Morning Joe - Morning Joe 8/25/22

Episode Date: August 25, 2022

Biden to cancel up to $10K in federal student loan debt for certain borrowers and up to $20K for Pell Grant recipients

That's 20 million people who can start getting on with their lives. All this means people can start, finally crawl out from under that mountain of debt to get on top of their rent and their utilities. To finally think about buying a home or starting a family or starting a business. And by the way, when this happens, the whole economy is better off. President Biden making the case for his decision to wipe out hundreds of billions of dollars in student debt, up to $20,000 for some borrowers. We will discuss the impact that could have on the economy and whether it strikes at the heart of the problem, the soaring cost of college. Plus, today is the deadline for the Justice Department to submit its proposed redactions to the affidavit used to get the search warrant of Mar-a-Lago. We'll have the latest developments in the investigation of former President Donald Trump. Good morning. Welcome to Morning Joe. It is Thursday, August 25th.

I'm Willie Geist. With us, MSNBC contributor Mike Barnicle, former aide to the George W. Bush White House and State Department's Elise Jordan, the president of the National Action Network and host of Politics Nation, Reverend Al Sharpton and White House editor for Politico, Sam Stein. Let's dive right into the story that's got everybody talking right now. Forty three million people now in line to have at least a chunk of their student loan debt erased and as many as 20 million people could clear all of their student debt. Those are the figures from the White House following an executive action yesterday by President Biden. The president pushed back at criticism that debt cancellation will make inflation worse. By resuming student loan payments at the same time as we provide targeted relief, we're taking an economically responsible course. As a consequence, about $50 billion a year will start coming back into the Treasury because of resumption of debt.

Independent experts agree that these actions taken together will provide real benefits for families without meaningful effect on inflation. Here's how it breaks down. Borrowers who earn less than $125,000 a year or $250,000 for couples who file taxes jointly can get relief for up to $10,000. Pell Grant recipients who make up the majority of student loan borrowers will be eligible for up to $20,000. The administration also extending the pause on federal student loan payments through the end of the year.

And the president yesterday announced a new repayment plan that would cap monthly payments for undergraduate loans at 5% of discretionary income. That's half the rate under most existing plans. The reaction on Capitol Hill fell predictably along party lines. Let's just celebrate because understand 20 million Americans got the news today that they will never have to pay another nickel on student loan debt. Young people, people who are trying to make ends meet, they as it is, are struggling. And so to ask them

to be paying back their student loans right now with a difficult economy is just wrong. This is an unprecedented step to alleviate the burden that people are feeling. I think it's a bad idea. I'm sure the people who will benefit from it will love it. The question is, is it fair to everyone else? That's exactly what this is, a massive bailout for people who've made bad decisions and are doing very well economically. It's completely unfair. It's hardworking people. They shouldn't have to pay off the great big student loan debt for some college student that piled up massive debt going to some Ivy League school. So, Rev, we're going to get into some of the complications with this and some of the criticism of it.

But let's start with, first of all, for President Biden, this was a campaign promise, number one. And number two, this will be transformational for millions of people in this country. Definitely was a campaign promise and it definitely will be a relief for millions of people. And it definitely is a step in the direction that we wanted this president to go. And many of us voted for him to go. Now, did we want him to go further? Yes. Will we always want him to go further? Yes. But he's gone further than anyone else has gone. And let's remember when we hear the opposition party, the Trump party, give their objections. These are people that did exactly what they said they would not do. The whole stereotype is that these are

people that want to live life and do nothing. They're reckless. They're worthless. They're not trying to lift themselves up by their bootstraps. These are people that got in debt trying to educate themselves, trying to be good citizens, trying to be better that would make the nation better. They're not in debt because they were out partying all night with a bottle on their toe. They were going to school. And here is society is saying we have a responsibility to not put weights on their legs the rest of their lives because they tried to be constructive,

well-educated citizens. And when you compare that to how we are globally, how people are trying to educate and outrun America in terms of our educational ability. We ought to see it as an investment in raising the standards of the country and commending people that despite their backgrounds, many of them impoverished, I want to be educated. I want to have the kind of life that maybe I can't afford, but that I can make myself constructive. And they ought to be aided. And Joe Biden did that yesterday. I wish we could have done fifty thousand, but I'm glad we got 10. If you were drowning in a hole and somebody lifted you out, even in part, you thank them.

