Transcripts For MSNBCW All In With Chris Hayes 20180310

Im chris hayes. You can rail against Robert Mueller all you want but actually defying the special counsel is another matter. This morning, former Trump Campaign aide sam nunberg, you might have heard of him showed up at a federal court in washington where he was expected to testify before a grand jury in the russia investigation. It has been just four days since nunberg vowed not to cooperate with the subpoena from mueller going on a media blitz to broadcast his defiance. Im not cooperating. Arrest me. Youre not cooperating, arrest you . Yeah. Im not cooperating. Youre more than happy youre going to arrest me, arrest me because know what . Im not a fan of donald trump, jake, and you know this. You had a big falling out. Im not a fan of his. You know what . When them start asking for stuff like this trump is right. Its a witch hunt. But nunberg apparently changed his mind appearing in court today and telling reporters earlier that he would turn over subpoenaed documents to investigators after an initial meeting with muellers team two weeks ago, he told katy tur he thinks the special counsel is building a case against the president. You sat there in that room being questioned by muellers investigators. I want to hear directly from you, do you think that they will have something on the president . I think they may. Why . I think he may have done something during the election but i dont know that for sure. Why do you think that . I cant explain it unless you were in there. If nunbergs turn around this week is any indication, the president himself may not be able to avoid a facetoface with muellers team. Its been two months since the president s lawyers were in initial talks with investigators about a trump interview. As far as we can tell, those talks are still unevolved. The wall street journal reports this today, that the president s lawyers are trying to use a potential interview as leverage to induce mueller to wrap up the russia probe. Among the conditions, they are reportedly considering is that the special counsel commit to a date for concluding at least the trumprelated portion of the investigation. Of muellers office declined to comment while the president s outside lawyer disputed the story to nbc news. But its clear that as mueller continues to bear down on the white house was no immediate end in sight, the president finds himself more and more isolated inside his own administration. Theres been an exodus of senior aides first secretary rob porter admitted Domestic Abuse scandal, then Communications Director hope hicks and now economic adviser gary cohn a few days ago. In recent days, the president has appeared to be winging it on high stakes policy matters, imposing tariffs on little more than a whim and committing himself toy Nuclear Diplomacy with kim kim kim. Now he is planning to clean house of few high level staff that remain by his side. First to go with be kelly and h. R. Mcmaster they say both of which trump has clashed for months. Next are Jared Kushner and ivanka trump. The white house today was asked about the president s general state of mind. President s in a great mood. The president s been in a great mood because weve had not just a successful couple of days, weve had a successful year and were focused on making sure we have seven more. Gabe sherman is a contributor and also a special correspondent for vanity fair who wrote the new report on trumps clean reset, and Betsy Woodruff is a political reporter for the daily beast. Gabe, your reaction to Sarah Sanders today in the briefing not disputing the idea mcmaster is on the way out something others have reported along sort of in line with that. Take a listen and i want to get your reaction. Reporter would we assume then that general mcmaster will remain National Security adviser throughout the duration of the negotiations . I have no reason to believe otherwise. And that means, so it could be in the fall of this year, it could be later, but hell still be on there to advise . I dont have a krystal ball to predict the future. But the president s National Security adviser is general mcmaster. Hes a valued member of the president s team and an important part of this process. Not getting anywhere hes not leaving anytime soon. Not that im aware of. What do you think, gabe . If i was general mcmaster, that would not inspire a lot of confidence in my job security. Look, chris, this is clear that the president has wanted to clean house for months now. He is surrounded by people that he doesnt know and doesnt feel they have loyalty to him and he is desperate to bringing in people back from the good old campaign days, back from new york who he can feel comfortable with and clearly as we saw earlier this week, you know, he has had conversations with sebastian goreka, hes on the phone routinely with Corey Lewandowski, former campaign manager, dave bosse, former Deputy Campaign manager. Clearly this a president who wants to bring in people that feel they would allow him to be the impulse hiv freewheeling executive he fashions himself to be. Betsy, i have