on the show friday. by the time he got off the september he turned to me and he said, i think tiger will pull it out. he kept calling me all weekend. richard had this right. we will have his moment. also, you know, sometimes a game is so remarkable it makes you forget everything that went before. that happened last night when the red sox beat the yankees. i would say humiliated them, almost in historic fashion. i think that when this -- when -- i really do think that -- look at this. this is the last inning. deekman, strike one. he strikes judge out. here is stanton, can't miss. oh, but i guess he can. two away and here we go. ninth inning. oh, my god. you know, looking at deekman there, it makes me wonder if when the history of this season is written whether anybody will even remember the first two games of this series. i mean even, jonathan lemire, do we have barnacle there? >> oh, yeah. >> barnicle is here. >> i don't know how long barnicle is going to be here. he is probably going to get up and leave in three minutes, but okay. >> let me just say, i think when the history of baseball itself, they will remember last night's game as the game that turned everything around for the season. never mind what i had said about deekman before, jonathan lemire will tell you, mike, i said after the first game the boston cops should drive him to the city limits, open the door and tell him to keep walking. he looked pretty good last night. in fact, he's learned how to throw a strike this spring. >> well, deekman is further proof of himes' total genius in assembling this multi-faceted roster. >> total genius. >> deekman came in and was embarrassing for everyone sitting in the bronx last night to watch deekman shred the heart of the yankee line-up. >> it had to be humiliating. >> 150 games to go and it will be positive. >> this might have been new yorkers' worst moment since washington's retreat from long island, it was that bad if you are a new yorker. >> yeah, president biden is fond of the phrase inflection point. it was an inflection point not just for baseball but maybe for the course of humanity. mowing through the line-up last night, it was a win the red sox desperately needed and they got it. at this point. i could do math here. 162 games, yankees on pace for 2 and 160 i think. >> what about your favorite? >> bobbie deek came through with a home run. what did i keep telling you about deekman, jonathan lemire? >> you -- >> oh, wait a second. don't tell people what i said. if he can seriously -- he did not throw a strike all spring training. here is bobby d taking it deep, my main man, bobby d. >> i'm not going to fact check you on your claims. as much as roger stone has a tattoo on his back, we know you have one of him on your back. it is a huge moment for you and your entire family. >> a huge moment for the entire family. of course, this was the game, the moment everybody was watching all across the world, but they had a little golf tournament in georgia. richard, you want to take us through that really quickly? >> the masters? >> that's the golf tournament in georgia, yeah. >> scottie scheffler. >> no, no. the macon member guest invitational. let's go to the news, mika. >> world number one, world number one on a tear. by the way, fourth major win. tiger woods, he's on tiger woods' pace, just saying. tiger woods, by the way, the fact he played and could barely walk at the end was an amazing moment. >> for sure. >> an amazing moment. scottie scheffler played the most consistent golf except for the 72nd hole where it took him three-putts from two feet to win. but just before that when you first had rory mcilroy and collin morikawa both hole out from bunkers on the 18th hole, it was about as cool as it gets. >> yes. >> there was amazing golf. >> richard haass, your debut as the golf correspondent, kid, you blew it. you blew it. >> we'll do it again later. let's get to the news. >> let, let's get to the news. that surprise visit british prime minister boris johnson made to kyiv over the weekend for a remarkable show of unity with ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy. the two leaders walked side by side through ukraine's capital on saturday. look at this. just a few weeks ago this city was under threat from russian forces. they stopped to talk with citizens on the street, waved at people. johnson's visit came one day after he announced that britain would provide an additional $130 million worth of weapons to ukraine. >> have a great leader. [ speaking foreign language ]. >> he said thank you. >> boris. yeah. >> how are you? nice to see you. [ speaking non-english ]tv. >> it is nice to meet you. we are privileged to help you. you have a remarkable president, mr. zelenskyy, who has done an outstanding job. we simply wish to keep supporting the people of ukraine for as long as it takes. take care. >> i'm from london. >> i know. i'm from kharkiv. so sorry. >> thank you. thank you very much. here for wine? >> they're two cockerills. >> thank you very much. thank you. >> over the last few hours i have been able to see quite a lot of your beautiful country. it is an amazing country. i have also seen the tragic effects of the war, an inexcusable war, an absolutely inexcusable and unnecessary war. i think that the ukrainians have shown the courage of a lion, but you, volodymyr, have given the roar of that lion. >> translator: i'm very grateful, boris, for this visit. it is very important, this very difficult and terrible times for our country. at the same time you came here and we are especially grateful for this to happen. this is a true reflection of the decisive and significant support to ukraine from united kingdom. >> so, joe, a day before top leaders from the european union also visited ukraine. i mean this is incredible. it really shows the charismatic and unifying aspects of the leader of volodymyr zelenskyy. >> it really does. it also shows that those people that continue to talk about the decline of the west are just so wrong. they bore me so much. they've been talking this way for 50, 60, 70 years. it used to be when they would say that from the left, now they're saying it from the trump right and it is just wrong. i must say, boris johnson's walk through kyiv was remarkable with zelenskyy. >> truly. >> it even overshadowed the eu visit, which we will get to in a moment. but boris johnson walking through all of the city, and his ukrainian twitter account said why? because he bloody could. it takes people across the world back to a month, month and a half when zelenskyy were in the streets, in the darkened streets whispering into a phone, just saying, we're going to stay at it. now broad daylight, walking down the center of the street. let me just say, making a declaration to vladimir putin, these are not your streets. these are zelenskyy's streets. these are ukrainian streets and we are here to help. richard haass, i would love for you to talk about the extraordinary symbolism of a british prime minister walking through the streets of kyiv with the ukrainian prime minister while his country is under attack from a totalitarian regime, but also talk about the fact that we're starting to see even more significant weapons systems going in to ukraine, not just from lithuania but from all over the west. and you talk about inflection points, this weekend felt like an inflection point in the western part of the country. >> well, the visit of boris johnson was impressive for two reasons. one, simply a physical man at the station of external support, but also that it was safe enough to walk those streets. that told you how much the center of gravity of the battle had shifted and that kyiv essentially has been successfully defended. a few weeks ago it was anything but. nobody knew which way it would go, and indeed it was vladimir putin's plan to take kyiv and to put in a puppet government. what is happening now though is the battle is changing to the east. we are now going to have the first really large set piece battle. you can say it has world war i or world war ii written all over it, but we will face battles of mass in the donbas. the problem is this to some extent is slightly more at van tagous to the russians, they know the terrain better and it is largely depopulated. >> the president and the vice president of the eu's executive branch met with president zelenskyy in the country's capital on friday. from there the group made the trip to kyiv, to the kyiv suburb of bucha, the site of that horrific massacre of innocent civilians. after seeing the devastation the european commission president provided an update on ukraine's application to join the alliance. >> in this envelope, dear volodymyr, there is an important step towards eu membership. the questionnaire that is in here is the basis for our discussion in the coming weeks. it is where your path towards europe and the european union begins. these are questions that then formulate the opinion of the european union as a recommendation to the counsel. it will be not as usual a matter of years to form this opinion, but i think a matter of weeks. >> you know that is, richard haass, again i actually got chills watching that clip again because i know how much the ukrainians have been fighting bureaucratically, not with weapons, since 2007, 2008 for nato membership, for eu membership. it is actually -- we talk about nato so much, but ukraine's membership in the eu hugely important. explain why. >> no, you're exactly right indeed, joe. when you go back to 2014, it was the desire of the part of ukraine to many of the people to join the eu that in many cases brought about the earlier russian intervention because what vladimir putin wanted to stop was ukraine's westward drift, if you will, from his point of view. the eu represents anchoring in a club of democracies, market-oriented economy. so in some ways i think this could be more significant. nato is not going to happen, but now that you have the eu talking about accelerating an entry plan, that would be essential. but for anchoring ukraine in the west but also for rebuilding ukraine, this actually in some ways is the most relevant international associate ukraine could have. there's a security dimension, but even more there's a political and economic dimension. >> certainly, and finland and sweden applying for membership, and the victim of cyberattacks on friday, russia the suspect there. these members go into kyiv, i would expect another delegation to go in there. to richard's point, it will be different in donbas. it will be a larger set piece, tanks needed, anti-aircraft weaponry needed because the russians have a better chance of maintaining air superiority there but also easier supply lines. >> good point. >> the russians certainly have struggles with their military. they are positioned to do better there in the donbas than in the other parts of the country. >> what we may have to have is rather than providing russian or former soviet weapons i think we have to make the transition to western weapons, to train the ukrainians on that because it is a more sustainable supply line. >> joe. >> and at its best time the united states had many soviet era weapons they had taken after the cold war ended. those supplies have been exhausted. it is now time for us, as richard says, to stop saying, oh, you know what? we've run out of our old soviet weapons. get them the best, get them the newest. we are going to have to train them up. yes, we will have to train them up and it will be a longer war. mike, i want to go back to you quickly again just for the viewers who may not understand the historical significance of this, the eu talking about fast membership. you know, in the cold war you had berlin. berlin was on the razor's edge of world war iii because of the divide through the center of berlin. here we've had ukraine in this really second cold war. we didn't realize vladimir putin was fighting it but he was fighting it, and as richard said, his entire -- his attacks in 2014, his attacks this year had one purpose and that purpose was to stop ukraine from moving west, stop ukraine from becoming a european, modern, capitalistic, free, democratic country. the fact that the eu came in this past weekend and said, here is the application, it is not going to take years, it is going to take weeks, you will be a member of the eu, hard to overstate the significance of that. vladimir putin, as we have said since before this war began, everything that vladimir putin thinks is going to happen in this war is not. it is going to backfire horribly on him. look at the tape. we said it time and time again before this war started. that press conference, mike, may have been perhaps the greatest example of just how this idiotic war on his part has backfired in putin's face. >> well, it is certainly the latest evidence of the complete underestimation vladimir putin had in approaching ukraine. this is a war that's been going on at least 20 years, largely in putin's mind as well as on the ground in the last five to seven years. over the weekend boris johnson walking with the president of ukraine, clearly, openly, bravely, was a significant sign this is, in addition to the horrors of the war, one of the great human dimension stories that we've seen in years. you have a nation here under siege by russia, butchering cities. the russian pattern is destroy and terrorize and they've been very successful at it thus far, destroying cities, terrorizing the people. yet ukraine stands firmly, boldly, proudly up against this. you are right, and, richard, putin has so badly underestimated this, his last shot, his last, most terrifying, perhaps most dangerous shot is in the donbas starting perhaps today. we don't know. the question is just how absurdly terrorizing will putin be ready -- what will he be ready to do? >> well, the only models we have are grozny and syria and essentially this is scorched earth. this is no civilian is safely, no building is safe. that's the question. we don't know also whether he's, as bad as it is, content with the donbas as an end itself, land bridge to crimea, whether he sees it as a base to press more towards the center of the country. and if he is pushed back, take the other scenario, whether he would then be tempted to use chemicals or nuclear. i think in the next month or next six weeks the personality of this will enter a new phase and define itself. if putin does badly, it is a third set of calculations. we will see this crisis essentially enter a fundamentally new phase over the next month to six weeks. >> by the way, at least 57 people killed in the train station attack in donetsk. there's another sign it could take a darker turn. russia's army has a new top commander who has a history of cruel attacks on civilians. general alexander devornikov