>> please don't take that away from my daughter or the countless others like her who are out there. let them have their child hoods. let them be who they are. >> when "all in" starts right now. good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. in a dramatic twist two countries that have had the hardest time dealing with the coronavirus are now doing the best jobs of vaccinating people. in many ways, the united states, the united kingdom have had similar experiences. we have a lot in common, common language. we both had right wing populist leaders who caught covid, and both societies have been absolutely hammered by this virus. and now those two countries are basically the best big countries in the world at vaccinating their populations. obviously, the u.s. is much bigger. both countries are taking advantage of a once-in-a-lifetime miracle to try to stamp out the disease. remember, in less than a year, major drug makers, right, manage to develop vaccines and run trials with tens of thousands participants before they were approved. and we have reams of safety and effectiveness data with two vaccines approved by the fda. another of the biden administration. there have been more than 110 million doses administered in this country and so far, so good. you may have seen several european countries have suspended use of the astrazeneca vaccine which i should note has not been approved in the u.s. after reports of blood clots in people who have gotten the vaccine. astrazeneca said there were 37 out of 17 million vaccinated in the 27 country eu and britain. in fact, it's the incidents of clots is much lower than expected to occur naturally in a general population of size and is similar to that of other licensed covid-19 vaccines. so, this issue, which has gotten a lot of attention, understandably. it's showing up in .0002% of cases. all these vaccines have been subjected to incredibly, if anything, overly cautious review processes. given the stakes, right? right now, the u.s. and the uk are crushing. now, arguably, the most powerful person who doth bestride those two worlds in the english speaking world is of course, that man, media mogul rupert murdock. he is at a high risk if he were to get covid because rupert murdock is quite old. so two weeks after the pfizer vaccine was approved in the uk, the guardian reported, quote, a convoy of range recoveries delivered the 89-year-old billionaire to a dedicated center in henley oxfordshire. normal hours are understood to be extended at the last minute. a favorite for rupert. he got the vaccine. he put out a statement how good it was and the rupert murdocks, the wealthy and powerful people, they understand the vaccine is our best shot to protect themselves from severe illness and to bring this virus to heel. and rupert murdock did not want to get covid, because he wanted to make it to 90. he did last week. congrats, happy birthday. he does not want to die a premature death. that is not the message the rest of us are getting from the multi-billion enterprise he owns. because you see you are not in rupert's club, not in this social circle. you viewers out there in tv land are where they throw out the chum for the common people, where they disingenuously scope skepticism and fear in the most cowardly way possible by posing as brave truth tellers in the guise of just flinging nonsense at people and leading to more people getting sick. this has been true throughout the pandemic. there's a nightly drum beat on fox news specifically from tucker carlson that is undermining our best chance to get out from under this disease. >> when are we finally going to repeal corona law, and what about this vaccine? why are americans being discouraged from asking simple straightforward questions about it? questions like how effective are these drugs, are they safe? all of these should prompt pretty tough questions for our experts in this country. and one of the questions is how effective is this coronavirus vaccine? how necessary is it to take the vaccine? don't dismiss those questions from anti-vaxers. don't kick people off social media for asking them. answer the questions especially now. >> i mean, those questions were the subject of two 8-hour long zoom meetings publicly televised by the fda where they went through the data on precisely that question. i watched part of it. these are not hidden. i mean, of course, it is fine. it's understandable to ask questions, and it's fine and understandable to be skeptical. this is all new. no one is saying get the vaccine or we'll throw you in jail. it is a free country. and tucker carlson knows this. obviously tucker knows there are obviously easily accessible answers to these questions about the vaccines. he's not stupid. he just thinks his audience is, so he feeds into their fears by lying these shadowy people are out there. they're just questions, can't people ask questions? and this by the way is the most cowardly way to do this. i say this as someone with a platform myself. to hide behind a podium of contraryism because he can't say it outright, the vaccine will kill you unless he wants to find himself gone in the way of lou daubs. here is the data we have. let's look at what is happening in long-term care facility across the country. this is the actual data. this is what's happening in the u.s. once people started getting vaccinated in long-term care facilities, cases and deaths started to fall precipitously. look what is happening in israel where a cdc study found mass vaccinations led to drop in severe covid cases. johnson & johnson hopkins medicine, a really helpful page where doctors answer questions