Transcripts For MSNBCW All In With Chris Hayes 20180223

Tonight the mind boggling fraud and Money Laundering charges are for Paul Manafort and rick gates and what it means to the Mueller Investigation and why the republican governor of missouri was just taken into custody by the st. Louis sheriff when all in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Forced by the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School to reckon with the senseless massacre that upended their lives last week, the gun lobby and the president they back as strongly as anyone they ever backed are trying to reframe the debate in terms that serve their own interests, offering up a proposal that would benefit the gun industry and avoid the root problem all together. Put more guns in americas schools. We have to harden our schools. Not soften them up. A gunfree zone to a killer or somebody that wants to be a killer, thats like going in for the ice cream. Thats like here i am, take me. But i think we need hardened sites. We need to let people know. You come into our schools, youre going to be dead. I want my schools protected just like my banks are protected, just like everything else. If that language from the president sounds familiar, its because nra chief wayne la pierre used the same exact terms almost word for word earlier today at conservative Political Action conference known as cpac. Our banks, our airports, our nba games, our nfl games, our office buildings, our movie stars, our politicians, theyre all more protected than our children at school. We drop our kids off at school that are socalled gunfree zones that are wide open targets for any crazy madman bent on evil. They all must come together to implement the very best strategy to harden their schoolsive including effective trained armed security. You hear that . Harden the schools, armed security, more guns. Always more guns is the solution to the problems that guns create. By treating School Shootings as a separate issue from the epidemic gun violence more broadly in this country, the nra and officials it promotes avoid addressing the one issue that sets the u. S. From the rest of the world. The sheer number of guns. The red line on the right is us. We have the highest rate of privately owned guns on earth by quite a long shot. The president , however, thats not enough. To him the solution is to arm teachers with more concealed weapons. I want certain highly adept people, people that understand weaponry, guns, fur they really have that aptitude. Not everybody has an achtitude for a gun. If they have the aptitude, i think a concealed permit for having teachers and letting people know there are people in the building with a gun, theyre not going to walk into a schoolful 20 of the teachers have gun bnz it may be 10 or maybe 40 . What id recommend doing is the people that do carry we give them a bonus. We give them a little bit of a bonus. Just take a second to think about a school where 40 of the teachers are Walking Around carrying guns. And think about what happens when theres a scuffle in a hallway. Just think about that for a second. The teenagers who survived the parkland shooting, they are cleareyed and sane about the problem and what it will take to solve it. In a listening session yesterday, sam zif confronted the president facetoface. I turned 18 the day after, woke up to the news that my best friend was gone. And i dont understand why i could still go in a store and buy a weapon of war an ar. How is it that easy to buy this type of weapon . How do we not stop this after columbine, after sandy hook . Im sitting with a mother that lost her son. Its still happening. And in a town hall last night with lawmakers and a spokesman for the nra, members of the Stoneman Douglas Community Left no doubt where they stand. Look at me and tell me guns were the factor in the hunting of our kids in our school this week and look at me and say you will work with us to do something about guns. You just told this group of people you are standing up for them. Youre not standing up for them until you say i want less weapons. Its not the loopholes. Its the problem that once you start looking at how easy it is to get around it, you would have to ban every semiautomatic rifle thats sold in america. Fair enough. Following up on that unexpected applause line, senator rubio tweeted later banning all semiautomatic weapons may have been popular with the town hall audience but a position well outside the mainstream. Polling does not support that claim. Twothirds of the public 67 support a nationwide ban on the sale of assault weapons according to newest quinnipiac poll. They couldnt have better with spokespeople than the students of Stoneman Douglas who refuse to waste time on the tired conventions of the gun debate thee inherited from previous generations. Instead they appear to be following an approach to wlar senator brian schatz outlined earlier today. Im normally interested in compromise. Not this time. I cant imagine a bill that would make a difference that the nra supports. We dont need to cut a deal with them. We needed to beat them. Barbara boxer a former congressman. Mickey, let me start with you. Does it feel to you like youre watching some sort of madness when you watch the president or Wayne Lapierre talk about this. It feels like im watching a lot of repetitive madness because when this happens over and over again, it happenses in colorado, it happens in florida. It happens in nevada. And these