a theory. It has to do with the tax cuts. The first year of the domestic policy agenda of President Trump was outside of scutting tpp off the bat and the emigration stuff, the large portion of it was essentially mike pence, paul ryan, Mitch Mcconnell domestic policy and the tax cut bill was the ultimate example of that. Once that was done, gary cohn says goodbye. And theres really a question of what the shared project between the Donald Trump White House and the Republican Party is and that gives trump kind of leeway to just follow his instincts wherever they take him. Thats a good point. One of the interesting things were seeing on the congressional side of this whole story is that Mitch Mcconnell is telegraphing that the single thing he caress about for the indefinite future is confirming judges which obviously, that takes nominations from the white house but were not talking about complex legislative negotiating. Were not talking about anything where the president s art of the deal background is going to come in handy. Mcconnell is just pushing through these district and Circuit Court level federal judges that will have extraordinary power for the rest of their lives deciding what laws actually mean. That in and of itself is massively consequential. At the same time it highlights like you pointed out this rift in sort of this diversions perhaps of interests between your traditional george w. Bush style republicans on capitol hill and President Trump who seems to be sort of going his own way, doing things his own way and kicking his heels up a little bit. Yeah, and he seems to be on both the tariffs and the announcement on north korea, gabe, you know, following his impulses i guess is the most sort of charitable way to describe it. Whats so troubling to many people close to the president is that these two develops significant policy decisions were made outside of the policy making process. There was not buyin from the relevant stakeholders. We saw just yesterday morningrism tillerson said there would not be talks with north korea. And what did we have at the end of the day, a very dramatic white house announcement that donald trump had agreed to sit down with jongun. This is a president breaking down all barriers. What the risk is that this is not a came. This is not a joke. We are now talking about an impulsive executive who is dealing with the highest stakes issue which is Nuclear Diplomacy. Betsy, your point about judges i think is a good one. Its so sort of indicative to me when they were in the shared project of repealing Obamacare Tax cuts, reigning him in was so important. At this point, im not sure what the incentive is even op their sort of on the congressional end. Hes going to nominate judges and well confirm them. And maybe hell do a lot of crazy stuff in the white house and well cross our fingers and see what happens. That seems to be the attitude at the moment. Lets remember relations between capitol hill and the white house have never been ideal. Additionally, anytime its an Election Year and even under the Trump Presidency had, capitol hill all but shuts down. They just dont accomplish very much. We should not expect to see anything major happening in the coming months. One thing i can tell you is folks and speaker of the house paul ryans inner circle are operating the assumption that theyre going to lose the house. Speaking broadly, it doesnt look great for republicans. Especially when you have a tax bill that puts republicans in blue states. Blue state republicans are necessary for republicans to keep control of the house. When you have a tax bill that puts those guys and gals careers on the line, people all of a sudden just stop being chatty and cooperative. And the result is that people in paul ryans circle and mcconnells circle may feel less compelled to try to reign in the president and keep him focused on spec projects. I seriously imagine a month from now, its like Corey Lewandowski and seb gorka and donald trump in an empty white house. Running the entire u. S. Government. Sort of making decisions on the fly which is a sort of distaupic version. Gabe and betsy, thank you both. Analyst and editorinchief of the law fair blog. The news from the wall street journal. The president s attorney pushes back on this idea. The headline was trumps lawyers seek deal we lawyer tore seek end to russia probe. The most comical nugget was the idea of trading an the president s availability for a date certain deadline to wrap up the investigation. Do you think thats going to fly . Well, the fact that you found it amusing is sort of gives a sort of answer to the question. Look, federal investigations dont end by negotiation on timelines for interviews with subjects of the investigation. Thats not how it works. The Mueller Investigation will end when bob muellers done. And the president , short of the ability to fire him, in has really no ability to control that. Its not up to him. No matter what he thinks. And so his lawyers certainly have some leverage to you know, to negotiate the terms of an interview or the terms in which he would answer questions to the