like is covid-19 vaccine safe, what are the side effects of the covid-19 vaccine and can i get covid-19 itself from the vaccine? and the answer in every instance is vaccines from the best data we know appear to be safe are for almost everyone. we're all human beings trying to figure this out. it's the overwhelming consensus of scientists based on the data, based on rigorous clinical trials. and now millions and millions and millions and millions of doses of real world use. that's what we got. again, it's not perfect. the world is complicated. we all make decisions under uncertainty. but that is how we have the best evidence we have is that these are safe, they are certainly super effective and we know how bad covid is even though lots of other people spent a whole year lying to people about how bad it was. and that's the really hard thing to come face-to-face with throughout this last year. there's been a lot of errors people have made. there's been good faith errors and there's been bad faith errors. lots of people, people in media, public health people, policy makers republican and democrat, right, lots of people made good faith errors. they just made the wrong call, bad judgments because it's a bad terrifying disease and it's new. and they've gotten stuff wrong while trying to do their best to help others. so that's a big category of errors, right? but there has been a force in our life for this pandemic between donald trump who went out of his way to get his vaccine in secret and rupert murdock's media franchise and a whole ecosystem that demonstrated nothing but bad faith. bad faith, fully knowing what they were doing. putting people in danger and getting people sick because they think it will rate. and we still have to deal with this because overcoming this cynical bad faith misinformation is the final hurdle for herd immunity. both before and during his time as u.s. senator al franken had one of the experiences in dealing with fox news. and brandy has specialized in disinformation specifically around health and both of them join me now. senator franken, i want to start with you about the kind of ways in which our informational consumption in this country, our political discussions and now these health discussions get shaped in your experience in the u.s. senate, your experience in politics by this kind of bad faith cynicism. >> well, i've had some experience with fox news both before and since being in the senate and they do -- i wrote a book and there's two universities of information right now. there's information and there's disinformation. and fox news and oann and news max others deal in disinformation. and the republicans in the senate and in congress have in large part bought into that. that's why even though 70% of the american people favored the covid relief bill, every republican voted against it. and now they're going to double down by suppressing votes. that's their game plan. and because of that we've got to deal with the filibuster. i've been pushing something that norm orrinstein and i would have worked together for a long time, which would be a reform of the filibuster, which would put the burden on the minority, the republicans in this case instead of democrats having to come up with 60 votes and a filibuster. republicans would have to come up with 41 votes to sustain that filibuster, and then they'd have to stay on the floor and they'd have to debate. and the debate would have to be germane, and i think the voting right bill would be a good one to do this on. and i know my republican colleagues. they're not going to want to be on the floor 3:00 in the morning. this is -- i've bip talking to my senate former colleagues and i know joe manchin and i know kristen sinema had said they won't vote to overturn the filibuster but joe manchin went on a number of shows and said he was very open to reforming it. >> i think the sort of that question of minority control and particularly when it interlocks with this sort of alternate ecosystem is kind of the logger heads the country finds itself. and i think brandy on that point of alternate information ecosystems. i think we all have people in our lives we know, love, respect who are skeptical or hesitant or don't trust big pharma, which again that's not a crazy view. and no one should feel like cowed or bullied into this, right? but there is this question of how you in good faith sort of bring information to bear when the stuff people are getting access to is often not being disseminated in good faith. >> right. well, you know, it's normal to have questions especially in times of crisis, right? but misinformation really thrives when people have no faith in the institutions, right, that are there to protect them or help them. and tucker carlson but not just him, a lot of fox news opinion people, they spend each and every day chipping away at that trust. these messages have an effect. i mean, right now polling suggests that 50% -- 49%, half of republican men are not going to get the vaccine and that's because these messages, you know, really come through. and, you know, the most odious part about tucker's stick he likes to say no one asks questions. tucker carlson has one of the biggest platforms on the planet. if he had real questions he could probably get doctors or scientists or experts to come on his show and ask these questions. instead he invites covid deniers to come on his show. but he doesn't want answers, right? he wants his audience to be afraid and it's working. >> and i wonder, too, senator, the role of the republican party in this. you did see a little daylight with mcconnell on sort of covid