kids make more sense, are more sane than the people in congress who cant deal with this whoing are afraid to deal with a problem that is just eating us up alive. The cowardice in the congress and the idiocy in the white house are such a difference from the clear, hard voices of these young people who are standing up for whats rational. I should point out, are you a former Republican Office holder, member of congress for many years. You bed in leadership, correct . I did. Senator boxer, there is a cycle to this. There was a period of time in which democrats really led the charge on gun safety and gun regulation. It was seen as a winning issue. And things changed in the late 90s, 2000, people attributed al gores loss to the assault on the ban. Is that changing now . I believe it is. And i say that with a full heart because ive thought it before. When they murdered all those babies at sandy hook. But i think, Micky Edwards is right. How many times can we see the nra do the same thing over and over . Were not fools. Americans are smart. Whenever theres a horrible, horrific incident, shooting, slaughter, they lay low for a week. Then they quietly talk to their people that they really, theyre like the puppeteers. They talk to their puppets in Congress Like rubio, tell them however they can go. Then they might do 0 something cosmetic or maybe nothing at all and turn the whole thing on its head and beak say we all have to be armed. This is absurd. Theres a beautiful song called children will listen, written by steven sondheim. Those children in florida, we need to listen to them. They are the cleareyed ones. They are the ones who understand what it feels liking to go to school, be excited about your work, your learning, your friendships. Relationships with the teachers and have that all literally blown apart. We need to listen to them and do what the American People want. Youve laid out over and over again what some of those are. Some of those steps. And barbara, you know, if you stand up to the nra and you lose your seat, life goes on. There are things much more important, you know, to protect the lives of Young Americans than to say gee, i want to hold this job for no another two years. Its cool. You got it. Its, do you remember, barbara, when we were there and there was this proposal to ban plastic guns. Yes. Which was so common sense. And i voted for it and the nra attacked me. I sent their money back and i said im never again going to take another penny from this organization. Thats what we need. We need courageous republicans. Most of the democrats are on the right side of this, not all. I want to make a point though, micky. Youre so right. When i started out, california was a red state. Then it was purple, then blue. But in the days when it was a red state and i was in local office and then the house, i just put it all online like you did. They came after me, they still come after me. Im retired, they still chase me around with their tweets. And i proved, i proved that you could win even if you stood up to these people because even the people that didnt agree with me, said that woman has guts. You know . Lets see some guts. You know, micky, let me ask you this. Youre not theres a certain kind of retired republican that represents a district thats now become very democratic. Maybe they represented new hampshire. Youre from oklahoma. Right . Right. The folks in the district you represent are, do they want more guns in schools . Is that an idea thats going to sell where you used to represent . Well, i dont know. That district has gotten much more right wing than it was when i represented it. When i was elected it was a heavily democratic state. And it has moved pretty far to the right. But weve got a lot of congressmen and state legislatures in oklahoma who are good people and who would like to see something done. It just takes the courage to a look, our kids are more important than our party line. Its more important than trying to make sure we win the next primary. You know, its also, you can be afraid of what happens when the hard liners turn out in the primary. You got to get your people out there because there are more americans who want to put a stop to this tan there are who are willing to go along with it. Micky, i think its important to note this. It is tough sometimes. But when 85 of the people support better background collection and they know that weapons of war shouldnt be on the street, it shouldnt take much courage. Barbara boxer, that was fascinating, thank you both. You reminded me of that insane plastic gun issue from back in the 90s and the nra said no, we have to have plastic guns barbara micky, thank you both. Thank you, chris. Sam zeif is a senior at marjorie stone in Douglas High School. Hes here with his father doug. Sam, first, the entire nation is watching all of you in a kind of wawe at the grace youve shown and we send our condolences obviously. Watching the president a day after that listening session sort of ruminate about teachers carrying weapons and hardening schools, what was going through your mind . Its not right. Teachers, they dont go to get degrees to shoot. They get degrees to teach to, mold young lives every single day, to mentor, to build relationships, to love and protect. But how can you put that responsibility on a teacher of knowing whether or not theyre going to have to point a gun at their students that day . What happens when a teacher and a student get into the an argument and the teacher thinks