Morning Joe - Morning Joe 9/6/22

Episode Date: September 6, 2022

Judge grants Trump's special master request, delays parts of criminal probe

Bye-bye. Look, see, he's smiling. See, he's having a good time. I love the old days, you know? You know what I hate? There's a guy totally disruptive, throwing punches. We're not allowed to punch back anymore. I love the old days.

You know what they used to do to guys like that when they were in a place like this? They'd be carried out on a stretcher, folks. Guards are very gentle with him. He's walking out like big high fives, smiling, laughing, like to punch him in the face, I'll tell you. We're a serious moment in our nation history. And it's not high pride. I mean it from the bottom of my heart. As I said last week, we remain in the battle for the soul of America. By the way.

All right. God love you. Let him go. Let him go. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't let him go. He's look, everybody's entitled to be an idiot. No, no.

Everybody's President Biden's response to a protester while campaigning in Wisconsin yesterday, as compared to how Donald Trump handled hecklers during the 2016 campaign. Remember that? Yeah. And, you know, and I really it kind of feels like he was speaking to me there. Everybody's entitled to be the same thought or different approach than Donald Trump, obviously. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Also, looking back on 2016 to the idea that Donald Trump's ever been in a fistfight in his life, the rich kid who's

had everything handed to him by his dad. He's a tough guy, but he was projecting something out that continues to this day. Right. To spur on violence just on a much bigger scale. Now talking about the FBI and the Justice Department, the IRS and everything else. Yeah, really. It has escalated, to say the least. And as we approach the midterm election season, the investigation into Donald Trump's mishandling of classified documents might be slowing down after a judge appointed by Trump granted his request for a special master to review the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago. We'll discuss what this means for the case and the timeline for how things could play out. Good morning and welcome to Morning Joe. It is Tuesday, September 6th. It's over. Summer's over. It's just over. This is it. Moving forward now.

It is. It is. We now go toward, of course, football, Willie, the fall classic and the Yankees won last night. That's a good thing, right? They've won a couple in a row. The story, though, is Aaron Judge is on this tear right now. He's up to 54 home runs. The American League record, the non-steroid record, if you'll forgive me, is 61 set by Roger Maris in 1961. So if you can get eight home runs in the next 27 or so games, he will have done something historic in baseball. So, man, we have slumped for since the all-star break but aaron judge has made every game worth watching for sure that's exciting all right along with joe willie and me we have the host of way too early white house fair chief at politico jonathan lemire and the red sox have slumped since the all-star break of course just reading

jonathan's book yeah makes it worthwhile yeah also with Also with us, U.S. special correspondent for BBC News, Katty Kay. So Katty Kay, I saw Britain's new prime minister speak yesterday, Liz Truss. And I may say you can judge her by, you know, you can stack her and her speech and her delivery yesterday, her command of the stage up against any middle school candidate for student council vice president or sergeant of arms. And I think I think she fares. I think I think equally there. I like to hear Kat is what's your point of view, Kat? I don't think anyone would ever accuse Liz Truss of having got her job purely on the basis of charisma, Joe. That's probably not how she got it.

But look, expectations are incredibly low for her. That never hurts a politician, right? She works very hard. She is, as she says herself, relentless. She styles herself after the Iron Lady. You will like that, Joe. The French have taken to calling her the Iron Weathercock because she can change positions on things. That might just be called pragmatism. And she's perhaps not the most smooth of politicians. She's known for being a little

awkward, a little odd. Perhaps she can make kind of quite curious diplomatic statements. It'll be interesting to see what the administration makes of her. But most of all, she inherits a country that is in a mess. I mean, there is no, I don't know what the opposite of a honeymoon period is, a nightmare period. She goes straight into dealing with a massive energy crisis. Much of Europe has it too. But Brits are really feeling it. It's going to get cold soon. They will have to heat their houses and their energy prices have gone through the roof. Food prices are up, too. Inflation is rampant. Everybody seems to be on strike, not the prime minister, luckily yet, nor the queen, who will be handing over the prime ministership to her up at Balmoral in Scotland in the next hour or so. But this is a country that is in those very dark days, the same kind of dark days that Maggie Thatcher took over

in. Maggie Thatcher, transformational prime minister. Liz Truss styles herself on Maggie Thatcher, would like to be that same kind of transformational prime minister. Let's see how she does. As I said, expectations are low about her charisma, perhaps a little bit lower, but expectations are low. Well, you know who was charismatic? Boris Johnson. Here's him finally leaving 10 Downing. Take a look. I'm now like one of those booster rockets that has fulfilled its function, and I will now be gently reentering the atmosphere and splashing down invisibly in some remote and obscure corner of the Pacific. Yeah, no, we don't think that's ever going to happen.

