Morning Joe - Morning Joe 8/24/23

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

2024 hopefuls square off in first GOP debate

Ukraine is the first line of defense for us. And the problem that Vivek doesn't understand is he wants to hand Ukraine to Russia. He wants to let China eat Taiwan. He wants to go and stop funding Israel. You don't do that to friends. What you do instead is you have the backs of your friends. Ukraine is the front line of defense. Putin has said if Russia, once Russia takes Ukraine, Poland and the Baltics are next.

That's a world war. We're trying to prevent war. Look at what Putin did today. He killed Prigozhin. When I was at the UN, the Russian ambassador suddenly died. This guy is a murderer. And you are choosing a murderer over a pro-American culture. First of all, Mr. Ramaswamy, you have 30 seconds. Mr. DeSantis, the governor of the United States. Nikki, I wish you well in your future career on the boards of Lockheed and Raytheon. But the fact of the matter, Boeing came off of it, but you've been pushing this lie all week, Nikki. You want to go and defund Israel? You want to give Taiwan to China? I'm glad you brought that up. I'm going to address each of those right now. all week, Nikki. You want to go and defund Israel? You want to get turned on to China? You want to go and give you

I'm going to address each of those right now. This is the false lies of a professional politician. There you have it. So the reality is you have no foreign policy experience and it shows. And you know what? It shows. Frazier is down.

Frazier is down. You know, hey, welcome to Morning Joe. I'm Joe. It's really great that you've chosen to be with us on this first of our hopefully many shows ahead. That was some kind of debate last night. But Nikki Haley had a couple of moments. She really did. There's another moment, Willie, where she basically said, come on, let's stop lying to everybody.

It's not Joe Biden that caused the deficit. It's not Joe Biden that caused the debt. It's Donald Trump. And you all went along with it and said nothing. So it was a fascinating debate. I've got to say, Ramaswani was going around. He really was insulting everybody. Everybody's bought and said nothing. So it was it was a fascinating debate. I've got to say, Ramaswani was going around. He really was insulting. Everybody's bought and paid for every what I found in politics is when you have somebody going around the stage saying everybody's bought and

paid for, they're the one who's bought and paid for. But he reminded me of Tracy Flick in that old that that old movie about politics. Yeah. Yeah. Reese Witherspoon, yeah. Yeah, Reese Witherspoon as Tracy Flick. And he's just this little kid going around trying to say the right lines and do the right things. Everything was so prepackaged. Everything. There wasn't a conspiracy theory. He didn't fall down.

There wasn't an insult. He didn't launch. It was all it was all so miserable. But it was a fascinating debate in other aspects. Nikki Haley and, you know, DeSantis kind of was like Biden. Like, I know they both would love to hear that. But DeSantis just kind of stayed in there. He didn't do anything great. Anybody that wanted to save his campaign are going to be disappointed. Anybody that wanted to see him collapse would have been disappointed. He just kind of hung in there. And I think for me, the headlines are Nikki Haley had a couple of really good moments. Vivac did his best to insult absolutely everybody. Chris Christie was actually thrown off his game a bit by VVAC because they went back and forth.

At one point, Chris Christie saying VVAC sounded like chat GBT. But again, DeSantis kind of held his own. All in all, probably not much of a change, except a lot of press for VVAC. And who knows, maybe some conspiracy theorists will support him coming out of this. Yeah, if this was Vivac's Ramaswamy's night to introduce himself to the country, which he said was his goal last night for people who said, who is this guy? He did that. He earned a lot of time. He was center stage next to Governor DeSantis. But also with that time, he said we should cut off aid to Ukraine altogether.