the student is a little more sensitive to the subject and after the argument, the student reaches in their bag for a School Supply and the teacher thinks theyre reaching for a gun so they pull the gun out on them first and the rest is history. Yeah. Doug, what do you think of how this has played out in the National Conversation since what happened in your sons school . Well, i think were talking about some of the wrong things here. We should be talking about, this is not about the nra. I mean, yes theyre a powerful organization but the truth is, our politicians have empowered them to be powerful. If we just taking special interest money from organizations like the nra, we wouldnt be having this issue right now. Wed still be honoring the Second Amendment. So first and foremost, we need to have sensible gun control in this country. It needs to start yesterday. Maybe it needed to start tuesday of last week instead of wednesday after wednesday. Secondly, we do have a Mental Health issue. Its a small one. But Mental Health is a lifetime thing for most people. And honestly, im more concerned about Mental Health right now for the grieving families than i am about a would be shooter. If a would be shooter cant get an automatic rifle or a semiautomatic rifle or high capacity magazines, we have mo issues with mentally ill people necessarily. And third, as far as background checks go, yes, we need a system of improved background checks, absolutely. So the dialogue i think has moved away, its become obviously very political. And it shouldnt be political. This is about our constitution. I agree. But the interpretation of our constitution is whats critical here. And how our Founding Fathers i said this earlier, our Founding Fathers would be rolling over in their graves if they knew how far our society has fallen from the values they put forward in the 1770s. Sam, youre nodding your head. I am. Im in complete agreement. The Second Amendment was it was put in place for defense, not offense. The Second Amendment was so that you could walk and feel safe with protection. But not to walk around with an ar. You dont need to walk around with an ar to feel safe. You walk around with an ar to kill people. Thats what happened. Thats whats been happening. And when is it going to end . Thats my question. Sam, can i ask you, you mentioned your best friend. I wondered if you could tell us his or her name. Joaquin oliver. Im sorry about joaquins loss. Were all desperately sorry about joaquins loss. Thank you. Doug, how do you feel about watching your son and the students he goes to school with somehow deal with all of this in the way they are dealing with it . Well, you know, its a terrible thing for a parent or a sibling to go through this. And honestly, we won the lottery last week. 17 families are broken forever. And were having to deal with our grief of both of our children. My wifes grief for standing on the Street Corner in parkland waiting for surrounded by s. W. A. T. Team and sheriffs deputies and police and am ambulances and emts wondering if both of her children were alive or dead. I cant even imagine. Its still surreal to me that our nation is still going through this at this point in our civilization. After 9 11 it, im a new yorker, i revere new york. After 9 11, we fixed that almost immediately. There were a couple little tweaks that needed to be made to our Homeland Security system. Such as the bottles of water, the liquids, shoe laces, all of that. But we fixed it immediately right after the first incident. We should have fix this had after columbine. It should have been done. And people that have Little Elementary School children like in sandy hook or the nightclub shooting or it could be any shopping mall, this could never happen in a civilized society. I maintain we are still still misinterpreting the way the constitution was meant to be used. And honestly, my generation has failed these kids. Sam, there are so many people watching you and watching your classmates who want to support you. I mean, i think you sort of awakened a real kind of conscience in people, people want to do what they can for you. They want to make things better for you. What can they do . What should people who want to support you do . Were not going to stop. We have a march coming on the 24th of march in d. C. All over the country also. Come out. Come to douglas. Come support us. Come be with us. Were going to fight this. You know, we were lucky enough to start at the white house at the top with the legislators. But thats not working so far. So far, its been over a day since being there, and nothings been changed. So that has not worked. We are going to having to start from the bottom now. Were going to have to start from the judiciary and work our way right back up to the top. Doug zeif, sam, i got to say, i got an almost 4yearold boy and i would be delighted if he grew into the kind of young man that you are and doug, you should be very proud of the job you did. Thank you both. I appreciate it. Jennifer and i both are. Thank you. Well be right back after this. Purchase new charges revealed tonight in Robert Muellers russia probe. Special counsel unseal agadditional 32 counts against former Trump Campaign chairman Paul Manafort and his aide rick gates. It claims manafort and gates hid income from the u. S. Government and defrauded banks in applying for a series of loans including jaw dropping sums of money, in total more than 75 million manafort with the assistance of