Prepare for the trial. Oh my goodness all the networks wow then, why a federal judge suggested elon musk was protecting donald trump from the production of his twitter plus, real evidence that many criminal charges across four indictments are having an effect on trump voters. And, one year after it was signed, the simple math and wild success of the Inflation Reduction Act, when all in starts, right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Donald trump and his 18 codefendants in that rico indictment must turn themselves in at the Fulton County jail in atlanta, georgia, within nine days. There they will be booked, processed, and mugshots taken ahead of the arraignments, which District Attorney fani willis wants to take place the first week of september. Today willis also proposed a trial date for this case in the efforts to overturn the 2020 election in georgia and elsewhere. She requested it begin on March 4th Of Next year. That is the day before super tuesday. Now of course there is one name that stands out above all the others in this sweeping trump, its listed first, donald trump, but the second most wellknown name here is of course Rudolph William Louis giuliani. Weve been expecting this for quite some time. Weve been expecting to see Rudy Giulianis name on this indictment ever since prosecutors in williss office informed giuliani he was a target of the investigation day about a year ago. But it is still a remarkable fall from grace for a man who was once a pretty widely renowned public figure. Giuliani rose to National Prominence as the Star United States attorney for the Southern District of new york, a gop held from 1883 to 1989. There he oversaw the prosecutions of members of the mob, corrupt government officials, earned a tough on crime reputation, which are used to launchs political career. After giuliani became mayor of new york in 1983, he has totally cultivated the image as the man singlehandedly responsible, just him, for cleaning up the city and bringing Law And Order. Then in the wake of september 11th, he was americas mayor. Rudy was a front runner for the republican president ial nomination in 2008, though that didnt go that well. And now here, in 2023, at 79 years old, Rudy Giuliani has been indicted for his role and what prosecutors call a criminal enterprise. He is an alleged racketeer, the onetime future president to disgraced laughing stock. In recent years, he has been best known for a series of hat comical, have villainous escapades, like presenting ludicrous claims of voter fraud in front of the four seasons total landscaping. And another Press Conference a few weeks later with hair dye trickling down his Sweat Streaked face. His awful and often unreadable conversations with a subordinate are all over the internet in a really unsettling Sexual Harassment lawsuit. Hes even a punchline in a borat movie in the final chapter of his life, Rudy Giuliani is the object of ridicule and scorn. He is reputationally and financially near bankruptcy. He is looking at the possibility of living out the rest of his days on this earth in prison. How did it happen . How did the once clean as a whistle Crime Fighter, the Law And Order man, americas mayor who led us through such dark moments, how did he end up like this . What happened to rudy . You hear that a lot. I will submit if we take a close all look there is a case to be made, rudy has been this version of rudy the whole time, or least had it in him. In fact, rudy himself made a revealing statement to that effect last night when he emerged from his shame bunker to address the indictment. This is a ridiculous application of the Racketeering Statute, and theres probably no one knows it better than i do. Probably some that know it as well. I was the first one to use it in white collar cases. But in major cases like the boesky case, the milken case, this is not meant for election disputes. This is ridiculous, what shes doing. Rudy is correct. He really did pioneer the use of racketeering laws, often shorthanded as rico, to go after white collar criminals. It was an innovation of his, like michael milken, as he mentioned. He brought rico charges against the mob, the five families in new york, helping to bring down organized crime in new york. According to new reporting for the messenger, wiseguys are rejoicing in the wake of giulianis own rico indictment. A Veteran Mob Lawyer says his clients are, quote, effing thrilled. Giuliani also used the rico laws to go after corruption in politics. One of the ways he kickstarted his own electoral career in the city of new york was turning his office, the u. S. Attorneys office, attention to the Democratic Political machine of the city, which he was, of course, going to run against, in the race for mayor. In 1986, he took down Stanley FriedmanOn Racketeering charges. That was a democrat from the bronx, one of new yorks most powerful political figures, as the New York Times painted at the time. By his own admission, rudy used rico law against his political enemies, including the man whose job he wanted. , democratic mayor ed conche. The rico statute, i was the first one to use the Racketeering Statute for a public corruption. I did it against most of ed kochs administration. [laughter] well, ed wasnt paying attention, while they were stealing millions. Think about this. The u. S. Attorney that wants Political Office in the city prosecuting the opposing party, using the power to do that. You might uncharitably call that