about yesterday's one-year so member rags about the january 6th insurrection was the absence of every republican with the exception of two members of the cheney family. as the capitol police officers who protected the u.s. capitol and the members who were hunted inside it that day marked the sad an versary, the gop took a decidedly different path. and one year after the insurrection, it has become blasphemy for any republican to describe the january 6th attack for what it is, a terror attack intended to stop democracy in its tracks by halting the electoral college vote count. case in point, senator ted cruz, who led the charge in objecting to the election results on january 6th but got himself in trouble this week for stating a few inconvenient truths during a senate hearing on wednesday. watch. >> we are approaching a solemn anniversary this week. and it is an anniversary of a violent terrorist attack on the capitol where we saw the men and women of law enforcement demonstrate incredible courage. >> so good for him, right? because it's uncontroversial to describe january 6th as the terrorist attack? . it's not just democrats who are referred to it as an act of terror, but also donald trump's appointee to lead the fbi, director christopher wray, former republican president, george w. bush, and one ted cruz himself, who called the insurrection a terrorist attack as recently as may of last year while explaining why he opposed a bipartisan commission to investigate january 6th. but after one single intervening event, one thing that transpired, cruz has spent just so far, an entire news cycle trying to shove the truth back into the proverbial toothpaste tube. that event? tucker carlson, who tore into ted cruz. here is cruz groveling to tucker carlson on this topic last night. >> the way i phrased things yesterday, it was sloppy, and it was frankly dumb. >> i don't buy that. whoa, whoa, whoa, i don't buy that. i have known you for a long time before you went to the senate. you were a supreme court contender. you take words seriously as any man who ever served in the senate. you repeated that phrase. i don't believe that you use it accidentally. >> as a result of my sloppy phrasing it caused a lot of people to misunderstand what i meant. >> what a joke he is. aaron blake puts it this way in the "washington post." the interview had it all. here is the runner up for the 2016 gop presidential nomination appearing on the air waves of a january 6th conspiracy theorist who instantly made clear who had the real power in that relationship. cruz even acknowledged that he sought out the interview shortly after seeing what carlson had said wednesday night. the whole sory episode may be emblematic of the post january 6th gop which largely i go fired the anniversary yesterday. the "new york times" reports, the only republican-led event on thursday to commemorate january 6th was hosted by two lawmakers on the fringes of the water, representatives matt gaetz of florida, and marjorie taylor green of georgia. seeking to deflect blame from trump they held a news conference about the origins of the assault on the capitol. quote, i think it is a reflection of where our party is, ms. cheney told reporters. very concerning. yesterday's speech by president biden slams the republican party for receding into the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories and lies about the 2020 election and the insurrection caused by the big lie. it was a powerful speech, an angry speech, a necessary speech. it was also a speech that biden wanted very much not to deliver because doing so meant acknowledging that although trump may be out of office, trump and trumpism have not been banished but live on as a dominating unpleasant reality of american political life a year after his appalling refusal to accept the election results should have exiled him ever more from the public space. the post january 6th gop embrace of the fall narrative of the insurrection is where we are start this hour. carol len i go is here. matt dowd joins us. and barton gehlman is back, from the atlantic, who in a cover story last months reports that the former president is in an even better position seize power in the next election. i want to start with you, matt dowd, he and she who hail from texas know the underbelly of ted cruz and being ted cruz. and i wonder your thoughts to this bit of political performance art. >> well, as you know, i have known ted cruz since i worked with ted cruz in the 2000 campaign. and to know ted cruz is to dislike ted cruz. it's pretty uniform. anybody that encounters him. i think i said this before, there used to be an expression, people, reporters would ask us, why do people take an instant dislike to ted cruz? and the answer was, it saves time. i was watching ted cruz. every time i think he can't go lower, he goes lower. he reminds me of the character reeked from the "game of thrones." the only good thing about reeked is he had redemption later on when he became theon gray joy. ted cruz is the guy who donald trump ripped his father, accused his father of being a part of the kennedy conspiracy, called his wife ugly, and then kissed up to donald cruz. and this is ted cruz. this is guy -- i don't know if it is physically or anatomically possible, but was born without a backbone, has no moral principle at all other than his own ambition in the court of this. but i think it is another example -- i will give donald credit -- one thing for. donald trump has been the great revealer of people and who they really are. that's one of the things i think has been a benefit. we're because of donald trump, and because of people like tucker carlson, they reel veal people in the republican party for what it fundamentally is, which is a party with no moral center a party with no interests other than power, a party that doesn't care about the common good, that has no distinction between facts and fiction in any of this. and ted cruz is a perfect example of it. ted cruz represents the republican party as good as anybody in this, which is he's willing to say or do anything, including lying, deceiving, sucking up, throwing his wife and his father to the side in per suit of power. and that is pretty much the headline for where the republican party is today. >> carol len i go, i think in five years i have never contemplated leading with a ted cruz story. but this isn't a ted cruz story. this is about what threatens our country, what a terror attack is and is not. in the words of ted cruz on january 7th, 2021, the january 6th insurrection was, quote a despicable act of terrorism. in the words of ted cruz on january th, 2021, quote, yesterday's terrorist attack was a horrific assault on our democracy. january 8th, 2021, quote, we saw a terrorist attack on the united states capitol. may 28th, we saw a terrorist attack on the capitol. we found four -- five times were sloppy mistakes. i have never said this either, but tucker carlson is right. ted cruz picks his grave and little words very carefully. what does this -- what does this usher in when a republican senator who clearly described the event and the insurrection as terrorists carrying out a terrorist attack goes on national tv and tries to take all that back? >> i think two things are going on which you very, very well described in the opening. but let me give you a few more details. one, to matt's point, ted cruz's latest political embarrassment is -- is an illustration of the party writ large. he did it in a very suck-uppy kinds of way with tucker carlson. by saying what something is, when people bring flag poles and bear spray and weapons and radios to march up to capitol police and use those, that is a terror attack. you can't deny that. but the administration that he provides is that of hundreds of republican lawmakers. many said to me they know the election wasn't rigged and they know january 6th was terrifying because they experienced it and they were running through tunnels and hallways with no guide as to where they were supposed to go. they know exactly what it was, but they can't say that publicly or else they will have hell to pay. whether that is from tucker carlson, sean hannity or the federalist society or donald trump himself. that ultimately to them is a loss of voters. and they can't have it. i guess i would then pivot to the second major reveal of this moment. and that is one you just mentioned, nicolle, where is the power? the power is in the hands of fox news pundits who have a very high and constant platform to spew information that's just not true. and they are able to do that over and over again. the other day, president biden tried to wrest that row strum back from fox news it is a bit laid, to be clear, because they have been repeating and patienting this for so long. but that's where we are. the power is in the people who have the billy pulpit. right now that's fox news and donald trump. >> we spent days on your cover piece because it shook us and it would appear there are some echos in your warnings in president biden's speech yesterday. i want to play some of it. let's talk about it on the other side. >> while some to uphold the principle of that party, too many others are transforming that party into something else. they seem no longer to want to be the party, the party of lincoln, eisenhower, reagan, the bushes. and so at this moment, we must decide, what kind of nation are we going to be? are we going to be a nation that accepts political violence as a norm? are we going to be a nation where we allow partisan election officials to overturn the legally expressed will of the people? i did not seek this fight brought to this capitol one year ago today. but i will not shrink it from either. i will stand in this breach. i will defend this nation. i will allow no one to place a dagger at the throat of democracy. >> you remember this, too, i believe the last president uttered this sentence, i did not seek this fight. it was george w. bush after the attacks of 9/11 vowing to make the people who carried out the attacks at new york and at the pentagon and in shanksville pay. now we have another american president in another time completely vowing to not shrink from the fight. and the fight is against disinformation peddled on fox news and republican lawmakers who six, seven times call