He said the climate change agenda was a hoax. And he said he would issue a preliminary, a preemptive pardon of Donald Trump for all these crimes he's alleged of. We're going to see Donald Trump turning himself in in Fulton County today. So, yes, he had the spotlight. Yes, he introduced himself. But that's what he did with it. And to your point, Joe and Mika, that Ron DeSantis, he had the spotlight. Yes, he introduced himself. But that's what he did with it. And to your point, Joe and Mika, that Ron DeSantis was he was center stage. He's polling the highest among the people who were there. We had 40 points behind Donald Trump in the latest

poll. But he was, Joe, he wasn't really there. I mean, he you know, he got off a few can lines at the top. And it was interesting to see that the fire from the other candidates was trained not at all on Ron DeSantis. It was all going at Vivek Ramaswamy, which tells you what the rest of the field thinks about this race. Yeah. Well, along with Joe, Willie and me, we have former aide to the George W. Bush White House and State Department's Elise Jordan doing way too early duties for us this morning. Thank you, Elise. The president of the National Action Network and host of MSNBC's Politics Nation, Reverend Al Sharpton. Founder of the conservative website The Bulwark. Charlie Sykes is with us and attorney and contributing columnist at The Washington Post. George Conway is with us.

And there's a lot of reasons why George is here today. Former President Trump is set to surrender to authorities at the Fulton County Jail tonight. Trump will travel to Georgia later today and will reportedly wait until primetime TV hours to officially turn himself in. Here's a look at his co-conspirators who have already been booked. We have Rudy Giuliani, Kenneth Cheeseborough, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis. They all surrendered yesterday. They've got mug shots. It's quite something that this group, the so-called enterprise, is beginning to turn itself in, Joe. And, you know, some of them in these mugshots, they did not seem to be taking the moment quite seriously.

It is a very serious moment. Well, they all understand. As we look at these mugshots, they all understand it's a very serious moment. And, George, let me go to you. I think you probably, like me, looked at what Rudy Giuliani did. And unlike a lot of people may be watching, look what Rudy Giuliani did in New York City.

And along with, again, everybody else, whenever you credit Giuliani for anything in the turnaround of New York, everybody says, well, what about this person? We'll throw everybody in there. I'll even throw David Dinkins in there. But he was mayor when there was an extraordinary turnaround of New York City. And I've got to say, one of one of one of the great accomplishments, one of one of the great accomplishments for a city that I've seen in my lifetime. I mean, New York City from 1989, circa 1989, 1990 to 1995, unrecognizable. And of course, there were many people who were very moved by what he did on 9-11. There were a couple of days when George W. Bush just didn't find his footing politically or rhetorically or in a lot of other ways. Not really until he went to New York and stood on that

pile of rubble. And Giuliani was was for those days, for millions and millions of Americans. He was America's mayor. I look at that mugshot and listen, he deserves it. Justice has to be served. But what a sad, sad fall for a man who didn't have to be there. No, it's absolutely stunning. I remember being a law clerk in New York for the federal appeals court there in 1987 and 88. And, you know, he was U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. So basically, you know, 10 or 20 percent of the briefs were, you know, had his name on it. And he was, you know, defending Rico convictions, trying to get them affirmed. And now he's charged with Rico. And if you had told me then,

or if you had told me at the end of 2001, that 20 or 30 years later, he'd be a penniless, almost friendless, although he did have that private jet. I don't know where that came from. A criminal defendant in a Georgia state racketeering case. I would have looked at you like you were insane. But that's where we are. It's just stunning to see this fall and it just keeps getting worse. And it's hard to see. He can't even get a lawyer. He might not even be able to pay a lawyer. I don't know where this goes for him other than it's going to keep going down. It's a fascinating split screen for the Republican Party. So convoluted last night, the candidates were asked on stage if they would still support the former president as the nominee.

If he's convicted in any of his ongoing legal battles. Take a look. If former President Trump is convicted in a court of law, would you still support him as your party's choice? Please raise your hand if you would. So just to be clear, Governor Christie, you were kind of late to the game there, but you raised your hand. No, I'm doing this. Look, look, I'm doing this, not this.

And I know you did. Whether or not you believe that the criminal charges are right or wrong, the conduct is beneath the office of President of the United States. This is the great thing about this country. Booing is allowed, but it doesn't change the truth. It doesn't change the truth. President Trump, I believe, was the best president of the 21st century. It's a fact.

And Chris Christie, honest to God, your claim that Donald Trump is motivated by vengeance and grievance would be a lot more credible if your entire campaign were not based on vengeance and grievance against one man. You sit here talking about how you want to stand up for the rule of law. Yes. And law and order. And the fact is that it can't be selective. In your book, you had much different things to say about Donald Trump than you're saying here tonight. That's not true. No, it is very true.

