plus, senate republicans block a bill to protect access to birth control as "the 11th hour" gets underway on this wednesday night. good evening once again, i'm stephanie ruhle. we are now 153 days away from the election, and it -- that means it is exactly five months from today. and as we get closer to that day, president biden is trying to show the sharp differences between him and donald trump. right now he's in france to mark tomorrow's 80th anniversary of d-day. and while he is there for a very important occasion, he is also trying to reassure our allies about america's place on the world stage. and what will happen when voters go to the polls in november. as our friend reports for the atlantic, quote, in capitals across the continent, leaders and diplomats express a sense of alarm bordering on panic at the prospect of donald trump's re-election. on friday, he is scheduled to give a major speech on democracy and the global struggle against authoritarianism. compare that to what donald trump's allies are doing here at home. they are openly calling for revenge against democrats after trump was convicted in new york even though there is zero evidence that president biden or any of his allies in congress had anything to do with that prosecution. steve bannon, one of donald trump's oldest allies, told "the new york times" that now is the moment for obscure republican prosecutors to make a name for themselves by prosecuting democrats. with that, let's get smarter with our panel, and it's a super one. my dear friend molly is here, special correspondent for vanity fair and an msnbc contributor, evan joins us, reporter and former federal prosecutor and msnbc legal analyst, glen kershner is with us. molly, it's obviously important for president biden to be there as america's leader, but from a political standpoint, what is the image he's trying to protect -- excuse me, project, and how important is it? >> it's really, look, it's really important, because it really is a struggle for democracy. i think -- and we were talking about this before -- the more he can get out there, every time biden gets out and speaks, people are like, oh, he sounds pretty good. i mean, that state of the union address was excellent. it was so -- >> they said he knocked it out of the park that night. >> and he was so good, in fact, that trump was like he's on drugs -- remember the trump world was -- couldn't even like conceptualize it. so you need to get out there. this kind of thing is good. he did this before the midterms and a lot of people in the media were like this doesn't work, people don't vote on democracy. and in fact, it worked really well. also, d-day is really important, and world war ii was one of the sort of, you know -- the thing that sort of created american democracy in a different way and also nato. >> okay, that's kind of the thing, right? so the president is there marking d-day but sort of standing arm in arm with other world lead ears, do you think it will be success eful or they're hitting the right tone raising the alarm that this is a battle across the world against the rise in authoritarianism? that threat is real. >> you mentioned coppins piece at the top, there's question all over the world to what's happening to the conversation about democracy, what happens next in all these countries and the world system we've been used to is a big one. and what's remarkable to me, when you put those two things back to back, they show how different these candidates are who are running for president. i talk to a lot of vote ear, people all over the country, and a lot of americans are kind of sad and freaked out. they want to feel econfident and good about being american again. they don't feel that right now. and biden tells them there's a way to do that by building up from what we are used to as a country, the foundations that we have, build up. i'm going to talk to nato, rebuild those alliances, we're going to have a country you're used to. and trump's argument is we're going to tear these things down and prosecute democrat, do politically motivated judicial things. the difference is so stark, and it is remarkable to me just how close the election is when you see how different the two guys are and the two messages they have are. >> how different they are and those messages. those messages that donald trump is pushing one would think are wildly unpopular, so who is he speaking to and why is it sticking? because the new sort of super wealthy set that's getting excited about him, that's all about tax cuts and deregulation. they cannot be down with any of this. >> a lot of these republican policies are not super popular, but they are -- you know, look, we live in a media bubble, right? there's not that much media that -- mainstream media that's getting to a lot of the people in this country. >> bingo. let's talk about what donald trump and his allies are doing. talk to us about this revenge mission, right, steve bannon saying this is a moment for obscure republican prosecutors to make a name for themselves and go after democrats, what? >> you know, the republicans are distinguishing themselves as the pro-crime party, plain and simple. when you see house speaker mike johnson, you see representative jim jordan and his weaponization of government committee, i mean, what they are doing, at least this is the way it looks to this old prosecutor, is they're obstructing justice. they're obstructing prosecutions of donald trump for political advantage. they're doing it whether they're state court prosecution, whether they're federal court prosecutions, and i wish some prosecutors would actually rise up and begin to call them out and hold them accountable for it. because they seem to stand for nothing other than just a naked power grab in the way they per ereceive, i think, their chances of retaining power is to make sure they never break from donald trump. so i don't understand it, but i hope it comes back to haunt them come november. >> evan, molly's correctly identified media bubble be let's talk about the truth, because republicans are arguing that the justice system is being weaponized, but sit those every republicans that are openly advocating for politically persecuting their opponents. while at the same time while donald trump just stood trial, guess who else is, the president's son and new jersey senator bob menendez, at this very moment. what is going on here? on what grounds can republicans say this? >> sometimes you ask me hard questions, it's a difficult challenge for me to answer them. i've got to dig deep. >> if we knew the answers, we wouldn't have you