from all of our colleagues across the networks that nbc news, thank you for staying up, late be good this, weekend and i will see at the end of monday. >> in a federal court in miami at 10:30 am on monday. and then on tuesday the graduate special counsel jack smith has been using in his investigation into trump's attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, that jury is expected to meet again, which could mean more testimony or it could mean a possible indictment. and as much as everyone is and has been holding their breath to see what happens in that investigation, let's be clear that special counsel jack smith took us all by surprise yesterday with a new superseding indictment in the mar-a-lago investigation and that new indictment offers a potentially valuable clue about what we might see in smith's other indictment, shouldn't actually happen. all sorts of information in the mar-a-lago case seems to come from a witness referred to as employee number 2. it alleges that one of the conspirators walt nauta and employee number 2, brought boxes from -- starting as far back as november 2021. nauta and employee number 2 then texted back and forth for months about the movement of those boxes. nauta is listed as a coconspirator in this indictment, in part because he lied to the fbi about those movements, those movements of boxes. but what about employee number 2? why isn't that employee also indicted? could it be that employee number 2 did not lie? and does that mean that employee number 2 is cooperating? well, the new york times has identified employee number 2 as a woman named molly michael, trump's former executive assistant. nbc has not independently verified that reporting, but if that is the case, her potential cooperation would be a huge deal, and not just in the mar-a-lago case. as trump's executive assistant, molly michael sat directly outside trump's office while he was president. she connected his calls and she kept his schedule. trump famously does not use email himself, but he does still need to read and send emails because he lives in the 21st century. so for a lot of the end of trump's presidency, when some of the totally crazy stuff was allegedly happening, if someone wanted to email president trump, they would just email molly michael. she was a fly on the wall, very much in the loop in the inner circle, and molly michael could be an incredible witness. when the house january six committee examined the plans for january six, there was a focus on this date, december 23rd. that day, trump lawyer john eastman sent two-page memo summarizing ways to ensure, quote, that president trump is reelected. in that memo, eastman suggested that vice president pence could simply count electoral college votes from seven states. we now know those states to be the states ultimately involved in trump's fake electoral--. that was an important memo in terms of this plot. eastman's thinking was that eliminating those seven states would take enough electoral college votes off the table the pants couldn't just gavel in trump as reelected. the same day that eastman cooked up that plan, december 28th, 23rd, that same day john eastman sent an email to molly michael. quote, is the president available for a very quick call today at some point? just want to update him on our overall strategic thinking. five minutes later, mr. eastman got a call from the white house switchboard, a call that lasted 23 minutes. molly michael could be a heck of a potential witness. and that would be a new development, because ms. michael did not seem to be the most helpful witness in the house january six committees investigation. and reference to the actual day of january six, molly michael was present in the oval office that day but, the committee seemed to note, with some frustration, that she claimed not to remember nearly anything from one of the most memorable days in recent american history. and molly michael's testimony to the committee is filled with, i do not recall, i'm not sure i recall, i don't specifically recall. her lawyers during that investigation were from former trump lawyer mark kasowitz's law firm. we do not know if that means that trump and his organizations were paying molly michael's legal bills and we don't know if he is paying them now. but if molly michael is indeed employee number 2 and she is talking, what could that portend for both of jack smith 's investigations? joining me now is andrew weissmann, former senior member of special counsel robert mueller's team and co-host of the essential podcast prosecuting donald trump. i don't exaggerate. when is the new episode coming out? >> today. >> that's a great promo. andrew, there is so much we don't know about employee number two. but hypothetically, if jack smith has someone like molly michael, who is employee 2, who he how could he use that person if they are cooperating in both investigations? is that done? >> absolutely. there are people who could have information that's relevant to the january 6th case and what led up to that. they could also have information that is relevant to the documents case. so, for instance, mark meadows, he presumably would have keys to the kingdom, and could have a cooperator that has information on both. you definitely need to be fully cooperating. you just can't be a