an attack a terror attack and then last night on the one-year anniversary, try to take it all back. >> for better or worse, george bush, after uttering those words, put the country on a war footing, devoted the full resource of his presidency to combatting the threat as he saw it. as i said, for better or for worse. we don't know yet whether joe biden is going to do the same. this isn't the first time he has spoken in strong terms about the threat to our democracy. in july, in a major speech at the national constitution center, he actually said that election subversion by the republicans is the gravest threat to our democracy since the civil war. those are very big words from an american president. and we are not seeing yet what he intends to do about it. >> matt, this is the point you make i think with increasing despair, if i may be so frank about what i think you convey. and i think it's something that a lot of people feel, that there is no one in charge of protecting our democracy. it doesn't neatly fall into anyone's cabinet post or portfolio at the white house. did you hear or see anything that suggests that has changed? >> i saw a difference between what i heard from joe biden before and from what i heard yesterday. i mean, i thought it was a forceful factual speech, a speech that i have been waiting for. but it's very -- i think he has taken this up a notch. and i was -- you know, every morning, as you know, i have a tendency to do readings. today is the birthday of this wonderful, wonderful poet named stora neil thurston whose both sets of grandparents were born to slavery. is ithate her birthday today. one of her pope ems had a beautiful quote in one of her poems, some years ask the questions and other years answer them. 2021 was a whole series of questions. i think what joe biden did yesterday, i think, and i hope is going to be beginning to answer them. i have encouraged over the last eight or nine months, i think they need to appoint a cabinet level position on democracy, on where we are today. it is the gravest threat to our country. it's a much graver threat. that combined with domestic terrorism, the threat to democracy, both together is a much graver threat in 2021 than islamic terrorism. much graver threat the our country in the breakdown of our country. one of the things that happened after 9/11 was the country united behind the president and for months or years was united in an effort to defeat that and do all it took to do that. some were mistakes but there was a united effort to go do that. we don't see that yet today though i think joe biden's speech yesterday was a good first step for the president of the united states to use, that platform, to say it in that way. i think it was appropriate. i think it also was really smart because right now donald trump's net enfavor sbl twice as big as joe biden's. if joe biden can get in a fight with donald trump over the course this midterm year, it is a benefit to him to do that. it is a big benefit to him to wrap the republican party completely into the anti-donald trump forces. he has to do it week in and week out. it can't be just a speech yesterday and then go on to something -- build back better or whatever. it has to be week in and week out all the way up to november. that's the only way it is going to work. i hope that we are going to see public hearings related to the january 6th -- i think really soon. it would be smart in my view if they started them next week to build on what joe biden just said. but i see a difference between what joe biden said yesterday and what he has said for 30 years. >> we will have a chance to ask congressman adam schiff a member of the select committee that very question later on in the program. i have to ask you about dick complainy and liz being the only republicans present yet. but in your piece you wrote, the insurrection took place on november 3rd, election day. january 6th it was protest, he wrote in a statement released by his fund-raising group in october. it is difficult today to find a republican elected official who will take issue with that proposition in public. was trump loyalists ascent and no left room left for ascent in a party twisted for the former president. anyone who thinks otherwise need only glance toward wyoming where liz cheney has been toppled from her leadership post and expelled from the state republican party. it feels that we are tumbling toward this dynamic being even more cartoonish. it was -- it was sort of in question for a few hours on january 6th. then mccarthy goes to mar-a-lago, and they are all back to being submissive to trump. and tucker carlson. and even since the piece came out, the conduct of the republican elected officials is more shamelessly torqued toward the lies about january 6th. >> it's testing the limits of shame, honestly. you look at what happened with ted cruz. it's got to be absolutely humiliating to go on to tucker carlson's air and be ridiculed by carlson, and to suck up to him, and to admit, you know, all of your sins. i mean, this is a man who wants to be president of the united states. and came as close as anyone did to defeating trump for the nomination. and he can't stand up to a television host. yeah, i mean, the cartoonishness of this whole thing is -- is based on the fact that there are tens of millions of people. >> who believe night in the republican party who believe it. and punish any deviation from doctrine. >> well, there are two, liz cheney and adam kinzinger, those are the only two who deviate from what bart is talking about. let me show you what adam kinzinger says he is going to do when he leaves congress. >> if the past 12 months taught me anything, it's that saving america is the fight of our lives. this time last year i hoped victory would come in a matter of months. now i see it will take years. that's why i am transitioning from serving just one corner of illinois into fighting this new nationwide mission full-time. what we do in the days ahead will determine whether america moves away from january 6th or moves towards an even bigger crisis. it matters how we vote, not just in the big elections, but in primaries, too. >> carol, this is so nuanced, but it's so important. this is one of the two republicans serving on the 1/6 committee. the committee now has eyes inside the room of what donald trump did and didn't do. we have been reporting your reporting, you and phil, you were really were the first two to report out what we understand trump was doing during the insurrection. the committee is now beginning to have real granular understanding of it as well. kinzinger saying it 345er9s how we vote, not just in big elections, but in primaries, too. i think central to whether or not that can be successful is who joins him. john bolton broke with donald trump. he is doing polling to finds out if trump is getting weaker. bill barr walked out the door sort of between the debacle of donald trump as a general election candidate and the coup. maybe there is a pocket where maybe he would do some stare telling. jim mattis. there are a whole bunch of people who know exactly and what kinzinger is talking about. but in order to be successful he needs some of them to come with him and push back on the base intoxicated on lies from donald trump and fox news and all those echos. >> they need the stars of the constellation of the republican party. i think that's why you saw dick cheney along with his daughter, liz, to show the bush administration, the big olddogs of the 2000s are here to say this just isn't right. i am amazed as i travel the country how many nice sweet old ladies, grand mothers like my mom, you know, interesting individuals who remind me of so many of my friends, will say to me in just casual conversation how concerned they are about the election being rigged. they have just been listening to either talk radio or the trickle down of sean hannity and tucker carlson. and they have essentially been brainwashed without realizing it. and that's what kinzinger is up against. he needs people that are going to listen or rather people who are going to command the attention of those brainwashed individuals. it sounds so harsh to say. but you know, when people with a financial and political agenda continue to spew this material that is so palpably wrong, demonstrably false, it sinks in. it becomes fact. and now you need a george bush out there saying, guys, you have been tricked. it is hard to tell someone they have been tricked because that will make them feel lesser and fooled. but a large part of the american public is in that situation. >> it's an unbelievable state of affairs. no three better people to talk to about it. thank you for starting us off on a day like today. when we come back, are those who called out the justice department for not yet holding the organizers of january 6th and the defeated expresident accountable feeling any better today about merrick garland after his pledge to pursue the january 6th perpetrators as, quote, any level? we will ask one of those critics next. plus, what are the consequences of the repeated lies of the expresident is how it has emboldened hate and extremism among people you might not expect. we will talk about how this is exploited and what can be done to stop it. and later in the program, the reports of cooperation between former members of vice president mike pence's staff and the january 6th select committee, committee member adam schiff on that big development. all those stories and more when "deadline: white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. r a quick bre. don't go anywhere. ♪ i see trees of green ♪ ♪ red roses too ♪ ♪ i see them bloom for me and you ♪ (music) ♪ so i think to myself ♪ ♪ oh what a wonderful world ♪ i brought in ensure max protein, with thirty grams of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks! 