oversaw the fighting in syria. he was awarded the hero of russia medal before his command in syria. before his appointment russia's military was not lead by a single commander. joining us retired four star navy admiral james stavridis, international security and diplomacy analyst for nbc news and msnbc. admiral stavridis, what can you tell us about this new general in command? >> butcher of syria kind of sums it up. we have to remember that he started life as a junior officer in chechnya. grozny, the name of the city means "terrible" in russian and his behavior even as a young officer in command was terrible. he is in every sense a war criminal. his record in syria is a mirror of what is happening today in ukraine. so you have to ask yourself, what is putin's message here. i think, frankly, just as we spoke a moment ago about boris johnson and the european union, the very hopeful messages, sadly, here is a very dark message because putin is signaling first to his army and his armed forces that pour it on, you can't do anything that's over the top to the civilians. so he is signaling more dark warfare. to the ukrainians he is signaling, i'm not taking my foot off the gas. i have gone to the bullpen, that one is for you, joe, and pulled out the toughest, hardest picture i got in putting him into the game. to the west it is a message of utter defiance. i could care less what you think. i'm going to do exactly what i want and i'm going to continue to terrorize this population. it is a pretty dark way to start a monday morning, and i think over the next month or so we are going to see the extent to which putin has unleashed this particular dog of war. >> well, so he is a war criminal, the butcher of syria, admiral. the question is how does the west do what it has done from the first day of this war, where it has out thought, out maneuvered, whether you are talking about cyber warfare, whether you are talking about information warfare, whether you are talking about shipping things in. so putin showed his hand. yeah, he is going to keep committing war crimes and killing civilians. so doesn't that send an even clearer message to joe biden, to the administration, to the united states, to the west that just sitting back and sending in the weapons that we sent in the first month or so is not going to be enough? as richard haass said, maybe it is time, as the commercial says, to send the very best and start sending in u.s. weapons, training ukrainians up and seeing how much longer mr. putin really wants to take this? >> absolutely correct. let's focus on three things in terms of weapons systems. let's give the ukrainians the tools to establish a real no-fly zone. that will mean they have to have high-altitude surface-to-air missiles. the s300 is a good start, but, boy, have we got better kit than that to offer frankly, patriot, thad, we have a lot to offer. the russian black sea fleet is maneuvering around in position. if putin wants to shake up the battlefield, he will go from the seas behind the ukrainian lines, perhaps going after odesa. need a counter to that which the ukrainians do not have. thirdly, you mentioned cyber. i think that's a very real possibility we ought to be thinking about in terms of providing additional offensive capability. by the way, that's just the military side of this thing. looking at the signal again from putin, again for our european friends, i think it is time to continue to dial up on the sanctions. we have to find a solution on the natural gas piece of this thing if you really want to put the screws to this to the russian economy. finally, send a signal back. i think it is time for a very high level u.s. visit to kyiv. with boris johnson, you see, you know, the man who studied churchill standing next to the man who is today's churchill, that's zelenskyy. we ought to be standing somebody like lloyd austin in my view who stands tall for this country, a great symbol of the country, a combat soldier, secretary of defense. he ought to be going to kyiv. >> how long in your experience will it take for the ukrainian forces to get up to speed because time is of the essence? are we talking days, weeks? what is your experience? >> i think it would be weeks. it is not a matter of flipping a few switches, but on the other hand these are systems designed for mobility, for quick training opportunities. we have experience doing this, richard, as you know with our israeli friends where we train back and forth on missile defense systems. and when you add the exigencies of combat in ukraine it could be done rapidly. you do the training outside the country, bring the systems forward. boy, that starts to look like a real additional problem for russia. >> richard, let me ask you, listening to you and the admiral just now, especially the admiral's description of the incoming commander of the russian forces and given their past history over the past four or five weeks, their clear intent in the east of ukraine is to just light it up, just light it up. how do you negotiate with people like that? >> the short answer is we're not ready to negotiate. this war is not yet ripe for a diplomatic resolution. hopefully that won't be too far off. in part, that will depend on what happens on the battlefield and then what mr. putin is ultimately -- what his war aims become. he has clearly dialed them down. the question is what does he feel is enough. to put it another way, is the most ukraine ever could or would be expected to offer russia, is that enough for russia to accept. i don't think we know the answer to that. that will shape what people feel they need, what they realize they can get. either this battle will set the stage for potentially successful negotiation or this battle will be but another chapter in what will become an open-ended war. i don't know the answer to that question. >> joe. >> you know, what is so fascinating about what richard is saying is we're looking right now, jonathan lemire, for an opening for negotiations. but as the foreign minister from turkey said a couple of weeks ago when he was trying to bring about a deal, he said right now putin can't do it because he's on the defensive. he would come to the negotiating table weak. that's when they still had troops surrounding kyiv. now they've all had to rush back into their home country. we've got desertions, we've got people quitting. you have russia looking weaker than they ever have. now they're going into donbas again, an area that they could not subjugate for eight years. so we actually find ourselves in this remarkable position where the -- what is keeping us, according to a lot of people, from a peace deal in this war is how weak russia is performing and putin is looking for an opportunity to go to the negotiating table with strength. he just can't do it because his troops keep losing to the ukrainians. >> yeah, it is a remarkable contraction of war aims for moscow, now just focusing on the donbas, barely getting more territory than they hoped from 2014. on the note of diplomacy it didn't receive the attention. boris johnson's visit but the chancellor of austria met with zelenskyy and is in moscow today. we will see what message he may carry from zelenskyy to putin. admiral, i want to pick up on joe's point there about just how poorly the russian military has performed to this point in the war. we just went through with richard a few minutes ago the advantages they have now in the donbas, better supply chains, the new commander, so on, but it is still the same military that dramatically underperformed. how do you see them, considering the losses they've taken to both manpower and equipment, how do you see this part of the campaign playing out from the russian military? >> good news and bad news, as you correctly point out. the bad news is by consolidating their forces they flipped the battlefield in a certain sense and they are contracted into an area that is more containable. they're not diluted. they're not spread as thinly as they were so badly at the tart of this campaign. that's, if you will, the good news for the russians. the bad news for the russians, however, is the fact that the weapons logistics flow from the west has just accelerated. the russian logistics chain is not going to be a lot better. it will be somewhat better because they have fewer -- a smaller level of offensive forces to support. so bottom line, jonathan, they will get some benefit out of this contraction. but the heart of this thing is the resistance, the will and the spirit on both sides of that fighting line. the ukrainian could not be higher. the russian side of this could not be worse in terms of conscripts, reservists. their actions, all of that is extremely demoralizing to a military fighting force. so the bottom line in all of this, i do not think the russians are going to have a sudden shift where they will be able to turn the tide here and come across ukraine. i, for one, believe we are probably headed toward a period of stalemate on those fighting line, and that may open the chance for negotiation as both sides see there's no obvious outcome. hey, bottom line, by the way, i don't know, nobody knows. if you think life is unpredictable, try war. >> admiral james stavridis, thank you so much. here's a new piece for "time" entitled "what the u.s. military needs to learn from the ukrainian war." thank you, admiral. still ahead on "morning joe," new details from the january 6th committee. the committee's vice chair, republican liz cheney, says there's enough evidence to refer former president donald trump for criminal charges. plus, the texts trump's eldest son reportedly sent before the election was over about keeping him in power. we are also following the election in france that has the white house extremely concerned. and in our 9:00 a.m. hour we will speak with white house domestic policy advisor susan rice ahead of a big announcement today from the white house on gun violence. you are watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. you're pretty particular about keeping a healthy body. what goes on it... usually. ♪♪ in it... mostly. even what gets near your body. please please please take that outside. here to meet those high standards is the walgreens health and wellness brand. over 2000 products. rigorously tested. walgreens pharmacist recommended... and particularly kind to your wallet. ♪♪ xfinity mobile runs on america's most reliable 5g network, but for up to half the price of verizon, and particularly kind to your wallet. so you have more money for more stuff. this phone? fewer groceries. this phone? more groceries! this phone? fewer concert tickets. this phone? more concert tickets. and not just for my shows. switch to xfinity mobile for half the price of verizon. that's a savings of over $500 a year. switch today. ♪♪ pretty shot of new york. 36 past the hour. incumbent french president emmanuel macron will face far-right challenger marine le pen in a run-off after both advanced in the country's first round of voting this weekend. this is le pen's third attempt at the presidency. she ran against macron five years ago when he won in a land side to become the youngest serving president in french history. yesterday's voting showed a much tighter race with macron securing 27% of votes to le pen's 24%. the far-left contender was on track to come in third at 22%. let's bring in roger cohen. he covers diplomacy for "the new york times." his new reporting entitled "macron to face le pen for president as french gravitate toward extremes." joe, jump in. >> roger, thank you so much for okay. we love following you and love your work. so you are obvious the person we wanted to talk to this morning. what i haven't been able to figure out, from your piece i figured out macron gets the 15% most likely from the communists, the greens and the socialists, but in the united states we really didn't hear much of anything about this character who got 22%. where did his votes go? >> well, his votes come from the left and they come from all of the people who no longer identify with the socialists, a lot of environmentalists. he got a lot of massive support from the young. people under 25 voted overwhelmingly actually for him. the big question now is where do all of those votes go because there's a part of the left that is very disillusioned with macron, who moved to the right during his presidency. now, will they hold their noses and vote macron again? well, one certainly hopes so but there are some who may drift toward le pen. >> it does seem to be a bit like what we saw in the last election where we had many people on the left, progressives, who were offended by parts of joe biden's history in domestic politics but there's no way they wanted trump. is this what we should probably expect to happen with that 22%, along with the greens and the socialists and the communists, that most likely macron gets his 50 plus 1%? >> yeah, most likely. but between that and the reality there are two weeks and they will be very tense weeks. most polls are showing 52%, macron, 48% le pen. that is really within the margin of error. as you said, the far right and the far left do meet. most of marine le pen's support is from working class france. so it is not a done deal by any means. macron did a little better in the end than some of the polls were showing in the first round. he had a very lack lusted, distracted campaign. he seemed to be on the phone to vladimir putin every other day, and in the end his seeming remoteness got to the french. you know, they like attention to be paid to them, especially when the election comes around every five years. can you explain to americans the importance, the significance of the center right and the center left completely collapsing in france as you explained this morning in your times piece? explain why it happened, and where did the center right and center left go? why did voters flee? >> it is hugely significant. it wouldn't be too much to say roughly equivalent to the republican party and the republicans vanishing overnight. five years ago a socialist president was in power. now we have the socialist at 2% and we have the center right republicans at under 5%. that was the party of the person who was president until 2012. this is a huge sea change. now, why? i think these parties just really had nothing more to say to the french at a time when issues like security, immigration, growing inequality and technology had created, as we've seen in other western societies, a lot of unease, disaffection, uncertainty about your future, a feeling of being alienated. that kind of anger did not -- does no longer find expression in these centrist parties, especially when you have a guy like macron who has been very agile and very adept at trying to occupy the whole center