‘Can't Fumble This Away’

0:00Now, you can watch Ali Velchee five nights a week in prime time on MS now, as he takes command of the 11th hour. The Justice Department is facing its own legal obstacles over this case, putting today's stories in perspective. This one is perhaps one of the more interesting surprises. And tomorrow's headlines in focus. Economists are warning that American consumers are soon going to feel the hurt. The 11th hour with Ali Velchee, week nights at 11 PM Eastern on MS now. Good evening everyone and welcome to the weeknight. I'm Smolland Sanders Townsend with Luke Russell and Eugene Daniels in for Michael. Tonight Donald Trump urges his loyal supporters to cheat to help Republicans win the midterms. This is all while diesel prices smash a new record, even hitting nearly $10 a gallon in some places. Meantime, the crony Trump installed at the DOJ to prosecute his perceived enemies has

1:00suddenly resigned without filing a single charge. Mr. Murray will join us. And Trump's FCC faces new censorship accusations after Jimmy Kimmel claims he was told not to air an interview with James Talleriko. FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez will join the table. But we start tonight with a stark split screen that perfectly sums up the current moment that we're living in. On one side you have all four former living presidents attending a solemn ceremony in New York City marking the 25th anniversary of the September 11th attacks. And on the other, Donald Trump looking a little tired. Alongside his defense secretary, Pete Hegsith, used today's Sombra Memorial Service at the Pentagon to defend the administration's deadly and deeply unpopular war in Iran. We're still sending terrorists where they belong to hell and tankers to the bottom of the ocean where they belong.

2:01And we're ensuring that Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. The economic pressure tightens every day. We've been tested many times. We're being tested today. And we're winning that test very handily. I just want to underscore how disturbing and sick it is on the 25th anniversary of 9-11. That is what the president was saying. And that kind of rhetoric I just frankly also think it flies in the face of what the American people actually want to see today. There's a new NBC poll and it finds just 31 percent of Americans approve of Trump's war in Iran, which has led to the deaths of 18 American service members. It's also made life much more expensive for many. The national average for a gallon of gas and I'm just talking about the regular is now $4.30 according to AAA. And diesel, which fuels trucks, trains, farming equipment, key to the global supply chain, right? Well, that has topped $6 a gallon for the first time ever.

3:03But you know, it's actually much worse in places like California where gas buddy reports some diesel prices are literally maxed out at $9.99 a gallon. That's a lot. And yet yesterday during the final night of the Republican Trumpapalooza in Dallas, the president didn't mention gas prices or affordability once, not one time. In fact, he claimed we're living in a quote golden age of America. Feel like that to you? I don't think so. There was one of many moments during Trump's closing remarks last night that a week of denial, desperation and a willingness to say seemingly anything to cling to power. Listen to this. I pledge to the greatest president in the history of the United States that loves us so much he can't even breathe. That I will go out with my family, my friends.

4:07I'll do it anyway. I don't care if I'm registered or not. I'm going to try and cheat like hell like they do. You know what happens if you don't vote? You go to hell, you know that. Okay. Maybe, maybe I'm just tired, okay? Because I don't know. We didn't get a lot of sleep over the last couple of days we've been working between the three of us. But I think it is just so crazy that there are a lot of people that heard that to the, obviously we heard it last night. There are people we've played the clips throughout the day today. Luke, folks have been like, well, okay, he was joking. When are people going to take him seriously? Got a lot of girl hand claps going to that. That was, come on now. That mean, it was so, I think that was very scary. And I think it's scary for a few reasons. Number one, there was this interwoven desire for his campaign and his people to present

5:08him like this deity. He mixed him in with the Christian nationalism that we've seen so much so that he said it would be morally okay for you to cheat because of your adherence and your faith towards me. That is a really sick thing to see in American politics, especially for a guy who's talked so much about voter fraud. The other thing though, to go back to what we said earlier in the week, if you show that video to anywhere around the world where leaders have cult followings or try to establish themselves as the fathers of the homeland, et cetera, that's what that looked like. And that is here in the United States of America, not on our front door. It's inside the house and it is growing. So when people laugh and make jokes about that and, oh, haha, Trump being Trump, no, no, no, no, no, no. That was a very scary and serious thing that happened in Dallas, Texas. You know, guys, when I was on the floor at the Trumpa Paloza talking to folks, everything I asked them, I was the day after his first speech and I asked them, you know, what did

