Underway right now. Good evening once again, im stephanie ruhle. Tonight, in his First Oval Office address, President Biden made the case for the bipartisan debt ceiling bill. He spoke of an economic crisis averted, and reminded the nation that, without the bill, the u. S. Was in fact headed for a disastrous u. S. Default. Passing this Budget Agreement was critical. The stakes could not have been higher. They were extreme voices threatening to take america, for the first time in our 247 year history, to default on our national debt. Nothing nothing would have been more irresponsible. Nothing would have been more catastrophic. No one got everything they wanted. But the American People got what they needed. We have heard of an economic crisis, an economic collapse. I want to commend speaker mccarthy. You know, he and i, we and our teams, we were able to get along and get things done. The final vote in both chambers was overwhelming. Far more of our bipartisan than thought was possible. The Senate Passed the bill just 24 hours ago. President biden said he will sign it tomorrow and called the Deal Essential to economic progress. This morning, we learned a stunning 339,000 jobs were added in may, a huge number, and while unemployment did take up slightly, it remains historically low. Meanwhile, there are new details related to reports of a recording that captured donald trump discussing a classified document about iran. The New York Times says the Justice Department issued a subpoena for that document. But trumps lawyers say, they cant find it. Earlier, my colleague ari melber asked one of trumps former attorneys about that recording. Heres what he said. It looks bad. But you have to really mattered up with a lot more facts. The tape alone is not something that is efficient. You have to match it up to an actual document. You know, what was he supposedly waving around . Was there any document there at all . Was this all just bluff . When you say, it was a bluff, just to be clear your best offense would be that he was lying about the document . Possibly. The doj has also been investigating mike pences handling of classified documents. That case is officially closed, with no charges, which brought this reaction from donald trump. Quote, when i am going to be fully exonerated, im at least as innocent as he is. But the classified documents case is not trumps only legal problem. The Washington Post now reports that the investigation into his alleged interference in georgias 2020 election has now been expanded to include d. C. And other states. We have a lot to cover cover, so lets get smarter with help of our lead off panel, and bringing my dear friend and colleague jonathan allen, Senior Politics reporter for nbc, peter baker, chief White House Correspondent for the New York Times, and cynthia alksne, former federal prosecutor. Peter, lets start with the president s remarks. He started and ended with bipartisanship. And remember, he ran as the bipartisan president. What were your takeaways from his remarks . Right, exactly. Well, Kevin Mccarthy and republicans tried to talk about how conservative goals they achieved in this legislation. President biden trying to focus on the idea that he was able to reach across the aisle, and solve a big problem. And that is central to his argument for reelection next year. Hes the one grown up in the room. Hes the mature bipartisan leader in a partisan era. And thats what he is stressing tonight, rather than, i got my progressive goals, or anything like that, although, of course he does think that he got a good deal for progressives in that. I think that tells you a lot about where he is at. He wants us to remember that he is of the school of normalcy, if you will, of politics. The idea that when republicans and democrats could in fact have a harsh debate but sit down at the end of the day and reach some sort of a compromise, he wants to know he is the one person he thinks can do that biden saying that neither side got everything that they wanted, jonathan, but america got what it needed. And, again, bipartisanship, bipartisanship does this remind us that joe biden, unlike republicans, does not have to worry about a primary in pleasing only his base . And hes already focused on the general . Such a great point, stephanie. I was on the campaign trail this week with ron desantis in new hampshire. One thing you are not hearing him talk about a lot as bipartisanship. What he is talking about was how republicans can win, and how he believes he is a winner who will be able to, essentially, push the republican line on the rest of the country. And so, yeah, absolutely, a huge contrast here. Biden has the luxury of not having to worry about a primary at all. Although, i will say this. He won whose primary in 2020 with very much this message. He gambled on this. Put all that money on the Roulette Table and last time. 81 this time going back again. He says, look, bipartisanship, putting all that money on a black red, pick a color. But, basically, he sticking with what he did last time. And the belief that that is actually where the sort of middle piece of the countrys end of that will win him reelection well, listen. He has been in Washington Post a long time. He that he was going to lower the temperature and, to peters point get back to normal. So, hearing him, in a president ial address, thank the republican speaker of the house, that was a kind of normal politics we have not seen since donald trump went down the escalator in 2015. How strange is that two here in 2023 . John . Oh. Stephanie, the trump years were so very different than anything we have seen before. Certainly, there were some bipartisan