gates laundered more than 30 million, income he concealed from the department of treasury, department of justice and others in addition to previous charges from october against manafort and gates including Money Laundering and failing to register as a foreign agent. Latest charges come less than a week after mueller indicted 13 russians and three Russian Companies for interfering in the president ial election. And they come only two days after a dutch lawyer no oneheard of before pleaded guilty to lying to investigators specifically about some of his interactions he had with gates. Its a far flung web of charges that so far does not in any way implicate the president himself. The New York Times reports mueller could be trying to leverage that information to get closer to the white house. His friends said his indictment is an effort to pressure him into providing him to provide information to the campaign. I want to bring in jennifer rogers, and ben wittes, nbc legal analyst and editorinchief of law fair blog. A must read always. Ben, what do you make of this . Well, so theres a lot of confusing aspects of it. First of all, i think it is an effort to ratchet up the pressure on both manafort and gates. The new charges are much more focused on Financial Crime which was a significant element of the previous set. And less focused on you know, on things like foreign agents registration violations. Its a more moneybased indictment. And i think it, you know, theres some confusion today about you know, this case was brought across the river from the other one in virginia, not in washington. And there are conflicting reports this evening abouting whether rick gates is or is not in a near a plea agreement and who his counsel is going to be at this point. So theres a fair bit of confusion but i think its clearly you know, a ratcheting up of pressure by the special prosecutor against two people who are already in a world of trouble. I agree. I agree. Its clearly ratcheting up the pressure. Its also in some ways a fairly typical move because as a case goes on and gets closer to trial, youre going to add the charges you find tax offenses are notoriously slow. P. It takes a long time to get approval to charge them. Im not surprised they added the tax fraud accounts that were coming if you read the first indictment. Were still in a little bit of not knowing whats going on. Not with gates. One thing that stuck out to me when you talk about pressure, people made this how the first set of charges were paper cases that you dont need witnesses. I either registered or you didnt. Theres a bunch of stuff. Theres some evidence here what these people are putting in emails, one of the things happening here is theyre alleged to be doctoring Financial Information in order to acquire loans. And at one point, the document first submitted to lender b, a conspirator working at lender b working with manafort on this allegedly says it looked doctored. Can someone do a kleenex sell doc. A subsequent version was submitted to bank. They seem pretty exposed here. They are. This is a paper case, too. You dont need witnesses to prove this up either. Youve got beak the emails you just mentioned, the tax records and you know, the contrary accounts. Thats really all you need. This is a paper case too, a very strong case. You make up how dumb people are sometimes in their emails. Ben, im sort of amazed. Heres Paul Manafort just doing this stuff. I mean, until Robert Mueller comes along. Here he is doing what a lot of these are public transactions what hes alleged to have done in terms of Money Laundering where hes taking out mortgages against them and no one was knocking on his door and he wasnt in criminal peril till mueller starred sniffing around. Im not sure thats quite right because there were prior investigations. Right. There were was previous scrutiny, and including in ukraine. And so one of the Amazing Things about Paul Manafort is that given the prior scrutiny of some of his activities that donald trump made him the Campaign Chairman in the 2016 campaign. You know, some of this stuff about Paul Manafort was actually known. And so you know, it was a highly risky thing for a president ial candidate to do to give him the chairmanship of the campaign in the first place. That said, youre certainly correct. This is incredibly brazen activity. Right. Involving astonishingly large sums of money. Over a remarkably long period of time, too. And you know, the fact that he you know, got away with it and you know, its not that he didnt take steps to hide it. He certainly did. Thats why some of the allegations involve fraud but you know, there is a lot of this stuff that there was not a whole lot of secret about who Paul Manafort was. And this relates to whattize saying its not only that the president hired him, he wanted to get on that campaign. The reporting indicates i wanted to get on this campaign. He was cash strapped who goes to work for free at the campaign and dying to get on the campaign. It seems like we dont know the full story there yet. The other thing happening here is before the allegations all ended, before his time on the campaign, these charges go all the way into well into 2016. So not only is he on the campaign at the time hes on the campaign, hes doing all of these frauds. So i mean, the campaign wasnt keeping him busy enough. I dont know what was going on. This rolls the clock forward to stuff hes doing while serving on the campaign. So there is the conduct does