gunman opened fire at a grocery store in arkansas. the alleged shooter was shot by police before being taken into custody. conditions from those injured range from non-life-threatening to extremely critical. in south carolina, a small plane was forced to make an emergency landing on the interstate. they were in the air for 40 minutes before a quick descent on the interstate's median. wow! in moments the watching and the waiting, and the waiting, and the waiting. what's behind at the supreme court, ahead. good day to all of you from msnbc headquarters in new york. welcome, everyone, to "alex witt reports." with just five days until the presidential debates, president biden is campaigning today while one of his surrogates is outlining how the campaign is boosting outreach to african american voters. >> the idea black folks should just show up is wrong and i believe joe biden understands that. kamala harris certainly understands it, which is why as we move forward into this campaign, you will see the ways in which they have already invested far more than donald trump in reaching out to black communities even if it were to list them up and you will see them ramp up over the next few months in order to and the job is and on until november 5th. >> donald trump on the campaign trail today speaking at a rally in philadelphia tonight. right now you see him addressing conservative in washington, d.c. we will have a report on that in just a moment for you. a short time ago, congresswoman ocasio-cortez and bernie sanders in the bronx. tight primary race on tuesday. >> why is our political establishment doing that? because jamaal bowman dared to speak up for palestinians. >> this election is about whether or not the billionaire class and the ll. will control the united states. government in our view, no, they won't. >> the biden/harris campaign announcing a series of events next week marking two years since the overturning of roe v wade and while we await two more big decisions from the supreme court, both with connections to the former president, ruling on his claim on absolute immunity and a ruling on a january 6th obstruction charge. we have correspondence in place covering all of these angles. we will first go to julie tsirkin at the face conference in washington, d.c. where -- i can't figure it out. is that donald trump still speaking behind you there? he's been on for well over an hour. >> reporter: well over an hour indeed, alex. he has been talking about every topic you can think of. he is talking to a crowd of christian conservative activists , people who want to hear the former president who want to hear him talk about culture war issues and that is exactly what he has been doing. of course, he has been focusing on the border issues and immigration. he talked a little bit about the debate and through jabs at president biden. he talked about how the 2020 election was rigged and said democrats won't do it again. trump said they won't do it again this november. he had roaring applause from the crowd so far to pretty much everything he's brought up. most notably his comments on abortion. of course, he's the reason we have three supreme court justices adding to that majority in the supreme court who were responsible for the ruling in 2022 to overturn roe v. wade. take a listen to trump taking credit for that here. >> i took a lot of heat. i took a lot of heat. a lot of hits, but we did the right thing. thanks to jesus justices, we have achieved what the pro-life movement for 49 years and we've gotten abortion out of the federal government and back to the states. the way everybody and the legal scholars always said it should be. it is up to the will of the people in each state. some states will be more conservative. some will be more liberal. that is happening now. >> reporter: so saying abortion should be left up to the states, saying there should be exceptions, that is not going as far as some of the people here want him to go. they want him to advocate for federal abortion ban but outside of this room, that is not popular. the former president of course talking about other issues that i mentioned, most notably sing to the crowd christians are being attacked undercurrent -- under our current president, president biden. i want to point out the top contenders to be trump running mate in november to split his ticket with him are not at this event. we saw a lot of senators, a lot of lawmakers. not senator rubio or senator vance as you see on your screen. another governor did take the stage, kristi noem of south dakota who took the stage a few minutes before trump went on, touting the conservative christians in the room need him as president so that was an interesting dynamic there. she was once viewed as a potential contender on the list but as you can see behind me, alex, he is still going in the crowd is very receptive of him before he goes to philadelphia later today for a rally. >> applause to you, my friend. you didn't miss a beat. that was very hard to do. i hope our viewers understand that. i am applauding you. good job. thank you very much, julie. let's get over to allie raffa at the white house. what a rehearing as president biden prepares for the trump rematch? >> reporter: in an exclusive interview with msnbc , harris talking about what she sees as the stakes of this election and giving a preview of what she expects the president to focus on when he faces off against former president trump for the first time in four years on thursday night's debate stage. listen here. >> joe biden and this debate will make clear the contrast. you know, many issues in our country and our world that are complex and nuanced. november of 2024 is binary and when you look at the difference, i would ask people to really imagine what the world will be like on january 20th, 2025. on one hand -- >> reporter: alex, right now the president is prepping for what is expected to be the biggest prime time moment of this election cycle so far. he's using the remote retreat of camp david to huddle with his team of closest advisors and campaign staff to prep for this high-stakes moment. as far as what these intensive sessions consist of, we know they are being led by his former chief of staff. he is surrounded by his