Morning Joe - Ukraine Inflicts Heavy Toll on Russian Troops

Episode Date: May 19, 2026

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When President Trump needs backup, Massey wants to debate process. When the movement needs unity, especially at the biggest moments, Massey's willing to vote with Democrats. When conservatives are fighting the most radical left in American history, too often Massey's instinct is to throw elbows at fellow Republicans, instead of the people who are destroying our country or want to destroy our country. and there's one man standing in their way, and it's President Trump. It's really incredible, isn't it? Willi? You have a Secretary of Defense who is fighting a war

that has upended the economy, not only in America, but across the world, that as Bob Kagan has written, may be one of the greatest losses militarily in American history, and he finds time to campaign against a Republican congressman who Donald Trump hates because that Republican congressman is trying to follow through on Donald Trump and Republican candidates promise to release all the Epstein files. And because Donald Trump has been trying in every way possible to cover up the Epstein file, something we haven't talked about since this war began, he is doing everything he can, along with all of his billionaire supporters, to destroy a congressman who wants the Epstein files released. And the Secretary of Defense has time to go down. And instead of

trying to prosecute this war, which we are losing politically, he's instead trying to beat a congressman because the congressman wants full accountability for the victims of Epstein and all the very powerful people around Epstein. Some say, including the president. Yeah, I mean, it's extraordinary, unusual, inappropriate for a defense secretary to be on the campaign trail to begin with. Let's just start there to be out campaigning for a candidate. There are Hatch Act considerations potentially here. but then to do it in the middle of a war where just hours ago the president was on the brink, he said, of a new round of strikes against Iran before pulling back again. We'll get into that in just a moment.

You have the Secretary of Defense on the campaign trail. And as you say, why are they fighting against Thomas Massey? Because he wants all the information out. He wants the truth out about the Epstein files. And this is how hard they're working to suppress that truth. The president dispatching his Secretary of Defense. to campaign against the guy who's trying to get to the bottom of that. Also, Joe, I know this is something you've talked about for years now,

which is that Thomas Massey, the argument goes from his opponents and yesterday from the head of defense, is not conservative, that he's anti-Trump, he's not conservative. Look at the voting record of Thomas Massey. Talk to anybody who's ever spent 10 minutes on Capitol Hill. He is incredibly conservative in all the ways that conservatism used to actually hold up Now we're talking about Trumpism, which is something very different from conservatism. But the MAGA folks, Secretary of Defense, trying to conflate those two things.

If you're against Donald Trump, even on the Epstein files, now you're not conservative. Yeah, I mean, let's just go down the list really quickly because Republicans are waking up this morning and they are down, well, it's really historic numbers, over 10 percentage points and the generic ballot tests. And that's not just a New York Times-China poll, which actually usually trends more Trump than other polls. It certainly did during the campaign. But you look at a lot of other polls, Atlas, an A-plus poll, double-digit losses for Republicans on the generic ballot test. Willie, it goes back to what I said when I was in Congress and pushing to balance a budget. I said if you give voters a chance to vote for a real Democrat or a Republican, Republican trying to be a Democrat, they're going to vote for the real Democrat every time.

You look at this generic ballot, keep that up. Let me explain something to you. When people like Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump go around talking about conservative, I've said it for 10 years. There is nothing conservative about Donald Trump. And now that the Republican Party has cowtowed to him like he cowtows to she and cowtows to Putin, this is what you get. you get a Republican Party that has exploded the deficit in historic ways, and the debt, Willie, has skyrocketed. They promised, Donald Trump promised to balance a budget. He promised to pay off the debt.

We actually, Donald Trump, no matter when he leaves office, will set the record for actually piling on the greatest debt ever. In fact, he will have piled on more debt over his time in office than, every other American president combined. It is absolutely staggering. The national debt is going to go up probably to $50 trillion over the next year. We're already over 100% of GDP. Donald Trump now has America spending more servicing its debt than on our national defense. Do you want to talk about the Epstein files? They promised full accountability. What do we get? We get no accountability. and now Donald Trump and Pete Heggson want to try to defeat the Republican that wants full accountability

for those that were predators against Epstein's victims. You could talk about Russia. Donald Trump is doing everything he can to destroy a NATO alliance that crushed the Soviet Union. That's my father was a cold warrior. That's why our family became Republicans. It was to push back against Russian aggression. You know, if Donald Trump and Republicans, like allowing, and Pete Hegseth doing everything he can do to help Putin win, to undermine Ukraine,

to undermine Poland by pulling out troops, to undermine Germany by pulling out troops, to undermine NATO day in and day out in Ukraine. And so, yeah, so the Republicans are actually taking aside that radical leftists used to take in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, and they wonder why they're losing. The same thing with President Xi, you have Donald. Trump going over there and what's happening? They're abandoning Taiwan. Again, going along with a communist Chinese leader and saying, well, I don't know whether we're going to fund Taiwan anymore. No, no, no, no president does that. And Willie, I could go down the list time and time again.

You have Donald Trump and his Republican Party doing the exact opposite of what conservatives did for 50 years, for 60 years, we balanced the budget four years in a row. We pushed back against Russian aggression. We pushed back against the communist Chinese. We did everything we could to empower NATO to push back against Russian aggression to expand NATO. They're doing just the opposite. And they wonder why they're getting crushed right now. They don't care about affordability.

they don't care about working Americans. They only care about doing what Donald Trump tells him to do. And we see the result. It's very, very bad. So Thomas Massey, not conservative, please. Pete Hagsiff, not conservative. Again, I just really quickly, this is a guy who 10 years ago was campaigning against Donald Trump, said he cared more about himself than military people, and stood before a group of military men and women. and what did he say? If Donald Trump's president don't follow illegal orders. It's on tape.