You don't say, why did you bring me all the way out? Majority leader Chuck Schumer and others agree with you. They had pushed the president for it to be fifty thousand dollars, but they'll take what they've got in front of them. Sam Stein, how much did the president grapple with this decision? Obviously, as I said, he made the promise on the campaign trail, but he does know that it's not just Republicans who have criticisms of this. It's a lot of working people, Democrats, independents who feel like they're footing the. Right. The question is, how much did he grapple with this? A tremendous amount of grappling. This was, you know, more than a year and a half in the making. Continuous disagreements within the White House. The president getting frustrated at

leaks around this stuff, hearing from different stakeholders, an intense internal debate around what to do on the policy merits, and then sort of out of the blue, to a degree, a quick decision. It was kind of classic Joe Biden governance in that sense. But look, I think, you know, in the end, you ended up with a product that actually goes beyond what Joe Biden had initially pledged. He had pledged a $10,000 relief. He's going to go up to $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients. And then on top of that, he has these reforms that cap the percentage you pay in student loan payments based on discretionary income at 5%, which could be the biggest actual policy plank in this whole package. You know, there are going to be critics here, specifically on the right,

and among even allied economists who say this is the wrong time to do it. We're in the midst of this inflationary crisis. Also, this doesn't do enough to actually tackle rising tuitions. It could, in fact, exacerbate that. But in the end, I think ultimately the politics of this probably do win out for Biden in that you see a poll pretty well and you see a lot of people grateful, even those who have already paid off their student loans, say, yeah, this is the right thing to do. Student loans are incredibly burdensome and people need to get out from under them. You know, given the divisions in this country today that exist, it's amazing that he did it yesterday in the face of all the the clamor that will surround it, no doubt. It's amazing that he did it yesterday in the face of all the clamor that will surround it, no doubt. The first thing that we ought to really consider is to just completely ignore

the criticisms of people like J.D. Vance, who we saw in a clip, and Marjorie Taylor Greene. They are preposterous in their criticisms of it. The problem would seem to me would be that the base of the Democratic Party, the old Democratic Party, largely working class people, you're always going to encounter the possibility that you're going to encourage resentment among those who have already paid their loans, who have already helped their children get through school and paid off their loans. Now they're going to be saying, you know, hey, what about us? On the whole, though, you're absolutely right. Ten thousand dollars. People were clamoring for fifty thousand dollars. Elizabeth Warren was clamoring for free

college for everyone. So it's it's a moderate position when you look at it. We're going to have to wait and see. Does it add to inflation? Larry Summers claims it will add to inflation, but we'll see. We'll see. I am concerned about it adding to inflation. I don't really understand the timing necessarily, because even politically, what's the bump? What's the point in doing this right now at this specific point? I guess what I find annoying about it is that it doesn't address the higher education cartel. And it basically is infusing money into a higher education system that is basically just corrupt at this point. You look at how much tuition has just skyrocketed over the last 20, 30 years. I mean, my college tuition,

it's three times today what it was 20 years ago. And that's just absurd. And it doesn't do anything that's not accessible for the majority of Americans. It just it's absolutely obscene. And the other thing is, a lot of these schools that we're talking about have billions, billions of dollars sitting in endowments, collecting interest for for generations. Did you have student loans? I did not. My mom worked to pay for my college. I was lucky. It took me 12 years to pay off my student loans. I can still remember it wasn't a burden. I just didn't want to pay it off. Sounds like you. Yeah. Rev, let's just look at the political side of this. There are the accusations that yesterday that we heard of

President Biden buying votes, that he wants to get young people to come out and vote in the midterms. This is for him a good political move, you think? I think in the end it could be, but there's no guarantee. I think that the safest political thing would have been to do nothing, which is why I give him credit for doing something and taking the risk. And what are we talking about? We're talking about relieving debt, actual real burden on people. And if you actually help people and you do that because you want their vote, that might be the way the American political system ought to work, that you do something for

the voters in order to get them to vote. I mean, I think there's nothing wrong. There's something right about that. It is a lot better than trying to play to their worst senses like his opponent in the last presidential race. You actually want to earn people's vote. And I think that a return to that is a good thing. Well, there are economic, there are moral, even legal arguments against forgiving student debt in this way. Last year, even Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the president of the United States does not have the authority to cancel debt. People think that the president of the United States has the power for debt forgiveness. He does not. He can postpone. He can delay. But he does not have that

power. That would have to be an act of Congress. That was in July of last year, a former top lawyer at the Department of Education under Barack Obama telling The Wall Street Journal it is, quote, doubtful the courts will let this stand. On the economic front, former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, among many, arguing canceling student debt will increase inflation by encouraging colleges to raise tuition. And a former economic advisor for President Obama tweeted this, quote, pouring roughly half trillion dollars of gasoline on the inflationary fire that is already burning is reckless.