investigation, but that is not a condition theyre going to be able to attach to an interview. Do you think the president s leverage about that interview increases or decreases over time . Like the longer he draws it out, is he in a better or worse position . Thats a really interesting question. I dont think time is on anybodys side in this negotiation. Its not on muellers side because people want resolution to this. And the longer it drags out, of course, the more people will suspect that you know, there may be political ambitions to the investigation. I happen to think thats nonsense but i do think thats always the risk for a prosecutor in this situation. Similarly, its really not on trumps side either because the Mueller Investigation is hanging over his entire presidency. And it is you know, a real disease for the presidency that he cannot get this thing behind him. And so the longer he drags it out, the worse it hurts. And also the more it the drip, drip, drip of daytoday stories damages him. So i dont think time is really on anybodys side. Its probably less on the president s side than muellers. But i think the fact that nobody has as interest in a protracted negotiation much less a lengthy litigation which is what would happen if mueller had to issue a subpoena tends to mitigate toward resolution. You have followed this case as closely as anyone. I wonder what your mental model is of the scope of this investigation because i have to say tracking it myself, weve now got an intermediary for the qatari government and a meeting in the saychelles in the indian ocean, theres a dutch lawyer from skadden arps who has pleaded guilty to lying to investigators. Sometimes it seems enormously sprawling and i wonder how it can wrap up at any point given the sort of strands and tentacles we just get glimpses of. Right. So this is a really important point. We have know what mueller has done. And we know from witnesses and their lawyers about certain things that hes asked questions about. But what we dont know is what the connective tissue is between things that hes asking questions about and things that he may do. So for example, you know that there are questions being asked of cooperating witness about the meeting in the say shells. Does that mean theres an expansion of the investigation or does that mean its fundamentally a russia issue where theres a russia leapt to that meeting. So its hard to tell actually how much had the investigation is expanding and how much theres just a lot of information there in that core russia matter that they are working their way through. Benjamin wittes, thank you. Good to see you. Ahead, putting the scale and scope of todays big loss for the nr app into perspective. As they announce tonight immediately upon losing theyre suing the state of florida for passing gun safety laws in. The wake of the parkland massacre. Full details ahead. Next, after making a spectacle of announcing the president s plans to meet with kim jongun, is the white house already walking it back. That in two minutes. Successful people have one thing in common. They read more. How do they find the time . With audible. Audible has the Worlds Largest selection of audiobooks. Books like peak performance. And endurance. Books that energize and inspire for just 14. 95 a month. Less than youd pay for the hardcover. With audible, you get a creditamonth good for any audiobook. If you dont like it, exchange it any time. No questions asked. You can also roll your credits to the next month if you dont use them. Audible members use the free mobile app to listen anytime, anywhere. On the go. Or in the car. The audible app automatically keeps your place, no bookmarks required. So youll pick up right where you left off, even if you switch your phone. To your echo at home. Get more books in your life. Start a 30day trial and your first audiobook is free. Cancel anytime, and your books are yours to keep forever. Listening, is the new reading. Text listen 12 to five hundred five hundred to start listening today. Were not going to have this meeting take place until we see concrete actions that match the words and the rhetoric of north korea. The president has accepted that invitation on the basis that we have concrete and verifiable steps. Less than 24 hours after historic news of a planned summit between trump and kim jongun, the first time in the history of those two countries the leaders met facetoface, the white house appeared to walk back the commitment only for senior segregation Administration Officials walk back the walkback leaving everyone asking what exactly is the game plan here. Confusion over the meeting criteria underscores the administrations lack of preparation for this high stakes facetoface nuclear Nuclear Diplomacy. If it feels like the meeting came out of nowhere, that appears to be what happened. West reporting tonight that trump personally intervened into a security briefing intended for top deputies inviting sat south korean officials into the oval office where he agreed on the spot to a historic but exceedingly risky summit with kim jongun. Jeffrey lewis is an expert in