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(excited yell) woo-hoo! ensure max protein. with thirty grams of protein, one gram of sugar, and nutrients to support immune health. one gthe pain.gar, itching. emerge tremfyant®. with tremfya®, adults with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis... ...can uncover clearer skin and improve symptoms at 16 weeks. serious allergic reactions may occur. tremfya® may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms or if you had a vaccine or plan to. emerge tremfyant® with tremfya®... ask you doctor about tremfya® today. i think merrick garland has been extremely weak, and i think there should be a lot more of the organizers of january 6th that should be arrested by now. >> merrick garland is either going to rise to the occasion or go down in infamy as one of the worst attorneys in this country's history. >> at the moment, all that they have shown us so far has been basically street dealer prosecutions. >> what about the role of those involved not just on the 6th but in the days leading up to the 6th and the the aftermath of the 6th who may have broke ten law to try to overturn the presidential election? there was no indication were the attorney general that issues like that were under investigation. >> there is none, and there is now a rising chorus of criticism for attorney general merrick garland and his apparent failure to hold the organizers of january 6th and the disgraced expresident accountable. garland speaking wednesday vowing to pursue the perpetrators of january 6th at, quote, any level. for this conversation, let me bring in congressman ruben gallego of arizona one of those voice who is has been critical the attorney general so far on this issue. and we will get a chance to talk with neil cat yell, a former u.s. slitter general. now at georgetown law school in just a moment. congressman, first to you. your criticism was first, it was blunt,way covered it at the time. we wanted to come back to you after the speech and find out if you were feeling any differently about what is to be fair to this justice department, this attorney general, public pacing response to scrutiny about prosecution of the prerp traitors of january 6th? >> look, nothing changed. but i want them to do well. i am not here to be someone who throws stuff away. i am worried about your daem accuracy. part of his speech he said they are treating this like any other investigation. but this was a coup attempt at our country that involved multiple politicians at very high levels across state lines. and what i am seeing is something that scares me, that they are going to move so slow that either there is going to be a very successful cover-up or we are going to run out of time. and i say this all the time, what happens when donald trump declares that he is running for president in january 2023? is the department of justice going to investigate him and people around him actively? from my understanding in the past, when someone is run forth president, we do not continue or indict, more importantly, when somebody is running for office. and i think, you know, your dealing with someone in merrick who is so used to trying to live within norms and actually re-establish the norms of the d.o.j. that he is basically going to be binding himself. when you are dealing with trump and some of these people who actually use norms, time, and illegal procedures to basically run out the clock like they have done many, many times. >> one of the criticisms that i think is five years old now from democrats and republicans and just institutionalists is that the brazen willingness to obliterate every norm was not something that any of our criminal codes captured. but it would appear that from the 1/6 select committee there is enough conduct that looks at least questionable enough to -- for folks like yourself to wonder why it isn't under investigation. the call to referenceberger, putting in writing a plan to fraudulently have mike pence throw out the vote and install alternate electors. the pressure campaign against state election officials. the -- you know, whatever the movements were. >> the list could go on and on. >> right. do you have any explanation from the justice department why none of those rackets under scrutiny? >> you don't have to give me the explanation but certainly you have to give the public the explanation because they are the ultimate victim here. we haven't heard it. not only that, i don't need to hear -- i hear from some defenders of the d.o.j. and merrick garland, you know, they are professional, they don't like. he don't need to see leaks, but we need to see movement. there have been no dimtsz. we haven't seen or heard any subpoenas. we don't know if they are gathering evidence. in the past we have seen other department of justice operations, we can sue there are actual viable steps. i think right now we are not seeing it and by the time they get moving the political landscape is going the change to the point where it is going to be impossible for thib to be held accountable. >> i worked in the white house and the people who were most critical of our performness would call and say we are just concerned about your success. i don't know how her going to view that. i want to bring into this conversation neil cat yell. over to you. >> i am in the middle of this. i wrote a piece in the atlantic yesterday. first of all, i think merrick garland gave a great speech. indeed, the country has been blessed with two phenomenal speeches in a 24-hour period. his and president biden's. and garland said, went out of his way to say in the speech to say no one is above the law. there are two possibilities here. one is that merrick garland has a secret investigation into trump and the other coup plotters and we just don't know about it. the second is that garland is too afraid of his shadow and doing nothing. as we think about, nicolle, which of these possibilities is right, i think there are three things to consider. first, it's really obvious that an investigation into the higher ups including trump and his coup plotters is required for all the reasons you were just saying to the congressman. a criminal statute makes that kinds of behavior a federal flnl. the second is, it is rare for a investigation of this magnitude to be kept secret. if it is happening over the last year we would normally have leaks, at least have witnesses talking, or trump and those who are targeted by the investigation would be filing lawsuits as they have in new york to try to block subpoenas and the like. we have just seen none of that lastly is that the u.s. attorney's manual which governs the justice department allows them to conduct an investigation if the pbl confidence requires it. and we have had no confirmation of that. all that the me is my concern because like you just said we have to have an investigation. i don't know where that investigationest necessarily goes in terms of indictments but darn it, we need one. >> can i ask you just a question about the mecke mix, what precipitates the opening of an investigation at d.o.j. my understanding of the role that the benghazi committee played in an investigation being opened into hillary clinton by the justice department was that the committee as they gathered documents and as the hillary clinton state department and i believe the kerry state department at some point, those investigations went on so long, they turned over so much, there were questions about her personal -- use of a personal email address, and then questions from the committee about whether classified information was on them. it sort of triggered an i.g. to make a referral. why hasn't that happened, either at the national archives or anyone who would have sent -- or someone from homeland security who was sending or receiving texts from mark meadows -- why hasn't that triggering event happened at the 1/6 committee to get the ig or d.o.j. to open an investigation? >> two things. the fact you are invoking again ghazi is significant. because the republicans the conniptions and hours of interviews with hillary. yet all of these republican congress folks are basically saying we shouldn't even have an investigation over january 6th, when they were jumping up and down to investigate like mad, benghazi. and the second thing, the reason why i think we haven't seen that yet is because the congressional investigation is still ongoing. it's always a complicated dance when you have congress investigating and potentially the justice department doing so. indeed, in iran contra, the fact that congress was investigating actually led to messing up oliver north's conviction by the justice department because they had given him certain immunities and the like. it is a complicated dance, but here the january 6th committee isn't done with their work and they are not going to make the referrals in a piecemeal basis. it could be merrick waiting for congress to make the referral before opening an investigation into the higher ups. that's certainly better than the alternative that there isn't going to be an investigation. but it's not so great. here we are more than a year after the attack. memories fade, trump of course is good at delay and filing all sorts of bogus lawsuits. so it is harder to conduct a law enforcement investigation at the justice department as time elapses. the last thing, i disagree with the congressman about d.o.j. policy. there is no d.o.j. policy that says you won't investigate if donald trump announces he's a presidential candidate. they are absolutely free to investigate. and indeed, no one is above the law. there is no principle that is more sacred to the justice department, at least in normal times, than that. >> you know, it is one of those news cycles in which we need new the next hour. we will see you in a little bit. thank you, my friend. after the break, how and why some of our most vulnerable found themselves caught up and susceptible to lies and disinformation. one year after the attack on the capitol, a reflection on the state and strength of extremism, and what it's going to take to contain and it fight back against it. we will be right back. we will be right back. you're a one-man stitchwork master. but your staffing plan needs to go up a size. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. indeed instant match instantly delivers quality candidates matching your job description. visit indeed.com/hire zuriel: st. jude gave us hope. matching your job description. stephanie: all you've got to do is take care of your child, focus on her healing, give her a life. that for mother means a lot. and-♪ i see trees of green ♪ude. ♪ red roses too ♪ ♪ i see them bloom ♪ ♪ for me and you ♪ ♪ and i think to myself ♪ ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ a rich life is about more than just money. that's why at vanguard, you're more than just an investor, you're an owner so you can build a future for those you love. vanguard. become an owner. - i'm norm. - i'm szasz. 