monetary the truth about this or not that. that makes the person unusable. they may have their own exposure, meaning they could be prosecuted. >> what strikes me about employee number 2 is how deep the federal investigators have penetrate penetrated into the inner sanctum of trump world, are not just with the names that we know, not just the mark meadows on the rudy giuliani, spoke with these aides, these spies on the wall, the people on the background who were there, who were literally sending emails on behalf of the president. i mean, that to me seems like a wealth of information that is going to be critical. >> this is typical in a white-collar case. you have people who are seen as your people, there are lots of people around them. that is a prosecutor is where you go. you start there. those people presumably some of them may tell you the truth because they are concerned about their own exposures. so maybe like cassidy hutchinson, which is they were brought up well, which is they believe in the mirror test, which is going home and being able to look at themselves in the mirror. there are other people, and there appears to be a case with mr. nauta and mr. de oliveira, who are concerned more about loyalty to their boss, about money, about their future, and they are thinking you know what, i might be able to escape because i might get a pardon or some other belief down the road. so there is a whole variety of people, a whole variety of motives. when your prosecutor, it's figuring it out. >> it's figuring out the humanity that undergirds even their positions. i have to ask you, because i think this is relevant to your experience, the new york times is up with a new piece, a long piece, comparing what we are learning in terms of obstruction in the mar-a-lago case with the obstruction that was detailed in the mueller report. --. john bolton in the piece calls trump's approach obstruction as a way of life. in the lead investigator and the mueller investigation, andrew goldstein, says the superseding indictment in mar-a-lago, the one we got yesterday, is a clear example of criminality than what we found in the mueller case. it makes it easier to show criminal intent. do you agree with that incessant? >> yeah. it's a little hard because all the details with respect to the mueller investigation and we only have the indictment, so we have to wait a lot more, put meat on the bones. but there is nothing more classic than somebody saying let's just destroy evidence when there is a pending subpoena. in terms of john bolton's comment about this being a way of life, this is the through line. you have obstruction, take the former presidents comments to don mcgahn, saying i need you to create a fake document making something that's not true and he's basically, i'm out, i'm not doing that. zelenskyy, what the former president was doing there was saying i need you to gin up a fraud investigation because i'm going to use that to defraud the american people and say this in an impending investigation with joe biden. there's also an indictment now with two schemes to obstruct justice, and we're about to see a charge by jack smith for obstruction on a much larger scale. it is not going to be just getting rid of documents or lying to the government. it's going to be a question of congress or overthrowing the will of the people. if you look at all of these forms of obstruction that the former president has engaged in -- >> an embedded in the times piece is a reason offered for how and why this obstruction gets more flagrant as time goes on. effectively, trump viewed the conclusion of the mueller investigation as vindication of his behavior, which became increasingly emboldened. he basically, i know you disagree, but he viewed, because there were no political implications for him, he viewed it as a vindication and therefore the obstruction, the acts of fraud, became ever more flagrant, blatant, and unchecked, it seems. >> a vindication, not that we found, or vindicated him, but in terms of from his point of view he had no political consequences. i would go back further. you have somebody who has lived through decades and has managed to escape with no consequences, legally. and so this is really an unusual situation for him, because he is now out of control of the situation and to courtrooms soon to be i think for courtrooms, that is going to be an unusual experience, where it's not just a civil case where he can just by his way out of it, because just talking about money. i think it's a lifetime. i would go back further than the mueller investigation in terms of his lesson, in terms of how to deal with these things. >> and the times effectively said it's a long pattern of gamesmanship with prosecutors, regulators, and of the others. others being basically anyone trump came across in his career as a businessman, as a husband, as a father. so many levels of deception, culminating in this moment right now where he's being held to account. i know we're talking about the airtightness of this mar-a-lago case. ty cobb, the presidents for former lawyer, said the evidence is so overwhelming it is engineered to last in antiquity. maybe he meant in eternity, or maybe he meant in reverse time, back into the days of ancient egypt. not sure what he meant other than this thing is -- >> we get the