So it's charisma. I've got to say one thing I saw today. Really, you talk about Maggie Thatcher taking over in 79 when Britain was really just an economic basket case. I was struck a bit by just how negative most of the reporting was, at least with The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, about how bad the British economy is, especially compared to the United States. I had not considered it to be in such dire straits, but it reminded me of when we were over there a couple of years ago, did a week out of London, and we

were bemoaning the fact that we were going through some couple of years ago, did a week out of London, and we were bemoaning the fact that we were going through some problems with Donald Trump. And everybody, no person said to us, yeah, you've got a problem with one guy. He'll be gone soon. We have a problem with an entire system. We're in deep trouble. There was that feeling several years ago, and it seems to still permeate the sort of the British, the British character and the economy right now. Tation of Brexit has not been easy. On top of that, we've had the coronavirus, years of austerity programs. We've also had Ukraine and the impact that the Ukrainian crisis has had on our own energy prices back in the UK. So it's kind of been this confluence of things

that have made a lot of challenges. We don't know. Liz Truss says she is going to deal. She has to deal day one with the energy crisis. We're talking about people being what's called energy poverty. You've heard of food poverty in the UK. They're talking about energy poverty heading into the winter. She's going to have to deal with that today. She says she's going to deal with it aggressively. We don't know what her plan is. She is a she's a small government conservative. She used to be on the left of the political spectrum, but she's become a small government conservative. One promise that she has made proposal is to cut taxes on the wealthiest. Well, that a lot of economists will say there isn't much evidence that trickle-down economics has worked very well in this country, in America, or in any other countries. And it seems a curious thing to be doing in a bid, she says, to promote growth.

But it's a it's a thing that's going to be divisive. She's got elected by, you know, a small rump of the Conservative Party. But she has to appeal as well to working class people up in the north of England who Boris Johnson won over with that kind of charisma we just saw. And by promising an end to austerity, effectively promising more government programs for them. She's doing the opposite. So, you know, let's see how she manages. But cutting taxes on the very wealthiest in Britain may not be the best way for her to hold on to Boris Johnson's big majority in Parliament.

Liz Truss about to meet with the Queen in Scotland. Shortly, we'll go live to London in just a bit for more on her as she accepts that position today. Back here at home, there are new developments following the FBI's search of former President Trump's Mar-a-Lago home and golf club. A federal judge has approved a request by Trump's attorneys for a special master to review the materials seized during last month's search, temporarily blocking parts of the Justice Department investigation. U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon stated in her ruling yesterday, the special master should be able to review the seized documents to address questions of attorney-client privilege and to litigate claims of executive privilege.

The Justice Department had argued a special master was unnecessary and would significantly harm important governmental interests, including national security interests. Judge Cannon rejected the government's argument that Trump's special master request was filed too late, that it was superfluous and that Trump had no right for review because he did not own the documents in question that were seized. At the same time, Judge Cannon allowed a national security review of the records to continue, but temporarily blocked the government from reviewing and using them for its, quote, investigative purposes. So the order essentially puts a pause on the DOJ investigation until the special master's review has been completed. No word yet on who the special master will be, but Judge Cannon will make the appointment. She ordered the DOJ and Trump's attorneys to send her a list by Friday of potential candidates for the position and suggestions for what powers the position would hold. So, Joe, we've heard a lot of criticism of

this from legal experts of this move that the investigation is well underway, but may ultimately and we'll talk to Andrew Weissman in just a moment about this, may ultimately just signal a pause in the Justice Department's investigation into these documents. It's just a pause. And again, I don't know, maybe it's the lawyer in me when the government says, trust me, I don't care who it is, if it's a prosecution and there's a way to bring bring some special master in if that will at least make the process seem more down the middle for. Forget about the extreme. Let's just talk about the handful of independents who can still be persuaded. I think I think that could be a good thing. But let's bring in somebody who actually knows what they're talking about. NBC News legal analyst Andrew Weissman. He's a former general counsel of the FBI and served as lead prosecutor in the Mueller special counsel's office. So, Andrew, you certainly know I have been bellowing for years now about how Donald Trump is above the law and he should be held. You should be accountable for for his crimes.

But I'm not catastrophizing over this appointment, first of all, because if it delays prosecution by a few weeks, I think the Justice Department will figure out a way to work itself around that and also let him litigate the executive privilege. I don't think he has it. And the Supreme Court may have to rule on that. But other than those two issues, what is what is the tragedy in this special master being appointed? OK, let me see if I can convince you. So let's first talk about something that you mentioned, which is sort of equal justice and that Donald Trump should not this to the law would just bore no resemblance to what happens every single day in federal and state investigations. No one else would be treated this way. And what's the harm other than there's opening the door to every defendant is going to

now ask for this, which is nobody wants to have a fast investigation. Everyone's going to want to delay an investigation. And any good defense lawyer is going to glom onto this decision and say, you know what, I want a special master appointed to review any document at all that I have an interest in. It doesn't work that way. You do have an opportunity to do that if you get indicted. And it really isn't going to be a question of a couple of weeks. It is unheard of for an Article 3 judge to enjoin a criminal investigation. Unheard of to do that. And here, with the defense, Donald Trump's defense now knowing that it can delay things, it's not just a question of appointing somebody and that special master will do their own independent review.