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[szasz] we take care of ourselves constantly; it's important. we walk three to five times a week, a couple miles at a time. - we've both been taking prevagen for a little more than 11 years now. after about 30 days of taking it, we noticed clarity that we didn't notice before. - it's still helping me. i still notice a difference. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. a must in your medicine cabinet! less sick days! cold coming on? zicam is the #1 cold shortening brand! highly recommend it! zifans love zicam's unique zinc formula. it shortens colds! zicam. zinc that cold! ♪♪ three times the electorlytes and half the sugar. ♪♪ pedialyte powder packs. feel better fast. with his terrific podcast, american radical, our friend and colleague showed all of us that a decent into disinformation and conspiracy theories can happen lightning quick and sometimes totally out of nowhere. our reflexes this week ought to include that amongst the consequences of the big lie is what it did to people you might have otherwise considered totally normal. consider this, from the president of the anti-defamation league. quote, of the 727 people arrested because of their actions on january 6th, about 155 or nearly a quarter had ties to a wide range of right-wing extremist groups and ideaologist. including the proud boys, oath keepers, qanon and white supremacists. more alarming, however, 79% of those arrested had no explicit ties to extremist movements or groups. this suggests that a significant number of seemingly ordinary americans decided that mob violence was an appropriate response to the election results. joining us now is jonathan greenblatt. author of "it could happen here". and rick stengel is also with us, a former top state department official. now an msnbc analyst. jonathan, i want you to tell me the story of damian patton. but tell me -- your title and congressman jamie raskin's title both including world unthinkable. how did we descend into that, unthinkable. >> it shows you how far we have moved, nicolle, i think it is rather frightening. i mean, look n the last five years, since the advent of trumpism, if you will, we have seen the normalization of extremism. we have seen an acceleration of intolerance. we have seen the spread of anti-semitism and anti-black rachl, and hate crimes that we never would have imagined. to be clear, extremism existed before donald trump. he didn't invent it. quite the contrary. what he did was weaponize it and turn prejudice into a political weapon that was very effective for him. so today i think what we are looking at is, again, anti-semitism has been amplified. we have nearly double the number of incidents today than we did just a few years ago. hate crimes increased 12% in 2020 according to the fbi. and it feels like that -- those numbers that you shared at the top, four out of five of the people who staged a terror attack -- because that's what i would call january 6th -- the most predictable terror attack in american history because they told us what they were going to do weren't, you know, members of the equivalent of isis or al qaeda. they were ordinary people who were radicalized. and that requires us to consider, how can we employ a whole of society strategy to tackle this problem of domestic terrorism and amplified extremism and i will liberalism once and for all? >> how do you do it with all of the i think treasured protections of a first amendment right of free speech and association. how do you do it when the threat is so interconnected and braided into the most prominent figure in the american right right now, donald trump? >> it's a great question. i guess what i would say is that, you know, as an organization, the adl, we are the oldest anti-hate group in the united states. we have been fighting for the first amendment and our our freedoms for more than 100 years. and we have always pushed back on extremists since the kkk and nazi sympathizers and whatnot. and frankly, hearing hard speech is part of the price of the first amendment and there always be a lunatic fringe. but, nicolle, we have got to keep them on the fringe. and we don't need to privilege prejudice as if it were something to be validated, with you know, prime time appearances. social media for the first time in a long time did the right thing in taking trump off of facebook, off of twitter, off of youtube. because -- you know, let's be clear. freedom of expression is not the freedom to incite violence. and you may be the president or kind of a public figure, alex jones the pseudoperformer that he is, but you have no right to show up on social media if you are going the slander people. that suspect protected speech. and i applaud those networks who -- you choose not to have white supremacists on your air time, choosing not to display that madness is actually i think part of our shared civic duty. and we need to do more of it not allow bad guys to weaponize the first amendment and hide behind it. >> do you feel, though, like civic duty doesn't mean the same thing to the country at large anymore? you have 40% of americans who think civic duty is marching on the capitol quote hang mike pence. >> yeah, it is a scary moment in history when indeed you have ordinary americans who want to lynch the vice president, who broke into the capitol with the intent to capture and kill elected members of congress, let alone the vice president. and by the way, a year later the "washington post" poll earlier this week, more than 30% of americans think violence is okay against the government. i mean, this is really without precedent. and yet i will say, there are ways to stop this madness. i mean, literally that's why i wrote the book, nicolle, because i share sort of our strategy. pardon? >> i want to ask you about the book. there is incredible story telling in the book that brings this conversation into how do we fix it. i want to bring rick stengel into it as well. i want to ask you both to stick around through the break and then we will put those pieces together and talk about how to fix it. what donald trump and foreign adversaries share in common, the disinformation and the ability to target impressionable people with it. we will have that conversation next. with it. we will have that conversation next people everywhere living with type 2 diabetes are waking up to what's possible... with rybelsus®. the majority of people taking rybelsus® lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than 7. rybelsus® isn't for people with type 1 diabetes. don't take rybelsus® if you or your family ever had medullary thyroid cancer or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, or if allergic to it. stop rybelsus® and get medical help right away if you get a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, or an allergic reaction. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. tell your provider about vision problems or changes. taking rybelsus® with a sulfonylurea or insulin 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men in the car were arrested, damian was let off. this was, you know, dismissed, this case for him, and yet, he went on to join the military, got involved in nascar and eventually got involved in tech and started a very successful software company, and yet, about a year and a half ago, it was revealed, some investigative reporter discovered that earlier in his life, he had been a white supremacist. when this news came clear, even though for 20-some-odd years he had done nothing in the white supremacy movement, had actually given to jewish causes, he was outed, he was sort of canceled, despite his apologies and whatnot, fired from the company he founded and then left to spend the next year in a process of sort of introspection, reflection, and ultimately redemption. i got to know him when he started this process through a mutual friend, a venture capitalist, and i worked with him over the past year, watched him come around, and his story gives me hope. his story is remarkable about how a person can amend for their sins and be redeemed, and i think in this moment today, i wish more on the extreme right and even some on the far left would remember that we all can be redeemed. we just have the power to accept responsibility for our errors and look ahead. >> you know, rick, it's such an important conversation, and cable news doesn't do a good enough job of showcasing the nuances here. i mean, you cannot write off the 40% of the country that believes in the extremist views of the ex-president. you just can't. there's too many of them. and this idea of redemption is an interesting one to lay over the january 6th anniversary. what are your thoughts today? >> well, first, nicole, i want to congratulate jonathan on his book. incredibly important subject, and his day job is incredibly important as well, so congratulations on that. no, you can't write off 40% of americans. we're a democracy. they're significant. and the thing is, i think what people don't understand always is that disinformation doesn't radicalize people. it's a gateway -- it's not a gateway drug. people are radicalized much more -- we saw this with isis when i was in the state department, much more by an em deem logical model, by people that they know already, by intimates. i mean, you know, were talking about the oath keep and these illegal militia groups. there's a reason why the people in there are brothers and cousins. they radicalize each other. the disinformation and the conspiracy theories increases enthusiasm. it's a kind of a force multiplier, but it doesn't actually create radicals from the get-go, and i think we have to realize that. but i think -- and i, you know, have been on the disinformation front for a while, and i'm a little disheartened because it's not very easy to counter disinformation. i actually think the thing -- the only thing we can do is try to overwhelm it with fact-based information, with truth. because you and i know, we all know the experience of trying to argue with someone who's a conspiracy