unmasking, right? he would do his little videos like with the senate republicans last year where they have a mask and mcconnell saying like oh, i don't go to the white house, that place freaks me out, that's a germ factory over there. but also strikes me in some ways the platform of the republican party and elected officials is dwarfed by those new systems anyway. >> you know, he -- mcconnell will go anywhere at any time. he'll change his story as we've seen of late. the thing about it is i had andy slavitt on today and on my podcast. and these are incredibly effective. there has been -- when they say 95% effective for pfizer no one is going to get very sick who has gotten it. you're not going to be hospitalized. you're not going to die. and we need people -- enough people to take this to get herd immunity. dr. fauci has said between 70% and 85% depending on things that we don't know about the variants and stuff like that. this is incredibly crucial information. tucker carlson knows what he's doing and it is so cynical and so wrong. and this is really what this whole culture of putting out this disinformation is about. and it's -- it's awful and it's doing a huge disservice to everyone. >> wherever you are out there there is good information on this, the john hopkins thing we talked about, the data really is remarkable. one way or the other. al franken, host of the al franken podcast and brandy, thank you both. people are starting to see that stimulus money hit their bank accounts. people are having a little fun with the news imagining all things they'll do with the money like when the direct deposit hits, time to upgrade this career. we can afford the sun now, or my personal favorite, what would the chicago bears do with some stimulus cash? pick up andy dalton apparently. now if you want to find out when you're getting your check or hit your account do not go anywhere. we'll tell you exactly where to go to find out next. ll you exac go to find out next. sure, he's the 76-year-old guy who still runs marathons, right? sadly, not anymore. wow. so sudden. um, we're not about to have the "we need life insurance" conversation again, are we? no, we're having the "we're getting coverage so we don't have to worry about it" conversation. so you're calling about the $9.95 a month plan -from colonial penn? -i am. we put it off long enough. we are getting that $9.95 plan, today. 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(soft music) ♪ hello, colonial penn? many plug-ins are stuck in the past. they release a lot of scent at first but after a while, you barely know they're working. new febreze fade defy plug works differently. it's the first plug-in with built-in technology to digitally control how much scent is released to smell 1st day fresh for 50 days. it even tells you when it's ready to be refilled. upgrade to febreze fade defy plug. see every delivery... every yikes... and even every awwwwwwww... wait, where was i? introducing self protection from xfinity. designed to put you in control. with real-time notification and a week of uninterrupted recording... all powered by reliable, secure wifi from xfinity. gotta respect his determinatio. it's easy and affordable to get started. get self protection for $10 a month. americans are already starting to see their stimulus checks hit their bank accounts after president biden signed the new rescue plan into law last week. it gives 85% of households at least $1,400. you can go to irs.gov, click on get my payment which is a great link. on thursday president biden laid out the ambitious goal of getting 100 million payments into peoples pockets in just ten days. and i have to say the speed and the scope of the way they're going about this is really unlike anything i've seen in the time i've covered politics. middle class families across the country waking up to thousands of dollars in their accounts. $5,600 for an average family of four to help them make it through the last part of the worst period of american life in recent memory. and that's part of the reason the american rescue plan is super popular. 75% of americans approve of it, according to a recent cbs news poll. but its passage was really not preordained particularly the part with direct payments. in fact for a while it looked like it wasn't going to happen at all, but the democratic party unified around these payments in a way really astounding. one of the influential figures is senator bernie sanders of vur minute who's been working very hard with his colleagues to get this done and he joins me now. senator, what does it mean to have the government do something which is to say the president signs a package and for people a week later to see money in their bank account? >> chris, it is huge. it shows that, in fact, not only can government respond to the crises and the pain that people are feeling -- and you are right. if you are a struggling working class family today worried about eviction, worried about feeding your kids and suddenly you've got a $5,600 check, man, that is extraordinary. but it also shows that we're trying to get a level of efficiency in the government of competence that we have not had before. so it's not only doing the right thing. it's doing it promptly. >> you're obviously very proudly a socialist. you've called yourself a socialist for many years. and there's tis concept i was thinking of sewer socialism which i think thinking about milwaukee and the idea about it was look you want to have people do stuff you better deliver on the technical parts. you better implement otherwise people are not going to trust you. i think two of theis we're seeing now in the