Ali is coming up. Sticking the landing. I thought you were referring to the fact that i passed the show exactly at 9:00:00. Much like vice president harris. We all do, you know we all have to perform in different ways. We all have our lane. You really stuck it tonight. And now we've gone 20 seconds over. You and i together. Sorry, sorry, sorry. No, you stuck the landing my friend. Vice president candidate j. D. Vance has a new line he likes to repeat on the campaign trail. You know the big difference between conservative and liberals is no one has tried to kill kamala harris in the last couple of months and two people now have tried to kill donald trump in the last couple of months. I would say that's pretty strong evidence that the left needs to tone down the rhetoric. Two assassination attempts in as many months and i think it's time to say, to the democrats, to the media, to everybody that has been attacking this man and trying to sensor this man for going on 10 years, cut it out or you're going to get somebody killed. In the wake of the latest apparent assassination attempt against donald trump. His running mate j. D. Vance wants the public to believe it is the left's inflammatory rhetoric that has motivated these attacks. Donald trump has taken it a step forward directly blaming vice president kamala harris and joe biden for the attacks. In an interview with fox digital trump said, they use highly inflammatory language. I can use it too, far better than they can. But i don't. Now so far there is no public evidence to support the claim that rhetoric from harris or biden was in any way implicated in either of these attacks. In fact, trump's first would be assassin didn't even appear to have a political association. And the latest suspect, his profile suggests he was a disillusioned former trump supporter in 2016 when then supported nikki haley and ramaswami who is not a typical description of a democrat. We don't know what might have or not the incited the assassination attempt. It's been a week since trump baselessly claimed on the debate stage that haitian immigrants in the town of springfield ohio were eating the pets of local residents. Their cats and dogs. And that lie has wreaked havoc on that small ohio community. The city's mayor has received death threats, the city has received more than 30 bomb threats in the last few days. The city was forced to cancel an annual celebration amidst safety concerns. All of it because of something donald trump said. Sort of the literal dictionary definition of rhetoric. Trump and vance won't give it up. This week j. D. Vance even appeared to admit that he and trump invited this story out of whole clothe but that he was still sticking to it. The american media totally ignored this stuff until donald trump and i start talking about cat memes. If i have to. It wasn't just a meme sir. If i have to create stories so that the american media actually pays attention to the suffering of the american people then that's what i'm going to do because you're are letting kamala harris coast. You just said that this is a story you created. Yes, we are creating. It comes from firsthand accounts from my constituents. I say we're creating a story is we're creating the american people are listening to it. I think jd vance is saying he is fabricating a story about immigrants so that the media will focus on immigrants. Which, which sort of feels like the dictionary definition of a bait and switch, or a canary or a lie. Mean while, kamala harris was asked about springfield and she offered the most wholesome response on the issue, yet. When you have these positions, when you have that kind of microphone in front of you, you really ought to understand at a very deep level how much your words have meaning. It means that you have been invested with trust to be responsible in the way you use your words much less how you conduct yourself. And especially when you have been and then seek to be again president of the united states of america. So that's what it looks like when a politician considers the impact of her words. Then there's the man she is running against. We pledge to you that we will root out the communists, fascists and radical left tugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country. The threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous and grave than the threat from within. We have a lot of work to do. They're poisoning the blood of our country that's what they've done. Together we will take on the ultra left wing liars, crooks and freaks who are devouring the future of this state like a swarm of locus. And we find, we fight like hell and if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore. Reporter: joining me now is clar amc caskell and eugene daniels. The author of politicals. It's great to have both of you here with me. Claire, you know, calling out inflammatory rhetoric by while at the same time engaging endlessly and inflammatory rhetoric seems like i think textbook version of hypocrisy but i sort of wonder whether trump and vance are going to get away with this by saying these assassination attempts are happening publicly as far as we know, only against us. Therefor this is all the democrats fault. Blaming, the way you deescalate political violence is not by blaming the other side