theorist. it makes them even more convinced that they're right. so, it's not about countering disinformation, which is often counterproductive. it's about creating truthful, true information and hopefully letting people redeem themselves. >> well, the opposite happened at the 8:00 hour on fox news with ted cruz and trying to put the truth back in the toothpaste and be part of the conspiracy so we have a lot of work to do. i would like to put you both on the spot for a 2022 project of having this conversation where we focus not on the most outrageous sort of consumption of disinformation or distribution of it but how we fix it and i hope that's something we can do here in these hours, and i won't say i hate putting people on the spot on live tv, because sometimes it's effective, but i apologize in advance for having done so. we will continue to call on both of you. the book is called "it could happen here." it's out now. jonathan greenblat and rick 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(excited yell) woo-hoo! ensure max protein. with thirty grams of protein, one gram of sugar, and nutrients to support immune health. playback! one gram of sugar, the feel great event of the holidays is still in theaters. i love you! and now it's hit home too. oh, hah, hah. oh boy. hang mike pence, hang mike pence, hang mike pence! >> just one of the most haunting and defining sounds of the insurrection. hi again, everyone. it's 5:00 in new york. those were the ex-president's supporters who had just erected a gallows outside of the u.s. capitol. rioters got less than 100 feet from the then vice president right as his secret service detail whisked him and his family to a room off the senate floor. mike pence ultimately did not succumb to the pressure from donald trump, fulfilling his role and overseeing the certification of the electoral college and declaring joe biden the winner of the 2020 election. with all that in mind, axios has new reporting. quote, people in and around former vice president mike pence's office have been particularly cooperative as the january 6th select committee focuses on what former president trump was doing during the more than three hours the capitol was under attack. that's according to sources familiar with the testimony. the staffers, who we know are cooperating, marc short, pence's former chief of staff, alicia fa rah, his former press secretary and keith kellogg, pence's former national security advisor. kellogg was with trump in the white house the day of the attack and we know from reporting in the book "peril" that kellogg urged trump to send out a tweet to help control the rioters. axios goes on to report this. quote, some of the most helpful information has come from second and third tier administration staff who were not directly involved but were at the white house on january 6th and had access to top administration officials, sources tell axios, they have been integral in helping piece together exactly what happened that day. one committee aide said. the committee has made clear it is interested in speaking with the former vice president but stopped short of saying he would be subpoenaed. all this as the committee is ramping up its efforts with the investigation's public phase on the near horizon. yet again, vice chair liz cheney is acknowledging the committee is examining the former president's potential criminal exposure. watch. >> the president of the united states is responsible for ensuring that the laws are faithfully executed. he's responsible for the security of the branches. so, for a president to, through either his action or his inaction, for example, attempt to impede or obstruct the counting of electoral votes, which is an official proceeding of congress, is, you know, we -- the committee is looking at that, looking at whether what he did constitutes that kind of a crime. but certainly, it's dereliction of duty. >> the latest developments from the january 6th select committee is where we start this hour with congressman adam schiff of california. chairman of the house intel committee and author of the book, "midnight in washington." someone we have a privilege of speaking to often on the years-long effort now to hold the ex-president accountable and i guess i just want to start with your thoughts after seeing no one, other than liz cheney and her father, present to even mark the horrors of 1/6. i thought that was a nod to something more than disinterest in honoring the capitol police, but maybe some nerves about how much you all know. >> well, it was so striking to be on the house floor yesterday and to stand in the same spot where i and others stood a year earlier, but to look across the aisle and to see no one there but liz cheney and her father. to go out on the capitol steps for a candlelight vigil and have it be, essentially, just democrats singing "god bless america." i was in congress on 9/11 and i remember we met on those steps and it being very bipartisan. i suspect most of those republican house members, whether they would like to be there or not, are afraid to be there, not afraid of another attack on the capitol, but afraid of earning the scorn of donald trump, and they won't do anything, most of them, that risks any chance of earning the former president's disfavor and a primary challenge, and it's, you know, a wholesale lack of courage, i think, on their part. >> but the same cannot be said, it would appear from staff members of the former vice president's office, and i wonder if you can confirm that the sort of spirit of the axios reporting that the vice president's former staff have been helpful. >> you know, i can't confirm as to any particular individuals, but i can tell you, we have been getting a lot of cooperation. most of the people that we have reached out to and a great many that have reached out to us are volunteering to come forward. they're not requiring subpoenas. they're certainly not fighting subpoenas. and you know, for those few who are, those high-profile few who are, you know, resisting and potentially going to jail, like steve bannon, and we hope there's an indictment coming out of justice on mark meadows, we are looking for other ways to get the information. now, some of that information, you can't get in other ways. no one knows better than mike pence the kind of coercion campaign against mike pence, the kind of effort to get him to violate his constitutional duty. so, i do view him as an indispensable person to talk to. and you know, we haven't sent out a formal invitation yet, because we realize that if we do have the opportunity, i think, to interview him, we'll get one shot at it. we want to make sure we have all the information that we want to ask him about before we do. but we are certainly getting a lot of cooperation from people that were in the white house and in the know. >> if you could just characterize the picture, is it -- is it piecing together more dots of a picture that you all think you understand? is it corroborating witnesses to things you've heard from folks like marc short and others who have not had high-profile fights and showdowns with the committee, as you said, there are only two who are in that category. can you characterize what the investigative work is -- or is it still simply following new leads that come up up in the interviews? >> i would say, honestly, it's really all of the things you mentioned. we are getting a picture of the multiple lines of effort to overturn the election, and for me, one of the big takeaways thus far happen that it's not just about january 6th. a lot of those efforts took place well before the 6th. some carried on after the 6th. some involved abuse of the justice department. others involved efforts to coerce elections officials into violating the law, potentially, and so we are learning a great deal about those multiple lines of effort. we are still, you know, there are still missing pieces, and we're still very much open to the idea that there may be big things that we don't know about yet, but we are filling in the timeline. we are developing a comprehensive understanding of who is involved in what, and while we still have a lot of work to do, i think we've gotten a lot of work done so far. >> can you talk about what point in your work a criminal referral to the justice department would come? >> you know, it really depends, i guess, on the kind of referral. clearly, we were open to making referrals on an ongoing basis for people who refuse to show up when they're subpoenaed, or if we have someone coming to testify, and we think they lied to us, we will make referral as soon as we feel confident that there's sufficient evidence to do so. with respect to other, even more serious charges, such as the one that liz cheney was describing, i think we're going to want to see the full pictures, as full a picture as we can get, and decide whether or not we think a referral is warranted. but i do want to emphasize one fundamental point, which is, the justice department should not be waiting for us. they better not be waiting for us, and in my experience, after having served in the justice department, and having worked on congressional investigations while the justice department was doing their investigations, they don't wait for us. they often ask us to wait for them, so, you know, they should be looking at things, in my view, like georgia. they shouldn't lead to the fulton county d.a.'s office whether there was, you know, federal laws violated when the former president was trying to get brad raffensperger to find 11,780 votes that don't exist. >> we know that the committee has used the investigative tool of phone records requests from some of the objections of lawyers who allegedly say their clients have had their records requested. is it fair to assume that, if george were representing mark meadows in a criminal investigation and doj were looking at his records, we would know about that? is it a fair assumption to say that if mark meadows were under investigation for sitting on the raffensperger call, we would likely know about that? >> well, you know, it's -- i don't think i can say with absolute certainty. you know, you shouldn't be hearing about it from the justice department. so, you know, again, when i listen to merrick garland, my first impression was, god, it's great to