fans are hoping for another surprises, like taylor's version album releases and after last night a talk of whether travis kelce will pop up on stage again. >> that is all well and good. but more ian rad nick for me. thank you for letting us end on that happy note. "deadline: white house" starts right now. ♪♪ howdy friends. aloha and namaste. it is 4:00 p.m. in new york city. i'm john heilemann in for nicolle wallace. we're t minus 72 hours and change away from the spectacle of sitting american presidents debating a former american president, the latter of whom just to spice things up, also happened to be a 43 four time criminal, a scoff law, with 34 scarlet f's across his wrap sheet. if donald trump gets his way, the first and maybe only presidential debate of 2024 this thursday in atlanta will be less lincoln douglas or even krend nixon than randy savage versus ricky the dragon steamboat. those are wrestlers for the record. the chain of events that led president biden to face off against a felon ran through the mush had been case brought against donald trump by alvin bragg. who has received a litany of heinous threats. threats that the manhattan d.a. office say are connected to trump's dangerous rhetoric. yet where he's facing grave legal peril, the wheels of justice appear to be grinding and spinning very slowly and possibly in reverse, where judge ilene cannon is at this moment hearing arguments in the classified documents case including over the question of whether to modify the bond conditions of trump's release and especially request from jack smith, quote, for a gag order limiting the former president's rhetoric about fbi agents involved in the case. that is a reference to when back in may trump, quote, twisted the meaning of boilerplate instructions to fbi agents about limits on their use of lethal force and accused the use of deadly force during the mar-a-lago search or as trump put it in a fundraising email, president biden was lock and loaded ready to take me out. now, that, that is precisely the kind of rhetoric and distortion that trump is known for and that why there is a request for a gag order in a withering filing ahead of today's hearing. quote, in late may, 2024, donald trump made a series of false public statements about the law enforcement professionals who conducted the court authorized search at mar-a-lago telling his audience that the fbi was out to kill him and his family. the quote goes on. trump knew that this was false and he intended that his comments would inflame his listeners. indeed, that was the whole purpose. there is no question that his statements were intentionally false and designed to inflame and anger his audience and that he knew that his statements would do so. every court to have examined the issue has recognized the threat caused by the long-standing and well-documented dynamic between trump's comments and the predictable response from some of his supporters. it continues, here, common human experience leaves no question of the imminently foreseeable harm posed by trump's knowingly false and inflammatory accusation of an fbi plot to murder him and his family. three of those words bear repeating. imminently foreseeable harm. that is just posed by trump's knowingly false inflammatory accusations and that is where we start this hour with former top officials with the department of justice and legal analysts, andrew weissmann, plus u.s. senator and co-host of how to win 2024, podcast -- claire mccaskle and david jolly. and we will join us from the courtroom as soon as she's able. andrew weissmann, i start with you as we all do, a platter of common courtesy and deference to your genius. what is going on in florida down there today. >> one of the things that people should know is the way that judge cannon runs her courtroom and in contrast to the judge merchan courtroom is that there are no laptops, there is no telephones, nothing that you could use to communicate. so that is why it is slower than when we had, you know, the ability to get immediate tweets and information from judge merchan's courtroom from the insiders who were there. so, we know that both on friday and this morning she heard an issue about the constitutionality of the appointment of the special council. that is an issue that has been decided by every court that has addressed it against the people challenging the appointment of special counsel, whether republicans or democrats. and then this afternoon is the very, very belated oral argument that the judge scheduled on, john, what you confirmed as the changing of the bail conditions to impose additional restrictions on what the former president can say. and that is when, also, when you think about how it is been addressed in d.c. and in new york, we have had a situation where the former president has needed to be under a gag order because of these, as you put it, his false statements that pose imminent harm to people either who are witnesses, jurors, court staff, or prosecution staff. so we'll see what judge cannon does. one thing i'm keeping my eye out for if she doesn't rule for the government here, i could easily saying this going up to the court of appeals to get reversed for a third time. >> andrew, i follow you relentlessly on twitter and i saw a tweet of yours that talk about the state of affairs in cannon's courtroom and you compared it to judge merchan. he ran a tight ship, right? well done. >> absolutely. first rate judge. >> first rate judge who ran a first rate courtroom. cannon not so much. here is the tweet. a tweet where you likened cannon's courtroom to being so backed up in this case, it is like planes over la guardia on a holiday. i will say it is a very new york thing to -- that shows your new york roots. for people in the midwest would say backed up like planes over o'hare. so it is the same. as you talk about ilene cannon, is the inescapable question, politically biased, bozo, or both? >> boy, it is like a game show where do you want behind the curtain or in the box. so, i actually think it is both. there is no question she's inexperienced. and she does not have the tools to handle a case that is this complicated. this is clear. there is -- everyone has seen that. we also do have the fact that the 11th circuit, a conservative circuit that she is in, reversed her not once, but twice. and those were conservative judges who just thought she was absolutely bonkers in terms of her rulings. and of course both times that she was overturned her rulings were for trump. it is not like she's inexperienced and sometimes she gets it right for trump and sometimes she gets it right or wrong for the government. they are always siding with donald trump and it is very, very hard at this point, to see her as being anything other than partisan. let me just give you one reason that i and other people are particularly perturbed about the timing of her scheduling this argument on the gag order. the government raised this issue almost a month ago with her saying that there is a real concern about danger to law enforcement from these false statements. and she initially rejected the filing. she said it needs to be refiled because you didn't -- yes, you can confer with the other side but i don't think you conferred enough. so she actually bounced the filing and said you need to confer enough. that was meaningless. because the other side didn't agree to it. they were never going to agree to it. they said they didn't agree to it. so that delayed it. and then she put it on a slow trajectory where we are finally here today having this heard. you could