ahead. And he is ramping up his campaign now. You know, he's going to Iowa on Monday. The machine is starting to move. The moment that Michael just referenced there on Fox News, that diner wasn't just any diner. That was a diner in DeSantis' old district in Florida. And Trump's still way ahead. And I got to say, you know, the reason why the Fox News primetime host can show this stuff to whitewashed January 6th is because he knows his viewers are with Trump. They believe him. They still have the base. And we can play as many video as we want of Republican senators,

rightly good for them, condemning what Fox News was doing. And yet to a man, they have all said, if Trump's the nominee, I'll support him again. Yeah. I mean, literally, it's a captive audience. But to Michael's point about, you know, when will someone step up in the Republican Party running for president against him, take him on. I reference you back to a clip from one of the debates between, I think maybe the only debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump. When Joe Biden was sitting in a chair, Trump was carrying on. And Joe looked at him and said, will you shut up? And the look on Trump's face in that split second, I can remember it was like he was stunned. Classic, classic bully.

Hit him. Just hit him and keep hitting him. Guaranteed something will happen. not to not to his positive effect. And no one's doing that. He doesn't. He doesn't respect weakness. So you go on like this. They got you just then.

Well, I know that's that was a direct shot at me. That's most mornings. It usually is. All right. We've got a busy morning ahead. Still ahead. The latest developments on the kidnapping of four Americans in Mexico with two survivors now back on American soil with new details emerging about the victims.

Plus, the latest on the fighting in Ukraine as Russian troops appear to advance in a key eastern city. Retired four-star Navy Admiral James Stavridis joins us with his analysis. Also ahead, a live report from Israel amid a string of deadly military raids carried out in broad daylight. You're watching Morning Joe. We'll be right back. Two Americans who were kidnapped in Mexico are back in the United States this morning, but two others were killed. We're learning now more about the victims and why they made that

trip and what exactly happened there. NBC News national correspondent Gabe Gutierrez has details. The two Americans who survived the brazen kidnapping are back on U.S. soil after a harrowing few days. Latavia Washington-Magee, seen here in an ambulance, is among the survivors. Her mother, who spoke with her directly, tells NBC News. The violent abduction caught on camera. The victims dragged onto this white pickup truck. The FBI says gunmen had opened fire on the group shortly after they'd crossed the Texas border into Metamoros, Mexico. Authorities confirmed two of the Americans had been killed.

We extend our deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of the deceased. McGee was joined by her cousin, Shied Woodard, and friends Zendell Brown and Eric James Williams on the days-long trip from their homes in South Carolina to Mexico. But what a law enforcement official familiar with the matter says was a cosmetic medical procedure. Mexican authorities say Williams also survived but was shot in the leg. We spoke with his wife Michelle by phone. I didn't know anything until Sunday morning when the FBI came. Everything just seemed so surreal to me. She says she spoke with her husband for a few minutes before he went into surgery. She says the four were childhood friends taking the trip together to share driving responsibilities.

So-called medical tourism is on the rise. Pre-pandemic, an estimated 1.2 million Americans travel to Mexico each year for elective medical treatment, mostly cosmetic procedures and complex dentistry. But Matamoros is in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, which the State Department classifies as Level 4 Do Not Travel. Violence there has intensified among warring factions of the notorious Gulf Cartel. The governor of Tamaulipas said one person who was guarding the kidnapping victims was arrested. They were found in a wooden house in Matamoros, and over the past three days, investigators say they've been moved to several locations,

including a medical clinic, to create confusion. The cartels are responsible for the deaths of Americans, and we are fighting as hard as possible. The DEA and the FBI are doing everything possible. Gabe Gutierrez reporting on just a terrible story out of Mexico, turning to the Middle East and an Israeli raid on a refugee camp in the West Bank that left at least six Palestinians dead. Join us live from Tel Aviv, NBC News foreign correspondent Raf Sanchez. Raf, what more can you tell us about this? Well, Willie, we have now confirmed that all six of the Palestinian men killed in Jenin yesterday were members of armed militant groups. And, Willie, there is a grim irony to this violence that just a week ago, the U.S. government convened a rare meeting face to face between Israeli and Palestinian officials. That meeting ended, according to the U.S., in an agreement to de-escalate the violence. Instead, the bloodshed has only gotten worse.

