Morning Joe - Trump's 'socialism' and the waiting game with the Blanche nomination

Episode Date: July 31, 2026

July 31, 2026 - 6am: Joe criticizes Trump's 'socialism' after Commerce Dept. takes equity stakes in 7 private companies Trump suggests pulling Blanche nomination amid GOP standoff The U.S. economy slowed in the second quarter amid continued concern over inflation Saudis form military coalition to deter Red Sea attacks MS NOW: Trump claims agreement reached for Hamas disarmament Iran war expands to Saudi Arabia, Egypt as strikes resume Major hurdles remain in Gaza ceasefire plan Jay Clayton still hasn't taken office as DNI NFL Training Camp round-up To listen to this show and other MS podcasts without ads, sign up for MS NOW Premium on Apple Podcasts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Todd Blanche is negotiating in good faith, but it's clear that the approval to get this done is above his pay grade, and we just need to get to that pay grade. I don't believe it's the president. Who is it, though? Well, I don't operate that way. Right now, I hope y'all never know who it is. But we don't get it solved. I mean, we've heard from them. It's just that they refuse to commit to writing what he testified to under oath. and it's not a big ass. We're trying to help them get this solved, but they refuse it, accept ours for help.

All right, the two Republican senators who are holding up Todd Blanche's nomination for Attorney General continue to stand firm on their demands from the Department of Justice. We'll bring you the latest on that back and forth, as well as President Trump's response. Demand. All they're asking. What are they asking? It's pretty simple. Give us an assurance that you're not going to help Donald Trump rig all future IRS dealings with his family and himself.

They're asking for immunity from the IRS and something that could save them hundreds of millions of dollars. And so Todd Blanche says, oh, yeah, we'll do this. But the White House refuses to let him put it in writing. Definitely not how it's supposed to work. Everything about this is so corrupt. Everything about this administration is so corrupt. It's just extraordinary. And here you have two guys that are about to leave office.

And they're just saying put it in writing that you're not going to have this corrupt sleazy deal. And they won't do it. Meanwhile, despite the Senate confirming Jay Clayton to serve as Director of National Intelligence earlier this week, he still hasn't officially taken office, leaving Trump loyalist Bill Pulte in the position for now. We're going to dig into the concerns that Pulte may stay involved with the Intel community. Also ahead, we'll go through new polling out of Texas that shows Attorney General Ken Paxton, trailing by a wide margin in a key demographic ahead of the midterms. Smart people?

Yeah, and will they be afraid to vote? That maybe should be the key demographic. Right. Yeah. Good morning and welcome to Morning, Joe. It is Friday, July 31st. That makes me sad. I wish it we were Monday all over again so we could do this five days in a little and get no sleep. That's what you said when you woke up. I was like, darn. It's Friday.

With us, we have the co-host of our 8-m. Hour staff writer at the Atlantic. Jonathan Lemire, President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haas. He's author of the Substack, Home and Away. You know, he's got that special, I just turned 49 Shee. I know. I know he's glowing. Yeah, okay. Wow, we're just all over the place here. I'm so confused. CEO and founder of Axis Jim Vandahai is with us. White House reporter for Axis Mark Caputo is with us.

And senior MS now, senior national security reporter, David Rode joins us with his reporting this morning. So we begin. Yeah. May I? Oh, wow. Let's start with the socialists that nobody's talking about. Okay, we can do that. But everybody should be talking about because socialists are taking over some of the most important companies in America's economy.

The Department of Commerce is taking equity stakes in seven companies developing semiconductor technologies for artificial intelligence and advanced computing systems. Also known as socialism. announced yesterday that it would designate more than $870 million in, federal incentives under the Chips and Science Act in exchange for minor equity stakes in those companies. This practice has drawn criticism from lawmakers, including some Republicans like Senator Todd Young, who has said the Chips Act was never intended to let the federal government take major stakes in private companies. Richard House, this is socialism. This is pre-Fatcher-style socialism and the great irony.

you have Republicans, small government Republicans running up the biggest deficits, the biggest debt ever, crippling this country, not future generations. They're going to cripple this generation with the biggest budgets ever, the biggest spending ever, the biggest socialized schemes ever. And now you have these same Republicans, Trump socialism schemes spread as Republicans seize control of seven more private companies I wrote yesterday. This is a policy that poisoned pre-Thatcher Britain, that Republicans keep spreading socialism across the tech sector businesses is deeply disturbing. So too are the record deficits in debt. Richard, they point at a radical fringe group in the Democratic Party and claim, oh, this is what Democrats are doing, they're

socialists. And yet, you actually have Republicans practicing socialism. First, they practice socialism with Intel. Then they practice socialism by forcing other companies to do business with the federal government or else they're going to get cut out. And now the same thing here. Oh, yeah, you can be involved in the Chips Act, but you've got to engage in a little act of socialism with us and let us take over stakes in your company. This is outrageous. Every Republican, every Democrat, every small government, conservative should be against this. Yeah, what it does, Joe, more than anything, is it just underscores that today's Republican Party has ceased to be a conservative party.

Everything it is doing is antithetical to the principles of Thatcher, of Reagan, Hayek, you name it. This is Milton Freeman. This is not a conservative part anymore. The whole idea of government was to be minimal to simply set the context through its, the private sector would do its thing. And instead, the government is essentially making the private sector a quasi-public sector. And history suggests it's expensive, it's inefficient, it's bad for the economy, it's bad for democracy, it leads to corruption, it leads to inefficiency. And yet we're doing it and there's no pushback. So again, again, we don't have a conservative party. We have a

populist party. We have a personalist party. And this is an experience. of it. An extortionist party, Jim Van Dy, going to these companies and basically saying, yeah, the government will let you do this,

let you do that, but you're going to have to let us take over stakes in your company. I mean, this, again, this is what Britain was doing, and it collapsed economically. Then Thatcher came in

and privatized all of these companies that socialists had nationalized. Here's Donald Trump, nationalizing large parts of the tech sector. Yeah, I mean, he's so impatient with the legislative process that he doesn't want to do the things that you could do to incentivize investment in sectors.

