Forward. You see, Donald Trump is stuck in the past. But its like i say to my husband, doug, when he leaves his phone at the chilis. We are not going back you know, Trump And Vance are weird. All right . They want the government to control what you do in your bedroom, what books you read. You know, in minnesota, we have a saying, mind your Damn Business we also have another saying in minnesota, my nuts froze to the park bench. They say that me blaming the democrats for inciting violence is the pot calling the kettle black. Frankly, i didnt know the kettle was black until very recently. I thought the kettle was indian. Then it decided to turn black. I miss Joe Biden oh, joe. We miss Joe Biden, folks. What we wouldnt give to have him stand next to me and be old. We had this in the bag, but then they did a switcharoo and swapped Out Biden with kamavala. Hello, it is me, Jd Vance. How much do you love Donald Trump . He told me, youre like a son to me. I dont like you, and im stuck with you. Im sure you heard what the liberal media has been saying about me. Im a creep. Im a weirdo. What the hell am i doing here . Im getting this crowd hot woo. A lot of people forget im president. Including me. Folks, we still have work to do, no joke. I am being serious right now, come on. Guess what . By the way, the fact of the matter is, the rich dont pay their pair share. They have to pay their fair share. We have to build back the better, build back the better, the best, cant believe its not butter thank you, Joe Biden. Thank you so much. I just want to say, thank you, Joe Biden for putting country first and handing over the reins. I didnt want to Saturday Night live with an extended cold open to kick off its 50th season. Maya rudolph reprising her portrayal of Vice President Heart race. So good. Jim gaffigan taking on governor tim walz. So good, right . Oh, my gosh. They all really were. Donald trump and Jd Vance. A cameo by Dana Carvey as president Joe Biden. So good. It was fun. Good Morning And Welcome to Morning Joe. It is monday, september 30th. With us, we have the host of Way Too Early, white House Bureau Chief at politico, Jonathan Lemire. U. S. Special correspondent for Bbc News, Katty Kay is with us. And Nbc News national Affairs Analyst and a partner and chief political columnist at puck, John Heilemann. In a moment, well get to major developments out of The Middle East following israels killing of the leader of hezbollah. Richard haass and admiral James Stavridis are standing by with their analysis. First, five weeks to go until the November Election. Former president Donald Trump spent the Weekend Campaigning in several key Battleground States and used extreme and dark rhetoric to attack his opponent, Vice PresidentKamala Harris. Really is doubling down, if possible. I think its a meltdown. I dont think you call it a double down. I mean, ill let you say we can play the clips. Again, even republicans are attacking him. As Jonathan Lemire said, you know, quietly, theyre getting really worried right now. He reiterated his pledge to go after people who cheat in the election. He said one violent day of policing will end crime in america. And continued to push misinformation about haitian immigrants in springfield, ohio, in addition to some very odd tangents, i guess more of the weave. Take a look. Kamala is mentally impaired. If a republican did what she did [ applause ] if a republican did what she did, that republican would be impeached and removed from office. Rightfully so. For high crimes and misdemeanors. Joe biden became mentally impaired. Kamala was born that way. She was born that way. And if you think about it, only a Mentally Disabled person could have allowed this to happen to our country. Anybody would know this. Theres something wrong with kamala, and i just dont know what it is. But there is definitely something missing. You know what . Everybody knows it. Shes a stupid person. Stupid person. I dont care. [ applause ] i dont care. If they didnt cheat, i wouldnt even be here today. You know why . I wouldnt have to campaign. Im here only because they cheat. They cheat in this state, especially in philadelphia. I mentioned a couple other areas. For the most part, philadelphia is out of control. Detroit is out of control. Atlanta is out of control. Places are out of control. Out of control. Because if there was no cheating, if god came down from a high and said, i am going to be your Vote Tabulator for this election, i would leave this podium right now because i wouldnt have to speech. We wouldnt have any problem. We have to have a landslide because they cheat so damn much. If we win and when we win, were going to prosecute people that cheat on this election. And if we can, well go back to the last one, too. If were allowed. But were going to prosecute people so at least they know thats going to happen. You know, these are smart people. Theyre not so stupid. But they have to be taught. Now, if you had one really violent day, like a guy like mike kelly, put him in charge, congressman kelly, put him in charge one day. Mike, would you say, right here, hes a great