The defense is going to keep raising issues and wanting to litigate and take them to the special master and then take them to the district court judge and then take them to the 11th circuit. This really could open the door to months of litigation. And the precedent, as I said, is horrendous because no other defendant or putative defendant is given this kind of right. Well, if somebody's engaged in insider stock trading or some other white collar crime and their office is broken into or there are there's a search of their office or there's a search of their home. Isn't it a bit different than a former president whose premises is is searched,

legally searched by a warrant? I mean, these, you know, these are fairly extraordinary times. This is a fairly extraordinary case. And again, I'm you know, I my concern is that at the end of the day, Donald Trump is brought to justice. So if it is delayed, if there are procedural steps that are taken that makes it look like our democracy is bending over backwards, to be fair, what what what is the ultimate damage in this case? Does it make it less likely that the DOJ can actually prosecute a case against Donald Trump? I think the answer to that depends on how long this goes on. I think that is the answer. And I do think there's damage to the principle that nobody is above the law and everyone should be treated the same. Let me give you an example of how easy this issue is. In the special counsel investigation, when we did a search of Paul Manafort's home,

all of the documents were put in a room. We called up his defense counsel at a very reputable firm at the time, Wilmer Cutler. We invited them to look at the documents to flag anything that they thought was attorney-client privilege. We had the Taint team review those things. We worked it all out in a matter of days. If there were any disputes that could be brought to the judge, there was no need to enjoin us. There was no need for a special master. It all just sort of comes and goes, and there's a normal process for this. That's why what the judge did here just seemed so out of the ordinary. And I don't think it really helps with people's confidence if you have special rules for somebody.

It isn't the case that because you're the former president, you get more justice. You should get equal justice. You shouldn't be treated worse, but he shouldn't be treated better. So, Andrew, obviously, the precedent, you've made clear the danger there, but what's the potential this could be held up and for how long, given what we know about the types of documents this special master will be dealing with? So that is the big question that I think the Department of Justice is going to be wrestling with now is do they take an appeal because this is so legally wrong and sets this terrible precedent for other cases? Or do they think they can get through the special master process quickly enough that

it won't have any lasting damage, as Joe said, that, you know, so what? There'll be a special master. It shouldn't be done in other cases, but let's just get through it. But the real issue is, you know, you really can't read what the judge did here and have any confidence that she's going to be reasonable in the way that the special master process is going to work because the decision is, I mean, frankly, is just so off the wall, both in its legal analysis and even its recitation of the facts. It's not even handed. So I can see people of the department probably being very skeptical that this won't open the

door to really inordinate delay. So, Andrew, Judge Cannon will make the appointment of this special master. This is not an area that any of us has covered or our viewers have really been familiar with over the years. So what kind of person is a special master? Is it an attorney? Is it a is it a credible person? Is it somebody with experience or can they work with the Trump team and put the my pillow guy in or Rudy Giuliani or someone like that? That's another great question. So this now has to be somebody who both sides, according to the court, both sides agree on. I'm not sure that's going to happen.

It should be somebody who's got top secret clearance because the judge has allowed review of executive privilege documents, which is, again, unheard of. And it makes no sense because if there are executive privilege documents, it means that the documents belong to the archives, not to Donald Trump. And it's presumably somebody who has done this in the past. So, look, the ideal person would be a former judge who doesn't really show strong partisan leanings one way or the other. It's possible, but I think there's going to be a dispute over that issue of who's actually going to be the special master, which itself can cause delay. And if the person doesn't have clearance, that also is something that takes at least some time,

although it can be expedited. That also is not something that happens overnight. All right. NBC News legal analyst Andrew Weissman, thank you so much. It sounds actually like it might be somebody who may have been a former FISA court judge. They handle obviously secret documents, classified documents. But both sides have to agree. That's a bit of an issue. We'll see. I mean, it could be it could be difficult. We can we can only see Jonathan Lemire. Obviously, one of the challenges is going to be and there's a new wrinkle added to this is regarding executive privilege. The Biden administration has stated outright and believe they have precedent on their side that former presidents don't have executive privilege.