There is a logic that sits behind it. I'm not defending investing in individual companies, but if you look at the production of artificial intelligence, there's all kinds of materials that flow into it where China has a massive advantage on us. They're really expensive and really hard companies to get off the ground. And so there is some wisdom in trying to figure out how do you incentivize, incentivize investors and companies to get into these spaces that will have or already have a national security implication for the country. But the minute that you put money into a specific company,

you now have a conflict of interest between the government and that market. And that's where it runs flat into the face of conservatism because you really aren't going to give favoritism to the companies that we now have an investment in and that the taxpayers are going to get a benefit from. It might feel good in the short term. But now you're freezing out competition from investment in other companies in the same space? What have conservatives like myself said forever about this? The government should not pick winners and losers. The government should allow everybody an equal opportunity for their small business,

for their startup, for their company to succeed. But Republicans, in the most socialist of ways, are picking winners and losers now. So another story we're following this morning. President Trump is suggesting that he may temporarily withdraw Todd Blanche's nomination for Attorney General amid a standoff with two Republican senators. The president posting on social media that he's essentially willing to wait until Republican senators John Cornyn and Tom Tillis are out of office next year. Cornyn and Tillis have said they will not vote to advance Blanche's nomination over the president's lawsuits. settlement with the IRS giving Trump and his family tax audit immunity as well as the 1.776 billion. That's that's that's that's that's that's that's Jonathan Lemire. Donald Trump is saying I will throw my attorney general nominee overboard if my family and I can't get immunity from the IRS.

the likes of which nobody else in America has. So what he's saying is, we want to live, the Trump family wants to live by separate rules regarding the IRS than any other family in America, any other family on the planet. And he's willing to not have an acting attorney general,

active attorney general, to do that. I mean, this is something, by the way, That's not just unpopular with Democrats. This is unpopular with Republicans. Yeah. And when this deal was first announced some weeks back, it was the weaponization fund that got most of the attention. And look, that's outrageous, too, the fact that January 6 felons may benefit from this.

But it's interesting in recent weeks on the hill anyway. Republicans are more upset about this IRS component of it. Because for exactly what you just said, it's an Trump exceptionalism. And no one else would benefit from this. This is an unprecedented fashion. And look, Trump is. is obviously upset. It's very clear.

He's made clear what his priorities are. He prioritizes the fund and the IRS protections over installing Todd Blanche as permanent attorney general. Now, yes,

look, Blanche can stay in the acting role for a while. So maybe in the short term, it's not that big of a deal. Trump floating there that he could just renominate Blanche, you know,

after January, when Corny and Tillis are no longer there. But the problem with that plan, of course, is we have no idea what the Senate's going to look like come January. The Republicans may have a smaller margin or perhaps be in the minority,

and also reporting I've done on the Hill and others as well, the objections to this deal are not just Cornyn and Tillis. There are other Republican senators who are very anxious about it, too. There's no guarantee that as long as Blanche doesn't put this in writing, as long as he doesn't officially memorialize this will never happen, there's no guarantee he'll get voted in his attorney general. But right now, of course, the focus is on Tillin and Corny. MS. Now's Allie Vitale, the host of Wait Too Early,

caught up with Corny yesterday on Capitol Hill. Have you talked to the president? No. Would a call from him help? Yeah, he could fix this in a minute. But I don't know whether who he's listening to or whether he's motivated to do that. This is about making sure that even if you're the president of the United States, you don't get favorable terms from the government in a settlement of a lawsuit

that ordinary citizens would not get, like protection from audits, by the IRS into the foreseeable future. And David Road, Cornyn himself said that the objections run much deeper in the Republican Party. It's not just limited to Cornyn and Tillis. In fact, there's his tweet right there. POTIS is mistaken if he believes concerns on divisions in his tax lawsuit settlement are limited to me and Senator Tillis. There have not been many moments where Republicans are willing to defy President Trump in this term,

but they've drawn a line on this one. And you see a shift. And it's self-healing, it's corrupt. but it's just basic competence. Again, the president chose to back Ken Paxson, Texas, alienating coronin. He turned on Tom Tillis, and now they're using their constitutional right to push back from what's unquestionably another corrupt deal. So on so many fronts, the president and his team think they can do whatever they want and they're going to do it better than anyone has in the past. But on all, we'll talk about the war later and other things, his plans and efforts are just failing.

Yeah, Mark Caputo. I mean, this is, as I've been said, this is self-tebris. dealing. This is corruption. This is also something I've never seen in my life. This is one politician saying, my family and I are going to get protected status, are going to get immunity from IRS audits now and in the future, just because we want them. And along with that, along with that was also the fund where they were going to pay people who beat the shit out of cops on January the 6th. Good luck getting that through as well. But taken together, this is just another example of one of these things that are just so toxic politically for Republicans that they can't even believe they're having to deal with this a couple of months before a midterm.