have someone of integrity running the department again. i was concerned not to hear mention of the possibility of criminal activity not related to the actual day of the 6th. i think that was -- that does concern me. but it could very well be that the justice department of georgia is going on and the grand jury is just being really secret about it, but the lawyers representing the witnesses and the witnesses themselves don't have to remain confidential about it, and generally, they have, you know, they have released information to the press when they are entitled to do so. so, i'm a bit skeptical that the silence is just owing to really good justice department adherence to policy. >> sean hannity has been asked to spend some time voluntarily with the committee, not as a member of the press, who covered donald trump and seemed to have advised him, but as a fact witness. is there any update on his interest in doing so from his lawyer? >> i don't have any update on that. clearly, he has relevant information he could share with the committee that would help us or allow some of those missing pieces. he was, i think, from -- on the basis of the text messages, very concerned with what was going to happen within the 48 hours before, you know, he expressed that concern before january 6th, the day before. he also expressed concern, i think, about white house counsel resigning as a result of the pressure campaign on pence, at least, that's how i read his text messages potentially. but it would be more important to get his reading than mine. so, we hope that he'll be willing to share that information. we made it abundantly clear, we're not interested in his political views or what he does on his show. we're interested in, you know, his role as an advisor to the president, as a confidante of the president, someone who campaigned for the president. those are not journalistic roles. >> congressman, you've been generous with your time. my last question is about signals that the committee has sent that primetime hearings are not off the table, and they could start in a matter of weeks. do you have any firmer either timing in terms of the hour at which they may take place and timing in terms of when they could commence? >> we don't have date yet. you know, from my own personal view, the better we can schedule them to get the information out to the american people, that's the course that we should take. there's obviously a vigorous effort to try to reinvent history by the former president and others, to try to make january 6th into a tourist day, and it's going to take all that we can do to set the historic record straight. and so, we want to bring the public along with us and our investigation. i think that will begin soon. and for my own point of view, we ought to do it in the manner that's most conducive to informing the public. >> congressman adam schiff, thank you for starting us off this hour. >> thank you. joining our conversation, jonathan lemire, white house bureau chief for politico and host of msnbc's "way too early." so many titles, i'm sorry i stumbled over that one, jonathan. and eugene daniels, white house reporter and coauthor of politico's playbook. jonathan lemire, i think it's such fascinating optics that not a single republican was free or in d.c. yesterday except liz cheney and dick cheney and as the committee makes so clear, so far, there are like two people that haven't talked to them. everybody else has either cooperated or has at least signalled that they will cooperate in some way, shape, or form with testimony or documents or some sort of other contribution. and everyone that they have subpoenaed is an insider's insider in trump world. >> yeah, a lot of the names are not necessarily bold-faced names who are cooperating but they're cooperating all the same and providing key information to the committee. these are staffers, senior staffers, the president's office, in the vice president's office, and there's new reporting on that today. who are going to -- who are painting a real picture of what happened on january 6, 2021, both in the capitol, where the vice president at certain moments had to be running for his life almost, and of course, the president of the united states, who was back at the white house in the private dining room off the oval office, transfixed by the images he was seeing on television, cheering on the rioters who were committing violence in his name, and doing nothing to stop them until he was prodded by aides to get out there and finally make a twitter video, a video, mind you, that took them three or four times before he was able to come up with one that was acceptable. and called for the rioters to finally go home, albeit he still told them he loved them. so what were -- it's a slow march here by the committee here has really accelerated in recent weeks and i think congressman schiff there talking about the primetime hearings which seem to be an act of consideration and maybe sooner than later to really bring this case before the american public, but nicole, you're right, it's a startling image yesterday. republicans are behind the scenes helping the committee but in front of the cameras, they're afraid of drawing donald trump's wrath, that included ted cruz having to apologize for rightly calling a terrorist act, what happened on january 6th, and he had to grovel for forgiveness, and as you well know, dick cheney, before donald trump came on the scene, was probably the republican most hated by democrats. >> yes. >> and yet yesterday, because he did the right thing, because he was respecting the institution of the congress, democrats were lining up to shake his hand and thank him for his appearance. >> well, and i think there's something to the enemy of my enemy becomes my friend. i mean, he said yesterday, during these events, that he found the chambers unrecognizable from when he was there, that to have a republican party and its leadership so disappointingly disinterested in the rule of law, i'm paraphrasing here, but i think that's something that is forming an alliance at an urgent moment for our country, eugene, the president making clear that there is a dagger at the throat of our democracy. axios making it clear that the vice president's staff is helping to tell the story of what happened that day, and i always wanted to believe that hanging mike pence would make people who worked for mike pence maybe more mad than mike pence was. it appears that that could be the fact. let me read you what axios writes. many of those former administration officials met solely with the committee's republican members, representatives liz cheney and adam kinzinger, sources with direct knowledge said. some also testified together with their former colleagues, so groups of ex-white house staffers walking in, talking to the republicans. eugene, this feels like a very strategic way on the committee's part to do what congressman raskin described as unburdening these staffers of what they saw and what they know. >> no, absolutely. trying to figure out what exactly happened that day, and we know all of those staffers, many of them who have been on msnbc, on cnn, talking about the things that they have seen, and some staffers, i think, the number was 15, getting together to, quote -- the term they used was trying to take trump down. so there is this recognition in some parts, a very small sliver of the republican party, that they have to get out front of a lot of this, and that's something that we're going to continue to see. this investigation is, i think, forcing a lot of people to realize how serious a lot of this is. president biden just yesterday, it feels like a million years ago, but just yesterday having to -- a sitting president having to -- feeling the need to say how much of a danger his predecessor was to democracy and the future of this country. this is all wrapped up together because there is a -- obviously, whitewashing of what happened on january 6th and it's happened -- it's started happening on january 7th on fox news, and right-wing media apparatus, and so trying to make sure that the facts get out there, that's what this administration is trying to do, and that is what this committee is trying to do. working to make sure that people understand what happened, and that's why when they're talking about, do we want to do this during primetime? that is trying to make the american people sit down and watch as they lay out the facts of the case. >> okay, and speaking of primetime, the facts of the case, i have to show both of you what chairman bennie thompson told "the washington post" yesterday when asked if the committee has evidence about current members of congress aiding those who participated in the riot. here's his answer. >> we do. we have information that members hosted people who came to washington on that day in their office. we have information that before the actual certification, people came earlier, were given tours in the capitol. we have pictures of members taken, pictures with people who came to the rally. so, members in various forms or another engaged people who came. now, there's a smaller subset of members that have been identified who probably did more to encourage the "stop the steal" part of coming to washington that we'll continue to work on. >> jonathan lemire, it was one of the most shocking observations or reports. i believe congresswoman mikey cheryl was one who had seen this and it would appear people came earlier and were given tours in the capitol, pictures of members taking pictures of people who came to the rally. a really, really startling little nugget there dropped to our friends at the "washington post" and obviously my colleague. >> yeah. an extraordinary moment there, because there had been whispers, almost from the early hours of january 6th a year ago, that this had happened. that some democratic congressmen and women had come forward and said, you know, i thought i saw -- but there was never any hard proof of that, that some republicans, the republican counterparts were giving tours to people who the next day stormed the capitol, perhaps even showing them means of egress, ways to get in and out. if true, this is a blockbuster thing. i asked congressman kinzinger on the network's air yesterday as to whether the committee would issue subpoenas to republicans, sitting republican congressmen, and he said, they have laws checked to see if they can do it but if so, that's a step they may take, and that, a subpoenaed congressman, put them on primetime. that's the blockbuster ratings and sort of grab the american people's attention that i think the committee so desperately wants. >> unbelievable. unbelievable state of affairs. jonathan lemire, thank you for spending time with us today. eugene sticks around. when we come back, the unheralded officials at the state and local level who stood up to the disgraced ex-president's efforts to overturn an election he clearly lost. the authors of the new book "the steal" will be our next guests. plus the supreme court's conservative justices showing signs of skepticism about the biden administration's vaccine mandates to fight coronavirus, which is surging everywhere. we'll look at what today's arguments tell us about which way the court might rule. and we are nearing the point at which we learn to live with covid rather than eradicate, right? that's what a number of former biden medical advisor are now advising him to do. our medical expert weighs in later in the hour. and right now, in louisville, colorado, president biden and first lady jill biden are surveying the devastation from those wildfires from last week. 