Smartmatic. Smartmatic. Reporter leaving certain rightwing media in serious legal jeopardy. As biden gets the vaccine, new concerns about a uk super spreader strain. It may be up to 70 more transmissible. At long last, a deal on capitol hill. What we know about whats in the 900 billion of covid relief. Today is a good day, but it is certainly not the end of the story. It cannot be the end of the story. All in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. While there was a sedition summit in the white house this weekend may sound extreme but thats what appears to have happened. Its kind of weird its not a bigger story. Weve seen the president try, through political pressure and, of course, the courts, to, you know, un over turn the election, undo american democracy and to install himself in the white house for another term against the last people. Now, none of those efforts have worked. In fact, theyve been so cartoonishly flailing that one of trumps most unwavering supporters, attorney lynwood, just filed a suit in which he asserted he was telling the truth under, quote, plenty of perjury. Thats supposed to be penalty of perjury. The work of wood and others is all in pursuit of the only project donald trump seems genuinely committed to at the moment. Instead of attending to the onceinacentury humanitarian crisis killing roughly 3,000 americans a day, or playing an essential role in the covid relief package or engaging in any way as president , trump is holed up, watching tv. We know for a long time thats where he gets his ideas as to what to do next. We dont know if he was watching live when disgraced and pardoned adviser Michael Flynn went on air last tuesday, it certainly appears as if he heard what he was saying. Within the swing states if he wanted to, he could take military capabilities, place them in those states and basically rerun an election in each of those states. Its not unprecedented. People out there are talking about martial law like its something weve never done. Martial law has been instituted 64, 64 times, craig. Yes. Just send the military into the swing states and make everyone revote at the point of a gun. Definitely what the founders had in mind. Now one day after that appearance, that got Michael Flynn, who is going on tv and toying with the idea of trump invoking martial law in order to achieve power and end the american experiment, that guy was meeting in the white house with the president himself to discuss his idea. Okay . This is not him just out there, saying stuff. Hes in the white house, with the president. Also at that meeting as the New York Times first reported, was attorney sydney powell, who has been spreading wild conspiracy theories about rigged Voting Machines. Trump reportedly discussed naming sydney powell as special counsel, like an official, i guess, department of justice counsel, overseeing an investigation into voter fraud. What would that look like . At the meeting the participants reportedly discussed commandeering Voting Machines with powell to inspect the machines. Sydney powell is someone so extreme and whose performance has been so bizarre and error ridden that trumps own legal team publicly disavowed her. She has supported qanon conspiracies, claimed the democrats stole the election, and said those who dont support trumps delusion will go to jail. Brain storming, figuring out what to do next. Now apparently there was some push back in the meeting as well discuss shortly. Think about this. You have the president of the United States considering apparently declaring martial law and announcing new elections and or seizing the nations Voting Machines so that sydney powell can use them to push her lies. And, again, its all so ridiculous, right . But its not idle talk. Axios reported Rudy Giuliani called up Ken Cuccinelli and asked him whether dhs could seize Voting Machines. Maggie haberman reported this afternoon, guess what, guess who is back. Sydney powell is back at the white house again today for the third time in four days. What do you think theyre doing in there, guys . What do you think theyre talking about . What do you think the president is contemplating . What are they drawing up in there . Trump is apparently contemplating here is so extreme and offensive, even some of his most stalwart yes men are having to ever so gently tell the president hes lost his mind. Even attorney general william barr, who completely has debased himself on trumps behalf, barr is saying, no, there is no basis for seizing Voting Machines or appointing a special counsel to investigate nonexistent Election Fraud. Thats where things are. Too much for bill barr to carry water for. And it is true that weve gotten fiveplus years of headlines about how the people around him are concerned, but two people who have covered him for the duration of that time more or less report that things have actually, in the minds of the people around him, reached a whole new level. In a piece about how officials have become increasingly new alarmed about trumps power grab, Senior Administration official saying, quote, people who are nervous arent the weakkneed bureaucrats we loath. These are the people who have endured arguably mayhem in history. Mag maggy haberman sources who have gotten used to trumps emotions are scared. New york times Homeland Security correspondent zolan casino young, who first broke that story about the fried evening meeting at the white house, along with his colleague, magazi maggie haberman. The meeting took place on friday