draft. >> we get the draft. this thing looks good, and yet to an american public that has watched this president skate by so many times, i mean, would you put your money on where the same square that ty cobb is putting his money on? >> we have to see what the president's long term plan for this is to win the presidency, and the case goes away. so that is not fighting this in terms of the fact to the law. this is an extra judicial remedy. in terms of the case, it is hard to not see this as very strong. you don't have to be or to go to law school to know he had classified documents, he was hiding them, they were found after an fbi search, you have people who say he lied to me and told me to lie to the government, he told me to get rid of tapes, surveillance tapes. this is a pretty rudimentary obvious scheme. this is where i think a jury is not going to be like okay this is an arcane issue and why should i care? there it's this why should i care, all you have to do is look at the description of the classified documents. i was in the intelligence community. i don't think you need to be to understand how much this hurts the american public and their safety. to my mind, this case kind of has everything. >> and i didn't go to law school, and i'm not an investigator. i check all those boxes. but why does jack smith keep investigating this? i understand, there's like a reason to have this superseding indictment because the narrative is pretty damning, but it allows the introduction a florida court. that seems important. but why continue to investigate? honestly. he has jarry six to focus on. this is kind of an open and shut thing. adding witnesses, adding indictments, the slows it down, it drags it out it maybe won't even go to trial before the summer. >> yeah, there's no question, the downside of doing this was the risk that a new defendant will say, i need more time. >> exactly. >> there's something that happened today that i think is going to help jack smith, which is that alvin bragg was on the radio saying, essentially, i am open to, if needed, to essentially moving my -- and talking to the judge. the reason that could be relevant is i can see there is going to be an argument now in florida about the trial date. aileen cannon was very interested in the fact that there was a march date. and they are going to be using that to say, look, if that's your concern, you picked may because you knew it couldn't be before the, and because of that march trial. this is -- you know, that date can move. if you are concerned about preparation time. so, it sort of adds an extra chest piece to the board. and then, why you do this? yes, the bedminster tape was i think an absolute -- i thought that was something really good to do. but sometimes, new evidence comes up. it is really hard to ignore that. prosecutor and you get a piece that says, you know what? there is additional obstruction that has gone on, it's really hard to say, you know what? not present that to the jury. >> yes, well, a shush emoji and secret audio closet conversation. that's still good to introduce to the -- 1 but sometimes, new evidence comes up. it is really hard to ignore that. when you are built as a prosecutor and you get a piece that says, you know what? there is additional obstruction that has gone on, it's really hard to say, you know what? i'm going to endure that are i'm going to endure that are not present that to the in teves deserves a great deal. that's why comcast business is launching the mobile made free event. with our business internet, new and existing customers can get one year of unlimited mobile for free. it's our best internet. powered by the next generation 10g network and with 99.9% reliability. plus one line of free mobile for an entire year. it's the mobile made free event-happening now. get started for just $49.99 a month. plus, ask how to get one free line of unlimited mobile. >> one of the central ironies comcast business, powering possibilities. of trump's alleged mishandling of classified documents is that trump himself was elected president after attacking hillary clinton over her handling of classified documents. and he accused clinton of trying to cover it up by destroying evidence in an unorthodox way. >> hillary clinton and her top aides knowingly destroyed evidence and covered up their actions. her staff deleted all the emails and wipe it clean! she bleached her emails. nobody even heard about it before. she bleached -- which, somebody said, they never even heard of -- used chemical so that nobody ever will able to see them. who does this? >> now, to be clear, hillary clinton did not bleach your private email server, whatever that means. trump appears to have computes the name of a software tool called bleach bit with the household cleaning products related promote as a cure for covid. and the fbi never found any reason to believe hillary clinton tried to destroy evidence. but the thing here is -- hillary -- jackson just accused trump of doing, conspiring to wipe a private server in order to destroy evidence. it is the kind of projection that we have seen time and again from donald trump. he accused hillary clinton of corrupt business practices and misusing her charities. they accused joe biden of blackmailing the ukrainian government and trying to steal an election, all