I am not going to bow to anyone when we have a president of the United States who disrespects the Constitution. It's important to say that the president said, Donald Trump said, it's okay to suspend the Constitution. Now, the oath you take is to preserve, protect, and defend, not suspend. I will always stand up for our Constitution regardless of the political pressure. When it comes to whether President Trump should serve or not, I trust the American people. Let them vote. Let them decide. But what they will tell you is that it

is time for a new generational conservative leader. We have to look at the fact that three quarters of Americans don't want a rematch between Trump and Biden. And we have to face the fact that Trump is the most disliked politician in America. We can't win a general election that way. So that Charlie Sykes was Nikki Haley criticizing Donald Trump in that moment, also criticized them for adding eight trillion dollars to the debt. But on this question of the legal matters in front of Donald Trump, including the one today where he's going to turn himself in in Fulton County, it was really down at the left side of your screen. Chris Christie and Asa Hutchinson, the only one with full throated and clear criticism of the president's conduct around the 2020 election, his conduct around those documents at Mar-a-Lago.

The others were wishy washy. You had Tim Scott and Ron DeSantis quickly pivoting, saying what we have to do is stop the weaponization of the Justice Department, suggesting Joe Biden was leading this prosecution of Donald Trump. What did you make all in of what you saw last night? Well, I mean, first of all, that was an extraordinary moment when you saw most of the candidates raising their hands when they were asked directly, would you support Donald Trump for the presidency if he was convicted of felonies? You know what a surreal moment that was. You know, I think there were a couple of surprises last night. Number one, I don't think, by the way, that this was the debate that Ron DeSantis wanted or that he needed. He felt like he was an afterthought by the end of the debate.

Yes, Vivek came in very, very strong. He's he's very, very facile. But you also saw his weaknesses later on when when Nikki Haley took him down. I thought Nikki Haley overperformed. I mean, she was she was impressive. She was the adult in the room. She was the adult in the room on spending on abortion on on Ukraine. I also think that Mike Pence actually overperformed somewhat. But let's be honest here. They were not appealing to the readers of The Bulwark or the viewers of Morning Joe. It was Vivek who knew exactly where all of the erogenous zones of MAGA World War, and he played on them.

He was playing to that that that ideological id. He was. Look, the reality is, is that he's a shallow, shameless, facile demagogue, which means he's probably going to get a bump in the polls, in the Republican polls. He may be in second place by the end of all of this. But I also thought it was extraordinary how little time they spent talking about the orange elephant not in the room. Fox News went out of its way not to even talk about him during the first hour. And you only spent about 11 minutes on the fact that the former president is about to do a perp walk today. So it was it was very much a mixed bag. I mean, I understand the people who are saying, you know, that Vivek came in hot and stole the spotlight. But I also think you saw his vulnerabilities later on when Nikki Haley just absolutely eviscerated him.

Yeah. And Rev, the section about Donald Trump was almost apologetic by the by the debate moderators. We're just going to talk about this for a few minutes and we'll get back to these issues. And they did it at the top of the second hour. That is the question, though. Does any of this matter? You know, some people had good moments. They had bad moments. Ron DeSantis kind of wasn't a factor last night. Maybe that's important. Vivek Ramaswamy introduced himself. Maybe that's important. But Donald Trump's up by, depending on your poll, 30, 35, 40 points over anyone on that stage. And I think he's probably feeling pretty good this morning about not showing up. Didn't need to. Trump probably feels good that he didn't show up.

He didn't lose anything by not showing up. But my two takeaways were that when you saw the question asked that if Donald Trump was convicted, would you support him? And you saw most of the hands go up. You saw the resigning of the Republican Party being the law and order party. I mean, how do you look at that and ever take them seriously as a law and order party when they said by their own hand raising that we will excuse a convicted felon to be the president of the United States. You lose all credibility in that area. And it happens on the same day. Rudy Giuliani is being booked in on the eve of your or the guy you're saying you would support for president. Not if he was indicted, if he was convicted, was the question. I think, you know, I ran for president in 2004 in the Democratic primaries.