deals during the trump administration. But what we can mostly remember is donald trump assaulting his enemies in the other party, and in his own party, much more than anything he said that was sort of gracious about a leader in the other party. Here you have got joe biden looking across the table, basically, from Kevin Mccarthy and saying, look, this guy operated in good faith, saying the same thing about Mitch Mcconnell and, of course, the leaders Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer of the democrats and in the house and senate, respectively. This is very different. It is very joe biden. And its very much in the tradition of the United States, when a deal gets done. Look, as biden said this is not everything democrats wanted. He said he was not going to negotiate at all in the first, place that we just want to get a debt limit increase. What they ended up with was a suspension of the debt limit in quite a few things that the republicans wanted or at least, sort of, in the direction of what the republicans wanted. But for joe biden, its a huge policy victory, and also a political victory. Because, had the economy falling off a cliff as a result of a default, the person most likely to be blamed would have been the president of the United States, joe biden. Peter, wasnt this also a reminder, or even a realization that maybe that matt gaetz, jim jordan, Marjorie Taylor greene of the Republican Party, at least in the house, is not nearly as powerful as a lot of people who thought they were . This was a return to normal. Old school politicians classically negotiating right. It was a test of Kevin Mccarthy. And we knew, of course, that joe biden sees himself as a bipartisan leader. He passed a number of big bills in the last two years with bipartisan votes. We did not really know about Kevin Mccarthy. Because, of course, he won the speakership after 15 ballots, only by making concession after concession to the matt gaetz, Marjorie Taylor greene wing of the party. So, the theory was, okay, hes going to have to be beholden to their view, the much more Explosive View of politics rather than the deal making view. Instead, what he proved here is that he does actually, at least in this instance, he wanted to govern. He want to come up with a compromise even though it meant that he had to give up a lot of things that he would have liked and have his caucus wouldve liked. It does not necessarily mean hes going to do that going forward. But its a very interesting moment for him, where he can chose to basically say, im in charge of this caucus here, i can take some of the negative votes if i have two for my own hard right, in order to get the deal against me part way to the goals that parkway even if not all the way. Peter, it is a huge relief that weve avoided Economic Disaster. But we shouldnt celebrate this like its an enormous win. No lawmaker, from either party, should ever do anything that tips us into default. Given that, given what was achieved in the last 24 hours, where do you think the two parties are headed in terms of working together. Yeah, its a good question, you are right. The debt ceiling, ideally, is not used as a vehicle to impose budget restrictions. The debt ceiling is all about paying the bills, spending that they have already authorized. But you are right that President Biden originally said, no, im not going to negotiate on that. Turn around, and he did. Thats obviously not ideal from the perspective of Good Government advocates. On the other hand, nothing in washington, it seems, these days, gets done without a catastrophic consequence and a deadline attached to it, right . So, in fact, while it may not be ideal, it was the only way that the republicans sought to get biden to play ball. The question is whether they can get each other to come to the table on anything else without such a catastrophic end result looming if they fail to do so. That is a bigger question, and harder to see. We are going to have this fight all over again. They suspended the debt ceiling now for two years what we still have to have an appropriations bills, budget bills this fall. They are going to find out a lot of these things that we think are sort of settled in this bill all over again in just a few months. Or at least we are going to make it another few months. Cynthia, lets go to a new topic, former president donald trump. His lawyers are reportedly now saying they cannot find the classified document that he referred to on that tape. How big of a problem is it . And what does it mean for the Special Counsel . You know, this entire brouhaha about the tape and what it means is important. But it is not the be all and end all. First of all, its obviously important. Because it does show that trump is a liar. Because he has had inconsistent defenses. It does show that, on some level, he understands the concept that everything was not declassified. But remember, the classification issue the truth of the matter is, no classified documents are required for the elements of the crimes that we are talking about. Its espionage, retention, 1000 of one witness statements or obstruction. So, on some level, its not as important as, somehow, it might seem in this new cycle. Lets look at the other its a log on the fire. But lets look at the other logs on the fire that are already there. We already know that trump has lied to his lawyer about whether or not there were more documents. We know that he basically misled him on we are to look. We know that that lawyer has testified and turned over notes. We know that they moved boxes after the subpoena, that trump ordered the boxes removed after the subpoena. And they would not let bragg