Morning Joe - Morning Joe 4/16/24

Episode Date: April 16, 2024

Today: Day 2 of historic hush money trial

Because Trump was in Pennsylvania, he took a moment to talk about local history. Gettysburg, what an unbelievable battle that was. The Battle of Gettysburg, what an unbelievable, I mean, it was so much and so interesting and so vicious and horrible and so beautiful in so many different ways. It represented such a big portion of the success of this country. Gettysburg, wow. I go to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to look and to watch. What a stirring order. I look forward to Ken Burns' updated documentary. My dearest Martha, wow. Today we fought at Gettysburg. It was so much and so interesting and so vicious and so beautiful in so many ways.

But all worth it to protect every person, woman, man, camera, and future TV. For as it says in the Declaration of Independence, all men are endowed with certain rights that are unadethalim, unadlimable, unabobabodabobo. Forget it. I'm dead. Oh, my God. That was pretty good. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. The original, though. How can you top the original? Donald Trump's speech. I don't know.

Wow. It was so interesting. So, my God. The original, though. How can you top the original? Donald Trump's speech. I don't know. Wow. It was so interesting. It was so wow. Who says that? It was so much. It was so much. It was so much. In many ways, he's right.

I go to watch. I mean, I just don't know what to say about it. I go there to watch. It was so much. Wow. It was so much. What's going through his mind? Not much.

Not much. But President Biden is in cognitive decline. I mean, the argument is that the president can't talk his way out of a paper bag. Just go watch any Donald Trump rally. Yeah, there's just no there's no comparison on any of these fronts. And he he is he's just rambling. I mean, I guess I guess, Jonathan, he's lucky he's going to be in court for several weeks and can't do any more damage to himself on the trail. OK, that's right. The limit, the limit, the gaps. Yeah, this is an inflection point.

We had the president Biden, of course, in the road this week for President Trump will be in a New York courtroom each and every day. But when he is out on the trail, as he was in Pennsylvania over the weekend, you know, Gettysburg. Wow. Wow. That's it. That's it. So much. I really don't know what to say. We also have this president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haass. And Pulitzer Prize winning columnist and associate editor for The Washington Post, Eugene Robinson. I don't really know what else to say other than Mika. Wow. Yeah, so much.

So much. Well, actually, there is this to say. History was made yesterday as former President Donald Trump is set to be back in court later this morning for day two of his hush money criminal trial criminal trial after the first day ended with no jurors selected for the panel of 12 and six alternates 18 total so the court spent much of the morning yesterday reviewing several motions before moving on to the jury selection process. One of the motions included Trump's request that Judge Juan Merchan recuse himself from the trial.

The judge ruled against it. Judge Merchan also denied any changes to the jury questionnaire. He then denied prosecutors requests to bring in other allegations of sexual assault against Trump, calling them complete hearsay. Additionally, the Access Hollywood tape will not be admissible in court, but the transcript can be used. The judge also barred prosecutors from introducing the video of Trump's deposition in the E. Jean Carroll case. The jury selection process began then after lunch. A total of 500 potential candidates reported to the courthouse. Of those, the first batch of 96 were brought into the courtroom for questioning.

More than half, 50 potential jurors, said they could not be impartial or could not otherwise serve and were immediately dismissed. Reporters noted that Trump watched the potential jurors at times, turning to smirk at them at one point. And several potential jurors in the jury box appeared to frequently stare at Trump while the judge introduced the case. The process will get back underway later this morning.

Jury selection could take up to two weeks or more due to the large pool of prospective jurors. They brought like 6,000 to the courthouse. There were other cases happening as well, Joe. And of course, we have a full set of legal experts lined up this morning to take a bigger look at what's going on at the Manhattan courthouse with the former president. Right. We're going to be talking to Chuck Rosenberg, also Lisa Rubin in a minute. But but but Willie, no surprise at all that they're they're going to have trouble finding. Yeah. Finding jurors is this could take a long time. Yeah. Just look at the question in the questionnaire.

Do you have any strong opinions or firmly held beliefs about former President Donald Trump? It's hard to find somebody in 2024 who does not have some view of Donald Trump one way or another. So it is going to be a long process. And we saw yesterday they're just throwing out jurors by the dozens because they say, well, yes, of course, I have strong views about Donald Trump. Yeah. And it is, Jonathan, it is really something. I mean, a criminal case, president going and to to courtroom for a criminal case where he has to sit for the next however many weeks and go through the trial. Yeah, reality has arrived. He doesn't have a choice in the matter. We heard Trump yesterday afterwards complain that the judge wouldn't let

him step leave to attend his son's high school graduation, to leave to attend the Supreme Court oral arguments, which are set for next week. And the judge is like, that's not how this works. We're going to treat you like everyone else. You're a criminal defendant. You have to be here. The judge could issue a waiver for a day if he wants, perhaps for the graduation. But he certainly doesn't have to.

And we could see the frustration from Trump was obvious in the Truth Social posts afterward as well. His demeanor in court, the reporters are loud in the room. They suggest he looked really frustrated at times. At a couple of different moments, he closed his eyes. And we don't know if he was asleep or not, but he had closed his eyes. He was not watching. All I'm saying about using the Trump standard for judging Joe Biden when he closes his eyes and prays at a memorial service in Hawaii, then he's sleepy and he's dopey. I saw something this past weekend. It was a headline. And I won't even say what the what the newspaper was. But as I. OK, I have to see it because it said Biden was addled or whatever. And he just like him walking across the White House lawn.