And I can tell you, getting on that big stage is different than any pulpit I ever preached at in anything I've ever done. And I watched to see how people could handle the big stage. And, you know, I'm not a baseball or football fan like Joe and you, but I loved boxing. And Babik got his title shot last night and he was good until he got punched. It's not enough to throw a good punch. You've got to be able to take a punch. And Nikki Haley scored a TKO on him last night in front of the whole world. If I was with Vic, I'd go back in the gym this morning and let the trainer hit me because he can't take a hit. DeSantis almost wasn't there.

He should have been in Florida with Trump because both of them didn't show up last night. And in my opinion, and I think that surprisingly, Mike Pence did well. I was surprised that he really came out of the ring unscathed, unscarred. I was surprised how Tim Scott underperformed. You almost forgot he was there. So I was watching it as somebody that's been in that ring. And I was impressed that Mike Pence did not get punched. And I was absolutely impressed that Nikki Haley seemed to have the – she came in with a fight game, and she did it.

But I think that Babik was good the first five rounds, but they were telling him take him out the ring by the eighth round. Yeah, waving that towel, waving that towel. So, yeah, very interesting. You brought up Tim Scott. I had actually forgotten about Tim for a second. We've been talking. I've been talking at least about how good he seems to be on the campaign trail. Good on the stump. Good talking to people. He was not good last night. And so I guess the story, it's a South Carolina story. Tim Scott really underperformed last night and Nikki Haley really overperformed expectations. So that was that's a real surprise. I do I do have to say that, Mika, I'm so glad that Rev talked about how the Republican Party has forfeited forever the idea that they were ever some law and order party or ever supported justice or, you know, even the Constitution with Chris

Christie's getting booed when he brings up the unpleasant fact that Donald Trump said he wanted to terminate the Constitution of the United States, if that's what it took for him to get back into the White House. But those candidates raised their hands, except for Asa Hutchinson and Chris Christie, to say they would support a president if he was convicted of stealing nuclear secrets, stealing military war plans to invade Iran,

stealing military assessments on what the weakest parts of the United States military was stealing a presidential election and having everybody not liberals, not progressives, having everybody around him saying not only did he try to steal a presidential election, he headed up a conspiracy to get fake electors and then called the Georgia secretary of state saying, I need you to steal eleven thousand something votes for me. So, again, the fact that they would raise their hand and say that they would support a presidential candidate who is convicted, convicted of stealing nuclear secrets. Tells you once again, so much more than you need to know about how low the Republican Party has fallen in 2023. It's sad and it's pathetic. And I, for one, think we need a strong, a strong Republican Party. This is not it. No, it's almost like the question was, would you forfeit the Republican Party for the cult of one personality and several raise their hand? I mean,

there were so many moments last night that said a lot about where the where the party stands. If you still call it a Republican Party, the Democrats have very strong positions on guns, abortion and democracy as it pertains to where the American people are. George Conway, regardless of what Republicans thought last night in Milwaukee, Donald Trump most likely is going to be facing justice and facing justice again today. What do you expect as you look forward to the events of today in Georgia? Well, I mean, I look forward to the mugshot. I look forward to the spectacle, I guess. I mean, it's kind of sad. It's almost old hat now. And, you know, what's really, really sad was the

events of last night, which will be soon forgotten, where you had six candidates saying they would vote for a person who's a convicted felon. I mean, it's just absolutely stunning. But this is this is going to be 2016. This year is I mean, it's going to be 2016 is all over again because everybody they're all attacking everyone but but Trump. And they're all going to they're going to end up nominating a candidate who, you know, will maybe a convicted felon or probably die in prison. And Frank was found by a federal district court to be a rapist. It's just crazy.

And I don't know what the box, the box you get out of this box. It's crazy. I mean, look at this. Look at this. First of all, I want to get back to you and talk about how hard it's going to be for him to get out of this box

because I don't, I can't figure that out. But look at these people indicted in the Georgia election probe, all for blindly following a guy about stealing an election. Talk about I mean, you're a lawyer. I mean, you've seen how much one charge against somebody can impact from life, especially from the feds. The feds usually don't miss when they go after you. The feds get you if they prosecute you like they convict you most of the time. Talk about what the future looks like for most of these people. And then let's talk about Donald Trump with 90 something indictments against him. And let's just talk for a second. How does he not end up in jail again? I listen, I know I've spent I've spent I've spent years saying he will always escape justice. He always escapes justice. No man is above the law. But Donald Trump, it seems.