night. Theres three main takeaways out of our reporting on this meeting as well as a separate push on the same week involving some of the same people. The first thing you touched on in your intro, the president considering making sydney powell a sort of white house special counsel, a lawyer from within the white house, who will investigate what she, as well as other people in the trump campaign, have deemed, have described as widespread voter fraud. Its important to point out here again, chris, that that is something thats been tossed out in the courts already. And to this point, those are baseless claims. That was the first takeaway, to make her a sort of lawyer from working within the white house that would investigate this. And you saw a pushback on that. Well get back to that. The second takeaway is the fact that her client as well, Michael Flynn, the former National Security adviser that was recently pardoned by the president , was also present at that meeting as well. As you touched on, Michael Flynn also recently went on to news max and indicated that the president should use the military, invoke martial law to, quote, unquote, rerun the election. And we do know, based off our reporting that the president did ask about that in the meeting as well. And then the third is also a separate push. Now, Rudy Giuliani, as well, earlier in the week, separately, also placed a call to Ken Cuccinelli, acting deputy secretary at the department of Homeland Security, the second highest ranked person at the department and put in a request to have dhs assert control of Voting Machines for the purpose of trying to find some sort of evidence of some of this voter fraud. Now, its important to say here there was pushback. You touched on that. In terms of sydney powell and appointing her this counsel to investigate fraud, you saw pushback from almost everybody else in the room. I mean, really specifically, white House Counsel as well as mark meadows, chief of staff. And when it came to Rudy Giulianis second push, you saw as well Ken Cuccinelli denying that request and saying dhs just does not have the Legal Authority to do that. So, here is my ive read your reporting and some others reporting on this meeting. The basic dynamic, as far as i can tell basically, is that you have these people working on the president s behalf in the courts and trying to overturn the election, right . Sydney powell and Rudy Giuliani. My understanding is what it seemed like this meeting was, them coming into the white house and saying we dont have the support of the state, the american government, which is run by the president , isnt helping us in this. Basically, how do we use the government to help us pursue this agenda . And a bunch of people, meadow owes, essentially barr now today basically he wasnt at the meeting, but really not wanting that line to be crossed, as i understand. Is that a fair characterization of the dynamic . Sydney powell calling people in that room that refused to use the resources of the federal government for the efforts of the campaign to overturn the results of the election, she was calling them quitters, quote, unquote, quitters at that point. Yes, you hit on it. You do have people that are within the federal government, including the attorney general, who just today at a press conference, an unrelated press conference, said that he had no intention in appointing a special counsel to investigate socalled widespread fraud or hunter biden, which had been another wish of those individuals. Yeah. So, there is a guy who is a former ceo of overstock. Com, patrick burn, who claims he was in the room at this meeting as well. I dont know if thats been confirmed by other independent reporting, but i think the tenor we know he has become a very big maga die hard. The tenor of what hes saying is partly what youre getting from sydney powell, is my involvement was i was in the room when it happened. Raised voices included my own. President trump is being terribly served by his advisers. They want him to lose or are lying to him. Hes surrounded by vindacious mediocrit mediocrities. The mark meadows or bill barrs of the world are undercutting him and he needs to be more firstful. Not just that it seems but the reporting shows that this push by sydney powell and some of what was said in that meeting caused concern for even those who have been the most staunch supporters of the president. That being said, while mark meadows did push back in that meeting, we did have another meeting today. Sydney powell has continued to go to the white house. As you noted, my colleague, maggie haberman, reported that today. A group of republican congressmen went to the white house today, and mark meadows tweeted that out and touted that as well. Even those who pushed back days ago, there are still individuals within the federal government that are going to continue to advocate for this push, that there was widespread fraud in the election. Zolan kannoyoungs, thank you so much for sharing that with us tonight. Appreciate it. Thank you. Now for some perspective on what exactly is happening, i want to turn to retired u. S. Army lawrence wilkerson. At one point, colonel, this is a similar story to others weve heard where the president has a crazy idea and people are trying to walk away from him. In this case, though, its hard to get your head around how wildly danger sbous offensive it is. What is your reaction to what youve heard about this meeting and what the president is attempting to consider . My first reaction, of