Right. And what they're seeing, what you're really hearing out of the Republican Senate is that the president and what you're hearing out of the White House is they have just sort of a broken relationship, setting this aside, which is sort of a major issue, right? The president just keeps insisting that the Senate scrapped the filibuster. They won't do it, and that makes him angry. He insists they passed this Save Act concerning voter fraud and voter ID, and they won't do that, and that makes him more angry. And the Senate and Congress, more generally, wanted the government to release all the Epstein files, and it now appears that there are not. of documents that the administration has not released and won't release. And there's now a lawsuit

over that. The president won't do that. And that makes a more. You say, you say a number of documents, Mark, isn't that like in the thousands? Thousands, yes. How many docks? Yeah, thousands and thousands of Epstein documents that the White House continues to cover up, thousands and thousands of Epstein documents that if you read regime change, actually Todd Blanche was at the center of that cover-up in that situation room meeting on trying to actually, I would say, break the law that Congress passed to stop from having to release a statement. So how does, maybe you can explain this to me, because I'm just a simple country lawyer. How is it that Congress passes a law that says the Justice Department has to release all the Epstein files and they just completely stop releasing the

Epstein files? It's an interesting conversation when you have with DOJ and senior officials there. they, when you ask that very basic question, their answer is, well, we don't have to release these. And they say that they're shielded from privilege. And when you point out, the law actually specifically exempts that. Congress passed the law. Right. When you point that out to them, they then just sort of repeat, well, we don't have to release it. So, I mean, taken to its extreme, what you see generally in Trump's mind is his belief that, as he's told in New York Times a number of months ago, that the only check on him is his own morality.

I mean, constitutionally speaking, the check on any president is the impeachment and removal process. Trump, having been subject to that twice in his first term, understands that takes 67 votes in the Senate, and it's not going to happen to be removed. So there are times where he's just going to draw a line in the sand and just say, well, make me, enforce me. And so you're seeing that in a number of these cases. One of the questions that they do have in both the White House and in Congress is as the continuing resolution to fund the government starts to come up and as the United States government needs to pay its bills, is the president going to go along with that and help the process? Or is he going to say, well, you're not going to pass the Save Act, which I want, or do these other things that I want, and I'm going to basically hold this hostage and essentially have the government shut down. This is during an election year where his party is really sort of on the ropes. as we're about to discuss this polling in Texas, for instance.

And the president so far and his advisors don't really know what he's going to do. And it creates an incredibly challenging situation. All right. We have a lot more to get to on this Friday morning. Still ahead on morning, Joe. We'll have the latest from the Middle East as Iran launches new attacks on U.S. assets in Kuwait and Bahrain. Plus, Georgia's Republican Senate nominee, Congressman, Mike Collins walks out of an event after refusing to answer questions about his son-in-laws,

alleged ties to white nationalism. And talking about son-in-laws are former son-in-laws. I mean, what's happening with Marino's son-in-law, former son-in-law, whatever, is just absolutely extraordinary and outrageous. I'll show you that moment I talked about it and what Senator John Ossoff is saying about it. And as we go to break, a look at the Travelers forecast this morning from Accuweather's Bernie Raynow. Bernie, how's it looking? Mika, still a spoty shower or two today in Portland and Boston.

You're actually with a forecast. Also calling for a stray shower this afternoon in New York City. But Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, look great. Rain, Green Bay, Chicago, late today, strong thunderstorms late this afternoon in St. Louis. I'd be careful about storms in Florida this afternoon. plenty of heat in Dallas. If you're doing any traveling, not many delays today,

although I would be worried about Tampa and Orlando this afternoon. To help you make the best decisions and be more in the know, download the Accuether app today. Enjoy your weekend. Look for the second quarter of 2026 to be amazing

as all this money comes back into the economy from this big, beautiful bill, which really takes care of Americans. Finally, the president has the power to take care of Americans. actually in the White House cares about the real people. Oh my God. Thank God. Thank God. Thank God. The big beautiful bill. What did they say to us?

They said, you pass this big beautiful bill that gives billionaires tax cuts. They give multinational corporations tax cuts. And you are going to have Lamere. You are going to have an economy. Let's start a war. And we're going to start a war. And we're going to rev up. tariffs and we're going to freak out the Fed. But what you do, if you do all of this stuff, then the economy is going to grow at an extraordinary rate of 1.5%. Yeah. There was that prediction last December from Howard Lutnik, Congress Secretary. The economy is bad. On Fox News. It keeps slowing down. It just keeps slowing down, Lemire. Like, what's what's going on? What's the White House? What's Lutnik going to say today. Wait until next

year? They keep moving the goalpost, Joe. Howard Lutlander clearly missed that one. They've had to acknowledge a few times now that, oh, the boom, we're going to get the golden era, the tariff that might's coming in. Later. Well, it hasn't come close

just yet. In fact, the country's gross domestic product, which is a broad measure of goods and services increased by, as Joe just said, 1.5% in the second quarter. That's down from economists' predictions of 1.1 and from the first quarter, which it grew at 2.1%. Inflation in the form of higher gas prices amid the ongoing war in Iran is keeping grocery

prices and airfares persistently high. And that's just it, Joe. When Howard Lillac went on Fox in December and made that bullish prediction, he apparently did not account for the idea that the U.S. would be engaging in a war in the Middle East and that gas prices and many other things would surge as a result. Yeah, and, you know, the real problem here, Jim Vanda High, is just the fact that, again, you have so many pressures on this economy, so much pressure on this economy. You've got the war, obviously, that is causing consistent problems. And then as the president's trying to get the Fed to lower interest rates, he does exactly what the Fed has told him not to do and what every economist has told him not to do that is respectable and understands. inflationary pressures, and he's going on another round of raising tariffs. Again, this is,

this is so self-defeating for the president. It's kind of shocking, actually, that the guy that wants his party to win in the midterms keeps doing all these things that put drags on the economy. In some ways, it's the natural conclusion of surrounding yourself with people who keep just saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, do whatever you want to do. And you take it back to what you're talking about earlier in the Senate. Imagine for a moment that you're John Thune. You've known him forever. He's the Senate leader in terms of politicians. He's kind of a normal guy. And he's sitting there running the Senate. He's being asked to do the Safe Act, which he thinks is bad policy. He's having to deal with this nomination and this IRS issue, which deep down he knows is corrupt. He's got John

