store you are watching our live continuing special coverage of today's unanimous guilty on all counts verdict. in the criminal trial of former president donald trump. i am rachel maddow, i'm here with my colleague, stephanie ruhle and jen psaki and alex wagner and chris hayes, in a courtroom in downtown manhattan, just after 5:00 eastern time this evening, a foreperson of the journey rose and delivered the jury unanimous , guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in order to conceal the scheme to correct the 2016 election. the scheme that was described by the prosecution in their summation as something that may very well have been the reason that donald trump won the 2016 election. as of tonight, it is official a criminal scheme, he has been convicted on 34 counts. with those convictions, we enter uncharted territory as a country, for the first time, a president has criminally convicted and for the first time for one of our two main political parties is about to nominate that same man for president. after he has been convicted of 34 felonies. that is where we are tonight. there has been no official reaction from president biden tonight, to a jury finding his predecessor and his 2024 likely competitor, donald trump, guilty today on so many charges. i should tell you, today is the anniversary of president biden's son, though, diane. the president is spending the day in family in delaware. for the most part, president biden has been very circumstance about making any statements regarding trump's trial, at all. that has been true all along. >> i have no comment on that. >> president biden. >> have you been following it at all? >> not, only on the evening news i watch. >> are you following that at all? recently there have been a few occasions, particularly in a campaign context, where president biden has been willing to sort of obliquely acknowledge the legal troubles afflicting his rival. >> under my predecessor, who is busy right now. >> [ laughter ] >> pennsylvania lost 275,000 jobs. >> i had a great stretch since the state of the union. but donald has had a few tough days lately. you might call it stormy weather. what the ? >> always act like he wants to debate me again. make my day, pal. i will make you do it twice. let's pick the day, donald. i heard you are free on wednesdays. >> free on wednesdays referring to the fact that the trial schedule kept donald trump free on wednesdays because judge merchan had other matters to attend to most wednesdays. >> the white house counsel's office which represents the office of the president, the office of the presidency, not the president himself, did offer this short statement in response to the jury verdicts tonight. they said, quote, we respect the rule of law and have no additional comment. the biden campaign did put out a statement. what, donald trump has always mistakenly believed he would never face consequences for breaking the law for his own personal gain. but today's verdict does not change the fact that the american people face a simple reality. there is still only one way to keep donald trump out of the oval office, at the ballot box. convicted felon or not, trump will be the republican nominee for the president. on a similar and shorter note, former trump white house staffer and now trump antagonist, anthony scaramucci, remember him? he posted this today in response to the verdict. quote, trump will never be president again. democratic senator, cory booker of new jersey, this response today. today, our legal system has reaffirmed that no one is above the law, not even a former president this was from new york governor, kathy hochul, also a democrat. in preparation for a verdict in the straw, i directed my administration to closely chordate with local and federal law enforcement and we continue to monitor the situation. we are committed to protecting the safety of all new yorkers and the integrity of our judicial system. a response from e. jean carroll, she went mammoth damages in civil court against trump for sexual abuse and libel. she tweeted one word and a picture worth and infinite number of thousands. this is the picture she posted, this is e. jean carroll posting a picture of stormy daniels. one word, justice. and then two! punks. on the other side, the response has been quite the opposite. trump himself, again, called the trial rigged and a disgrace. he called the judge corrupt, nothing new there. trump allies follow suit as if they had been bought wholesale to do there. sarah huckabee sanders, formally took trump's white house press secretary, a politically motivated sam she promised that, quote, donald trump will be our next president. republican u.s. senator, jd vance from ohio called the verdict,, an absolute miscarriage of justice and a disgrace to our judicial system. republican u.s. senator tim scott from south carolina road, quote, absolute injustice, this arose our justice system. mike johnson, a similar attack, quote, today is a shameful day in american history. he called the charges, quote, ridiculous and said, quote, this is a purely political exercise, not a legal one. the weaponization of our justice system has been a hallmark of the biden administration. and the decision today is further evidence that democrats will stop at nothing to silence the dissent and crush their political opponents. congresswoman marjorie taylor greene, with the upside down american flag. a distress signal seen among the mob on january 6th, and then later in the yard of justice samuel alito. responses along those lines have just kept coming. >> didn't he say he didn't do it? >> i haven't noticed. >> just, yeah. >> the conviction of donald trump is bringing out allies, whether performative. it is bringing out aspirant, it is bring out aspirant to be his running mate. if the republican party continues on the path of making his formal nominee, they have come out to support trump, which is a matter of politics, of course. but they have also chosen to do so, not by saying, stephanie ruhle just pointed out, not by saying he is innocent, but instead by saying that the american system of justice is a sham, is a legitimate, doing everything they can to undermine not just this verdict but our system of government in order to do so. >> can i ask a question here? so it strikes me as important during the process of the trial, particularly if the president of the united states, to not weigh in on it, i think that is correct and i understand the posture of democrats to say when the case being made, this is fundamentally a partisan exercise, by democrats and liberals, et cetera, to kind