things that trump himself has been charged with or sued over, or impeached for. many, many of the things he accuses someone else of doing is something donald trump himself has done or might do, or, as my colleague mehdi hasan puts it, every accusation is a confession. . and nobody knows more about that side of trump that my next guest. michael cohen he's a former lawyer and fixer for president trump. he is the host of the podcast mea culpa and political beat down, and the author of revenge, how telling trump weaponize the u.s. department of justice against his critics. michael, thank you so much for joining me this friday night. >> good to see, you alex wagner. >> sorry to take you away from dinner. >> that's okay. for you, anything. this is, i think, a little bit more important then -- >> well, we all have our standards. first of all, this indictment that we all just got from jack smith -- the superseding indictment -- i think, is really illustrative for the american public at a certain kind of behavior and mentality. to be sure, we have heard some of this behavior before, but the notion that trump is lobbing these accusations that people for crimes that he himself may be guilty of -- is that something, this notion of every accusation is a confession -- is that something that you saw in your time with mr. trump? >> with donald, it is projection and deflection. just take a look at my book as an example -- revenge. how donald trump weaponized the united states department of justice against his critics. >> right. >> what is donald trump doing? he's using the second part of the title of my book. what is joe biden administration doing to me? >> weaponizing -- >> he's weaponizing the department of justice against me. your favorite president -- it's always about deflection. and it's always about projection. because he believes that everyone is as guilty and as underhanded as he. and so he wants to be first to the line. >> when you -- >> it's a real psychosis. >> yeah, it's a real specific psychology. and the other part of it is the almost mafia like organization that you see detailed in this indictment. the notion that he has his late people, as it were, the maintenance worker, the i. t. guy, the valet, all doing his bidding, and it's almost like they are doing this bidding out of a sense of loyalty, or fear, or both. that seems to be the organizing principle of the trump organization as well. is that a fair characterization? >> it's also something that i have talked about it, that don't trump speaks in mob code. and yes, the sense of loyalty or, in organized crime, it will be called omertã code of silence. either you are loyal to donald, with your entire being or you are not there. and that's how everybody was, from the children, all the way down to the front door man. it didn't make a difference. you pledge your loyalty to him. if he asks you to do something, you don't ask why. what you do is, you do it. now, i was in a little bit of a different situation, i would have quite a few conversations with him. this may not be the best move. most of the time he would ignore the advice. every now and then he would accept the advice. but he doesn't accept the advice from you. he accepts it -- it's his advice, and then he alters his decision. >> he has to believe it is. >> it's always got to be his. >> but with these lower level mar-a-lago aides, who are being named as coconspirators, trump is paying the legal bills for some of them. >> you know, i just finished a lawsuit with -- >> exactly. >> as long as they stay on message he will continue to pay the bill, or, let's rephrase that. his unwitting supporters who he is drifting off of we'll be paying those bills. >> right. and this being donations. >> of course. and once that stops -- once you stop being loyal, specific to, him and following his message -- well, now you get cutoff. and it's not that -- it's not just that the legal bills become yours. the headaches all become yours as well. because he exacerbates them by doing the things that he does best, which, is on social media, attacks and so on. >> what is it like, though? i mean, as someone who worked for donald trump, had representation paid for by downtown, biden flipped on donald trump, what is that decision like? when you make the calculation, i can't -- i'm going to have to get my own council. i'm not going to be able to pay for those bills. -- but i cannot look at myself in the mirror and go along doing the bidding for this man, who is criminally guilty -- who is guilty of unethical, if not, criminal behavior. what is that calculation like? >> it's very difficult. first of all, in my case it wasn't about the money. it is a whole another thing. you can read about it in the book. it wasn't about the money. it was more about the loyalty. i had spent a decade with him, little more than even a decade. and there is a sense of loyalty. and it's almost like a sense of responsibility that you have for keeping him in line. but truth be told, as his sister, judge barry once said, nobody can do that. he's impossible. and there's no way that anybody can keep him in line when he makes up his mind on something. and his decision is not predicated on a sense of reality, a sense of moral, ethics, or right or wrong. it is what he believes is right for him. and that is