course, is dont take counsel of your fears. Weve just gone through one of the most incredible election sequences in our nations history, certainly since world war ii. More people voted by more methodology, in a pandemic environment, et cetera, et cetera. I have to commend all those people who worked so hard to deliver a free and fair election. At the same time i say that, i have to say my fears are somewhat significant with a former Lieutenant General in the United States army saying what flynn said with regard to martial law, going to the battleground states and essentially reconducting the elections. Were i secretary of defense, i would call him back to active duty, in the perogative of the secretary of defense and courtmartial him. At a minimum, i would cite him for incitement for insurrection. This is not something a military officer should do. You serve until youre roughly 85 years old. Its half pay, not necessarily retired pay. You can be called back at any time. I got my letter from secretary rumfeld when i was chief of staff to secretary powell. I was called back to active duty. I didnt have to do it, but thats the power of the military over this general, and he needs to be rebuked. He needs to be reprimanded and done so officially. That would be the best way to do it. These other people like bannon, powell and so forth, theyre sycophants, seeking whatever they can gain from the magical aura of this man before it dissipates, and it frightens me as to the things they could do if the 25th amendment or Something Like it is not implemented and we dont remove him from office. Theres a lot of time left. When we work on this as a transition integrity project we saw trump do some pretty desperate things. One of the things that we saw him do that im not waiting eagerly to see if he fulfills it, he did everything he could possibly do to ruin bidens first year in office, everything from not allowing him to get cabinet officers confirmed because he had such a control that weve seen demonstrated over the senate of the United States, to not allowing good transitions to take place. I understand from inside sources that those transitions are, for the most part, taking place, but theyre taking place in some instances begrudgingly. Thats not the way transitions should occur. Yeah, your point about general flynn, just to circle back to that for a moment. I find the generals trajectory here really just unnerving. This is someone who was celebrated, had a fairly sterling record. People thought he was an incredible intelligence officer, and he was the head of Defense Intelligence agency before he was essentially fired. And to watch someone who served and had this reputation and is known by a lot of people that work with him go on the trajectory he has where essentially he was an unpaid Foreign Agent of a foreign government, turkish government, and now talking about martial law, its a very unnerving trajectory. It is. In my view, hes a disgrace to his uniform. Hes one of those examples, and i knew several of them when i was in the military, some 30 years plus. Hes one of those examples of a prn who gets squirreled away in a special community. In this case, special ops and also intelligence, and he grows up to flag rank and no one really applies any adult supervision. And i include in that general mcchrystal in afghanistan when he worked for general mcchrystal. I blame general mcchrystal for putting him in the position hes in right now to a certain extent. These people come along and get to the position where they really have some authority. In this case, much beyond the three stars, National Security adviser almost, and they then show their true colors. And i think thats what flynn is doing. Otherwise ive got to pronounce him a psychotic or worse. You seem unnerved but also somewhat confident about the situation were in, which i think tracks of where i am. Again, there is a dwindling amount of power the president has. Theres a kind of whiff of desperation. Hes going to sort of more and more bizarre, crankish kind of voices. And yet, you know, the authority of the government still rests in the mans hands for 30 days. And weve been anticipating breakglass moments. I dont think weve quite gotten one yet. Are you confident basically, based on the reporting and also on what you know about the institutions, and particularly department of defense that he will not be allowed to do anything like he is contemplating . There will be nothing with the military, in my very strong view. The military will not do anything untoward, no matter what orders come from him. And, indeed, if the orders were truly untoward, the 25th amendment might be implemented. I dont see how people could stop from doing that. What worries me, chris, right now, is the opportunistic advantage thats out there right now for a very hard press by covid19 north korea, for example, kim jongun, for a very pressured china with regard to what taipei is doing and taiwan in general, and in the situation with iran where we have them just waiting. These are the kinds of things that trump could leave as a blow to the country and it would wind up being a significant blow to the country and the new administration. Colonel lawrence wilkerson, always great to get your insight and experience shared with us. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. Still to come, a rare walkback from rightwing Media Outlets about one of their favorite Election Fraud conspiracy theories. 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