good afternoon. i'm chris jansing live from msnbc headquarters in new york city. today another escalation in what is already a brutal 2024 presidential race. this time coming from hunter biden who says the right is trying to kill him in order to destroy his father. that accusation made in a rare interview after prosecutors filed a shocking new indictment. what his lawyer is saying and what this latest round of charges could mean as his dad tries to hold onto the white house. overseas, the u.n. calls the situation in gaza a, quote, spiraling humanitarian nightmare. >> people with open wounds and people stand in line for hours to use one shower or toilets. families who have lost everything sleep on bare concrete floors wearing clothes they have not changed for two month thes. >> the chilling new letter from the leading u.n. official on the ground who says they are, quote, hanging on by their fingertips. and the major controversy that just keeps growing after leaders of some of the country's top universities failed to unequivocally denounce genocide. the now viral video of that heated hearing on capitol hill and the growing calls from some students and top donors for them to step down. all that is coming up. but we begin with a stunning escalation of the legal peril for hunter biden. a brand new indictment in california. the justice department filing nine charges including three felony counts. prosecutors say among other things, the president's son failed to pay taxes, evaded an assessment, and filed a fraudulent form. the indictment also says rather than pay his taxes, hunter biden spent millions of dollars on an extravagant lifestyle that included drugs, escorts, luxury hotels, exotic cars and clothing. if convicted, he could face a maximum of 17 years in prison. the charges were brought by special counsel david weiss who has been overseeing the federal investigation into hunter biden. this is the second indictment against the president's son in just a matter of months. he's also facing federal charges of being in possession of a firearm while using narcotics. he pled not guilty in that case. his lawyer said in a statement, if hunter's last name was anything oerhan biden, the charges in delaware and now california would not have been brought, and this is hunter biden himself on a podcast. >> they're trying to destroy a presidency. and so it's not about me. in their most base way, what they're trying to do is they're trying to kill me, knowing that it will be a pain greater than my father could be able to handle, and so therefore destroying a presidency in that way. >> the white house has declined to comment, but it does raise the possibility of two trials while his dad is running for re-election. i want to bring in jonathan lemire, host of msnbc's way too early, "politico" white house bureau chief and an msnbc political analyst, barbara mcquade is here as well, former u.s. attorney university of michigan law professor, and msnbc legal analyst, and with me here on set, tom winter following this story very closely for us as you have been throughout. tell us more about these new charges, tom. >> right, so folks over the summer will remember they were supposedd to have a plea of guilty on these specific charges. that was going to be for two years and two misdemeanor counts. what's changed here, chris, is prosecutors are not only just saying, hey, look, there's a failure to file your taxes here, which is something that hunter biden has talked about and was ready to admit in open court. they take it a step further, and the justice department alleges not only did he file his taxes on time, but he too willful steps to evade paying the taxes that were due to the united states. that's where you start to see the crux of these allegations and the weight of these allegations which could lead to potential jail time for the son of the president. what they talk about is in certain years he was categorizing expenses that were, in fact, things that he was using for his own personal expenses. you can write down business expenses. you can deduct those from the taxes that you might pay for a business that you own. the problem is if those business expenses are, in fact, personal expenses, going to very deep detail in this indictment, talking about in one particular instance he was saying something was a golf club membership, when in fact it was a membership for a sex club. they use that to point to his willfulness in the conduct of these allegations, which of course is something that they don't -- they deny effectively. >> so barbara, when you look at that differentiation that tom just talked about from what was original and what is now, talk about the legal significance of that. >> yes, as tom said, this isn't simply failure to pay anymore. this is willful engaging in efforts to evade the payment of taxes. it includes fraud allegations and so that really takes it into a different category. also, the amount alleged here, when he was looking at misdemeanors, they said that the amount was something like $100,000 in unpaid taxes, we're now up to $1.4 million in unpaid taxes. and so i think he gambled when he decided to back out of that plea deal. there was no meeting of the minds, which is what the judge found, because there was the possibility of charges being brought later on down the road. but the consequence is, as is usually the case, it gets worse, and so those are the allegations that we are seeing here. i think one thing that's important, though, is what is in this indictment and what is not. there are some very egregious allegations about willful failure to pay taxes, no doubt. we aren't seeing anything about acting as a foreign agent of the government of china, or acting as a foreign agent of the government of ukraine. he's already paid back the taxes and the penalties, and so it would seem to me that it might be in his best interest to enter a quick guilty plea and move on and get this off the political stage. >> what are the chances that his lawyers are successful in doing what abby lowell has suggested, which is argue that the immunity provisions from his own plea deal remain in force since that part of the agreement was signed by a prosecutor. what are the chances that that happens? >> i don't think it's likely to succeed. it's an argument. he's made it, he's likely to make it in court, but the agreement that they had