the only thing that matters. >> the reason i bring the financial asset is -- the folks that we are talking about, well nada walt nauta and -- and carlos de oliveira -- they are not lawyers. i would imagine they are concerned about voting legal bills. >> they better be. because all of these legal bills add up very quickly, into the millions. >> yes. >> and whether it is donald's responsibility to pay for, it based upon indemnification clauses and so on, that doesn't matter. what matters is that, as long as you want me to continue to pay for those bills, you stay on message. and the second that you deviate in a way that i determine, meaning donald -- i determined that i don't like it -- you are cut off. and you are ex communicated. i mean, it's almost like john wick, ex communicator. ex communicated. >> -- that's made explicit when you get your legal bills paid by donald trump? >> yes. >> -- >> it's like a mob boss. they don't come out and say it you explicitly. you just find out. and you know that that is going to happen. like, these two gentlemen -- right? de oliveira and tavares. they have to understand, because it's been all over the news, my lawsuit, so they know what he did to me, and for some unknown reason, like walt nauta, i've said on television, on msnbc, and other programs, i've said run. because look at what has happened to me, and history always repeats itself, especially in donald trump's orbit. so, look at what -- do you think that you are special? do you think that you are going to be the one that he actually is going to care about? the answer is no. he would throw his own kids under the bus when it comes to a legal bill, if they do something wrong, or they say something that he doesn't agree with. they would be on their own to. >> these are calculations they're gonna have to make in the coming days. because they are now coconspirators in a trial with donald trump for a federal criminal indictment. michael cohen, thank you so much for your -- >> good to see you. >> great to see you. up next, the republican plan to deal with yet another indictment over the parties leader. the plan is, impeach joe biden. former white house press secretary jen psaki here to talk about that. don't go anywhere. donald trump for a federal criminal indictment. michael cohen, thank you so much for your -- >> good to see you. >> great to see you. up next, the republican plan to deal with yet another indictment over the parties leader. the plan is, impeach joe biden. former white house press secretary jen psaki here to talk about that. don't go anywhere. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ only pay for what you need. make a splash with the ultimate pool party essential. blendjet gives you ice-crushing, big blender power on-the-go, so you can soak up the sun with a frosty beverage. enjoy 15+ blends before rapidly recharging via usb-c. and it even cleans itself with a drop of soap and water. stand out even when you're accidentally twinning with our kaleidoscope of colors. make this summer the coolest ever. order yours now from blendjet.com. with amazon's back to school deals, you can save money by spending less of it. makes sense! oh, i see what you did there! - what? - what? i don't get it. hehe. >> -- document -- that would be -- because i know i can't take that document -- the scif. he is a president. when he was a senator, he took a document. how many years is that -- prosecution -- >> donald trump has been charged now with 40 criminal counts, including obstruction of justice, and willful tension of classified documents. and congressional republicans would like to focus on joe biden and his senate papers. now, biden has handed these documents back. and he has not been charged with anything. but donald trump, again, has been charged with 40 criminal counts in just one set of indictments. but this, apparently, is the plan that house republicans that have put together to deal with this crisis -- deflection. republicans have set forth dueling resolutions to impeach president biden for not handling the southern border to their liking. the house oversight committee is conducting an investigation into the biden family's financial dealings, and house speaker kevin mccarthy is now raising the prospects of an impeachment inquiry as the oversight committee struggles to find evidence of an alleged bribery scheme involving president biden and foreign national. >> i haven't seen an administration act this way at the same time as nixon did by withholding information. if we do not -- if they do not provide the information we need, then we would go to an impeachment inquiry. impeachment inquiry. -- simply is an investigation, and providing congress the power to do that investigation. >> so, that is their whole plan. that is the plan, to deal with the fact that the head of the republican party is now facing two criminal trials and possibly a third in the coming week. my friend and colleague jen psaki will join me to talk about the strategy on display here. that is next. i will be a travel influencer... hey, i thought you were on vacation? 