from the center right to the center left. he said during the campaign to move forward you have to walk, and to walk you need a right leg and a left leg. it is a clever phrase. it is the kind of clever, clever phrase that tends to annoy a lot of his opponents, but, anyway, he has been very adaptive. all of that created this implosion. >> jonathan lemire, what's the white house perspective? they must be watching this. >> watching with great concern. if le pen were to win, that would, first of all, change europe as we know it and the european union could collapse. it could be frexit at brexit. it could change the dynamics of nato. le pen has been a supporter of putin up until the eve of this war and they macron wins but does so narrowly the message it could send to the rest of europe and other leaders that could be facing their own populous challengers, what could it mean for them particularly if they stick with the west over moscow? >> that's what vladimir putin homes, that over time fissures will emerge in the west. i want to come back to something in the piece in "the new york times." the last time the french presidential election macron won overwhelmingly, in the final round roughly one third to two thirds. now we are talking about him winning with a couple of a percent. this shows to me almost a transformation of french political life. this to me is a really powerful anti-establishment vote, immigration, class issues and so forth. can you say a little bit about it? that was the most interesting statistic in your piece, roger. >> yes, richard, you are absolutely right. there had been a barrier of the extreme right against le pen. as you know, france had a terrible experience of extreme right governors during world war ii. the defense of the republic demanded that extreme right be kept out of power. now this has faded over the past five years, this sentiment. it is partly that liberal politics have become somehow more standard, more acceptable and more part of the mainstream. we had donald trump in the united states. marine le pen was very quick to congratulate viktor orban in hungary on his fourth consecutive victory recently. there was a makeover of le pen, a milque toast makeover, she smiled a lot, talked about personal issues, she was different in appearance. but she wants to make it illegal to wear a head scarf in public, that kind of thing, so her basic politics have not changed. but it has become somehow more acceptable and that's why we're seeing a likely margin that is so much smaller in the second round than it was five years ago. >> roger cohen, thank you so much for joining us this morning. we appreciate it. coming up, is a criminal referral in the works for former president trump? what a leading lawmaker on the select committee is saying about that. also ahead in our continuing coverage of the war in ukraine, clint watts is at the big board, breaking down the map, the new attacks in eastern ukraine and the new white house coronavirus response coordinator joins us amid rising case numbers in many parts of the country. we will be right back. vo: as vladmir putin wages war, oil companies are making billions by price gouging us at the pump... and republicans are helping them do it. they took millions from big oil, and blocked a clean energy plan that will lower costs for families. they're leaving us dependent on oil and at the mercy of foreign dictators congressional republicans: in the pockets of big oil, against american-made clean energy. it all means higher profits for oil companies, and higher gas prices for us. where do you find the perfect project manager? well, we found him in adelaide between his daily lunch delivery and an 8:15 meeting with his client in san francisco. ...but you can find him, and millions of other talented pros, right now on upwork. here we go... remember, mom's a kayak denier, so please don't bring it up. bring what up, kayak? 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"the times" reported a lawyer for trump jr confirmed to the times that the text message was sent, but suggested it was someone else's idea that donald trump jr was passing along. it is always someone else, joe. it is never, ever a trump. >> well, either way it is damning. >> right. >> if it is from the son, it is damning. >> yeah. >> if he is passing it along from a staff member, it seems to me, richard haass, that is even more damning. you have white house staff saying we own the legislatures in wisconsin, in michigan, in pennsylvania, in georgia, in arizona and all of these states, so it doesn't matter whether we have the most votes or not. we can figure out a way to rig the system to win. what is most remarkable about this and what shows their intent from the very beginning is these text messages were being sent around while the votes were still being counted. they knew they were going to lose. they knew they were going to act illegally. they knew they were going to try to subvert the constitution. they knew they were going to try to get the legislatures to ignore the will of the people and not allow a peaceful transfer of power. this is extraordinarily damning. i know people get tired of hearing this stuff, but this is extraordinarily damning that the mindset for donald trump's staff, if we are taking junior's attorney's word for it, is we're not going to win the election so let's rig it. >> let's find a way to stay in power. this is more than two months before january 6th. if you were ever looking for intent, if you were ever basically looking for people saying no matter what the results are we are going to figure out a way to game or rig the system to essentially disenfranchise the american people and bring about the outcome we want, this is, you know, pretty good -- again, i'm not a lawyer but whether it passes muster in the court of law, in the court of public opinion this tells you what you need to know. >> yeah. >> let's also recall even before the text messages were sent rudy giuliani, the president's personal attorney, was talking on election night that donald trump should come out and declare victory while votes were being cast, come out and say, we won, and let the chips fall where they may. >> joining us, msnbc legal analyst joyce vance. your thoughts on these texts? >> i think joe just gave a pretty good closing argument for a criminal jury to hear in this case. these texts provide some of the pieces that we've been talking about over time. you have heard many of the legal analysts say one of the most difficult challenges the justice department would face if it wanted to bring a prosecution is improving intent, proving that donald trump really knew that he lost the election and that the big lie was just that, an effort to steal the election. so having this text from trump jr that while the votes are still being counted acknowledges the loss and then lays out a strategy, it is not just deeply offensive to the american people, and i worry that sometimes we get lost in all of the back and forth on this and don't take that moment to be offended that a sitting president thought it was legitimate to bypass the will of the american people and steal the election for his own, but this provides that key element of proof the government would need to go forward with a prosecution, that they knew they had lost the election, that they continued to engage in efforts to take it from joe biden nonetheless. >> joyce, i'm going to kind of put you on the spot here. joe just actually summed up the situation perfectly on a national basis here. people are tired of hearing about all of this. that's understandable. from your perspective as a former u.s. attorney, looking at what has happened in the manhattan district attorney's office investigation of donald trump, from the january 6th assemblage of evidence against donald trump and from other investigations that are ongoing as well as all of the anecdotal evidence we have, would you indict him? >> the question of whether to indict has to be an evidence-specific case and there are a lot of moving pieces. i have sympathy for what doj prosecutors are looking at. there are issues as varied as a first amendment defense. for instance, whether or not the speech that was used on the ee elipsis is protected by the constitution. prosecutors have to parse. the court of opinion, as you point out, is something entirely different. there's a lot fatigue in the court of public opinion, but that's not how prosecutions work. if doj decides that the law and the evidence merits prosecution, then a jury will be assembled in the united states district court in the district of columbia. that jury will hear evidence, not this entire enormous mess that really i think has created fatigue in the public, but they will hear very specific evidence on each of the elements of crimes that are charged, and they will make a decision about whether anyone charged with those crimes is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. something we've seen over and over in these cases, i remember the prosecution of paul manafort, is that citizens serving as jurors can set aside their preconceptions and biases and hear the evidence and reach the ruling. it is a very different enterprise from the court of public opinion. >> joyce, back to this just being offense itch, perhaps even more offensive now as we look through the lens of history. we watch ukraine's struggle for survival with a leader that donald trump tried to shake down. i mean it is -- the offense factor is way up. joyce vance, thank you so much for joining us this morning. still ahead, we return to our coverage of the war in ukraine after an incredible visual show of solidarity with the ukrainian people. british prime minister boris johnson joined volodymyr zelenskyy in kyiv on the streets of kyiv after russia's failure to capture the capital city. former world champion and boxer of the kyiv defense, wladimir klitschko is our guest. plus clint watts joins us at the big board to break down russian troop movements. we are back in just two minutes. shopping on public wifi is sketchy. but with aura digital security, my devices are protected in like 3 minutes. protect your wifi, credit, passwords and more. try for free at aura.com i should buy this... oooh socks! i recommend nature made vitamins, because i trust their quality. they were the first to be verified by usp, an independent organization that sets strict quality and purity standards. nature made. the #1 pharmacist recommended vitamin and supplement brand. ♪♪ it is exactly the top of the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." it is monday, april 11th. richard haass, jonathan lemire and mike barnicle are still with us. joining the conversation, u.s. special correspondent for bbc news katty kay joining us. we begin with the surprise visit with british prime minister boris johnson that he made to kyiv over the weekend. it was a remarkable and very symbolic show of unity with ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy. the two leaders walked side by side through ukraine's capital on saturday, which just a few weeks ago was under threat from russian forces. stopping to talk with citizens on the street, johnson's visit came one day after he announced britain would provide an additional $130 million worth of weapons to ukraine. >> boris, have a great leader. such a good leader. [ speaking language other than english ]. >> he said thank you. >> boris. >> how are you? >> yah, yah. [ speaking language other than english ] >> well, it is nice to meet you. it has been our privilege to help. you have a remarkable president, mr. zelenskyy, who has done an outstanding job. we simply wish to keep supporting the people of ukraine for as long as it takes. thank you. thank you. >> i'm from london. >> i know. i'm from kharkiv. so sorry. >> thank you. thank you very much. it is for wine or water? the two cockerills. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thank you. over the last few hours i've been able to see quite a lot of your beautiful country, and it is an amazing country. i have also seen the tragic effects of the war, an inexcusable war, an absolutely inexcusable and unnecessary war. i think the ukrainians have shown the courage of a lion, but, you, volodymyr, have given the roar of that lyon. >> translator: i'm very grateful, boris, for this visit. it is very important at this very difficult and terrible times for our country. at the same time you came here and we are especially grateful for this to happen. this is a true reflection of the decisive and significant support to ukraine from united kingdom. >> katty kay, the symbolism of a british prime minister touring the streets of a city turned into a war zone, under attack from a foreign tyrant, unmistakable but especially when the british prime minister is boris johnson, who, of course, wrote one of the more fascinating biographies recently of winston churchill. this was quite a moment this past weekend, wasn't it? >> yeah, i think it is these pictures, you're right, joe, to point to, the ones where they're outside walking around as if the city looks normal. yes, they've got a lot of body guards around them. he's with the president of ukraine, of course he has. but a week ago, two weeks ago these scenes would have been impossible. it would not have been possible for a foreign leader to arrive in ukraine and be out in public walking the streets, chatting to locals like he did, translated, by the way, by the president of ukraine who just happens to slip in there as the translator. but i think it is as much as anything why this was powerful. yes, he promised anti-ship missiles, 120 armored vehicles, 800 anti-tank missiles, all of those important. but as much as anything it is the fact that he went and that the two leaders could be seen in public, which was sort of symbolic of how the ukrainians have managed to protect and liberate their capital city and its surroundings that boris johnson could be there. >> yeah. it really is, mika, pretty incredible, again. not only do you have boris johnson going, but you also had, of course, the head of the eu going. extraordinarily significant that she went and said, here is your application, and instead of taking years to become a member of the eu we hope it will just take weeks. that is, again, as we explained last hour, that's hugely significant because that's what this war is about actually, that vladimir putin had feared for a decade that ukraine would move in a westward direction, in a democratic direction, in a capitalist direction, in a free direction. that's exactly what is happening and that's the guarantee that the eu gave in kyiv. again, remarkable. couldn't have happened two weeks ago. that's the assurances that zelenskyy got this past weekend. >> well, and also with all of