Israeli forces taking their hunt for Palestinian militants deep into the occupied West Bank, killing at least six Palestinian men during a raid on a refugee camp in the northern city of Jenin. This is the scene inside the Jenin refugee camp just a few minutes after Israeli forces left. This crowd is coming down the hill and they want revenge. Israel says it succeeded in killing a Hamas operative responsible for gunning down these two Israeli brothers last month. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commending his forces, saying, Our brave warriors operated surgically in the heart of the murderer's den.

But the Palestinian Authority condemning the raid as a massacre, and people here mourning the loss of yet more young lives. In Washington, fears of an accelerating cycle of violence. We remain deeply concerned by the sharp rise in violence in the West Bank, and we continue to urge the parties to take immediate steps to prevent the further loss of life. Hours before the Janine raid, an Israeli settler armed with an axe attacking a Palestinian family in their car. Sitting terrified inside the vehicle, 27-year-old nurse Omar Idris, his wife, elderly parents, and little daughter Tia. Do you believe the person who attacked you will be arrested,

will be prosecuted? Of course not. Why? Who is protecting us? Who? Which government protects Palestinians? No one. Just talking. No one protecting Palestinians. And U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will land here in Tel Aviv in a couple of hours. Willie, he has the difficult task of trying to bring American influence to bear and bring some calm to the West Bank. We were expecting him privately to urge his Israeli counterpart to scale back these daytime raids in the West Bank that are leading to such high casualty figures, but also to call on the Palestinian security forces to do more to confront these militant groups themselves.

Willie, an important moment with the secretary of defense there. NBC's Raf Sanchez in Tel Aviv. Raf, thank you very much. Coming up here, our next guest is reporting on what he calls a troubling sign for 2024. He is profiling an Arizona election official who's faced a series of attacks while trying to defend democracy and elections in his state. Morning Joe's coming right back. Oh, man, that's a beautiful sunrise over Washington at 635 on a beautiful Wednesday morning. Since the 2020 election, we've heard reports of election workers being verbally accosted or facing direct and indirect threats due to lies spewed by election deniers. One man that's faced a flurry of threats is former Maricopa County, Arizona, Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates. After the 2022 election, Maricopa County held a meeting in which he and his fellow board members endured nearly an hour of anger from voters. Chairman Bill Gates and Recorder Richer, you both have lost all credibility in any shred of integrity. This entire board is corrupt. You need to be replaced. This is the epitome of weak, corrupt men. You five up here.

You need to resign today. And I pray that God is going to convict your heart. And for what you've done, this Proverbs 11, one states, the Lord detests dishonest scales, but accurate weights find favor with him. The Lord knows what you've done. I would ask you to confess and repent and may the consequences of your actions be on your heads. I warn you and I caution you. We got a big God in Jesus name. Join us now. Staff writer for The Atlantic, Barton Gelman. He talked to Maricopa County Supervisor Bill Gates in a new piece in The Atlantic titled A Troubling Sign for 2024, the two discuss the threats Gates fates during his time as the county's chairman, the state of democracy, and Gates' thoughts on the

future of elections. Barton, good morning. It's great to have you with us. So let's talk a little bit about Bill Gates, by the way, no relation to his role in these 2020 elections, what he did before, during, and after, and what he endured because of it. So he had an important role both in 2020 and in 2022. As chairman of the Board of Supervisors, Maricopa County has more than half of all the votes in Arizona. It's the fourth largest county in the country. And the job of the Board of Supervisors, among other things, is to certify the election results. And in 2020, when, as you'll recall, the Arizona outcome was so crucial and so close,

he came under, he and his fellow supervisors came under huge pressure from the president on down not to certify the actual results of the voting, which said that Joe Biden won. So he's getting calls from Rudy Giuliani. Arizona Republican chair, Kelly Ward, filled with fabulized claims of fraud. And he's being told, not in as many words, but very clearly, that his whole political future as a politician in Arizona hangs on him being loyal to his party. And as you write in the piece, Bart, he hardly was alone. We've talked about Katie Hobbs, now the governor of Arizona. There are a long list of officials in that state who endured these kind of threats. What was it like to be on the inside of that for Bill Gates? What was it like to not want to go outside your home

and to get these phone calls, not just from regular folks, but from, as you say, Rudy Giuliani saying we need to do something about these election results? How did they push through that? And did they work together on that? Did they have sort of a band of brothers and sisters? Yeah, you know, it used to be a good thing for a politician to be recognized on the street. And I mean, he liked that as he was growing up as a city and county politician. But when I met with him, he was barely willing to meet me at a restaurant. And we did it after dark in a kind of sparsely populated restaurant. He was looking around furtively the whole time saying he hoped he wasn't recognized.