It's something Donald Trump is claiming. It's something that the judge is suggesting can be argued in court. What's what's how how big of a challenge is that going to be? Is that where we end up seeing that at the Supreme Court as well? It's certainly possible. The Biden administration has said throughout this process that they do not believe executive privilege applies to Donald Trump or any ex-president, president who's not in office. And certainly the fact that this judge took that into account yesterday raised some eyebrows in the legal community. And there really were howls of protests from legal experts, including some from both sides of the aisle, saying what an unusual step this was. And certainly from Andrew Weissman, we heard a little bit of that just now. The DOJ

now has the ability, they could try to appeal this ruling, but that of course would just slow things down further. There's no guarantee of success. As just noted, having to agree on the identity of a special master would slow things down potentially even further. And of course, the clock is ticking because we do have an election day coming up and the DOJ has its informal 60-day guideline where they're not supposed to do an act, an investigative act that would seem as being overtly political within 60 days of an election. Now, of course, we all remember James Coleman, the FBI defying that in 2016. We don't need to remind any Democrats of that. That was just 10 days out from that election when they reopened

the investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails. But while Trump is not on the ballot, there is a sense that people that I've talked to that he's going to be perceived as such because he is still the dominant figure in the Republican Party and that a prosecution of Trump would seen as being inflammatory one way or the other to the upcoming midterms. So that's another complication here as well. So this decision yesterday may almost ensure this delay will push anything, any decision from DOJ about a prosecution to well after the November midterms. Well, I will say, I've been I've been hearing quietly over the past couple of weeks the belief that and you've heard it, too, that that if if this if charges aren't brought before Donald Trump, before Labor Day, that it was never going to happen until after the election, because he is the dominant figure in the Republican Party. A prosecution against him after Labor Day of an election year is going to be seen as being highly politicized and people can be angry with that if they want to.

But that's always sort of been the general feeling. And even before the special master decision was made, people were saying they're going to wait most likely until after the election if they bring charges. Well, we'll be following this a lot more questions ahead. Still ahead on Morning Joe, we're going to have more from President Biden's Labor Day campaign stops in a pair of states that will be critical this November. Plus, a live report from London as Liz Truss prepares to take over as Britain's new prime minister today. NBC's Keir Simmons is standing by for us. And the latest from Ukraine amid new reporting this morning that Russia is buying millions of rockets and artillery shells from North Korea. Which is actually what you want to do. If you're in trouble, if your back's against the wall,

it doesn't matter what you're talking about. Buy North Korea. Also this morning, what we're learning about a mass stabbing attack in Canada. Police are still searching for one of the suspects. We'll have the latest. You're watching Morning Joe. We'll be right back. I treat myself with you, by your beauty. Send a load of New York City. 27 past the hour, Mississippi's capital is one step closer to restoring water service. Jackson officials on Sunday announced water pressure has returned to normal for most of the city's customers. One week after the city's main water plant failed. But officials warn it is still too early to say when reliable drinking water will be restored. The capital's boil water notice will continue until the city reports two rounds of clear water samples. Meanwhile,

the holiday weekend brought more flash flooding and severe weather to the Midwest and South, leading to at least one death and widespread damage. In Jefferson County, Indiana, nine inches of rain fell in just three hours on Saturday, causing deadly and destructive flash flooding. 64-year-old woman Linda Woods says she was trapped in her house and swept away by the fast-moving floodwaters, later finding her body about five miles downstream on Sunday. And in Georgia, the governor declared a state of emergency Sunday in Chattanooga and Floyd counties as two days of thunderstorms and heavy rain pounded the state's north. Up to 12 inches of rain fell in some areas, causing some creeks and streams to flood, damaging homes, businesses and cars. Willie, turning back to politics. Republican Senator Marco Rubio is downplaying the FBI search of Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago home.

Here's what Rubio said in an interview with NBC's affiliate in Miami on Sunday. This is really at its core, a storage argument that they're making, right? They're arguing there are documents there. They don't deny that he should have access to those documents, but they deny that they were not properly stored. I don't think a fight over storage of documents is worthy of what they've done. Marco Rubio speaking on Sunday, calling it a storage issue. Compare that to what Senator Rubio speaking on Sunday, calling it a storage issue. Compare that to what

Senator Rubio said about Hillary Clinton's handling of classified information. In July of 2016, Rubio released a statement saying, in part, there is simply no excuse for Hillary Clinton's decision to set up a home-cooked email system, which left sensitive and classified national security information vulnerable to theft and exploitation by America's enemies. He went on. Hillary Clinton's actions have sent the worst message to the millions of hardworking federal employees who hold security clearances and are expected to go to great lengths to secure sensitive government information and abide by the rules. They don't take their oaths lightly, and we should not expect any less of their leaders, said Marco Rubio, Joe, back in 2016. So you had Jared Kushner the other day calling this a paperwork issue.