6:09you think of the president's speech? And these are some of the most ardent marga supporters. And everyone said, you know, he was just, he's just so funny. They see him as an entertainer, right? Even when you watched him for the 30 minutes yesterday and you're watching people laugh, the women who are laughing behind him better, they've been standing up there for hours, waiting for them to come out. Like that aspect of it is something that has never gone away since he was a reality TV star, is that even when you talk to members of Congress here in Washington DC, like we all do, they still see him as an entertainer wanting to get a hat from him when he's, when they're at the White House. And so I think that aspect of this makes everything that he says for them, not as serious as it needs to be. You, let's bring into the conversation first, Democratic strategist, John McCarthy. He's the former senior advisor for political engagement to President Biden. And he's a principal at Causeway Strategy Group. Also with us is MSNOW's Antonio Hilton, host of the new show, The Assignment with Antonio Hilton, which debuts tomorrow at 1 p.m. Eastern right here on MSNOW.

7:12We're so excited for you both. Can we just pick up where Eugene left off McCarthy? Because I, I think that frankly a lot of people have laughed off many of the things that Donald Trump has said. Frankly, since he's came down that elevator in 2015, but I think what the American people are living through right now are the ramifications of the reality that it is not a joke. Yeah, and I mean, the thing that we have seen since the very debut of President Trump on the national stage is he's really good at diagnosing the issue that's at hand, right? Like, he understands what people are going through. And then he kind of treats the common cold with chemo and totally over does it. It's something that we see every single time. And I think that voters are really fatigued with it at this moment. One of the things that really struck me the most of the last two days was that as you're looking around at Dallas, right, as you're looking at this convention, it doesn't sound like a party who's in political power. I mean, they control the Congress, they control the White House. And they're acting as if they had nothing to do with any of the things that are in front of them. So I don't think that they're teaming up for a pretty strong midterms clearly, but

8:15they're not going to be able to run away from this. They own this economy. And Tony, you are always on the road. You're an outside cat. You're about to be an inside cat a little bit on the back to be an inside cat a little bit. Something that always strikes me and has for this kind of entire Trump era is the way in which people explain away the things that Donald Trump has done to them, the his actions that he has taken that has caused them to have higher gas prices, higher grocery prices. When I was talking to folks there, they kept saying things like, you know, the prices will come down. I promise you that. I said, well, whatever this you have, Donald Trump said it, right? He has this innate ability and it's not new. But it is even shocking to see for his ardent supporters that they are not going anywhere, that they truly, truly believe that he's going to do what he says he's going to do. Even when sometimes they know his line, when I talk to them about the five K checks, they said, oh, he's probably just doing that to get people to vote. He's not actually going to give us money. So better even believe him on some of the things.

9:15And yet, they're still on his side. You know, Eugene, I think there are, I'm no psychologist, but it is a pattern that I know that we have all seen in our reporting and our travels over the course of the last decade now, which is that you meet people who, as you just said, they seem to have, there's like a layer of their consciousness. It's aware that they're not going to get the $5,000. Some of them do try though to kind of go along. Our colleague Von Hillier spoke to people who, you know, were kind of at least appearing to seem enthusiastic about the idea that they were going to be able to pass that $5,000 onto their kids or their grandkids, despite the fact that I mean, there's just one thing after another example of him promising money to people that he ultimately cannot, will not, doesn't even try to pay out. But I think that there are people who, at this point, they've sort of cast their lot in with the president over the course of a decade. And to admit that, he is lying to them would be to admit something really uncomfortable about themselves. I've had this conversation with people where I talk them through, we are, I was just in

