Morning Joe - Morning Joe 4/3/25

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

Trump announces sweeping tariffs on major trade partners — some as high as 54%

My fellow Americans, this is Liberation Day. Waiting for a long time. April 2nd, 2025 will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America's destiny was reclaimed, and the day that we began to make America wealthy again. We're going to make it wealthy, good and wealthy. For decades our country has been looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike. This is one of the most important days, in my opinion, in American history.

It's our declaration of economic independence. Tariffs have also led to political decimation. When McKinley most famously put tariffs on in 1890, they lost 50% of their seats in the next election. When Hot Smooly put on their tariff in the early 1930s, we lost the House and the Senate for 60 years. So they're not only bad economically, they're bad politically. President Trump touting his new tariffs as a major win for America. But Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky says it's a really bad idea. We're going to go through the president's plan and the international reaction straight

ahead. Plus, we'll dig into new reporting that Elon Musk might be leaving Doge after massive cuts to the federal workforce. Also ahead, we'll get expert legal analysis on a key hearing over the Trump administration's deportation flights to El Salvador. Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe. It is Thursday, April 3rd. With us, we have the co-host of our fourth hour, Jonathan LaMere.

He's a contributing writer at The Atlantic covering the White House and national politics. Former Treasury official and Morning Joe economic analyst Steve Ratner. A great day to have Steve on to get his analysis of what's happening. Co-founder and CEO of Axios, Jim Van De Hei is here, and CEO of the Messina Group, Jim Messina. He served as White House Deputy Chief of Staff to President Obama and ran his 2012 reelection campaign. Good to have you all on board this morning, along with Willie and me.

So Wall Street is reacting sharply overnight to President Trump's sweeping tariffs on most major trade partners with the United States. The Dow futures were down as much as 1,000 points, while the S&P 500 and the NASDAQ have lost around 3%. The president is imposing 10% tariffs on imports from all countries set to take effect Saturday. And that's just where it begins, Willie. Yeah, and the president also announcing larger taxes on dozens of countries that he and his administration say have treated the United States unfairly.

In their words, these so-called reciprocal tariffs hit the United States' largest trading partners, but not clear how the president or the White House calculated those numbers. A handout from the White House listing the tariffs said it included currency manipulation and trader barriers. Here's some of what the president said yesterday from the Rose Garden. Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already. We will supercharge our domestic industrial base. We will pry open foreign markets and break down foreign trade barriers. And ultimately, more production at home will mean stronger competition and lower prices

for consumers. This will be, indeed, the golden age of Americans coming back. We're going to come back very strongly. For nations that treat us badly, we will calculate the combined rate of all their tariffs, non-monetary barriers, and other forms of cheating. And because we are being very kind, we're kind people, very kind. We will charge them approximately half of what they are and have been charging us. So the tariffs will be not a full reciprocal. I could have done that, yes, but it would have been tough for a lot of countries who didn't want to do that. So meanwhile, Donald Trump's former vice president, Mike Pence, criticized the tariffs sharply on social media.

He called the president's plan the largest peacetime tax hike in U.S. history. Donald Trump's former vice president Mike Pence criticized the tariffs sharply on social media. He called the president's plan the largest peacetime tax hike in U.S. history. Yeah, we're going to get reaction not only from Republicans but around the world. Markets across the globe have taken a hit following Trump's tariffs announcement. Officials in the European Union, China and Canada say they're preparing to take countermeasures. But Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is warning against any retaliation. You know, you look at this list of all these countries and there's some policy decisions here.

China is at 34 percent added to the 20 percent already. So that's 54 percent on Chinese goods. Are they going to come back with something big? Well, we'll see what they do. My advice to every country right now is do not retaliate. Sit back. Take it in. Let's see how it goes.

Because if you retaliate, there will be escalation. If you don't retaliate, this is the high water mark. Indications suggest many investors expected the tariffs to be far less expensive than they turned out to be. Retail giants like Walmart and Target saw shares drop in after hours trading. Nike, which produced 50% of its footwear in Vietnam last year, fell as much as 7%.

And Dollar Tree, which imports many of its goods from overseas tumbled 11%. Steve Ratner, big picture here. Your thoughts? Look, as you said, this was much more significant than people thought. The numbers are truly staggering in terms of some of the levels of tariffs they're putting on. China goes, so I think a 54% tariff on everything we bring from China.