Marco Rubio saying it's just a question of storage. They'll sort this out. You do wonder what is the line? Is there anything that Donald Trump could do that would make them not defend something that they never would defend under any other circumstance? Much better. I mean, there is no line. Of course, Marco Rubio

was running the Senate Intel Committee. And so you have you actually have Marco Rubio saying top secret documents are only at risk if they're mishandled by Democrats, top secret documents mishandled and actually taken, removed from a government office, removed from the White House, and illegally, improperly hidden at Mar-a-Lago, even after the FBI negotiates and tries to get them all back, it just doesn't matter. So again, is there any line? No, there's no line because we've seen actually that the Republicans are the fiercest defenders of cops until it serves their purposes to defend people that brutalize cops and beat them, to death with American flag to cause riots, to start riots, to participate in riots that end up ultimately, at least the families believe, being the result of the death of four cops. And so it doesn't matter to Republicans. No, it just doesn't matter. Top secret documents don't matter to Republicans. If defending Donald Trump comes in front of that, defending men and women in blue doesn't matter.

Defending law enforcement doesn't matter. The FBI doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter if if that stands in the way of defending a failed reality TV show host. And that's exactly where Marco Rubio is. And that extends to threats to FBI agents and their families, calling them the Gestapo, calling them wolves. You know, in past days, if a former president said something as horrific about the FBI as Donald Trump said this past weekend, you'd have the entire Republican Party coming out and condemning him. Instead, these people are all along for the ride. And here's the thing. They'll say horrible things about the FBI publicly and privately. They'll say horrible things about Donald Trump, which tells you, again, every institution is under attack. They'll they'll actually say they'll actually lie about government employees saying that they're coming to Iowa with AR-15s

that are going to knock down doors and kill Iowans. No backing down from Chuck Grassley, no backing down from the cable news hosts that said that government officials were coming to kill middle class Americans when they know it's a lie. It's radical. How do you deal? I don't even know. I don't even know how you would deal with somebody like Marco Rubio, who, again, is so outraged with Hillary Clinton when there's a possibility of mishandling of classified documents. This is why Joe Biden is talking about our democracy being at stake. Right. And then now it's it's it's a storage issue. No, it's not a storage issue. Nobody's ever believed it's a storage issue. Marco Rubio never believed it's a storage issue. If you take top secret documents out of a government building, Marco Rubio would be the

first person to say, like me in the past, you go to jail, you go to jail. So how do you deal with a party that actually reminds me? Kevin Williamson was right. This is this is the Republican Party's hippie moment. The hell with all the institutions, according to people like Marco Rubio, the hell with top secret documents, the hell with the FBI, the hell with the CIA, the hell with with with with the Justice Department, the hell with the rule of law. If any of that gets in the way of any of anything gets in the way of of actually institutions that actually make this country great and the rule of law, which makes this country great and constitutional norms that make this country great. People like Marco Rubio and unfortunately, too many other Republicans that I once knew are willing to just throw it away. And you know what? I don't I don't have to worry.

I don't have to worry about how I'm going to look in five years, because in five years, all of these people are going to be saying the same thing that I'm saying. You don't believe they are. And they're all going to write books, as I predicted, about how I won the war, how I made things a little less worse for America, by sucking up to anti-constitutionalists. I was in the game and I somehow made things a little bit worse for America. It doesn't sell. It didn't sell five years ago. It doesn't sell today. It won't sell five years from now when everybody will be saying what I'm saying right now, what we've been saying on this show for five years. Let's bring in right now, presidential historian, Rogers chairs of the American presidency at Vanderbilt University, John Meacham, he's an informal advisor to President Biden on historical matters and major speeches. John, you know, what is so bizarre to me, it's not the first time I've said it is that the modern conservative movement grew exponentially in response to left wing

radicals in the 1960s who were trying to destroy American institutions, who really didn't give a damn whether American institutions thrived or collapsed, said that most American institutions were corrupt. Now we have people like Marco Rubio who are basically doing the same thing. Donald Trump attacking the FBI viciously this past weekend. And no Republican will say a thing in defense. How do how? How do Democrats? How do major news networks? How exactly are you down the middle when you have one party that's actually defending the rule of law and constitutional norms and another party who says, well, if Donald Trump does it, doesn't matter. There is no such thing as top secret classified documents. If Donald Trump lies about an election't matter. There is no such thing as top secret classified documents.