But here I go through every scenario. I don't see how he stays out of jail. I agree with that. I mean, essentially, he has been playing Russian roulette with the law and has loaded every single chamber. I mean, one of those he's not going to make it through all of this. The only way he can make it through all of this is if somehow he wins the presidency and then can declare himself immune from from going to jail or being prosecuted. And I don't think that's going to happen. And he is, you know, as for all the other defendants, I mean, I don't think there will be 18 defendants by the time this case goes to trial. I mean, I think you're already seeing them in conflict. You're already seeing different strategies playing out. And you're seeing that some of these defendants,

even Rudy Giuliani, who came down to a private plea, he can't find a lawyer and he can't pay one. He's going to have to sell his co-op in New York. And these people, all of these people, a lot of them are going to end up having to plead. Jenna Ellis, no one's paying her legal fees. It's going to be Trump ending up all by himself or just a couple of other people. And I don't see how he survives that. But that's, you know, that the Georgia case is going to take the longest probably to resolve because it is it is a multi-defendant case. You know, the Jack Smith has brought this absolute laser beam of a case in D.C. It's not complicated. It's just looking at his conduct. That case, I'm pretty sure I'm going to be surprised if that case doesn't go to trial

within a year and he's convicted. I don't see how he gets out of that. And the and the Mar-a-Lago documents case, the only thing he has going for him there is that the judge is this judge who actually ruled in his favor a few times but got slammed for it. But I don't know how she can save him other than by delaying the trial. And she hasn't really shown an inclination to do that. I mean, at the end of the day, you've got these individuals who are going to testify that he that he you know, that he moved the boxes around. You've got tapes showing you moved the boxes around. You've got this IT guy who just flipped, who basically says that he was told that the boss wanted to cover this up. And he's dead to rights there. And again, 91 counts. You don't have the prosecutors don't have to go.

Ninety one for ninety one. A lot of these felonies are five, 10, 20 years. It's just all it takes is a few counts and he's done for the rest of his life. And by the way, with the I.T. guy flipping, there may be more flipping to come as people look at the potential for jail time. They're not going to jail for Donald Trump. At least our colleagues at CNBC are reporting that Donald Trump is going to hold a fundraiser for Rudy Giuliani's legal defense fund. Finally, I guess he answered Rudy's call. $100,000 a plate at Bedminster coming up in a couple of weeks to get at least Rudy some legal help. But we were watching at the debate last night and this question we've been talking about of would you still support Donald Trump? Would you still vote

for him if he's a convicted felon? It was telling some hands went up quickly, but notably Ron DeSantis looked down the aisle and said, are we doing this? And then he raised his hand. What did you make of that moment at the debate last night? I think that specifically with Ron DeSantis, it was the problem that he had all night of not really being there and not being firm, decisive, having a presence. But the Republicans writ large, it shows how they just do not want to attack Donald Trump and just see the electoral vulnerabilities that come with attacking Donald Trump and Asa Hutchinson. And Chris Christie said that they wouldn't vote for him. But the rest of the crowd was still there.

Another notable moment around the events of January 6th in the 2020 election is when the moderators asked the panel, did former Vice President Mike Pence, who was on the stage last night, do the right thing in certifying the election? Here was their reaction. Do you believe that Mike Pence did the right thing, Senator Scott? Do you believe he did the right thing? Absolutely, he did the right thing. Number one. Number two, we should be asking ourselves a bigger question about the weaponization of the Department of Justice. When I'm president, the first thing I'll do is fire Merrick Garland. Secondly, I'll do fire Christopher Wray. Mike Pence stood for the Constitution, and he deserves not grudging credit. He deserves our thanks as Americans for putting his oath of office and the Constitution

of the United States before personal, political, and unfair pressure. I do think that Vice President Pence did the right thing. And I do think that we need to give him credit for that. I've answered this before. Mike did his duty. I got no beef with them. But here's the thing. Is this what we're going to be focusing on really going forward? The rehashing of this? I'll tell you, Democrats would love that. The president asked me in his request that I reject or return votes unilaterally power that no vice president in American history had ever exercised or taken. He asked me to put him over the Constitution.