10:22Texas talking to people about a whole lot of conditions going on there where Trump is making life really difficult for Greg Abbott and Ken Paxson at the moment. And you'll talk to people who voted for him three times. They have described their life becoming worse and worse, but they still are not fully ready to separate themselves from the Trump movement. And I think it's because they have a hard time reckoning at times with the fact that to admit that this has happened to them is to admit something about themselves that they're not ready to say at times. One of the things I've seen is there are people who are, say, taking down the signs or the MAGA hats and they're no longer flying the flags on their cars, right? But perhaps they're still sort of socially in the fold. And so you see this sort of winnowing away, this sort of beginning of a realization, but it's really, really difficult, I think, for people to come to terms with that. And that's why it persists. Yeah, and ultimately it comes down to cultures, these cultural wedge issues with supersede everything. And we had a discussion earlier in this week where a lot of people say, why do they want

11:23to folks keep voting against their own interests? And sometimes those own interests are actually those cultural issues that just supersede everything to the point of where you become bewildered, but they still believe themselves to will it true. John, MAGA in waiting over here, Mr. JD Vance, he seems to be making this play that the Democratic Party is a bunch of crazy people. And if you give them the keys, they're going to go off the cliff. I think we are way off the cliff already. But let's listen to the Vice President, I just say. Don't give the country over to a bunch of crazy people because you happen to disagree with us on a policy issue here or there. Look, I'm not asking anybody to agree with me on every single issue. I'm not asking anybody to agree on every single policy, the administration. What I am asking you to do is to recognize the contrast with the radicals and recognize the achievements of the last 18 months.

12:26You're not in a good position where your message is, well, we might not be the worst option. So please just give us the keys one more time. Gas prices are through the roof. The Epstein files are still out there. The corruption is on massive scale. It feels like Democrats just have to run out the clock where they are right now and can't fumble this away. It seems impossible to fumble this one away. Will there be some benefits of the way? There are two things that are happening here at the same time that I think are worth watching, right? You spent two days watching Dallas where all they did was propose some of the greatest hits. I mean, there was nothing new because they don't have a record to run on. That's just the dirty little secret of the Republicans at this moment. So all they're going to do is spend their time talking about who's to blame and who you should be afraid of. The problem for Democrats that we need to be aware of is that what they're saying feels true to some voters. Like we need to be self-aware enough to say that our candidates need to demonstrate all of the fight and enthusiasm that people are looking for, but it needs to exist inside of a social norm that people are willing to be comfortable with.

13:26Because if people don't feel like you understand their lives or share their values, they're certainly not going to listen to what you have to say about the economy. I mean, it's a very astute point. The social norm they're comfortable with, doubted out. Very much so. Okay, so let's check a pivot because I got thoughts, but I'm a whole my tongue on some of that. Because Antonia, you've been on the road, McGurough. And you're not going to get off the road. You're just going to be in a studio a little bit. And still on the road. But I was struck by this AP poll that had Trump's approval on immigration down about 10 points. And I take that with this understanding that you have been kind of driving around down through the big bin sector in Texas. And you have driven thousands of miles. And you have a firsthand examination of how Donald Trump's renewed request for this border wall construction is actually like tearing up some of his supporters. Yeah, this is a perfect example of the Trump own goal kind of thing where he has forever

14:29now had this dream of an end to end border wall. He's obsessed with him being able to say that the border wall goes from one end of the bottom of the United States all the way to the other. Reality, topography, geography, land ownership, be damned. And he's pushing it forward anyway. I mean, the administration has bypassed dozens of environmental laws. There are all these no big contracts that have been fast tracked to people who in some cases have happened to donate money to his 2024 campaign. And they're now moving hundreds of federal workers into these camps on the border. And not only are they starting to disturb pristine, beautiful natural lands that Texans love. They love the outdoors. They cherish it on both sides of the political spectrum. But they are also sending out to hundreds of landowners eminent domain requests. So people are getting letters in the mail, people who are in these ranching farming families on the border who've lived there since before Texas was Texas. They're getting letters saying Trump wants to build a wall right through your property.