for political violence. Right. That's not how you deescalate. And frankly, we could take this entire show and just run clips of the things that have been said by both donald trump and j. D. Vance that are incredibly inviewed with ideas of political violence. Fight like hell. When trump used to encourage people to hit people at his rallies. So that doesn't work. I think, i'm very proud of both joe biden and kamala harris. They called donald trump, they said they were glad he was okay. I think they still have to continue to point out the differences between these two campaigns. Is incumbent on us to make everybody realize that one is darkness, and rounding up people. And putting their political opponents in jail. And the other is you know what, we're going to try to help you. And your family. We're going to try to make your lives better. We're going to try to expose more opportunity for you and by the way. Isn't america a wonderful place. That is a contrast she's tried to draw both in space, in public discourse, in advertisement. I don't know how you felt about it or the way it was in the room. Almost the tenor of the vice president's response to your question. About springfield, and the way she almost seemed sad. Genuinely that this is the way trump is doing to the count country. What was the sense of her mood. I've covered her since she became vice president. I've never seen her react to a question. The moment that we're living in. She hadn 't really talked about springfield. When we were thinking about the topics that we were going to talk about, and i had the question of what the federal government had to do to help the community. She took the time to do something that people wanted to hear from her. Talk about this moment in history. Talk about what it's like as someone who one is a current leader. To continue to be a leader of this country as we move forward. And she didn't even really say trump's name, right. It was clear what she was talking about. She you know was talking about the kids. She's concerned about the kids. She's concerned about the way these kind of rhetoric and tropes, she said more than once, are dangerous for people. Because at the end of the day the conspiracy theories had no basis in fact, right. And you played the clip of senator j. D. Vance and him saying he kind of created a story. I don't know if he created it but he did paritied it on the debate stage. We get these kind of questions when these opportunities come up. A lot of democrats wondered why she didn't say anything on the debate stage. I knew something that people even within her party were wondering how she felt about what was going on in springfield. And, it's going to continue. Donald trump said he's going to go. This isn't going any where so she's going to have to continue making these same points because, both in springfield and in general the racist conspiracy theories of people are not going any where, especially dark skinned democrats. She said something that was important when she talked about this inflammatory rhetoric. Shep didn't really focus so much on trump she talked about the little children in springfield who were going into school for picture day. And she talked about them being dressed up to get their photos taken and that they couldn't do it because donald trump and j. D. Vance had been spreading these lies. I think one of the things that's important about this conversation is that it doesn't exist in the abstract. And that, it's about real lives. And not just the lives of the powerful people who are potentially in the cross hairs but the normal every day people who don't have secret service protection. Who didn't ask for any of this that are caught up in the mail strum that trump has created. I wonder if you think that that is as setting aside this rhetorical value of that. How helpful that is in terms of bringing people into the democratic tent and saying, look we have to get past this because this guy is costing all of us. I think it is helpful. I think when donald trump made the famous line, they're eating the dogs which will go down in presidential debate history as the most inane thing that has ever been spoken from the debate stage. And i think it's really important to point out alex, this is the first time they have really gone after legal immigrants. Yeah, uhhuh. These people in springfield are there legally. They're not illegal in any way. They have status. They have been told by the government of our country that they are there, they can work, they can raise their families. The fact they're going after them, they really crossed a border here. You know, paradoxically and said now we're going to try to demonize people that have legal status in this country. And the republican mayor is saying don't come here. This is total bs. The republican governor is saying this is garbage. The employers of these haitian legal immigrants have said they're wonderful employees. People of springfield have spoken out and said leave us alone. We're fine. All of that, and now they're going to continue to try to marginalize these people and in the long run, impact these children's lives in a way they will never ever forget as long as they're alive. It's such a, it's such a sering point claire. Eugene you know you mentioned the way in which j. D. Vance, when