vaccination and the checks is an attempt to do them. >> that's exactly right, and we have to continue to do that. to me, chris, what was so important about this legislation is not only the $1,400, not only beginning effectively to deal with the pandemic, not only cutting childhood poverty in half, not only getting money to states and cities who desperately need it, not only extending unemployment, not only developing great summer programs for our kids, community health centers all over this country will be expanded. it is that and much more. it is finally seeing the united states congress taking a hard look at the problems facing working families and responding rather than listening to corporate lobbyists, rather than listening to wealthy campaign contributors. they are actually paying attention to the needs of the american people. and that is what the democratic party has got to continue to do. and if we do that, we'll transform this country and we'll become a political force that will not lose control of the house and the senate. >> you have a hearing tomorrow in the budget committee which you now chair. it's a second hearing about sort of inequality and in particular the way it's been shaped in the covid era. and i believe you invited ceo jeff bazos of amazon to come. i believe he declined. what do you want to ask him? >> well, not a radically different question than i wanted to ask the walton family last week when we did a hearing on minimum wage. walton family is the largest family in america and yet they pay their workers little wages. and jeff bazos, i wanted to say you are worth 180 billion, "b" -- $180 billion. you are the wealthiest person on earth. why are you spending millions of dollars trying to defeat a union organizing effort in alabama where your workers are fighting for decent wages and decent working conditions? what is your problem? when is enough enough? so tomorrow we're going to have lunch with bazos and the union organizing drive in alabama, but what we're going to deal with is the whole issue of welt inequality and two people today bazos and elon musk, two people own more wealth than the bottom 40% of the american people, where ceos today are making over 300 times what their average working is making. we need to take a hard look at that and determine the kind of country we want to become. and i do not believe we want to become an oligarchy. i think we want an economy that works for all not just the people on top. >> great book on amazon out today called "fulfillment" which i would recommend to folks watching this that sort of talks about some of those issues. i want to float a theory to you that's put you in the chair of the budget committee and passed that legislation on a party line vote. jonathan is great health care reporter and has a great book out about the aca. comparing this to 2009 this is his take. sometimes 50 senators can get more done than 60. nearly everyone of those senators is now gone leaving democrats with a caucusthality that seems more inclined to think big at least for now. what do you think of that? >> i think that's kind of right, but i think the most important point is the american people are now prepared to think big. let's not kid ourselves. the progressive movement for the last number of years and grass roots organizing has had a very significant impact on changing consciousness in america. what happened is the democrats, we passed a very strong bill. and you know what as you've indicated, 75% of the american people like it. and you know what? when we raised the minimum wage to $15 and we guaranteed paid vacation time and we do paid family and medical leave, and when we create millions of good paying jobs, rebuilding our infrastructure and tackling climate change and taking on the fossil fuel industry, the american people will like that, too. so the issue we're dealing with is will the democratic party -- and we're off to a really good start -- have the courage to address the crises facing the american people even if it means taking on the big money interests who have so much historical influence over the legislative and economic life in this country. >> senator bernie sanders who is the chair of the senate budget committee, thank you so much for making time tonight, sir. >> thank you. next the cruelty of the republican bills targeting trans youth across the country. one father makes an impassioned plea. you absolutely need to hear this. i'm going to play it right after this. hear this i'm going to play it right after this did you know that some aluminum-free deodorants only mask odor? 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[♪♪] looking to repair dry, damaged hair without weighing it down? try pantene daily moisture renewal conditioner. its color-safe formula uses smart conditioners to micro-target damage helping to repair hair without weighing it down. try pantene. a number of states right now are demanding the right interest transgender children to just play organized sports. one of those states is missouri which recently introduced house joint resolution 53, a bill that would effectively ban trans athletes in high school from participating in girls sports. unlike a lot of bills on this issue it would write the ban into the state constitution, meaning because it's a constitutional amendment if it passes both the house and senate it would then go on the ballot for a vote. and earlier this month the father of a young trans girl spoke out against the bill in a committee hearing before the missouri house. i've got to say as someone who covers politics also the parent of young children, this is some of the most