Cornyn leading the charge because he should be running for reelection in Texas and easily winning a Senate seat that would allow John Thune to remain majority leader. And by the way, he would love for the president to be talking about not doing tariffs and doing something to juice the economy when he's looking at poll after poll after poll after poll in red states showing Republican candidates losing. Like the amount of pain that Trump puts these people through and the fact that they don't just burst is astonishing. But that economy, that's all that. That's all that matters. You look at those numbers. It's not just that Trump is at 32 or 33 or 34 favorable ratings. He's getting crushed on inflation, on the economy, on people feeling like things are going to get

better, people feeling like things are good in their life. By a lot of these measures, it's not a good time to be anything other than super rich. People aren't traveling that much. Mortgage rates yesterday hit the satanic level of 6.66 percent. That's not good. That's the highest point in the last year. Things cost more. So that's not, I don't think any Republican wants that, but I don't think Trump cares what the other Republicans want. You know, it's a really bad sign when you call your banker and say, what are mortgage rates at? And they answer, I am Legion. Six, six, six. It's not good.

It's not good at all. And speaking of not good at all, you can tell me again, what did the economy grow by last quarter? 1.5%. Oh, my God. That is not good at all. I'll get it close to our stagflation. That was good. That was pretty good. No, it's getting, yeah, I mean, you, you were around Richard in the 1920s.

No, in the 1970s, we had stackflation, man, and that's where you're getting it from both sides. And again, what's crazy. Hold on, Richard just turned 40. Richard's birthday. Yeah. Exactly. So, Richard, so, yeah, stagflation is, you're getting it from all sides. And that's exactly what you like that. With Carter, you have high inflation, you have slow growth. And what's crazy about this is that this is all, like, politician made. This is policy made. You look at the policy. You look at the policy since the beginning of 2025.

And I know he's been surrounded by yes men and yes women saying, Mr. President, you're just the greatest president of all time. Please, please. I know you put the horses in gold. Could you like make me like the lady in gold finger and make me in gold too? But it's just not working. These policies are being ruinous. And it's working Americans who are suffering the most.

As Jim said, if you're a billionaire, These are gravy days for you, but if you're working Americans, you're getting it from all sides. No, exactly. And the parallel is to stagflation. Thank God, the rates now aren't as high as they were in Carter, but they're high. And it really slows down housing. It slows down business growth. I think we have a really bad combination coming.

If you've got inflation, you've got potential joblessness because of technology, AI, in particular. you've got, you know, what's going on with the war. This is a bad commission. And then I think it also reflects, and maybe Jim was getting at this, you don't have any place in this administration where people sit down and put it all together because you don't have any process. And you don't have anybody saying, hold it. If you do this with tariffs and this with the war, it's going to make it impossible for the new Fed chair

to do what you wanted to do, which is to lower rates. Indeed, the rumors going around are the pressure-mortar raise rates. several members of the Fed wanted to do just that. So the president, again, gets in his own way. And there's no way this administration ever looks at things in the hole. But you've got a hub and spoke. And the president's the hub. Everybody else has spoke.

And there's no integration of policy. He's a sharp young. Yes, he is. In just a moment, we're going to get the very latest on the war in Iran. There are new developments to report. Of course, the war is the reason the gas prices are up. is up. And also, which D&I is going to show up at the cabinet meeting today? David Rhodes will have his reporting on that. We'll be back in just a moment. I'm betting the guy that goes

around with a foam, board things and shows up to the president. 36 past the hour, Saudi Arabia is launching a new military coalition to protect shipping in the Red Sea. As attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels threaten one of the Saudi's most important oil export routes, Saudi officials say about 50 countries have been invited to join the effort with 14 nations, including Turkey, Egypt, and Pakistan, already pledging support. The coalition will focus on intelligence sharing, joint training, and maritime operations to safeguard global trade. This comes, as Iran says, it's launched drone strikes targeting U.S. military facilities in Kuwait, though there's been no immediate confirmation from U.S. officials.

U.S. Central Command said yesterday it completed another wave of strikes on sites in Iran, including command centers, as well as missile and drone facilities. So, Richard, this is really the week that this war has expanded. It has become, in earnest, a regional war with attacks even down in Egypt, which I think so first. Where are we right now? No, exactly that. The U.S. basically wanted to wind things down. We were sending out diplomatic signals, but if it takes one to start a war, it takes two or even three to end it, and the Iranians are showing no interest in ending it right now. They're expanding their attacks on some of the neighbors. The Houthis, who they heavily influence and support, are making it impossible for the Saudis to use the alternative route through the Red Sea, the Bab al-Mandab. So that's where we stand is the war keeps going.

It's not all out show. You don't have massive attacks on the energy or water infrastructure, the neighbors. We're not attacking Iran's energy infrastructure. There's a kind of mutual assured destruction not to do that. But otherwise, diplomacy is stalled, and things just continue. And the strait is barely, the strait of Hormuzes is barely open, which explains, again, my energy prices and other prices are as high as they are. Mark Caputo, what are you hearing on the Hill from Republicans who obviously want this war over as quickly as possible?