And now what's he doing? He's trying to go after a war hero, again, something that Republicans would never do in the past, trying to go after a war hero, highly decorated war hero, who's also a U.S. senator, because he's saying the same thing,

Pete Hegzith said before he started blindly chasing power. It's a sad display. voters are on to it. Yeah, and Jonathan Lemire, to Joe's point about affordability, there seems to be absolutely no focus from the White House. Despite everything we're seeing at gas pumps and food stores and groceries and everywhere else, it's anything but the core issue that's dragging down the poll numbers,

as Joe just showed and we'll dig into some more. They just keep getting worse for this president because of the issue of inflation, which is tied to the war in Iran, which most Americans in these polls don't support. They don't see, haven't been explained well of the point of this war, why we remain over there. So what is the White House planned to do of anything at this point to change the trajectory of what we're seeing in those polls before November? So after Republicans took some losses in the elections last fall, the White House, you know, told reporters, President Trump's going to start traveling every week, domestic trip every week, and every week he's going to talk about the economy, what's working, and he's going to acknowledge that affordability is an issue, and we're going to come up with a series of solutions to address that.

By my count, I think he's gone twice since December. You know, no domestic travel, and that's in part because of adjustments to his schedule, in part perhaps because of his age, but also, of course, he's been consumed with the war and other things. And he has shown no ability, even though, even from his perch at the White House, no ability to show any empathy to Americans, hey, I understand things are tough right now. You know, yes, we have to sacrifice a bit because of this war. None of that. Last week, he's on the White House lawn saying he doesn't care about Americans' finance situations.

He literally just said that. And that is what Republicans have been so nervous about. So they are deeply concerned about November, and President Trump isn't helping at all. And instead, he's consumed with legacy projects like the ballroom and arch, the war, and going after his political foes. Now, that sometimes means the Department of Justice, or in this case it means trying to defeat a Republican who has defied him, Congressman Massey. Now, Trump has shown just in the last 10 days or so he still has a hold on the GOP. those who opposed to Indiana lost. Senator Cassidy over the weekend, lost. You know, and now it's Massey's turn, and Trump has mobilized even his defense secretary at a time of war to go after Massey.

And for good measure, Lauren Bobert, another Republican congresswoman, another Trump loyalist for a time who also defied him on the Epstein files. She went to Kentucky Joe to campaign for Massey. And now Trump is targeting her and saying someone should primary Lauren Bobert. Of course, we should note the Colorado filing deadline was months ago, so that's not going to happen. But again, it shows you what Trump is thinking about what he actually cares about. And the media is breathlessly reporting on these Bill Cassidy losing. Okay, well, you know, Democrats should rejoice. But you have somebody actually that can win statewide.

And instead, putting in somebody that's going to cowtow to Donald Trump, no matter what he does, who puts that state in play finally. And Willie, it's really great news for Republicans that Donald Trump's going around knocking off Republicans that can win, even in these deeply red districts. And I will tell you, more and more people are, the Republican Party are concerned about the redistricting. When you look at the poll numbers, and when you look at the poll numbers, you see that Donald Trump's doing historically bad with Hispanics, doing historically bad with younger voters, doing historically bad with independents and Republicans as well. So all of these machinations that are going on that right now the White House is cheering actually will work against them most likely in the fall. I've got to say one other thing. The White House wanted Donald Trump to go out and talk about affordability. But when he goes out the two times and talks about affordability, he calls it, in his words, bullshit.

Something made up by the Democrats. You look at the polls, Willie. It is anything but that. Yeah. And that crosses parties and certainly is hitting with independents. We'll look at those numbers in just a moment. Meanwhile, President Trump has announced he once again will postpone a planned U.S. military strike on Iran, this time issuing both the threat and the pullback in a single

lengthy true social post. The president wrote yesterday, an attack had been scheduled for today, but that he would be holding off, citing requests from Gulf allies and what he says are serious negotiations now taking place. The president added, however, he instructed military leadership to be, quote, prepared to go forward with a full large-scale assault of Iran on a moment's notice if a deal is not reached. He also noted any deal would include, quote, no nuclear weapons for Iran. Over the past few weeks, the president repeatedly has issued threats and set deadlines for

Tehran before ultimately backing off, a pattern that's played out at least six times since late March. As for that polling we've been discussing, President Trump's approval rating sinking amid the unpopular war with Iran, the latest New York Times, Sienna poll shows nearly two-thirds of Americans think going to more was the wrong decision, including almost three quarters of independent voters. Amid rising gas and energy prices, a majority 55 percent said the war is not worth the cost. Only 33 percent approve of how the president has handled the economy as a whole, 64 percent disapproving. When it comes to affordability, 69 percent of Americans disapprove of how President Trump has handled the cost of living.