the limitations that you could talk about with nato not wanting to make this worse, this is especially i think stinging for vladimir putin. it is mocking him. it is telling him he didn't get it. you didn't get what you want. you didn't get kyiv. in fact, we are walking the streets of kyiv because you failed. as you said, joe, the president and the vice president of the eu's executive branch met with president zelenskyy in the country's capital on friday. from there the group made the trip to the kyiv suburb of bucha, the site of the horrific massacre of innocent civilians. and after seeing the devastation, the european commission president provided an update on ukraine's application to join the group. >> in this envelope, dear flod volodymyr, there is an important step toward eu membership. the questionnaire that is in here is the basis for our discussion in the coming weeks. it is where your path toward europe and the european union begin goes. these are questions that then form the opinion of the european union as a recommendation to the council. it will be not as usual a matters of years to form this opinion but i think a matter of weeks. >> okay. to explain what mika was explaining, nato membership is a defensive organization despite the paranoia of vladimir putin. the eu, that's a question of whether you will be a country that leans towards russia and has a more totalitarian type regime now, of course, especially after the last month, or whether you are leaning towards europe, whether you are free, whether you are democratic. actually, eu membership for the whole of the country even more significant than nato membership, even though we talk about nato a lot because it is a defensive alliance and we are in a war. speaking of war let's go to the big board. you saw clint there. we wanted to give you a tease of clint there to stay with us through my rambling. so, clint, i just -- you know, i look at the maps and i have been watching you at the map since the war began. it is just fascinating to see the blue in kyiv and to the north. we saw what happened this weekend, in part because of what the map is looking like. let's talk about where the war is as we start the new week, what we expect from the russians and how the ukrainians are, i suspect, going to once again respond in a way that frustrates vladimir putin. >> yeah, joe. really three big updates but i think some interesting things to look at is even here in the north, i will start off on kyiv. this is where you saw the russian withdrawal. you now see european leaders showing up but you have pockets where the ukrainians actually cut off the russians from russia. it is pretty remarkable to think the degree to which the russians abandoned their own soldiers, even left their own dead behind. coming from the u.s. military, you never leave a fallen ranger. this is incredible to watch because it plays on morale and begs the question what we will see in the east. today in the east we are seeing reports of the russian military buildup. there are satellite photos that show another convoy essentially moving in about eight miles along. this would be the buildup that's going to play into the axis heading towards izyum. secondly, the russians have come up to kharkiv and have been unable to essentially control it and tried to build out this pocket. they will have a couple of axis that will go down towards izyum. the battle is shifting entirely to the east. you are seeing a big plus-up in terms of military force. what the russians are trying to do is bring in forces from luhansk, the separatist region the russians essentially controlled and their separatist fighters. the problem for them is about morale. not only have they lost tons of soldiers, the soldiers they're redeploying from the northern sector pushing into belgrade are not motivated to fight. you are seeing things for offering incentives whatever you destroy you get a certain plus-up in salary or a bonus to return to the fight. if you have to beg people to return to the fight with money you are in a desperate situation if you are the russian military. separately from that looking at the big picture, down here in the south or toward the east and the south what you will see the russians try to do is essentially bisect these portions in the donbas region. they would like to take the donbas region because it would give them something they can claim to be an achievement. vladimir putin has said his original motivation for going in here was to retake donbas. if he doesn't have that, he doesn't even have a bargaining chip through which he can negotiate. secondly and more importantly in the south is where i want to shift to, the ukrainian military putting up an intense fight here. this is where the russians went in weeks two, three and four, advancing to here and were blocked. you are seeing the ukrainian military pushing back towards kherson, and if they can take that back this would be devastating to the russians. they couldn't even make the southern advance. this is where they did welcoming out of crimea, you see them shifting all forces back. the question is what places in the east can the ukrainians continue to hold and it is a race of combat power and will to fight on the russian and ukrainian site here in the east. >> clint, thus far there's been a successful defense of kyiv by the ukrainians, and this new front in the east, is there a significant difference in topography in the two areas, the area around kyiv, largely urban, and where they are now where the russians intend to try to force their way towards odesa? >> definitely a different fight. when you look at what is going on in the east, you are talking about a lot of smaller towns essentially sprinkled throughout the east connected by roads that essentially run from izyum and this corridor here down through the donbas. so this is larger open area, fields better for armored forces like the russians. the russian plan in kyiv was dumb in the sense they were taking massive armored columns of formations in with limited light infantry to try to take an urban environment. difficult to do. out in the open the russian military can do better but you are seeing them bypass these cities. they still have to clear the cities. this brings up two questions, will they reinforce the infan try to try to take it or will we see massive fire power. or, three, will they do something more devastating if they get into trouble like use chemical weapons to clear urban areas. >> you effectively stated how the war can look on the ground. give us a sense how the fight can be taken in the skies and by sea. will the russians have any more success controlling, maintaining, say, air superiority in that part of the country than anything else? >> the one thing the russians have going for them in the east is the border is so close in will many locations that russian aircraft don't have to cross a russian border into ukraine to fire. they've really struggle ltd. their precision munitions, they expended a ton of them, even in tons of aircraft, in terms of flight. what they send out they're firing from long distance which means they can't use dumb munitions effectively. much of the artillery, usually long- range missiles, they're being shot from inside russia or just inside ukraine. so they have masses of fires they could lever here they could never get to in kyiv. in kyiv they tried to build the convoy all the way up to plant artillery so they could hit more directly inside the urban center. they never got there in kyiv. here they will have more capability to do it, and i would suspect and you hear reports from ukrainian civilians saying they're hearing explosions much closer each day. i think you will see a buildup of the military power over the next two weeks. >> thank you so much. now one of china's largest tech companies is reportedly suspending operations in russia. this is a big story. a chinese tech blog reports huawei is preparing to close its office in moscow. huawei is t evaluating western sanctions on russia amid the threat it could face secondary sanctions from western allies. joe, this is an important move. >> well, it does seem on the face of it to be quite significant. richard haass, when this news broke over the weekend an analyst said this is one more example of how things in china as it relates to russia just are not black and white. it is not an either/or decision for them. the chinese continue to try to straddle the line, not getting too close to vladimir putin with this attack while not turning their back on him as well. how significant is this move if it happens? >> if it turns out to be true it is significant. huawei would not do this, there's zero chance it would do it freelancing. this is something that would be 100% coordinated with the chinese government and, as you say, it is a move to avoid secondary sanctions. it is a continuing juggling act on the part of the chinese that they made strategically something of a mistake throwing in their lot so unconditionally with the russians. ever since they've been tactically pulling back. it shows china is in a sense in a difficult period with covid lockdown, president xi has his eye on his coronation in fall. it is a tight rope back for the chinese. they cannot be happy. on the short list of people unhappy with 2022 you would have to put xi jinping. this is not the way he wanted the year to play out. >> no, it has been a miserable year, a miserable year for china, a miserable year for xi. of course, most of his problems are self-inflicted, whether you look at his zero tolerance approach to coughed. whether you look at him trying to straddle the fence when it comes to a tie ran cal march through ukraine. one bad decision after another put china in a terrible position, with the economy growing at a slower rate than quite sometime, mika, not good news at all. again, you have china, they're going to have to make a decision. >> yeah. >> are they with the russians -- is this how their future looks or are they with the west? economically that's really not a difficult question to answer. >> they might be making it a -- >> one other bad piece of news for the chinese, pakistan. pakistan is one of china's closest allies in the world, obviously used against rival india. the fact that the government collapsed, the fact there's not political stability there. china made a massive investment, the belt and road project, one of the biggest recipients is pakistan. it shows how chinese foreign policy is on a roll here. >> we will be watching this one. >> i want to ask richard a quick question about that. we've been told all these years that the pakistanis have problems with the united states because we tilted our foreign policy towards india, yet india is in vladimir putin's pocket. what do we do? how do we use leverage one against the other? if india is not going to be with us you don't just sit there and let india choose which direction they want to go. they're either on our side or they're not on our side here, and perhaps we need to start being friendlier to pakistan. >> oh, my god. >> a couple -- >> okay. >> first of all, india has a long tradition of, quote, unquote, strategic non-alignment. they will work with us selectively against china. they will not work with us against russia since most of their arms come from russia. it is just a frustrating, imperfect relationship. by the way, it is symbolic of the world sitting on is sidelines, they don't want to side with us or russia. pakistan, we have a history of frustrating each other. >> terrible. >> it is a country with 150, 200 nuclear weapons. it was once described not as a country with an army but an army with a country. this is just part of the world to be worried about. these countries have been at war with one another periodically since they were born 60, 70 years ago. it is just another -- it is another example that this world -- you notice, here we are 30 years after the cold war. things are just not stabilizing. there's more and more disarray. i know our focus is on ukraine for good reason. it is a reminder how many other problems there are out there. >> in a timely phone call president biden is set to speak with prime minister modi of india today. >> exactly. we will come back to this loaded conversation. i need to get to this right now. three more people tested positive for covid-19 after the gridiron club dinner in washington more than a week ago. administration officials, reporters and members of congress are now among the 72 people to test positive for covid. new york city mayor eric adams has also tested positive. his office says he woke up yesterday with a raspy voice. he is not showing any other symptoms. he cancelled all public events for the remainder of the week. adams will take antiviral medication and work remotely while isolating. joining us now white house coronavirus response coordinator dr. ashish jha. good to see you in this capacity, doctor. tell us about, because we have 72 cases, that probably means there are more. what do we know about this covid variant and are we seeing as many overall deaths from this latest round everywhere we are seeing it. >> yeah, good morning, mika. thanks for having me back. what we know about this variant, ba.2, it is incredibly contagious, even more contagious than the original subvariant of omicron and it, you know, causes a substantial spike of cases in europe. it is causing a little bump in cases here in the united states. we are still at extremely low levels. the good news is that the thing we care most about, people getting really sick, hospitalizations, deaths, they remain low. we have fewer people in the hospital right now than at any point in the pandemic. that's obviously good news. we will want to watch that closely. this variant, if you are vaccinated and boosted you still have a high degree of protection against this variant. >> katty ska. >> dr. jha, this is katty kay. i am hearing around me anecdotally more people are getting covid, i've got my mask out again, but people are not going to hospital. should we now treat it as a common cold and not worry about it? >> there are a couple of things. first of all, there are still a lot of americans not yet vaccinated or boosted. when they get it the consequences are quite substantial, so we want to continue working on trying to get them vaccinated and protected. that's number one. number two, we should not let the infection run while, we should absolutely continue to watch it carefully and keep it under control. at the same time we don't have to let it dictate our lives anymore. if you are vaccinated and boosted you are quite protected. we have a wide therapy for people at risk, so even if you have a breakthrough infection you can get treatments. that means the virus should not control our lives