So, yeah, using their standard, they would say if Joe Biden did that in a courtroom, they would say he was comatose and had to be rushed to, you know, Bellevue or something like that. But yeah, Trump. But but but Trump, obviously, though, we we can we can. We don't have to be the Bill O'Reilly. What did he have? The body language. We don't we don't have to be that. You can just look at his face and see that the weight of all this is finally weighing down on him. No question. We just spoke to Charles Coleman, one of the MSNBC legal experts on way too early, who just who notes that, you know, again, sitting in criminal trial, it is it is draining. You're there for seven, eight hours. It's intense. It's going to take a toll on anyone, particularly someone who is in his late 70s, who's under a lot of pressure right now. So that is a real thing.

But otherwise, yesterday, it proceeded as it was expected, Willie. It proceeded as a matter of routine, but that doesn't take away the history of it. This was the first time a former president and about to be presidential nominee is sitting as a criminal defendant. And it's going to be a long trial. I mean, we got a window into that yesterday. Just the jury selection now looks like that could take weeks before we even get to introducing evidence and conducting the trial the way we would watch it. So he's going to be there for a long time. And remember, this is just one of several trials ahead for him this year. Gene Robinson, a lot of people have said that the system doesn't work, that Donald Trump is above the law. It certainly has seemed that way for most of his adult life, all of his adult life.

But you wrote that yesterday proves he's not above the law. The system works. Yeah, the system is actually working. It's taken it a while. It's taken a while for any of these four criminal cases to actually get to a courtroom for trial. And this is the this is the first one. Prosecutor Alvin Bragg filed these felony charges against Donald Trump, and the process moved along. He was prepared. Bragg was prepared to step back and let the federal cases

go first, or even the Georgia case. But those all got delayed, thanks to Donald Trump's machinations, mostly. And so so here we are. And, you know, to quote to quote the great orator about the first day, wow, it was so much. It was just it was fascinating and and kind of riveting as he sat there in a courtroom where he's going to be day after day after day. There was a point, reportedly, at which he seemed to kind of lose it at his attorney, Dodd Blanch, over maybe Blanch wasn't fighting hard enough on some point of procedure or producing some documents. And Trump seemed to really get cross with him right after lunch. And so you've got to wonder how long he's going to be contained in that defendant's chair and whether he actually blows at some point and gets himself into deep, deeper trouble with Judge Merchand. Yeah, it's an exhausting process. We have Chuck Rosenberg and Lisa Rubin standing by

to talk about where this is all headed. But there's a lot of other news to cover this morning, including a potentially significant development on Capitol Hill. House Speaker Mike Johnson unveiled a Republican-led foreign aid package yesterday. According to three sources familiar with the process, the legislation would include three aid measures with roughly tens of billions of dollars for Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and allies in the Indo-Pacific. A fourth measure would include national security priorities, such as seizing Russian assets in the U.S., a loan lease program for Ukraine, and additional sanctions on Iran. Johnson says his preference is to vote on each bill individually, but we'll let the chamber decide. There are precipitating events around the globe that we're all watching very carefully.

And we know that the world is watching us to see how we react. We have terrorists and tyrants and terrible leaders around the world like Putin and Xi and in Iran. And they're watching to see if America will stand up for its allies and in our own interest around the globe. And we will. Well, but they haven't. I'm very glad he said that and hope that he actually comes through with with a clean aid bill to Ukraine. They haven't said it, but they're talking about it now. What's it look like, Richard? I don't much care whether it's a combined bill or a separate bill, so long as the aid for Ukraine passes.

That's the most pressing of all of that. Right. And every day, the battlefield news, Joe, is is awful strategically, but also in human terms. You have these soldiers on the front lines who simply maybe have a half dozen shells and they have to parcel them out to get through a day. You can't fight a weatherway and it's tilting in Russia's favor. This is recklessness and irresponsibility on steroids that we've ever reached this this this point. I'm hoping and again, to me, it doesn't matter so much whether it's loans or grants. Just get Ukraine the military aid more and sooner. There's obviously going to be a compromise here. There'll be less than Ukraine wants and needs. Arguably, it's obviously been later. Some of the economic terms won't be as generous. But if that's the price of getting it, let's pay the price. Let's bring in Admiral James Trevitas. He's a former Supreme Allied commander of NATO, retired four star Navy admiral and the

international analyst for NBC News. Admiral, your thoughts on this aid? I'm with Richard. Get it done. And frankly, it doesn't matter whether it's linked together, although I can make a pretty good argument that they all kind of fit together. But at this point, without question, the racehorse that needs to be in the pole position is Ukraine. Look, the Israelis are not going to be defeated by Hamas. Certainly, China is a longer term problem. The one that really matters now, now, now is getting the aid to Ukraine. It's a military imperative.

The only bright spots in Ukraine are the hits against the Russian Black Sea fleet at sea have been quite effective. Other than that, the Ukrainians are on their back foot both in the air and on the land. Good news, they're going to add F-16s over the next couple of months. But that will not tip this balance without the bread and butter of hardcore ammunition for the battlefield, particularly artillery shells. Got to get done. And final thought, to draw a line under something the speaker said, which is the world is watching. It is watching. It is watching.