The Wall Street Journal editorial board calls it a moral hazard, writing in part, those who will pay for this write-off are the tens of millions of Americans who didn't go to college or repaid their debt or skimped and saved to pay for college or chose lower-cost schools to avoid a debt trap. This is a college graduate bailout paid for by plumbers and FedEx drivers. According to the latest census, fewer than half of American adults hold a college degree. And the recent NBC News poll found debt cancellation not particularly popular anyway. Forty six percent of registered voters say they are more likely to vote for a candidate who supports canceling student debt. Thirty three

percent said it is less likely. Let's bring into the conversation columnist, The Washington Post, Megan McArdle and former Treasury official and Morning Joe economic analyst Steve Ratner. Good morning to you both. Steve, let me begin with you just on the pure economics of this. What do you think this does to the economy? What do you think it does to inflation? Well, first of all, Willie, it'd be difficult to overstate the vastness of this program. This is a huge, huge amount of money that is going to change hands in basically one fell swoop of the president's pen. There aren't yet estimates, real good estimates of what the costs will be, but let's call it something in the $500 billion range. That is pure increase in the deficit and costs of the

federal government. And that's roughly twice the size of the amount of deficit reduction that was in the Manchin-Schumer bill that was just passed. In terms of the size of the spending in the Manchin-Schumer bill, this is larger. It's the largest, I believe, amount of money ever dispersed by an executive order. And so we just have to really kind of gasp a little bit at the scale of all this. In terms of the economy, yes, it is going to nudge us to the inflationary side. You saw the Larry Summers and the Jason Furman quotes that you just put up. I would say that that would not to me be a deal breaker.

It's not ideal. We don't want to be increasing inflation or inflationary pressures at this point in time. We don't want to be increasing the size of the deficit and the size of our debt at this particular point in time. The whole point, one of the points of Manchin Schumer was to reduce the amount of debt through deficit reduction, not to increase it. And this goes in the wrong direction on that. But I think by far the biggest issue is the issue of fairness that you alluded to in various of the other conversations.

Half of Americans who don't go to college don't benefit from this. People who, like your family, that worked hard, took an extra job to put their kid through college so he didn't have to graduate with debt don't get anything from this. There are substantial questions of fairness here in terms of who's going to benefit and who's going to be left without really getting any benefit from this. Megan, your piece in The Washington Post is titled Biden's student loan fix. It's perfect for making the problem worse. There certainly are a lot of people out there this morning who kind of feel like suckers for having worked a second job or having paid off their student loans or gone to a college maybe that they thought they could afford versus one that they'd have to pay off for 20 or 30 years.

So let's break down your piece a little bit. What's at the core of your argument against this? Look, I agree with Mr. Ratner. There are a lot of reasons that this is problematic. It causes fairness problems for people who worked hard to pay off their debt or to put their kids through school without debt. But it also is going to create pressure for future such bailouts. You know, you look at the graduate, the people who are enrolling in college next year, right? They are getting the reduction to a 5% rate on their income based repayment, but they're not getting the ten thousand dollars. And they are going to look at that and say, look, tuition is still going up. Why? This is this is unfair. And they are going to say to the administration, what about me?

You're kind of creating this pressure to keep doing this over and over again. And it's not fixing it's not only not fixing the problem of rising college costs, it's actually making that problem worse. So there is considerable evidence that in fact, subsidizing student loan debt, you know, it seems like a great idea. It allows people, you say, look, you're going to be making a lot more money in the future. Let's let you bring a little bit of that income forward and use it to pay your tuition in the same way that we do this with mortgages and car loans and business loans. But the problem is that colleges can respond to that by saying, oh, you can pay more. Let me raise tuition. And that is one of the things driving the last 40 years of tuition increases is this

ability to pay more. And so by making it even easier to borrow money, the thing I said in the column is this is kind of like trying to quit smoking by switching to unfiltered cigarettes. So, Rev, what about the fairness question? I'll let you take it to Megan. But people, the majority of Americans don't have a four year college degree and they're saying, wait a minute, why am I paying for people who went to college, took out big loans and then got that wiped out in tax increases in this half a trillion dollars potentially that's going to have to be spent to cover it. What do you say to that?