on. >> but sometimes these questions are just like straight up politics. like the most old school, boring politics you can kind of think of. and when you think of a person saying the judge that prosecuted my case, that judge is a bad judge, but the judge that is going to be good rulings in florida, for example, or the judge that's prosecuting the case against hunter bide on or the judge that's doing -- those are good judges. this is just basic politics as it goes. the idea is if it's against me, it's bad, if it's against them, it's good. and that's all it is. i mean, it's the most direct thing i've ever seen, at least in this cycle. it's just such an obvious, obvious political play. >> the steve bannon argument is you opened the door, if you're going to do this to trump, we're going to do this to you. >> the whole thing is retribution, right? the idea is if you try to do these prosecutions, we will get back at you. you need to be afraid of republicans. and look, the whole party is basically about trump now. i mean, like name a republican platform like one of the tenets of the party now. >> well -- >> trump? >> if you were in the trump sphere, you're never doing mainstream media, so no one is going to look back and see bannon and say, well, what about bob menendez, what about hunter biden. >> but look, this is very dangerous. one of the things you cover as a reporter is the things that bind us together as a country, and we talk about this idea of attacking the judicial system, just saying that like it's just fake. this is what they're saying. when someone says, look, you elect me, i'll prosecute everybody that you hate, and it'll -- that's just how it works. and when they prosecute me, it's fake. and it's fake. this stuff has real impact down the line, right? it is politics right now. people are making bets they can say these things and get votes and get just enough of those swing state votes to win, but there is a really serious long-term impact to be thinking about here. when we take away the idea of the courts as being real, we don't really know what happens after that. and that is something i am watching so closely when i do my reporting and talk to these voters who are concerned tant state of america to come and tell them that this whole other chunk of it is not working, is also fake, i don't know what that means for the nation's sort of, like, health in the long term. >> glenn, it's sort of this reminder of how extraordinary it was that a week ago 12 ordinary new yorkers took on the brave, bold, and difficult task of sitting on that jury and convicting donald trump, because now today we learned from axios reporting that trump allies are already talking about this idea that they want to throw d.a. alvin bragg in jail. what does that say to you? especially where donald trump was in 2016 to where he is today. >> yeah, it says the republicans are the pro-crime party. you know, i am thrilled that new york -- a state jurisdiction decided to do the hard work of holding donald trump accountable for just some of his crime sxchlts these were crimes that were designed to gain unfair advantage in the 2016 presidential election. and what did they get for it? new york? we have jurors who are being doxxed. we have witnessed being s.w.a.t.ed. we have judge's family members and prosecutors being put in harm's way, including by the republican party who want, to as you say, steph, go after alvin bragg for simply doing his job. and you know, the one thing that i think would probably go a long way to, you know, kind of prod justice into wakefulness writ large is if the federal government began charging some of the hierarchy of the insurrection. the suits of the insurrection as compared to the boots of the insurrection. the command structure. because what happened on january 6th, steph, is a federal problem. and it needs a federal solution. and for whatever reason, the feds seem content to elet the states, whether it's new york or arizona, wisconsin, georgia, michigan, do the dirty work, the hard work of justice and for whatever reason the feds continue to just sort of sit back as they did until we saw the house january 6th select committee begin to prod doj into wakefulness. i would like to see the federal government start flexing its justice muscle and begin indicting some of these folk, including the ones that are presently unindicted co-conspirators in donald trump's federal prosecution in d.c. >> so molly, what do democrats, what does the biden campaign do with this, right? how do they break through and explain to the american people this right wing drive for vengeance? this ain't old school politic, okay, this is dangerous. >> i think what we were talking about before, donald trump is an awe tro crat. that's just -- he's running as an awe tro crat. he does these things which are anti -democracy, the norms that we have lived by in this constitutional democracy. and i think that what democrats have to do -- and biden has done a good job of this, but he needs to be out there more. and then the vice president, who's really an effective messenger, she needs to be out there too. and they both need to be out there, and they need to explain that these are the norm, and if these norms go away, we will no longer be the country that we our whole lifetimes have lived. in we'll be closer to hungary or russia or turkey. that's what it'll eventually be. i think they need stakes not odds. >> oh my god. all right, glern, i saved this question until the end because i know this story has you ready to bust out your black belt and start kicking, today the georgia court of appeals basically froze the fulton county election interference case at least for now. why is this happening? what does it mean? >> yeah, but for the new york result, justice seems to be going nowhere fast. and i think georgia is now proving the point. listen, appellate litigation can be a very slow, plodding, you know, ordeal, and the georgia appeals court just proved it by not only setting the argument in the appeal of the disqualification of district attorney fani willis issue, which was rejected by judge mcafee and trump and company appealed it. they set that off for october, but they have also sort of put a stay in place, so now judge mcafee can do nothing except kind of tread justice water until the georgia appeals court finally resolves the appeal. so look, there is no hope now of anything happening in georgia before the november election. of course, there's still a slim chance we might see something happen in d.c. if the supreme court danes to decide the absolute immunity issue and return it to the