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we loved him. we love all those judges, but enough. and i wonder if they feel that some of the blame lies with this sort of zombie posture from republicans in washington as he spent all those days between november and january repeating these lies. again, to you, mark. >> yeah, i think definitely the republican leaders, state and local, who we interviewed are dismayed by the stance of the party and by the leadership in washington. they feel that their first obligation is to their -- the responsibility is to the country, to the constitution, to the office that they hold and i think, you know, what happened was, you know, they were loyal republicans and frankly loyal trump supporters up until the point where they were being asked to lie for him, and then they, to their credit, refused to do it. >> matt, i want to read some of what you guys write. distrust, if there was anything like genius in donald trump's methods, this was it. democracy depends on that modicum of trust it takes to bring competing parties together after an election to govern. without it, there can be no majority rule. from the day he entered public life, trump had chipped away at the vote, that cornerstone, he sowed and planted and nurtured widespread distrust of many things, of government, of institutional and academic expertise of any kind, of whole industries, but most often, and insistently, he chipped away at trust in elections, and when he lost, he mobilized that distrust to try to stay in power. i went and looked at that, because you feel when you're here that he spends most of his time calling the press the enemy of the people, but he really did, in that last year of his presidency, as it was clear that covid was going to be dominating people's thoughts and experiences that year, he really did take after elections and specifically absentee voting and different localities, and he targeted them viciously, and he told his voters to vote twice. did some of us, not you guys, but did some of us miss that? how did that happen for so long in such a sustained way? >> well, i think it's just a gradual process. i think propaganda is an insidious thing. disinformation is a creeping thing. it's -- it just sort of moved across the population, and it does sow distrust. some of the most heartbreaking stories that we have in the book are the stories of people who were turned against by their own neighbors. i'm thinking of cheryl guy, a county clerk in michigan, who made a very simple mistake in her tabulations on election night, and she quickly corrected within a few hours, herself a trump supporter, but that in the -- the propaganda and stirring that went on around that, she had people, her neighbors, her friends, people whose very birth certificates she had signed call her un-american and nonpatriotic and much worse than that. >> matt, you guys dedicate the book to the patriots who basically walk the line. have things gotten better or worse for them since last november? >> well, maybe worse, because a lot of them have paid a price. cheryl guy, the county clerk i just mentioned, is not going to run again for her position. likewise, people in georgia, people in arizona, and elsewhere, the good thing is, though, that it's not really -- we found it's not really a question of red versus blue. a lot of these people who did stand up and tell the truth were people who were republicans and even trump supporters, but they had the information. they had the facts. and having that, they were able to say, hold on. the conspiracy that you're spinning is false. it's not true, and i'm not going to go along with that, and so what it tells us is that it's not red vs. blue. it's truth vs. lie, and that's a line that's drawn through every human heart, and that gives me some real hope for the country. >> it's a really, really important book. it's out now. "the steal." mark bowden and matthew teague, thank you so much for spending time to talk about it with us today. thank you so much. when we come back, the biden administration says vaccine mandates for both large companies and healthcare workers are essential in the fight against coronavirus. today, they argued their case before the united states supreme court. what today's arguments tell us about which way the court may be leaning. us about which way the court may be leaning. to be a thriver with metastatic breast cancer means asking for what we want. and need. and we need more time. so, we want kisqali. women are living longer than ever before with kisqali when taken with an aromatase inhibitor or fulvestrant in postmenopausal women with hr+, her2- metastatic breast cancer. kisqali is a pill that's significantly more effective at delaying disease progression versus an aromatase inhibitor or fulvestrant alone. kisqali can cause lung problems, or an abnormal heartbeat, which can lead to death. it can cause serious skin reactions, liver problems, and low white blood cell counts that may result in severe infections. tell your doctor right away if you have new or worsening symptoms, including breathing problems, cough, chest pain, a change in your heartbeat, dizziness, yellowing of the skin or eyes, dark urine, tiredness, loss of appetite, abdomen pain, bleeding, bruising, fever, chills or other symptoms of an infection, a severe or worsening rash, are or plan to become pregnant, or breastfeeding. avoid grapefruit during treatment. ask your doctor about living longer with kisqali. ♪ i see trees of green ♪ ♪ red roses too ♪ ♪ i see them bloom ♪ ♪ for me and you ♪ ♪ and i think to myself ♪ ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ a rich life is about more than just money. that's why at vanguard, you're more than just an investor, you're an owner so you can build a future for those you love. vanguard. become an owner. a must in your medicine cabinet! less sick days! cold coming on? 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challenges to the biden administration's proposed vaccine mandates, both for employees of larger companies and for some healthcare workers. republican-led states have challenged those mandates, and today, with covid cases and hospitalizations rising across the country, justice stephen breyer essentially asked one of the lawyers arguing against the regulations, are you serious? >> are you still really asking this court now, today, to issue a stay? there are three quarters of a million new cases yesterday. that's ten times as many as when osha put this rule in. the hospitals are today, yesterday, full, almost to the point of a maximum they've ever been in this disease. the question is, how can it conceivably be in the public interest, with three quarters of a million people yesterday, goodness knows how many today, i repeat my question. to me, it's unbelievable, but i want to hear what you say. how can it be in the public interest? >> one of those new cases was one of the lawyers who's arguing against the covid protections. you can't make this up. he delivered his arguments remotely, because he can, i guess, after testing positive for covid. joining our conversation once again, neal katyal, former acting u.s. solicitor general, now a georgetown law professor, and eugene daniels is back with us. neal, i have to play some of the republican questions, because it's the contrast that has my brain tied in a knot again. >> is a vaccine the only way to treat covid? >> it is certainly the single most effective way to target all of the hazards osha identified. >> i don't want to be misunderstood in making this point, because i'm not saying the vaccines are unsafe. the benefit's greatly outweigh the risks. some people, who are vaccinated, will suffer adverse consequences. is that not true of these vaccines? and if that is -- is that true? >> that can be true, but of course, there is far, far greater risk from being -- >> but there are -- there is -- >> by orders of magnitude. >> right. there is some risk. do you dispute that? >> there can be a very minimal risk with respect to some individuals but again, i would emphasize that i think there is no basis to think these fda-approved and authorized vaccines are not safe and effective. >> i'm not making that point. i tried to make it as clear as i could. i'm not making that point. there is a risk. >> neal, all i could think of was when savannah guthrie was trying to get donald trump to say something intelligent about his views on qanon, and she got so exasperated and said, you're not someone's crazy uncle. what do you think? these are supreme court justices, and they want to know if the vaccine is the only way to deal with covid? and they're talking about the adverse impact of the vaccine? i mean, millions of people -- what is happening, neal? >> yeah, i know, it's a potentially very dark day for the supreme court, because what makes it even more ironic is these are the same justices who have traditionally deferred to presidents, particularly president trump, when he invoked public safety, most