include the period of time. It actually runs into january of 2017. And so you know, it does include a period of time in which he is working for the president or the person who becomes the president. Think of this, youre the Campaign Chairman for a Major Party Nominee and youre allegedly like laundering money and doctoring financial it is a shockingly brazen set of activities if indeed the indictments are true. Jennifer rogers and benjamin wittes, thanks for your time. Still to come, the party that chants lock her up in the afternoon and faces indictments in the evening, guess which states governor was led from his office in the custody of a sheriff today next. When youve got. Nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea heres pepto bismol ah. Nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. Lock her up. That chant is still going strong on the right. Some 471 days since the election of donald trump. Ironic because just a few hours after that scene at cpac, the Mueller Probe filed even more criminal charges against Trump Campaign officials. Special counsel Robert Muellers investigation of the Trump Campaign has yielded indictments or guilty pleas from 19 people and three Companies Including more charges for the president s former Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort, his Campaign Deputy rick gates, former National Security adviser by the name of Michael Flynn who has already pleaded guilty same as george papadopoulos. Those are the people the president selected to run his campaign and put into his white house respectively. Also today, just hours after the cpac crowd did their lock her up chant, it was announced that missouris governor, Eric Greitens was indicted on a charge of felony invasion of privacy. A rising star in the republican party. Thats his mugshot by the way till well probably today. The Details Behind this explosive and fascinating news story next. Missouri governor Eric Greitens was indict today by a st. Louis grand jury on a felony charge of invasion of privacy. Kansas city star reports the charge steps from an affair and allegations he threatened to release a nude photo of the woman taken while she was blindfolded and her hands were bound if she spoke publicly about the fair. He was arrested by st. Louis city deputies and rained today. Republican state representative nate walker an early supporter told the star i called for him to step down three weeks ago because i thought this was going to happen. My understanding was he was led off in handcuffs and thats not a good sign for the executive of missouri. Jason hancock from the kansas cities star joining me. What is going on down there . Its definitely been a busy day for us in the Missouri State house press corps. We know the allegations, right . This came forward that there was an affair and the woman in question that he had taken pictures of her. Did anyone see this coming today . There was some murmers of it early in the day. You can imagine how many rumors and wild speculation weve been dealing with. It wasnt till Late Afternoon in this started to really feel real. And close to the end of the day that the District Attorney made the release that the grand jury had indicted him for this allegedly taking the photo of this woman and threatening to release it as a form of blayke blackmail. This affair that had he came out recently. He has acknowledged it, is that correct . Right, hes acknowledged the affair and it took place in 2015 before he was governor. He was sort of in the early stages of his campaign for governor before he officially announced it. Hes vehemently denied that he tried to black thail mail this woman although strangely hes refused to say yes or no to questions like did you take the picture. He said he has not taken a picture for blackmail but hasnt made it clear whether he took a picture of this woman while she was bound and blindfolded or not. So he has, im sorry, were getting my train of thought back. He is was seen as a real rising star in the republican party. The guys got an exceptional resume. What is his political life like right now in missouri . Well, just to give you a perspective, a few months ago i was iin iowa where people were speculating he might run maybe 2024 or beyond. Hes a young man with a great resume, former navy seal, former rhodes scholar, former democrat for that matter actually. As far as nrs missouri, he burned a lot of bridges in his first year. Didnt have a lot of friends even within his own party. When the news broke, theres the old saying the hardest time to find a friend is when you need one. So he just didnt have a lot of Political Capital with the people who now hold his fate in their hands. You already have the speaker of the house talking about launching an investigation that could lead to impeachment. A lot of his republican allies are not there to stand next to him to defend him. Republicans seem to be throwing him and vil at this moment. Finally, has he said what hes going to do about these charges . Hes going to fight them. His attorney released a statement saying theyre going to file for a motion to dismiss. He released a statement later saying hes innocent. He didnt committee any crimes. He was supposed to be in washington, d. C. This weekend. Were not sure if hes going to make the trip or not to the nga conference. Hes going to try to continue to be as governor despite all the calls for his resignation. Bob menendez managed to keep going as a senator while indicted. Jason hancock, thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me. Coming up, the head of the nra speaks for the First Time Since the parkland shooting. What he had to say had more to do with being essentially an ideological front group for the trump administration. Plus tonights thing 1, thing 2 starts right after this. Of thing 1 tonight, florida sheriff scott israel, heading up the investigation into the parkland shooting called out nra spokesperson dana loesch last night with this unambiguous demand. We do needed to have some gun control reform. 