Domestic Terror Threat posed by fringe conspiracy theories. And the jawdropping scene in green land as the sea rises and massive ice sheet melts. All in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Amidst all the angsty hand ringing about the democratic firing squae ing squad in the l of debates, there is something more interesting happening on the ground among republicans. In the last week three texas congressmen decided to call it quits, and that includes one of the most politically skilled and able members of the House Republican caucus, will hurd. He is one of only three republicans anywhere in the Hillary Clinton district that managed to survive the 2018 blue wave. He represents 800 miles of border with mexico. Hes the only republican African American in the house, and him saying goodbye is quite simply a huge deal. Abbie livingston, the Texas Tribune leader who covers texas, and you should definitely follow tweeted my phone is absolutely exploding with texts and republican operatives reacting to the retirement. All have a word i dont usually use on this forum and my mother highly disapproves of, but it rhymes with duck. Heres what it means about texas. Republicans already lost two congressional seats in 2018, and for years lib rams have been crying wolf about texas turning blue, yet it never happens. Last time around beto orourke only lost the statewide senate race to ted cruz by less than three points. And Harris County, which includes part of the houston suburbs went hard for orourke. The map looks pretty, but all those cities where a lot of people live are very, very blue. Now were seeing this in all these suburbs that republicans have counted on in the past as well. Despite the blue wave in 2018, there were few representatives in close races who managed to hang on. But now in just the past little stretch of time, two of them, will hurd and pete olson are retiring because frankly, i can think, they can read the writing on the wall. This is not just a story about texas. This is a story about the kinds of voters donald trump is alienating, that trumpism is alienating. We have all read the stories about the White Working Class across the greater industrial midwest who show up to trump rallies in cincinnati, the people who say, swing at 61yearold trump protesters. The people who cut tshirts on their baeds, the people who like to chant send her back, but say of congresswoman ilhan omar i dont want her stinking muslim crap in my country. We all know there is a significant portion of the country that that appeals to, that trumpism appeals to. It was a key part of trump winning a narrow Electoral College victory, despite losing by three million votes. But, and this cannot be stated enough, there is a much larger part of the country that trumpism alienates. Yes, the scales are tipped in trumps direction thanks to the Electoral College, but its still a real problem for him. What is happening in texas is will hurd and pete olson realizing their constituents dont like donald trump, and reelection is practically impossible because they are stained by the president. Thats what i think were seeing. Will hurd would probably win reelection without donald trump. So would pete olson. The culture war that donald trump is waging is polarizing the country. As much as we focus on the people that trump is energizing, there are even more people who used to be gettable republican votes that he is deeply alienating. Software programmers in dallas suburbs, chicanos along the rio grande who are not in any way liberal. Heck, george w. Bush won texas hispanics. Those are gettable votes the gop or at least they used to be. But running around spewing racist rants of people of color, congressman had his house being broken into, being so much of a bigot that people thought was a racist, it does cost you something. And the cost is what youre seeing happen in places like texas. Joining me now former republican congressman ryan costello. He chose not to run for reelection in 2018. Natalia salgado, an organization that encourages Voter Participation and jelani cobb, staff writer at the new yorker and professor at the school of columbia journalism. Let me start with you since you lived this. I sure did. If you were still in congress, when donald trump goes in front of a rally and people shout send her back. When the president says taunting about Elijah Cummingss broken in to, what position does that put you . . No matter how much you speak out, i think we were in twanlt where if you oppose trump, and maybe youre a republican or an independent or independent leaning democrat, no matter what your republican member of congress would say as a rebuttal or as an objection to that, it almost didnt matter. Criorrect. What are you going to do . Its a slippery slope. Thats why thats the challenge. I might also add, were talking about the retirements. Now were going into august where everybody gets to go home, and these questions multiply over and over and over again. Your group focuses on mobilizing voters that are on the other side of the trump equation, right . Largely people of color, black and brown voters. And thats part of the story here too. There is some alienation among white voters in the suburbs and elsewhere, all through the country. We should be clear. Its not geographically limited. There are white people in rural areas who find it gross the president is doing this. What effect do you think it has on mobilization and your ability to organize . Look at the numbers that we have on the ground, right . We have the largest number of registered black voters in texas more than any other state in the country, right . We had 831,000 texan latinos, more texan latinos came out to vote in 2018 than did in 2014. So we have this rising majority, not just in texas, but nationally. And