of stay away. but after the verdict comes in, let's just imagine you are running for state rep, jen psaki . and your opponent gets convicted for felonies. you think you do maybe a campaign event about it you think you maybe call a press conference, you have your surrogates out. right now we have this bizarre situation in which the entire republican party is running around all day say this is rich, this prosecutor. and largely the democrats are just saying like, rule of law. i'm sorry, your opponent got convicted of 34 felonies. it's okay, guys. >> it's done. >> it's done, you can go talk about that. you can go do something with that. i feel like i'm losing my mind watching the reaction here because there is a set, there is this learned helplessness where everyone has already rushed to conclude this won't matter. everybody has already rushed past whether it will matter to say if it won't matter. the biden folks come off the record, talking to reporters that they don't think it will fundamentally change the race. you talk about it that way i imagine it probably won't. >> the official statement from the biden campaign says it does not change the fact that a simple reality, there's only one way to keep trump out of the oval office, at the ballot box. >> i'm just going to disagree with you guys. one, i think you see a differentiation right now between what the white house is saying, that statement you read is from the spokesperson for the counsel's office. not the white house press secretary. that is the right decision. the campaign statement, i think who they are speaking to hear is the democratic party and the base to say hey, guys, don't go out there and celebrate. this is still going to be an extremely close race and there's a lot of things that we need to battle over. what i think is happening in strategy meetings with the president right now is a discussion of what he is going to say when asked. i don't think he is going to say yeah, running against a convicted felon. right? that is not his style. nor do i think you should say that because i do think it feeds into the politicalization that the other side is accusing them of. i could see him saying something to trump like no one is above the law, not even you, at the debate. so they see the debate as a big moment. right? not necessarily to battle over the legal cases but to battle over a lot of things that have not been litigated out there. this is blocking a lot of things out. for them, they don't want the legal cases to be the base of the campaign. they want it to be about abortion rights and other issues. >> but take a win where you have one. i am not saying they should go out and say to democrats, let's go celebrate today. but just like donald trump, seconds after the verdict, he is, boom, out there with a fund- raising screen on every. >> the biden campaign is fundraising, too. they are all fundraising. the campaign's fundraising. so in some ways, they are politicizing it, as well. everybody is politicizing it. they will all raise record amounts of money, i would just predict that over this. i do think, in this moment, everybody is covering, four hours, the fact that trump was just convicted on 34 felony counts. they need to decide what they do tomorrow and the next day, i don't think i think it is the right decision for them not to be out there with the president giving a speech or a big statement or anything like that >> you said you don't imagine him saying you are convicted felon because you think that is breaking policy. >> actually i think it is not his style. i think they have to figure out what his style is that is going to be authentic coming out of his mouth. >> he called him a six-year- old, i bet he could call him a felon. >> he might. my point is, they've got to figure out what is going to sound authentic coming out of his mouth, that hauls this out, right? that calls this out at the debate and calls this out when he answers questions at some point. be about this moment be a street fight, say to this american people, this is what this man was just convicted of. was john bolton today, trumps former nsa adviser who said, today's verdict is a fire bell in the night, the republican party now has one last chance to change course, and not nominate a convicted felon for president. to me, those are stronger fighting words then we are seeing from democrats. today, we saw a huge wall street bigwig, bill ackman, start to get closer and closer to endorsing trump. why aren't people saying to him, you are the guy out there who looked to college protesters and said, i would hire a college protester at my multibillion-dollar hedge fund. why isn't a democrat saying to him, would you hire a convicted felon? where's the streetfighting is the question? >> bill ackman does not rule the country. i don't think people care, in general, like the public isn't waiting for that. but i get the streetfighter thing and i also think that what they did with de niro this week was an effort to do that. and i first saw that they were doing that i thought, that is a little weird. i don't know what you guys thought, that is like a weird kitschy thing. but then when they actually did it, i thought oh, they are injecting themselves into the story. i think it is a tricky balance. >> i just think there's a little but of distinction, there is a political point, which i agree with, which is i don't think the fact that the president, the ex-president of the united states and the current nominee was just convicted on 34 felonies in new york by a jury of his peers after two days of deliberation in a six week trial, is going to magically alter the political terrain. >> no. >> if you ask me as an analyst. but i think if i were working in democratic politics, i would try to make -- i think that normatively and descriptively, yes, descriptively i think people, there's this narrow group of people, everything about trump, we all know that. but also like, sometimes the politics god give you something and maybe you do something with it and not just conclude ahead of time. >> and don'ts, the assumption that it is not going to matter seems premature, right? nobody knows that it is not going to be a thing. so why not talk about it? bill ackman may not matter to everybody in america but he is an indicator. if you make it okay for wall street or swing voters to not care about this, then it will be okay for them not to care about it. so it does matter whether they buy into this being a thing or not. >> let me say, this is not all on president biden. we are also heading into an election where the democratic party and the republican