And I chose the Constitution. So, Charlie, we see in some cases there a grudging affirmation of what Mike Pence did. Ron DeSantis notably said, yeah, yeah, he did the right thing. But but and Tim Scott even said, yes, but. And the suggestion is that, yes, Mike Pence did the right thing in that case. But what's really important here is we talk about Donald Trump and all his legal problems is that the Justice Department has been weaponized. Suggestion somehow Joe Biden is ordering all of these investigations into Donald Trump, which, of course, is not how any of this works at all. But it may be offensive. A lot of what we heard last night to a lot of people watching this show tonight. But is it the fact that it's what the base wants to hear? And that's who these

candidates are speaking to? No, there's no question. No, that's what the base wants to hear. I mean, you can almost think of this as as two two debates, two two primaries. You have the the MAGA primary, which clearly I think Vivek won. And then you had the donor slash normie debate. And I think that Nikki Haley really scored some points there. I think she's going to get another look from a lot of the folks looking for an alternative. But I have to say that that may have been Chris Christie's finest moment, standing next to Mike Pence and devoting his time to defending what the vice president did very clearly in a very articulate way. Mike Pence not shying away from the decision he made on January 6th. But we should be under no illusions

that people like Vivek and Rhondaantis were appealing to the majority of Republican primary voters. And by the way, you know, that clip also, I just, you know, kind of captures just the awkwardness of Ron DeSantis, who spent so much of the debate sort of shouting and, you know, the man does not seem comfortable in his own skin and and can't quite figure out how do you run against Donald Trump without antagonizing the majority of Republicans who don't want to talk about January 6, who don't want to confront the fact that that the former president of the United States might be a convicted felon by November. So there were little outbreaks of clarity and principle there, and I think you just saw that. And also, just so Bush League of, it was just so Bush League of Ron DeSantis, like, screeching, really, are we going to talk?

Very shouty. It's just very shouty and and and nervous and not knowing what to do. I mean, I always told political candidates when they ask for advice, like if you got something that you're uncomfortable about doing, go for it. Go go head on into it. Nobody stops you when you're going 90 miles an hour. And that's the thing that you see with all these people in tim scott well yes but let's talk about the weaponization of politics i mean it's he stole nuclear secrets like i i just don't play to the lowest common denominator you can go 90 miles an hour tell the truth about this, and then move forward and talk about the future. You really can.

But nobody here other than Chris Christie seems to be able to do it. Rev, I want to stop for one second. Stop talking about politics of what happened last night for one second and talk about Mike Pence, because we have a lot to be concerned about in this country and we have a lot that we can be concerned about regarding Mike Pence, including him saying he would vote for a convicted Donald Trump. I do want to say, though, that it's impossible, and I was so glad to see everybody up on stage, most of them even having to say he did the right thing.

It does take you back to January the 6th. And but for Mike Pence, but if Mike Pence had not put himself in a position where he risked his life and he risked the life of his family, this country would have gone hurling towards a constitutional crisis, the likes of which we haven't seen since the Civil War. And we probably would have moved towards something resembling a civil war. So I'm glad that question was asked last night, and I'm glad that most of them answered the right way. But how sad that people like Ron DeSantis had to be petulant in their response and couldn't

just say, yeah, of course, he saved the Constitution of the United States of America and our country. And, you know, or our Tim Scott going, well, yeah, but yeah, but yeah, but yeah, but yeah, but Hunter Biden's laptop. How sad they couldn't just sit back and go yeah that guy i'm running against him i've got issues with him but on that day on january the 6th when he said no to donald trump and that mob who wanted to lynch him mike pence did a pretty incredible thing for this country in the constitution i don't think there's a question about that. I probably disagree with Mike Pence on ninety nine percent of the issues. But the fact is that history will say that Mike Pence was the thing that stopped us as a country from going into a clear

undermining and cementing of the undermining of where votes don't matter. And then we're going in to the never never land of fake electors and where that would lead us. No one knows. He did the right thing. And for people on that stage last night to ask to become the president of the United States to equivocate or hesitate or try to rush through an answer to give another answer to cover themselves with who they think is the base shows they're unfit to be president. There's some things that are just basic that you have to say. This is what I'm about. That's why I deserve to sit in that seat and when I saw them equivocating on a fundamental question not of the personality of Mike Pence but where Mike