honestly given the chance not that he would ever issue a mia culpa but to admit he's wrong that eating of dogs and cats aren't being eaten in springfield doubles down. Says it's a means to an end. If people are caught up in it, so be it. But this is what it takes for people to understand the stakes, i guess. Of the immigration crisis as the right wing would have them. What did you think of his answer? at the end of the day, the answer as he's given to dana and other journalists too. It doesn't really hold water. Because if your constituents come to you as a senator and say these things happen and it didn't happen. It is important for you to say. We looked into it. It didn't happen. If your kids, if someone's children came to me and said this thing happen and that thing did not happen. It is your duty as the adult in the room to say, actually, there's no demon under your bed. Right. That's an important aspect of being a leader. S that is the point that our colleagues are making when they're asking these questions. That as leaders you aren't just someone's crazy uncle online, retweeting cat memes right. The words matter. And you can, we've seen over and over again you laid it out, vice president harris laid it out. The kinds of impact that happen to every people's live, to kids lives who are just kind of living in this community. In a community that is dealing with resource issues, could probably use federal assistance when it comes to the translators on the ground so that there aren't so many backlogs in the hospital. They can use as a policy prescription that would be useful here. When you see leaders engage in rhetoric conspiracy theories it shows you where the republican party is right now. Thank you for your time. It's great to have you here. Coming up. J. D. Vance defends his party's position on abortion as that exact position appears to have cost one georgia woman life saving care. Do you think you know all of the things trump has done to make his wealth? you do not. Whoa! how'd you get your teeth so white? you gotta use the right toothpaste! dr. C?! ♪♪ not all toothpastes whiten the same. Crest 3d white removes 100% more stains for a noticeably whiter smile. New personal best. Crest. Thursday night football on prime. It's on. Welcome to thursday night football. The new england patriots take on the new york jets, as thursday night football is on. Making the catch for the touchdown! it's aaron rodgers what a catch! up against a new era in new england. Good show, you guys. Stream thursday night football. Only on prime. Unnecessary action hero. . . The nemesis. It appears that despite my sinister efforts, employees are still managing their own hr and payroll. Why would you think mere humans deserve to do their own payroll? because their livelihoods depend on it? because they have bills to pay? hear me now, paycom! return the world of hr and payroll to its rightful place of chaos or face a tsunami of unnecessary the likes of which you have never seen! that was the demolition of the trump plaza hotel and casino back in 2021. And if you know anything about the story of trump and his casino businesses, i bet you know that the story does not end well. Multiple trump casinos ended up filing for bankruptcy. That much i bet you already knew but you probably don't know this story. The year was 1982, the first year that forbes magazine published its list of the 400 richest americans. Donald trump made the list claiming he was worth $100 million. But at the time, trump was really only worth about $5 million. And he was also hemorrhaging cash. But donald trump had a plan. That year trump got a license from the new jersey casino control commission to operate a casino in atlantic city in new jersey and trump found an investor to help him finance the project. Holiday inn which owned the casino chain harrah's would give trump $50 million in cash to build the casino and then trump and harrah's would split the profits. Trump had to just prove one little thing first. Here's how the new york times investigative reporter tell the story on lucky loser. Donald was on the verge of a great deal one that would also would get him out of of a bind. Before leaving, the then ceo of holiday inn rose told that things had to be under way. Donald kept it under wraps, he did not have things under way because he didn't have the money. So he asked to hire every piece of earth moving machinery he could find. The day that holiday inn came to the site, machinery pushed around. Trump introduced himself to one of the holiday inn executives to a line that he would never forget. I think i'm the most successful person my age in the united states. That's the way trump started the harrah's holiday inn casino. He sold it to the public so he could then sell it to his business partners and for a long time that myth really worked out. There is a new billionaire in town, trump is the name. Donald trump is a major deal maker. A swash butler. Today much of this country still believes that myth. Trump may try and pull off one of his biggest schemes yet. I know it is very difficult to keep track of all of trump's cash gambits. Just yesterday, 50 days before the election trump launched his crypto. Then there were the gold trump sneakers, the trump endorsed bible, the nft trading cards. This thursday