nonproliferation in east asia, columnist at Foreign Policy where he wrote today that donald trump agreeing to meet with kim jongun is like Richard Nixon going to china but if nixon were a moron. I like that as a starting place, because i think it seems worthwhile to start with the exercise of separating the policy from the individual implementing it. Lets start with the policy. It does not seem crazy to me to agree to a facetoface meeting with kim jongun given how intractable this problem is and given how long the North Koreans have saw the that the kind of meeting. I think it absolutely makes sense top pursue diplomacy. The question is, when you deliver the president , you know, i think the thing that most of us have bought is that the North Koreans more than anything else value a visit from a sitting president. So at least in the past, thats the big deliveriable we have. Thats the biggest thing we have to offer that we should probably trade for the biggest concession. So its a good idea to do it. But front loading and giving it away, thats where i start to have a questions whether theres anybody really at home. Well, let me ask about this. The u. S. Coverage of this is focused understandably on the president and kim jongun but the South Koreans are obviously an incredibly Interested Party here having more to lose than anyone else from north korea and from a war on the korean peninsula. Moon jaein, the president of south korea, has been very clear on this. Seeking rapprochement using the olympics to pave the way. It was their summit that seemed to pave the way. They do seem to be four square behind this, right . Yeah, i think theyre driving this. If you look at the things they attributed to kim from that meeting, he was convivial and positive but didnt say all that much. The South Koreans have been very entrepreneurial in making the case there is something here if only we will push hard enough. So yeah, i think they are fully behind this policy. Im not against diplomacy. I think we do need this kind of engagement. I get nervous when the president pops into a meeting and you know, suddenly declares hes going to up end that careful work and fix it himself. Now lets talk about the individual who will apparently South Koreans were over for a deputys briefing. The president pops in, invites them in and before they even lay out the case basically says ill do it. Cuts off the sort of discussion. And now theres a real question who is around . We dont have an ambassador to south korea. Can you build the plane in midair essentially . The first thing you have to start with is what is it were trying to achieve. My worry is that when the president seems to talk about it, he seems to act like he would be going to north korea to pick up kim jonguns weapons. I dont think thats what the North Koreans have in mind. I dont think North Koreans have intention of relinquishing the weapons. Theyre interested in reducing tensions. You have to get to a point where there is some productive purpose for the meeting where were going to agree on something. It the worst Case Scenario is for donald trump to show up, have Unrealistic Expectations and come home disappointed you know and trying to decide who is at fault. Hes not going to blame himself, probably kim jongun. Theres also the question whether this happens. We saw the president sit on Live Television and im going to sign a daca bill. He said people are too squared of the nra and im going to endorse gun control legislation. Hes said i cant wait to sit down with Robert Mueller. None of those have happened. It seems like theres ample room for this to be memory holed by the white house. Yeah, i think the reason that you see the walkback and then the unwalkback of the walkback is that you know, the president was freelancing and got way out of ahead of where everybody else. There are a probably a lot of people on staff who dont want him to go. They have to have their own deliberation and work it out. I think theres a substantial chance actually that as it becomes clear that this is not about kim jongun giving up weapons theres trumps interest may wane. On the other hand, you know, 10,000 people in a pyongyang stadium holding up cards that make a picture of his face, he may like that. Jeremy scahill, the writer for the intercept said i can totally see trump going full Dennis Rodman on a trip to north korea. Jeffrey lewis, thank you for your time. Coming up, the Trump Administrations stonewalling on yet another big scandal setting up a white house showdown. Ill explain right after this. At the Marine Mammal center, the environment is everything. We want to do our very best for each and every animal, and we want to operate a sustainable facility. And pg e has been a partner helping us to achieve that. Weve helped the Marine Mammal center go solar, install electric vehicle charging stations, and become more energy efficient. Pg e has allowed us to be the most Sustainable Organization we can be. Any time you help a customer, its a really good feeling. Its especially so when its a customer thats doing such good and important work for the environment. Together, were