Among Hispanic voters, Joe just mentioned this, Trump's approval has fallen to 20%. That is the lowest number from that voting block in the history of New York Times-Cena polling for a president. And among the in critical independent voters, just one in four, 26 percent of those voters approve of the president's job performance. All of this spelling trouble for Republicans ahead of the midterms as the poll shows Democrats with that double-digit lead over the Republican Party. on a hypothetical 2026 midterm ballot, Joe. I've been following polls my adult life. I've never seen generic ballots this bad for either party. Let's bring in right now,

Playa Thanks, Bureau Chief. Senior columnist at Politico, Jonathan Martin, also associate, columnist and associate editor of the Washington Post, David Ignatius. Jay Martin, let's go to you first on those polls. Again, I'm sure, like me, you've never seen a generic ballot test this bad for the, the Republican Party and it keeps going down. But there are a couple of other numbers that really

pop out to me that should scare the hell out of Republicans in Florida, in Texas, in California, in states where there's a lot of redistricting. And that's Hispanics. I mean, I will tell you, you couldn't talk to a Republican operative just 18 months ago that said that the tide has changed forever in American politics. So the Hispanics are breaking wildly towards the Republican. And they were. And Democrats were saying the same thing. Something has changed. It will forever change the future of politics. Well, as you and I know, the future of politics usually lasts about six months. Now, Hispanics, that's about as low a number as I've ever. Mitt Romney was eviscerated for getting 28% of the Hispanic vote. There was a huge postmortem. What do we do? What do we do?

Donald Trump is eight points below Mitt Romney. And the same thing with young voters. Young voters were breaking it. I thought astonishing numbers towards Donald Trump and the Republican Party. The same thing has happened with young voters, a radical break away from Donald Trump, from Republicans. And we're just seeing numbers that appear to be historic, certainly in the congressional balloting. Joe, you and I have lived through about three 40-year realignments in the last 20 years. So it's kind of like the old joke about the guy.

who predicted, you know, five of the last zero recessions. Yeah, it's, the numbers are about as brutal as you could possibly imagine at this point in an election cycle. You know, midterms are always tough for the party in power. I don't know if I've ever seen a midterm that was shaping up to be this bad, this early, expressly because of the choices of the president. This is on his hands. You know, he made the choice to pursue an elect of war in the middle of the middle of.

that he was told could increase the prices of global oil, and he did it, and this is their response. Give him credit, Joe, because in 24, Trump did put together a coalition that made profound inroads, deep inroads, with non-white working class voters, black, Asian, Hispanic, that if they had been sustained, would have broken the back of the Democratic coalition, especially when paired with Reagan-style inroads

with younger voters that you just mentioned. The problem is he's done nothing to nurture that coalition because he was never interested in sustaining a coalition, Joe, because it's not a larger ideological project. It's not a movement. It's a personality project. It's Trump is for Trump. He's not creating Trumpism. And I think that gets to the heart of the matter here. He just wants to get big victories for Trump instead of trying to find a way to sustain and grow the coalition that he won in 2024. You and I know what happened in 24. he was running against a deeply unpopular president who pulled out there on the summer, handed the baton to a flawed VP. And I think that goes to the heart of what happened in 24, more than what he did. But still, he put together the coalition he did. And the day after the election has done virtually nothing to sustain the coalition. And the one issue he had that he did live on for a while was immigration.

And then because he decided to hand his immigration policy to Stephen Miller, he lost that issue, the advantage on that issue, right, in the streets of Minneapolis in January. Well, I was going to say, Willie, not only do you do nothing to sustain the possibility of historic Hispanic growth as far as support for the Republican Party, his policies were seen as actively going to war

against Hispanics in America. And the horrors that not only they have gone through and Americans being gunned down in the state, streets, city streets of America. Not only do we have that, but we now have internment camps and the horror stories that are coming out of internment camps that the Trump administration does not want you to hear about. That's being heard by family members, loved ones, friends of the people that are inside those internment camps being brutalized, being treated horribly. And there's been a veil of darkness over those internment camps. Congress is not being allowed to go in. The media is not

being allowed to go in. It's like nothing I've ever seen in my life in America. That the people that are funding these internment camps through appropriations aren't allowed to go inside the internment camps to see the humanitarian violations that are going on. But guess what? Word is coming out. It is spreading through communities and you see historically low support among Hispanics? This is one of the reasons why, one of the big reasons why. Yeah, it's no mystery why the administration doesn't want eyes on what's going on inside of those detention centers. And as we've talked about quite a bit, the deal many Trump voters made in 2024, including many Latino voters, was, yes, get the violent criminals out of the country. We agree with that, too. Get them out of our neighborhoods. But what

they're seeing instead as people they know, neighbors, hardworking people being dragged from their homes put into detention centers, being dragged from their homes and being deported. That is not the deal that voters made. And many Latino voters now have turned. As you say, it's only been 18 months, completely flipped, in fact, gone below where they were before that election in terms of support for President Trump. So David Ignatius, as we get back to the war in Iran, which has sparked all these increased prices across the country, especially in gas. Let's talk about what Donald Trump, the president did yesterday with that true social post saying, I was just about to annihilate Iran. He's done this six or seven times now where he was just about to launch a full-scale military

assault, but slammed on the brakes to give more time for negotiations with Gulf states and Iran. He says there are now serious negotiations. There are positive developments. He often says these things. We don't have any evidence that any of those things are actually taking place. What is your sense of those conversations toward a peace deal right now? So, Willie, the first feeling I have is a sense of the president's desperation. He faces terrible set of choices. This erratic pattern of extreme threat against Iran, followed by delay, has been characteristic now for several months. He does have advisors who are urging him to go back into full-scale war and finish the job,

as people would say in quotation marks, get it done, reopen the straight of hormones by force. He knows what a messy campaign that would be, how long it would last, how little decisive result it might produce. So he's looking for an alternative diplomatic approach that he can do, in effect, under the cover of regional powers. And that's the way I see yesterday's announcement. He's saying that the three leading figures in the Middle East, the leaders of Qatar, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, have decided to seek a negotiated settlement with Iran that might serve everybody's interests. If they can find that, you know, they have all sorts of contacts, longstanding people that they've worked with in Iran.