15:32And oh, if you're not into that, we're going to send you into the eminent domain process, which the government wins more than 90% of the time. And I spent time with landowners, with conservative sheriffs, with Republican voters, people whose businesses depend on the ecosystem of the border, on people who want to visit places like Big Ben National Park. And they see this as a crisis. In fact, what they described to me as Simone is we don't actually feel like there's an invasion from the South as Trump keeps saying. We feel we're now being invaded by Washington DC. And I spent some time with one of the conservative sheriffs who has praised Trump in the past and is now fighting him on this. I want you to take a listen to some of what he told me. The Rio Grande River is in a straight line that runs from El Paso straight to the Gulf of Mexico. It zigzins the eggs and creates the Texas border. A president Trump is not only giving away the Rio Grande River, but he's also seeding sovereign American-owned land owned by Americans, basically given it to Mexico. And I find it kind of ironic that we wanted to take Greenland and Iceland, but yeah, we're

16:34willing to give up part of the continental United States. I mean, what happened to the whole, they're going to pay for it, thing? Yeah. Never saw it. And now? And not only did they not have to pay for it, yeah, that's a good point now, they're getting free land as well. So you hear that they're not only as Mexico not paying for this wall, as the president Simón told us so many times, they would. But a lot of his plan for these landowners property would end up leaving their homes, their land, their property on the Mexican side of the border. So these are people who again have been Americans, Texans for generations and generations, and they'll now have a wall here, some part of their property in the United States, but in some cases, they're home, they're animals, they're farms, technically in Mexico. This feels very opposite of what the conservatives say they believe in. Antonia, I believe more of this report from Texas is going to air tomorrow on your new show and your debut. We're just using DC hearing that by the way. We all are malzare just like, what? We're just going to be forward about the internet. This is a pointed TV tomorrow. I'm going to check this out.

17:35Okay, y'all need to tune in. John McCarthy, he'll be watching. Antonia, thank you. You can see the premiere of the assignment with Antonia Hilton tomorrow at 1PM Eastern right here on MSNOW. Don't go anywhere, though, folks, because after the break, one of Trump's top Department of Justice loyalists that he brought into the investigation about getting back at his perceived enemies, well, that person has suddenly resigned without filing a single charge. And later FCC commissioner Anna Gomez joins us after Jimmy Kimmel, claim that Trump administration censored his interview with James Telebrico that was supposed to air on TV last night, but it didn't. This is the weeknight.

18:37A Trump loyalist leading a sprawling DOJ investigation into Trump's perceived political enemies has suddenly resigned. ABC News first reported that Joe DeGio Nova, his exit comes amid growing frustrations from Trump and senior DOJ officials regarding his so-called Grand Conspiracy investigation. This is told ABC that DeGio Nova pitched himself to Donald Trump as someone who could ramp up the investigation. But despite dozens of subpoenas, the investigation didn't produce a single criminal prosecution. I wonder why. Joining us now is MSNOW legal analyst Melissa Murray. She's professor at the NYU School of Law. Thank you so much for being on the program, Melissa. Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here. Melissa, it's good to see you. Okay, so this is from the New York Post on Thursday.

19:41Ask whether he had lost focus. DeGio Nova dismissed the accusation and shot back. If you want indictments where there's no evidence, you have an ethical problem. Now, DeGio Nova later tried to walk that back telling the Associated Press, quote, there's plenty of evidence in all of these cases. It just takes time to get there and some people want to get there a little faster than others and you can't do that. There's a thing. I don't think DeGio Nova's departure necessarily means any of this is ending. The reporting out there seems to strongly suggest that people were unhappy that DeGio Nova had not returned, they were no return on his investments. All these subpoenas, no actual indictments. And so to me, that says that the Justice Department actually would like to triple down here. They want some soldiers that are willing to just yolo it with the law. No, sorry, I think he was not as compliant as was expected. No, DeGio Nova was not the first person in this world charged with doing this, like unifying all of these investigations into some sort of coordinated grand conspiracy as the Trump

20:45administration has said, right? So he was not the first person to try to do this. The earlier lawyer also departed again because apparently she was not moving fast enough, she was not being effective. DeGio Nova will do this and he will leave. It's likely that there's going to be another person who's going to step in here. And again, I don't know if this person is going to have any more success than DeGio Nova did. It may be the case that this person is perhaps less wedded to professional norms than DeGio Nova apparently was. Or just simply, this is someone who may be more willing to flout ethical standards in a way that he wasn't. But there's definitely going to be another person, I think, and this is not going away. Well, let's see, you're right. There's always another person, but the good news, at least for us right now, is that evidence still matters. So even a diopathy wants them to go into court, as you know better than I do, when they go into court, they don't always tell the same, yell the same things that he's writing on to the social. It always sounds a little bit differently. It always sounds like, oh, wait, the law actually matters here still in this country.