building a better california. Are you troubled by rob porters employment in the white house . Yes. Who knew what when and to what extent and if you knew it in 2017 and the bureau briefed him three times, then how in the hell was he still employed . The security clearance is a separate issue. Its an important issue but separate. How do you have any job if you have credible allegations of Domestic Abuse . The white house is now refusing to cooperate with the request from the republican chairman of the House Oversight committee. Trey gowdy sent a letter valentines day to the white house giving chief of staff john kelly two weeks to answer questions on why rob porter, the former white house staff secretary and accused spouse abuser, was allowed to work with an interim security clearance for so long. Last night talking points rors the white house just refused the request. A move that prompted the top democrat on the House Oversight Committee Eli outcummings topping ask gowdy to issue a subpoena or step aside to allow the rest of the committee to vote on it. I want to bringing in Political Science professor Cristina Greer and sam seder, host of the majority report. Cristina, theres a fascinating thing happening between this white house and the Republicancontrolled Congress in terms of oversight. There has been none and then it seemed maybe there would be a little bit. What is your bet what we see as the next step from congress here . Weve been talking about this over a year. My biggest worry and biggest fear is that the house is not going to do their job as mandated by the constitution. So a lot of committees are either giving the public the run around and theyre saying they may investigate things. I think part of the problem is, there are no adults in the room. On the executive side or on the legislative side. So theres no one be really putting the feet to the fire to make the republicans in the house real follow through in these committees. The democrats are trying. I think were not going to see any movement till actually after the midterms. And if the democrats take over the house, really Forward Movement with these committees to have some sort of success with all of the scandals. We dont have time to list all of the different scandals that are currently going on this particular white house. Sam, youre nodding your head. Yeah, i agree. In fact, i wouldnt even go as far as saying its not a question of theres no adults in the room. There are adults. Its just that their incentive structure is such they have no incentive to pursue this white house whatsoever. This is the same dynamic why every single republican elected official who is not resigning was not going to buck donald trump. And in fact, the most surprising thing to me in this drama involving this committee is that trey gowdy felt like he had to perform like he was going to provide oversight. Right . There was a day or two where i was like i wonder what his angle is . It turns out just it was very convenient to pretend like he was going to provide oversight. Now that it requires a slight bit of effort or that he can shift the blame outside of himself, theres nothing. Partly right was that the rob porter scandal stuck for a long time. We saw a picture of a woman with a black eye and we saw this individual standing next to the president. He had been allowed to work and warned by the fbi four times. We never got resolution. John kelly told a story that doesnt hold up what he did with that. I wonder also, i mean, cristina, theres something thats changed structurally as a Political Science professor. This is something you think about. The constitutional design at the beginning was a rivalry between the branches and thats largely been replaced bipartisan rivalry that congress in the control of the president s party is sort of looking out to help the president and vice versa. And i dont see anything changing that. Right . Heres what worries me and keeps me up at night. The constitution is laid out as essentially an equestion lateral triangle, legislative, executive and judicial branches. Pull out the eighth grade geometry if you have to. Im trying. Whats happening is that we see there abdication of the legislative branch. This is what George Washington warned us about during his farewell address. He said if we actually dont Pay Attention to the structure that the framers have laid out and allow this red state, blue state, red team, blue team partisanship to take over our politics, we are on a dangerous road and weakening our democracy by the moment. What were seeing with the republicans is you know, donald trump is like the antimidas. Everything he touches turns to rust and every person around him is willing to prostrate themselves in front of him but their careers suffer. Weve talked about many republicans are essentially bracing themselves for an embarrassment in november. Not only because of the National Tide that the party of the president usually loses seats during midterm. But this particular president is so erratic and i think those little tax cuts, the 1. 