Pence stood up and enforced and stood with the Constitution and they equivocated there they forfeited that right to sit behind that desk in the Oval Office as far as I'm concerned how do you trust somebody that has to try to wait whether or not somebody did the right thing to protect the office and the country that you're seeking? There's no excuse for that. Yeah, it's actually sad we're even having this conversation. George Conway and Charlie Sykes, thank you both very much for being on this morning. Throne's philosophy applies here. If you go for the king, you better

kill the king. Bogosian didn't do that. He now is going to be isolated from the 35,000 fighters that have protected him. He's like a snake whose head has been cut off from its body. I don't think he'll last 60, 90 days, frankly, because Putin

at his dark heart is a never forgive, never forget kind of person. He'll do everything he can to wreak vengeance on Prigozhin. Yeah, retired four-star Navy Admiral James Stavridis back in June predicting the demise of Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin within months. And it appears the admiral was correct as Russian state media is reporting that a private passenger plane en route from Moscow to St. Petersburg yesterday had Prigozhin on board when it crashed. This video uploaded to social media has been independently geolocated by NBC News. It shows a plane falling to the ground in the same area

where Prigozhin's plane reportedly crashed. NBC News has not independently verified Prigozhin was on this plane. Earlier this summer, the Wagner Group with Prigozhin at the helm staged an unsuccessful uprising against the Russian government. And Joe, I still question. I mean, was he on that plane? I just been knowing this man, having read about him. I guess that that might be a question. Well, I just Julia Yaffe, who knows a little bit about Russia, the way Russians think and the way Russians act. I tweeted this line from her newsletter about this. She said, Prigozhin, it seems, is dead. The it seems, of course, does an awful lot there because I agree with you. I mean, you just never know. He's dead if that serves

Vladimir Putin's purposes, if having him running around Africa, killing pro-democracy forces undercover serves his purposes. And that's the case, too. But at least, Jordan, there's no doubt that he at least wants his his enemies, his rivals in Russia to certainly think at least that Prokofiev is dead. And we're not saying he's not. We're just saying we can't trust anything Russian state media says right now. So it's it's it's hard to confirm this for sure. Well, and since the day that Prigozhin attempted this coup, I just assumed and you heard from so many Russia analysts, you know, far more than I do, that Prigozhin was dead man walking. And what surprised me was that Putin actually gave him two months. And I wonder what was said in the

interim that placated Prigozhin to make him feel that he had some modicum of safety because he still was able to travel around. He could have gone into exile. He had different paths that he could have chosen to have ensured his security. But he felt like staying in the game. And look at what happened. Yeah, I guess I really, too, is we we we now I think we have the admiral online now, and we'll let you go to him, Willie. But first, I've got to say, I always was I won't say I was suspicious about this, but when when Vladimir Putin's chef was kept attacking Vladimir Putin's military leaders, I just thought this is an inside game. Putin doesn't want to attack the powers that be in Moscow by himself. So this is an inside game. He's having his chef attack this guy. And then, again, you never know.

You never know what's going on. Just like you didn't know what was going on in the Kremlin with the Soviet Union. They had criminologists who were paid a lot of money in Western think tanks to try to figure that out. You don't know what happened here. Who knows? Maybe it is just what it looks like. Maybe he was on that plane, got blown out of the sky. Regardless, Vladimir Putin certainly can't have that guy running around, as the admiral predicted, people thinking that he could get away with staging a coup against Putin.

And by the way, you were not alone in that suspicion when that when the Wagner group was marching toward Moscow abruptly stopped. And within a couple of hours, there was a deal struck with another nation to end it. There were some suspicions among experts on Russia. That happened a little too quickly. Admiral Stavridis is with us now and joins us. Admiral, you called this many times. You said, you know, not long for this world likely is progrosion. What is your suspicion or what you've heard from your sources around the world about what may have happened yesterday?