I mean, I think you understand that feeling. But in the same way, I think that a lot of people would say, I'm glad to see people may not have to go through what I went through. I mean, it's kind of really tricky to say I went through two jobs. I want everybody to have to go through two jobs. I think it's probably the more mature way to say, I'm glad people don't have to go through what I went through. But I think, Megan, where I agree with you and I want you to elaborate is where we put pressure on those institutions to deal with the higher tuitions and to deal with what they are doing to try to

meet the hour. I happen to think the way the president moved yesterday was good in terms of direction. I wish he'd gone further. But I think that it does not address the escalating college prices or college, the amounts that they're getting for tuitions and all. And I think that there needs to be more focus on how we kind of bring that in. Well, I think that this is a huge problem that no one really has a very good idea about how to control the cost of college. And so what we have done continually is say, look, this is a really big problem. I know let's increase the subsidies. And especially when you think, you look, this is a really big problem. I know. Let's increase the subsidies. And especially when you think, you know, this is a college professors, college administrators, all of those

people. Those are key Democratic constituencies. And so I think on the party, you have the pressure to increase the subsidies, but you definitely have a lot of pushback if you want to go in and say, hey, you know what? You've got too many administrators. You've got to cut that back. You've got too many of these amenities. You have to cut them back. I know they help you be competitive with other colleges, but we can't afford to keep subsidizing this forever. And so kind of expecting the Democratic Party to find a way to do that, I think, is really difficult. I think there is a reason you would continually. What are all Democratic proposals? They are proposals to put more money into colleges, not to start taking

some of those costs out. Hey, Steve, on this particular issue, and it's a tough issue, the cost of tuition at some universities, you could be spending 50, 60, $70,000 a year on tuition at these universities at some of them. Do you have any ideas? Do you know anyone who has any ideas on how to cap the tuition cost increases that occur at these universities? Especially a lot of these schools get enormous sums of government money to help subsidize the programs that they have within the university. Any ideas on that? You know, Mike, one of the ironies of this whole college tuition issue is that college tuitions, as everyone here has pointed out, have gone up very fast, faster than inflation,

taking a higher share of family incomes for a very long time. But yet, ironically, people see value in that and they're willing to they've been willing to pay for it. If you look at applications to private education, in particular Ivy League schools and so forth, which charge the highest tuitions, those applications hit record numbers pretty much every year. They've escalated at an enormous rate. And so people see value in this. And therefore, the schools feel that they can raise their services, raise their tuition, and that that's what people want. And I think it is an important point to recognize that this program or programs like this do encourage, in effect, more raising of tuition because you're subsidizing the students. But other than the government coming in and somehow controlling college tuition, which I'm not sure any of us, at least I would not particularly be in favor of, this is what happens. Can I just make

quickly, though, one other point that I've been thinking about in this context? You'll remember back in 2009, we passed $75 billion of homeowner relief as part of the response to the financial crisis. As a result of that, literally the day after, Rick Santilli went on the part of the response to the financial crisis. As a result of that, literally the day after, Rick Santilli went on the floor of the Chicago America CNBC reporter and started a rant that turned into the Tea Party. And it was all over these fairness issues. It was all over the question of someone who had bought a house he couldn't really afford, put on too much mortgage debt, gone to Disney World, whatever, and now is being bailed out by the government versus someone who acted responsibly. I agree with what the Rev said, that this is a different issue in the sense that people are borrowing this money to go to college. And that's a very

responsible thing to do in a way. But this basic issue of fairness that gave rise to the Tea Party, in fact, is going to be something I think we hear an awful lot about in the coming days. Well, and you already are. Megan, I'm curious what you think about how this plays out politically. You've had even Democrats like Tim Ryan, who's running for the Senate in Ohio before the president even made the announcement coming out against it because he knows it would cost him votes in that state. This is a really interesting moment because no one can really figure that I've spoken to, at least no one has a good idea of how much this is actually going to help the Democrats. It might well hurt them. The problem is that the

people that are most avid for this are kind of young, very politically engaged voters who have put a lot of pressure on the administration successfully, obviously. The problem is those people already vote. They're already solidly in the Democratic camp and they are already solidly turning out at higher rates. You know, educated voters in general turn out at higher rates than non-educated voters and young voters don't turn out that much at all. So you've got two groups where you're like either they're going to come out and vote for us or they're not going to come out. How many people is this really moving to the polls? I am somewhat skeptical that this is actually going to be long term helpful for the administration. But obviously, he made it a promise.