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(vo) consumer reports evaluates vehicles for car shoppers in... ...reliability, safety, owner satisfaction, and road-test evaluations... and the results are in. subaru is the 2023 best mainstream automotive brand, according to consumer reports. and subaru has seven consumer reports recommended models. outback, forester, solterra, crosstrek, ascent, impreza, and legacy. it's easy to love a brand you can trust. it's easy to love a subaru. >> does all of this legal stuff he is facing disqualifying -- >> at the end of the day, voters make that decision. some people like to ask me, we'll, if somebody's indictment, should they be able to run? the problem is, we've seen political indictments. i mean, i think alvin bragg was political. you have these other -- these people. that would just give any prosecutor the ability to render someone ineligible. so, i've not said that. but i also think just -- the elections got to be about the future. >> at the end of the day, i don't want to have to talk about that thing that is sort of in the past but not really. it's also in the future. by now, it is clear that republican presidential candidates do not have any kind of coherent plan on how to handle trump's mounting legal troubles ahead of the 2024. election in fact, most of them, from nikki haley to mike pence, or trying to avoid this topic altogether. house republicans, on the other hand, have a plan. kind of. and that plan is to downplay trump's legal peril by talking about president biden. joining me now is jen psaki, former white house press secretary and current host of "inside with jen psaki" right here on msnbc, a woman who is pulling, i will call it, triple duty -- hosting for chris hayes, doing your show, and also doing mine. we are so deeply grateful. >> and our children. don't forget about -- >> who are they? >> -- >> jen -- first of all, ron desantis -- there is so much to talk about in terms of -- >> there were a lot of words just said in that clip. a lot of words. they don't go together. >> -- the only people who have a strategy, if they can call it that, are the republicans who, under kevin mccarthy's leadership, you only want to talk about impeaching biden. i'm not saying it's a good strategy. but it's a strategy. and my question to you is, what do you think the white house thinks of all this? >> i don't think the white house is terribly worried about it. number one, they did think that there would actually be much more aggressive and, effective, i should say, strategy, to impeach plenty of cabinet members, maybe the president, all sorts of people, earlier this year. they hired a bunch of smart communications people and strategists at different agencies to prepare for that. but they couldn't really get their acts together. >> they are literally sitting around, like ready to -- >> they are ready! they are ready with their phones and everything, exactly. it's clearly very political. of course, you have to take everything seriously. >> right. >> but this was a case with even -- and i thought this was so interesting -- i think it was election post. some outlets reported this week that vulnerable republicans in the house do not want mccarthy to move forward with this. >> yes. >> and that is generally who you listen to when you are speaker, and you want to remain speaker. so, he's moving forward with this, and this is an awkward problem for kevin mccarthy. he's moving forward with his because he wants to appease his -- donald trump -- but he's going to have all these members as this proceeds who are like, hey, man, i want to keep my seat. you want to keep being speaker. >> exact -- >> and the white house knows this too. they understand the politics of all this, and that this isn't entirely easy for kevin mccarthy to proceed on. >> -- nothing and kevin mccarthy's life is entirely easy. but we played that ron desantis sand in the beginning for a reason. and that is to illustrate just the ridiculous bind that republican presidential candidates find themselves in. will hurd, who is not running for president, but is a former republican congressman, is at the iowa dinner -- the iowa lincoln dinner -- which is occurring tonight, and just -- there is a moment that everybody should be made aware of, where will hurd there is to say the quiet part out loud. let us play the soundbite for our audience. >> donald trump is not running for president to make america great again. donald trump is not running for president to represent the people that voted for him in 2016 and 2020. donald trump is running to stay out of prison. and if we elect -- >> -- >> i know, i know, i know, i know. >> the truth is hard. that's how that ends. he says, the truth is hard. that's what is so shocking. if there is a sense that, underneath it all, they know what is going on. but he's the only person that wants to say it out loud. >> to be fair, chris christie, who wasn't there -- >> sure. >> -- has been saying a version of this. asa hutchins and has been saying this. but none of them are polling above double digits. so, the challenge is, yes, it would be helpful to taking down trump down if all the republican candidates were maybe rattling this, maybe. but we haven't seen this -- down trump to date in the polls. >> i guess i kind of wonder, when it comes down to brass tacks, how much republicans think they are going to be on the -- lake, they are making -- they are not taking out any insurance policies that this actually matters. do you know what i mean? they are not really