21:48I want to shift a little bit to the, some male and ballast and the attorneys and those and their concerns. Our colleague Lisa Rubin sat down with a group of attorneys general and listened to what they said about kind of their biggest fears as we get closer and closer to the midterm elections. Well, Keaps, me up at night is the federal government seizing ballots in a closely contested election and taking custody and control of them after the ballots are cast and before they're counted. It's my biggest concern as well. We, in Georgia, they have seized ballots and an Arizona, they're subpoenaed ballots. It hurts me to say it, but Smoan has been saying this for a very long time that that is what we should all be concerned about. And in the first term, in 2020, when Trump was trying to steal the election, trying to overturn the rule, the American people said. The deal, J Folkson, the deal, J.C. No, the attorneys general said, no, you actually can't do the things that you want to do. We don't have those protections anymore. Are the concerns that these A.D.'s have?

22:49Do you have the same ones? No, I think this is a really big concern. I've been saying this since January, when those ballots were seized in Fulton County, that was a dress rehearsal for what I think we are likely to see in the upcoming midterm elections and certainly in the later presidential election in two years after that. I mean, it's a dry run to see what you can get away with. I think we are going to have to really, again, be a situous here, educate the public about what is going on. I know that a lot of different voters, advocacy groups are talking about how to educate the public, especially in those states like Washington. I saw the AG from Washington there, where many of the voters are actually using mail-in ballots because there's such a far-flung population in those states. That's also the case in other Western states like Utah, where mail-in ballots are the norm. We have to figure out how to make sure people can vote, maybe not necessarily using mail-in ballots, using Dropboxes or having the mail-in ballots brought somewhere else, but removing the postal service. And again, we still have this whole question that's lying out at the Supreme Court whether or not this executive order that the president has issued effectively federalizing the election

23:56and making the U.S. Postal Service a major component of the election. We still are waiting for the Supreme Court to issue a decision on that. Again, this has been pending at the court for a couple of days now. Usually, the court likes to issue these things on Friday evenings, right, before people go home. So, you haven't seen anything. That to me suggests that there is perhaps a lot of debate within the court about what's going on. Well, listen, I'm going to tie this here. So this guy, Joe DiGinova here, okay, was looking for the Grand Conspiracies. He wasn't able to find any Grand Conspiracies. So he walked away from it and it faced immense pressure to try to find them, they didn't exist. So now that these Grand Conspiracies don't exist, what are Trump and his cronies doing? They're going into technicalities. I'm happy you brought up this Washington state and Oregon is facing the same problems. They are now seeing ballots there that are not marked before Election Day because of operations changes at the Postal Service. Our great guests, we always have on Mark Elias and Democracy Doc Ed reported about this

24:59in Florida. I want to read this for people to show them how technical this is becoming. Okay, in Florida, in an ominous sign, USPS initially rejected Florida County's mail ballot over a spacing issue. The Postal Agency rejected Leon County's envelope because the words return service requested and the Election Office's return address were only 0.236 inches apart when there should have been a full quarter inch between them. The envelope design was only accepted when early office filed an appeal. A representative told Democracy Doc Ed Friday, those of us older remember it sounds like the hanging chads in 2000 to Florida all over again, but if they can't, they have no grand conspiracy. There's no grand voter fraud. So now we're getting into spacing issues from the USPS, Professor, I mean, this is wild. Well, it's not only that there's no grand conspiracy here. There's no rampant voter fraud as we've noted. The idea that non-citizens are voting, that doesn't exist. It's infinitismally rare in US elections.