All the iPhones, all the clothes, all the toys, all the bicycles, so much of what we need is made here. And the prices are going to go up very, very substantially for these goods for the American people. And it's going to have severe economic consequences, because it is like a tax. It's going to slow the economy down. It is going to add severe economic consequences because it is like a tax. It's going to slow the economy down. It is going to add to inflation. And I think it is not inappropriate to start to use the R word for recession in the context

of all this. The basic premise, sorry, Willie, I'll go to you, actually. The basic premise here, the president says, is to address some form of cheating. And is that the case? I mean, or what is he addressing here? Well, there's so much, and Steve has charts, luckily, because there's so much to say. First of all, a fundamental misunderstanding of who pays the tariffs, apparently, from the president. He says these nations, China, Vietnam, they're all going to pay these big taxes. No,

the importers in the United States pay them, therefore pass those on to the wholesalers and the distributors and down to consumers and all that. Also, the importers in the United States pay them, therefore pass those on to the wholesalers and the distributors and down to consumers and all that. Also, the way these numbers were calculated when he says the EU, for example, has put this percentage tariff on us. It's not true. He's representing a trade deficit, not to get too far down in the weeds. But there are smart people around him. I'm trying to figure out how to ask you this.

The Treasury Secretary, Scott Besson, was an econ professor at Yale. They understand how the economy works. They know this is bad and wrong, and yet they're going along for the ride. So when you look at that board and you see those numbers, what do you see as the future for the American economy? I think it's going to be very tough. So look, he is a 19th century mercantilist. He is taking us back to the days of William McKinley. Tariffs didn't work particularly well then.

There's no particular reason to think they're going to work well now. What he's got on that board, what he's trying to say is the actual tariffs that those countries charge are mostly quite low. Single digits in most cases. He's raised it up to double digits, significant double digits with these non-tariff barriers, claiming in effect they use other kinds of mechanisms to keep our exports out of their countries and protect their domestic industries. There's some bits of truth to that here and there, but this is not the way you address it. So, Steve, it's not just for Vice President Mike Pence with the dire warnings.

JPMorgan put out guidance last night also agreeing this is akin to the largest tax hikes since 1968. They say a recession, very possible in the aftermath of this. This seems to be twofold. As you noted, your average American's going to be paying more for a lot of goods starting in just a few days' time. But also, let's talk about the markets. Americans are gonna, those who have 401ks are gonna see hits there.

You know, real worries last night. How are you seeing both overseas and then as we're a few out here, you can see all the red on the board there were a few hours from the opening bill on Wall Street too. Yeah, there's pain for everybody. And the reason why stock prices are down so much is yes, they're gonna pass through the vast bulk

of this cost to consumers, but they're probably going to have to absorb some of it. And secondly, and that's a market chart showing the reaction. You see, the last few days, the market was doing fine. It was going up a bit. And we've got the three indices there, the S&P, the Dow, and the NASDAQ. And then you can see that at 4 o'clock, the moment the president started speaking, you can see what happened. And it just kept going down from there.

So the companies will have to absorb a little of it, but they're also going to lose a lot of sales. People are not going to be able to afford iPhones. They're not going to cost 54% more. The tariffs are actually imposed at the border on the value of the iPhone when it gets here, and then there's more costs inside this country for supply and distribution and so on. So they're not going to go up 54%, but they go up 20% or 25% or some number like that. And so people are going to buy fewer iPhones.

And they're going to be less well-off economically because they have to pay so much more for their iPhones. And that's why JPMorgan is saying what they're saying. And in addition to Mike Pence, of course, the Wall Street Journal has another hard-hitting editorial today. You know, the best friend of the anti-tariff crowd is The Wall Street Journal, and they have just been battering the president, as you guys know it almost every day. So several Republican lawmakers talked about the possibility of price hikes due to these tariffs but opted to take a wait- see approach. There could be short-term pain, but I think if I spend some time visiting with people in Wyoming about what's really happening, what kind of tariffs are imposed on us and

have been for years by some of these countries, that it will help people understand that what President Trump is proposing is fair trade. Sometimes in business you have to have short-term pain to have long-term gain, and we don't think this is even going to be that long of a short-term, if it is at all. We trust the president. I understand completely where the president's coming from. I support his objective. What should the Americans' tolerance for terrorists be?

I don't know how to answer that. If they make things better, they should want more. If they make things worse, they should want to recalibrate. And if the tariffs help America, they should want more of them. If the tariffs end up hurting America, I think you'll see President Trump recalibrate. All right. Let's go to the political implications of this, the two Jims, Jim Messina, Jim Van De Heide, Jim Messina.

I'll start with you. Short-term pain is one way to put it. I mean, I've heard of some, like the farming industry, severely impacted and the list goes on if this short-term pain is deep pain where families are put out of business and can't run the businesses that they have spent their lives building political implications would be what they would be massive, Mika. We just had a presidential election where inflation was one of the biggest issues. Where voters said repeatedly they want elected officials to focus on the economy.