contemplated required acceptance by the court, and once the court refused to accept it, all the parties stepped away from this plea. if you wanted to go back and enforce it it could include that provision that charges could be brought in the future. i think that's the part he balked at with the possibility of a future trump administration bringing these charges again. >> so in lieu of that, what do you think the chances are based on your appearance and your knowledge, barbara, that there could be more conversations that reopen about some sort of plea deal, that this never actually goes to trial. >> i think it's highly likely. this happens from time to time. you know, parties try to work out a resolution. they think they've got one, and it stalls for whatever reason, and then usually the situation for the defendant gets worse. the value of plea deal is for the prosecution to go lenient, pull something back in exchange for that plea of guilty. now that we've seen this indictment filed and we see these additional consequences for hunter biden, if he goes to trial and is convicted, then i think it is in his best interests to negotiate a plea of guilty perhaps to one count instead of nine counts and acceptance of responsibility. he's already paid back the taxes, and so i don't think these charges bring -- you know, the statutory penalties are enormous. in truth, tax bases usually result in sentences of a year or less, so perhaps there is room for negotiation of even a plea without any prison time. >> tom, help us look back so that we can look forward. was the relationship that frayed and that's using a kind word, right? between the two sides that resulted in the other case plea deal. >> from july. >> yeah, from july going away. could it carry over or do you think knowing what happened there there is still a chance that they'll recognize that maybe one way to do this is to settle. that's the best possible outcome they're going to get. i know you can't read minds, but what's your knowledge of if i buy -- >> i think we have some reporting from our colleague sarah fitzpatrick who obtained a letter last night that was sent back and forth between abby lowell and the prosecutors who brought this indictment. and basically saying, look, you know, we want to engage with you. we want to have another discussion with you. we want to talk about these tax charges. by the way, it's a unique thing about tax charges in cases according to legal expert, and certainly barb can speak to this. you do have the opportunity to appeal to the department of justice to explain what was going on in your tax case. it's a bit unusual when it comes to some of these counts. effectively prosecutors saying you already had your chance. we spoke with you back in the spring. we had a long negotiation. we're not engaging with you again even if you have a new attorney, in this case abby lowell this time around. so it's very clear already that they were not interested in further discussions, that they were going to bring this indictment. we have no indication that the biden team was given any sort of heads-up. i'm not talking about the white house speaking specifically to hunter biden. no indication that they had any sort of a heads-up that this was coming. i think they learned about it from reporters. the white house says they were not told in advance as well, so i don't know how strong that relationship is to your question, chris, and i don't know if there's going to be a real -- you know what, let's all get together and work this out because i think they feel like they've been down that path before. so what will ultimately happen here, i think, still remains very much a question. and of course you have to look at -- looking at the indictment, the types of witnesses that could be called, the types of things that could come out in a trial that might be personally embarrassing to hunter biden, at a very dark and difficult time in his life, how that could impact a presidential election should that trial occur during the next year i think is something that will be cons as ll. >> which brings me to you, jonathan. this indictment lays out a split screen. prosecutors say they trace money that hunter biden took from his own company, 1.6 plus million in atm withdrawal aost 690,000 in payments to various women, almost 400,000 in clothing and accessories, 189,000 almost in adult entertainment. 214,000 plus restaurants and groceries, all while not paying his taxes they claim. president biden is not so much is mentioned in the indictment, but is there a condition in biden world that it could hurt him with voters? obviously democrats would prefer to draw attention to trump and his trials, not to hunter biden trials. >> there is far more concern about the weight it will have on joe biden the man, the father than it is joe biden the candidate running for re-election according to those in his inner circle. most in the biden campaign and white house don't think this will move the needle very much. there's no allegation here either in these criminal charges or in the investigation that the house republicans are conducting. there's been no evidence whatsoever that joe biden was involved with any of his son's alleged wrongdoing, and also to the point mentioned, this is narrow charges about taxes. it has nothing to do with some of the more outlandish claims of republicans who have yet to prove anything about hunter biden. it's clear what the republicans are trying to do here. they're trying to create a false equivalency between legal trouble with people of the last name biden and people with the last name trump. donald trump himself has been indicted 91 times. he is running for re-election. hunter biden's name is not appearing on any ballot. those close to the president believe that frankly some americans will be sympathetic, that they themselves have people in their lives who have struggled with addiction as hunter biden has so powerfully written that he has done, and we see how joe biden loves him. that is certainly, though, there are those close to the president who do worry about the toll this is going to take, the worry he's going to have about his son potentially going to trial or potentially pleading guilty and facing prison time, especially as he embarks on a gruelin campaign. >> a distraction to say the least for any loving parent. so jonathan, speaking of no evidence, the