go ahead and see them and it was right before the doj came. We know that he has had all these contradictory defenses. He has had contradictory explanations. And we know that there was a tape, a Security Tape may have been tampered with that overlooked the area of the boxes. So, this is one more log on the fire. But it is a burning inferno ready to be indicted. I want to share, cynthia, what our legal analyst colleague, neal katyal, said about this. All sorts of ways that implicate him further. Its as if trump is to dumped even played, which was his defense. I mean, honestly, do you really buy this, that he could have been bluffing on this tape and it was never really even a document . Yeah, i buy that. Just because he every moment he has to have some excuse on apparently, on this moment, he had to have an excuse on milley, why milley was going after him. So, he made up something about milley. So, i buy it. But i agree with, neal katyal, he is his worst enemy. The best thing that could ever happen to this prosecution is if donald trump decides to take the stand in his own defense. Because all these statements are so contradictory and he is so terrible and he makes applies on the fly. And we saw that in the e. Jean carroll deposition. Nothing would be more fun to watch. And i think would be more devastating. But he is in huge trouble here. And the fact of whether or not this was, an document or a recipe for lemon squares, doesnt matter. Hes going to be indicted by jack smith for the espionage, the retention of records, the 1001 false witness statements, and obstruction, and i should come relatively soon. Devastating for our country that a former president of the United States would be in this position. Peter, you have Coverage Donald Trump extensively. What do you think about these developments . I think thats right. I think it shows that there is sort of zeroing in on this case. And im not a lawyer, obviously. But you talk to the lawyers, you hear again and again, as we just heard, that the prosecutors have a lot of elements of various crimes here. And its not like the mike nance case, contrary to what former President Trump said. Mike pence discovered documents on his own, returned them without question, did not obstruct any inquiry. Theres just not even a close parallel here. And what former President Trump has done, even by the fact that we already know, put in clear legal jeopardy and thats what we dont know. The question, i think he has timing. It is a question the deeper into the year we go the closer we get to the republican nomination debates and more political it might look. The more ammunition it gives to donald trump trying to discredit prosecutors against him as just being partisan witch hunts so, thats obviously something that the prosecutors are aware of. Its not, maybe, the first important comparative in their mind as they are building a case. But they have to be aware, obviously, of Public Opinion out there is part of the environment here too. Now, peter, didnt you hear all of this is going to come to a head Fourth Of July week, when every lawyer is trying to go to a guard the queue have a barbecue, maybe go to a few fireworks. Thats all when its going to come together. Cynthia, new topic. There is a report that the Fulton County d. A. Fani willis is brought in great Appearance Investigation outside georgia, to d. C. And some other states. What does that tell you . To the extent that she is getting information from these two organizations that did research for trump after the election, and they both told him there was no reason that the election was going to be overturned, that make sense to me, that she needs that for her intent requirements. I have to say, im not really a fan of her suddenly trying to investigate what happened in arizona or what happened in michigan or pennsylvania. She has got a complicated case enough. She has a case where she could introduce the raffensperger phone call. She could introduce giuliani lying to the legislature. She could introduce Election Workers being harassed. She could introduce the slate of fake electors that came after they already had three counts of the vote and the Republican Party had certified the election. And they were getting hiding from the press or trying to hide from the press she can introduce everything that was happening in Coffee County and the software. He has a big enough case as it is. And it is going to be complicated enough. And i do think timing matters. And it is timed, also, to get that underway, and get that case indicted. A lot in her own backyard. Cynthia alksne, good to see you. Peter baker, jonathan allen, you gentlemen know i love spending my friday nights with the two of you. When we come, back new details that you really have got to hear about on the final days of Jeffrey Epstein and a wellknown fund he tried to contact. But will the documents quiet the Conspiracy Theorists . The report who exposed it all is here. And later, it is friday night, of course. So, the nightcap is here to break down all the big stories of the week. And President Bidens bipartisan win, the Season Finale of succession the 11th hour is just getting underway on my favorite night of the week, friday. We moved out of the city so our little sophie could appreciate nature. But then he got us tmobile home internet. I was just trying to improve our signal, so some of the trees had to go. I mightve taken it a step too far. Chainsaw Revs tree crashes chainsaw continues daughter screams lets pretend for a second that you didnt let down your entire family. What would that reality look like . Well i guess i wouldve gotten us xfinity. And wed have a better view. Do you