anymore and at this point we should continue to focus on protecting those not yet protected. >> doctor, i think by now most americans realize that the virus is going to do what the virus wants to do. so how do you control the virus and convince the public we're almost in the clear in terms of dealing with the virus if you have huge numbers of people in this country who are unvaccinated, who don't believe in the credibility of the vaccine, who refuse to wear a mask because it has become so politicized, how do you deal with the human dilemma? >> that's a really good question. it has been one of the challenges in this pandemic. one of the things that caught a lot of us in public health off guard, we assumed -- i assumed a couple of years ago if you got these incredible life saving vaccines, we had incredible health measures, that people would follow them in the pandemic. that has been true for many americans but not everyone. we have to continue to share the message, get doctors, other health people that people trust, religious leaders to share the truth and get people protected. we have to continue plugging away at that. >> jonathan lemire, good to see you again. i hope you can provide advice for people watching at home how they should go about their days. we are seeing cases tick up particularly in new york and d.c. quite a bit. can large indoor environments like the gridiron be attended? if there's rapid tests at home, they're slow to pick up the variant. that people might present symptoms for a couple of days before registering a positive. if you have the sniffles should you assume you have a pcr and clear it? >> a bunch of good questions. first of all, rapid tests at home but you are right that the first day of symptoms a lot of people turn out negative. if you have been exposed and now you have symptoms you should continue to have testing and i think in the first day or two to assume you may well have it. that means don't go out into crowds and spend time with other people until you have the test. that rapid antigen test does work, it just takes a couple of days to make it available. second, the treatment was in short supply a couple of months ago but it is more so now. we need to make it widely available and easy for people to get treatment. we have plenty right now. we need money from congress to continue to get enough for the american people, but i think it is making progress. in terms of how to behave i turn to the cdc guidance on this. the cdc came out with a new framework a couple of months ago. i was enormously supportive of it before i came into this role. it looks at what is happening in hospitals, at infection numbers. that's what i follow and recommend that people follow. >> white house covid response coordinator, dr. ashish jha. we appreciate seeing you. still ahead on "morning joe," new polling shows it is all about the economy for this year's mid terms. also ahead, white house domestic policy advisor susan rice talks about the biden administration's new plans to fight gun violence. you are watching "morning joe." we will be right back. we will be right back. where do you find the perfect developer? well, we found her in prague between the ideal cup of coffee and a truly impressive synthesizer collection. ...but you can find her right now on upwork. better. when the world is your workforce finding the perfect developer, designer, marketer, or whomever you may need, tends to fall right into place. find top-rated talent who can start today on upwork. to make my vision a reality my varilux progressive lenses provide seamlessly transition from near to far. with every detail in sharp focus. that's seeing no limits. 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oscars. because, trust me, nothing will make you question your choices in life more than hosting an awards show. >> pretty funny "snl". he really screwed it up, just had his big break and then just bombed. we're going to give him another chance. richard haass, you have 20 seconds. don't screw it up. the masters. break it down for us. golf correspondent. >> scottie scheffler, number one golfer in the country. unbelievable. every aspect of the game, driving, irons, chipping as good as it gets, putting unbelievably consistent. 25 years old. it just really is special. >> what about tiger? >> the fact that he played, competed, finished. at the end he could barely walk, mika. it was a moral victory. it was an impressive thing. he was playing golf on one leg, upper body. it was not a normal thing. rory mcilroy, came in second. really played the best -- 64 yesterday, also a fantastic round? look at tiger woods, we showed the clip of him walking up i think the 18th fairway which is almost 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( ( your leaving makes it more likely the republicans are taking over. it is hard. >> it is hard. i have been vocal about what i think we should do to win in 2022. allow members to represent the districts that they have. i don't want to hand this country over to a party that has become more of a cultive personality and is focused on dismantling democracy. i also don't want to hand my party over to the faction that is trying to dismantle capitalism. >> democratic congresswoman stephanie murphy of florida speaking on a new episode of show time's "the circus" with jen palmeri about the issues plaguing her party ahead of the midterm elections and why she decided not to seek reelection. she is concerned the far left of the party is opening them up to be branded socialists. there's also the issue of crime. some cities controlled by democrats have das who won't prosecute certain offenses. there's an assault on free speech from the left that's hurting the party, and the party is chasing after the gop's own legislation rather than focusing on their own story of accomplishments. it is still about the economy. new polling shows rising prices as most important for voters across the political spectrum and democrats are the ones who control washington, d.c. here to discuss it all former mayor of new york city bill de blasio joins us. the host of msnbc's "politics nation," president of the national action network, reverend al sharpton. creator and co-host of "the circus" on show time, mark mckinnon. good to see you. it has been year. >> it has been years, prefecture covid. >> ceo of all in together, a women's partisan civic organization, lauren, you have polls. what did you find? >> prices, prices, prices, the economy, the economy, the economy. it trump every other issue and it trumps it not just for democrats, for republicans, for voters of color, by across the board it is not even close. by double digits it is the most important issue. >> you break it down between men and women, how well is the economy working for you. this is interesting. >> women, particularly the economy is not working well for them. 58% of women say that the economy is personally not working well for them, that they are worried about the impact of prices on their ability to support their families, to pay for basic necessities. what is really interesting about the polls is that voters are pretty evenly split about who they blame, republicans and democrats do you blame equally, joe biden and the democrats and donald trump, but it begs the question, you know, how are we going to -- how are democrats going to address this going into the incredibly tight midterm. the tendency is to blame the party in power. >> why i bring up women and the big number not happy, reverend al, because who ends up saving the democrats? who ends up saving the country if you believe trump was a threat, but women, right? >> absolutely right. any data shows that in the voting. >> saw it in virginia, won virginia. >> in georgia, everywhere. i think it is very concerning. i did not see the poll until she came out with it, but i get it every day on my talk radio show and the national action network chapters. we just had our convention, thousands there. they are totally demoralized around the country. you have to turn people on to turn people out. >> wow. >> and they're not turned on. i think that that -- that the left and the right are misreading the people. people on the left underestimate how people are reacting to crime, public safety. people that are moderate in the party are underestimating criminal justice reform, people they feel are incarcerated unfairly or police that are out of bounds, and they're not talking toward what people want to hear. >> right, right, right. >> answering the phone when it is ringing, they call you crazy. >> barack obama and mark mckinnon said tell the story, and there is a story to tell, but even joe biden at this moment, some would argue of great leadership on the world stage, not resonating in the polls. >> well, it is tough when you have inflation and everything -- you have these great jobs reports and the problem is that, you know, most people have a job that want a job. that's part of the story the democrats need to tell. you have to say the reason we have inflation is we fought covid, jobs are up and that's one of the consequences of the good news. >> former new york city mayor bill de blasio has been watching this. i wonder what you think democrats should do moving forward? i will suggest a worry that i have. i think they're getting tweaked by republican legislation across the country that shouldn't be -- they're getting distracted, completely distracted. >> and one of the huge problems, mika, and i feel empathy for the president here because there are so many distractions. >> yeah. >> what you really need is message, the core message that breaks through and i will take us back to 2018 where the democrats did very well because the message was we're going to get you health care, across the board we will help people get the health care they need and make it affordable. we have the opportunity to do it again. the house just passed the insulin bill. there's an opportunity for a deal with manchin on prescription drug prices. there's a chance for president biden to say, i'm going to make your life easier, i'm going to lower the prices on the things families care about the most in many ways, which is health care. joe biden is a good messenger. >> he is. >> you can relate to him across the ideological spectrum. he actually has the ability to reach everyday working people, but what we're not hearing is the message. if i asked you around the table what is the democratic message half a year out from the election, i don't know what that message is. i think if we get to the clear, strong message there's an opportunity to turn it around. >> i feel if i spoke to five different democrats they would give me five different answers and here is a clip from "the circus." take a look. >> what is your outlook for the election and what do democrats have to do to overtum of come the challenges. >> when you look at a place like georgia, a place like florida where there's person of color to be at the top of the ticket, they have to reach that. when you see the approval rating running around 73% of the black vote, you have lost full stop. there's no path to victory. >> wow. >> i think we have to put donald trump back on the ballot. when you talk to voters this idea that if we don't vote it could lend to a shift in partisan power in congress, not motivating to them at all. later we asked what if i told you that if republicans win the house then donald trump will be president in 2024, every single hand went up. >> interesting. >> every single hand. >> that right there, we can't let it happen. >> interesting. >> more than that, for some of the voters it won't be enough to give them someone to vote against. we have to give them something to vote for. democrats have to not go out on a stump over the next six months and make promises about what they will do with the next two years. they have to demonstrate progress in what they have done with the last two years. >> mark mckinnon's conversation with a top polling strategist, i mean there's no path to victory. those are pretty clear words, and putting donald trump back on the ballot, that at any time work in virginia. i feel -- i feel concerned about that advice. >> well, he's very specific about this though. first of all in virginia you had a flawed democratic candidate. secondly, what he is saying is that it is not just trumpism. he is saying you have to explicitly say this is the gateway to donald trump being present again, right, rev? >> i think you are right. and i think that -- but take all of what he said. you have to put trump back out there, that it is his gateway to being president again, which you also have to say, and we have done these things and we will do these things. we talked about voter goes, we did not get the john lewis bill passed. we did not get the george floyd justice bill passed. what did we do? well, biden put more blacks on the federal courts than all presidents combined. nobody knows that. you have got to put your message out there. of, what we have done, why it makes a difference, what it means to you at home, not the washington beltway crowd, and the threat that trump will take us all the way back. it must be both. >> i want to bring joe back into the conversation because, joe, as i said before, i feel like if i ask five different top dems what the message is i will get five different stories. what should the democratic message be? >> well, it is not all things to all people, and especially this year. i think democrats may do better than expected in the senate races because of how badly trump's candidates are. but, you know, if bill de blasio was running in parts of new york city it is going to look a lot different than in virginia. rev, i want to talk to you about a real blind spot a lot of democrats in the beltway, in d.c. have that you don't and you have been warning about, but let's say it right here. let me say it slowly for my democratic friends in washington, d.c. black voters are more conservative than you are, white woke leaders in washington, d.c. hispanic voters are more conservative than you are, white woke leaders in washington, d.c. asian-american voters are more conservative than you are, white woke voters in washington, d.c., and they're more conservative on crime, they're more conservative on education, they're more conservative on, quote, these woke issues. get off of twitter! i'm telling you. rev, if you look at biden, biden runs against 15 progressives, biden is the only moderate, biden wins. we said it time and time again. eric adams runs as a conservative. he wins brooklyn, he wins the bronx, he win staten island, he wins queens as a conservative, as a centrist democrat. can you please -- i know you have done it a lot. >> no. >> can you explain to white woke leaders? can you explain to them they're not