And this is exactly the opposite of this. It is going to put us into, as Ratner points out, an economic place where we could be in recession almost immediately here. And so, you know, when you look at the election results from Tuesday night in Florida, in Wisconsin, voters are already starting to worry. President Trump's approval rating on the economy is down to the lowest level it's ever been in both of his terms and dropping precipitously because voters don't understand why this is

how he's choosing to focus on the economy. And all he's gonna do is make prices more expensive for voters. The other thing is we haven't even started calculating is the retaliations. I have over a dozen presidents and prime ministers as my clients around the world, and they're not gonna sit there.

They can't politically sit there and not respond to this. If you're the Canadian government in the middle of an election, you're not going to sit there and just take this. And so we're going to have back and forth with these countries that is going to further exacerbate some of these things that Steve Ratner just talked about. So I think we haven't even begun to see the political calculations here. Steve mentioned the Wall Street Journal. The editorial board does have a new piece this morning titled Trump's New Protectionist

Age. It reads, in part, if the response is widespread retaliation, the result could be shrinking world trade and slower growth, recession, or worse. Mr. Trump is making a deliberate decision to transfer wealth from consumers to businesses and workers protected from competition behind high tariff walls. Over time, this will mean the gradual erosion of U.S. competitiveness. The cost in lost American influence will be considerable. Mr. Trump thinks the lure of the U.S. market and American military power are enough to

bend countries to his will. But soft power also matters, and that includes being able to trust America's word as a reliable ally and trading partner. Mr. Trump is shattering that trust, writes the journal. Remaking the world economy has large consequences, and they may not all add up to what Mr. Trump advertises as a new golden age. So Jim Van De Heide there in Washington, where you are yesterday in the Rose Garden yesterday, the president opened his remarks by saying welcome to Liberation Day.

He declared it a day that will go down in American history. It very well may, depending on what happens to the economy here. As I said a minute ago, Donald Trump has smart people around him who actually understand how the economy works, who've spent their lives working in business or in economics. They know this is bad. They know this is inflationary. And yet they are sort of rallying, as you would expect, around this idea. I mean, it's what we've seen throughout his presidency. People are going to let Trump be Trump and do what Trump wants to do. Nobody should be surprised by this.

He's been talking about it for 30 or 40 years. But I think we have to put this in perspective. I'd argue it's the biggest bet we've had a president make on the economy unilaterally, proactively in our lifetime. He's basically betting that he is right, that some of his advisors, many Republicans, many Democrats, most CEOs, most small business owners, most academics, and many economists, that they're all wrong, that he can basically use these tariffs to start to drive people back to doing business in the

US, that he can use them now probably for a series of one-on-one negotiations, that he believes in the end will be massive net beneficiaries to the American people and to the American consumer and the American worker. That's a hell of a bet. It defies a lot of economic logic that a lot of people have held onto for a long time. It also ignores a lot of the reality that it's not like we have a lot of workers just sitting around in empty warehouses ready to roll to build all of the products that will now be a lot more expensive for us to be able to import.

And so he is betting his, in some ways, his presidency and certainly his power on this. You can go after law firms and most people who are passively paying attention to politics don't really know about it. But when you suddenly have to pay more for everything, make no mistake, people will know about it. And so it's a hell of a bet. Yeah, it's a hell of a bet. And plenty of people were taking the other side of that bet. There's also the political timing of this. As I wrote for this morning, I mean, it comes, it's coincidental that it ended up being April

2nd, originally Liberation Day, especially April 1st. But the president said he didn't want it to fall on April Fool's Day. But it comes, Steve, a day after the Republicans lose in Wisconsin and have worse than expected results in Florida. It comes, we're still dealing with the aftershocks of the Signalgate scandal, the first scandal that really broke through in this time, this term for the president. We also have even some, as we've been noting on this show, some MAGA supporters criticizing some of his heavy-handed deportation tactics.

The list goes on. The White House aides and senior Trump allies confided in me last night. This has been the toughest two weeks of his term by far. And now you add this, this extraordinary bet, this unpredictability, with maybe real economic consequences, negative consequences. Republicans, they don't want to say too much publicly yet outside of a few senators who have been willing to defy him, are really, really nervous about what happens now. Yeah, they should be nervous.

This is really where an uncharted war is. This is extraordinary. One thing about Trump that I'd say is we all know that there are not a lot of core beliefs in Trump. He kind of blows with the wind, whoever is the last person he talked to and so forth. Tariffs are one thing. However, it happened when his genes were being formed, it became a core belief.