If they can find that pathway, then Trump can declare a victory. It will be not far from perfect resolution, but at least get it off the table for the short term. Do I have confidence that that's possible? To be honest, Trump was near that sort of deal with the pragmatic Speaker of the Iranian Parliament more than a month ago. And it blew up because hardliners in Tehran are in control. I have no evidence that that's not still the case. But it's obvious that Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE are trying to find that pathway to get some sort of arrangement that would reopen the strait.

I can imagine some sort of international mechanism that pays people, people. some money that Trump thinks he can stomach. Basically, what we're watching is the consequences of this absolutely acute problem. How do you reopen the straight without going back to full-scale war? And of course, those Gulf states you just mentioned, those have been the target of retaliation from Iran in the war that the United States began. Everyone sit tight. We're going to continue this conversation after a quick break. More with David Ignatius, Jonathan Martin, new reporting from Jonathan Lemire out of the White House. Plus, Vladimir Putin now arrives in Beijing for his summit with Xi Jinping. Warning Joe's coming right back.

Authorities in California are investigating a deadly shooting at a mosque as a hate crime. At least three people were killed in the shooting at the Islamic Center in San Diego yesterday. The center's imam said the victims include a security guard and two staff members from the Islamic school. All the children at the school are safe. The attack comes amid rising reports of Islamophobia in the United States. The Council on American Islamic Relations says, it received more than 8,600 civil rights complaints just last year. That's the most the group has recorded in nearly three decades, writing in its 2025 report, quote, government actions and official rhetoric treated Muslims and people who speak up for Palestinian human rights as suspicious and outside the circle of protected, religious, and civic life.

End quote. Let's bring in MS Now reporter Jillian Frankel. She joins us live from San Diego outside the home of one of the suspected shooters. Jillian, good morning. What else are we learning today about this attack? Hey guys, good morning. Yeah, that's right. We're outside the neighborhood where we believe one of the suspects may have lived. There's been a law enforcement presence here steadily since yesterday. And obviously so many unanswered questions still remain this morning. But here's what we do know. A call came into law enforcement around 9.42 a.m. yesterday about a runaway juvenile whose mother was concerned that her teenage son may have been suicidal. She said that several of her weapons were missing and her vehicle was missing and that her son had departed with a companion who was wearing camo.

Law enforcement was dispatched locally and within a couple of hours around 1142, 1143 a.m. yesterday, the call came in about that shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego. Three adults, as you mentioned, found dead there, including the Center Security Guard and two staffers. law enforcement said that the suspects then shot at a landscaper just a few blocks away from there, and then shortly after were found deceased in their vehicle from self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Now, our own Mark Santia is able to report that anti-Islamic writings were actually found inside the vehicle. In addition to law enforcement pressers yesterday, we also heard from the Imam of that Islamic Center, who said that this is a place of worship, not a battlefield. I want you to hear from him directly. Here's more.

The other mosques and all the places of worship in our beautiful city should always be protected. It is extremely outrageous to target a place of worship. And this is still actively being investigated as a hate crime law enforcement is continuing to collect evidence from these scenes here. Willie? MS now reporter Jillian Frankel live in San Diego Forest. Gillian, thanks so much. Joe, some reporting this morning, too, that that security guard who was killed outside the school stood between the shooters and the children inside and being called a hero this morning, rightly so.

Yeah, incredible eyewitness saying him actually take a shot and then run inside to protect those inside. An absolute hero. And David Ignatius, just an absolute tragedy right. now. You have historic levels of anti-Muslim hatred across America, a rising tide of anti-Semitism across America. The events of October 7th and Gaza and everything that's followed has led to a complete lack of dialogue in some of the places where it's needed. most badly on college campuses among our young people, the hatred that is spreading online against Muslims,

against Jews, against Hispanics, against Asians, against, quote, the others is sad and unfortunate. I can tell you as somewhat evangelical, someone who was raised in the church, I do understand that there is a place for people of faith in government, but seeing this constant un-American campaign by people posting on official U.S. government websites that we are a Christian nation and quoting Bible verses. on historic sites,

that goes completely against what the First Amendment says. And you also at the same time have a lot of those people also saying terrible things about Muslims, saying terrible things about, quote, the others. And unfortunately, anti-Semitic slurs, anti-Muslim slurs, continue to skyrocket and and and people lose their lives as well. So we're just tearing each other up in this country. I think we all feel it. There's something oppressive about it.

And we're a country that just desperately needs good leaders. We look to the administration, Donald Trump, and often what we see is more polarization, more inflammatory rhetoric. But you hear a story. about a person like this security guard, just a guy standing in front of the building who has the courage to try to save people because that's his job and because that's what keeps our country and the place he was assigned orderly. You think, okay, that's the spirit that gets us out of this. That multiplied by a million, by a hundred million. That produces the country that we love and want to

live in. And, you know, I never want to give up hope on that, but this is a time when we're really under strain. And the institutions that should be helping us, like the Supreme Court, seem oblivious to some of these pressures, you know, a shooting almost every day somewhere. And we sail along with this extreme view of the Second Amendment. Sometimes it's just a depressing picture. But when you hear those stories of the individual heroes, you think, yeah, bang, that's That's still it. Yeah. And again, you're so right.

