In battleground florida. That does it for us on this wednesday. Im alex witt. Im louis burgdorf. Morning joe starts right now. Good morning on a wednesday morning. Im willie geist. Mika has the morning off. We have breaking news overnight to get to. The city of charlotte, North Carolina, is on edge after violent protests erupted over the Deadly Police shooting of an africanamerican man. More than 200 demonstrators gathered last night carrying signs and in some cases verbally taunting officers in riot gear and physically as well throwing rocks according to an nbc producer on the scene. Officers used flash bangs and tear gas disperse the crowd. 12 officers were hurt including
one hit in the face by a rock. Unrest began spreading after the death of a man. They came upon scott in his car. At this point all we know is theyre in the apartment complex parking lot and this subject gets out with a weapon. They engage him. And one of the officers felt a leithal threat and fired his weapon because of that. A social media post who said shes the daughter of scott said she was unarmed and disabled. A Police Source confirmed the man who died and the Police Officer who shot him were africanamerican. Lets bring in nbc news correspondent chris clappen live from charlotte. Reporter it was indeed. The scene here different than the one it was a few short hours
ago. Protesters here ended up being met with tear gas because they had grown so tense, so volatile in their confrontation with police protesting the death of 43yearold Keith Lamont Scott as you mentioned. An important point to make at this particular point, willie, is police say they have indeed recovered the gun from the gun that scott allegedly possessed at that point. After the protesters were dispersed from this particular scene by the tear gas, they moved over to a major interstate here in charlotte. Interstate 85. And blocked the interstate in both directions taking their protest over there. But that broke up just a short while ago with the police chief and the mayor of charlotte now calling for calm and promising a thorough investigation. Willie . All right. Chris clackum, thank you very much. Conflicting reports about whether or not mr. Scott was armed. His family saying he was not. Police say they recovered a weapon. And then tulsa. My gosh. That footage is just shocking. Hundreds of protesters in downtown tulsa, oklahoma, yesterday calling for the arrest of Police Officer betty shelby. There are duelling interpretations of the dramatic video released and we hear the officers side of the story for the first time. Nbcs Gabe Gutierrez has the details. With the suv stopped in the middle of a twolane road, a 911 caller wasnt sure what to make of him. Officers responding to an unrelated call spotted him. But said he ignored their commands for more than a minute. Video shows that he had his hands up as he walked back to his vehicle. An officer in the chopper who cant be heard by officers on the ground makes this observation. Second later, one officer deploys her taser and another fires her gun. She joined the Police Department five years ago. She said she was never this scared ever in her entire life. She clearly believed him to be under the influence of some type of narcotic, possibly pcp, because she is a drug recognition expert. Reporter citing the lead investigator in the case that a vial of pcp was found in the suv and no weapon was found. You can see that reporter the attorney for the family shows the video shows he wasnt reaching inside the vehicle because his window was up. It shows that this department, like many police
departments around america, see people of color as criminals and suspects but not as american citizens. Reporter the District Attorney is now reviewing the case to see if any criminal charges should be filed. Were looking at two Different Cases this morning. One in tulsa, oklahoma, the one in charlotte. The one in tulsa though, the guy is walking slowly. He looks like hes on pcp . His hands are in the air the whole time. Hes walking slowly. When your hands are up here, what are you doing . He was walking slowly back to the car. His hands were in the air. He does absolutely everything that police would tell you to do. Look at that. Hands in the air. Legs spread. The window is closed. And then they shoot him. And by the way theres one, two, three whos in the helicopter . Four cops. Whos in the helicopter saying this guy looks like bad dude. He looks like hes on something. The guy is walking slowly. That comment from the helicopter confirms every suspicion africanamericans have in this country about the way police look at them. An africanamerican man walking down the road and call him a bad dude. Look at the splashy sports car. Wait. Hes driving a family suv. Its pathetic. In khakis. A tshirt. His arms are in the air. You have three Police Officer. Guns drawn. Weapons drawn at the rear five feet from the rear of the automobile. And one of them, were told just now by defense counsel, shes a drug recognition expert. So fully eight feet, ten feet away from the supposed, you know, person on pcp. Shes a drug recognition expert. Please, stop it. Lets go through these. Ferguson, we didnt have a camera on there. We didnt know exactly what was going on. It was a he said she said situation. Baltimore. We saw what happened to freddie gray on the ground. We never we dont know what happened in the back. Its two different accounts. You go one after another after another. Eric gardner was just pathetic and sickening and the morning it happened we said those officers should be arrested and put in jail. Black and white. This is black and white. This is black and white. You know what . There needs to be due process. It needs to go through the proper steps. I tell you what. This better not be an inside job in tulsa. This better not be an inside job. They better have an independent
prosecutor. Somebody from outside that district that does not work with the Police Department day in and day out getting bad guys off the street. It better be independent. And there better be justice here. Its pretty shocking. All right. Well be all over that story all morning. Keep you updated as we learn more. Lets move to politics. Donald trump was in North Carolina yesterday where an Elon University poll shows his campaign is back to life. A tightening race in florida where clintons lead has shrunk to just five points. 46 for secretary clinton to trumps 41 . Weve seen polls that show that race a bit closer actually. There i would think probably given all of the polls over the past week if youre in the Clinton Campaign, youre okay with a fivepoint lead in
florida given the bad news you got last week. I think they probably woke up yesterday and felt okay about taking the day off the trail for debate prep. National poll showing them and then the week before she had probably the worst postlabor day out of any general election candidate in the lead all summer that i can remember. She seems to have righted the ship. You know florida. I know florida. This is what i dont understand. I see i understand pennsylvania. I understa s states that are wider. Ive never understood how a state with as many hispanic voters could be tied, for instance. You just go through the i4 corridor and you look at a lot of puerto rican immigrants in that area who were not voting for donald trump for the most part. You look at his strength in the primary where he wiped out two of floridas favorite sons, jeb bush and marco rubio. For shortterm he paid a price