only losing white dudes in the upper midwest, they're losing people of color. >> they're losing people of color because they really don't get the people of color's life. if you are living in a city, in a neighbor that is inundated with crime and you act like that's not an issue you have already lost me. that is an issue. yes, we must deal with policing. i have been out in front of that. but you cannot ignore when 12-year-old kids who is somebody's niece and neighbor is kill and you act like it is a nonissue because you are too elitist to live on the ground. we don't want to be manipulated by right-wing elitist billionaires or by left-wing guys that don't understand our life on the ground, that is living in fear of crime, that is living as a result of inflation that is culling us. in many parts of the country we need gas to go to work. these beltway leaders that these limousine liberals here in new york don't live in the real world and blacks have to and we have to deal with it every day and we don't sit in crowded subways reading right-wing propaganda. >> it gets back to we have to reach people at the kitchen table, right. this is where the left and right of the democratic party can come together. if we are talking about health care, if we are talking about changing peoples lives for the way, if we're talking about taxing the wealthy and this is something that's important to see across the idelaunlical spectrum, people are moved by that because they want to think there's some fairness because working people are carrying such a burden. democrats have a lot of messages that can reach everyday people across the color spectrum, but we have to have that core energetic message that we expect to win. >> exactly right. exactly right. and two things as we always say on this show. we're growing, we're growing every day, aren't we? mark mckinnon, two things can be true at once. i can talk about how democrats need to be tough on crime. i can talk about how democrats need to be a little less woke. i can talk about at the same time taxing billionaires, taxing multinational corporations, getting rid of the trump tax cuts, making sure that the tax code is fair, making sure that the richest 1% don't keep moving forward, you know, paying zero in taxes, whether you're amazon, whether you're nike, whether you're occidental petroleum. we can do two things at once, whether we're republicans or democrats. the democratic party can be fair. they is seek economic justice. they can seek justice, racial justice, and at the same time, have that sort of hard edge that bobby kennedy had when he needed it. >> well, that's exactly right, joe. when we're losing people like stephanie murphy, that's a wake-up call for the party. the fact is that you can be both things. and democrats have powerful messages on the progressive side and on the conservative side, and the problem is that the democratic party for too long is saying you have to be either/or. when democrats are successful, they're a big tent. that's the message that should be going forward. not forcing out people like stephanie murphy. she was a rock star in the democratic party. the fact she's leaving says all you need to know. >> katty kay. >> so this discussion is so interesting and i have to say i'm having kind of flashbacks to the last weekend in the election in france where we had exactly this. and there was one candidate who took on the kitchen table issues and took on specifically what lawrence found, and that's rising prices. that was marine le pen. she surged in the polls because of it. the risk for democrats here is if they ignore this. inflation is really tough for politicians. and you have to find some way to tackle inflation or at least take ownership of it as an issue or you risk somebody on your right coming up behind you, a populist on your right, we know what it looks like in this country, and sweeping the board. >> so important what you're saying because what happened to democrats happened to labor in britain, happened to the left in france. it happened to the social democrats in germany. this is a pattern in the entire western world. the parties that used to be the true voices of working people lost their way, got into messages that were really more appealing to elites and folks who were economically privileged. we have to get back to the kitchen table. i used to talk about a very simple concept. working people first. i think this is what democrats can and must do. again, i think joe biden is a great messenger for this, but talk about making sure the wealthy pay their fair share in taxes. talk about getting the cost of health care down. making it easier for people to make ends meet. and show that we can do something that actually reaches people's lives as rev just talked about, that we're living with them in their lives making a change. it can be done. but you only do it with a clear sharp message, and i think one of the things that's afflicting democrats right now is thinking if you speak to one issue one day, oe isue on monday, one on tuesday, that's message. that's not message. we're going to lower your health care costs. say it 100 times between now and the election and that can register with people. >> lauren, how does this conversation reflect in your poll. >> with respect to the mayor, i think this is way beyond messaging. and health care maybe was the primary issue six months ago. it's not right now. i's prices on food and gas, for every voter across every group. it's not about the democrats in mew view talking about the economic. it's about fishing the fundamental underlying issue. yes, there's low unemployment, but what voters are saying, it's wonderful i'm making $15 an hour, but steak is $9. the unemployment of america, yes, an amazing success story for democrats, but if they can't buy groceries, it's a problem. it's more than just messaging. it's more than whether democrats have a slogan. it's what are we going to do to intervene to lower prices. >> sometimes it's a problem problem. >> it's a problem problem. >> exactly. >> so you're dealing with the problem. let's remember all of this happened while the democrats were in power. ia told us to put you in power. we put you in power. now i can't afford the life i'm living. you have got to tell me how you're going to deal with that because i put you in power there to understand me, not to preach to me. >> joe, it's a big challenge. >> it's a huge challenge, and it is -- and i do agree with lauren. it's right now, it's inflation, inflation, inflation. crime is right behind there. the southern border, something the democrats never talk about. southern border is in there for a lot of swing voters. in the 25, 30 house districts that are going to determine whether nancy pelosi is the next speaker or whether it's kevin mccarthy. and so you may be offended by people who talk about the southern border. be offended all you want, turn the house over to kevin mccarthy. they need to -- you know, as we always say, you gotta put the wheat down or put the hay down where the goats can eat it. make your message. make your message applicable to people in those swing districts because that determines who the next speaker is. and former mayor bill de blasio, thank you so much for being with us. i have to say this again. when we talk about crime, it's important to remember, pre-covid, new york city's crime rates were so low they had to go back to the 1950s and estimate when it was safer to living in new york city. mark mckinnon, always great to see you. reverend al sharpton, you moved from your latte liberals back to limousine liberals. both of them work in new york city. and lauren, as always, thank you so much for being with us. a great, great information, thank you so much. mika. >> up next, we continue our war coverage with expert analysis from former u.s. ambassador to russia, michael mcfaul. plus former heavyweight boxing champ turned soldier vladimir klitschko joins us live from kyiv. we look at what's next for the select committee investigating the capitol attack amid a new report the panel is divided on a criminal referral for former president trump. we'll be right back. ♪ ♪ do your eyes bother you? because after all these emails, my eyes feel like a combo of stressed, dry and sandpaper. strypaper? why do we all put up with this? when there's biotrue hydration boost eye drops. biotrue uses naturally inspired ingredients like an electrolyte, antioxidant, even your tears' own moisturizer. and no preservatives. these ingredients are true to your eyes' biology. see? bio.true. this is a hero, walking his youngest down the aisle, which to his bladder, feels like a mile. yet he stands strong, dry, keeping the leaks only to his eyes. depend. the only thing stronger than us, is you. when it 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[ speaking foreign language ] >> nice to meet you, and it's been our privilege to help. you have a remarkable president, mr. zelenskyy, who has done an outstanding job. and we simply wish to keep supporting the people of ukraine for as long as it takes. >> i'm from london. >> i'm from kharkiv. >> thank you very much. for wine? >> thank you very much. thank you. >> british prime minister boris johnson making a surprise appearance in kyiv over the weekend, for a show of unity with ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy. welcome back to "morning joe." it's monday, april 11th. jonathan lemire, mike barnicle, and katty kay are still with us, as we are two minutes past the top of the hour. we will begin with the overnight revelation from the president of ukraine, who now says tens of thousands of civilians have likely been killed in the city of mariupol. it comes as a russian military convoy has been mobilizing in the eastern part of the country, in a sign russia's focus appears to be shifting. nbc news correspondent molly hunter has the latest. >> this morning, president zelenskyy delivering a dire warning, saying in a video address that it's likely tens of thousands of people are dead in the besieged city of mariupol. overnight, saying ukraine is ready for the next phase of the war, but whether they can win, zelenskyy says, depends on u.s. support. warning russia is rapidly increasing its presence. satellite images show an eight-mile column, hundreds of russian military vehicles moving near kharkiv on friday. zelenskyy says ukraine needs bigger better help. >> translator: it all depends on how fast we will be helped by the united states. i have 100% confidence in our people and in our armed forces. but unfortunately, i don't have the confidence that we will be receiving everything we need. we ask president biden for very specific items. he has the list. >> over the weekend, british prime minister boris johnson pledging $130 million in military aid during his visit to kyiv. >> the two leaders walking around the capital sending a powerful message, the city many predicted would fall to russia is still firmly in ukrainian control. over the weekend, the airport in dnipro hit by russian missiles twice. and this morning, trains are still suspended. civilians forced to find other ways to get out of the east. the death toll from friday's attack now at least 57 people. >> it's extremely difficult to even think about sitting down with people who commit or excuse or find excuses for all these atrocities and war crimes. whatever i feel, if i have a chance to save a human life or a village, a town from destruction, i will take the chance. >> on 60 minutes, president zelenskyy asked about his expression in his photo from bucha. >> translator: it's anger. it's anger. because we don't understand the russians. you can't really understand this world. >> no, you can't. you really can't. let's bring in former u.s. ambassador to russia, now the director of the institute for international studies at stanford and nbc news international affairs analyst and a man unfortunately who does understand the russian mindset because he's seen it in chechnya up close, in aleppo, and he's seen far too much and understands it all too well. so let me just ask you this morning, mr. ambassador, we have so much going on right now. the remarkable images of boris johnson and zelenskyy walking through the streets of kyiv. could not have happened two weeks ago. russians retreating east. and then of course, the war crimes on a mass scale. in the east as well. where are we at the start of this week? >> well, those are the two big, and then the battle is coming. so i think the battle of kyiv will go down in history as one of the great military defeats of the russian army. it will go down in history books in ukraine as one of the great victories of the ukrainian army. let's remember, april 2022, that's the way it will be written in history books. that's the good news. that created the permissive conditions for that walk around the city of kyiv that you just showed. second, we will also remember these horrific, horrific genocidal terroristic killings in bucha, as you alluded to, in mariupol, as president zelenskyy alluded to. everybody i talk to in the ukrainian government says mike, bucha was bad. mariupol will make it look like something much, much worse if we ever see those photos, by the way, because mariupol is being attacked by the russians. they couldn't invade the city, so they had to destroy the city. and now third, and i think we'll be talking about this for the next several weeks. both sides are preparing for a major conventional battle to control donetsk. putin wants to connect crimea to donbas. ukrainian forces are moving there. i think it will be a major conventional battle. as president zelenskyy himself said, they're prepared for the fight. they don't know if they will win. >> well, it depends so much of that depends, as president zelenskyy says, on how much the west sends. we had admiral stavridis earlier agreeing with the rest of the panel that it's time to stop relying on old soviet systems. start sending american systems. start sending nato systems and training them up. i want to show you another clip. we're talking about history. i want to show you another clip and then have you explain the significance of this extraordinary moment. let's go. >> in this envelope, there is an important step towards eu membership. the questionnaire that is in here is the basis for our discussion in the coming weeks. it is where your path towards europe and the european union begins. these are questions that then form your opinion of the european union as a recommendation to the council. it will not be as usual a matter of years to form this opinion but i think a matter of weeks. >> you know, mr. ambassador, as you know full well from '45 to '89, it was berlin that sat on the razor's edge of cold war tensions between the u.s. and russia. from 2006, 2007 