i think what trump is underestimating, he thinks his fearmongering is giving his folks the sort of energy and air that they need to go into 2020, but he is underestimating our side. Right. He is underestimating what black and latinos can do when we come together and when we organize. And can i one more thing . The sort of our political home has so much transitioned from the Democratic Party and is so much more attune to organizations that are on the ground doing the sort of local organizing. These are folks that are there year round. Right. Knocking on doors, talking about issues, not just candidates, but about issues that our people care about. The amount of organizing that went into texas before beto. Obviously beto had run a very Good Campaign and he really worked his tail off and he went to all the counties. But in places like Harris County slr , there have been groups on the gr very, very hard on precisely those constituencies. Thats exactly right. Texas organizing project through nine electoral cycles basically went in and took a republican stronghold and converted it into a democratic stronghold, right . So when beto came in on his white horse, all this fruit was ripe for the picking. He ran a very good race. If you look at the numbers, to me texas is so important. Its not just about texas, its about the changing shape of the coalitions, right . Romney wins texas by 16 points. Trump wins it by only 9. Now cruz beats beto by three. That is an arrow pointing in the wrong direction for texas republicans. Sure. And its also kind of representative of all the things weve seen across the south. You remember we think back. Georgia too. Well certainly georgia. You think 2008 about how much of a shockwave it was when obama won north carolina. Not only was this a viable African American candidate, it was a viable African American candidate winning a republican state in the south. And so this has been kind of the kind of slowmoving wave for a long time. The other thing about this i think is interesting, though, if you think about what we saw on the kind of early wave of trumpism where anyone that kind of stood up, especially in the republican side was vulnerable. The way he taunted jeff flake. You cant win if youre not 100 aligned with me, and so on. What were seeing is kind of the flip side of this. You remember when the lee atwater tape, the famous lee atwater team, the famous way he talks about evolution and race, how people use overt racist language and how they move into more subtle coded. It goes from the n word to then youre talking about tax cuts is the trajectory. There was a reason for that. There was a reason that people made that evolution, because there were people who might tolerate but they would not stomach the overt gross forms of it. That was a smart thing to do. Exactly. This is what trump is saying. Its kind of a boomerang effect that now people wow, youre talking about baltimore. Maybe i dont like Elijah Cummings. Maybe i think mostly the problems are selfinflicted. But i cant really think of myself as a good, fair person if i cosign this kind of foolishness. You know, i want to play a little bit, he is now doing this riff about how terrible americas cities are, which again i think is pretty explicitly racially coded. I want to play the riff about how the places in america that he is, again, theyre his constituents as much as theyre anyone elses, how terrible they are. Take a listen. You sear our inner cities. We spend billions and billions and billions for years and years and years, and its stolen money, and its wasted money and its a shame. The homicide rate in baltimore is significantly higher than el salvador, honduras, guatemala. I believe its higher than give me a place that you think is pretty bad. Give me a place. The guyayn. I believe its higher than afghanistan. The conditions in Nancy Pelosis once great city of San Francisco are deplorable. Look at los angeles with the tents and the horrible, horrible disgusting conditions. You must have a democrat mayor. Do you have a democrat mayor . I mean, this is untolerable. Its indefensible, right . Because we all look at that and we think to ourselves this is just an indefensible way for the president of the United States to talk. Im not here defending it. Im not saying you have to. If you can just agree. What am i going to say . I am literally Left Congress so i wouldnt have to. Can i add one thing here, though . This is what happens when you turn off your critical faculties. These are the same people who loved him because they felt he was empathetic toward these places where white mens Life Expectancy was declining in part because of opioid abuse. You could go through a long moralistic taunting rant where these places where people are using fentanyl and places where there are no jobs and why havent you moved some place and get work. You could do the riff about those places. So as the republican, right, the Jack Kemp Paul ryan sort of lets have an urban agenda. Lets go in the city. Lets go workforce development, reform the education system. There is a lot of things republicans can and should be doing for the longterm health of the party. If we do not have a twoparty system that is competing all across the country against one another, we have a marketplace of ideas that is held hostage by one party or another. The bigger problem to me is forget the inner city as its called. The bigger problems for republicans are the suburbs. Whats remarkable is the metro areas. Barack obama i think won Harris County by 900 votes. Hillary clinton won by 100,000. So were not just talking about the city. And the city increasingly, the boundaries, i know this from my reporting in chicago, theyre very permeable. There are lots of suburbs of chicago that are very black and brown, that are very