They can't get any clarity on what Trump wants to do, and that's because Trump isn't quite sure what to do. In the press conference the other day in the Oval Office, I had an opportunity to ask the president. It seemed like a basic question, but the reason for it was I want to understand sort of his thinking going forward, which was, are you going to hit back every time Iran strikes United States assets? And he said yes. And the reason I think that's significant is that Iran, to Richard's point, doesn't show much of an interest in wanting this to end. And so they have shown, they've demonstrated that they're periodically going to strike out at the United States, probably knowing that the U.S. will hit back and it will just keep the U.S. there. The best guess of people in the White House and in the administration, and everyone has to

guess, is that this is just sort of a prolonged, no longer really a Cold War, sort of a lukewarm war of tit-for-tat reprisals, maybe some peace talks in the back or, you know, ceasefire talks in the back, more tit-for-tat reprisals, and it just continues on. There's a phrase that is really popular in Israel called, like, mow the grass or mow the lawn, or they would sort of periodically strike out at Hezbollah or at Hamas and use their military, the Israelis, to severely degrade their opponents. And there's a sense that the United States is sort of taken on this idea in Iran itself, which is there's just going to be this periodic mowing of the lawn, periodic bombing, periodic attacking to keep their weapon systems as degraded as possible. But that doesn't mean

that there's a durable peace that is foreseeable, at least not right now. So David wrote elsewhere in the Middle East, President Trump last night announced that the Board of Peace has reached an agreement for Hamas to disarm in Gaza. They assist the taken number of weeks. We should note Hamas themselves have not confirmed that they've agreed to this. Some Israeli officials have already expressed real skepticism. I know you were briefed by the White House last night. Talk to us about what we know. So the U.S. officials and Board of Peace officials on this phone call, the reporters were much clearer than the president. This isn't an agreement. It's a pathway, a framework. And it's unclear if Hamas is going to agree to this. And then Israel, I mean, look at the timing.

You had BB Net Yahoo in the Oval Office. If BB and Israel was going to agree to this, you would do it with the president at his side. They're not going to agree to it when we push them with questions, the reporters on the phone. There's no framework for when Israeli forces will withdraw. And even the speakers from the administration were honest about it. It's a series of steps. So this, you know, will come together. Look, I hope this magically works where Hamas is going to agree to completely disarm. They haven't done this for decades. They carried out this horrific attack on October 7th. And I've just back to basic competence. And I can't resist to the nerdy factoid. Again, a Saudi-led naval coalition is going to solve this disastrous war in the Middle East.

Saudi Arabia is not one of the world's leading naval powers. I checked they have a 16 ships, they're pretty small frigates. Eight of the 16 are more than 40 years old. That makes them obsolete. So yet again, it's just sort of talking points and strategies and policies that just don't make sense, whether we're talking about tariffs and inflation, this war of choice in Iran. Things just keep getting worse, it seems, for the president. Yeah. I think the White House would probably be pleased, though, the Saudis getting engaged finally, they'd been reluctant at the beginning to do this. And Jim Vanda High, it's interesting, the Associated Press just reporting this morning

that a Hamas official has actually confirmed that they are all in on this agreement, that they're going along with it. I think the real question, if you talk to the people that are inside and negotiating this deal, they say that Israelis are going to go along with it, but obviously very nervous right now. very nervous for domestic political reasons. They don't want to be seen as retreating from Gaza or going along with Hamas. So that is going to be with AP reporting Hamas official is now said we're in. That's the next step.

And I think that's going to be the biggest step to see if Netanyahu's government will come forward and do the same. Yeah. I don't think Hamas are like men of great trust in faith. So then I'm saying that they're going to back it. I don't know how much credibility we should put into that. It'd be great if they can resolve this. This is one of the hardest things to resolve on the planet. So God bless him if they can.

I think it's obviously a hell of a lot more complicated than what they're talking about. I think the bigger issue is we have to come to grips with there might not be a way out of Iran. I don't see any incentive whatsoever for the Iranians to give on anything ever. If they're reading our newspapers, they now know, and they are reading. them, they know that we've depleted a big chunk of our missiles and of the military equipment that they need. They know that Donald Trump doesn't want to be there. They've had their economy blown to smithereens. They've got nothing else to lose. So they have every incentive to hold on to that straight like it's a nuclear weapon, because it is their strength now.

And I have not heard a plausible path from any official around Trump in my military. months that paints a picture of how we ever get out of this big hot mess. And it was a mess of our own making. And it was a mess where the President of the United States was worn by his vice president and by a lot of people around the table that this was the exact outcome that you were going to have. So when people are mad, they probably should be mad. When people think that this is not going to change, they should probably think that because there's not a clear path. And when there's not a clear path. You're going to continue to have high gas prices. You're going to continue to have instability in the Middle East. When you have those two things, you're going to

continue to have an economy that can't do anything like Howard Lucknick talked about in December. Yeah, you know, Richard Haas, I said yesterday or the day before, this is one of the first wars, one of the first crises in my adult lifetime, 32 years being in Congress and covering this stuff in news that I've seen an issue like this, and this large, it seems so intractable. There are no good answers. And the leverage right now that the Iranians have are twofold. One, they know we are not going to put boots on the ground, that we can only shoot from the sky.

And because, you know, they know that because there's not the will to do that in America. Most Americans don't even want to be over there, let alone putting boots on the ground. But that is a known known by the Iranians that the Americans almost certainly will not put boots on the ground. So why do we have to do anything more than what we're doing right now? And number two, Donald Trump has an election coming up in November that he cares very much about. And they're thinking this is the exact position we had Jimmy Carter in in 1980 when he was running against Ronald Reagan. It's extraordinary leverage for the Iranians. And given those two realities, I remain with Jim.