looking forward to the potential that trump could actually be convicted on any of this. and if and when that happens, where do you go from here, after you have spent the entirety of your political career, your recent political career, basically undermining the work of federal prosecutors? >> i can't get in the heads of -- >> yes -- >> the minds of other heads -- >> it's a scary -- >> a lot of them seem to be running to be -- maybe to be a candidate member, i guess. ron desantis has that he doesn't want to be vice president. i have no on idea on earth what mike pence is running for. that's a separate question, for a separate block. but they to think the electorate is going to wake up today, and there's no evidence of this, and think, you know what? he's got too much baggage. and the republican accountability -- that group is running as that say -- who knows? but the electorate has not done that today. so they're either wondering that, when they, they might wake up in, say you know what? ron desantis doesn't have as much baggage. i'm going to pick him. or they are running to be his running mate or a cabinet position, it seems. >> and if you are not running for president, if you are republican in congress that is trying to just survive this, the answer, other than impeach biden, i can't comment on the indictment is, leave town. >> yeah. >> house republicans -- the house went into recess one day early. and the conventional wisdom is that they did so so that they wouldn't actually have to answer questions about the indictment. >> of course! because reporters are everywhere in the hallway asking questions. and this is such an important point. i said this earlier today to my team. they never leave early. it's not just that they left a day early. they are always there late. because, typically, they are negotiating something, like a spending bill, a component of appropriation, some other piece of legislation someone wants to get on. it's always a grinded to august when you are on capitol hill, because it never feels like it's ending. and now they're, like see you later. >> we have, how many different appropriations bills before we have to pass before the government -- okay, by! >> -- >> unbelievable. jen psaki, pulling triple duty, such a good friend. thank, you my friend. the host of "inside with jen psaki", which, of course sundays at noon on msnbc. thank you so much for your energy and wisdom and appropriations bills before we have to pass before the government -- okay, by! >> -- >> unbelievable. jen psaki, pulling triple duty, such a good friend. thank, you my friend. the host of "inside with jen psaki", which, of course sundays at noon on msnbc. thank you so much for your energy and wisdom and brilliance. we have one more story for you so, you've got the power of xfinity at home. now take it outside with xfinity mobile. like speed? it's the fastest mobile service around. with the best price for two lines of unlimited. only $30 bucks a line per month. that's hundreds in savings a year when you wave bye to the other guys. save hundreds a year over t-mobile, at&t and verizon. and now, trade in your current phone, >> okay, it's a good chance and get up to $1000 off the new galazy z flip 5 and z fold 5. that, wherever you are right, now it is hot. this is what you would have been seeing if you were on the highway on minnesota on tuesday, the pavement little thoroughly buckling from the extreme heat, which is not something that you want to drive on. if you were in arizona, you might know that hospitals have kept their freezers stocked with ice to fill up inflatable beds to cool down patients who have overheated. this is not a normal thing. some hospitals in the state or even using ice filled a body bags to cool down patients. again, very much not normal. and it is all tied to the fact that, in arizona, there have been over 25 consecutive days of temperatures over 110 degrees. in fact, it has been so hot in that state that doctors are seeing a spike in patients who were burned after falling onto the pavement from heat exhaustion. the situation is so dire that maricopa county medical examiners office has brought in additional refrigerated coolers to hold bodies because they are concerned about a surge in the number of heat related deaths. more than 180 million people across this country are living under heat alerts today. and against this backdrop, people being burned by the scorching earth as they collapse from heat exhaustion, against that backdrop, republicans in the house are poised to make the cuts to the very programs aimed at combatting the devastating effects of climate change. joining me now is david wallace wells, opinion writer for the new york times, and author of the uninhabitable earth. david, thanks for being here tonight. i kind of wonder what you make of the political disconnect between these constituents who are feeling some of the worst effects of climate change and their representatives, who are doing everything in their power to undo the measures that have been put in place to mitigate the worst effects of climate change. >> i would like to think that project 2025 plan that you are mentioning, about undoing all the climate legislation -- i would like to think that that is rhetorical posturing. it doesn't seem to me to be a morally serious