And this is good news, Jonathan, obviously, if the aid gets to our allies. But it's a little rich for a lot of Democrats who've been making this exact argument for months and months and months now, which is Beijing is watching what we do in Ukraine. Mike Johnson, who stood in the way of a lot of this aid, is now making those same arguments, saying also the munitions are being made in America. We've been saying on that show, Admiral Stavridis has been saying on this show for months and months and months. So Speaker Johnson coming around late to all the cases that people have been making for foreign aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. Yeah, he's come around late. And also this is

far from a sure thing to get to get done here. First of all, the fourth bill we don't know much about yet. It's still being worked out. It's going to include a package of related measures of potentially a ban on TikTok, seizing assets from Russian oligarchs in the U.S. and so on. But the White House deeply opposes this idea. The whole point was to combine this, thinking they would have a better chance to get Ukraine funding through if it was attached to Israel. Certainly right now, Israel has a lot of momentum in the wake of this weekend's attacks, but a lot of those on the right are still opposing the Ukraine aid. And it's not clear that Johnson has the votes. A number of Republicans are still opposed to this.

And in order to placate some of the hard right Republicans, even if he's able to get their support in the House, it's probably going to mean including provisions that are non-starters in the Senate so that they're going to have to go back there. And that seems pretty dire that that could get done. And lastly, the fact that Johnson's even taking this step is endangering your speakership.

So I guess credit to him for doing that. The Marjorie Taylor Greene raged afterwards about this, declaring it a betrayal. But again, you said hard to write. You can't even say that anymore, Willie, when when members of the Republican House GOP are saying they're Putin propagandists, leaders of the Republican Party's foreign policy apparatus inside the House are saying they have become dupes to Russian disinformation? Or I don't know. Are they dupes? Why would somebody from northern Georgia start spouting Russian propaganda points? It's not a dupe, is she? Why would I'm just curious.

Why would other members of the House Republican Party start spouting Russian propaganda? I don't have any answers to this, though I am fascinated by it. I know there's been some talk in Russia that actually I mean, some talk in Europe that some European politicians have actually been on the take from Russia. That explains that. I don't understand, though, why politicians from Dalton, Georgia, are spewing talking points from Vladimir Putin and RT, Russian television. Very strange times when I'm not saying this. I'm quoting the Republican who runs the Intel Committee who's saying this. I'm quoting the Republican who runs the Foreign Affairs Committee for saying this.

Very strange times indeed in the Republican House. Mike Turner, the chair of the Intel Committee, a Republican, said publicly in an interview on CNN last week, he hears direct Russian propaganda from the mouths of the Republicans on the floor of the House. That's from him. He's a Republican talking about his colleagues there. And it is it is a fair question. Why? Why? What what is what's going on? And by the way, you could take that argument as we have for almost a decade now, all the way to the top. Why does Donald Trump defend Vladimir Putin at every turn? We never fully gotten to the bottom of that, but it does seem

many of his minions in the House are following his lead on that. Yeah. Richard, why? Look, we have been debating that for, what, 10 years now? No, but I know, I know. But now you have the the right Ronald Reagan's former party. Yeah. Being run by by by a speaker who has been worried about Russian propagandists. Again, Russian propagandists, according to the head of the House GOP. And so let's talk about a couple of reasons. One is the isolationism in the Republican Party, as you know, now is powerful. The virus has come out and it's got a lot of political appeal. There's a lot of a lot of the support for Republicans, particularly South as white Christians, a lot of support there for Russia. You see the websites there, a lot of overlap, a lot of support, almost visceral support for Putin and Putinism, an inability to support anything that has that Joe Biden wants. If Joe Biden wants

it, Republicans have to oppose it. And I can come up with lots of reasons. Bottom line is, Joe, it risks American national security. These people, they use the word patriot 24-7. This is about as unpatriotic as you get. Unless you're talking about Russian patriotism. Yeah. Literally spewing Russian propaganda talking points according to the GOP intel chief and the head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House Republican Party. It is a strange number one issue. Why is this her number one issue?

Why? I don't have that. I don't understand. Perhaps we'll find out. Perhaps we'll find out. It's bizarre. It is bizarre. U.S. expects Israel's response, Willie, to Iran to be limited in scope, just like I've

got to say, we predicted here that Iran's response would be limited enough because Iran talks big. Iran doesn't want to. Let's just say find out. They don't want to find out. They don't want to find out what the response from the United States will be if they open up the door to a widespread war. Mess around and find out. Mess around and find out is what the kids say. Yes. So we're hearing at NBC News, according to four U.S. officials, the retaliatory actions from Israel likely will involve strikes against Iranian military forces and proxies outside of Iran. The assessment is based on conversations that took place before this

weekend's attack. On Saturday, as Joe said, Iran fired more than 300 missiles and drones at Israel. Ninety nine percent of them were either intercepted or shot down by Israel, the United States, with the help of some Arab allies and the UK as well. The attack was in reaction to an Israeli strike earlier this month in Syria, in which several Iranian leaders were killed. The US.S., U.K., France, all asking Israel now to show restraint in order to avoid a larger conflict. Israel's war cabinet met yesterday for the second time in less than 24 hours. A government spokesperson says Israel, quote, retains all its options and reserves the right to do everything it can to defend the country.

Officials have not yet provided any detail on which options are being considered. So, Admiral Stavridis, obviously, Iran could have inflicted more damage than it did. Ninety nine percent of those missiles and drones were intercepted. No casualties either. So what do you expect now from Israel? Do you think they will heed the advice and the warnings from the United States here? The way I'm thinking about it, and I suspect the way it's being briefed to the war cabinet is, look, there's four options here. One is go big, major, major strikes, jets whistling over Tehran, go after the nuclear program, a big, big strike against the homeland. Option two, which is what we're discussing and I think we'll end up with, would be some level

of response, probably against the homeland, but much more limited, perhaps going after the manufacturing site for the drones or something that would smack a proportionality. So a more limited strike, but against the homeland. Option three would be strikes against proxies, strikes against non-homeland targets that could include, for example, using cyber to go after the Iranian economy. It could include maritime. You know, the admiral is going to say that you can go after the Iranian warships at sea that are supporting the Houthis, both with intelligence and supply. And then finally, final option would be be very, very restrained, kind of take the narrative high road. If you ask me to bet where it lands, I think they'll do some combination of option two and three.