He was under fierce pressure. And a lot of Democrats in high cost areas like New York were putting a lot of pressure on the president to do this. And I think he eventually just said, OK, let's do it. We'll see how it plays out. But at the end of the day, 43 million people will have a little bit easier time getting through their day. Columnist at The Washington Post, Megan McArdle and Morning Joe economic analyst Steve Ratner. Fascinating conversation. Thank you both for being here. We're going to talk much, much more about this over the course of the morning, but still ahead.

We will have more about student loan forgiveness joined by the head of the NAACP. Also, the latest from Ukraine as Russia launches a new attack on a train station in Ukraine's on Independence Day. We'll get a live report from Kiev. And in Syria, three U.S. service members have suffered minor injuries after rocket attacks. What we know about their condition and how the United States responded to those attacks. You're watching Morning Joe. We'll be right back. The Washington Post is reporting an email sent by the National Archives and Records Administration to former President Donald Trump's staff months after Trump left office, expressed concern about the return of documents taken from the White House and noted Trump's

own staff had agreed they should be returned. In an email sent to Trump lawyers in May of 2021, the lawyer for the National Archives, Gary Stern, wrote, It is also our understanding that roughly two dozen boxes of original presidential records were kept in the residence of the White House over the course of President Trump's last year in office and have not been transferred to NARA, despite a determination by Pat Cipollone in the final days of the administration that they need to be. Specifically, Stern references at least two well-known documents the archives knew to be missing. Correspondence between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, also a letter from President

Obama, writing, quote, We know things are very chaotic, as they always are in the course of a one term transition, but it is absolutely necessary that we obtain an account for all presidential records. Stern did not state specifically in the email which documents the archives thought were in the boxes, but cited the correspondent correspondence as an example of something then President Trump requested just before the end of the administration. In that email sent to some of Trump's lawyers, but not to Cipollone, Stern refers to the fact that he also raised the issue with another Trump lawyer, Scott Gast, prior to the president leaving office.

We'll talk to the reporter behind that story coming up in just a bit. Meanwhile, as questions swirl about whether outgoing Wyoming Congresswoman Liz Cheney will pose a challenge to former President Trump's expected 2024 presidential bid, new polling suggests her candidacy actually would hurt the current president more than his predecessor. In the latest survey from Yahoo News and YouGov, 46 percent of registered voters say if the 2024 presidential election were a two-way race between President Biden and Trump, they would back the current president. But when Cheney enters the mix as an independent, look at this. Trump wins the three-way race with 40% of the votes in that scenario. 17% of voters do say they are undecided. Following her Republican primary defeat last week, Cheney said she would consider a presidential run. She's not said, though,

whether that would be as a Republican or as an independent. So this was the suspicion of many people, at least, that if she ran for president trying to take down President Trump, she might actually take down President Biden. Exactly, because who would be the voters who would move from Donald Trump to Liz Cheney? Not that many people. If you're a hardcore, committed Donald Trump voter, you don't just move over to Liz Cheney. It's taking some never Trumpers who then don't vote for Joe Biden. So maybe she could really damage him in the Republican primary and her presence in the Republican primary would stunt Trump much the way that Marco Rubio was taken out by Chris Christie, perhaps. But in the general does not help Joe Biden at all. So, Sam Stein, this is why many Democratic

strategists are saying applause for you, Liz Cheney, standing up to Donald Trump, leading this fight against his attempt to overturn the 2020 election? But please do not run for president. Well, let's start by stipulating that this is painfully early for 2024 conversation. But I think I hope I hope. But I think I agree with all the analysis. It's hard to see how she could impact an election in the way she wants while running in that election. Elise is absolutely right. Her candidacy would draw support away from Biden by getting Neva Trumpers to vote for

her and not him. I think that the damage she could inflict, if that's what she wants to do, and all indications are that's what she wants to do, would be through the form of a primary bid. But even that would be so long shot at this juncture. So my suspicion is she knows this stuff. She's pretty wise politically. She understands how this works and that she ends up doing something entirely different than running for president, maybe launching an organization or some sort that could do ads or organizing in the course of Republican primary and then ultimately in a general election to try to defeat Donald Trump,