closest aides and confidant, really preparing him for policy issues they expect to come up during this debate against former president trump but also what they seek as the inevitable moments, those unscripted moments, those personal jabs they expect former president trump to take against president biden, so that is all factoring into the president's debate prep in camp david the next few days. alex, the biden campaign sees this as an opportunity given this debate will happen months before the first general election debate in 2020 which happened in september, they see this as an opportunity as a chance to grasp the attention of voters who may not have been paying attention at all thus far. they will be operating this very robust response operation, responding and reaction to the debate in real time. they are planning on sending several surrogates to atlanta where the debate is held to drive the president's message even further, alex. >> thank you from the white house, allie raffa. watch the rest of the vice president's interview on morning joe monday morning at 6:00 a.m. eastern right here on msnbc . joining me now, supreme court reporter lawrence hurley. let's get into the things that have happened and what has yet to happen. why has it taken so long for the court to rule on trump's claim of immunity and election interference case? knowing the delay could possibly present the case from going to trial before voters cast a vote, lawrence, is there reasonable justification for holding up the decision? >> alex, it is different to -- difficult to see into the heads of the justices to know what they are thinking about but there was a delay in the court whether or not to even hear this case but when they did decide to hear it, there was no urgency to hear it quickly. they heard oral arguments in april and there is clearly no urgency in deciding the case as we head towards the end of the course term. although we will get a ruling in the next week or so, that doesn't leave a lot of time for trial especially if there are local proceedings that have to take place first so we can infer from that there are some justices who think there is no urgency in deciding this and this is just another case they have to decide. maybe they don't want to look like they are favoring either biden or trump, but of course by delaying it, a lot of people are accusing them of exactly that, favoring trump. >> they would fail on that front if that were the attempt but there are 14 left to decide. one involves a january 6th defendant trying to throw out charges. he tried to obstruct an official proceeding. donald trump has been accused of that same, lawrence, so explain how the court's ruling could affect trump's prosecution. >> that's right. obstruction of an official proceeding law that trump and this defendant, joseph fisher is the subject of this supreme court case have been charged under, you know, the defendant in this case says this is evidence tampering and shouldn't apply to what he was doing on january 6th. a lot of scholars are saying even if the supreme court rules in his favor and says yes, this law can't be used to prosecute someone on january 6th, that doesn't necessarily mean it would affect trump's , himself. in his case he is accused of being much more intimately involved with this scheme of fake electors and to try to actually impede the certification of the electoral votes and there is a suggestion there there were pieces of paper involved and documents and this is what the law was intended to cover but we will see more when the court actually rules in that case. >> okay, when will we hear about presidential immunity? i know there will be wednesday releases, which is a typical. thursday, a typical. does this possibly going to the beginning of july? what are your thoughts on that? >> as you head into the last week of the supreme court, the court starts to add days as needed so we can assume we already know there will be rulings on wednesday. they will probably add thursday, friday, and if they are not done by then, which usually they tried to get it done by the end of june but there is no reason it can't wait until monday if there are cases left. it is worth noting the immunity case was added at the last minute so it wasn't the last case to be argued. it was argued after all of the other cases were argued and that could be a reason they are backed up a bit. >> okay. lawrence hurley, we will see. thank you so much. one thing donald trump's campaign is doing ahead of the debate and if it could backfire for him. back in 90 seconds. 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does biden want trump's words to be the final of the night, and if so, why? >> many people think the podium advantage location is because of where your eyes go when you are watching television. typically speaking the person that has the last word in most cases is the person acknowledging donald trump will be a wild character because he has been 5000 times over and is guaranteed to say extremely offensive things. having him go last could be the moment he says something that turns off the majority of americans, particularly those in the swing states and those necessary to actually maintain real leverage in this upcoming election but i do think that to allow donald trump to have the last word? it means there is an ace in the back pocket for the biden campaign because typically unless you already know you will say something unexpected. i would say pay attention to how biden performs in this upcoming debate because there are going to be some surprises. >> interesting take. brendan, the trump team has repeatedly called biden sleepy, incoherent, unable to put a sentence together. have they set the bar too low for the president and are they now trying to reverse course? >> yes, and every republican in the country and conservative media, no doubt. there is an expectation joe biden is incapable of completing a sentence. there are moments, notably at the state of the union, it has been deflating for republicans. now i do think though there is a high bar that joe biden is going to need to be able to meet . people are going to be looking for this from joe biden. has his age caught up with him? people are tuning in really starting to pay