response to the state of the world or the state of the country at the moment. i simply don't want to believe that it is possible to be a serious effort at legislating. and i would like to believe that, if a serious effort were made in that direction, voters would punish their leaders for it. this is a very, very extreme and even scary time in the country for weather disasters. and the temperatures are really off the charts. we are seeing an extreme heat wave that was unthinkable, according to climate scientists, just a few years ago, now being perhaps a once a decadeand -- a little more frequent than that because, last year, more than 100 million americans were under heat alerts too. and last summer, in europe, 61,000 europeans that because of the heat. so, we are headed to some quite scary territory. and any efforts to peel back our progress on climate mitigation, i, think is deeply, deeply irresponsible. and i would like to think the country's eyes are open enough to see that clearly, no matter what political persuasion the voters are. >> you would hope that that would be the, case right? because the effects of this heater so palpable everywhere. red states, blue states -- it doesn't matter what your political persuasion. as you can see when the sidewalk is buckling. you understand what it is like to walk out to 110-degree temperatures 125 days in a row. and i wonder if that reality of what constituents are feeling is a thing that shakes people use of these ridiculous partisan affiliations that prevent them from seeing the obvious, which is that climate change is here. having said that, david, we are also in a vicious cycle, as the washington post points out, which is that, as the heat waves ramp up, we burned more fossil fuels. the air conditioners do not power themselves on solar yet. or, mostly -- and we are consuming more gas than we ever have before. is there an inch to that vicious cycle insight? or are we destined to exacerbate the conditions that are putting us here to begin with? >> i think in the relatively medium term we can say, that yes, we should be getting much cleaner electricity from the grid so that when we turn on our air conditioners we won't be drawing on fossil fuels. i think that date will be at different points depending on where you live in the country, but over the next decade or so i think it will be true for most, if not all of the country, that using air conditioners in times of extreme heat won't also be making the problem worse for future generations at the same time. and we have seen already, in many parts of the country, that, in fact, as the additional capacity of renewables that has been added just over the last couple of years, that has enabled grids that would otherwise be buckling under the demand, actually stay online -- and so we would probably, in an alternate universe, where we hadn't been rolling out renewables as quickly as we have the last couple of years -- we probably would also be seeing a bunch of blackouts in a summer like this. and that is really quite scary because all those people who wouldn't have access to air conditioning -- it makes the heat even more intense and even more potentially lethal. so, on some level we already have renewables to thank for a slightly softer experience of this intense summer. i would like to think that, five years from now, or ten years from now, we would not even have to think in terms of that actually bargain. because all of our -- at least nearly all of it would be clean. but we are not there yet, which means, for now, every time we do flick on the switch, we are still inflicting a cost and imposing a burden on the future. >> local officials, including mayors from around the country want these heat extremes to be categorized as a federal disaster. is that the right call, given the fact that this is, in all likelihood, going to be an ongoing situation for us to be grappling with? >> my own feeling is that most of the measures that are going to be taken in response to these hazards are going to be initiated locally. it would be nice to have those officers and those officers well-funded. it would be nice to know that they have the support of the federal government. but it's not primarily, i think, going to be a federal response -- it's gonna be a local response. what we really need is an understanding at all levels from a rhetorical, through the political, down to the individual, that we are living in a very different world. and we are not going to be able to respond to the threats of this new world in the same way or at the same scale that we responded to threats of the past. and we need every policymakers and every leader at every level to understand that quite clearly clearly, to talk to constituents about it quite clearly, quite frankly, and to make medium and long term investments in the infrastructure of 2030 or 20 -- can handle the actual weather of 2030 or 2035, and we don't find ourselves standing at this incredibly horrifying gap between what our communities can adapt to and can endure, and what they can't. >> david wallace-wells, thank, so always, for your time and thoughts, david. really preceded it. that is our show for tonight. and a quick note to all of you heard that last block, will hurd, he's of co r

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