which she has stated is her preeminent goal at this juncture. Yeah. I mean, Rev, she has said my goal here is not to be a spoiler, is to prevent Donald Trump from ever stepping foot in the White House again. So maybe that comes from the outside rather than running in the race. Or if she chooses, if she just decides she has to run, run in the primaries. I mean, I would love to see some Republican primary debates with Liz Cheney against Donald Trump. I would really love to see if she could really weaken him with body punches from the inside. But I think one thing that we shouldn't miss about this poll is it does say that on a head to head, and I agree that we're painfully early here talking about it,

on a head to head, Biden beats Trump. And I think what the Democrats need to look at is who other than Biden can beat Trump. According to this poll, he can beat him by four points. I don't know there's another Democrat that we could poll that can do that. So all of this age talk we need to start looking at. But the polls say he can beat Trump. Who else can beat Trump? While we are on Cheney land here, the Democrats need to do a little inspection on who they have in there in the back up here. If Biden does not keep his word and run.

And I think so far he's saying and I think he really means that he's going to run. Who exactly is trotting out of the bullpen, Mike? That's the question. And that's something President Biden has said himself. The White House has said, I see all these polls that say 70 percent of Democrats don't want me to run again. But I also see the polls that say 98 percent of you would vote for me again against Donald Trump because, you know, I'm the guy who's already beat him and can beat him again. That's their argument. You know, as I listen to this, I'm in sort of a wistful mood, wondering, will we ever be rid of the division, the disruption, the demagoguery that is Donald Trump? We talk about him in one way or another every single day, sometimes all day long.

The damage that this man has done to this country, to the institutions of government, to the business of politics and elections is almost incomprehensible to me at this time. You know, we're never talking about a Republican versus a Democrat straight up. We're always inserting and forced to insert Donald Trump in almost every conversation. I don't know about you people. I don't know about the people out there. I am so sick of listening to his name, talking about him, hearing him being referenced. He renews every move being followed. How did this one individual, as corrupt as he is, as he has been proven to be nearly all of his adult life, so dominate the business of politics in this country. Well, because of his crime syndicate, it's not going to end for quite some time.

I hate to say it, but, you know, for media, his whole just string of things. Now, the revenge of the librarians is happening and they might be the ones who actually take at the end of the day, go National Archives. But we're going to have a you know, this is going to be such an ongoing story. I do think, though, we should refer to the Republican Party as the Trump Party, just as you did earlier, because that makes much more sense. You look at the context of who some of these candidates are going into midterms and those are Trump candidates. They're not who GOP leadership wanted to have running for office and losing Senate seats, basically. No, but but I think that to Barnacle's point, I think one of the reasons that we have this endless conversation about Trump is, from my view, Trump is a symptom of a lot of suppressed feelings that had never been brought to the forefront, that people now are seeing him bring out how they feel as ugly and as archaic as they are. And I think that we're seeing them express because he's hit something that people really have felt. Now, I don't think he feels a lot of it himself. I think

he's playing on that because he's the ultimate con man. But I think that that is why he's having this lasting effect is that a lot of people are saying, yeah, that's how I really wanted to say, yeah, he represents me. The fact that a guy that has no lifestyle similar to them at all is the one that brought this out is the irony of it, which is why I think he's the perfect symbol to deal with these ugly feelings once and for all, because the demise of Trump and there will be a demise. You got it from me here. Whether it is long term or short term, there will be a demise. Nothing that wicked can last forever, in my opinion. And you can't. The reason we're talking about him is you can't wish him away.

He's likely coming back and going to run for president again. So he'll be back with us. Sorry, Mike. Coming up, more fallout from the reversal of Roe versus Wade. Three more trigger bans on abortion take effect this week. We'll go through those laws and what they mean for women in those states. Plus, a state lawmaker sees firsthand the consequences of a restrictive abortion law that he voted for. I'll show you what he said when Morning Joe comes right back. Three American service members have suffered minor injuries in two separate rocket attacks in Syria. According to U.S. Central Command, a pair of facilities that house U.S. troops in northeast Syria began taking rocket fire yesterday afternoon. One service member was treated and released. Two others were said to be under evaluation for minor injuries. A U.S. military official tells NBC News the United States responded with strikes from Apache

helicopters, destroying three vehicles and killing two or three of Iranian-backed militants believed to be responsible for yesterday's attacks. In Ukraine, at least 25 people were killed, another 31 injured when Russian rockets hit a train station in the central part of the country. Join us now from Kyiv with more on this story. NBC News foreign correspondent Megan Fitzgerald. Megan, what more can you tell us? Well, we know that this attack happened yesterday

in the eastern part of the country, Dnipro, not far from the next area. We know that 25 people, as you mentioned, were killed in what's being seen as the deadliest attack since the middle of July. So we're talking in several weeks. But the country was expecting some sort of a deadly attack. This one particularly sad because we know that children were among those who died in a separate attack not far from that railroad. We know that a missile hit a home, killing an 11-year-old boy. There were attacks across the country, in the West and even just outside of Kiev. We know that there was an explosion targeting a residential building.