There'll be some strike, I think, against a homeland target. It's almost irresistible for the Israelis, but they will certainly take that more limited package I described, cyber, maritime, special forces. That piece, I think, is almost certain. We'll know more in five to seven days, I would say. Now, Richard, let's underline the fact, again, that Arab neighbors helped in this in this moment. And it's it's pretty remarkable. But it also tracks with what we've been hearing behind the scenes that that you have Jordan, the Emiratis, the Saudis, a lot of other Arab neighbors standing by waiting to help in the post-war period. Their only problem is how long it's going on and the number of civilian deaths in Gaza, only because, you know, if it were to continue another six months, it would be extraordinarily hard for them to go in and help.

Yeah, but what we're talking about here with Iran is not going to really change that. This Israeli government, whatever it decides to do with Iran, and my guess is they will do something direct against the Iranian homeland in order to, quote unquote, restore deterrence. I think that's what they will end up doing. They're not about to do the sorts of things with the Palestinians that would make it, shall we say, easy for the Arabs to step in economically or with troops or whatever in Gaza. So that's the disconnect between this Israeli government and the Arab world. The Arab world would like the Israelis to do something against Iran. They're prepared to support the Israelis against Iran. But I think there's a real disconnect still between this right-wing government in Israel and what the Saudis and others would see as

the necessary. So I don't see this changing it. And funny sort of way, the Gaza debate's almost been parked for a couple of days. Right. But none of the fundamentals has changed whatsoever there. Well, no, I mean, when you have Netanyahu against two state solution, that's just not going to work. No, that's why the Iran. I mean, it may work for him. It may work for a right wing government. But I but in the long run, that won't work for the United States. It won't work for allies in the region. It won't work. They have taken they've taken a position that Yahoo's taken a position that's too extreme. And like I said, I understand right now is the Israeli people not wanting to talk about a two state solution. But again, that Yahoo's been

working against it for 10, 15 years. We've got to move forward. And when I say we, we ought to be able to say that as friends that help Israel remain afloat. We ought to be saying it publicly. We ought to be coming down hard on the Israelis over settlements, over settler violence. We ought to be articulating the parameters of impeachment. We don't need to go. We should not go.

You cannot go to a two-state solution now, but you can sketch out the horizons. Right. You begin the process of moving down that path. But this Israeli government will never go there because this Israeli government, the political and ideological foundations of it wouldn't allow it. So there is going to be a day of reckoning there. In the meantime, though, we've got this other crisis we've got to deal with. Well, and by the way, another crisis that shows that we remain their friends and steadfast allies and people who will stand with them through thick and thin, regardless. When they're attacked from by Iranians, that's that's a very, very easy call for us. Richard, thank you so much.

Should we talk about the Masters? He picked it correctly. If you look at the tape, Scotty Scheffler. It's on the tape, but it was such a dominant performance by Scotty Scheffler, seven birdies in the last round, a level of consistent golf that is quite breathtaking. I think that's the thing that struck me is in the final, the last nine, the back nine of the Masters on Sunday, I don't care who it is. They usually, except unless we're talking about Tiger in 2019,

I've seen the greats even push one off to the right or hook one into the woods. But he was, from eight eight nine on uh man he was he was locked in and every shot was where it needed to be and you know you watch him and his disposition never changes he didn't get too high if he had a good shot didn't throw his club or look down he was just like you said he was dialed in he is as consistent and great a golfer as we've seen in a long time. He's won two masters in the last three years. He's 27 years old. He's got some road ahead of him. I think the only threat to him on Sunday was that his wife was going to go into labor and he was going to have to go home. Other than that, there was nothing else. Nothing else was going to get in the way of his getting a second green

jacket. The wife told the doctor, don't call him. We'll take the check and the endorsements. You know, we actually call Scotty Scheffler of Morning Joe as Admiral James Trevita. That's right. Very consistent. Locked in. He's locked in. He is locked in.

Admiral Trevita, you're always locked in, and we're going to be providing you with your own green jacket, sir. Yeah. As we always say, Scotty Scheffler, wow, so much. Wow. So much. So much. I like to go there and just watch.

Okay. Still ahead on Morning Joe. We're going to turn back to Donald Trump's hush money trial, which will get underway again in just a few hours from now. We'll go over the top takeaways from day one, including the new fight to hold the former president in contempt. You're watching Morning Joe. We'll be right back. That is an absolutely beautiful shot of Mika's penthouse right there, by the way, TJ. Thank you for putting that up. Wow. The thing is, this trial could go on for months, but Trump still has a presidential campaign to run.

His team claims that even on some court days, Trump will hold both in-person and virtual events. That's going to make for some awkward trial moments. Your Honor, can we wrap this up, please? Because I am late for a rally where I call for your execution. If it please the court. Welcome back. Joining us now, former litigator and MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin and former U.S. attorney and MSNBC contributor Chuck Rosenberg, also with us, president of the National Action Network and host of MSNBC's Politics Nation, Reverend Al Sharpton. He's with us as well. Lisa, we'll start with you. You were in the courtroom. Aside from the historic aspect of this event yesterday, if you could break down the major developments in the first day

legally for us. Mika, one of the biggest things that happened yesterday, and really truthfully, what consumed the most amount of time was the pretrial motions that the parties wanted heard before Judge Marchand, and in particular, the DA's office asking for clarification with respect to a number of evidentiary rulings that Judge Marchand had made. In doing so, and in asking for that clarity, they took us on a tour of their case. It was almost like a mini opening statement, because we got a preview of all of the ways in which they are going to buttress the story that you and I and many viewers know so well, that Michael Cohen worked with Donald Trump to ensure that Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal's stories never saw the light of day before the 2016 election.