prominently with the muslim ban case which was all made up, and yet they said, oh, who are we to disregard what the president says we need for public safety and now they're turning around and questioning the efficacy of vaccines and the like, and so i do think it's potentially a very dark day for the supreme court and indeed for our public health. it's always difficult to predict for moral arguments and there are two different cases here. one involves hospitals that receive federal funds in which the biden administration has said, if you're receiving funds, hospital, you got to vaccinate your workers. that, actually, i think is going to be upheld, it looks like, by the supreme court, so the justices on both sides of the court basically said, you know, these are federal dollars and the federal government can say that the person is treating you shouldn't make you sick. but this other one, which the excerpts you were asking about, the excerpts you were playing about is about osha, the office of safety and health administration, and they have a rule that says if you're an employer and you have more than 100 employees, you've got to require vaccinations or mask and test. and osha has said they have the power to do that, because congress says you can regulate a, quote, grave danger to the workplace. and that's where you heard this kind of nonsense from the state challengers, saying, well, it's not so grave, and vaccinations aren't good enough anyway, because i, the lawyer, arguing, am vaccinated, and yet i got sick with covid, and have to phone in my oral argument, so that's one set of arguments. the other set of arguments was they were saying the rule is too broad because some employers don't actually force employees into close quarters like meat packing plants do, and so this rule is too broad, and that, nicole, was just incredibly striking to me because the justices themselves, you know, i've argued on the supreme court since covid, is not a meat-packing plant. indeed, you're already spread out. they barred all outside visitors. they required a negative test of the attorneys before they show up. they've moved the podium back a further 15 pete. this is like the opposite of a meat-packing plant and yet they're imposing all these rules and they have the luxury and power to do so. and all osha is saying is, look, when your employees don't have that power, we need to do it for them. >> justice sotomayor makes those points about the workplace putting you in danger. eugene, let's listen to her. >> we have more affected people in the country today than we had a year ago in january. we have over 100,000 children, which we've never had before, in serious condition. if you're sick, you can't come into work. the workplace can't let you into the workplace. and you shouldn't go on unmasked. tell me what's irrational about rules of that nature when it is the workplace that puts you into contact with people that will put you at risk. >> it just feels, eugene, like we have common sense so outnumbered by the conservatives on the court today. >> yeah, i mean, the liberal justices are talking about what we all know, the closer you are to other human beings, the more your risk is to getting covid-19 and that's something that we've known for a really long time. and i think that's right that the law about health area -- the health places are going is maybe held up. that's what experts are saying. but the osha law probably not, and what's interesting is this administration's really -- knows a lot's riding on both of these cases, actually. they don't always do this. a lot of information to allies or journalists, kind of making the key arguments they were going to be making today so it makes it clear to us that they know the requirements, these mandates and an important part of what they want to do is make sure that the economy doesn't close down because of covid and they're leaning on a 1970 law that gives osha this authority but the conservative majority, it seems like they're leaning toward, you know, kicking that one to the curb, and that is something that this administration has been worried about for a while. >> since well before we were living in our current surge. neal katyal, eugene daniels, thank you so much for helping us make sense of it. it's great to see both of you. thank you. still ahead for us, six former biden medical advisors say it's time to shift strategies in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic rather than working to eliminate the virus, they say it's time we learn to live with it. we'll ask our medical expert about that strategy and what it would look like if he listens to them. d what it would look like if he listens to them i have moderate to severe ulcerative colitis. so i'm taking zeposia, a once-daily pill. because i won't let uc stop me from being me. zeposia can help people with uc achieve and maintain 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singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ zuriel: st. jude gave us hope. stephanie: all you've got to do is take care of your child, focus on her healing, give her a life. that for mother means a lot. and-- and thank you to st. jude. today, several of president biden's former top health advisors are calling on him and his administration to rethink their strategy to fighting covid, to stop living in what they call a perpetual state of emergency and instead adapt to a new normal of living with covid indefinitely. let's bring in msnbc medical contributor dr. kavita patel, former policy director for the obama white house, now a fellow at the brookings institute. dr. patel, let's talk about where this comes from, this sort of new strategy, who it comes from and whether you think it's a good idea. take us through all three. >> yeah, nicole, so, this is a great strategy. it comes from -- there's a series of articles in the journal of the american medical association, got snopss in "the new york times," but comes from the covid task force during the transition advisers. these are people you and i know well, emmanuel, rick bright, here's what it boils down to, it basically says instead of eliminating or eradicating covid, a covid zero policy approach, we need to think about living with covid. when i first read it i'm like, we're all living with covid, trust me, but i think they're advocating for looking at covid in the long term. it's not going away, we hopefully won't be talking about it as much because it will a be part of a normal pattern of other respiratory viruses and i think they're advocating makes a lot of sense, better healthcare infrastructure, school better data, they lifted some of the stuff we did in h 1 n 1 years ago so it's not new but i think worth the whole world revisiting, and brings up important points. >> my son is doing a couple days of remote learning because of back-ups with testing and it is, a he's a fourth grader now. he did the end of second grade at home, third grade, and fourth grade, it's so clear we didn't have our priorities straight the first year, i'm not talking a short delay, or teachers sick obviously, or teachers -- i'm not saying any of those things but any sort of approach that includes shuddering schools is insane. we can never go back to doing that again. how do we put schools in the urgent section and i don't know, maybe bars and squash in the not as nice reserved for school section. >> we can talk again, i feel the same way you do, take a 10-year-old child, am majority of their life has been in this pandemic. let it weigh on you, their entire life this pandemic. we should not close schools but we can debate how to make them safe, testing, masks et cetera. but you're bringing something stronger that even six months from now when covid is a part of normal life, which it will be, we need to have schools prepared for children what they were denied last year. i think it's critical, they should be prioritized part of an essential work force, price standards for healthcare should apply to education too. >> such an important conversation, i'll purt you on the spot in 2022 to continuing to have it with us, dr. kavita tatel thank you so much for being with us today, we'll be right back. s today, we'll be right back. people everywhere living with type 2 diabetes are waking up to what's possible... with rybelsus®. the majority of people taking rybelsus® lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than 7. rybelsus® isn't for people with type 1 diabetes. don't take rybelsus® if you or your family ever had medullary thyroid cancer or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, or if allergic to it. stop rybelsus® and get medical help right away if you get a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, or an allergic reaction. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. tell your provider about vision problems or changes. taking rybelsus® with a sulfonylurea or 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ever before with kisqali when taken with an aromatase inhibitor or fulvestrant in postmenopausal women with hr+, her2- metastatic breast cancer. kisqali is a pill that's significantly more effective at delaying disease progression versus an aromatase inhibitor or fulvestrant alone. kisqali can cause lung problems, or an abnormal heartbeat, which can lead to death. it can cause serious skin reactions, liver problems, and low white blood cell counts that may result in severe infections. tell your doctor right away if you have new or worsening symptoms, including breathing problems, cough, chest pain, a change in your heartbeat, dizziness, yellowing of the skin or eyes, dark urine, tiredness, loss of appetite, abdomen pain, bleeding, bruising, fever, chills or other symptoms of an infection, a severe or worsening rash, are or plan to become pregnant, or breastfeeding. avoid grapefruit during treatment. ask your doctor about living longer with kisqali. thank you so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times, we're greatful, "the beat" starts right now. welcome to the beat everyone, new development involving one of the most strident republican leaders in congress, ted kruz and odd apology with tucker carlson, a warning about the authoritarian rising on the american right. to see how important this is and how deep it runs, why this isn't just some