But look, this is a country that's been on high alert. There is intelligence from the U.S., along with Ukrainian intelligence, suggesting that the Russians are preparing a particularly vicious attack. Members of the community here in Kiev were told to stay inside their homes yesterday and to work remotely, not to have mass gatherings as the country celebrated its 31st Independence Day. But this threat is not over. The president of Ukraine saying that people need to stay vigilant. They need to pay attention to those air raid sirens when they go off and take cover, because the thought here is that there could be an attack at any moment.

Willie. Yeah, Megan, what's the just a kind of a color and a feel on the ground there in Kiev, as you reported and told us about all week that there was tension because of this anniversary, the 31st anniversary of independence from the Soviet Union, that Vladimir Putin may take that as an opportunity to attack. How are the people in Ukraine holding up? How are they feeling? Well, it's a great question. You know, we've been speaking with people here um the ukrainians are resilient people they are convinced that they are going to beat the russians and push them out of their country but look people are scared people are on edge we know ahead of the independence day

yesterday that a lot of people here in kiev left the city because there was concern that there could be an attack here in the city. We know that obviously people stayed home for work. They didn't gather as they would for their Independence Day, just like in the United States. We have festivals, there's fireworks, there's gatherings, there's barbecues. It's a similar situation here. But yesterday was more of a somber day. It was a more of a low key day. Not a lot of people out on the streets enjoying the day. It wasn't a holiday. People didn't have off of work. They are on a heightened state of alert here because they realize that at any moment, at any time, the Russians could strike, Billy. Yeah. And the United States yesterday on that Independence Day announcing three billion dollars more of military assistance to Ukraine as that fight continues.

NBC's Megan Fitzgerald in Kiev for us this morning. Megan, thanks so much. Still ahead, we talked about him on the show quite a bit yesterday. Congressman-elect Pat Ryan will join us live in studio after his victory in Tuesday's special election in upstate New York. How the swing district could hold the keys for Democrats to hold onto the House this November. Plus, 25-year-old Maxwell Frost could hold the keys for Democrats to hold on to the House this November. Plus, 25-year-old Maxwell Frost could become the youngest member of Congress in history. The Democratic nominee in Florida for the House of Representatives is our guest. Morning Joe's coming right back.

Two restrictive trigger laws against abortion are set to take effect today in three more states. In Tennessee, nearly all abortions will be outlawed except in cases related to preventing the death or serious injury of a pregnant woman. The law makes no exception for rape or incest. In Texas, the state already has banned abortion with no exceptions for rape or incest. The procedure only can be performed if the mother is having a medical emergency. The state's trigger law, which takes effect today, will toughen the punishment for those involved in a now illegal abortion. Doctors could face life in prison and fines no smaller than $100,000. In Idaho, that state implementing a near total ban with exceptions for rape, incest, or if the mother's life is in danger. Doctors who perform abortions outside of these circumstances

could face up to five years in prison. But late yesterday, the Biden administration won its first legal victory since the Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade, convincing a federal judge to block a portion of that Idaho law, ruling a doctor cannot be punished if he or she performs an abortion to protect the health of a pregnant patient. As of this morning, a total of 14 states have near total abortion bans or bans after six weeks of pregnancy. Join us now, national political reporter at The Washington Post, Caroline Kitchener. Caroline, thanks for being with us this morning. Your piece this morning,

one in three American women already have lost abortion access with more restrictive laws coming. Put this in some perspective for us, if you could. What are we talking about here and how quickly has this changed just since the Roe versus Wade decision? I think what's really struck me in the two months since the decision is just how swiftly these laws have come one after the other, after the other. We knew that a series of trigger laws were going to take effect right away, but it's been even more than that. You know, existing laws that had been on the books that had been blocked because of Roe were just swiftly taken away. And we have seen one after the other, these states moving to ban abortion in the most aggressive way possible. And as you said, now one of three women in this country is mostly without abortion access two months after Roe. Caroline, what other laws are you hearing about in states that have banned abortion? I know in Mississippi, there was a nonprofit putting up billboards, PSAs essentially, with a website on how women can get the abortion pill. And now that is in contention over whether it's legal for people to even advertise how to go around the state laws. Well, I think a big question is abortion pills, because what I'm seeing talking to patients is just an overwhelming number of women