And thereafter, worked with Trump and Allen Weisselberg and others to paper it over in a way that we would never know that this is what they had done. But the DA's office yesterday was showing us how are they going to scaffold Michael Cohen as a witness? What are they going to build into that? And so we saw yesterday, for example, a preview of how they're going to use the National Enquirer witnesses. They said in 2015, there was a meeting at Trump Tower by which David Pecker made a promise to the Trump campaign. He was going to do three things. He's going to bury negative stories about Donald Trump, accentuate very positive stories about Donald Trump,

and also say extraordinarily denigrating things about his enemies. And yesterday, the DA's office said, these are some headlines we want to introduce as evidence of this tripartite scheme. Things like that are how we saw the preview of the DA's case yesterday. So, Chuck, Judge Marchand immediately ruled against recusing himself. apartheid scheme. Things like that are how we saw the preview of the DA's case yesterday. So, Chuck, Judge Merchant immediately ruled against recusing himself. That was pushed to the side of that motion very quickly. So any other motions that stood out to you? And then after that, if you can just speak to the difficulty of picking this jury, if the lead question is, do you have any opinion about Donald Trump, arguably the most famous person in the country right now? Let me take the second part, Willie, if I may. You're not looking for people who have no opinion, right? And I'll give you an example. We tried the 9-11 conspiracy in federal

court in Alexandria, a few miles from the Pentagon. We weren't looking for people who never heard of 9-11. We weren't looking for people who were neutral on al-Qaeda, right? People had heard of 9-11 and they weren't neutral on al-Qaeda. We were looking for people who could say, despite all those things, I can listen to the evidence and be fair. That's all you're looking for. You can put aside what you know, what you believe, watch what's adduced to trial, follow the instructions of the judge, apply the law to the facts, and render a fair and impartial verdict. So I don't think it's that difficult to find a dozen people who can be fair. You may have to ask a lot of people until you find 12, but they'll get there. As for the judge's

rulings not to recuse himself, that was easy. There was no basis for it. And I think Lisa very well summarized some of the other rulings yesterday, admitting evidence that the government is going to use a trial to sort of explain the context and the backdrop for why it was so important for the Trump campaign to try and kill this story right before the election. But I think as one that knew Donald Trump, Donald Trump, people forget most of us at some point are motivated or try to use the influence of those that we looked up to, mentored us or whatever. He's on his Roy Cohen mentorship right now, which believe that you always look to find one or two of the jurors that can either hang the jury or get you to quit. This is why he's sitting there when he could stay awake, trying to stare at the jury. And he's trying to see at the prospective jurors, trying

to see what kind of rhythm he could get with who may ultimately sit in that box, he's going to be playing Roy Cohen card all through the trial, trying to, you know, use his facial expressions and other things to try to discredit without saying anything, people like Michael Cohen and all. So, Chuck, my question to you is, how do you how do you counter that if you're the prosecutor? And how do you deal with the fact that you're dealing with a defendant who is trying to stay out of jail, who's hung around people like Roy Cohen all of his life, and is trying to play the jury as a defendant when he's not Sleepy Donald? Well, right. So all defendants are trying to stay out of jail. So he's not unique in that way. But but you raise a really interesting point,

Reverend. It only takes one juror to hang the jury. And let me explain that. A jury has to be unanimous to convict, 12-0. It has to be unanimous to acquit, 12-0. But any other combination, 11-1, 10-2, means a mistrial. And for a defendant who's looking to run out the clock, having a mistrial would be a wonderful outcome for Mr. Trump. Not a conclusive outcome, but a wonderful outcome. It means that if there's another trial, it's months and months away, and he might be president again by then. So that is know, that is a hard task for a prosecutor to eliminate from the jury pool anybody who has a hidden agenda. By definition, hidden agendas are hidden. And so the voir dire process is an attempt to try and pierce that veil. But it's not perfect. And while

I believe, as I told Willie, that you can get a fair jury. It could be the case that somebody ends up on the jury who wants a particular outcome. You ought to try and avoid that as a prosecutor. Yeah. And, Gene, we obviously that that's obviously what Donald Trump's hoping for. He only needs one juror who decides they're going to they're going to ignore the facts, they're going to ignore the evidence, they're going to ignore the law and let Donald Trump walk. Yeah, that's exactly what he wants. And he's going to try to, he and I guess his lawyers are going to try to engineer that. My question to Lisa, just in terms of inside the courtroom, aside from the interlude when he seemed to fall asleep,

was Donald Trump really actively engaged? Did he seem to be actively engaged with his defense lawyers? How was that dynamic? Do you expect him to try to play a major role in this jury selection process in making those decisions? And from the point of view of his defense team, is that a good thing or a bad thing? I think from the point of view of his defense team, look, nobody wants to be micromanaged by a client ever, particularly a client who maybe doesn't have the best judgment with respect to how he's perceived by others. But was he actively engaged? Yes. And I was particularly struck by the I'll call it the friendship or the bromance between Todd Blanch and Donald Trump yesterday. There was frequent huddling, arms around each other, whispering,