could be trump's biggest payday ever. This thursday is the day that donald trump will finally be able to sell his stock in trump media. The parent company of trump media truth social. If trump plays his cards right he could net around $2 billion. S that not because the company is doing well, that is not because the company is doing well. It's because trump has convinced so many people he's a successful businessman and so many of those people have inturn invested in that company. The reality of that company is that truth social stock has been going down consistently since the day the company launched. On friday, trump told the press he will not be selling his stock on thursday saying he loves it. But you should know that there's a huge incentive for trump to say that he's not going to sell. Trump is only allowed to start selling his sales on thursday if trump media stock remains above $12 a share. Today they were trading for about $16 bucks. So is this yet another trump con job? and what are trump's financing actually like these days. Susan craig and russ butner join me next to discuss. Before. . Crest. With bugs, the struggleisreal. That's why you need zevo traps. Zevo works 24/7 to attract and trap flying insects. For effortless protection. Zevo. Peoplefriendly. Bugdeadly. ♪♪ did you know that 96% of customers recommend the hartford? boy that's higher than most movie ratings. And those who switched to the aarp auto insurance program from the hartford? they saved hundreds. For the savings, benefits and best in class claims experience you deserve. Make the switch today. To get your free quote call or click today. The buck's got your back. I had 20 years of experience as an hr professional and i had reached a ceiling, so i enrolled in umgc. I would not be the person that i am today had it not been for the partnership with umgc. (♪♪) looking good, guys! haha! thanks! oh! hey pickle! hi dad! i brought mom's glasses from the hotel oh, great! she's in the ballroom. The big one. I'm coming up! vacations are better with the credit gods are on your side. Rewards once available to the few are now accessible to the many. Earn points for travel with credit one bank, and live large. C1 it is not just donald trump the republican knockknee who's having a busy week republican nominee who's having a busy week. As new york times reporters detail. Trump's successes aren't the result of shrewd business acumen, they are the results of many many many lucky breaks. Good things happen to donald trump, he did not earn many of those. He was born, he was discovered by a revolutionary producer. That sort of tail wind could paper over a litany of failure and still fund a lavish life and there's no evidence that in 50 years of labor, donald trump added to his lucky fortunes. He would have been better off betting on the stock market than on himself. Joining me now our pulitzer weub winner susan craig and butner authors of lucky loser. How donald trump squandered his father's fortune and created the illusion of success. Congratulations on this exhaustive, delicious read, i shouldn't say it like that. But filled with a lot of new reporting and some deeply informative reporting on stories we sort of knew. I want to talk first about because, the word father is in the sub head of the book. Maybe susan you can start first. Just the relationship between donald trump and fred trump was more beneficial to donald trump than i think people even imagine right. He's prone these days of calling him his brooklyn builder of a dad. But the reality is he's the money man behind donald trump's entire fortune. Can you talk a little bit about him. I think in some ways we would all love to have a father like donald trump. Millions of dollars. Yes, throwing around millions. Donald trump benefited from his father. He was born into an incredibly wealthy family. I just remember one of the story rs s that stories that i heard. He grew up in queen, and the people of the family marveled that they had a garage opener. He inherited and it was enhanced by tax fraud. That was the first lucky break. He has spent so much time talking about how his father, you know, really a small time guy. Nothing to look at here. Never could have made the fortune that trump did. Small time guy, gave him a very small loan and donald trump did it all. It was like he was robbed of a hard scrabble story and he had to make up one. It's incredible how he's gone out of his way. First we see in his early careers that he appropriates his father's wealth. And then he spends a lot of his life diminishing his father's accomplishments. And you know, fred trump, you know became donald became a black hole for fred's money eventually. And fred trump abides this smack talking from his chosen son right. Not only does he single trump of the 5 trump kids, donald is the chosing chosen one and he allows trump to diminish his master mind and really the inverse is true. It really is. This is as a long story, a thread that reads through decades. Fred has done everything pretty much, he's broken rules. But as a businessman he follows very strict procedures. He always estimates correctly what his rev phaou revenue is going to be. He never spends more than he. Trump immediately starts taking over the business. He becomes his imagine. This donald barron