I mean, the growing tide of gun violence and nothing happening post-Sandy Hook, we thought there would be a reckoning, just basic things that 90% of American support like universal background checks, Republicans keep blocking that. Red flag laws, Republicans keep blocking that. basic safety measures. Republicans keep blocking. And I must say, again, on faith, ask what would Jesus do?

These people that are, again, deciding that they're going to try to push on government bureaucracies, their view of the Bible. Christians don't even agree on their view. view of the Bible. Christian nationalists have totally twisted and distorted Jesus's words in the gospels, his exact words in the gospels being twisted and distorted. So if Christians can't even sort through it, what are Christian nationalists doing trying to project their view of America

from the perch of government bureaucracy? Individuals find. I celebrate that. I celebrate that when politicians, individuals talk about their faith, be they Muslim, be they Jewish, be they Christians or Hindu. That's America. But man, this hatred toward, quote, the others, it leads, unfortunately, to terrible violence. David, let me ask you about a new measure of Ukraine's growing success that we keep talking about on the battlefield against Russia. The economist is reporting now. Ukrainian drones are stalking troops far behind the front lines, making it almost impossible

for Russia to move units to the front without being targets themselves. Finland's president, Alexander Stubb, one of Europe's leading supporters of Ukraine, said this about the Kremlin's problems on the front lines. In the past five months, Ukraine has killed or wounded. at an average to 30 to 35,000 Russian soldiers per month, 23,000 dead, 10,000 wounded long term. Second, the killing ratio, sorry for me morbid, the beginning of this year was one to five, one Ukraine into five Russian soldiers. Now it's one to seven or eight Russian soldiers. In the month of March, for the first time, Ukraine was able to launch more missiles and drones into Russia than Russia was able to throw back into Ukraine.

Again, on mathematics, point number four, for the first time in this war, in the month of April, Ukraine was able to take back more territory from Russia than Russia was able to gain. And the reason, yeah, I agree. So, you know, Joe, Alexander Stubb, the President of Finland, is exactly right. The balance in this war is shifting. I think we need to be careful and remember that Russia is still a whole lot bigger than Ukraine. But Ukraine's ability to use technology and add that to the incredible bravery of its soldiers at the front. It's just a knockout. As you know, I've been there twice this year and looked carefully each time at how they're building out their technology.

this is the most modern army in Europe. They are learning how to do things with drones, with any drone warfare, with electronic warfare that the United States is struggling to keep up with. And you just have to look at the Ukrainian innovation cycles in developing these weapons and think they're going to make it. And Putin's going to realize this is not a country. He is going to be able to grind into the dirt the way he dreamed of four years ago. It's not going to happen.

Yeah, and Jonathan O'Meer, we had a couple of different things that we discussed yesterday that explains why. And this is basic. It was the difference between West Germany and East Germany. It was a difference. It's still the difference between North Korea and South Korea. Western democracy, Western freedom leads to innovation. It leads to ingenuity. It leads to people inventing things.

that help not only drive economies, but win wars. Yesterday, we were at thea Baker talking about college students, creating systems in college that actually ultimately made them billionaires, not simply for the money, but because they're so advanced technologically. I told you the story of Georgetown students that, you know, we're starting to make drones and entering drone competitions when they were freshmen and students. sophomores. They are millionaires now because they've been able to figure out how to map. This is just students in a small section at Georgetown figured out how to map where drones are

across battlefields. You multiply that a thousand times over in universities across America. I've got to say universities that Donald Trump is trying actively to slash their research and development, talking about cutting off your nose despite your own face. But that's happening everywhere across America, across Europe, across the West. And Ukraine is a beneficiary of that. Well, what's happening in Russia? They shut down the internet. They shut down telegram. Their best and their brightest early on fled the country. Remember all those stories about all the tech startups that fled Russia at the beginning of the war? This is pretty simple. It's why West Germany was always thriving in East Germany was always hungry. It's why South Korea does so well and North Korea

does so poorly. It's why Russia's beginning to lose this war and why Western technology is allowing Ukraine to not only win this war, but to become, as Marco Rubio himself said, the strongest fighting army in Europe. Yeah, others have deemed Ukraine the new arsenal of democracy because of the way of their innovations in the drone space. They've cornered the market in some ways. They've moved the technology further to the point where they're offering to help other nations,

including we know the Ukrainians in the Gulf right now, helping some of those nations ward off potential Iran attacks. They've offered their assistance to the United States, but for the most part, of course, the Trump administration has declined. And this is, this is obviously forced upon them this war, but they've used it as a chance to reinvent what their military could be. And they have certainly gained the upper hand right now. It would seem in the battle with Russia to the point where some observers think Putin might,

finally, after more than four years, be willing to take some sort of deal. But Willie, we should also note that Putin today, heading to China to meet with Xi Jinping, just a few days after President Trump did the same. And we'll see how this plays out. Russia and China have many times their two leaders expressed a friendship that would last beyond the generations. I'm paraphrasing only slightly. We know that President Trump really values his personal connection to Xi Jinping,

kept saying it over and over, my friend, my friend, my friend. President Xi didn't sort of reiterate that, return that compliment. So we'll see what he says with Putin as we see these countries, though perhaps Russia right now on the back foot, but continue to align themselves against those Western innovations and ideals. We'll see what kind of deals Putin and Xi strike versus how many or how few the president struck with Xi. Jonathan Martin, let's get to your latest episode of the On the Road YouTube show and podcasts featuring in the new one to sit down with Maryland Governor Wes Moore, who talked to you about his thoughts on the 2024 presidential race and the Democratic Party's way forward.