He never goes out in public anymore. He worried about me mentioning what color or type his car was. He didn't want me to say where he lives because he's had to be evacuated from his home more than once because of credible death threats. It's just his life has been turned upside down. He didn't ask for this. And he does know that it's commonplace. He keeps up communications and text messages

and Zoom calls with his counterparts around the country, almost all of them Republican election officials who are going through the same thing he is. Al Schmitt in Philadelphia, Gabe Sterling in Georgia, his counterpart, the Secretary of State in nearby New Mexico. And he'll say things like, well, the candidate for Attorney General just threatened to put me in jail if he wins office. I guess you're going to have to bail me out, that kind of thing. They make kind of dark jokes about it. Barton, I actually was just in Arizona over the weekend and there was a real sense there of voters I talked to just how close they came. The election, these election diners almost squeaked out victories and real fear about what could happen in the next cycle. So you just mentioned some of the other commissioners we heard from Al Schmidt, for instance, during the January 6th committee.

But these threats have also had a chilling effect on like volunteers and poll workers. What is your level of concern about just simply those Americans who want to do their civic duty to try to help out with the elections next time around might be too afraid to do so? Well, the truth is a lot of them are being forced out of those jobs. You're a volunteer, you're living in your community and you're getting death threats and phone calls and people calling you at home and people texting that they know where you live. And it's it's scary and it's pervasive around the country. According to one survey in the fall, 50 percent of all election workers reported harassment, abuse and threats in urban areas. That never rises to three quarters. Three quarters of all election workers are under this kind of pressure now.

And the system just isn't built for that. The new piece in The Atlantic is titled A Troubling Sign for 2024. Well worth the read. Barton Gellman, thanks so much for bringing it to us. We appreciate it. And Michael Steele, it's not just elections officials. It's not just secretaries of state or people like Mr. Gates here. There are regular people who go out and work in the polls.

We saw some of them testify from Georgia before the January 6th select committee about having their lives turned upside down, about having their lives threatened based on lies that Rudy Giuliani put out, for example, interpreting a video as some kind of malfeasance when one woman was passing another mint. So this is out there. This is in the bloodstream. And as long as people on major news outlets, as long as the leading presidential candidate on the Republican side continue to push conspiracy theories about what happens around our elections, it will be with us. It will, Willie. And to your point, we're talking about citizens, as you just talked about, who are just everyday people. I mean, these people coming and testifying and, you know, invoking the Lord's name in a voting process know these individuals.

They knew them before any of this crazy started to happen. They know in most instances, these are reputable members of the community. They've been volunteering and working at election centers for decades in many cases, long time activists in the space, nonpartisan election officials. And yet our system has now become so infected with this vile poison

perpetrated by Republicans, especially and I'm going to take that back. It's not Republicans per se, but these MAGA folks. Right. This this this strain of this republicanism, that now these folks live in fear. And you have the kind of, you know, hearings that you opened the segment with, where those very self-same, you know, average citizens coming out with their pitchforks ready to skewer someone for what? A lie. And here's the rub. At the end of the day, they know it's a lie because you can't refute the fact that there's no evidence, who know how the system works, who know where the problems lie, they would be the first ones to call out the problem and say, wait a minute, this election isn't right. But they didn't do that. In fact, they came back and said something else, and they're mad at them for that. Because when you get sucked into that rabbit hole, Willie,

and you realize you're the only fool inside the hole because unlike the others, you went headlong. You want to save yourself a little bit of embarrassment. So you go and you invoke the Lord's name at an election hearing. And it's all, Mike Barnicle, so backward looking. The president still wants to talk about the 2020 election. A lot of Republicans wish he would move on. But it is if you just watch CPAC over the weekend, for example, Carrie Lake, who ran for governor and lost in Arizona. She won the straw poll to become vice president. And as John told us yesterday, she said she couldn't take that role because she is the governor of Arizona and it would be a conflict of interest. What do you do with that? That was after she kissed the poster of Donald Trump. But, you know, Willie,