congressman. Would you say, mike, that if you were in charge, youd say, please, dont touch them, dont touch them . Let them rob your store. All these stores go out of business, right . They dont pay rent. City doesnt have money. Its a chain of events. Its so bad. One rough hour, and i mean real rough, the word will get out, and it will end immediately. End immediately. You know . Itll end immediately. The majority of the school cannot speak english in ohio, springfield. They cant speak english. Theyre taking over the schools. Theres nobody that can speak english. And the mayor is looking for interpreters. Isnt that wonderful . How can this happen . Remember, theres a hat thats made that sells like crazy. Oh, theres a fly. Oh, i wonder where the fly came from. [ laughter ] see, two years ago, i wouldnt have had a fly up here. Changing rapidly. We cant take it any longer. Two years ago, i would not have had a fly up here, but things are changing rapidly. I mean, this is republicans obviously are concerned about this. For good reason. Theyre talking about how hes doubling down. Of course, they usually whisper. They usually whisper these things. I wrote some of these notes down. Shes mentally impaired, he says, to the crowds applause. Nice crowd. Shes Mentally Disabled, he says, to crowds applause. Nice crowd. Shes a, quote, stupid person. This actually, John Heilemann, this actually has republicans doing something republicans never do. New york times shows republicans are actually being critical of Donald Trump. Yeah. Republicans Fault Trump over insults to his rival. Front of the national section of the New York times. This is Larry Hogan, who is Running for senate. Thats insulting not only to the Vice President but to people that actually do have mental disabilities. Ive said for years that trumps divisive rhetoric is something that we can do without. Lindsey graham also critical of Donald Trumps statements this weekend. Representative tom emmer, a Minnesota Republican who is helping Jd Vance for the upcoming debate, tried to distance himself. He said, i think we should stick to the issues. Yet, here he goes. John, the question answers itself, i guess. If she were so, quote, stupid, if she were, quote, so mentally impaired, quote, Mentally Disabled, why did she destroy him in a debate for 90 minutes, destroy him, and so much so, he refuses to debate her even on Fox News. Thats number one. If she had this mental condition from birth, why did he give her thousands of dollars in 2014 for her political campaign when she was Running for the united States Senate . Joe, i appreciate that you are interrogating this in this rational way, which is deserves to be interrogated on the rational level in some ways. Of course, because we should hold him to account. But i think part of the dark he announced these speeches would be dark, right . He literally started a couple of them this weekend, lemire, where he said, this is going to be a dark speech. Then he proceeds to uncork the series of these speeches, put them all together. It requires no particularly sophisticated or subtle decoding to see what kind of the common through line is of all these speeches. Theyre extraordinarily racist, and their racist top to bottom. You picked out, joe, a thing i think fits into that rubric. He says, you know, Joe Biden was mentally turned mentally impaired, but Kamala Harris was mentally impaired from birth. You know, she also was, you know she had the racial makeup since birth. Thats the difference between Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. One of them happens to be white. One of them happens to be black. If you go through his comments about where the corruption is, every single place he names where terrible things are happening, things are being stolen, where is the crime the worst . Where is the election being stolen . Where are terrible things happening . Just by happenstance, they happen to be places like philadelphia and milwaukee and cleveland. Every one of them a major urban center of america thats marked, especially in his bases mind, as being overRun by people of color. Of course, the haitian Immigrant Thing has always been racist, but blatantly, outrageously racist. He continues to hold on to that, despite all the debunking of it and so on. I raise this all just to say, some of us on this show, you, others, mika, people at this table, worried or foresaw that when Kamala Harris became the nominee, we were going to have we were likely to have, given Donald Trumps we would have a racist election, more so than before. Donald trumps speeches is a way of talking about whats going to happen, which is, its going to be a brutal, racebased assault on her, her supporters, that part of the democratic party, the coalition of the democratic party. It has been building over these last few weeks as he has floundered. His base, most grotesque comments are coming to the surface. Its ramping up. Itll be a big part of his Closing Argument in this campaign. Lets go through a little more of this. He also suggested that some of the migrants would break into your house and, quote, slit