Let's watch. When people ask me about what do you think about an autopsy, my point is this, release it, don't release it, I don't care. Right. I really don't. I'm like, listen, if you need a research report to know why we lost in 2024, then that's actually part of the problem. Why you'll lose?

Well, because I think we didn't engage people. And we did not deliver results with any forms of speed. I just think that everything in our party cannot be a 12-year analysis. Everything in our party cannot be, let me do a seven-year commission. on this. It's like, listen, are you going to fix it or not? So Jonathan, the Governor Moore, one of the stars, obviously, of the Democratic Party right now. You can talk a little bit more about his analysis of 2024. Also curious what he said about the possibility of 2028, his one of the many names being mentioned for that race as well.

Yeah, he's previously said that he's not going to run. He gave him a more open-ended answer, Willie, to me. I think he wants to keep the possibility open. Look, the challenge with Governor Moore is the challenge with a lot of Democrats, which is what was once termed the politics of evasion in a different presidential election. And that is, they don't want to come to terms with Joe Biden's decision to run when he shouldn't have. And then Kamala Harris's deficiencies as a candidate because they don't want to offend Biden, Harris, and the folks around them. But if you don't come to terms with that, then it's hard to move on, especially when Kamala Harris is talking about running again herself. Now, to Governor Moore's credit, he said, I want to

move on. And I said, well, Kamal Harris thinking about running. He said, well, it's time to move on. Now, he gave her, her due. They don't want to criticize these folks by name because they want to be good team players and Democrats, and they don't want to create enemies when they don't have to. But guys, I've seen this before. It was called 23 and 24. No Democrat wanted to raise their hand and say, Mr. President, it's time to go. They all wanted somebody else to do it. And now we're living with the post-mortem version of that, which is they can't yet come to terms with what happened. Now, look, Trump could fix all of this, and Republicans could be so unpopular in 27 and 28. They don't really have to actually grapple with the past, and they can just ride it out. That's certainly

the hope, guys. You can just keep running against Trump forever, like Hoover back in the 20s and 30s and 40s. But I think the voters are going to want to know who you are as a candidate, what your party stands for, and at some point you can't just be against Trump. You have to say what you're for, and come to terms with what the party should be for. Moore is not quite there yet, but at least will you all say this. Unlike the other folks on my show, he had his entire crab cake and had a beer while we were there. And by the one, the crab cake's the size of a damn softball.

It was like that big. Coco's in Baltimore. It's the real deal. Natural Bohemian on tap. It's a real Baltimore experience. It was fantastic. I did notice sometimes the food is more of a prop in these interviews. Governor Moore went for it.

He went into his credit for sure. challenged him. I said, you know, the other folks have not been terribly enthusiastic about eating on camera. He said, that's no problem for me. And he was hammering that crap cake, so props to him. All right. He got the crap cake down. And either way, wide open primary coming for Democrats, starting, honestly, in about six months as soon as these midterms end. I think it goes, it could be the most wide open primary since 1984. The first time since 84, you don't have a Clinton, a Biden, or an Obama, either running themselves or looming over the primary. That's, 42 years of the same three families either running or really looming over the race. So it's a wide open race unless Kamala Harris decides to run, which these guys don't want to address, which does complicate things.

Even if she runs, everybody else is going to run too. It'll be fascinating to watch Politico's Jonathan Martin. We'll be watching on YouTube. Thanks so much, Jay Martin. The Washington Post, David Ignatius, thank you as well. Still ahead here on Morning Joe, the Justice Department, sets up a $1.8 billion settlement fund to compensate some of the president's allies, including many of those convicted of crimes on January 6th. We will dig in to the growing outrageous questions around that.

Plus, MS now legal analyst and veteran prosecutor Andrew Weissman joins us with his new book. Looking at why misinformation, deceit has become so widespread in modern politics and what it means for the future of democracy. And as we go to break a look at the Travelers forecast this morning from Ackyweather's Bernie Rayno. Bernie, how's it looking out there? Willie, it's the hottest day of the year for many. Long the I-95 corridor, your exclusive weather forecast, 93 in Boston, 97 in New York City, 98, Washington, D.C., and with the humidity, you're active weather, real-field temperatures,

over 100 degrees, few spotty thunderstorms around. Watch for the thunderstorms today. Chicago, St. Louis, also in Dallas, Oklahoma City. It is a warm feel, summer field in the southeast, with isolated thunderstorms. A few delays here and there in my mind. AMI, along the East Coast, though, you should be okay. They help you make the best decisions and be more in the know. Download the ACU weather up today.

House Democrats are fighting the Trump administration's creation of a nearly $1.8 billion fund to compensate the president's allies who believe they were unjustly prosecuted by the Biden administration, many of them convicted by juries of their peers. The so-called anti-weaponization fund was announced yesterday after President Trump dropped his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS for the leak of his tax returns in 2019. That would have been thrown out anyway. This fund would allow people who believe they were targeted for prosecution for political purposes to apply for payouts paid in your money, taxpayer money.