powerful testimony i've ever seen. >> i'm a lifelong missourien, a business lawyer, a christian, the son of a methodist minister, the father of four kids. one thing i often hear when transgender issues are discussed is i don't get it, i don't understand. and i would expect some of you to say that and feel the same way. i didn't get it either. for years i didn't get it. i years i would not let my daughter wear girl clothes. i did not let her play with girl toys. i forced my daughter to wear boy clothes and get short haircuts, play on boys sports teams. why did i do this? to protect my child. i did not want my daughter or her siblings to get teased. and truth be told i did it to protect myself as well. i wanted to avoid those inevitable questions as to why they child did not look and act like a boy. my child was miserable. i cannot overstate. she was absolutely miserable especially at school. no confidence, no friends, no laughter. i honestly say this, i had a child who did not smile. we did that for years. we did that against the advice of teachers, therapists and other experts. i remember the day everything changed for me. i'd gotten home from work and my daughter and her brother were in the front lawn, and she had -- my daughter had sneaked on one of her older sisters play dresses. and they wanted to go across the street and play with the neighbor's kids. it was time for dinner, i said come in. she asked can she go across the street. i said no. she asked me if she went inside and put on boy clothes could she then go across the street and play, and it's then that it hit me that my daughter was equating being good with being someone else. i was teaching her to deny who she is. as a parent the one thing we cannot do -- the one thing is silence our child's spirit. and so on that day my wife and i stopped silencing our child's spirit. the moment we allowed my daughter to be who she is to grow her hair, wear the clothes she wanted to wear, she was a different child. and i mean it was immediate. it was a total transformation. i now have a confident, a smiling, a happy daughter. she plays on a girls volleyball team. she has friendships. she's a kid. my daughter did not choose to be a girl. she's been a girl from day one. god made her that way. and the god i believe in does not make mistakes. i came here today as a parent to share my story. i need you to understand that this language if it becomes law will have real effects on real people. it will affect my daughter. it will mean she cannot play on the girls volleyball team or dance squad or tennis team. it will mean she will not are the opportunity that all of us had to be part of a team, to be part of something bigger, greater than ourselves. i ask you please don't take that away from my daughter or the countless others like her who are out there. let them have their childhoods. let them be who they are. i ask you to vote against this legislation. >> so out of the republican led legislature in missouri react to that incredible and emotional plea? 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they voted the bill out of committee 8-6. now goes to another committee for a vote. and that sports bill is one of two anti-transgender measures currently making their way through the missouri legislature. the other one would strip -- >> for the past four years of my life i've been using lupron to suppress my male hormone every three months and needle of the of my left index finger. without it i'd be standing here and i'd probably have things like facial hair, a deeper voice and things like an adam apple. and i really every day try to, like, express myself. and i know who i am and i know that i'm 100% female. and i feel like this bill would be harmful to people like me and thousands of other transgender youth. >> there are a record number of anti-transgender measures in state legislatures this year. at least 78 in 25 different states and many of them with strikingly similar language. using phrases like biological sex, biological males, sex listed on birth certificates. the first of the bills was signed into law set to become law july 1st. a staff attorney with the aclus lgbt project. i've been noting this. the two bills that republican state legislatures seem most intent on in the year 2021 seem to be targeting voting and restricting voting and targeting trans youth. it really does seem like those are the central priorities happening in state legislatures. >> yeah, i mean absolutely. we're seeing in the midst of crises unlike any that we've known where kids are not in school at all, where we are struggling in jackson, mississippi, to make sure residents have clean water and power. and here we are with lawmakers targeting transgender kids and their families, not only trying to push them out of sport teams, push them out of schools but criminalize in some cases the medical providers who treat them. and this in tandem with all the voter suppression measures we're seeing, this is animating state legislative sessions this year and it is devastating. if you take a step back what you see with the young person in missouri, what you see with that father is constituents begging their government not to criminalize them, not to take away their basic survival needs in a amendment of absolute crisis. >> so sort of two big categories here targeting sports participation and then gender care. we've seen this crazy and culture moral panic whipped up around this. for people that are open minded but maybe haven't given this a lot of thought, you know, there's this sense like basically you're going to create a loophole, right? this is sort of the argument, right, there's going to be this big loophole and people are going to pretend to be something other than they are so they can sweep in and win the mississippi track state finals, right, in girls sprinting or whatever. what do you say to folks who ask you about that or have that argument? >> taking a step back this is the exact same thing we heard in 2016. i was on your show in 2016 when there were 50 states proposing bathroom bills because we heard that the greatest threat to women and children was the possibility of trans people using the bathroom. and then we realized that was completely contrived fear based myth to push trans people out of public life and that's exactly what we're seeing here with sports. in 1977 when rene richards participated in the u.s. open we heard the trans take over of sports was just around the corner. 