to right now, it's been ukraine. will they go east, will they go west? we talk about nato all the time, and i understand it's important. it's a defensive alliance, but talk about how significant that clip is. ukraine getting eu membership. >> well, first, everybody needs to remember that the revolution of dignity back in 2014 when president yanukovych fled and vladimir putin in response invaded, that's when he seized crimea, that's when he gave a lot of support to the separatists in donbas. that was sparked by ukrainians going on to the square, the main square, and saying after yanukovych refused to sign an agreement with the european union, people went out on the streets. i know the one who sparked it, and he said why are we moving away from europe. we have got to join europe. that's what that whole revolution was about, and that's one of the things vladimir putin was trying to stop. this is a historic moment. and i like the timeline, right? weeks and months rather than years and decades. and i think this will be, again, remembered as a historic moment when ukraine finally moves towards eventually joining the european union. >> so, ambassador, then there's nato. finland says that their government websites were hit by a cyberattack during the time that zelenskyy was speaking virtually to finnish lawmakers and russia is now threatening both countries, finland and sweden, with military and political consequences if they try and join the alliance. how is nato responding to these threats at this point? >> well, first of all, remember, vladimir putin, one of his great dreams was to divide nato. and he may be making some progress on that. i think we need to remember, before this war, you know, in hungary with victor orbon, le pen in france, he had these allies that he was building up, and of course, he had mr. trump here in the united states who is also very skeptical about nato, and he's washed away all that progress by invading ukraine. another one of his object frive and gone, and now he has finland and sweden talking about joining nato. i don't think these scare tactics will change the trajectory, and i think he has reunited nato. i think nato has nigh life in a way it hasn't had for ten or 15 years. >> ambassador, there was a very interesting piece in the financial times over the weekend about the weapons mismatch between some of the nato countries and ukraine and it pointed out ukraine's long range artillery, which is of the soviet style, takes ammunition which is 152 millimeters wide. most of nato's is 155 millimeters wide. they literally can't supply the ammunition to the long range artillery weapons that the ukrainians use. how do we -- given time is of the essence, how are we going to get over that kind of logistical hurdle in supplying the ukrainians with what they need for what clearly is going to be a big battle in the east of the country? >> well, it's a very important observation, of course. and that's why so far, up to this point, the nato alliance has been supplying all this soviet materiale. it's mostly soviet. you saw that s-300 roll in from slovakia. that's a soviet and russian weapon. that's not a nato weapon. that's not an american weapon. so there's two things i'd say here, it sounds like what you're talking with admiral stavridis. on the one hand, we have to get that soviet, post soviet material moving as fast as possible. the s-300 should have been there two weeks ago, not two days ago, and it has to be the heavy material they need for the war in donbas, including artillery, including tanks, and if zelenskyy had his way, including mig-29 aircraft as well. >> all right. joining us now, a member of the kyiv territorial defense. wladimir klitschko, a former professional boxer and his brother, vitali klitschko, is the mayor of kyiv. thank you very much for joining us. first of all, giving these very, very high profile visits to kyiv, is there a sense that kyiv is out of the woods? or is there a worry that there could be another russian assault? what are you hearing? >> the capital of ukraine, kyiv, has been more stabilized in the past days than the other regions of ukraine. and we could feel that russian forces were thrown off of their plan to surround the capital. and basically, the past two, three nights, war relatively quiet or quieter than it was before. we didn't hear any explosions, which was like normal life for the night. so it was not the case. life is coming back in the capital. and we can see that people are coming back to the city. >> mr. klitschko, here in america, we see the pictures of the devastation, the destruction, the slaughtering of ukrainian citizens by the russian army. but they're only pictures for people in america. could you give us a sense of what it was like, what it is like for the citizens of the area around kyiv to live under the threat of the missiles arriving at night or any time of the day, the terror it brins the destruction it brings, the tearing and destruction that lives inside people as a result of this. what has it been like? >> it's total opposite than what you guys living life. i have been in the u.s. living, working for many years. and partially the family members are in the u.s. so it's total difference. and ukraine was progressing. since 2014, ukraine was progressing towards the western democratic principles. and true democracy. so we were very creative with everything, what we have done, and we have built our country, but now it's all been destroyed. and it's continuing to be destroyed. infrastructure is getting destroyed. life is getting destroyed. this is genocide, and this word, genocide of ukrainian population, when you hear, when you see dead bodies and hear the stories, people before, they were getting killed with tied hands behind their back and executed with head shots. they have been tortured before, raped before. you have seen cases where children were observing their parents being shot and killed or parents seeing children getting executed. this is so unhuman and this senseless war eventually will come to an end. and every crime, and this is war crime, every crime behind every crime, there are people with names, and they must face justice. in international court, they must face justice. in this digital world, in this modern world, you cannot hide facts anymore. and there are plenty of evidence. not just the satellite cities, as bucha, just look what is happening in mariupol in the south. the city is getting completely destroyed. and civilians are getting killed. or just two days ago, russian forces knew exactly the people, refugees that were fleeing for the west at the train station, there were thousands of them gathering and waiting for their trains to get boarded on the trains. and the rocket, russian rocket lands right in the middle of it. taking life more than 50 people. children, women. and one more time, how can you call this war so to speak or so to speak special operation. this is genocide of ukrainian population. and that must be stopped. we definitely need help from our allies and partners of the free world. we need to receive it now. i understand the humanitarian side is important, and to get humanitarian help, but we need weapons now, to defend ourselves, because those rockets landing and coming from above, if you cannot close the sky, we're going to close it on our own. we don't need any other army on our soil. we're going to take care of ourselves. we will it. and our will is so strong, and stronger than any weapon or any army, but we definitely need support, and thank you, you're delivering some, but we need it sooner than later. >> all right, member of the kyiv territorial defense wladimir klitschko, thank you so much for coming on the show today. we'll hopefully talk to you soon. >> jonathan lemire. >> ambassador mcfaul, i wanted to cross the border and get you to talk about what we're seeing in russia right now. public opinion polls, independent ones even, have shown a rise in support for putin at home in recent weeks as the war effort has continued. and with as we just heard from mr. klitschko, we know the war now is focused here on the east in the donbas, and real atrocities being committed. what sort of victory, if you will, does putin need in order to have a strong enough hand to go to the table to negotiate an end to this conflict? >> first on public opinion polling, i want to remind everybody, actually a russian friend just said this to me over the weekend. mike, it's like doing a poll in the gulag where people have guns to your head and you'll go to jail for 15 years, there's only one right answer to the question, do you support vladimir putin. always remember that. even though the polling company, i have known them for 30 years, they're the one independent place. we have to remember the context within which we see the polls. number two, i think there has been an uptick, a rallying around the flag effect, and they're blaming us. remember, everybody needs to remember, on russian television, the way this is portrayed, they're not fighting ukraine. they are fighting the united states and nato. that's the way it's portrayed. and with sanctions, there's been a rallying around the flag effect. that will burn out over time, but it is there. therefore, third, putin does need something different than what he had before he invaded. right? you just can't go back and say, well, we got crimea and donbas. they had that on february 23rd. that's why he needs mariupol. that's why he needs to connect the territory between crimea and donbas, and then he'll say this is his propaganda, not mine, he'll say we have liberated the russian ethnic russian dominated russian speaking territories of ukraine, and then he can sue for peace. whether or not zelenskyy can take that deal is another matter, but that's where i think his play is in the coming weeks. >> mr. ambassador, i want to ask you about this new russian general at the forefront who is known as the butcher of syria. and the potential of chemical weapons and how that would change the game. >> well, he was the commander in syria. he's a very evil man, in my view. by the way, was horrific in mew view that they blessed him as he went into this battle. another aspect of public opinion inside russia where the church has been 100% supportive of this war. i think it's time we sanction him, too, by the way, the patriarch. but you know, obviously, when the war is not going well, you change generals. and that's what's happening here. i'm worried about chemical weapons, but i really don't think we're there yet. i don't see the military rationale for it. what i do see is the psychological rationale for it. it's designed to scare us just like the threats about nuclear weapons so we don't provide the weapons the ukrainians need. i think we have to stop fearing putin and start helping the ukrainians get the weapons they need for this big battle coming in the donbas. >> former u.s. ambassador to russia, michael mcfaul, thank you very much. and still ahead on "morning joe," france's presidential election is later this month, and a new leader could be a win for vladimir putin. we'll explain why. >> also ahead, covid cases are rising in more than half the country, but some health experts say the numbers don't tell the whole story. >> and in our 9:00 hour, twitter is a big story on wall street this morning. now that elon musk says he's not going to join its board. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. finally. our honeymoon. it took awhile, but at least we got a great deal on our hotel with kayak. i was afraid we wouldn't go.. with our divorce and.... great divorce guys. yeah... search 100s of travel sites at once. kayak. search one and done. for investors who can navigate this landscape, search 100s of travel sites leveraging gold, a strategic and sustainable asset... the path is gilded with the potential for rich returns. ♪ ♪ nice suits, you guys blend right in. the world needs you back. i'm retired greg, you know this. people are taking financial advice from memes. 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>> well, his votes come from the left and they come from all the people who no longer identify with the socialists. a lot of environmentalists. he got a massive support from the young. people under 25 voted overwhelmingly, actually, for him. the big question now is where do all those votes go? because there's a part of the left that is very disillusioned with macron, who moved to the right during his presidency. will they hold their noses and vote macron again? one certainly hopes so, but there are some who may drift toward le pen. >> it does seem to be a bit like what we saw in the last election, where we had many people on the left, progressives who were offended by parts of joe biden's history in domestic politics, but there's no way they wanted trump. is this what we should probably expect to happen with that 22% along with the greens and the socialists and communists, that most likely macron gets his 50 plus 1 percent? >> well, joe, yeah. most likely, but between that and the reality, there are two weeks and they're going to be two very tense weeks. most polls are showing right now 52% macron, 48% le pen. that's really within the margin of error. and as you said, the far right and the far left do meet most of marine le pen's support is from working class france. so it's not a done deal by any means. macron did a little better in the end than some of the polls were showing in the first round. he had a very lackluster distracted campaign. he seemed to be on the phone to vladimir putin every other day, and in the end, his seeming remoteness got to the french. they like attention to be paid to them, especially when the election comes around every five years. >> so can you explain to americans the importance, the significance of the center right and the center left completely collapsing in france, as you explained this morning in your "times" piece. explain the significance of that and always why it happened. where did the center right and center left go? why did voters flee? >> well, it's hugely significant. it wouldn't be too much to say roughly equivalent to the democratic party and republicans vanishing overnight. five years ago, the socialists, the socialist president was in power, now we have the socialist at 2%, and we have the center right republicans at under 5%. and that was the party of sarkozy, who was president until 2012. so this is a huge sea change. now why? i think these parties just had really nothing more to say to the french at a time when issues like security, immigration, growing inequality, and technology had created as we see in other western societies a lot of unease, disaffection, uncertainty about your future, a feeling of being alienated. and that kind of anger did not -- does no longer find expression in these centrist parties, especially when you have a guy like macron, who has been very agile and adept in trying to occupy the whole center from the center right to the center left. he said during the campaign to move forward, you have to walk. and to walk, you need a right leg and a left leg. it was a clever phrase. the kind of clever, clever phrase that tends to annoy a lot of his opponents, but anyway, he's been very adept at that. all that created this implosion. >> roger, thank you so much. >> from a presidential race overseas to presidential leadership here at home. we'll speak with historian michael bechloss about the biden administration's approach. 