pointing, constant back and forth. And I will also tell you that Todd Blanch, who joined former President Trump's legal team about a year ago, seems unparalleled now in his closeness to former President Trump. He didn't enjoy that same rapport with two of the other attorneys sitting at the counsel table. Emil Bove, who's one of Blanche's partners and a former colleague in the U.S. attorney's office, and Susan Necklis, who was sitting at the far end of the table and is one of New York's best known criminal defense lawyers. She's extraordinarily skilled and yet doesn't seem to have that same relationship, that rapport that Todd Blanche and Donald Trump have clearly developed. And so I will be looking to that, that interplay. Who is leading who is the key question on my mind. Is Blanch

able to get through to Trump and give him his best counsel? Or is this a situation of agency capture where, in effect, Trump's lawyers all become more Trumpy as a result of their association with him. MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin, thank you very much. We'll be seeing a lot of you and we appreciate it. And Chuck Rosenberg, I do have one more story we'd like to ask you about. The armorer on the set of the film Rust has been sentenced to 18 months in prison for involuntary manslaughter. Hannah Gutierrez-Reed received the maximum sentence yesterday. She was convicted last month for the death of cinematographer Helena Hutchins. Hutchins was killed in October of 2021 after a gun that Alec Baldwin was holding fired a live bullet. Prosecutors argued

Gutierrez-Reed was reckless in her job of managing weapons and directly caused the tragedy. Baldwin is also facing an involuntary manslaughter charge. Prosecutors allege the actor was negligent in failing to make sure the gun he was handed did not contain live ammunition. Baldwin has pleaded not guilty. His trial is set to begin in July, but a judge is currently weighing a motion from his defense to dismiss the indictment. Chuck, just what do you think this outcome means for Alec Baldwin, if anything? What do you make of his attempt to dismiss the indictment? And then, of course, there's always the concept of whenever you're handling a gun, no matter real or fake and or unloaded, you don't point it at a person.

Well, that's exactly right in terms of gun safety, Mika. But I think about it this way. Though Mr. Baldwin and the armorer were involved in the same shooting, the same place, at the same time, with the same victim, there are differences in two cases, right? The armorer was directly responsible for the weapons on set and making sure they were safe. Mr. Baldwin was not. If this ends up at trial, if his attorneys aren't able to dismiss the indictment prior to trial, I think you're going to hear the argument from them that he relied on her. And so I'm not sure that the outcome in one case portends an outcome in a second case. I think they're different enough factually that Mr. Baldwin's attorneys are going to have room to argue and to maneuver. We do know the judge

takes this very seriously and the maximum sentence for an involuntary manslaughter sends a message certainly to the armorer. But I don't know that you can draw a straight line between what happened to her and what may happen to Mr. Baldwin. All right. Former U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg, thank you very much. And of course, we'll be seeing a lot of you as well. Thank you for coming on once again this morning and coming up. A Republican senator advocates for vigilante justice after crowds of pro-Palestinian demonstrators blocked roads and bridges in major cities across the country. We'll play for you Tom Cotton's remarks next on Morning Joe. It's 49 past the hour. This was a little startling. Republican

Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas suggesting Americans take matters into their own hands when it comes to pro-Palestinian protesters. Cotton's comments came after crowds of activists protesting the Israel-Hamas war blocked roads and shut down bridges in major cities like San Francisco, Brooklyn, Seattle, and Chicago yesterday. Take a look at what the senator said on Fox News I have to say Sandra I agree with you that you have to get to these protests or these criminals early if something like this happened in Arkansas on a bridge there let's just say I think there'd be a lot of very wet criminals that have been tossed overboard not by law enforcement but by the people whose road they're blocking if they glued their hands to a car or the pavement, well,

probably pretty painful to have their skin ripped off. But I think that's the way we'd handle in Arkansas. And I've encouraged most people anywhere that gets stuck behind criminals like this, who are trying to block traffic to take matters in their own hands. There's only usually a few of them, and there's a lot of people being inconvenienced. It's time to put an end to this nonsense. I sympathize with law enforcement having to deal with this, but I think it's time for private citizens who are the ones being inconvenienced here when they're confronted with these protesters just to solve matters on their own before the police even show up. I'm thinking that's a little over the top. I don't know.

Well, it's beyond that. I mean, police officers would be the the top. I don't know. It's beyond that. I mean, police officers would be the first to say, don't do that. Please don't say that. Cops would say, please don't do that. Please don't say that. Please don't take matters into your own hands. Rip people's skin off? You know, Mike, there are a few things.

Well, I'll just put it this way. I doubt Senator Cotton is any more exasperated than I am when I see people doing this, blocking, blocking people who are going to work, are trying to take their kids to a doctor's appointment, are trying to to to to make an airplane at O'Hare so they can get home in time to see a kid's ball game or a recital or just to get home to the people they love. It's their ways to protest. And and there's ways, I think, not to protest. And this is this is extraordinarily counterproductive to any cause that you're pushing. But here we have a guy, Tom Cotton, that went to Harvard, undergrad and law school, served in the military, who's talking about throwing people off the Golden Gate Bridge, ripping their skin off. We had a United States senator going on a network, national network,

suggesting that Americans rip skin off of people's hands because they're aggravated. And to take matters into their own hands. This is just beyond stupid on his part, beyond dangerous on his part to say this. And I must say this this goes Tom Cotton that used to be on this show pre-Trump would never have said something like that. Never. No. Tom Cotton that we interviewed time and again on this show would have never said anything like this. This shows how violence and and violent rhetoric has has has become normal practice in the Republican Party. These are the people who are preparing for a guy who who has promised to be a dictator from day one. Listen, nothing is more infuriating. I could not measure the anger within me if I were

disrupted in terms of getting someone to a hospital, a member of the family who was stuck in traffic because of what they did on the Golden Gate Bridge or whatever, wherever it was. But you know what would happen if I get out of my car and grab one of the protesters from their cars and threw them off the Golden Gate Bridge, I would be doing 15 to 20 years for manslaughter. There's no doubt about that. That's what I mean. That's what he was saying. That's what that's what he said. Throw people off the bridge. I wouldn't strip anybody's skin off their skin off. But it gets to a lot. Eddie Gloud and I were talking just prior to coming out here. There was a poll. As a matter of fact, I have the numbers.