I don't see a way out of this unless it's a way where we just, it's an abject surrender to the Iranians. And I don't see Donald Trump doing that. I think you're probably right. The Iranians have got enough of an economic cushion in part because we allowed them to sell some oil at various times during this crisis, which was a colossal mistake. The only real leverage on them is their economy. and they're feeling some economic pressure, obviously not enough. So this will probably stretch on for some time, and we can do whatever we want militarily,

but it's not going to turn them around. On the other issue, by the way, just very quickly, I was involved in Northern Ireland, Joe, with the whole idea of decommissioning and getting the IRA and the other militias to give up their weapons. This is not going to happen. Hamas can give up a couple of rifles and say they're giving up equipment, but the idea that they're going to completely disarm,

and then the Israelis are going to completely withdraw. from Gaza, if you believe in that, I mean, that's fairy tale stuff. So the administration is great forward. I understand that, Richard. I understand that, but a lot of people were saying that about Northern Ireland. The IRA was never going to give up their weapons. Even 25, 26, 27 years later, still seems like a miracle that they did. Big difference, though, which was in Northern Ireland, the IRA was given a diplomatic path. There is no diplomatic path. There is no diplomatic path that has seriously been put forward to Palestinians in either Gaza or in or in the West Bank. Plus, the agenda of Hamas is far more radical than the agenda of Sinn Féin ever was.

Hamas still doesn't accept a Jewish state. So again, I just think the situations are sufficiently different that I just don't, I just don't see it happen. But more than anything, Israel has to offer an alternative politically and diplomatically. So Palestinians are someone to turn to, other than people who think they can kill their way to a Palestinian state. Israel has not done that. This is the work of a generation. So, David, at a time of war, there's real questions right now as to who is leading the U.S. intelligence community, the post of DNI.

And, look, Jay Clayton was confirmed a couple of days ago. So he should be the answer. But yet, he has not taken, he's not been sworn in yet. Bill Pulte is saying he wants to stay in the role for a while. There's going to be a cabinet meeting today up at Camp, David. Who's sitting in the DNI chair? I went into the White House yesterday with that question, and actually well-meaning sort of junior staff there were said, we don't know and we'll try to find out. No answer. So it's just extraordinary. And you've got, I've got baffled senators I spoke to as well. Senator Mark Warner is like, the Senate confirmed him as the director of national intelligence. Senate Republicans, you know, went out on a limb and after that terrible performance by Clayton before when he wouldn't say Joe Biden won the election, they confirm him. And I just. Again, it's the president himself.

Why hasn't he taken the seat? And we're at war with Iran as a dangerous moment for the country. And just back to Pulte. Bill Pulte is the head of the top federal mortgage agency in the country. He's 38 years old. He has no intelligence experience. And his most impressive skill seems to have been getting close to the president. And most importantly, helping the president dump a bunch of declassified documents

and give his speech a couple weeks ago telling Americans our elections, our elections aren't secure. None of the documents showed that our elections aren't secure. None of the documents showed that somehow there was a secret plot in 2020 and the election was stolen. Bill Pulte and the journalist John Solomon were part of this. And there were others in the White House who sort of were against the two of them. Pulte remains one of the country's most powerful intelligence officials. He's also been claiming of doing layoffs. And this is, again, performing for an audience. So one, there's social media posts. I talked to former intelligence officials, they're not hearing from their colleagues that he's actually laying

off 30% of the workforce as he claims to have done. Wow. MS now senior national security reporter David Rode. Wow. Axius, White House reporter Mark Caputo and CEO and co-founder of Axis, Jim Van de Haid. Thank you all very much for coming on the show this morning. We'll be following what happens today in that meeting. Still ahead, we've assembled the sports reporters. Pablo Tori and Mike Lubbukad. Join us to discuss the nearing NFL season and how the MLB postseason race is taking shape. We're back in just a moment.

I'm very, very thankful for the chance they gave me. Do not get me wrong on that. But I really know what I've brought to this franchise leadership-wise and even play-wise. It's been some of the best years of my career, and I think it's only going to trend upwards, just being comfortable and feeling that. So disappointing in that regard to not have, you know, to feel disrespect a little bit.

And that's really the disappointing part to feel undervalued after, you know, thinking you've earned it. Well, that's Tampa Buckingnear's quarterback Baker Mayfield voicing some real disappointment yesterday after he and the team failed to reach an agreement on a new contract before the start of training camp. Yes, training camp is here. Football almost back. For more, let's bring in Pulitzer Prize winning host at Pablo Tori finds out. MS now contributor, Pablo Tori, and longtime sports columnist and best-selling author, another one lately, Mike Lubbica. Our thanks to you both.

Pablo, football is indeed back, or almost back. Tell us a few of the storylines that we're following here. I mean, yes, an unhappy quarterback in Tampa Bay being among them, don't let Richard Haas chalk you into the fact of the Giants. He thinks the Giants who are in the players. Oh, boy. Yeah, set that story. Don't bother with him.

You heard it here. Yeah. I won't even lead with Mike Vrable bringing in a cute little puppy. Who's that? Into his press conference. You didn't notice that? Yeah, yeah, I know. It would be his emotional support animal. I was really hoping we'd all forgotten that happened. Yeah, I did feel like a zillion years ago, admittedly. But look, the Los Angeles Rams are the favorite. Oh, yeah. And what's funny is that you get to watch, you talk about training camp, all of the surrounding footage of like, is that, is that Aaron Donald working out? The guy who

went retired and is now working out as if he might just be back. And so there's just this notion of like, that team is so stacked and they might have the most dominant pass rusher just waiting in the wings load managing. So that to me is fun. But then you get to the Buffalo Bills. Will they do it this year? They're right there, John, in terms of the odds. I'm not beholding to those odds. Those odds tend to be quite wrong. But the idea that the AFC East might have in it, the Bills and your Patriots. And I'm not going to be. to say the Jets. I'm just going to acknowledge No, Joe.

Yeah. But that's, but that's, but okay. Yeah, so Joe, yeah, I agree. I mean, probably is right.

I think there's a sense right now. It's the Rams. It's everybody else. But I'll note, the Rams have a quarterback in his late 30s with a bad back.

So if that goes, they come back to the pack. And also, though, they have Ty Simpson waiting in the wings. Oh, boy. He's in the straight face. He tried.