25:59But they also don't have a message that's compelling right now. US prices are high as you've noted. We have a very unpopular war. This is an administration that's on the ropes and they know it and when you're on the ropes, this is the kind of stuff that you do. Melissa Murray, thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it. If the election comes down to spacing concerns on envelopes, God help us all. Next the most dangerous form of cancel culture. That's how James Teleriko described the pressure campaign from Trump's FCC after ABC decided not to air his interview on Jimmy Kimmel last night. FCC commissioner Anna Gomez is here at the table to discuss next on the weeknight. I caught up with state representative James Teleriko yesterday in the Lone Star State

27:04to discuss his campaign to become the first Democratic Senator out of Texas in roughly 30 years. I also asked him about this ad from his Republican opponent featuring an AI-generated likeness of Teleriko. Well, here's how the real James Teleriko responded. This is I think what bothers people about modern politics that you can use AI to literally put words in my mouth, create a fake version of me, throw it on the air without any disclaimer. So no Texan watching this is going to know that it's artificial intelligence. And by the way, this is happening as data centers pop up all over the state of Texas, soaking up all our water, jacking up our utility bills, and Ken Paxson's contributing to that problem with these AI deep fake ads. It shouldn't be surprising because Ken Paxson has taken nearly half a million dollars from the data center industry. He is bought and paid for by these AI data centers. And so it makes total sense now that he's using it in his campaign to lie about me distort

28:09the truth and mine the pockets of his big AI donors. So everything in the ad is false? I think I haven't even seen the whole ad to be honest with you. But what Ken Paxson does is he will take comments out of context in order to distract from his career of corruption. He doesn't have anything to run on. He has no clue how to lower costs. He has no idea how to get this economy back on track. He has no defense for his self enrichment, his self dealing. And so he's going to try to take things that I've said completely out of context, paint them in the worst possible light to make me look like a crazy person. I am telling people across Texas about my record in the state house of bringing both parties together to pass 60 bipartisan bills that lower the cost of housing and childcare and prescription drugs. And ultimately I think that's what Texans are looking for in their next century. Are you worried that folks, because I know you had a lot of big endorsements today, actually Republicans, Fatal Rico came out.

29:11Do you want, do you worry that people will see this ad? Because it's, we honest, when I saw it, I said, is this AI, is this AI? Are you concerned that people will see this ad and not realize that it's AI? Oh, absolutely. I mean, I used to make fun of my grandparents when they would get tricked by something on social media. But with how good AI is getting, I increasingly can't tell the difference between deep fix and reality on my social media feeds or when I'm watching television. And so yes, I'm very concerned that this ad will deceive voters that it will distort the truth. And that is completely consistent with Ken Paxton's career of lying to the people of Texas. He lied to his own staff. That's why they reported on the FBI. He lied to law enforcement. That's why he was indicted for investment fraud. He lied to his own party. That's why they impeached him for bribery. So Ken Paxton is a liar through and through. And he's going to continue to lie to the people of Texas to try to cling onto power.

30:13We're going to have to have the resources to combat those lies. And it's why we need Texas to step up. That's right. Elon Musk is spending millions of dollars trying to buy this election. The only way to stop him is with people power. You know, up until this week, you were outspending Democrats were outspending Republicans on the airwaves here. And then this week has been the first week as of September 5th that Republicans outspend you. And then there's 14 million to 14 million. Are you concerned that you're going to have the resources to compete? And that just you. I mean, there's a governor's race here. Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic nominee. There's a number of House races. That's right. Are you all going to have to cash? It really depends on whether or not the people are going to have our backs. I don't take corporate pack money. I never have, never will. I don't have Elon Musk dumping millions of dollars into my campaign. I don't have dark money groups that are putting ads on the airwaves.

31:16And so I'm relying on regular people giving five, ten, fifteen dollars at a time. We've been able to shatter grassroots fundraising records that way, but we have to keep our foot on the gas. We cannot get complacent. I know that we're leading in a lot of these polls against compacts and but we are the underdogs in this race. We are going up against entrenched power and entrenched money. That power and money is powerful. I don't want to lie about that, but it is nothing compared to people power. And so if folks step up and fund this race by giving those small contributions, if enough people do that, we're going to have the resources we need to fight back and win the seat in November. You mentioned Kempaksen staff. And I was really struck by David Maxwell. You have to add out with featuring him. David Maxwell, he spent what, nearly, fifty years in Texas law enforcement. He worked for Kempaksen. That's it. He is also the person that reported him to the FBI. That's right. What did he tell you about Paxton that said that made you say, I need to put him in this