imagine, there -- the allegations are that law enforcement is being harmed here. there is a grave risk of harm. even if she thought ultimately she was going to rule against the government, you would want to hear that as soon as human by possible. it just shows such incredible cavalier attitudes about safety and those -- that cavalier attitude and that safety is what got her reversed twice in the 11th circuit where they said she was showing cavalier attitudes toward the national security of the united states. so, again, i think it is worth really keeping an eye on this. because if she did not rule for the government, this is one where it could easily go up on appeal. >> claire, andrew is perturbed. out in the show-me state, do you get perturbed or do you have a different word for that. >> well gobsmacked. i think the lawyers that are watching this and particularly the other federal judges that are watching this, are all like, what in the world. this woman has a serious gase of robe-itis and it is a disease that inflicted a federal judge once they get the lifetime appointment. they forget they are accountable to anyone. and even not accountable to the people who appear in front of them, the lawyers who appear in front of them. i'll give you an example how nuts this is. people file a friend of the court brief many times on various issues. typically they are only looked at and potentially maybe argued at the appellate level. this woman on an issue that has been litigated over and over again, about the constitutionality of a special counsel, she's letting people who filed briefs come in and argue in front of her. like she's a supreme court judge or something. it is just not -- it is just beyond weird. i mean, no question, it looks like she's in the tank. it may turn out that she's not. but the appearance of impropriety here not just with her timing and failure to act but the rulings she's made and as andrew said when you get reversed twice by a conservative appellate court, you start paying attention because no judge, no judge likes being reversed. even one who doesn't know what she's doing. >> david jolly, i come to you as the -- i believe the soul floridian, or at least florida resident on this panel and i won't make you try to defend all of the things going on in your state including in this courtroom. but i will read to you from the "wall street journal" and ask what you think about there. these days of hearings, hearing palooza. and here is a quote that i found gobsmacked was claire's word. a hearing on friday. judge cannon took the unusual step aof allowing a texas law professor and two other lawyers unaffiliated with the case to argue on whether the special counsel jack smith was unlawfully appointed. she cut off the law professor as he quoted a line from the spiderman comics and later nudged him to finish his argument. i do want to let you wrap up, she said. so she is basically letting the clowns into the courtroom and then shocked that they're wearing -- have bozo noses and fred winks. what say you about the state of the courtroom in your state. >> i think the greatest gift for ilene cannon is there is no cameras in the courtroom. it is clear to a lay person. she's unqualified for this case. maybe they are credentials prepared for her the bench but she's absolutely unqualified for this case. so how does she cover that. it seems she's saying well then i'm going to be exceedingly thorough. i'm going to take my time. i'm go toss listen to everybody. always politically knowing that that favors donald trump's fortunes if in the end he indeed is elected president. i think that the lightning bolt last week that came out said everything. that the senior judge, the chief judge suggested that she recuse herself and let a more experienced judge take the case and yet she went ahead and did it. i think another lawyering sign is in the jack smith filing you just read from, where it talks about the imminent threat, the crutch of his case is -- his argument relies not on law but he said on common human experience tells us that donald trump's rhetoric is in sighting violence. it is saying don't overthink or overjudge this, common sense would tell you there. and if she's paying attention to anything outside of her courtroom, she might realize that the common sense of america is looking at her saying what are you doing because it is obvious that you're unprepared for this moment. >> andrew, ty cobb, the lawyer not the baseball player to worked for donald trump and criticized him and has the most skplent excellent mustache known to man made an argument i would like to hear. let's play that. >> the worst thing that could happen to her is she could rule for judge on this and that would go to the 11th circuit and this petty partisan pre-madonna will be removed. >> he's mustache and beard of ty cobb now. what do you make of that notion, cannon is bending over backwards to favor trump could end up backfiring on her? >> i totally agree. ty cobb is an excellent lawyer. leave aside the way he dresses and his illiteration. his point here is absolutely right. this is an issue that is serious. you go into law enforcement, you are at the department of justice to take seriously threats to civilians, threats to law enforcement. if judge cannon knew what she was doing, she would put it to the trump team to say, isn't it a fact that what you said is false? and make them really defend on the issue of his why there is a knowing and imminent harm here. if she rules for trump and it is the kind of issue that the reason that you are in law enforcement is to protect people. the idea this would not be taken up to the 11th circuit seems really remote to me. i put myself in what would i do in that situation. you would do everything you can to protect people in law enforcement the way that you try to protect witnesses and jurors and the court staff. and this is a kind of thing that doesn't take a conservative or a liberal judge, it is sort of a bipartisan issue on the 11th circuit that this is kind of thing that will really show her incompetence both in terms of the substance or ruling and, as i mentioned, the timing of it. that she waited so long to hear this matter. >> andrew weissmann, i detect a certain kind of adisapproval for ty cobb's facial hair. you may have a problem with it but i do not. thank you for spending this time with us. the florida hearing is still ongoing. when we get any kind of reading, we'll bring that to you. in the meantime, the marquee political event of the 2024 presidential cycle is just days away. more than likely one night only spectacle given that one candidate has an incredible penchant for breaking the rules. it is a debate with huge implications for both candidates on the stage, no audience and new rules. we'll look at how this match-up will be different from what you remember in 2020 and god help us, it has to be better than that. and later in the show, it is two years since the decision to over turn the right to an abortion in this country. it was an earthquake of a decision. perhaps the most political consequential decision of our lye time and the aftershocks are still being felt today. how democrats an the biden white house plan to make women's issues an the courts a reason to show up in november. all of those stories and more when "deadline: white house" continues after this so, please, please, even though it is me here and not nicolle, don't go anywhere. olle, don't go anywhere i got the power of 3. i lowered my a1c, cv risk, and lost some weight. in 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