judge to put it back on the trial track. and of course, down in florida, judge cannon has made sure that that case will make zero progress. >> down in florida, safe to say, forget about it. molly, evan, glenn, thank you all for starting us off. don't go anywhere if you're watching from home. in fact, stretch your legs, sit back down, and turn up the volume. when we come back, bibles in classrooms and making abortion a homicide. texas republicans are making their extreme platform very, very clear. how they are taking a page from the project 2025 playbook. and later, my keynote conversation with charl main the god. why he says we need to quit the small talk and commit to deeper, tougher conversations. "the 11th hour" just getting underway on a wednesday. " just getting underway on a wednesday. craig here pays too much for verizon wireless. so he sublet half his real estate office... [ bird squawks loudly ] to a pet shop. meg's moving company uses t-mobile. so she scaled down her fleet to save money. and don's paying so much for at&t, he's been waiting to update his equipment! there's a smarter way to save. comcast business mobile. you could save up to 70% on your wireless bill. so you don't have to compromise. powering smarter savings. powering possibilities. you've heard us talk a lot about project 2025 on this show. sit the 900-page playbook for a far right agenda that is backed by many of trump's closest allies. and it lays out policies and plans that trump could put into effect if he wins in november. now the republican party has not officially endorsed it yet, but some members got closer than ever to embracing its most extreme principles at the texas gop convention last month. watch this. >> they want to take god out of the country. they want government to be god. >> it's not a battle between republican and democrat. it's not a battle between conservative and liberal. it's a battle between sane and crazy. and the forces that are targeting this country, they are organized, they are incredibly well funded, and they are committed. look at what the democrats have done. i want to ask you, if you were actively trying to destroy america, what would you do differently? >> for more, i'm going to bring in robert a democracy reporter for the texas tribune. robert, educate us. the texas gop convention is known to amplify the loudest and most hard line activists, but have you ever heard anything like this before? >> you know, as you said, you know, this convention has always kind of been where the most hard line people come. you know, last year -- or two years ago we saw a referendum on texas succession. we saw calls that homosexuality was an abnormal lifestyle, but even in talking to people who went this year, the consensus was this year did have a much more overt kind of spiritual warfare dynamic that i think really was concerning to even some republicans, because as we saw from the stay jiness, a lot of this was framed not as a fight with political enemy, people on the other side of the political aisle, but an existential battle. >> what does that even mean, spiritual warfare? >> you know, i think it's -- it is a term that is, you know, really started, i think, has been popularized amongst evangelicals in particular and among more charismatic pentecostals, but what it calls for is in line with this idea of an appeal to heaven. it is this idea that their political opponent, again, are not just political opponents. they are dark cosmic forces, principalities of evil, satanic. that has kind of created the permission structure for a lot of the things we're seeing on the right right now. >> how does thet gop's new party platform compare to project 2025, which is the most extreme we've seen? >> i think that there's a lot of overlap. some of the things that, you know, i think in the platform there is, for instance a call for a constitutional amendment that would require statewide office holders to win a popular vote in at least the majority of texas counties, which would effectively lock democrats out of elected office statewide. there was a call that abortion would be labeled homicide, a call for the state board of education to require the bible to be taught in schools. and i think as you rightly pointed out, not just the platform, but the rhetoric that we saw over the last few days and are increasingly seeing, this us versus them rhetoric, is integral to not just project 2025 but it's precursors, whether it's council for national policy, just this broader marching christian nationalist, christian dominionist -- we've seen flare up. >> you interviewed a republican vote who are leads this group that's dedicated to pushing back on fox news, not because fox is too extreme but because he says it is not extreme enough. he said in your piece that people need to go, quote, further down the rabbit hole. okay, going down the rabbit hole is usually a negative thing, and this guy's pushing for it? what's he talking about? >> this is one of, you know this was not an uncommon sentiment we heard from delegates, which is this idea that fox news had been coopted by rinos. we are coming off a political season in texas where the term rino was thrown at some of the most conservative lawmakers in the house simply because they supported the impeachment of ken paxton. and so really what i saw, you know, much more than that at the convention was this really, you know there have always been conspiratorial minds in that world, but really it seemed to be ingrained into the texas gop in ways that the people i talked to said was really unique this year. we had in the lob bis the epoch times, which has been in the news recently. the john burkes society, the original communist conspiracy theory group that was too radical for the gop in the 1950s and '60s, and here they are being embraced and their ideas elevated within, you know, in the convention hall of the texas gop. >> too radical in the '50s and '60s and is center stage in 2024, robert this is really important reporting that the whole country needs to hear. thank you for being here. when we return, my next very special guest says small talk is killing society and that real, meaningful, difficult, sometimes uncomfortable conversations are what we need to repair the deep divisions in our country. charlamagne tha god joins us when "the 11th hour" continues. ins us when "the 11th hour" continues [sfx] water lapping. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [sfx] water splashing. ♪ ♪ [sfx] ambient / laughing. ♪ ♪ the 2024 election is now five months out, and the country is more divided than ever. a lot of americans have gi