45 years later there was no trans take over in sports, but what we are doing is pushing kids out of schools, out of safety, out of the ability to be in solidarity and camaraderie with their friends. you can't tell someone that we will honor your identity, we will respect you until 2:30 p.m. and then we are going to tell you you are not who you know yourself to be. that is not a position of affirmation and support and has catastrophic consequences for these young people. >> let's talk more about the gender affirming care part of this. there are people who i think not bigots or not given this a lot of thought and they think to themselves, you know, children or hormones or medical intervention of any kind, i don't know how i feel about that, i don't know how i feel about an 8-year-old. break down what these laws are doing and what our best sense of medical consensus is on gender affirming care. >> first and foremost there's so much fear based misinformation being pedaled around this. the realty is young children are not getting hormones, not getting surgery. we're talking about a well-established set of medical protocols supported by the american academy of pediatrics. there is a medical consensus this care is lifesaving, that it helps young people affirm who they know themselves to be. and if you listen to brandon, the father in missouri's testimony you have children who are begging their parents to be who they know they are. these kids will suffer. these kids will die without this care and alabama just voted yesterday to move a bill that would make it a felony to provide this treatment. i cannot stress enough how catastrophic this will be. in alabama kids as young as 14 can consent to any medical procedure. this bill would make it a felony for young people, their families and their doctors all of whom would agree that the care is necessary. all of whom are consenting to it would make it a felony up to age 19. we would then be cutting kids off from the care we know to be saving their lives, and they're doing it because of that. these bills are being pushed in tandem. the animating principle behind them it is harmful to be trans, which it is and we're sending horrible messages to children, to their families when we know what these young people need is love, affirmation and support. >> dwayne wade had a great tweet about the other day saying i don't know brandon at all but our kids are more than bedrooms, bathrooms and locker rooms which i thought was really, really well said. chase, thank you so much for both the work you'ring to and coming on the program tonight. i really, really appreciate it. >> thanks so much, chris. good to see you. >> 55 days into the biden administration republicans are already attacking him on immigration, but what is really happening on the border? 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you don't, you bounce forward, with serious and reliable internet. powered by the largest gig speed network in america. but is it secure? sure it's secure. and even if the power goes down, your connection doesn't. so how do i do this? you don't do this. we do this, together. bounce forward, with comcast business. the president's allowing so many people in the country illegally without stopping invasion and we're being forced to educate those folks. >> that can weaken our country. >> we don't know whether they have skills we need, whether they're gang members. ? we have a political party opening the border for illegal immigrants to come. what happened to the rule of law? i think the president should shut the border. >> a visceral elemental fee of invasion has been a key core right wing message for years. under the democratic administration and trump administration itself which never made a lot of sense, at the end of his presidency trump even used covid as essentially a pretext to keep out unaccompanied minors. that's children accompanied by themselves even those with legitimate asylum claims. they just got turned away. now under president biden we have thousands of unaccompanied minors still arriving at the southern border and of course just like clock work conservatives with swooping in again. >> this crisis is created by the presidential policies of this new administration. there's no other way to claim it than a biden border crisis. >> for years the border has been a kind of right wing anti-immigration metaphor but there is of course also a real actual physical border which is an incredibly complex place. we saw this first-hand in 2019 when we traveled down to texas probably the worst moment during the child separation crisis even amidst the right the actual details of what were happening then even were complicated. and there are people working on these issues for years including democratic congresswoman annette of california