There's a poll taken. I was just looking at it yesterday. One third, 34% of Americans would like to go and settle in another country if they were free to do so. Half of Americans, 51% of those under the age of 35, want to resettle elsewhere, as do 39% of those 35 to 54 years of age. Why is this happening? It's happening because people like Tom Cotton and people like the guy who is in trial today, downtown Manhattan, they continually run this country down, that there's something

wrong with this country, that there's something going on in this country that is against you and me, average citizens. They have done this. They've roiled the pot in this country to a point where the anger, the unspoken anger of people, the unearned anger of people has disrupted. Mike, listen, we can't say it enough here. Fareed Zakari was on the other day. We just went through the numbers. United States military by far stronger relative to the rest of the world than any time since 1945. Our economy stronger than it's been relative to the rest of the world probably since 1945. Our soft power stronger than ever before. Culturally, we have a bigger impact across the globe. American ideas going across the globe faster than any time.

Technologically, we are light years ahead, light years ahead of every I mean, of our closest competitors. You combine the United States of America with the EU, who also these people hate you. You look combined. We have like fifty five trillion dollar GDP. Russia has a 1.4 trillion dollar GDP. China has like an 18 trillion dollar GDP. We are so much more powerful, so much stronger than we have ever been. Iran, why did Iran do what Iran did, knowing what the outcome was going to be, because they didn't want to screw with the United States of America. So Donald Trump keeps talking about how America sucks. And he before he got elected, America sucked. And then he got elected. Suddenly America was great. Then he lost. Now America sucks again. You're voting for a guy like that. You live in the most powerful, greatest country on the face of the earth. And you're voting for a guy like that? You live in the most powerful, greatest country on the face of the earth, and you're voting for a guy that tells you every day that America sucks? What's wrong with

you? Who raised you? What history did you read? That's it. Like, where are you from? Because you may claim to be from where I'm from, but you were not raised by the same teachers I was raised by, and you don't read. Because if you read, Mike, the facts are clear, and I'm getting tired of saying this to people who claim to be patriotic but hate America, because they're always running America down. They're always trashing America. They're always saying America's horrible.

It's democracy doesn't work. We need a dictatorship if Donald Trump doesn't win. I'm tired of people running America down. And on Fox News, I'll just say it on Fox News, they didn't want to show Donald Trump in trial. So they got three protests and said protests shut down America, basically. This weekend, there were like four migrants and a hound dog on top of a hill in New Mexico. And they had their four migrants and a hound dog cam on for hours. There's right now, I'm looking up the hill

and there are two, three. I see a coyote. That's a hound dog, Bob. Okay, a hound dog. I mean, this is the world. They give their viewers anything to try to make America look bad. They are obsessed with trashing America when America is stronger, more powerful than ever before. Its economy stronger and more powerful than ever before. So what do they do? They find a trans athlete in Utah. Our world's coming to an end. Help us, Jesus. The country ain't the country ours, Ray Stanton.

No, it's better. It's stronger. We're more powerful. Our military is more powerful relative to the rest of the world. Our economy is stronger relative to the rest of the world. But you would never know this because they are fed a steady stream of hate America first rhetoric, which I suppose is why you have the chairman of the House GOP saying that some of those dupes, backbenchers, are actually clinging to pro-Russian propaganda

and spreading it across their districts, across America and across the House floor. So I want you to try and answer this question for me. And it's the question basically is, has this country lost its memory ability? Because there's another pollers. I had a lot of time on my hands yesterday. You did. There's another poll. Trump versus Biden. Forty two percent are for Trump Trump, 29 percent are for Biden. And the question was the differences between life in 2020 and life today in 2024. So 42 to 29, that life was better in 2020.

In 2020, at the end of 2020, there were 23 million cases of covid in the United States of America. There were four hundred and nine thousand six hundred and fifty one deaths at the end of 2020. Do people not remember that? I mean, Eddie. Facts don't seem to matter to a lot of people. They keep talking about how horrible America is today. And they they just they they have to work really hard to to suggest that we're a weak, broken power. As I've said in my travels across the world, the complaints aren't what they were during the Obama administration, which is, oh, you guys are back on your heels and you guys are leading from. No, they're saying you're you're you're you're exerting yourself too much. U.S., you're too powerful. You're controlling our economy this way or our military that way.

Like. We're out there. You know, I was sitting here listening to the conversation and I was just thinking about all the measures that you've just laid out. Yeah. About American greatness. And you're absolutely right. By the way, Eddie, you're a professor. Let me add another. We got problems on college campuses. Greatest schools and universities in the world. Greatest.

There's not a close second here. Greatest universities in the world. Not a close second. You look at any list. There's not a close second to the United States of America when it comes to higher education. Not a close second on any list. Bar none. And I happen to teach at the best one.