trump. His alias. Yes, when donald does get a project up. When he gets a building up, he starts, donald starting telling the world that he has fully taken the financing of his father's company. He has not. But fred goes along with that and allows donald to say and echoes it that donald has surpassed me. When donald literally had one building up of his own. It's really just a remarkable relationship that's very central to what he was able to accomplish. And setting in motion what would become a long career of diminishing people closest to him who support him and assuming that their loyalty is inviable. Like tossing them over board when they're not loyal. What's staggering to a lot of folks who remember trump in the 80s and 90s. Even in the apprentice years it's like completely castles build. It's a paper castle. The office that the apprentice is going to film in are so shabby they have to use smoke and mirror. Can you talk about. There's a lot of stage craft involved when mark burnett showed up at his offices and his producers. They came in that they were going to be casting a billionaire. Keep in mind donald trump is the cast of the show. He was the prize that all these contestants wanted. They are vying and they were scheming to work for. And the producers showed up and they found chipped furniture, and they said the carpet smelled. They said it was awful. So they ended up creating a whole another area on the fourth floor of trump tower, partly where the contestants would live but the whole boardroom was fake. That was not donald trump's boardroom. They had to create the whole set. Given the fact that he continues to sell himself publicly as a businessman. Nobody pipes up. I mean here we are looking today at the potential sale of social which is based on trump's reputation. Do you have a thesis on why he's able to convince people over and over and over again. He has an innate charisma that has followed him. In every stage of his life there were people who were wooed by them. And he can be persuasive. And people who are very smart and very accomplished who give him opportunities to do something that he hasn't done it before because he convinced them that they could. That has been a diminishing trend over the last 10 years, right. The things, once he got the money from the apprentice he decided again to under take this effort to make himself look like a businessman. By starting businesses. So he built a huge tower in chicago. He secretly declared it completely worthless on his tax returns after he got it open. He built the remodeled the old postoffice into a hotel in dc. He lost 7 to $10 million every year and he had to sell that. He bought some golf courses in the uk and he had to subsidize that by the money in the. He's selling their persecution complex to them and if you look at the site and read the people who invested that's the thing they grab on to. Is we're under assault from all sides. We have to protect this site, we have to protect donald trump he's our only chance. Yeah, he was once monotizing this sort of trump brand now he's monotizing grievance and rage. Really, you have to hand it to him in terms of the invasion on that front. Guys, it is. I said delicious. But it is, really, it's a work. It's a real work. And it's a really, it's a great time to be reading it especially as we're on the edge of you know the trump crypto currency platform and the potential sale of truth social. Thank you for writing it. Congratulations. Susan craig and butner. The book is lucky loser how donald trump squandered his father's fortune and built the illusion of success. The first publicly reported death that is likely linked to extreme state abortion bans. I'm going to speak to emily's list president jessica makler coming up next. Since she was able to enjoy a smile of her own. Good thing aspen dental offers affordable, complete care all in one place. And new patients without insurance get $29 exams and xrays. Plus 20% off treatment plans for everyone. 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Neither is missing your daughter's competition to do payroll. With paycom, employees do their own payroll so you don't have to miss your daughter's big day. Time to shine. Get paycom and make the unnecessary unnecessary. Remember when they said you've got your whole life ahead of you? at unitedhealthcare, we say you still do. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ it's nice to know you're free to focus on what matters, with reliable medicare coverage from unitedhealthcare. ♪♪ i don't know if anyone here has heard most recently the stories out of georgia. Tragic story. About a young woman who died because it appears the people who should have given her health care were afraid they would be criminalized. After the dobbs decision came down. President kamala harris earlier today in philadelphia and the woman she is referring to there is amber nicole thurman. A healthy mother of a 6year old. Thurman died in 2022 after doctors waited 20 hours to operate on mrs. Thurman even after she had been diagnosed with sepsis, after her organs started failing and after she started bleeding out. The reason for that was probably the dobbs abortion ban. Mrs. Thurman needed a routine procedure called the dnc. But that made it a felony with few exceptions. Any doctor