around yevgeny prigozhin and his army of mercenaries who were until now believed to be exiled to belarus after the armed revolt in russia. keir simmons is in belarus. according to belarus s president, this is not the case after all. bring us up to speed here. reporter: well, that s right. there are two things happening right now. kind of twin track, if you like. one what we heard today. nbc news was one of the few international news organizations invited to the presidential palace in belarus. we have heard from the president of belarus. the other is those images that you showed of gold bars, stacks of dollars, of wigs, of fake passports, during a police raid on yevgeny prigozhin s home in st. petersburg. nbc news not able to verify those images, but they are all over russian media, suggesting an effort to discredit yevgeny prigozhin, just as here in belarus, as i mentioned, the president of belarus, aleksandr lukashenko asked about where he is, where this man, who he had do
and my guess is they recognize that the only way they can win is if they undercut that advantage on strength. so what they re trying to do, and maybe they ll do this in the next ad is basically say donald trump isn t strong. he s weak. and these are the examples of him being weak. that may be the next adjective applied to donald trump in the ads down the road. talk about kind of confusion when it comes to messaging, right? ron desantis making kind of the first public comments about the controversial ad he put out that was homophobic by republicans and democrats alike. i want you to listen to his response, what he had to say, and then we ll talk. i think, you know, identifying donald trump as really being a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into the mainstream where he was having men compete against women in his beauty pageants. i think that s totally fair game. he s now campaigning saying the opposite, he doesn t think you should have men competing in
more importantly you need to hone a message that is hyper critical of donald trump and beat on it every single day until iowa. what do you make of this messaging as you talk about messaging there, right, the super pac making this antitrump ad about being too chummy with dictators. interesting they bring up putin. he s obviously in the news not just because of the war in ukraine but because of this rebellion, 24/48 hour rebellion led by the wagner mercenary group as well. do you think that resonates with voters here in the united states? you know, when i was doing the bush stuff years ago, the most compelling value that republican primary voters focused on was are you a strong and decisive leader, and i think that s what s behind this ad. it s not so much about the dynamics of vladimir putin or the dynamics of north korea, it s more about undercutting donald trump s strength as a strong leader, and i think he has such an advantage on that,
in order to win and become president, the campaign in your primary has to be the same campaign you run in the general election, and ron desantis right now looks like he s only running a primary campaign. it might be effective, but he s certainly going to make himself vulnerable in a general election. that s a really good point. i m not surprised by that either. matthew dowd, thank you. an exonerated member of the central park five has won a democratic primary to represent harlem on the new york city council. yusef solemn spent seven years in prison for the rape of a central park jogger before his name was cleared by dna evidence. he described his win as a quote, victory for justice, dignity, and decency for the harlem community we love. defending against a tripledemic, how doctors are planning to dodge major spikes in flu, covid, and rsv this fall. we ll be right back. rsv this fall we ll be right back.
californians pay some of the highest taxes in the nation. but now lawmakers are proposing a so-called “link tax” that would charge websites every time they link to a news article online. experts warn it could undermine the open internet, punish local newspapers, while subsidizing hedge funds and big media corporations. so tell lawmakers: oppose ab886, because another new tax is the last thing we need. paid for by ccia. welcome back, new numbers show just how much donald trump s indictments are helping with his 2024 fundraising, politico citing a campaign official who says that the