party are squaring off in gazillions of races. it is a republican party decision to keep somebody with 34 felonies against them at the head of their party. it is a republican party decision, and every republican politician in the country should have to answer for that if democrats are playing the politics of this correctly. you never have to mention trump's name. for the republican party to choose somebody who is a convicted felon as the namesake and leader of their party, something you should have to answer for if you are a republican running for dogcatcher. the republican party doesn't need to pick him, there is nothing determinative about his place as the nominee. they can change it. >> here's what i think, this is a really important point, because i spent the whole entire afternoon talking to big gop donors, all these big wall street guys, who in the last month or so, have all warmed to trump. and again, they are, because they know he is a completely transactional guy. and they know, while the chips are down, and he is embarrassed and he is desperate, which he is right now, he keeps score, and he remembers exactly who was with him when he was down. so they are going to stand up and say, you are my boy, and then if he wins in six months, they're going to call in their chips. you got a get out of jail free pass. >> because he is so loyal. >> a year and a half ago, guys, schwartzman, ackman, take your pick, they loved nikki haley. they loved ron desantis, and they are out there saying, we are done with trump. we are done with generous sixth, we are done with everything he did but now they don't have nikki haley or ron desantis and now they are sheepishly saying, well i guess i will go with trump. this could be a moment to remind them, remember a year and a half ago when you said the republican party is ready for somebody else, what are we going to do? and this could be a moment to say, really, you're going to go with this? let's talk about this person again. >> also, all the people you just read their statements of, speaker of the house called this a shameful day in american history. he is the second in line to the presidency, mike johnson, the shameful day in american history, where a jury of 12 men and women that were selected through a very legitimate historic, process, that is how it always works. they made this decision. and that is what he had to say. so for all of the same people who work giving to the house republican re-election fund, it is a question for them, too. you are also supporting that. >> chris hayes. >> let me bring a now a democrat who is running for office, congressman adam schiff of california, to serve as a lead manager of donald trump first appeasement trial. he is now running for senate in the state of california. congressman, thank you for being with us. i don't know, do we have him on sound? i do not hear him. do we have you there, congressman? >> yes you do, chris, can you hear me? >> now we got you. first, let me just get your reaction. it is the perfect opportunity to get to talk today as someone who has been chronicling and talking about donald trump's misdeeds for years, just your reaction to the verdict today? >> well, today, today was the day justice caught up with donald trump i do think with democracy as stressed as ours, we should take heart that you know, the system worked. the 12 ordinary americans adjudicated the guilt or innocence of a former president of the united states. that is a remarkable thing. something that is not possible in most countries around the world. and so i think it is a good day for the system of justice. chris, the other thing that leaps out at me is this was a victory for the justice system in new york. it was not a victory for the federal justice system. as you were pointing out earlier, donald trump was an unindicted co-conspirator number one in an indictment in the southern district of new york based on largely these facts, the justice department said michael cohen needed to go to jail for his role in that. they did not charge donald trump in the case of the justice department did charge donald trump. in florida, and washington, d.c. the federal judges, particularly on the supreme court, but also in florida, have knowingly gone along with donald trump's efforts to deny justice by delaying it. it was the justice system in new york that has held him accountable. and, you know, i think people in new york should take pride that their citizens were able to adjudicate the guilt or innocence of a former president of the united states. he is now in new york, been adjudicated of sexual abuser, he has been adjudicated a business fraudster. he is now a convicted felon. and someone with that kind of record is patently unfit for office. that is my quick take away on today. >> i want to ask about the reaction of some other members of congress speaker of the house, mike johnson. we were just discussing it. in case you haven't seen what he had to say, calling it a shameful day in american history. the democrats cheered as they convicted, they convicted the leader of the opposition party on charges, predicated on testimony. surely political exercise, not legal, the comment goes on and on. there has been a unanimous cry, essentially, from elected republicans along those lines. what do you think about the speaker of the house talking about the verdict in those terms? >> the only thing shameful about today is the actions of speaker johnson and so many of trump enablers. that they would for him, for the benefit of this convicted felon, would tear down our justice system, would have further discredit on the justice system. mike johnson knows better. this is just calculated desired to cling to power. and that truly is shameful. and there is just no two ways about it. every time over the last eight years, when we have thought, okay, surely now, republicans of good sense will reject, step away, move away, condemn, shun, donald trump, this incredibly immoral, unethical, and now criminal human being, but every time they show us who they truly are, and literally are people whose word, whose oath, whose devotion to the constitution means nothing compared to their desire for power. the cheney's, the adam kissinger's, stand out in such stark relief because there are just so few of them, that is the shameful aspect of today. the rejection still by republican leadership, our justice system, and of our democracy. >> i want to ask you one more question on political terms, last time i checked you are in fact a politician and practicing law and currently running to be a united states senator. we just