If Donald Trump lies about an election, we have to play that down the middle. How do you play that down the middle? I don't think you can. You know, one of the problems we have in political life is there's an endless demand to have something to say. And by nature, there's a limited supply of things worth saying. And so I think that that shapes and warps a lot of what unfolds. You know, you and I've talked in the past about, and you just mentioned it, the portrait test, right? You know, if you're thinking someday, and particularly politicians love this because they can't imagine a world

where people aren't looking at their portrait. What are people going to say when they look at my portrait? So that's one way to sort of organize what you should do. There's actually another way, too, which is the alarm clock test. When the alarm clock goes off and you're getting up to start your day, what's the goal of that day? And don't worry, this is not a lifestyle segment. What's the goal of that day? Is it to, as Theodore Parker said, bend the arc of a moral universe toward justice? Or is it just to score points, create heat, attack your rivals and your foes whom you see as enemies, no matter what, no matter what reason says, no matter what the facts say, no matter what

your own conscience says, if that's your goal, then you get what we have now on the, you know, particularly on the center over to the right. And, you know, Bill Clinton had a favorite historian at Georgetown, Carol Quigley, who was a historian who had a theory about future. He called it future preference. And the argument was that in particular, democracies run not on getting if your alarm clock test is getting everything you want right now. It's actually about deferring your own interests for a given time so that you invest in the future. You know, we build bridges that will never cross because somebody else will. And it seems to me that if we don't have that sense, if we don't have a sense that maybe our own ambitions, maybe our own immediate gratification, our own need for reaction in political land, if that's the only thing that drives us, then that way madness lies. If we don't find some way to honor the American experiment, which was

however flawed, it gave the reason a chance to stand against ambition. And right now, passion's winning. Ambition's winning. Yeah. And, you know, Katty, I saw this weekend a lot of Republicans now want to change the Constitution. Think about it. The Republicans have dominated the Supreme Court, appointed six of the nine Supreme Court justices, despite losing seven of the last eight, seven of the last eight presidential election popular votes. Republicans have a disproportionate impact in the United States Senate and have for some time per vote because the way Senate seats are set up and they've gerrymandered the House to a point where it's almost unrecognizable. And these people are freaking out because they lose one presidential election. They justify a riot at the Capitol. They justify the stealing of top secret documents, all because they lost

one election. This this is a party that is is getting more extreme by the moment. And a party that is laser focused on how to cling on to power in a country where it is increasingly hard for them to win that popular vote and to cling on to power by putting into positions people who have the potential to influence the way the vote is held and then counted in 2024 and basically changed the system. John, you know, we are witnessing today in the UK, that country you like to deride for losing its empire, a peaceful transfer of power. Things are happening in a democracy as they should be happening.

Liz Truss will go and she will not quite kiss the hand of the Queen, but she will brush her lips against the back of the hand of the Queen. And the transfer of power will have taken place. And I wonder whether I look at the states at the queen, but she will brush her lips against the back of the hand of the queen and the transfer of power will have taken place. And I wonder whether I look at the states at the moment, whether actually the system is just not strong enough at this moment to get us to a place that Joe is talking about, where in five years time, people will look back on this as an anomaly and say, we were in that moment of madness and extremism, and look, we have got out of it. Because on so many fronts, the system is not working for democracy in this country.

You have a Supreme Court that is making major rulings that do not represent the will of the people. You have the gerrymander system that doesn't represent the will of people. You have people getting into positions of power that can change the system in their own state in order to affect the way that the vote is counting. The American public is not where the systems are, where the organs of government are. The organs of government are acting in a way that is much more extreme than where the majority of the American public is. So how do we get out of this moment so that we can get to a place where, as Joe is saying,

in five years' time, we look back and we say, wow, that was a moment of tension and conflict, but we got out of it. Yeah, I totally believe that this is a political and also a moral crisis. And I'm not preaching. It's not it's not a homily kind of moral point. The root of the word moral is about custom. It's about how we are with each other. And democracies, like the one that's working today across the Atlantic, democracies depend on not just adherence to the substance of law and tradition. But as Montesquieu said in a book that was hugely important to our framers, the spirit of the laws. And the thing about this is that we have to decide is my basic point. Americans have to decide that we are willing to defer getting exactly what we want whenever we want it and say that the Constitution is imperfect.