house ways and means committee chair jason smith said these new charges, quote, further confirm the need for congress to move forward with an impeachment inquiry of joe biden in order to uncover all the facts for the american people to judge. but i wonder, does this latest indictment work against republicans' argument that biden is corrupting the doj for his own benefit? >> no, i mean, that's certainly a bad faith argument from the congressman. we've heard these claims from other republicans before, upset that hunter biden wasn't being charged with more extensive crimes and pointing to that as evidence of some sort of cover-up ordered by either merrick garland or the president himself. i think we can look at it the other way. this president has said from the beginning he would not interfere with doj. could you imagine his predecessor donald trump standing idly by if donald trump jr. was charged even with some sort of track crime while donald trump sr. was in office, i highly doubt it. i think these arguments republicans are making are not going to carry much in the way of water, and we're going to hear, we believe as soon as next week, that they're going to officially vote to open up an impeachment inquiry. speaker johnson thinks they have the vote to do that. we don't even know that there will be enough votes to impeach president biden. heading down this path, i will simply say, some mainstream republicans have said to me in the last couple of days, they're really worried about this. we have seen other occasions where presidents' poll numbers go up after impeachment, certainly most famously bill clinton, but even donald trump's first impeachment, the one about ukraine, his numbers went up slightly afterwards. so this has a real chance to backfire on republicans in 2024. >> tom winter and barbara mcquade, thank you both, and jonathan, you're going to stick around for a bit. the united nations is making moves not seen in decades, and the secretary general is now pushing for a cease fire in gaza. warning of impending humanitarian catastrophe. we'll explain when we're back 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(avo) this holiday turn any samsung phone, in any condition, into a galaxy s23+ on us. and now add netflix and max to your plan for just $10 a month. only on verizon. inside gaza this morning, more signs of the horrors of an escalating war, among the many stories we're learning about today, that of a 13-year-old girl who lost her leg and 15 members of her family as well, including her parents and siblings. her aunt who now watches over her tells nbc news we try as much as possible not to talk about her father, but when we talk about her father, she loses consciousness, feels like a hopeless situation and screams. no matter what we do, it will never be possible to replace the presence of the mother and father. and just today in gaza, a huge explosion and large plumes of smoke were seen. the top u.n. humanitarian official says the plan to provide critical aid to civilians is in tatters. the u.n. security council is meeting today on a resolution calling for an immediate cease fire. already, the secretary general invoked article 99. that hasn't been used in half a century, but it allows him to call for a vote on any matter he believes threatens world peace and security. nbc's challah gor ra knee reports from tel aviv. gaza is on the blink of a full-blown collapse. what can you tell us from on the ground? >> reporter: we're hearing from thomas white who is with the u.n. relief agency inside of gaza who was saying essentially after dark the streets feel wild, that the whole gaza strip is on the blink of a full-blown collapse. as you mentioned, the u.n. is calling for a cease fire. this is a resolution introduced by the united arab emirates, but as a permanent member of the u.n. security council, the united states is expected to veto that. with that veto, the u.n. will not adopt that resolution. that is certainly the expectation. as far as the situation on the ground as we've been reporting, over 2 million people crowded into an ever shrinking strip of the gaza strip in the south, and those people who have moved to the south where they were told to go for shelter, for safety, oftentimes in this u.n. relief agency school system as well, they say they're being targeted by air strikes in that part of the gaza strip as well leading many to say nowhere is safe for them. some of the air strikes have hit rafah, so close to the egyptian border. that is the crossing that was used to release those initial waves of israeli and dual national hostages you might remember. so it is very, very deep into the southern part of the gaza strip. there is really no infrastructure to support any kind of life in the north, and as far as the medical system in the south, it is really at breaking point, people with just ordinary illnesses that are becoming chronic in some cases, whether they're digestive or skin conditions or diabetes or cancer patients are just not able to access basic health care, chris. >> nbc's hala gorani, thank you. i wanted to bring in ambassador elon pin kus, also with us is jonathan lemire. mr. ambassador, secretary of state antony blinken said there is a gap between what israel agreed to do in its military operations, which is prioritize reducing non-combatant casualties and the actual results we're seeing on the ground. is he right? >> yeah, he is right. i mean, secretary blinken, chris, in diplo english, or american diplomatic jargon basically said israel is losing credibility in terms of the promises they made to us, the pledges they have made, and not keeping them. and this pertains both to the management of the war, but also when we discussed this in a previous show of yours, also it pertains to the so-called post-war gaza day after, both euphemisms. the secretary is just one of three american officials. before hand secretary of defense lloyd austin who warned israel it's turning a tactical win into a strategic failure. and then came last week, last saturday, vice president kamala harris who outlined or sketched out a day after american idea, framework. it's not a plan but a framework, which israel dismissed and derided offhandedly. yeah, the secretary is right. >> the u.n. is warning of that humanitarian collapse in gaza, and you heard what hala just reported that there's no infrastructure to supp