weaponizing the Justice Department for partisan political ads. Giuliani lost his first race but he succeeded the second time around, after embracing some of the ugliest most demagogic racist politics that trump would later mine to great effect. In September 1992 he infamously appeared at a police rally that turned into an allout riot, and he refused to ever decry or denounce it. As mayor, giuliani oversaw an incredible increase in surveillance and policing of black and brown new yorkers, in one notorious incident he demonized an unarmed black man who was shot and killed by the police. Clearly even his recent turn as a public face of, frankly, racist accusations of voter fraud is not really new. Take earlier in the day, of ruby freeman and Shaye Freeman moss and one of the gentlemen quite obvious obviously surreptitiously passing around usb ports as if they were vials of her went or cocaine. Its obviously to anyone who is a criminal investigator a prosecutor, theyre engaged in surreptitious illegal activity. Again, that day. That was false. Ruby freeman and shaye moss actually sued Rudy Giuliani for defamation. But that kind of rhetoric, talking about these two black women as being drug dealers, stealing an election, that goes way back to the 1989 race for mayor. The 1989 race for mayor, which giuliani lost to the first black man elected as mayor in new york, David Dinkins. As he told journalist Jack New Field in an interview he quotes, in his book, the full rudy, this is 21 years ago, and im quoting him here, they stole that election from, they stool that votes in the black parts of brooklyn and washington heights, illegal dominican immigrants were allowed to vote in washington heights. That sounds familiar, doesnt it . Has a certain ring to it. Let me tell you, as a lifelong new yorker, reporters in new york city and critics will tell you, Rudy Giuliani has always been an absolute machiavellian operator. So yeah, you might say, what happened to rudy . Or you could say, this has always been rudy, all the way to the end. Nick ackerman briefly worked alongside giuliani while serving as an assistant u. S. Attorney for the Southern District of new york. Ackerman was the First Federal prosecutor to use federal rico statute to prosecute a mafia boss. The first used to prosecute his non white collar defendants. This is a adam serwer, is author of the book the cruelty is the point. Let me talk to you, adam, about the continuity question. Its something youve written about and thought about and how you see the trajectory of giulianis career which is culminating in a very serious felony indictment. [silence] if you look at the back of those races in new york city, those races are a kind of blueprint make new york city great again. Theyre very much rooted in the stallion, and a kind of reaction to demographic changes in new york that were upset did by the election of the first black mayor of the city. When you go back and look at the rhetoric in that election, he is comparing David Dinkins to david duke, calling him racist. You can see the influence of giuliani on the Trump Campaign and on trumps style of politics. Its a great point. I think what really happened is not that giuliani changed. The country changed. We changed. We became more perceptive of this kind of manipulation. When we look back at it now, its very obvious. But at the time, that was considered an acceptable form of politics, and people didnt really get angry at it in the same way. Or rather, white people didnt get angry in the same way. Lots of black new yorkers were screaming bloody murder about it. I will say, that police riot that he was present at was extremely controversial at the time. That was a really notable event, and ugly. Ugly in a way that i think was covered as such in the press. Youre right, it had an appeal that carried him over and made him politically successful. Nick, you crossed paths with him in that same new york attorneys office. I dont want to overstate the case, because when you look at tape of the guy in 1990, he in 1989, hes just a better public speaker, a better communicator, a sharper version of himself now. But what do you think of this trajectory . I think he was definitely online to go into politics. He was using the u. S. Attorneys office as a vehicle to get him further into politics. Yes. What i was in the u. S. Attorneys office, every indictment, there would be a simple press release, done on an mimeograph machine, maybe one page statement summarizing the indictment, and i was there for about six months of his tenure as u. S. Attorney. I came back shortly thereafter just to visit the office on other business. And i walked into the main part of the u. S. Attorneys office, and you felt like you were in the west wing of the white house. Every single indictment was a major Press Conference. He hired three people on Government Payroll who did nothing but flack him to the press. He did that through in his entire tenure. This is unheard of prior to rudy doing this. Every case was made a major news story, which is why he was able to build up the reputation that he did. Without that backup, without the three people that he hired, one of whom was actually a press person from the New York Post who had been covering the courthouse for years, he was able actually to get himself right into the politics and press of new york city and make a big name for himself as a Crime Fighter when the actual work was done by the assistants in the office. Its not like he was