But right now it's what we have. And you you abide by it. Here's the thing that, you know, well, Katty, democracy is counterintuitive. Right. It's much more natural for human beings to slide into autocratic perpetual warfare because the human instinct is find a strong man that you're with whom you are in sympathy or enthralled by necessity. Stick with that strong man because he's going to fight your battles and defend your tribe. That's the state of nature is the war of all against all. And what Great Britain, what the United States, the great Anglo-American tradition, again, all the imperfections. The notion was that, in fact, we were able to give as well as take. And without deciding that we can give as well as take and obey rules that we don't like,

then we don't get out of the moment of madness. Yeah, you know, the church, evangelicals once believed that actually it was Jesus Christ that moved us beyond that. And now one televangelist after another, one TV preacher after another, one religious leader after another has decided that they'll do whatever it takes to win the culture wars and go back again to that horrific state. John Meacham, thank you so much. I greatly appreciate it. And Willie, I think the challenge actually for the media during this time is what I was just saying before. I mean, you have Donald Trump who's calling the FBI vicious monsters. You have Republicans that are calling the FBI are proud men and women who protect us every day. Wolves that want to eat and devour you. Republicans calling the Gestapo. How does the media exactly play that down the middle? Trumpists have always said, oh, the media is left wing and biased. No, it's not left wing and biased. They just love the Constitution of the United States. And by the way,

I salute what CNN is trying to do. They're trying to be more fair. They're trying to be more down the middle. I think that's a good thing. I think I think it's going to be hard for not only them, but for all of us to do our best. But again, when you have a former president calling the FBI vicious monsters, when you have Republicans calling them the Gestapo, when you have Republicans talking about defunding the FBI. Trump appointed head of the FBI. Yeah, Trump appointed head of the FBI. Exactly. How do we how do how do we play that down the middle? So Trumpists don't call us spies. There is no playing that down the middle, even for conservatives like me. If you believe in the FBI, if you believe in the rule of law, if you believe in constitutional

safeguards, there is no sort of, hey, let's kind of figure out what the middle is between constitutional norms and and and trying to defund the FBI. Yeah. And we saw that again with President Biden's speech last Thursday in Philadelphia, which his critics said was was too divisive and drew an equivalence with what Donald Trump has been doing for the for the last seven years. The difference is that Biden was talking about Donald Trump and his supporters and what they've done. And with Joe Biden, they're saying, yes, this is the same. This is what he said about MAGA Republicans. He was talking about a very specific group of Trump Republicans.

He was saying that what they're doing is undermining the democracy. And Donald Trump is objectively doing that. So you can call that equivalent or not. But this is obviously something that the media grapples with. But it's something that we're happy to grapple with, because the truth of the matter is you have mainstream Republicans, not conspiracy theorists and the dark corners of the internet, mainstream Republicans now talking about things like the IRS coming to kick down doors, like the FBI being corrupt, calling this a raid of Donald Trump's home. So these are different things without question, and it's on us to treat it fairly and to treat it the way it's going down. Let's bring in the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haass.

He's the author of the forthcoming book, The Bill of Obligations, The Ten Habits of Good Citizens. And, Joe, it has to be pointed out that Richard is going for either Sean Connery. Oh, my goodness. The most interesting man in the world, is another candidate. Or he said he prefers, I think you said Jeff Bridges. What do you think, Jeff? Fascinating. I think it's more of a Sean Connery thing. I think also he's just preparing a look.

His book comes out. He's got, of course, he's a saucier on the side. It's so airy, Josh. He's going to have real recipes for cooking. And he wants that look, Willie. He wants that look. It's working. Wouldn't you say, John, up close, it's working for him? Yeah, it was stunning.

I like it. It was stunning when he sat down. I'll freely admit it was stunning. But I think it works. I think it looks good. I think he should keep it. Now, are you on your way to a letterman or are we going to stop it right here? Right here? No letterman. No, no. Okay. All right. It's looking good, Richard. Let's get to your piece. Foreign Affairs Magazine turns 100 years old and Richard's got a new piece for the special

issue titled The Dangerous Decade, a foreign policy for a world in crisis. You write in part this, Richard, on the one hand, the world is witnessing the revival of some of the worst aspects of traditional geopolitics, great power competition, imperial ambitions, fights over resources. Today, Russia is headed by a tyrant, President Vladimir Putin, who longs to recreate a Russian sphere of influence, perhaps even a Russian empire. Putin is willing to do almost anything to achieve that goal. He is unable to act as he pleases because internal constraints on his regime have mostly disappeared. Meanwhile, under President Xi Jinping, China has embarked on a quest for regional and potentially

global primacy, putting itself on a trajectory that will lead to increased competition or even confrontation with the United States. Further complicating the picture is the reality that American democracy and political cohesion are at risk to a degree not seen since the middle of the 19th century. This matters, Richard writes, because the United States is not just one country among many. U.S. leadership has underpinned what order there has been in the world for the past 75 years and remains no less central today. The United States, riven internally, however, will become ever less willing and able to lead on the international stage. So, Richard, let's start with that last point about what everything we've been talking about this morning, the attempted undermining of democracy on so many different levels, what that means globally for our place in the world? Nothing good, Willie. First of all, no one around the world is going to wake up anymore trying to emulate us. And that's a change

for a long term. The vibrancy of our democracy, the strength of our economy was the envy of the world. Not so much. Foes see our divisions as a sign of weakness, something to exploit. I actually think it's one of the reasons Vladimir Putin thought he could get away with what he did in Ukraine. Our friends are nervous. There's no longer a presumption that we're there for them. I don't know who's going to be elected in a couple of years. None of us can now. But in the old days, we used to know that no matter who was elected, there was a presumption of continuity. Use a sports metaphor. The game took place within the 40 yard lines. Now we're playing it in the end zones. And if you're someone who's dependent on us for your for your security, that is not a comfortable situation.