Yeah, I went in there. But I was thinking I was going to say this, though, Joe, all those measures are important, but there's a moral malaise in the country. We're lonely. We're isolated. There's a sense of unfulfillment, hatred, and grievance. So all the measures, our military power, our economic power, the culture that's being consumed around the world, but what's happening in the soul of America? Something's wrong. When I saw what Tom Cotton said, I sent a tweet. I responded to him. I don't know if it's not a tweet now. I said, what is wrong with you? And then you ask that question, your question, which is so important. Who raised you? That question, who raised you?

By the way, I wasn't asking that specifically Tom Cotton. I know, but- Parents. They at least used to be morning show watchers. I hope you still are. But that's right. But I'm talking generally about these people who hate on America. But that question, though, gets us beyond the economic data, the cultural data, the you data, the military power. Can I just tell you, I know who raised a lot of these people. And it is, as Mike said, they have forgotten so much, Willie, of what their mom and dad taught them. When they're cheering on a guy that is making fun of people who stutter or people that have infirmary are people who are challenged. I mean, I know I know a lot of people who were raised by really good parents who were better than what their parents taught them when until they get in front of Donald Trump. Yeah, I'm thinking also about the times Donald Trump has mocked what happened to Paul Pelosi, an 82 year old man being hit over the

head with a hammer inside his own home. And the crowd laughs and you go, really? You know, there are lines, aren't there? But it appears there are no more lines. And I agree. I think Tom Cotton was probably raised very well. He volunteered for service, served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He knows right from wrong. He knows honor. He knows service. But something changed when they all pledged fealty to Donald Trump. They've got to rally around whatever position they think pleases him or whatever it feels like his voters want to hear or the culture of MAGA wants to hear. And I would add into your all the superlatives about America that you just laid out, our friends at Axios just published a big story that homicides and violent crime are plummeting in this country this year, back to 2014 levels as of the first three months. In 2014, they were at 30 year lows.

So this idea that America is a crime ridden hellhole, of course, we all have our problems. Of course, we don't like what's happening in the subways of New York and these random attacks that I see people don't like, of course, having the bridges blocked so they can't go see their families or catch a flight. Of course, that's all true. But you also have to live in the facts and you also have to live in reality, which isolated anecdotal evidence is not the story of what's happening in this country. And Donald Trump runs around even going drill, baby, drill. We're producing more oil. And I know a lot of people on Joe Biden's base don't like to hear this. I mean, I'm very concerned about climate as well. But you can't

attack Joe Biden by saying drill, baby, drill, because the United States, what are we, the number one oil producer, number one oil exporter in the world? We're number one in so many things. I do want to touch, though, on what Eddie said, because there's a reason why he's professor at the greatest university in New Jersey, Alabama. I know. And that is, I will say, one of the great challenges of our time that we won't talk about usually here is loneliness. And I will say to you, after being at your convention last week, you had people coming together from churches. We had a community from across the country coming together in churches. It reminded me of when, you know, we'd get together with other churches and where when you'd go to church and you'd go to, I always talked about, you know, Sunday school, like every week, you know, and filling up the pews every week. And if somebody

was kind of straying off and they'd say something kind of crazy, we go, hey, that's not real. By the way, they're really? No, you need to read about that. That's just a rumor. Then there was a check. Instead, you don't have people getting together in the pews. You don't get to be getting together in synagogues. You don't get together in mosques as much as they used to churches. And it's it is it is creating a loneliness epidemic where. People want to hear stuff like that, where people, especially men, lonely, isolated, looking for purpose. That purpose used to be filled every Sunday morning or every Saturday afternoon by church

attendance. It's just not now. No, it gives a sense of purpose, but of a communal kind of gathering where you feel like you're not in the world by yourself. So you become part of a mob that could be misdirected. And I've seen it grown up as a boy preacher where people could misuse it or use it to heal a community. And I think that what Donald Trump has done has misused this whole sense of loneliness,

this whole sense of people, Which was building before Donald Trump. Donald Trump exploited it. Right. Yeah. And he gives them a sense of purpose. And they have comrades now. And I think the danger of that is where you have a guy like Tom Cotton who wants to outperform the performer.

And, I mean, this is ludicrous. We all may disagree on certain things, but to say the things he said, a sitting senator, is frightening. I know at our convention, we had one congressman that some people interrupted. I thought they were Trumpsters because they didn't have signs. I didn't know what they were doing. And I reprimanded him. But to say you want to have people done to do what Cotton said,

it's this mob feeling that Trump does not forget. Trump was telling people beat up hecklers at rallies and they were plotting this. It starts with being alone and wanting to be part of something. And whoever becomes the focal point or the leader of that can misdirect. And because of Donald Trump, there is no peer pressure anymore. I will tell you, if a senator of either party or a member of Congress of either party said we need to throw people off the bridge, we need to rip their skins off their hands. And any time before Trump, that senator would be apologizing this morning. Now, won't even leave a mark.

Yeah, those are the quaint. He'll probably raise more money on it. Yeah, well, that's. Hey, I said we should rip skin off of people and kill them by throwing them off the Brooklyn Bridge. Send $25 to Tom Cotton for Senate right now. It's the world we live in. Can you believe the left wing media, the angry? No, I'm more conservative than Tom Cotton for Senate right now. It's the world we live in. Can you believe the left-wing media, the angry? No, I'm more conservative than Tom Cotton, probably.

I don't know what his ACU rating is. This has nothing to do with ideology, but that's how they'll play it. So they're suggesting that violence is conservative. It's what Tom Cotton's suggesting. It's what Donald Trump's suggesting. It's what those people that use violent rhetoric are suggesting. It's just not. It's the opposite of being conservative. And the problem is what January 6th told us is there are no more idle threats anymore.

This can't just be written off as inflammatory rhetoric because there is a group of people in this country who hear those signals and act on it.