It is just something that he honestly just does believe deep down inside. And I don't know how this movie ends because a lot of what they're saying is that the only way these tariffs get reduced is if other countries reduce their tariffs and reduce their non-tariff barriers. These other countries don't believe they have non-tariff barriers at this magnitude, and they don't believe there's that much to reduce. They're more likely to retaliate, as we were talking about earlier, which just means Trump could even raise them further.

Jim Van Hy reminded me of a couple of important points to make. One, we don't have the capacity to make this stuff here, even if we wanted to, and it takes years and years to build factories. And businesses don't plan around one crazy guy in the White House imposing a lot of tariffs to invest billions of dollars. They say, well, let's just wait and see. And the second important point to make is that when the price of some imported good goes up, you know, a pair of shoes, whatever, the domestic manufacturers raise their prices

as well, because why wouldn't they? If the import is now going to cost 20% more, 30% more, whatever, then you raise your prices as well. So prices for all these things, it's not like you're going to go find a cheaper pair of shoes that are made here somewhere else. Those shoes are going to get just as expensive before this is over. The headline here is a lot of uncertainty, and I've never heard of uncertainty being good for an economy. Steve, you're going to head over to the wall next block and we'll

take a look at some of the details here. But let's take a look now at some of the other stories making headlines this morning. Israel intends to seize large areas of the Gaza Strip. The country's defense minister says military operations are expanding and large population centers are being ordered to evacuate. Airstrikes continue to pound the territory where Hamas still holds 59 living and deceased hostages. Food and medicine in the enclave are in short supply. The National Weather Service reports multiple tornado sightings across four states as a powerful storm system swept across central and southern United States.

Strong winds and heavy rain destroyed homes and brought down power lines and trees. Eight people have been injured across Kentucky and Arkansas where states of emergency are in effect right now. The Tennessee Department of Health says there have been two deaths so far and at least one death was reported in Missouri. And get this a Beatles demo tape has surfaced at a record store in Vancouver Canada. A Beatles demo tape. The owner of the store says the tape

has been sitting on a shelf for years because he thought it was a bootleg. But a few weeks ago, he finally hit play. The first song is a cover of the Motown hit, Money, That's What I Want. The store owner says the tape has a total of 15 songs. Only three of them are originals. It's believed the tape is a total of 15 songs only three of them are originals it's believed the tape is a professionally edited recording of the band's New Year's

Day 1962 audition for DECA Records in London that session ended in a rejection for the Beatles that tape is gonna make a lot of money Yeah, okay, well I can't wait to listen to that now I know where Joe is Decker records missed that one. Yes Still ahead on morning Joe will have much more on the impact of President Trump's new tariffs as economists warn about an increased risk of recession and rising inflation. Plus, Elon Musk could soon be headed for the White House exit.

That's what President Trump is saying about the billionaire's role in the administration. Also head Democratic Senator Cory Booker is our guest on the heels of his record-breaking speech on the Senate floor. You're watching Warning Joe. We're back in 90 seconds. Are you going to vote for the tariff resolution? I am going to vote for Canada to make sure that we have good relations with Canada here. Tariffs are a terrible mistake. They don't work, they will lead to higher prices, they are a tax, and they have historically been bad for our economy. bad for our economy. Mr. President, the price hikes that will happen for Maine families every time they go to the grocery store, they fill their gas tank, they fill their heating oil tank, if these tariffs go into effect, will be so harmful. And as price hikes always do, they will hurt those the most who can afford

them the least. Three of the four Senate Republicans, Susan Collins, Rand Paul and Lisa Murkowski, who joined all Senate Democrats to pass a resolution yesterday to eliminate President Trump's tariffs on Canadian imports. The bill now moves to the Republican-controlled House where it's more than likely to die. Ahead of yesterday's vote, Trump called out the Republicans who were set to support the measure, writing on social media, quote, What is wrong with them? Other than suffering from Trump derangement syndrome, they have been extremely difficult

to deal with and unbelievably disloyal to hardworking majority leader John Thune and the Republican Party itself. The other Republican to vote for the measure, Senator Mitch McConnell, defended his position in a statement writing in part, quote, At a time when Americans are tightening their belts, we would do well to avoid policies that heap on the pain. We ought to strengthen our friendships abroad and reinforce our allies as pillars of American prosperity and security. And Steve Ratner, you say most economists believe the tariffs are counterproductive

and that there is hard evidence to back that view. Can you walk us through the numbers? And is there any positive take on this? Well, I can answer the second question first. I don't think there's a single positive take on this. This is all just bad. It's bad as we talked about before for inflation, it's bad for economic growth, it's bad for everything.