The DOJ's announcement did not give specifics on how the payments would worker, who exactly would be eligible. But as the New York Times points out, the arrangement raises the possibility American taxpayers could end up writing checks to those. prosecuted and convicted for their roles in the January 6th attack. President Trump was asked about that yesterday at the White House. Do you believe that people who committed violence against Capitol Hill police officers on January 6th should be eligible for compensation from this DOJ fund?

And are you or your family members going to be seeking compensation from that fund? It will all be dependent on a committee. A committee is being set up of very talented people, very highly respected people. I think it's a committee of five. And again, I didn't do this deal. It was told to me yesterday, they said they're doing something. I do believe there has to be compensation for people that were destroyed. You have families absolutely destroyed. And it's all going to be determined by a committee of four or five people that are respected

and very brilliant at what they do. Democrats watchdog groups calling this fund one of the most corrupt acts in American history. Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland told MS Now last night the so-called settlement is thoroughly illegal and unconstitutional. Of course, Congress never voted to set up a $1.776 billion political slush fund for the president, and we never would pass such a thing. So it's a complete violation of congressional appropriations powers. Moreover, even if Congress wanted to do such a thing, which we never would,

it would be unconstitutional because the 14th Amendment says that money cannot be spent out of the federal fisc for the purposes of repaying people for insurrection or rebellion against the United States. Nearly 100 Democrats in the House signed on to a legal brief yesterday, urging a judge to block any potential deal on this. Joe, you heard Congressman Raskman their site. The actual number, it's not 1.8, it's 1.776, 1776 here as we begin to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the country, disgracefully using that number to paint this at some kind of act of patriotism. Well, and this Trump's slush fund could be used to actually financially reward people for beating the hell out of cops. This Trump's slush fund could be used actually to reward the very people

that brutalized police officers who, in the weeks ahead, four, take their own lives. And their family members said they took their own lives because of what these people did to them. And so now you have a president who won't even say, no, no, no, no, the people that beat the hell out of cops and the family members say are responsible for their deaths. Oh, no, no, no, they won't get rich off of that, but it certainly sounds like that's the direction. we're going in, how fascinating that you had people like J.D. Vance and others saying that these people who beat the hell out of cops, brutalized cops, oh, they shouldn't be pardoned. And yet Donald Trump pardoned them. And now, look at these people. These people that beat up police officers,

beat the hell out of police officers, caused a riot, talked about insurrection. were found guilty in court could actually get rich from a slush fund set up for them by Donald Trump. I don't want to say it's the most grotesque thing I've heard coming out of this administration. Because my God, what's worse than gunning down? Americans and the streets of the United States. What's worse than building internment camps and torturing and brutalizing people inside those internment camps? And keeping members of Congress out?

Keeping the media out? But this is up there. Let's bring in MS Now legal analysts and former prosecutor Andrew Weissman. He's out today with a new book titled, Liar's Kingdom, how to stop Trump's deceit and save America also with us. MS now contributed, Mike Barnacle. Andrew, thank you for being with us and thank you for this book, and we're going to get to it in one minute.

Now, it just seems to me this is something that's just awaiting a federal judges stay and ultimate dismissal of this. It is blatantly unconstitutional. The president doesn't have a power to negotiate with his own. administration and then dole out money to people who beat the shit out of cops. They don't have that power. But he wants to do it. That's what he's saying right now.

So tell me where this goes from here. And if you agree with Congressman Raskin, this is blatantly, not only is it repugnant, it's blatantly unconstitutional. Yeah, well, it's very hard to see that this is not just theft of money. as if the administration just went into Fort Knox and just said we're just going to take the gold and we're going to use it for wherever we want. The federal judge who was overseeing the civil case, Trump versus IRS yesterday, basically wrote what you just said, that there is no case or controversy here because you have Donald Trump on both sides of the equation, and that this is something that is irresponsible for the administration to do

because it's not looking out for the public interest, which is required by their oath of office. One really interesting filing in that case, this is the case that sort of has the sort of fake settlement, is that former IRS officials, including the commissioner, former DOJ, folks in charge of the tax division, pointed out that in all the other cases that are just like Donald Trump's, the administration is fighting those cases, saying that the civil case is meritless, that they were brought out

of time, that they sued the wrong party, that there, in other words, this is legally deficient, and the administration is taking that position with everyone else except Donald Trump and his family. And that tells you just how much this is a sham and a pretext. I think that it is going to take a new civil lawsuit to be brought seeking to enjoin this. And there, it will be important for members of Congress to have, you know, a majority vote on this because that's something that the courts look at. And there was one or two members of Congress. are not going to have standing. They're not going to be able to just individually bring that case. Unfortunately, also any citizen, because we're all harmed, but the law is sadly that it's not,

you know, one citizen can't bring this, even though we are all harmed by what is going on. Andrew, the Congress has played little role in this, obviously. This is an executive decision made by the President of the United States. But what does it say to you, and you've been around a while? I mean, you've worked in the Justice Department, you've been around. What does it say to you, the all of a sudden, not all of a sudden, the constant silence from one political party, the Republican Party, to outrageous, to outrageous elements that happen nearly every day. But this one is particularly outrageous. You know, years ago, since we're talking about sort of experience, I worked on the Enron case. And I always thought that case was not about Jeff Skilling or Ken Lay, the sort of leaders of that corruption, that the case was about the complicity, the people who either allowed it to go on or didn't do anything. And that is exactly the story here. You have Donald Trump, who is being Donald Trump, and you're seeing just one outrage after the other that Joe recounted. But here, just taking it