So I think we're setting in motion a much more unstable world and we cannot insulate ourselves from it. Look at this summer's the hottest summer on record. Cling's like climate change. History tells us that, you know, 9-11, what happens in places like Afghanistan matters. So we can't insulate ourselves from the world. But what's going on here is going to make the world much less stable. So President Biden speaks about this a lot, Richard, right? The need for democracies to prove that they can still work or other countries may choose to follow another example. That would be in particular China. Now, there's some reports in recent days that there had been an expectation that China would surpass the U.S. as the world's number one economy. That now has been delayed. There's some thought it could have been by the end of the decade. Now it's delayed. It may never happen. China has

obviously been struggling itself on many fronts in recent days. But talk to us about how in this age of uncertainty, that competition between the two superpowers, how is that going to shape the future? Well, everything you said is true. China's demography is shrinking. China's now what, 1.3 billion? It's going to fall under a billion long before this century ends. Its economy, rather than growing double digits, is now maybe growing 2% at most. What worries me is in this slowdown, in these signs of weakness, all their health and environmental and demographic problems, Xi Jinping or one of his successors may turn to nationalism, what they call the rejuvenation of China, i.e. bringing Taiwan into the fold. And that's what worries me, that a China that's both stronger than it was,

but not as strong as it wants to be and is worried about the future, might see nationalism, might see a more aggressive foreign policy as the way to legitimize a political leadership that could no longer turn to a successful economy to justify its existence. So I think we're in for a very difficult phase of U.S.-Chinese competition. At the same time, we still have to deal with Vladimir Putin. Same time, we need to deal with Iran and its nuclear ambitions. At the same time, we've got things like climate change, like problems with cyber. So this combination, Jonathan, I've never seen anything like it. It's a toxic mix of geopolitics, global challenges, seen anything like it. It's a toxic mix of geopolitics,

global challenges, and the United States. It's a war with itself that if you're not worried, you're not paying attention. Richard, I remember having a conversation with former Defense Secretary Bob Gates back in about 2009, 2010. And he laid out, you know, the three big national security challenges to the U.S. being a rising China, a declining Russia and America itself, the divided politics. And he was actually presaging a lot of what you've said. So what is it that's tipped America into this position that you think is kind of untenable in terms of its role leading the rest of the world? If somebody 14 years ago was already saying this was a problem. What's the difference now? Why has it got so much worse? Well, to begin with, the Russian and Chinese challenges have reached a new stage,

much more acute than they were. It's not just a possibility, it's reality. Second of all, the gap between global challenges and global responses is large and growing. We see it every day on climate. We see it on cyber. Increasingly, we're seeing it on nuclear proliferation. And that worries me. We saw it on health, the inadequate response on COVID. And then the situation here is deteriorated and that we can't deny. And again, everything this show has been about, not just this morning, but for the last several years. We're not yet, we're not, the worst, none of us can sit here confidently and say the worst is behind us. It's quite possible

that it's not. And we're not debating foreign policy much in this country, but everything that goes on here, the distraction, the division, has implications for our foreign policy. And whatever it is we do or don't do has tremendous implications for the world, which in turn has implications for our foreign policy. And whatever it is we do or don't do has tremendous implications for the world, which in turn has implications for us. So, yeah, I think this is actually the most dangerous moment, even if, again, using what John Meechum said, when people get up and they hear the alarm clock, they're not thinking about foreign policy. But we may not be focusing on the world, but the world's not going to forget us. And this is all going to have this is all going to have, I think, profound consequences for the United States. Richard Haass, thank you very much. The new piece is in the 100th anniversary issue of Foreign Affairs. You can also see him. A lot of my dad's

pieces in there on Celebrity Jeopardy. Oh, yes. He looks so intelligent And air you die. Professor. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you as well. Coming up, students in Uvalde, Texas, are waking up for their first day of school since the massacre at Rob Elementary. We'll look into the changes in place for the new school year and why some parents say the state and district have not done enough. Also ahead, the latest on the kidnapping of a teacher in Memphis, Tennessee, and the discovery minutes away from where she was abducted. And a little later in the conversation, the impact of social media. One of our next guests says the platforms that are meant to connect us are tearing us apart. Who's surprised? You're watching Morning Joe. We'll be right back.