But let me put this a little bit in perspective. We talked about the stock market today and how bad a day it's going to have. This chart predates that and it goes back really to the election. And I wanted to show you, because Trump's got a bunch as we also talked briefly about before of other economic challenges he's facing. And so the stock market, which is this red line, our stock market, we start out here. And he was doing pretty well after the election. There was this burst of Trump euphoria, as we saw in 2016 as well.

But since inauguration day, it has basically been straight down for our stock market. And that is a combination of anticipation of these tariffs, but also just all the chaos and commotion down there, the cutting, the doge, all this stuff and the uncertainty has really scared the market. And that's actually, in stark contrast, China, which has had a terrible run in its stock market, has actually done exceptionally well. And even Europe, which is certainly nothing to brag about on the economic front, has way outperformed us. So Trump had a set of challenges already, as represented by the stock market before.

And again, before yesterday, because we don't have updated numbers just yet, economists were taking down their projections for the economy for this year. So Goldman Sachs thinks that unemployment, which they thought was going to be 4%, they now think is going to be 4.5%. And these numbers are going to get worse when they put out a new forecast. Inflation, which they thought was going to be between 2 and 2.5%, they now think is going to be almost 3.5%. And economic growth, which was supposed to be almost 2.5%, they've taken down to 1%. And let me just inject, the last quarter of the Biden administration, economic growth

was 2.8%, and inflation was down in the 3% range. And so they have taken an economy that was actually in pretty decent shape and moving in the right direction, and they are going to turn it it upside down and I think 50-50 into a recession. Wow, 50-50. And you have, as you said, companies like Goldman Sachs using the word stagflation, that combination of inflation and slowing growth. So let's move to your second chart, Steve, which is really the heart of this matter, rising prices for regular people just trying to buy things around the house.

What are you seeing there? Yeah. So this is an analysis done by Yale's budget lab. It was, again, done before yesterday. It assumed a 20% universal tariff. I think you're going to find these numbers get a bit worse when they rerun them for the actual proposal, but it'll give you a very good sense of what we're looking at. And so it divides the country into 10 groups based on income. If you take the middle group here, they are looking at an average of $3,800 a year in

additional costs to them. As you go up the income scale, the actual dollars you get do go up, but what's happening is the percent loss of your income is going down. In other words, it's regressive. People at the upper end are losing less of their income. People at the bottom end are losing more of their income, over 5% of the income, $2,300, somewhere in the second tenth from the bottom, which is probably $20,000 a year or something like that of annual income.

Obviously not a lot. So this is an indication of consumers. We're also starting to see an impact on business, and that's again part of why share prices are so depressed because of the cost. This is a price is paid by manufacturers for their goods that they need to make their product. And you can see how it's already shot up before the tariffs. In anticipation of the tariffs, companies are adding to their prices. And we've also had a few tariffs put in place. And I'll just also quickly note that manufacturing has turned down and is now in contraction,

another piece of not good news for the Trump administration. So as we move to your third chart, you raised President McKinley a few minutes ago, Steve. So let's talk about the history of tariffs. We have a long record to prove whether they work or they don't work. What does it show you? Yeah, and we don't have to go back to McKinley. We only have to really go back to Trump 1.0 because he put in a bunch of tariffs. He put in steel tariffs. And by the way, putting in steel and aluminum tariffs, which he's also done this time, is really actually particularly

dumb because you're raising the prices for companies in this country that use steel and aluminum to make their products like car companies. In fact, I think the CEO of Ford used the word dumb when he put in his last round of steel and aluminum tariffs. But let's go back to the ones that he put in last time around. So we gained a grand total of 1,000 steel jobs, but for the reason I said The increased cost all the steel users. We actually lost 75,000 jobs out in the manufacturing industry because their steel prices had gone up So net loss of 74,000 jobs from that set of tariffs and Steve started interrupt that this is the whole crux of the argument For the president which is we're putting these tariffs on because it's going to help the American economy, it's going to drive business to the United States and create jobs, but what you're saying is

just the opposite happened a few years ago. Yeah, and as I said, because when you put them on raw materials like steel and aluminum, it's particularly stupid because that's what our companies use to make their products, and so their costs go up, their sales go down, and they cut their workforce. Let's look at his farm tariffs. So he put on $50 billion of total tariffs in Trump 1.0 in his trade war then. But it hurt our farmers because our biggest export is farm products like soybeans. And so he ended up subsidizing our farmers for $24 billion.