your throats, suggesting, without evidence, that migrants are responsible for more crime. There is factchecking here. He suggested the 13,000 migrants who have Come In, accused of crimes, are all blamed on the biden administration, when, of course, stats show that many of them came in while he was in office. Also, many of them are still in prison. Its not like theyre Running around committing more crimes. Speaking of crimes, he did suggest that there should be an hour of violence, which sounds like the plot of the movie the purge, which is deeply dangerous. Again, we know how his words have inspired violence before, including on but not limited to, January 6th. Certainly his followers are hearing what hes saying. You see it on the screen here. Monsters, vile animals, saying migrants want to rape, pillage, and kill. Deeply offensive rhetoric there. Of course, as john and joe just mentioned, signaling out minoritymajority cities, suggesting his opponent is mentally impaired. Once again, katty, calling for his political opponents to be jailed. Suggesting anyone who opposed him in 2016, 2020, 2024, who might be trying to, quote, rig the election, should be prosecuted. This is an extraordinarily dangerous Closing Argument and vision for america. Yeah. The interesting thing, i guess, against all of this is that the polls are as tight as they are. Gene robinson in his column this morning is asking that question. Why is it so tight . I think while Kamala Harris has the momentum and she is a little bit ahead in most of the polls, if you took an aggregate of them, its really a Neck And Neck race. If you believe the polling, and we dont know if it is reflective of all the people who might end up voting for trump as they did in 2016 but arent telling pollsters that. One area Kamala Harris seems to have caught up with trump is on the economy. Trumps advisors wanted him to focus on the economy, just talk about the economy. That, they say, as the way for him to get ahead. He hasnt done that. The area he is talking about comfortably is immigration, race, and migrants. If you look at the polling, that is where he still holds the strongest lead. His Lead Hasnt eroded on the border and on immigration at all. If you look at particularly polling around hispanic voters and latino voters, they seem to have flipped on the issue of immigration. You wonder whether Donald Trump is actually driving that polling that shows hes still strong on immigration by keeping talking about this, whether hes tapping into something that is new in the electorate, where, clearly, there is a much more conservative approach in the electorate towards immigration and hes tapping into that. I dont know if its even that calculated. It is his Comfort Zone, and thats what hes talking about. You look across the polling, and that is still where he has his strongest hand. I dont see any reason to think hes not going to carry on, beating this drum for the next few weeks. John heilemann, a couple things. First of all, immigration has been an issue since 2016. Time and time again, its been the dog that hasnt barked. Maybe in specific house races, but nationally, it just hasnt. If you look at polling, and if youve looked at polling, his specific positions on immigration, theyre far more extreme than most importants. Americans. It is a lot of noise, racism, and hatred. Not so sure it is going to translate into a victory. As you know, if you ask the Harris Campaign how theyre feeling about the election right now, theyll go, you know, theres sort of a quiet confidence. But theyre like, you know, were tied. Were going to have to work hard if we want to win. You talk to the trump campaign, theres this, like, arrogance, where theyll tell you, oh, weve got it. We have so many pathways to 270. Were fine. The fact is, they might want to get that message to their boss. Because we all know Donald Trump. Donald trump doesnt talk that way when he thinks hes ahead. Donald trump, the more he sees harris catching up in the polls, going ahead in the polls, the more he sees data that shows the Trend Lines are breaking in his direction, the more hostile he gets, the more racist he gets, the more xenophobic he gets, its there. That is his tell. Yes, it is. I mean, entirely his tell. I would add, i mean, i dont think Donald Trump has any deep sense of what some of the more interesting, underlying demographic shifts going on in the polling are, but it is the case that what we are seeing right now, if you look at all the polling, and theres a ton of it out there now, but underneath the surface level consensus, which is that the race is incredibly close and we could be headed for maybe the most one of the tightest elections in the modern or any American History, at the electoral College Level at least, is this interesting trend toward racial depolarization in what were seeing in terms of support of the two candidates. Which is to say, Kamala Harris is performing better right now with white voters than Joe Biden the final results of Joe Bidens election in 2020, than Joe Biden did with white voters. Shes doing a little worse than Joe Biden did