attention. i've heard a lot about joe biden's age. this may be the first time people are going to be seeing him be challenged in any meaningful way, so there is a lot of risk for him in this situation and whether he does have a moment either he falters or trump can step in and really push the gas against him. so i think this is a relatively high -- very high-stakes debate, actually. most debates don't end up moving the numbers very much but i think this one in particular is extremely important. >> that's interesting because these men are three years apart in age, 81 and 78. it's not like either is a spring chicken. let's go to axios and reports from them, ameshia. senior democrats are worried about biden's strategy on democracy, on political violence, on trump's character. how much of the debate will shape strategy and could biden change course midstream? >> i absolutely think biden will change course midstream. it is important to understand the policy but it's also important to know america is on the brink of if trump is reelected not having a democracy at all. we seen what project 2025 looks like. trump said he would be a dictator on day one. this debate will be focused on the barbs donald trump tries to throw directly at president biden. we know he will go low for donald trump. i think he is going to go as deep and hard as he can that joe biden has to not the, rattled by that. he has to attack former president trump in the same types of ways. he has got to show his strength in that capacity. we know that trump will go after hunter biden and we know he will say a lot of things that are untrue because he does that debate after debate. he has to fact check him as well . there is a lot he has to juggle at the same time and i think joe biden is up to the task. >> brendan, with regard to hunter biden, do you think americans would want to see him pretty strongly push back against donald trump, because this is a father about her son. >> absolutely and i expect that is what they will do. donald trump needs to tread very carefully here. this election will be decided by what we call the double haters, those who don't love either candidate. donald trump would be wise with good behavior because he comes out and he's obnoxious and he looks mean and he reminds people why they don't like him. if he is the most heritable for the double haters, that could be really bad. going after someone whose son struggled with addiction, that will certainly come across as a pretty unseemly thing to do. >> what about the biden poll numbers trending upwards according to foxnews, that has him up by two points, within the margin of error. does that show you biden's strategy -- is it working? >> it might. that pole notably stands out as showing biden ahead. it is encouraging for the biden campaign because that poll has been trending in biden's direction. month after month, it is getting better for them. whether it is just a snapshot, it is trending in the right direction. of course, this election will come down to a number of swing states. we will see more polls decide the election but if you are the biden campaign, it has got to be encouraging you are finally starting to see what should -- all of the external factors, the conviction, the economy, these things should eventually start trending in your direction so it should be encouraging for them. >> ameshia, a poll found 20% of independents say trump's conviction matters to their vote and they are less likely to support him. only 5% say they are more likely to support trump . is that significant and how important is winning over democratics -- independence? >> it is extremely significant. donald trump has made a habit of trying to push up accountable for a majority of things he has been charged with but in new york he was found guilty on multiple felony charges. we are talking 30 plus felony charges. he's convicted of those things by a jury of his peers. for the swing voters in a handful of states brendan just talked about, it will matter because this is the same donald trump who has won on a law and order campaign. law and order has come up to him and he wants to dismantle the system that found him guilty. it matters to voters to have someone who is not a criminal in office. that is a big thing for a lot of undecided voters. >> should president biden, should he hammer it home that this is -- he has been convicted on 34 felony counts? is that something he should hit hard during the debate? >> he absolutely should and his surrogates have been hitting it on the campaign trail as well. there is no recourse. trump will come back and try to appeal but he has been found guilty on a multitude of felony charges. that matters, especially when he's out here trying to paint that is predominately black as being disgusting, crime-ridden, as everyone entering the country at the southern border is a criminal. this guy has literally been convicted. he has to paint that picture. >> last question to you, brendan. the washington post reports biden's message against trump, he's worse than before. how do you get across to the voters trump will be worse in the second and follow through on his threats? >> i think they need to be more specific about it. it is a very reasonable concern they have. all of the things people know about donald trump is actually tends to sort of wash over you and it seems easy to accept that oh, he is the crazy one and yeah, i can't look past that. you have to get the base fired up. also for those swing voters to remind them this isn't going to be just the good things your member about his time but he has actual policy changes that will be even worse than what you remember. he will come in with a bunch of people around you that will serve no rolling restraining him. they will only encourage his worst instincts. you have to rile people up and remind people because we are so numb to everything he's done but unless that pivot to some type of economic message and some answer on immigration, the top two issues people care about , it is insufficient and we haven't seen him figure it out yet. >> i think it's commonly called trump amnesia. brendan, good to see you. ameshia, you as well . it is hotter than hades out there and the heat wave is and over yet. when we will get some