So he took his $50 billion and spent half of it giving it back to farmers. So they've talked about how these tariffs are going to solve the budget deficit problem and generate hundreds of billions of dollars of revenues. History would not tell you that that is what is likely to happen. And then let's look at one other specific example from the past, laundry machines. of dollars of revenues, history would not tell you that that is what is likely to happen. And then let's look at one other specific example from the past, laundry machines. They put a tariff on laundry machines. It raised the price of laundry machines by $200.

And by the way, companies also increased the price of dryers because they sell them together. And they created 1,800 jobs at a cost per job of $817,000 per job created because there was some additional domestic production. But when the tariffs ended during the Biden administration, the price of the machines went down $75 and when all is said and done, they actually went down by a bit more than inflation. So here's an example of exactly how it works. You put on tariffs, prices go up for everything, domestic, imported, washing machines and dryers.

You take them off, they go down. And for all that, you've paid $800,000 a job. How quickly are American consumers going to feel this? I think probably very quickly in the next few months. The tariffs go into effect over the next few days almost instantaneously. There are some goods that are already here that won't be tariffed, but I think frankly you're going to see companies start to raise prices right away because it's going to be, as we talked earlier, it's going to be hard for them to recoup all the costs of the tariff, and they're going to do their best to do it by raising prices

very quickly. Morning, Joe. Economic analyst Steve Ratner, thank you very much for all those explanations. Thanks, Steve. All right. President Trump has told his cabinet that billionaire Elon Musk will be stepping back from his government role in the coming months. That's according to a senior White House official.

Politico first reported the news yesterday noting that Trump remains pleased with Musk and his Doge effort, but both have decided in recent days that it will soon be time for Musk to take on a more supportive role and return to his businesses. Here's some of what Trump said about Musk on Monday. Well, I think he's amazing, but I also think he's got a big company to run. And so at some point he's going to be going back. He wants to. But I'd keep him as long as I could keep him.

He's a very talented guy. You know, I love very smart people. He's very smart and he's done a good job. As for whether Doge will end when Musk leaves his government role, Trump said he was unsure and spoke about Musk's influence on his cabinet. I can't tell you that. I can say this, that a lot of the people that are working with Doge are the secretaries, you know, the heads of the various agencies.

And they've learned a lot. And they're dealing with the Doge people. I think some of them may try and keep the Doge people with them. But you know, at a certain point, I think it will end. But they have also gotten a big education, and they're doing a really good job. There'll be a point at which the secretaries will be able to do this work and do it very, you know, as we say, with a scalpel. And that's what we want. In a social media post yesterday, press secretary Carolyn Levitt downplayed Politico's reporting

about Musk stepping back soon, calling it garbage. This comes after the setback for the president in Wisconsin's Supreme Court election this week after Democrat Susan Crawford defeated her Republican challenger, who received financial support from Musk and an endorsement from Trump. I want to get to the two chimps, but why don't you do it, Jonathan Lemire, because I know you have some reporting to add. And also, it was the president who said that Trump is going to be leaving soon.

Yeah. The White House's argument is, well, nothing— I'm sorry, that Musk. Musk is— Yeah, the White House's argument has been that nothing is changed. Because he's a special government employee, he's only allowed to work for 130 days. That means that runs out at the end of May. So they're pushing back their idea this has been accelerated in any way.

But what is true is that there had been some talk earlier in this term of finding ways to extend that 130 days. That talk has quieted, at least for now, because Jim Van De Hei will start with you. Well, no, Musk, though still remarkably supportive of the president, is spending a lot of money. Well, it didn't work in Wisconsin. And as one Trump ally put to me for my piece today, Musk had been deemed a heat shield for a long time.

Now he's become more of a heat source. He's become pretty toxic in a lot of political circles, even as Republicans are still wary of his bank account, to be sure. So talk to us about how you see his future here in what could be his last month or so in his current role. Yeah, I think our reporting shows us a little more nuance than some of the reports yesterday.

I think this was in the works. It had been determined before the Supreme Court race in Wisconsin outcome that he was most likely leaving when his short term is up. But there's no mistaking that people are really frustrated with Musk internally and externally I was in Wisconsin over the weekend unless you're in that state You cannot appreciate what a big deal this race was and how much it became a referendum on Trump and Musk And to lose in a swing state that you won By that margin is a hell of a repudiation of whatever you're up to and if you watch the local news in the days before it

Must jumping around on the stage with his cheese head made himself an even bigger Part of it and so there's just frustration with how he's carried out doge Frustration with some of the stuff that he says in public that they think undercuts the president of the United States But I do think the bond between the two of them is as strong as ever. And I believe it's not really gonna break. They both have such a massive interest to stay together. Musk with his platform and all of his businesses that are now very much dependent on a lot of decisions

that the federal government will make. And Trump knowing the power of X and having and knowing the power of media. So I think that will outlast his stay in government. And my guess is Musk will continue to have the president's ear and you'll continue to see him in and out of the White House. But if you look at his own companies, including Tesla,

like there's work to do, right? Like he's obviously a brilliant businessman, but Tesla has suffered with him being focused on something else. So this was inevitable. Jim, as we said yesterday, and you understand better than anyone, a man earns the right to wear the cheese head.