to my world, which is in the Department of Justice, the idea that the acting attorney general wouldn't resign over this, that you wouldn't have people standing up saying, I am not doing this, I'm violating my oath of office. And to me, that's the sort of horror of what we were living through is the number of people who are willing to be complicit. Well, yesterday afternoon, late yesterday afternoon, Brian Morrissey, who was the general counsel from the Treasury Department, resigned. Seven months after he took the job and it's thought that he resigned because of exactly this. But there's an entirely separate political party, the Republican Party, especially in the United States Senate, nothing. You hear

nothing from them. You know, but there, this is one where, you know, I'm a lawyer, I'm not a political analyst, but you do have to think that in something like this, it reminds me of sort of the Alex Pretty shooting, because people could see it and they could judge for themselves. And here, this is not a hard story to understand. Somebody is taking one $1.8 billion, slightly less. So 1.776 billion. I have to keep on reminding myself, it starts with a B.

And that is something that I think people can get their arms around. When you're sitting there looking at gas prices, you're trying to make ends meet, and you're thinking, wait a second, why would that money be being used for giving it out to people like the J6 defendants? And we have, by the way, it's not really speculation as to how the money is going to be used. Michael Flynn just got well over a million dollars, and he admitted his guilt in federal court, and he was paid out.

So the idea that this wouldn't be used in a similar fashion, I think it's fanciful. Yeah, $1.776 billion for this. A billion now Congress is asking for a ballroom, all taxpayer money at a time when Americans are hurting. Let's turn to the book, Andrew. It is titled Liar's Kingdom, How to Stop Trump's Deceit and to Save America. There's been a lot of talk about teaching civics again, which, as you write, is very important. We've got to remind people how this government is supposed to work, but it needs to go further than that. So what are some of your approaches?

So my take on teaching civics is, of course, we need that. But I analogize in the book, that's like, you know, the Titanic hits an iceberg. And the captain says, you know, I really think we need to understand. invest in better radar. I mean, we do need to teach civics. It is important. It's necessary because we obviously have a huge segment of society that needs to sort of understand what our fundamental principles are, but that's not an immediate solution. What I really address, the sort of the elevator speech of this is sort of a truth in advertising for politicians. We have a problem of lying by political people in office, by candidates who are running,

and we really exempt them from something that applies to so many other people. I talked about Enron, and their Jeff Skilling and Ken Lay were convicted for lying about the state of affairs within Enron to the public. They can go to jail. They can pay tons of money for lying. Roger Stone and Paul Manafort that lied to. as found by juries or their own mouths admitting it to Congress, to banks, to the Department of Justice. So there are all sorts of ways that we deal with lies. But what I talk about is, why are we not doing what happens in many other countries

where there are systems to hold politicians and candidates to account for lying to the public? Not for making a mistake, but for intentionally. What does that look like, Andrew? So let's just take Brazil, where Bolson's. who is remarkably similar in so many ways to Donald Trump. And he was criminally prosecuted for engaging in an insurrection. And before that, he was found liable for lying to the public about the election. I mean, so, and the result there was that he was disqualified for running for office for a set term of years.

So Brazil has a system. England has a system. If you lie about your political opponent, you can be disqualified from running. France has a system. Germany has a system. Many of our states, we're in New York right now. New York has a system for dealing with fraud by political actors and disqualifying them from running for office. So there are a whole variety of things that are being done, but not federally. So what I talk about is sort of how that could be operationalized. And you suggest the state States play could play a role here or various counties. What sort of lies would be potentially criminal, right? There's a big Donald Trump lies all the time. We know every day thousands upon thousands of lies a year and so on. But what is, is it the big lie, election for fraud, or could he smaller ones too? It's a great question. You know, one of the challenges of this book is exactly that there was too many to choose from. I went to the Washington Post that just was looking at Trump 1.0. And they had cataloged over 30,000 lies in just that four.

term. And they did the math, which I never do in public, but they did the math for me, which came to 20.1 lies per day, which I imagine some viewers are going to say that seems a little low. But so what I did is, obviously, I can't, this would be a tome if it was every lie. But I just picked, let's go with a big one, which is, as you said, that there was material fraud in the election. And there obviously are many lesser ones that you can choose from. But I decided let's take that. I also was, it was a useful one because you could also compare it to the Brazil case where you had a very, very similar lie. And they took action. And Andrew, 48 hours ago with the acting attorney general on TV saying, we're going to continue to pursue new evidence about the 2020 election. There's evidence out there, and we're going to get to the bottom of this. What is that about? You know, I was fascinated that, you know, this is the Fulton County search where they,

the government went in and took ballots. And that got reviewed by the district judge when Fulton County said, we want our ballots back. And one of the most remarkable things about the judge reviewing that is that he looked at the FBI affidavit and did not endorse

that there was even probable cause of a crime. It was really remarkable, a lengthy decision where he did, the natural thing would be to say, oh, yes, of course there was a probable cause there, did not say it. So, you know, my view on that is let's wait. You know, you want to say there's all this other proof. We've been waiting for years. We've had Donald Trump say, oh, you know, I'm going to give a press conference where I'm going to give irrefutable evidence of material fraud. We're still waiting.

So that's one where every court that has looked at that issue has rejected it, every single one. The new book is titled Liar's Kingdom, How to Save Trump's Stop Trump's Deceit and Save America, author MS Now, legal analyst, Andrew Weissman. Always good to see you. Congrats on the book. Thank you so much.