just in this discussion, just in the past few minutes, we went coast to coast. Scottsdale, Arizona, you referenced Georgia, and there's a lot of denial of elections in between the two coasts. And of all the damage, of all the damage that the former guy has done to this country and its institutions, this might be the deepest and the darkest and the most long lasting because it gets to the core of our democracy. You vote, you win or lose, and you accept the numbers and you move on. But what this guy has done, the former guy, I would submit is he has injected a virus into the political culture, the political body culture of this country. And it's a virus thus far without a vaccine. And it's going to kill us in a certain extent unless it's corrected. And we opened this hour with Donald Trump's lies fueling the violence

of January 6th. The effort now to try to downplay and whitewash that that big lie was with us in the 2022 election. It will be with us in the 2024 election. We as a nation have to deal with it. And remember, election denialism was smacked down in the midterm election. So it's also a losing strategy to continue talking about elections being unfair or that Donald Trump was cheated out of his 2020 election. Still ahead, President Biden, during his State of the Union address last month, made a point to call out airlines for junk fees and credit card companies for late fees, both of which generate huge profits for companies. We'll dig into the proposals that could you save you a little money.

Oh, hey, you can use my and we are moments away from Mika's live conversation with the first lady of Ukraine, Elena Zelenska, and women's rights icons Billie Jean King and Gloria Steinem, co-moderated with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Quite a lineup coming up at the top of the hour. The administration is also taking on junk fees, those hidden surcharges too many companies use to make you pay more. For example, we're making airlines show you the full ticket price up front. Refund your money if your flight is canceled or delayed. We reduce exorbitant bank overdrafts by saving consumers more than one billion dollars a year. That was President Biden during his State of the Union address last month, outlining the steps his administration is taking to combat punitive

junk fees for consumers. To that end, the White House will host a virtual meeting later today with several state legislators from across the country to address that issue. At the same time, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is working to rein in excessive credit card fees, including late overdraft, non-sufficient funds and bounce check penalties. And that is big business. A recent report from the CFPB revealed banks collect about 12 billion dollars a year in credit card late fees. Joining us now, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Rohit Chopra. Mr. Chopra, thanks so much for your time this morning. We appreciate you being here.

So I don't think most Americans appreciated it that that number is $12 billion. There's a reason that they don't mind if you pay late the credit card companies because they make so much money off of that. So what are you all proposing to do about it? Well, we're looking to take on these junk fees across banking. Everywhere you look, it feels like there's fees tacked on for a service you never asked for or something that's charged way beyond its cost. We've looked at overdraft fees, credit card late fees and so much more. We proposed a rule that will make those credit card fees a little bit more reasonable.

And we expect our proposal will save people $9 billion per year. It's still going to make credit card companies money. They get to charge a lot of interest, charge a lot of other costs back to consumers. And I think this is just going to make the market a bit more competitive. So, Mr. Chopra, on credit card fees, late fees, they are exorbitant and they're killers in a way. What is your proposal? What's your bottom line? Where are you going in lowering the fees? That's one question. And the other aspect of credit cards is the enticement that they offer to people without credit cards. Get this credit card, 0% interest. You can go buy a car or a house on it. We don't care because we're your pal.

What do you do about the unbelievable deception in advertisements? Well, let's think about this. Credit cards are one of the most common items we owe, and we collectively owe about $1 trillion. We estimate that people pay around $120 billion each year in interest and fees. So here's what the law says. The law bans out-of-control and unreasonable penalty fees. provision that allowed financial companies to charge a late fee, and that one went up by inflation, and now it's up to about $40. So what we're saying is, let's look at those provisions again. Let's bring it in line with what the law actually says. So we've proposed making it at about $8. Of course, a company can charge more if they can prove that it really costs them more than that.

But I think what this is going to do is it's going to make companies not want to compete on how many late fees they can harvest, but really how they serve their customers, the rates they're providing, because this means so much to people's budgets. Now, of course, advertising, we're going to be looking across the board to make sure it's truthful and that people are getting the right part of the deal when it's promised to them. It's interesting for all the big policy proposals coming out of this administration. This in the State of the Union address, this talk about late fees and resort fees and airline fees seem to be what really broke through with so much of the public. Director of

the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Rohit Chopra. Thanks so much for being here today. We appreciate it.