18yearolds should never have a rifle. An 18yearold kid should not have a rifle. Theyre not adults yet. Theyre in high school. These kids should not have a rifle. Bump stocks should be illegal. They should be outlawed forever. Automatic rifles should be outlawed forever. Anybody who says different, i dont know about other people but were calling bs on that. But perhaps recognizing the power of the nra and the politics sheriff israel offer this had advice. Columbine, sandy hook this, Stoneman Douglas and a host of other tragedies, doing it the same way isnt working. And i could tell you, youre not going to change with all due respect and i think youre an amazing woman, youre not going to change her mind. Theres only one way to make america safely. What you have to do, as you said this young generation, we didnt get it done. But you will get it done. Vote in people who feel the same way you do. Vote people in. It appears Texas Democrats are ready to do just that. The numbers from the first day of early voting down in texas is thing 2 in 60 seconds. Texas democrats, texas one of the reddest states in the nation, Texas Democrats are fired up. On tuesday, the first day of early voting in telephones for the 2018 primaries there was a surge in voting but especially among democrats. In the 15 counties where the most people registered both parties saw increased turnout from the last election. While 16 republicans turned out, democrats saw a 51 rise over 2014. Dallas county, the republicans turnout shrunk by 19 while democrats saw a 56 surge. Overall more democrats cast ballots than republicans. They want to sweep right under the carpet the failure of school security, the failure of family, the failure of americas Mental Health system. And even the unbelievable failure of the fbi. And President Trumps election while crucial, cant turn away the wave of these new european style socialists bearing down upon us. Today, the ceo of the National Rifle association Wayne Lapierre spoke in public for the First Time Since the parkland, Florida School shooting. In a speech at cpac that wasnt on the official schedule and that pivoted pretty quickly from the Second Amendment and guns to socialists in the Democratic Party i guess . There is a key strategy at play here. The nra no longer has a democrat in the white house like bill clinton or barack obama to sell the fear that those president s will take away your guns. In fact, when george w. Bush was president , nra membership leveled off. In the trump era, the nra accelerated a new plan moving from being a single issue gun group to being a hard right organization on every issue, a kind of right wing vanguard of trumpism running ads like this one last summer which attacked protests against trump and railed against the hollywood elite, liberal media, yada, yada. This launched its own streaming service just weeks before the 2016 election which not only runs infomercial style shows about guns but covers topics like immigration, health care, fake news and the violent left. The nra is not only a mammoth lobbying arm for gun manufacturers but also a kind of ideological front group. How are you supposed to debate that . Thats next. Im a concrete mason. I own my own company. I had some severe fatigue, some funny rashes. Finally, listening to my wife, went to a doctor. And i became diagnosed with hodgkins lymphoma. That diagnosis was tough. I had to put my trust in somebody. When i first met steve, we recommended chemotherapy, and then we did high dose therapy and then autologous stem cell transplant. Unfortunately, he went on to have progressive disease. I thought that he would be a good candidate for immune therapy. Its an intravenous medicine that can affect the patients immune system and unleash it against the cancer. With chemotherapy, i felt rough, fatigue, nauseous. And with immune therapy weve had such a positive result. Im back to working hard. Ive honestly never felt this great. I believe the future of immunotherapy at ctca is very bright. The evolution of cancer care is here. Learn more at cancercenter. Com Appointments Available now. Many in legacy media love mass shootings. Crying white mothers are ratings gold. And notice i said crying white mothers because there are thousands of grieving black mothers in chicago every weekend and you dont see town halls for them, do you . Just there arent thousands of murders in chicago every weekend. And its generally stepping in a kind of rhetorical quicksand to attempt to take the bait from someone like dana loesch of the nra. But that said, it should be noted we literally did a town hall in chicago about gun violence there. We talked to mothers in chicago that lost their children and if dana loesch, who so breezily invokes the suffering of actual human beings in chicago to score her political points bothered to look at the evidence she, of course, would already know that. But thats the point. The nra doesnt exist to make good