50 that a lot of republicans are seeing in their paychecks is not going to be enough by the time midterms come around. Theyre going to see, look, were constantly distracted. Were talking about north korea today because were talking about you know, a porn star yesterday. I think weve seen the power of White Supremacy hold through this administration for quite some time. I do think by november when people go to the polls theres going to be a certain level of frustration with elected officials not behaving the way they should and could. Sam, betsy said theyre sort of planning to lose the house which that may or may not happen. What i do think is happening and gowdy poking his head up to play with the idea of oversight as part of that, i think this partnership has become a silent one in the wake of the tax cut passing. They dont have anything theyre doing jointly. The deregulatory agenda is happening. Mcconnell will ram his judges through. At this point, its not like theyre turning against him but theres a kind of like well go our separate lanes. Its a Holding Pattern sort of like a four corners in. Thats exactly right. Theres no agenda here. I think to a certain extent, and they should be, the Republican Party is probably sort of amazed they were able to do these tax cuts. Absolutely. And Everything Else were going to mitigate the damage and hold the ball in the corner of the court and hope that we can maintain the senate, today dean heller floated some rumor that Anthony Kennedy was going to retire over the summer. That signals heller has a problem with fundraising and floating this possibility that if kennedy leaves, theres going to be an open he seat on the Supreme Court and to a large extent, Mitch Mcconnell says he was responsible for donald trump because he kept Merrick Garland out of that spot. So this is the dynamic going on. I think were going to see a lot of this. Frankly, you know, you just raised White Supremacy. I think were going to see donald trump return back to that agenda of waiting for a black african excuse me, an africanamerican athlete to come out and Say Something that he can spend two or three weeks talking about. This is what theyre looking for, the culture war. In the absence of legislative action, the culture war will get more intense. Thanks for joining us. Thanks, chris. Coming up, the spending habits of trumps best people. Back in the headlines. Guess which cabinet secretary is explaining 130,000 for office doors . Trumps best people ahead and why drain the swamp when you can subsidize a ferry on it . Jared kushner is tonights thing 1, thing 2 next. Prestige creams not living up to the hype . Olay regenerist shatters the competition. Big hype. Big price. Big deal. Olay regenerist hydrates skin better than creams costing over 100, 200, and even 400. For skin that looks younger than it should. Fact check this ad in good housekeeping. Olay regenerist. Ageless. Now try olay hydrating eye. Hydrates better than the 1 prestige eye cream. Of thing 1 tonight, donald trump changes his mind about a lot of things but one issue where hes been unwavering is infrastructure. We have to rebuild our country. We have to rebuild our roads and our bridges and our tunnels. We would build new roads and bridges and tunnels and highways all throughout our land. Were going to make our infrastructure modernized. Infrastructure, were going to start spending on infrastructure big. And not like we have a choice. Its not like oh, gee, lets hold off. We can rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and we will. Well, theres a perfect project ready to go right now in trumps home state. Rebuilding the crumbling century old rail tunnel underneath the hudson river connecting new york and new jersey. The tunnel serves about 200,000 passengers every weekday. And its key to 20 of the nations gdp. Fixing it seems like a nobrainer. So it was, well, surprising when President Trump told republicans in congress not to fund a project to build new tunnels. The Washington Post calls it a direct challenge to a key political rival new york senator Chuck Schumer who has been among the most powerful and vocal backers of federal funding for the project. So while a project that democrats and republicans say is essential to a fifth of our economys is out at least for now, there is a smaller one nearby that the Trump Administration curiously does seem interested in. And would it surprise you if Jared Kushner was somehow involved . Thats thing 2 in 60 seconds. So donald trump is reportedly trying to kill a massive tunnel between new york and new jersey just to spite Chuck Schumer. But elsewhere in the tristate area, down the jersey shore in long branch, the Trump Administration is involved in a much smaller Infrastructure Project developing a Ferry Service that would bring passengers to the doorstep of a resort coowned by none other than Jared Kushner, the president s soninlaw who along with solving middle east peace has been known to advise his pops on infrastructure. The federal Transit Administration has been advising the town of long branch with the project which as the a. P. Notes places the federal government in the awkward position of lep steer a project that would benefit trumps soninlaw. Since the value of those condos coowned by kushner could rise as much as 50 if the project is completed. And given kushners role advising trump on policy issues ranging from middle east peace to infrastructure, some question whether those small town business ties now pose a conflict of interest. Rebuilding america, one kushner project at a time. 