32:19act? I mean, he is one of the most decorated law enforcement officials in the state of Texas, a former Texas ranger. He was the director of law enforcement for Kempaksen. And Kempaksen fired him for enforcing the law against Kempaksen. And so this just proves that Kempaksen thinks he doesn't have to follow the law. He thinks he operates on a different set of rules from the rest of us. And that's exactly the problem in this broken, corrupt political system is powerful people like Kempaksen who seem to operate with impunity. And I'm so glad that the people closest to Kempaksen are speaking up about this. Not only his director of law enforcement, his own defense attorney endorsed me in this campaign. His own party is the party that impeached him. And so I think the people closest to Kempaksen understand that he is unfit to be the next

33:20US Senator for more. I did not have on my bingo card the profiles and courage coming from Republicans and Texas, but you just never know. And that's how egregious his corruption is. There has been a lot of chatter about black voters all across this country, but especially black voters in Texas. There was a TSU survey that recently came out and in that survey about 77% of black Texans say that Texas Democrats, they believe take their vote for granted. So why should black folks in Texas believe that you're different? And they're not wrong about that. You think Texas Democrats have taken black voters here for granted? I think the Democratic Party as a whole, including Texas Democrats, have taken black voters for granted. The fastest way to lose an election is to take any voter, any community for granted. I hate the idea of a base because it assumes that people are going to show up and vote for you because you've got a letter by your name. And what that ends up looking like is elected officials and candidates don't actually show up and listen to the needs of a certain community.

34:23In this case, black communities across the state of Texas because they assume they've got their votes in the back. And we've seen in recent election cycles what that leads to. And so I am treating black voters in the state of Texas like swing voters. I have been shown up in black neighborhoods and been visiting black churches and black businesses, been meeting with black community leaders and elected officials all over the state holding town halls in black communities and engaging in sometimes difficult. Some of it has been contingent. That's okay. That's okay. Yes. When you sign up to do this, you have to decide do you want a real relationship with the people you seek to represent? So. I mean, you can show up and do like a photo op and wave and leave, right? But I don't want that kind of superficial relationship with the people that I'm going to fight for in Washington. After our conversation, Tolerico sat down with Jimmy Kimmel, but their conversation was moved from ABC's live broadcast to YouTube. Now Kimmel blames the shift on pressure from Donald Trump's FCC, which the White House

35:26has denied. Joining us now is FCC commissioner Anna Gomez. Commissioner Gomez, thank you so much for joining us on this Friday evening. Simple question. What happened here was the FCC weaponized against Tolerico in this case? Well, we've seen this administration have a pressure campaign against broadcasters in general to basically get them to come to heel. But they've particularly targeted Disney through its local stations, ABC. And it's done in a variety of ways. But Disney has actually refused to capitulate. And so they've upped the pressure by investigating the view, for example, because of their interview with James Tolerico. They are now reviewing their licenses early, which is very unprecedented. It hasn't been done for over half a century because of the fact that they have really refused to bow to this administration.

36:28So I think what's happening here is that this pressure campaign is making ABC cautious. You heard what Jimmy Kimmel said. He said he does not want to put the local ABC affiliates at risk by airing the interview. But sorry, these are extraordinary measures to being taken. They're extraordinary measures. And to be clear, the rules and the law allow late night shows like Jimmy Kimmel's to have news interviews. They are subject to an exemption from the rules that require equal time for all candidates. And this FCC has decided to upend decades of precedent. There was a time, Jay Leno had a FCC ruling. And Jay Leno was out campaigning for then governor candidate. And they still, the FCC still said no, the governor candidate, this was Arnold Schwarzenegger,

37:34is a newsworthy figure. And the FCC allows these interviews to take place in the interests of the viewers. And importantly, I think it's really important to note also, the FCC defers to the broadcast stations, determination of what is in fact newsworthy. Because otherwise what you're doing is you're substituting the government for the editorial decisions of these broadcast stations, which in of itself has problems under the First Amendment. We know that President Trump does want to subject to the way he thinks about what should be news for all of the ways we think about what should be news. I do want to read from the White House, they send a note to our team after Simone's interview with Talleriko saying Jimmy Kimmel is play acting as he often does to create a false narrative about this administration's policies. Chairman Carr has not threatened him regarding interviewing James Talleriko or any other candidate. Any media outlet blindly amplifying Kimmel's egocentric delusion should insist on proof of which they will find none.