faith argument which is is why its become pointless to argue with them at all. Msnbc contributor Jennifer Rubins and Charlie Pierce writer at large at esquire, charlie, youve been writing about the nra and the role it plays in the right for years and what is it right now . How do you characterize what it has become . Well, youre correct in that it is essentially a lobbying organization. Its the lobbying arm of the weapons manufacturing industry. Thats the most basic thing that it is. But i think to be perfectly honest with you, i think its making a mistake if it as it tries to become just another general Clearing House for conventional conservative thinking and getting away from basically what it was good at which was defending the right of every american to own as much as as many ar15s as can fit in their garage. When it starts talking about Saul Alinskey and immigration it just becomes part of the noise and it uses the unique purchased the in the constellation of right wing organizations. Do you agree with that, jennifer . Yes, and no. On one hand it has a i think a rather indefensible position at this point which is anyone should own any weapon of any type of any quantity at any time that they place. What have they done . Rather than make this about guns, i think theyve gone someplace to make it about identity, to make it one of these cultural touchstone issues and that way even if you dont own a gun, even if you dont like guns, if you think of yourself as a conservative this is one of those hot button issues you must believe in. Just like you believe in Climate Change denial, just like you believe barack obama was not born in the United States so they have turned this into an irrational issue because they are irrational. So its about urban leets trying to tell you what to do. It makes a weird sense because thats the politics the right is practicing. The risk is they come out in public and sound like lunatics and people realize theyre lunatics and you put them up against these kids from a high school and their grieving families and they look cruel and insane. To jennifers point. I wonder wharlly whether its good from a marketing standpoint. If you define gun ownership as tied to this tribe, its a 5050 nation. Theres hundreds of millions of people, theres the old Michael Jordan line about republicans buy sneakers, too, about why he wouldnt speak out on a political issue. It seems youre sending a message that if you buy a gun you have to be part of the kind of people that like dana loesch which seems like not a great idea. I think liking dana loesch is a terrible idea but well leave that aside for just a second. I think jennifer is right to an extent its something tribal but thats nothing new in conservative american politics. Almost everything in the last 30 years has been converted to tribalism now the way to debate the nra is the same way to debate the moral majority or club for both. Youre arguing against a bunch of selfcontained universes that have their own facts, their own history and at least in the case of Climate Change their own physical laws. There is some evidence, jennifer, that to to what charlie is saying about this bubble. Theres evidence about what youre saying about how this is all playing in the world outside that auditorium. Three major rental Car Companies dumping the nra enterprise, alamo, national which had partnership to have discounts to their members and an nra branded visa card dropped by the First National bank of omaha. What does that say to you . It says this may becoming a new dimension which is a commercial hit to the nra and thats an avenue that has rich rewards for people who want gun safety laws. If they make the nra brand noxious, theyre making some progress. And just as you see the shuffling and mumbling and looking at their shoes routine from republicans, pretty soon youll have Business Executives doing the same thing and they are much more sensitive to Public Opinion and consumers than some politicians. Thats a great point. The other person who is weirdly sensitive to Public Opinion is the president who is i think has an antenna for this. He seems to recognize he has to recognize both. This is what comes from having no real ideas of your own. I feel strongly both ways. I think his instinct his reflex, i wont even say its an instinct is to be for more expensive background checks and bump stock banning and maybe even going so far as to make just a little bit harder for people to own the weapon of choice of the i. R. A. Which is pretty much what the ar15 is. But then again im not the last person to talk to them on any particular day because thats the only person that matters. We know who that will be. It will be someone like Wayne Lapierre. We saw this play out with daca. Sorry, charlie, i have to get to rachel. Sorry. Jennifer rubin and Charlie Pierce, thank you both. Thats all in. Before you go, you can listen to the show as a podcast, find it wherever you get your podcast, new charges for Paul Manafort and rick gates in the Mueller Investigation. The latest reporting on the 32count indictment charges enough to amount to a life sentence for manafort. Plus President Trump says he wants schools protected like banks, talking about Arming Teachers with guns and paying them bonuses for carrying a concealed weapon. The resignation of an armed deputy who had a gun and responded to the shooting but never went in after the gunman. The 11th hour on a thursday night begins now. Good evening once again from our