You know, just jump around with it willy nilly like that. Faux Pops. Faux Pops. How there's a no Jordan love is. So Jim Messina, let's talk about Wisconsin. We don't want to read too much into one night and off your election, but that is a state that Donald Trump won by less than one point, 30,000 votes a little less actually back on November 5th And now a 10-point margin in this race notable the Democratic turnout which exceeded even expectations there

What do you take away? Maybe just as a kernel of something for Democrats from Wisconsin? Yeah, look, Wisconsin is the ultimate tipping point state. When you start running scenarios of a presidential election, Wisconsin is the number one state in America because, to Willie's point, it is the closest state, it is the bellwether state, and a 10-point election was just unprecedented. And going back to Musk for a second, Democrats smartly made this race at the end about Elon Musk, and he played right into it. He violated the cardinal rule of American politics. He made it about him.

And on election day in Wisconsin on Tuesday, Elon Musk's approval rating was 36%. Donald Trump's number is down to 42%, which is a pretty scary number. And around the world now, Elon Musk is becoming the issue. He's a huge issue in the Canadian election. He endorsed the far right candidates in the German election. Like he seems to be having a great time, but his candidates are losing all over the place because he's become toxic. I do want to kind of remind my democratic friends though, that

Tuesday in Wisconsin was nice, but it really is a referendum on Musk and Trump. And Democrats have still not done the work we have to do to have an economic strategy here going forward. They talk to normal American voters. We can't just be about anti-Donald Trump and anti-Elon Musk. We have to pick some economic fights going forward. CEO of the Messina Group, Jim Messina, and co-founder and CEO of Axios, Jim Van De Heide, thank you both very much for coming on this morning. And coming up, we'll have much more on that special election in Wisconsin when the chair of the Democratic National Committee, Ken Martin, joins the table. Plus, the latest on the Trump administration's effort to use the Alien Enemies Act to deport migrants to a prison in El Salvador. MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin will join us

with a preview of today's court hearing. Morning Joe, we'll be right back. 46 past the hour as the sun tries to come up over Washington, the Trump administration due in court today for a hearing over its use of the Alien Enemies Act to send hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members to a prison in El Salvador. The administration must prove it didn't violate a judge's order calling for the deportation flights to turn around midair. Administration officials have argued the timing of those flights and information on how many people were on board is a state secret and cannot be shared. Joining us now, former litigator and MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin.

Lisa, I've been peppering you with all sorts of questions around all of this, but start with what is today about? So, Mika, the question about whether the government can invoke this state secrets privilege is for another day. Today is solely about the two orders that the judge entered on March 15th, including an order where he said verbally in front of all the lawyers, you must turn these planes around to the extent that they are already in the air.

You turn them around. If they haven't left yet, they're not going to leave. And the question today is, did the government willfully and flagrantly violate those orders when it took two flights of Venezuelan nationals that they allege are members of Tren del Agua, a Venezuelan gang, and export them to El Salvador, where they are currently being held in what is notoriously a very violent prison. The issue is, did they comply or not? The government says they did.

The plaintiffs led by the ACLU insist that they did not. There's concerns, obviously, that these people who were flown out on those flights didn't have work processed. There wasn't transparency. There wasn't any type of idea that they actually were parts of gangs. Maybe they were. But today, will we see an outcome to that initial question?

Or what's the process now? Well, I think Judge Bosberg first has to determine, did they violate his orders? If they did violate his orders, then the second question becomes, what is the remedy for that? And there, he might be thinking more broadly than just this case, because that would be the first very clear instance of an administration willfully violating a court order. You've had many legal experts on this show. You don't need me to tell you that many people believe that a willful violation of a court order is the crossing of a Rubicon in terms of our slide towards authoritarianism. If there is a

violation, one of the remedies could be to hold people in civil contempt, but one of those people cannot be the president. Judge Boasberg has already determined that he does not have the authority to constrain the president. Can he impose contempt findings against various secretaries who are defendants here? Pam Bondi is a defendant.