are turning to the internet and turning to abortion pills that they're obtaining illegally as a way to get around these laws. And I think for Republicans, the next question is going to be, what do we do about that? You know, how do we basically restrict what people can get online through the mail? That is what I'm hearing anti-abortion advocates really bring to the top of their list of things that they want to tackle next with new laws. So there's an extraordinary moment in South Carolina where a Republican lawmaker now getting a lot of attention for emotional comments he made about his state's abortion law. State Representative Neil Collins shared the story of how South Carolina's 2021 heartbeat abortion law, which bans abortions after six weeks and that he supported, had a direct impact on a 19 year old woman in his district who ended up in the ER at 15 weeks pregnant. A 19-year-old girl appeared at the ER. She was 15 weeks pregnant. Her water broke.

And the fetus was unviable. The standard of care was to advise her that they could extract or she could go home. The attorneys told the doctors that because of the fetal heartbeat bill, because that 15-week-old had a heartbeat, the doctors could not extract. There's a 50% chance, greater than 50% chance, that she's going to lose her uterus. There's a 10% chance that she will develop sepsis and herself die. That weighs on me. I voted for that bill. These are affecting people, and we're having a meeting about this. It took that whole week. I did not sleep.

I followed up with the doctor a week later. She had heard nothing, did not know about the 19-year-old. Thank God I followed up. Two weeks later, she did return to the ER. They did extract the now non-beating fetus. What we do matters. Those comments come after the state Supreme Court temporarily blocked South Carolina's 2021 heartbeat law this week. But abortion still is outlawed there after 20 weeks.

The statehouse now considering a new abortion ban that has no exceptions other than to save the life of the mother. But as we just heard there, even that is complicated. That bill advanced Tuesday with Collins and five other Republicans declining to vote. The South Carolina Senate has pursued an even stricter version that would criminalize anyone who aids those seeking abortions. At least I mean, we heard he voted for the bill. And now when he's seeing the reality of what it means, you know, he's he's haunted by it. He said it weighs on him. But but it gets to something we've talked about now for a couple of months on this show is that some of this stuff is just extreme and radical. And the idea that these states are going to force women to deliver the babies of their rapists or somebody who molested them. That's not only it's not only grotesque,

it's also just an extreme position to take. It's so dark. And I just I can't I got chills listening to the story of a pregnant woman having to carry what she knows is a dead baby for two weeks every day that you're pregnant feels like a lifetime and having that kind of pain for two weeks just because of the law, because the government is forcing doctors to not practice medicine the way that they see fit. And I just the left is really losing and just libertarians in general, people who don't believe in government intervention. They're losing this battle over what this is. This is government control. That's all it is. Government control. Caroline, that clip that we just played, deeply emotional clip, is probably playing out in individual homes around the country right now

that we don't know about. But my question to you is, am I wrong in getting the sense that various Republican state led legislatures around the country? Are we now looking at a race to find the most punitive abortion laws, depending on the Republican legislature and the state that we're talking about? I think that that is probably a fair assessment in a lot of these states. I spent a lot of time last spring in Oklahoma where the governor repeatedly said, I want to be the most pro-life governor in this country. And in a lot of ways, it really is a race. And on that clip, I'm just hearing a lot of frustration from people who are saying, you know, we told you this. There are you know, there were there were doctors all through the spring. I was in state legislatures as they were passing these bans. And all through the spring, there were doctors who would come before these legislators and testify and say these things.

And so now there is a real feeling among abortion rights advocates of you weren't listening. Why weren't you listening? Yeah. And this is part of the reason we're seeing Democrats using this as a central issue in some of the campaigns we're watching and will be into the fall. National political reporter at The Washington Post, Caroline Kitchener. Caroline, thanks for being with us this morning. Coming up, we'll have more on the ripple effect we're seeing from President Biden's announcement about student loan forgiveness. We will speak to the head of the NAACP. Plus, what do young Americans think about that issue? Harvard University's John De La Volpe is looking at that. He joins us just ahead, saying this key voting group of young people, it's as much about values

as it is about policy. We'll explain when Morning Joe comes right back.