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People are afraid to an walk, to talk. We need to get the best and the finest and if we dont, well be in trouble for a long period of time. From time to time, we like to quickly collect in on the various people working in the Trump Administration. You know, the best people. Like for instance, oil and gas industry darling scott pruitt, the Climate Change skeptic in charge of the epa. New york times reported today he sought to stage public debates challenging Climate Change science possibly to be broadcast live. Though the president expressed enthusiasm for the idea, not surprising, it was reportedly killed by john kelly and other top officials. Another of trumps best people is Nick Mulvaney who is currently doing double duty as budget director and the acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which he once called a sick, sad joke. In january, mulvaneys cfpd dropped an investigation into a payday lend that contributed to his congressional campaigns. The a. P. Reports two days later, the ceo of said company who resigned wrote mulvaney asking to be put in charge of the cfpbcy citing her indepth experience of what an investigation is like. No word yet whether they plan to take her up on the offer. Then theres the head of the department of the interior, ryan zinke key to demands a special flag be raised whenever hes in the interior department building. It was reported the department is the spending nearly 139,000 todd upgrade three sets of double doors in his office. Spokesperson claims zinke was not aware of the contract. That news comes shortly after under ben carson, the department of hud place add order for a 31,000 dining room set. Carson sought to cancel the order in the wake of media scrutiny. Speaking of hud, a Senior Adviser is spreading a false conspiracy that Hillary Clintons Campaign Chairman was a satanist. John gibbs still has his job but has set his twitter to private. But im not standing still. 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Learn more at cancercenter. Com Appointments Available now. When we sit here and think about how hard it is to vote, push the green button, push the red button, i remind myself that this isnt hard. Putting your kid in the ground is hard. This is a button. This week, for the first time in more than two decades, florida lawmakers defied the nra. The republicancontrolled house and Senate Passed new gun restrictions, a law signed today by floridas republican governor rick scott. A big l for the nras king pin in florida former president marian hammer described as the most influential gun lobbyist in the united states. Hours after the bill signing hammer and the nra announced they are suing florida. With me now, contributor to new yorker magazine michael spies, the author of the profile. Politico mark caputo and avery gardner, copresident of the Brady Campaign to prevent gun violence. Mark, starting with you. I have been reading your coverage of this closely. You have the lay of the land there. It was a real open question about whether this was going to happen or not, as my understanding was. What was determinative ultimately. Crisis. Most legislative bodies react to crisis. In the middle of the florida legislative session and you have 17 people who are killed in a mass shooting, 14 of them kids, it is almost impossible to ignore. Still, i have been a reporter in florida for 20 years, and i grew up in the state. I have never seen them pass gun control. The idea that a Florida Legislature controlled by republicans and Florida Republican governor would sign any measure of gun control no matter how slight, is mindblowing, yet it happened. Michael, you talk about how marian hammer has been able to kind of keep a lock on that state and that is a model for other states. What methods has she used, and why did they fail here . I think what made this instance completely different and a total aberration from other sessions or other opportunities to pass legislation is that the republicans are fairly united in jumping off the cliff together. I think you had some 67 republicans with a or a plus ratings combined in the house and senate who decided to support this bill. And its pretty difficult to punish all of them. Its usually, when you have a couple people who are straying from the flock, you can focus on two, three, one person. But thats a really, really high number. And its also important to point out that the folks who were carrying those bills are in line to become the House Speaker next year, the Senate President next year. If she wants to start punishing their respective members, you know, you are going to wind up in a situation thats going to be an allout