behind everything. The last conversation i had with him when i was at that office, and i didnt have too many, was basically handing over to him a wiretap i had from an investigation into maddie ian l o, who was the under boss of the genovese family. And those tapes essentially where the basis for bringing charges against the five family bosses, who were members of the look coosa no strict commission in the country. I gave it to rudy. I told him he should do it. And hes been taking credit for that ever since. God bless them. It was something that had to be done. But, yes, it was important. And that was, you know, that rico case, which i believe was a rico case, that was one of his first start earns. Youve also got i mean, the other thing here is, like, you are sort of point, adam, about the sense of, like, whose city is it, right, and whose country is it, which is the sort of through line of that question in the rudy political appeal. You know, here you have i want to just play him, just to remind you of what hes asking people to do, right, aside from defaming, in my humble opinion, sheamus and ruby freeman and others. Here is before the state judiciary subcommittee, this is meant as one of the overt acts in the indictment, basically saying, you dont have to do anything to voters told you, you can choose who you want to be electors. Take a listen. State law doesnt, in any way, prevent you, the legislator, from a mediately taking this over and deciding this. You are the final arbiter of who the electors should be and whether the process is fair or not. And the other way to look at it, its your responsibility if a false and fraudulent count is submitted to the United States government. And its clear that the counts you have right now is false. I mean, theres a pretext there, a false pretext, about a false count. But its as frankly antidemocratic by any public utterance by anyone in this country have ever seen, with the exception of trump. Well, it is an expression of the ethos of trumpism, which is that there are certain people who are the real americans. And those people have a right to win every election, regardless of whether or not their preferred candidate gets the most votes. And so, if by some misfortune they get out voted by the rest of the country, then the State Legislature should step in and essentially, even though hes talked about on rigging the election, what hes demanding is for the election to be rigged in their favor, because they are the only legitimate americans, therefore, their political will is the only legitimate political. And it is an antidemocratic sentiment that is pretending to be a democratic sentiment. Thats right. Finally, nick, i just want you to respond, you wrote a piece in the atlantic journalconstitution that says actually this is a good application the rico statue, something which the federal Virginia Village with. Giuliani was on newsmax to say this is a ridiculous use of it. Why do you think its appropriate here . Well, its appropriate because they basically committed a whole series of crimes, which is the Indictment Shows comes down to seven different criminal schemes, with 18 individuals. Its a good way to put them all together in one count in an indictment and point out the jury how all of these schemes related to each other, how all these different defendants, some of whom may have never even met each other, were all working towards the same goal of trying to keep donald trump in office and basically steal the election from joe biden. Nick ackerman and adam serwer, great to have you both gentlemen, thank you so much. Thank you. Coming up, the Special Counsel slips into Donald Trumps dms as a federal judge asks if elon much is trying to cozy up to the former president. But first, with the law closing in, the trump gang scrambles to get out of georgia, next. Get out of georgia, next 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 need mulch . Yesterday, just a day after what, we have a ton of mulch. Donald trump and 18 of his alleged coconspirators were charged with racketeering in georgia, one of the defendants, mark meadows, former Chief Of Staff to donald trump, filed to remove his case to federal court. The filing argues the charges in georgia cover conduct by meadows as Chief Of Staff of the president , which is a federal position. We dont know how the court will rule on this request by meadows. But there is wide anticipation that other defendants in georgia, including trump himself, could also seek to move their case to federal court. And that is just one of the many procedural gambits we will likely see as the trump team tries to make sure this case does not get tried before the election. Its a daunting challenge for prosecutors because this is a complicated rico case, 19 defendants, that fani willis says she wants to go to trial in six and a half months, on march 4th. Every one of those 19 defendants will try everything they can to make sure that doesnt happen. Will it work . Sherry boston is a District Attorney in Dekalb County, next to Fulton County. She joins me now. First, i wonder how you see these moves to move things to federal court. As a local prosecutor i think projecting how i would feel, taking something out of my portfolio, i would be a bit miffed. But in the end, there are reasons that those motions can be filed. Do you think there is big stakes in that kind of thing . Well, what i can say is, is that this was not an unexpected notice. I can guarantee you that any pr