He's a straight face for a second and then he lost. No, I got to say, I still have no idea what the Rams were doing. They obviously didn't see Ty Simpson's season last year. We understand that he had 20 different things going wrong with his body, but whatever it was, it was hard to complete a pass for the second half of the season. So this is great. We have the sports reporters back, Lupica.

This is all very exciting. Mike, we're talking, well, first of all, I do have to say while you're talking about teams, the athletic says the most. Underrated team, the most overlooked team, my Atlanta Falcons, who I predict this year will go eight and nine or nine and eight. We'll see. It'll be one of the two. But anyway, Lou, Lupica, you and I were talking a couple days ago. We're all very excited about the NFL season coming up, but it was very hard to ignore the top two stories on ESPN the other day.

just talking about just the brutality of the NFL, we'll say hopefully even in the past before all the safety protocols. But man, there's some guys right now that we've all followed their careers from the very beginning who are really suffering because of most likely time playing football at all levels. Joe, the two lead stories at ESPN.com yesterday. One was about, I'm on Green, the all-time leading Russia for the Packers, announcing that he's suffering from Parkinson's disease. And in his words, my short-term memory is, quote, trash.

And that Billy Ray Smith, a great ex-charger, 64, had died with dementia, brought on by CTE. This is the shadow that falls across this sport, even as training camps are opening. It doesn't go away. Joe, we can fix most problems in sports. You want to speed up baseball? Okay, we've got a pitch clock. Everybody's worried about the collective bargaining. agreement in baseball. They'll figure it out. But this problem, concussions and sub-concussions

of injuries, it can't go away. They can't fix it. They can mitigate it. They can make the sport less dangerous, but they can't make it safe. And the wreckage of ex-players, a week ago, Jordan Devey, who played on a Super Bowl champion with the Patriots, took his own life. His mother told a salt lake TV station that she thought he was suffering from CTE. It goes on and on and on. And that is the dark flip side of our American passion for football. This is the sort of story. I mean, you might think that you could hide this story behind the giant pile of money.

Right. Because everybody. And look, we are football fans. It's so important to always maintain the cognitive dissonance that, we love this thing. It's so fun to talk about. And yet, the storyline that existed when it was Will Smith playing Dr. Bennett-O-Maloo in concussion in the movie saying, tell the truth, we never really got the answer. No, it's CTE is what we're talking about. You know, chronic, traumatic, and cephalopathy. Yes. I was going to let the Harvard guy say that. But it's, can you build a

safer cigarette? You know, that's the question. And the answer is no. I mean, they've tweaked the helmets somewhat. They're a little better. Some players wear the bigger ones. But even then, the guardian helmet thing. Yeah, you watch that and like fans like, what's that? Like, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's, you're, you're right. This is, it is, it is the sport inherently, the threat of violence. The physicality of the sport is part of the appeal for some people. Consensual concussions. Yes. But if that's, as long as that's the case, and as long as this doesn't simply become flag football, this is going to be a problem. And right now, you're right, the money is so huge, it doesn't matter. But we also see, I mean, Richard, we're seeing, we're seeing. I mean, Richard, we're

seeing parents across this country saying, I love football, but I'm not going to let my own kids play it. And that tells you a lot. That's the ultimate market test. People will watch it. But when it comes to home, you're going to see a large generation. I think they can do other sports. They'll do soccer, whatever it happens to be. But they're not going to do football. It's simply too, it's just too dangerous. And I think Mike's point is dead on. There's not a fix. You can make it slightly better or a slightly less bad is probably a better way of putting it. You can't fix it. Joe. You know, and part of that is, you know,

Lupiga, when we were growing up, you know, I was 6'4 weighed like 190, 200 pounds. Yeah, me too. Yeah, me too. It was a quarterback. Exactly. But I was a quarterback. I was one of the biggest guys on the team and usually one of the biggest guys on the field. My son Jack, 6-3 in the weight room for baseball, about 230 pounds, his freshman year of muscle. He went out to play football. And he's going up against guys who are running 4-640s who weigh 260 pounds, 270 pounds.

I told him I didn't want him to go out there. We grew up on football. Like, like, we went Friday night lights. We, you know, saw SEC football Saturday. We saw NFL Sunday, NFL Monday. Football was a religion in my household growing up. When it came to my decision whether my kids played football or not, I just looked out on the field.

And as Tom Landry once told Mikkelshevsky at the end of his career, football was never meant to be this way. They're too big. They're too fast. I let Jack play. He pushed me hard. He got one concussion when, you know, he was double teamed by a 275-pound lineman, a 260-pound lineman. He wasn't happy.

He got a concussion. I said, you're out. You're out. You can play any other sport, not the sport. That is the real challenge that, again, our generation, we were all in on this stuff. We wanted our kids to play this. We played it night and day. it's just gotten so dangerous because the athletes are so much bigger, so much faster, and the hits are like small car accidents.

Joe, listen, Archie Manning, who's one of the best people I've ever met in sports, you know, he's the head of the royal family in pro football, has had multiple surgeries. He's just had another back surgery. I can remember before Joe Namath had his knees replaced. I went to do a piece on him one time at his football camp up in Connecticut. watching him walk down a flight of stairs in those days is one of the most painful things I'd ever seen. So it's not just brain injuries. It's the continuing wreckage of the sport. And Joe, you're right. Bigger, faster, stronger. It makes the game more entertaining, but it doesn't help the players very much. You know, Chris Johnson, by the way, just recently, John, terrible.

ALS. And so you can sort of keep this along the scroll, the bottom line, the news ticker, on the side rail, and just say, man, that's sad and move on and not connect the dots. But the larger story here is even more disturbing, which is that this stuff occurs because of sub-concussive hits sometimes. It's not even just the jacked-up highlight reel. It's the fact that even on every play on the line, you're getting hit. And that is the stuff that you don't realize until the headline comes. Yeah.