working class. They arent necessarily what we think of when we think of the suburbs as code for white. Lancaster, there was a New York Times article that came out recently. Its the sort of, like, not to use the cliche, but a melting pot. Yes. We have all the folks that are coming to lancaster back in your home state, right, places like that that are not going to are going to sort of come up. Theyre going to stand up against this sort of fearmongering. Theyre going to stand up against the hate. And, you know, at some point were going to turn around to the Republican Party and say where are you going to stand . Well, and i think the biggest challenge for republicans right now is in suburban america, in a lot of counties that are historically republican which is where i was born and raised, the Democratic Partys ability to organize has been on rocket fuel. As a consequence. Of trump. Its the style. Its not the substance its the style, not the substance. And that is a very difficult thing to overcome. You know, you can talk about Good Government at the local level, a the county level. People dont want the hear it. What about that . Right . Yes. And thats a very difficult thing to overcome. I will say one thing, though. In the case of trump, the style is the substance. Yeah, thats right. Thats what he is selling. Ryan costello, not talia salgado and jelani cobb, thank you, it was great. Thank you. Next, a reminder that political pressure can work on President Trump as he backs off from nominating a highly unqualified supporter to a top intelligence post. The end of the ratcliffe fiasco in two minutes. The music event of summer. Cma fest country musics biggest stars perform their hottest hits. And the first time ever. Lil nas x, Billy Ray Cyrus and keith urban perform the hit old town road. Cma fest sunday 87c on abc. And after the show s song, catch. Available only on xfinity. Just say brett young into your x1 voice remote. I agree with the chairman this morning when he said donald trump is not above the law. Hes not. But he damn sure shouldnt be below the law, which is where volume two of this report puts him. That was republican congressman John Ratcliffes star turn last month at the mueller hearing. His performance almost certainly is what got Donald Trumps attention and prompted the president to float ratcliffes name as a director of National Intelligence probably that was probably ratcliffes high point. Today he stepped down for consideration for the position because once people started digging into his background, well, apparently he lied about it a fair amount. The terrorism investigations that he claimed to oversee in the Eastern District of texas seem to be pretty hard to find. The 300 undocumented immigrants he claimed to arrest in a single day, as the Washington Post put it, he didnt. Saying of ratcliffe, quote, the name doesnt ring a bell. Ouch. He is supposed to tenure chief of the antiterrorism and National Security for eastern texas. As one tweeted, quote, that role doesnt exist. Senate republicans seemed lukewarm at best on ratcliffe, and his nomination came as Mitch Mcconnell faced some serious pressure for his failure to protect american elections while expressing his deep personal umbrage at being called moscow mitch. Today he is announced he is out. He weirdly blame and praised the press for ratcliffes withdrawal. You vet. I think the white house has a great vetting process. You vet for me. When i give a name, i give it out to the press, and you vet for me. Which goes to show that even in the era of donald trump, political pressure can work and gravity does still exist. Josh marshall of talking points memo and jennifer rubin. Jennifer, it does seem to me, weve seen this now a bunch of times. We saw with herman cain and steven moore as possibilities a the fed where a name gets floated and the backlash both external and internal does actually matter. Right. I think its indicative of two things. One, there is absolutely nobody in the white house now to tell him no or to dissuade him from these things. He sees someone on fox and its out of his mouth and on to twitter. And the second is that there are limits in the Republican Party in the senate on some of these critical nominations. They do care enough about the fed to make a fuss. They do care enough yep. The one security, National Security position that possibly could still have someone who is actually competent. Theyre not willing to criticize trump. Theyre not willing to call him a racist or call him incompetent, but they do have their limits, and every once in a while they put their foot down, particularly when you taunt the majority leader. And he really doesnt like being called moscow mitch. Moscow mitch is a term that would annoy him a lot if we use the term moscow mitch all that much. Well, i think to jennifers point which i think is quite astute, in some ways this episode to me is tremendously damning for congressional republicans, because as with Stephen Moore and herman cain, who they both torpedos. Yes. They do and can exert pushback against this president if they so choose. When there are children being ripped from their parents and people kept in horrible conditions and tons of racism spewing forth and corruption right in front, they choose not to push back on that. Yeah, no, look. As jennifer was saying, there are at least several senators who really care a lot about intelligence, National Security issues. Its not just a political issue for them. Its something that they see as like kind of their possession. Thats what theyre there for. A commitment to it. Yeah. And that was just a case of yes, he is a the guy had zero experience. It was ridiculous. It was a ridiculous nomination. It was a ridiculous nomination. And it sort of this whole episode made me think as much