Yeah, the the only mystery here, I think, Willie, is why did it take so long? When I predicted with our colleague Chuck Todd on Meet the Press that, hey, it's going to be 30, 60, 90 days, I actually thought it would be sooner than that, but I was giving myself a little bit of time. In the end, it reads like a John Le Carre novel. And here's the point that really struck me and really chills me. The public nature of this. This was essentially a public execution.

You know, who is randomly filming a private jet flying between Moscow and St. Petersburg? They knew roughly when the bomb was going to go off would be my guess. We have very dramatic footage. You get to kind of imagine the last moments of Yevgeny Progozhin. And oh, by the way, presumably surrounded by his closest associates, friends, maybe his family. It's an awful way to die so publicly and then be flashed across the screens of the world. So no real surprise here. It is a marker of how lethal and how deadly and how unscrupulous Vladimir Putin is. Not that we needed any reminder of that.

Admiral, you point out how gory and staged almost for television to remind and show other enemies of Putin what he does when he comes for you. Do you think that Putin feels the need in the aftermath of this coup to dramatically reassert that he is still in power? Sure. Go back and read Machiavelli, the prince. When you go for the king, you better kill the king. And that's what Progozhin in the end failed to do. And Putin knew he needed, your point is a good one, Elise, he needed to demonstrate and pretty quickly, as it turns out, who's really running the joint. And I think that even over the last couple of days, you see the bricks are together, Brazil, Russia, India, South Africa in in South Africa having a conference.

So Putin is playing to that international audience and he's also playing to his domestic audience. Admiral, given the description you gave of the video and sort of giving everybody a front row seat to this execution. I mean, isn't Progozhin a fairly wily, smart character? I just wonder why he would get on that plane, why he wouldn't have five private planes lined up and get on the one. I don't know. It doesn't make sense to me that that man, knowing his reality, would get on a plane. I agree. What I'll add to your thought, Mika, is never underestimate the human capacity to decide who got past that one.

You know, how many times in all of our lives do we sort of say, boy, I'm going to get by this one. And oh, by the way, we can see plenty of examples on the national stage of people who think they're going to get away with something. I think Prigozhin thought he had gotten through this. And then final thought here, I think it is also a measure of Putin, how how clever he is, his ability to manipulate others, his ability to allow people to think it's OK. I am going to forgive you. I'm the big one here. I'm the adult in the room. He lets you go down that mental path until your airplane falls out of the sky. So I'm curious, your assessment of Vladimir Putin right now, Admiral, obviously on his back heels for much of the past year and a half, the economy not doing well, the military doing horribly. They're actually the Russian military is holding

now. The summer has been good for them moving into the fall. They're at least holding. I know air power may change that that equation. But I'm just I'm just curious. It seems that things have solidified a bit for him, even if his military is ravaged, even if his economy is weaker than ever before. What's your take? You know, if Vladimir Putin were a stock, he's probably lost 30 percent of his value since the beginning of this episode. And that's both internally and externally. His military, although you're correct, is holding. He's lost a huge percentage of his troops. He's lost a huge percentage of his tanks. They're holding because they're locked in behind defensive positions. He's lost the capacity to conduct offensive operations on the ground of any nature. I think he is diminished, but he is far from knocked out.

As we have seen, he's got other cards he can play. He could use cyber. He could use a weapon of mass destruction, God forbid. He could gain more traction working with the Iranians and perhaps the Chinese, although I think Jeep, let's hope, is too smart for that. He's got cards he can still play here, Joe, but he is much diminished. He gets a little bit of a bump in taking out Prigozhin, I suppose. That's really playing to that internal audience and also to the external group of his allies and friends. But diminished, but far from out is how I would categorize him this morning.

Retired four star Navy Admiral James Tavridis, thank you very much for being on this morning. Before we go to break this Saturday, thousands of people will gather in the nation's capital on the 60th anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington. Reverend Al Sharpton, you're going to be there. Tell us more about it. 60 years ago this weekend was when there was the great march on Washington that history records. Martin Luther King made a speech. I have a dream which went into history. I don't think in the 60 years since then, and I've been involved in the last three decade commemorations, but this one is different because never have we seen the freedoms, the

rights that were gained after the Civil Rights Movement.