So let's turn now to baseball. MLB Pennett race here. We're about to hit August 1st. you, Mike, you were writing and thinking about Aaron Judge, the Yankees who, look, still sit comfortably in the top wild card spot, boy, they've stopped hitting. And a big part of it is because Aaron Judge remains out and there's no real sense as to when he's coming back. The Yankees right now are scoring like Argentina did in the World Cup final, okay? And they don't even know. I'd like to give a few Yankees yellow cards. They don't even know when he's going to get another

imaging on this broken rib of his. Stan can't run. Bell and James on the D.L. And here's the column I wrote today. Pretty good outfield, Mike. Well, the column I wrote today is if you're Brian Cashman, the Yankees General Manager, how much do you go all in, not knowing for sure that you're going to get Aaron Judge?

He may not come back. And so that is one of the things that's bubbling with that. I mean, everybody wants to get help, okay? But if they don't get number 99 back and soon, they... That's the season. Then it's 17 years without winning the World Series. And you don't want to give up everything in order to play the short run. Yeah.

Yeah. You can't do that. Yeah. And, you know, Aaron Judge being healthy the last couple of years has been the exception rather than the rule. This is, sadly, for a guy that's that talented, just a great hitter. This is a return to form of what Yankees and the Yankee fans and Aaron Judge himself has been suffering with. Of course, he's never been out for a season taking a half swing like Roman Anthony, who takes a half swing like this.

Here we go. And his arm falls off. That's what happened to Roman. Nobody can still explain the injury. He did take a couple of full swings. Yeah, I know, I know, but it's just never happened. It's like, ah, my arm fell off. Hasn't played all year because of that.

He actually took a couple swings yesterday. It's the first time he's been able to swing the bat in a while. That's good. And the Red Sox keep winning. But John Lemire, in the middle of an incredible win last night, some really bizarre stuff going on with a guy that we've always loved because he's all in. Jaron Duran, but Jaron Duran yelling at Wilson Contraeus for not tagging up on a pop-up fly last night.

look at this. O'1. Duran to shallow left. Soderstrom coming on. And not deep enough. Jaron kind of motioning back toward third there? That was

about too shallow. Wanted him to tag and go? Too shallow to score there. Probably should have tagged or not, but we've been out. So it's up to Monasterio. Let's check one more time on the reaction here from Jared Duran.

Can't score on this. He kept yelling at him when they were going back out to the field later on. And, of course, anybody who doesn't follow the Red Sox can trace is the last guy. You want to bother. But I will say he was all class last night saying it's fine. We're all competitive. And we love each other and da, da, da, da, da, da. But that was truly bizarre, Lemire.

And maybe it's just the frustration of this season on Jaron. But a strange time to be picking a fire with, you want to even. your best players on your team at the middle of like what? What if they won? Like 18 out of 21? Yeah, the Red Sox just finished their best month in franchise history. And Wilson Contreras is the best hitter on the team and the team leader. And here's my one thought for Jared Duran.

Because first of all, Kroderas would have been out by about 20 feet. When you're, when your batting average Jared Duran starts with a one. He's hitting 195. You don't get to yell at. best player when he wisely doesn't tag up. And Lupico, real quick on the socks. I mean, that moment strange. That said, I'm not quite sure how they're doing this.

I don't either. We've been talking. Magical mullets from that clip is right. I can only assume it's the power of friendship and some good pitching. But they can't hit. But last night, Abraeu and Contreras back to back in the eighth, they win again. It is this month that they had. From where they came from is one of the most shocking things I have seen.

ever covering baseball. Yeah, just absolutely. Joe. Yeah, it really is. And you know, good general managing. Great mean, that's not it. By the way,

on the general managing, I do understand Pablo. We are, we, Boston fans, we're all art how and money ball. That's right.

We are. And, enjoy a long-term relationship with Craig Redlow. Sorry for that. Breslo is, yeah, Breslow is Billy Bean.

But a great meme right now going around is, you know, that scene from Field of Dreams where the brother-in-law of Ray looks out on the field and he can see the players for the first time. He goes, where'd all these ball players come from? And that's what Red Sox fans are thinking of. I can't get excited about this streak because I saw how bad they were in March, April, May, June. And I'm like, okay, when are they going to return to form? This really has been kind of a bizarre streak. This is the same.

And by the way, they're doing better now that their best players have been hurt. Yeah. No, no Anthony, no Garrett Crochet. I mean, and yet they find a way. But I think, Joe, you and I both know that the answer here is they're just setting us up for a very painful September. You guys could talk for hours about this. It's going to be the most historic collaborative. across August and September.

The Yankees, the Yankees are still, they're going to come back. They do this to us all the time. They're going to win the series in five. We can't have it. We can't feel balls. Not again. Mike Lupica, thank you. His latest book with James Patterson.

The Country Road Murders is out now. This book keeps selling. It's top 10 for the second. It's at number five. Every year. And anybody that grew up in the, anybody grew up in the deep south knowing about Buford Pussert? Oh, my God. Boy, you know, get my stick.

I'm telling you, this is like, this is like Southern Mafia. This is like a great ball player that leaves, gets hurt, comes back home. And he says everything, but boy, get my stick. This is a great talk. You got to read it. The Council on Foreign Relations, Richard Haas. Thank you as well. Thank you, Richard.

And coming up on Morning Joe, a Republican law. from Ohio is facing disturbing new allegations of abuse. What we're learning about a new restraining order filed against Congressman Max Miller. Also ahead, a look at the closely watched Senate race playing out in Texas as new numbers show Democrat James Tullerico, leading Republican Ken Paxton, including among voters in one key voting block. Morning Joe will be right back.