who joins me now. i know this issue has been a focus of yours for years. let's start with what's happening now. my understanding is that the trump administration had used covid protocols to basically say any unaccompanied minor could not come in no matter what. they couldn't pursue their own asylum claim and that was lifted and now there are thousands of children who showed up at the border. what happens now? >> thanks for having me on. and you're right every time there are challenges at the border republicans go down there not to see what's going on, not to find solutions but really just try to stoke this fear and division and try to paint migrants who look different than them from different countries as bad people. and so this is just another one of their playbooks that they're doing and they did this weekend. what we're seeing happening is a product of the trump administration dismantling an immigration system and dismantling the investment in northern triangle countries to try to address the root problems. we have to remember that there are children who are in these countries who are desperate. maybe they've gone through hurricanes, they're fleeing violence, they're fleeing poverty and of course covid just complicates that, are desperately making this journey to the united states because we've had a system of laws the prior administration basically threw out the window. just today i got an update from fema within the hour about their efforts to help hhs, the health and human services. the goal here is to make sure that these children get out of cbp custody as quickly as possible and into the home of a sponsor. chris, i don't know if you know this but about 80% of the cases these children have family members here in the united states so the administration is making every effort to reunite these children with their families while they wait for their cases to be heard. >> there's been some criticisms they're staying in -- by the way cbp custody is bad on the whole i think it's fair to say. you do not want to be in cbp custody very long. longer than 72 hours which is a violation of the policies and then there's concern about sort of temporary facilities and the kind of incentive structure. this is really what this is about alt a texual level is how much this is happening because of signals being sent by the biden administration and things happening in central america and other places. and the president gave an interview today and i want to play it for you and get your reaction to what he said about that conundrum. take a listen. >> a lot of the migrants coming in saying they're coming in because you promised to make things better. it seems to be getter worse by the day. was it a mistake not to anticipate this surge? >> first of all, there was a surge the last two years. in '19 and '20 there was a surge as well. >> this one might be worse. >> it could be, but here's the deal. first of all the idea that joe biden said come because i heard the other day that -- >> they're saying this. >> well, here's the deal. they're not. >> do you have to say quite clearly don't come? >> yes, i can say quite clearly don't come. while we're in the process of getting setup. don't leave your town or city or community. >> what do you think of that? >> well, there's one thing with the biden administration, and that is you're going to follow the asylum system we have that the former president dismantled, right, and so that means trying to get these kids out of the custody of cbp within the 72 hours not because of the influx we've certainly seen more kids coming. the president makes a good point there and that is he has been telling kids not to come because there is a system in place. he's developed a system to try to get them processed as quickly as possible and into this country, something the last administration did not do. it is a dangerous journey and we do need to find ways to make sure to address this problem. and that really does start in investing in the northern triangle countries. the root problems and the causes of why we're seeing more and more kids come here. and so, you know, i don't disagree with what the president said today. on the contrary this is a president, and by the way secretary mayorkas is testifying before homeland tomorrow has made clear both with his statements and opening remarks in line what the president is saying is this is a new administration that's going to treat migrants with the dignity and the respect and the humanity that the prior administration did not do. and even under the trump administration we saw those numbers rising. so this was happening prior to president biden, and we should be applauding the fact that we've got a president who is going to treat migrants with the dignity and respect and actually follow the law not throw it out, which is something the trump administration did. >> we're going to stay on whether that promise is fulfilled because often it gets complicated on the border whether it is. congresswoman, "the rachel maddow show" starts right now. good evening, rachel. >> good evening, chris, thank you, my friend. and thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. we are covering late breaking news out of georgia tonight. and i have to warn you, it is disturbing news and this is a developing story. seven people have been shot and killed in georgia tonight, in the atlanta metro area. at least two more people have been injured in what appear to be connected attacks. nbc atlanta affiliate has just confirmed that police do have a suspect in custody now in connection with these shootings. that confirmation coming in the past few minutes.