who violated could be prosecuted and face up to a decade in prison. Here is how vice presidential candidate j. D. Vance responded to that story a little bit today. I would like to learn more about this case but it's an unspeakable tragedy. It should never happen in this country and that's why we believe on the prolife side in the life of the mother exception. Joining me now is jessica mackler the president of emily's list. Thank you so much for joining me. It's worth noting to everybody here that georgia does have an exception for the life of the mother and that's probably precisely what led to this doctor had to wait until she was about to die before they could offer her a routine procedure that should have saved her life a lot earlier. What's your reaction to the vice president's nominee's statement today? well what j. D. Vance just showed everyone today across the country, is exactly the problem with this position. This is not a question of weeks or exceptions, it's about who gets to make choices about what happens to our body. It's a question of will patients get life saving care when they need it. It is a direct result as vice president harris said of the georgia ban and a direct result of the fact that, of the overturning of rowe versus wade. Because donald trump picked those judges and that's what got it here. The equivalent of thoughts and prayers rings very hallow now. It's really important that we both share amber's story so thank you for doing that. Also to make clear this is what's at stake in this election cycle. Also the other part of this story is part of the reason she had to go mrs. Thurmon had to go to north carolina is because there's nowhere else for her to seek reproductive care, abortion care in the state of georgia given her pregnancy. And because so many women from the south live in what are termed abortion deserts there's a real bottleneck of patients in states like north carolina where you can more freely control your own body. And she misses her initial appointment, she can't get follow up care at the abortion clinic so she's forced to go to the emergency room in a state that's not friendly to women seeking abortion care. It seems that's kind of the aftercare of this. The pressure that we are now as a society putting on the new clinics that do offer reproductive care. Can you offer a little bit more about that reality? well what we're facing in this country right now is nothing short of a state of emergency when it comes to reproductive health care. We have doctors also refusing to provide care in places where they are under these bans. Even care that isn't related to emergency care because they don't want government to telling them how to provide care. The ramifications of this abortion ban are far and wide and people are living with the devastating consequences every day. Amber's story is so heartbreaking and tragic we have a child who's going to grow up without a mother because of it. But what is even more horrifying is the fact that this is happening to people all over the country every day. And people are living in fear, in panic. And they are not able to get the care they need. And that really is what's at the heart of this conversation around the future of reproductive freedom in this country. How do we chart a path back and it's going to be democratic pro choice leaders particularly democratic prochoice women that are going to lead us out of this if we elect them this november. I do wonder, you know, we are now beginning to get the first bits of reporting about women who have not just suffered but lost their lives because of these abortion bans. And i wonder what you think that does to the national conversation? it's certainly not changed donald trump or jd vance' position. But i do wonder whether this moves people in the way the other stories of women bleeding out in parking lots but actually surviving whether this changes the sort of people who might now be moved to do something about it. Well, one of the reasons that the issue of reproductive freedom has had so much power is a deeply rooted issue. When leaders like the vice president like the vice president to answer your question, yes, i think this makes a big difference. I think that all of the stories we tell make a big difference, because it continues to put in front of people this very stark question, what is at stake? what is happening to women across america? we know that when voters have that in front of them and understand the stakes around reproductive freedom, they are with us. They have shown up. We saw that in the midterms. We've seen that in response to the vice president's campaign, so that is the work that we really need to do. Jessica with emily's list, a pleasure to have you on the program. Thank you for your time and thoughts. Really appreciate it. Thank you. Coming up, chief justice john roberts famously likened himself to an umpire, but explosive reporting suggests when it came to be cases concerning donald trump, justice roberts is very much a team player. More on that, next. Citi's industry leading global payments solutions help their clients move money around the world seamlessly in over 180 countries. . . And help a partner like the world food programme as they provide more than food to people in need. Together, citi and the world food programme empower families across the globe. Thursday night football on prime. It's on. Welcome to thursday night football. The new england patriots take on the new york jets, as thursday night football is on. Making the catch for the touchdown! it's aaron rodgers what a catch! up against a new era in new england. Good show, you guys. Stream thursday night football. Only on prime. I made a promise to my daughter that i would get my college degree. I had 20 years of experience as an hr professional. I had reached a ceiling, so i enrolled in umgc. Umgc removes every barrier. Everyone treated me like a person with individual needs and met me where i was. I would not be the person that i am today, the mother, the business owner, had it not been for the partnership with umgc. 