38:37How heavy-handed, when the FCC wants someone to not air something, how heavy-handed is it? Is it as much as they call up Jimmy and say you can't have it? Like how do they actually do it? Or is it just the sense of the world where it feels like oh, ABC shouldn't air? They feel it themselves. It's the latter. It is absolutely unconstitutional and unlawful for the FCC to say no, you cannot air something. It is censorship and we are prohibited to censor broadcasters. But what's happening is the administration is making it very clear what type of content they want. It did so in a variety of ways against Disney. So much so that Disney has now sued and basically said the FCC's actions are violating our First Amendment rights because we are self-censoring based on these threats and these investigations from the FCC. And the point that I'm trying to make of why this is so important and the fact that this is coming out is Disney and ABC has been very clear about the fact that it is in fact

39:41self-censoring. There are broadcasters all over this country that are very nervous about infuriating this administration and we don't know how much they're self-censoring too. Yeah, or more than thinking about doing. Exactly. Thank you so much for coming. We'll be right back. 25 years ago today, Americans watched in horror as nearly 3,000 people lost their lives in the worst terrorist attack in our nation's history, September 11, 2001. Today, ceremonies took place at the crash-size honoring the victims and first responders. I, when I think about this, I think about kind of, because we're all millennials here, it felt like the first time that we saw how bad the world could be, right? Like it took the innocence of an entire generation in this higher country in just a couple of hours.

40:41And that was one of the things I was a military about living on Ford Hood at the time and then the ways in which it changed everyday life for everyday Americans and then the world is one of those things that we can never forget. I think, yeah, I agree with you. I think it showed us into this new century and put us on a track of which there's been so many troubling things that have happened and they all tied back to 9, 11 in some capacity. But I remember that day so clearly. I spent so much time this week looking at the stories of the victims and remembering what that time was like. I was 16 years old. I remember evacuating from my school because we were by the National Cathedral and there is worry that that could be a target as a symbol of Christianity and religion. And I remember seeing the smoke from the Pentagon. But I remember the most about that time was the unity and how it really felt like we as Americans were looking after one another. And we are so far away from that now. And I hope that there are people younger than us who have never seen a time of unity like that. If they could ever experience that sometime in their lives and I just had a daughter, I want my daughter to feel that sense of American unity again. And I don't want to be after a terrorist attack.

41:42It should be something that we strive for as a country and so many of our leaders have taken us away from that. Well, you know, the people at the end of the day still have the power in this country. And I think it's up to us as our colleagues that rule said this morning, we are the light. I was 10 years old when that on that faithful day, 25 years ago. And I will just say having worked at the White House, every president and vice president every year, they participate in the commemoration so that we never forget. And being in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, the year that I worked in the White House, hearing the stories, seeing everyone come together, president George W. Bush was there. It was a reminder that there have been dark days in this country. There is light. We are the light and we can always do better. We'll be right back. Amen. That does it for the weeknight. We'll see you back here on Monday at 7 p.m. Eastern. And be sure to check out a new episode of Clock It. This week Eugene and I spoke with MSNOW Director of Elections and Analytics.

42:46Kabir Kana, here's a preview. We can't do a lot with the data we don't see because people were turned away and told, well, this isn't your polling location. We actually changed that. And now you have to vote somewhere else. And maybe that person doesn't make it to the alternate location or maybe they have to cast a provisional ballot. So rice pops up or the National Guard is hanging out near the polling station. Right. And the mail and it just never made it. Right. Subscribe to MSNOW Premium on Apple Podcasts for Acre Listening and Bonus Content. Have a good weekend folks. Happy Russia Shana to all who celebrate. Enjoying new episodes of Morning Joe, Deadline White House and The Rachel Maddo Show. Every small, deep, democratic muscle that we have is flexing.

43:50Plus the last word with Laurence O'Donnell, The Beat with Ari Melper, The Weeknight and More. On the go, wherever you get your podcasts, for ad free listening to all of your favorite shows, subscribe to MSNOW Premium on Apple Podcasts.