war. Great point. Its like a legislative wildcat strike. If everyone goes, right . Right. Then you cant do anything to them. Right. Avery, marks point here about the singularity of what happened in parkland, the incredible horror of that massacre there, there are two ways to interpret this as a oneoff or the start of something. I think this is the start of something. We look back to october 1, vegas, the deadliest mass shooting in history of the country and the congress and states did nothing. Then a few weeks later, a church in texas in Sutherland Springs where people were massacred at church. I think those two events having happened so close in time to parkland are part of why we are seeing a different reaction now both in florida and in other states and at the federal level. The American People were fed up after vegas, they were fed up after Sutherland Springs and now theyre really fed up. There is a threeday waiting period for gun purchases in this, minimum age raised to 21 to buy a firearm. Bans bump stock sales. Funds School Police officers and allows sheriffs to arm some school personnel. The last one was controversial. Some groups opposing it some whipping against it. Rick scott saying he might veto that. How controversial is that provision . Its huge. The bill needed democrats votes both in the senate where it passed only by one vote, and in the house. We spent hours and hours listening to debate and discussion over the one provision, the quote, Arming Teachers provision. Had it not been in the bill its safe to assume it would have gotten more democratic support, maybe less republican support. It was probably put in to curry support from republicans. It was controversial. I need to say one thing. This is a voluntary program. Most of floridas big urban counties will not participate. They have already said they arent. It wont be in a lot of the counties, a lot of the places where you have big minority populations where people are concerned about racial profiling and disproportionate treatment of minority students in classrooms and by the police. Good point. Yeah, please go ahead. I was going to say, we are already hearing from activists all over florida that they will now take their effort to the local districts and say, really, you dont want to participate in this voluntary program. It is not going to make your school safer. It has a real risk of having a disproportionate burden on students of color. I think well see now a lot of the activism that we were having in tallahassee move to local districts to say, okay, dont participate in this part of the law, its really not going to do much to keep children safer and it really could do a lot of harm. Michael, do you agree with averys assessment of this as something more than a oneoff . Its at this point pretty hard to tell. It is worth pointing out that, while relative to whats happened in florida over the last couple of decades, it is a big deal that these modest reforms passed. There were a whole lot of amendments that democrats tried to add onto the bill that were shot down, including obviously setting new restrictions on magazines, banning assault weapons. For that matter, i think, narrowing the definition of what is an assault weapon. So its hard to tell, but i am not sure. I think its to me, it seems like it, in florida, anyway, that this is a really unique moment and that it was pretty difficult for them not to act but ultimately what they did was, in the grand scheme of things, you know, you mentioned this earlier, and certainly it is worth celebrating some of the reforms that got into that bill. Still, you know, still modest for them. And mark, whats interesting now is the politics of this continue. They dont just sign it and walk away. Because of the nras lawsuit today, now you have rick scott, governor of florida, who will have to send his state solicitor general to defend this thing in court. Right. Well, actually the Florida Attorney general pam bondi who is named. Pam bondi. Right, noted liberal she, in the end, rick scott will probably run for senate. One of the things he has been doing through a variety of policies included by not limited to offshore oil drilling is starting to turn more to the left or to the center. The more it looks like he is, quote, defying the nra, the happier rick scott is as he looks to a general election. I am sorry, chris. This is my last chance to remind everyone in the new york area that this sunday i will be at an event in brooklyn for the launch of my book. I tickets are just ten bucks. There is a talk and q and a. It will be a lot of fun. Hope to see you there. Thats all in for this evening and this week. I could not believe it. I couldnt imagine anyone that would ever want to hurt her. I had no idea what could have happened. Married to her high school sweetheart, family meant everything to her. It was always a lot of talk about children. She wanted grandchildren fast. It all went up in smoke the night she died in a mysterious and monstrous inferno. I found the remains of julie. Shocking as the blaze was, it was nothing compared to what investigators found in the embers