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dispute on the committee. the committee is working in a really collaborative way to discuss these issues, as we are with all of the issues we're addressing. and we'll continue to work together to do so. >> republican liz cheney, the vice chair of the select committee investigating the january 6th attack on the capitol, says the committee has enough evidence for a criminal referral of the former president should the committee decide to proceed with that course of action. meanwhile, "the new york times" reports former president donald trump's eldest son sent the white house chief of staff a text message two days after the 2020 presidential election that laid out strategies for declaring his father the winner regardless of the electoral outcome. people familiar with the exchange said on friday. the text was sent by donald trump jr. two days before joe biden was declared the winner of the election. it's very simple, trump jr. wrote to meadows on november 5th, 2020. he wrote at another point. zee multiple paths. we control them all. nbc news has not reviewed the messages in question. this is according to the times. the message went on to lay out a variety of options that mr. trump or his allies ultimately employed in trying to overturn the results of the election from legal challenges to promoting alternative slates of electors, to focusing efforts on the statutory date of january 6th for certification of the electoral college results. the "times" reported a lawyer for trump jr. confirmed to the "times" the text message was sent but suggested it was someone else's idea that donald trump jr. was passing along. joining us now, former u.s. attorney for the northern district of alabama and an msnbc legal analyst, joyce vance. joyce, your thoughts on these texts. >> these texts provide some of the pieces that we have been talking about over time. you have heard many of the legal analysts say that one of the most difficult challenges the justice department would face if it wanted to bring a prosecution is proving intent, proving that donald trump really knew that he had lost the election and that the big lie was just that, an effort to steal the election. so having this text from trump jr. that while the votes are still being counted, acknowledges the loss and then lays out a strategy, it's not just deeply offensive to the american people. and i worry that sometimes we get lost in all of the back and forth on this and don't take that moment to be offended, that a sitting president thought it was legitimate to bypass the will of the american people and steal the election for his own. but this provides that key element of proof the government would need to go forward with a prosecution that they knew they had lost the election, that they continued to engage in efforts to take it from joe biden nonetheless. >> joyce, i'm going to kind of put you on the spot here. people are tired of hearing about all of this. that's understandable. from your perspective, as a former u.s. attorney, looking at what's happened in the manhattan district attorney's office's investigation of donald trump, from the january 6th assemblage of evidence against donald trump, and from other investigations that are ongoing as well as all of the anecdotal evidence we have, would you indict him? >> the question of whether to indict has to be an evidence-specific case. there are a lot of moving pieces. i have sympathy for what doj prosecutors are looking at. there are issued as varied as a first amendment defense, for instance, whether or not the speech used on the ellipse is protected by the constitution and whether that could prevent a prosecution. that's one of the many difficult issues prosecutors have to parse. the court of opinion, as you point out, is something entirely different. and there's a little bit of fatigue right now in the court of public opinion, but that's not how prosecutions work. if doj determines the law merits prosecution, then a jury will be assembled and the district court, that jury will hear evidence, not this entire enormous mess that's really what i think has created fatigue in the public, but they'll hear very specific evidence on each of the elements of crimes that are charged, and they'll make a decision about whether anyone who is charged with those crimes is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. something that we have seen over and over in these cases, i remember the prosecution of paul manafort, is that citizens serving as jurors can set aside their preconceptions and their biases and hear that evidence and reach a ruling. so that's a very different sort of enterprise from the court of public opinion. >> joyce vance, thank you so much. >> coming up, what's driving the day on wall street? andrew ross sorkin is here with business before the bell. 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>> i am going to do it, but i can see a lot of people are going to say no. >> today in philadelphia where cases are up 89%, officials are expected to announce whether the city will reinstate an indoor mask mandate. >> it stinks but we'll do what we have to do. >> over the last two weeks, twaefrb states have seen a rise in cases. experts say largely driven by the new ba-2 variant. >> right now, we're watching it very, very carefully, and there is concern that it's going up. >> in new york city, cases are up nearly 50% over the last two weeks. there's also a 76% increase in the nation's capital, where the number of high profile positive cases is growing after last week's a-list gridiron dinner. at least 72 people have tested positive after attending. among them, three biden cabinet members, new york city mayor eric adams, and three members of congress. >> there will be a level of infection. this is not going to be eradicated and it's not going to be eliminated. what's going to happen is that we're going to see that each individual is going to have to make their calculation of the amount of risk that they want to take. >> but even with renewed focus on the nation's case count, some experts are questioning whether it's still an effective indicator. saying the number of daily covid cases are dramatically undercounted, with more people using at-home tests. just over three months ago at the height of the omicron wave, the u.s. was performing nearly 2 million tests a day. now, that number is down to just over half a million. others with mild symptoms choosing to skip the test altogether. >> that was blayne alexander reporting. coming up, we'll go live to the white house. one of president biden's top advisers, susan rice, breaks down the administration's new efforts to curb gun violence nationwide. the former national security adviser joins the conversation straight ahead on "morning joe." if your moderate to severe crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms are stopping you in your tracks choose stelara® from the start and move toward relief after the first dose with injections every two months. stelara® may increase your risk of infections, some serious, and cancer. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, sores, new skin growths, have had cancer, or if you need a vaccine. pres, a rare, potentially fatal brain condition, may be possible. some serious allergic reactions and lung inflammation can occur. feel unstoppable. ask your doctor how lasting remission can start with stelara®. janssen can help you explore cost support options. ♪simply irresistible♪ ♪ ♪ ♪simply irresistible♪ applebee's irresist-a-bowls are back. now starting at $8.99. now that's eatin' good in the neighborhood. to make my vision a reality my varilux progressive lenses provide seamlessly transition from near to far. with every detail in sharp focus. that's seeing no limits. varilux lenses by essilor. we gotta tell people that liberty mutual customizes car insurance so you only pay for what you need, and we gotta do it fast. 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[phone ringing] hm. no way! no way! priceline. every trip is a big deal. 54 past the hour. russia's latest misinformation campaign is targeting the relationship between ukraine and poland. experts believe russian agents or sympathizers were involved late last year in vandalizing a monument in poland with the colors of the ukrainian flag to try and stoke tension between the two countries. the associated press reports polish and ukrainian authorities have for years accused russia of trying to provoke hostility between their neighboring nations as part of a broader effort to divide and destabilize the west. and the concerns have gained greater urgency since russia invaded ukraine. diplomacy is on full display in poland right now. today, germany's ambassador to poland joined his u.s. counterpart, my brother, ambassador mark brzezinski, in a visit with nato force. he sent these pictures, poland, germany, and the u.s. committed to sending a powerful message of solidarity in the face of russian aggression in ukraine. meanwhile, the u.n. refugee agency says more than 7 million ukrainians have been forced from their homes since the start of the invasion in february. the vast majority, of course, going to poland. there are also some people fleeing russia. hundreds of thousands of workers in russia have left the country since its invasion of ukraine. a survey conducted last month by a nonprofit organization helping people leave the country estimates about 300,000 workers have left moscow since february. the "wall street journal" citing interviews with immigrants say they include doctors, bankers, and those in the tech industry. they're going to nearby countries such as georgia, armenia, and turkey. it comes as russia may be headed for an historic default on external loans for the first time in more than a century. credit ratings agency, standard & poor's, downgraded it assessment of moscow's ability to repay foreign debt. however, earnings from russian energy exports have helped moscow stabilize its currency. joining us now, columnist at "insider," lynette lopez. her latest piece is "none of them have the guts: why russia's oligarchs will remain loyal to putin even in the face of crippling sanctions." here's some of what you wright, lynette. "after more than two decades in power, putin is more than just a man. he's the center of a system that is as orderly as it is corrupt. state media makes it very clear any turn away from putin is a turn toward anarchy." this is why not even an event as cataclysmic as the attack on ukraine has been able to wake russia's oligarchs from their sleepwalking state. for the oligarchs who have prospered under putin to stand against him, they would have to summon a type of courage few men throughout history have been able to summon. they will be charging in into an abyss. if no one follows him, they will have no recourse and very few places to hide." but how are they being hurt? what exactly is the impact so far on the oligarchs? and why isn't it moving the needle at all? >> well, they're being hurt because they own all the wealth of russia. >> what's liar life like now compared to before? >> well, they can't have bank accounts in the eu or the u.s. they can't go to certain countries. they can't do business with americans or eu people. this is a problem for them. i mean, some of the more london-based oligarchs are going to have to learn to live on $2,500 a month or pounds a month or something like that. so they are very concerned, one oligarch said. do i get a driver? how do i live? they don't know how to do their own laundry or drive their own cars or anything like that. >> yet that doesn't move the meter? >> well, you know, at least they're alive to do their own laundry. i mean, putin has a history of killing oligarchs that he doesn't like, making sure that they never go back to russia again or that their families are never safe. sometimes they mysteriously die. this is a problem. so back when putin took over, and that was in 2001, the oligarchs had a different place in russian society. back then, they owned media companies, they liked to play around in politics, they had their own political ambitions. when putin took over, he said that's over, we're done here. everybody comes to me for everything that they need. roman ibramovich in a lawsuit, he testified and he described this relationship as called a roof, someone who protects an oligarch from violence, from theft, from intimidation. so putin is now everyone's roof. for the oligarch who is got rich before putin took power, some of therm were like we don't like this arrangement and they left. then putin added new oligarchs, a second wave, people who were completely dependent on him for their protection. people who got companies from him. and the relationship to wealth is his. sometimes they hide money for putin. roman ibramovich, in order to stay in putin's good graces when he rose to power, helped buy him a yacht, also contributed to building putin's palace. these are the things you do. >> a lot of these oligarchs have had their yachts seized and there's i believe an airstrip in dubai where you see the private planes all lined up because they're all parked there, and they can't be flown anywhere right now because of the sanctions. that's where i want to go next, to the sanctions. oligarchs have been hit heavily by the west. is there anything that can be done to change their mind? but also writ large, what are tools that the west, allies can use? what sanctions can still be applied that might change the economic status in russia? >> we keep talking about this over and over again, and that is cutting off energy exports from russia. the thing is this process needs to be done very carefully. we need to make sure that there's economic stability in the rest of the world so that we can continue this protracted kind of excisement of russia from the global economy. putin is not coming back to us, we're not going back to russia as long as putin is there. so we have to have the process of if ig youring out how to create an economy that exists out him. >> without russian