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Is that love island? during his 2005 confirmation hearing, supreme court chief justice john roberts famously said that his job was to call balls and strikes and not pitch or bat, but this week stunning new reporting from the new york times is dismantling chief justice roberts cultivated neutrality. In a moment's trio of january 6 related cases, the court found itself more entangled in presidential politics than in any time since the 2000 election, even as contending with its own controversies related to that day. The chief justice responded by deploying his authority to steer rulings that benefited mr. Trump according to a new york times examination that uncovered extensive new information about the court's decision making. Joining me now is mark joseph stern, senior writer covering the courts and the law for slate. His latest piece is titled we helped john roberts construct his image as a centrist. We were so wrong. Mark joseph stern, why were you wrong and who do you think john roberts really is? we were wrong because we really believe even though john roberts was conservative through and through and share the goals of the conservative movement, that he was not a maga extremist. That he did not support the excesses of trumpism and that he would at least attempt to guide his court toward some type of middleground in at least some cases that involved donald trump and the election and the reality is we were wrong about that. You know this new reporting demonstrates that roberts really throws out his liberal colleagues when they came to him, attempting to make compromises in these momentous cases. Instead he was delusional enough to believe the praise from sycophants like neil gorsuch chand brett kavanaugh, who promised him these would be decisions for the ages and the public would embrace and celebrate a sweeping ruling granting trump criminal immunity for attempting to subvert the 2020 election. I think we believed roberts still had some eagerness for compromise and we thought he cared about the courts institutional legitimacy as a good in itself, when in reality he just wants to know how far he can push the court before he breaks it, how much he can get away with and as long as he doesn't think he's going to destroy the institution, he will push to help donald trump in every way possible. To that end he was offered effectively in olive branch from the liberals on the court who were ready to make deals on some of these cases and he basically rebuffed them. That shocked me. I don't know how you sort of processed that information. I was stunned. I think that was a real mask off moment because when john roberts first was potentially relegated to the sideline after amy coney barrett or at least ruth bader ginsburg, there was this new, hardcore, five justice conservative majority. John roberts did not immediately join them in every case. He famously declined to overturn roe v. Wade and in some shadow docket decisions he said the conservatives to his right had gone too far and it seems he kind of got sick of losing. He decided that losing was for suckers and so instead because he could not beat them, he joined the five conservatives and sort of almost outdid them in these cases, presenting himself as trump's chief defender behind the scenes. That was startling to me because previously it seems that he had some contempt for trump's extremism and had spoken out, in fact, about trump's degradation of the judiciary, but none of that skepticism came through in these decisions and it appears roberts never wavered behind the scenes and his commitments to giving trump all of the immunity that he wanted and more and positioning trump to achieve a major victory in 2024 that would let him reshape the law even further in his own image. It feels like we need more leaks from this court. Do you think we are going to get them? i do. I think we have entered a new age of supreme court reporting where journalists are no longer just stenographers for the justices, but asking difficult questions, cultivating sources behind the scenes and treating the court like the institution of flawed government employees that it is. That gives me a lot of optimism that this will not be the last leak we see. Nor should it be. Mark joseph stern, it is always great to have you on this program and to hear your thoughts. Thanks for your time tonight. That is our show for tonight. Now it is time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. Good evening, lawrence.