Kristi Noem is a defendant. Marco Rubio is a defendant in this lawsuit. Or could he also refer some of the lawyers involved for discipline? The question is how to calibrate the remedy appropriately so as to deter future violations as well. And the administration's argument here, Mika, I just want to point out to you and our viewers,

it sort of defies credulity. They are saying that they didn't violate his orders for two reasons. One, that he didn't reduce to writing his order that they had to turn the planes around and therefore they were under no obligation to follow it. But secondarily, because the flights were already outside of U.S. airspace, that these migrants had already technically been removed and there was nothing for them to prevent or reverse. The plaintiffs say that's nonsense. A court always has jurisdiction over US defendants, whether or not they're in US airspace or US

territory. They say the Alien Enemies Act or any other inherent authority of the president doesn't justify the flagrant disobedience of his orders. So Lisa, as you know know the argument from the Trump administration is we're expediting the process of getting gang members of thugs out of the country which is we've said a million times in the show if they're gang members if they're murderers drug dealers in our

communities get him out but there is a process for that there should be and what just to remind people this is not how this has worked in the past. If you are here illegally and you commit a crime, what is the normal process? Normal process is you're arrested and you're put through immigration proceedings where the government can make arguments about why you are subject to removal and or why you have committed a crime. And you can go through both immigration proceedings and criminal proceedings. In this case, Willie, many, if not most of those

who are on those flights, according to their lawyers, didn't have either of those processes. Some of them never heard before from the government that there was even a contention that they belonged to a member of a gang. Many of them also have lawyers who say, I never heard that from the government. My client had a proceeding that was supposed to take fact because, for example, they made

a claim of asylum. They said they couldn't go back to Venezuela because they feared violence against them. Never heard from the government that they believed my client to be a member of Tres de Arragua. Never heard from the government, for example, that they felt my client's tattoos were evocative of anything other than a stylistic choice. And yet on March 14th and 15th, our clients suddenly disappeared. We couldn't locate them, we couldn't find them,

and then we found out that our clients were on these flights by seeing video images of them or hearing from their families that they recognize people in those footages. What if the government just says, state secret, state secret, state secret, state secret, we can't tell you anything? Well, the government can insist on state secrets all it wants with respect to future rulings by Judge Boasberg.

But with respect to whether or not they violated the order, the state secret's privilege doesn't really come into play, right? They are asking, they meaning Judge Boasberg, is asking the government, did you violate my order? And they aren't relying on state secrets to answer that question. They are instead saying, no, we didn't violate it because it was an oral order. No, we didn't violate it because the plane was already outside of US airspace. No, we didn't violate it because once the plane was outside of US airspace, the president

has authority beyond the Alien Enemies act to control foreign policy and national security. It's breathtaking in its scope. Fascinating to watch that hearing. I know you're headed to Washington to see it with your own eyes. Look forward to your reporting on that. Let me turn you before we let you go to New York City right here where Mayor Eric Adams is opting out of the Democratic

primary and running for reelection now as an independent in an exclusive interview with Politico. Adams said he would mount a real independent campaign that relies on a solid base of people, his words, outside of Manhattan. Adams also said the bribery charges federal prosecutors hit him with last fall, which were fully dismissed yesterday, have handcuffed him. Let's talk about the decision yesterday. Was there any surprise in there? I mean, effectively the judge said,

this makes sense, we have to do this, but I object to the way that the- The process played itself out. That they were dropped, yeah. Yeah, and I read the opinion in some detail last night. I got a chance to thoroughly process it. It is, as our colleague, Kendall Lainey, said, a judicial smack down,

or what my friend Dave Latt calls a bench slap, telling the Department of Justice essentially that this smacked of a bargain, that you were trying to hold a future indictment over Eric Adams's head, dangling it over him to get him to comply with your immigration priorities. And at the same time, also vindicating all the prosecutors involved, Willie, saying very clearly that all the folks at SDNY and at Maine Justice who resigned, for example, they were the ones who understood what it means to have equal justice under the law,

not this current regime at the Department of Justice. And this decision from the judge yesterday removes the legal leverage that the Trump administration has over Mayor Adams. But in terms of the politics now, he has taken also to X to post that he is indeed running as an independent. He is obviously severely wounded here. His poll numbers were already poor even before the news of what the Trump administration

was trying to do. They have sunk even further. The legal matter now seems to be behind him unlikely to repair his standing here running as independent also challenging. But it does set up with tonight. In fact, first mayoral forum that he's going to participate in our friend the Reverend Al Sharpton's National Action Network, the sponsor, also former New York governor Andrew Cuomo also be there the first time they'll be face to face. We will cover that tomorrow morning. That's going to be fascinating. So MSNBC legal correspondent Lisa Rubin, thank you so much. You're headed to sunny, hot Washington, DC today, right?

I hope so.