We had segregationist democrats who controlled and tried to keep black people from voting but most of the party did not go along with that. what can, or should, the current-justice department, under merrick garland, do? what can, or should, the current president joe biden do about this? because you don t think it s it s over. i mean, donald trump is the former president but you don t think this effort is over. no, i don t. it s obviously not over. all we have to do is listen to your show and anderson every night and what we put on the air and what we read in the new york times and the washington post. look. what we ought to be doing, as journalists, particularly, we need to find out everything that happened in the trump presidency. in terms of its crimes against democracy, including the pandemic. homicidal negligence by a president of the united states. that figures in this, too. what was that homicidal negligence about and resulted in tens, hundreds of thousands of deaths? i
It is a theoretical issue in terms of our values. as much as it may become a source of litigation, legal fights, if the justice department, in fact, takes this up the way that attorney general garland promised today. it s it s real life, right now. for people, whose life s work is ending. people who spent their lives, people who are being run out of this type of work, on a one-by-one basis. even people working at a a a low level. or or at the county level. being picked off, one by one, by a violent mob attacking them. threatening them. in the case of tommy gong in san luis obispo county, showering them with racist abuse. this is not a potential danger to our elections in the future. this is happening right now. person by person. all across the country. joining us, now, is reporter lindsey holden. she has been covering the story of elections official tommy gong
At all. when he gave his speech today on voting rights. the members of congress who were targeted by trump s doj say they have been able to get zero information out of the justice department, under merrick garland s leadership, since this came to light. garlands people won t even tell targeted members of congress what the legal predicate was for going after this, let alone what type of information exactly was collected from them. they won t even tell congress, the current justice department will even tell congress right now, if more members of congress were hit. were brought into this thing. expect this to get worse before it gets better. it is clear that the justice department, under president biden, does not want the job of investigating and rooting around what went rotten inside their own department under the previous president. but even if they don t want that job, that is the job they have now. the stakes of them getting that job done, get higher with each
Today, in his big speech of the great hall of the justice department today, the new attorney general merrick garland spoke directly to this issue. to his credit. we have not been blind to the dramatic increase in a menacing and violent threats against all manner of state and local election worker. ranging from the highest administrators and volunteer poll workers. such threats undermine our electoral process and violate a myriad of federal laws. the criminal section of the civil rights division, together with the departments national security and criminal divisions, the 93 united states attorneys and the fbi, will investigate and promptly prosecute any violations of federal law. violations o attorney general merrick garland speaking today, delivering what was billed as a major speech on voting rights.
Behavior was but his underlings behavior was during the trump era. it even still, it s been kind of shocking to realize that there are people who were involved in this. in this particularly egregious, totally unprecedented case of the justice department secretly obtaining and rifling through communication records from democratic members of congress. who, at that very moment, were investigating the president. it is upsetting, to realize, as jaded as we all are now. it is upsetting, still, to realize that officials involve understand that are, still, at the justice department today. people who were briefed on this, while it was happening. people, who were in the chain of command while decisions were being made to do this. people who took part in it are, still, there under merrick garland. so, number one, what s going to happen to them if they, in fact, were involved in this? and number two, given the fact that those officials who knew about this are still in the department right now.
Merrick garland, spoke, directly, to this issue, to his credit. we have not been blind to the dramatic increase in menacing and violent threats against all manner, of state and local election workers. ranging from the highest administrators to volunteer-poll workers. such threats undermine our electoral process, and violate a myriad of federal laws. the criminal section of the civil-rights division, together, with the department s national security and criminal divisions, the 93 united states attorneys, and the fbi, will investigate and promptly prosecute any violations of federal law. attorney general merrick garland speaking today. delivering what was billed as a major speech on voting rights. and, of course, everybody was waiting, fruitlessly, as it
Now, instead, basically issued a threat. a threat that the justice department, now, under merrick garland, needs to clean this up themselves and quickly, or else. not sure i have ever really seen a statement like this, before. but it s pretty remarkable. it s this is what he says. he says quote it s outrageous that the department of justice may have used a criminal investigation as pretext to spy on journalists, members of congress, their families, and congressional staff. sadly, after four years of trump s corrupting influence at the department of justice, we have every reason to believe that these reports are true. indeed, my concern, meaning jerry nadler s concern at this hour, is that the corruption may run deeper than has already been reported. we know that the justice department, under attorneys general sessions and barr, tried to secretly seize data from the accounts of these reporters and of my colleagues on the intelligence committee in the house. but we do not, yet, know ho
His work here will be invaluable on investigation by his office. however, it s no substitute for if swift action by the department of justice itself. it says the committee has been in communication with the justice department. and we ve made our position clear. the department has a very short window to make a clean break from the trump era on this matter. we expect the department to provide a full accounting of these cases. and we expect attorney general merrick garland to hold the relevant personnel up for their conduct. if the department doesn t make progress toward their two goals. we on the judiciary committee will have no choice but to step in and do the work ourselves. so, he s not announcing that he s opening an investigation. the committee has a short window to make a clean break from the trump era. we expect a full accounting. we expect attorney general garland to hold the rally vote personal accountable. or else will do it for him.
Threat that they nailed merrick garland needs to clean this up himself and quickly or else. i m not sure i really saw a statement like this before but it is pretty remarkable, this is what he says he says it is outrageous of the department of justice may have used a criminal investigation as pretext to spy on journalist, members of congress their families and congressional staff. sadly after four years of trump s corrupting influence of the department of justice we have every reason to believe that these reports are true. indeed, my concern, meaning his concern at this hour is he thought that the corruption ran deeper than it has been reported. we know that the justice department under attorney general sessions and barr tried to secretly sees data after and my colleague on the intelligence committee of the house, but we do not yet know how these two efforts were connected or whether they were additional targets of this gross abuse of power.
Abominable behavior to spark an inspector general investigation today? i mean, this scandal wasn t known to any of us, the public. but it was known to multiple officials inside the justice department. none of whom, thought to peep about it? and tell their new superiors now that merrick garland and lisa monaco are in charge of the justice department? no, apparently, garland and monaco had to learn about it in the new york times. because even the officials involved inside the justice department. people involved in this scandal inside the justice department. didn t say anything. is that because nobody asked them? apple and microsoft have, both, released statements tonight. explaining how those companies were roped into this and why these legally-binding gag orders they were served with, prohibited them from telling anybody what was going on here, until now. since last night s show, when we reported on this, we have learned that, in addition to congressman adam schiff, california congres