for an extremely toxic primary there in the same way his weakness in arizona is because of his toxic fight with two republican senators who have Approval Ratings in the 90s with jeff flake and john mccain. But he has surprising strength in florida beyond the panhandle. My familiarity with florida is restricted to lee county. My instinct about lee county is he could carry 60 of the voters. I agree with you. Hes going to do extremely well in north florida. Hes going to do extremely well in southwest florida. Democrats are going to do extremely well on the coast of east florida in which we republicans for years called the killing fields. We have. If you get out of dade, broward and Palm Beach County four blocks in miami but other than that if you get out of those three counties and youre down 300,000 votes in fact, i know w. Was
going to win in 2004 because he only lost in killing fields by 300,000 votes. Then its i4 corridor. Again, its such a diverse state. This is a state that if im Hillary Clinton and donald trump is ahead in any polls in florida, im in trouble. And for Donald Trumps part of course shes ahead five now. Im just saying polls show it closer. A week ago it was closer. You cannot draw a winning map for donald trump without florida. Its not there. If you take that off the map, you have to pull magic in states hes not going to win. He has to win florida. Its close. He has to spend time there. If he wins florida thats indicative of something much larger that hes broken out of this stereotype of just Getting High School white dudes that watch wrestling. Which is what the media likes to say. Thats basically those are you just described my High School Years by the way. Describing me and all of my friends currently. So trump has always promised that im going to expand the map. Of course new york, were not buying it. But some evidence that he could win a state republicans havent won since 1988. Maine has not voteded for a republican in the president ial election since 1988. Clinton and trump are tied in the fourway race at 37. Clinton would win in a twoway race. Trump is poised to pick up one holding 11point lead in maines northern Second District where president obama won in 2012 by eight points. Wow. Thats pretty crazy. We call that a swing. Thats a big swing. Thats almost a twopoint swing in the north of the state. Thats a 20point swing. I dont mean to make it all about race, but you look at demographics and demographics is destiny. Its a very, very white state. Her weakness is pretty well documented among White Working Class voters and his strength as well. Thats what it is. Northern maine, its been decimated economically for the past 10, 15 years. People feel disenfranchised by the government. Its not a surprise hes going to do well up there. Willie, when were in new england, can you explain something to brother barnicle for me. Im enjoying the red sox up 51. Mike barnicle sends a tweet out. Im not one to jinx anything but i think destiny is on our side this year. I was surprised to see that tweet. You know better. Did you see my response . I tweeted back at him. I said, buddy, i hate to bother
you on the mound, but i want to let you know youre one out away from pitching a perfect game. Good luck. Dont jinx us. Its unbelievable. And sam stein was, like, no as soon as i sent it, he rarely tweet. As soon as i did it, the orioles got two men on. Whats wrong with you . You dont do that. I was watching the insults to more sam stein. I had to go back to figure out what his original sin was. This gets to what Donald Trumps compulsion must be. If you cant hold yourself back tweeting during a red sox mike i guarantee you that the red socks are more important to him. Were over watching portugal
play usa. Theres two minutes left. He stands up and goes i cant believe we beat portugal. I jumped out of my chair. I said i cant tell you exactly what i said. Get out of my and everybody starts laughing. I said you never, ever, ever do that until the game is over. Until the match is done. Sure enough ptugal runs down the sidelines, beautiful pass. You cant do that. Youve been around this long enough. I got carried away by the ortiz home run. I hate to go here. I have a vivid image in my mind game six, 1986. Red sox on the top step. You do not talk about 1986. The owner of the team at that time just brought the champagne down. Dont ever do that. Dont ever do that. Dont ever do that. Lets go back to the news. We have to in. My heart just broke. Trump picked up support in california. This all of 86 was a nightmare. The worst sporting series. Do we have any footage of that . You dont want to show that. Can we show it . I need to see it. We have three hours, can we not show a bit . That was the worst. 86 was the low point as far as sporting events. You think . You think . You could have chosen 78. 2003 was pretty bad. Nothing was worse than 86. Nothing was worse than 86. You started this with your sanchez swing. Rise young catcher in major league baseball. The old sanchez swing. All right. Trump has gained support in california where hes climbed seven points since july. Still down 17. Thats one of the states hes claimed he was going to claw back. California, new york, thats not going to happen. Hillary clinton was off the trail yesterday. Donald trump very much on twitter. He tweeted Hillary Clinton has taken the day off again. She needs the rest. Sleep well, hillary. See you at the debate. Was she off the trail . A day of prep. She did a radio show. What did w. Do . Did he go off the trail . Debate prep. If you do it in a traditional matter which reports suggest hes not, he does it on the
weekends not in a mock debate setting while hes golfing . I dont know. With her though to set up a mock debate, it involves someone playing your opponent and policy folks. We dont know if he has anyone. Theres someone playing donald trump apparently. The stakes for next monday couldnt be higher. My question is for hillary to be off the campaign trail a week before the most important debate in recent political history, thats not a big deal, is it . Im not doing her bidding . Is it a big deal . Its disciplined. Its what you should be doing. Whatever you do between now and then is dwarfed by whats going to happen at the debate. Its professional. Its discipline. Its what you should do. That would be my attitude. Nothing is bigger than this. When you worked with w. , what did he do . Its normal to take a day off the trail to do debate prep. It was a little considering
how tight this race is in the postlabor day stretch, surprising she didnt try to get one public event or one national interview. She called into the steve harvey radio show. To take a day you cant wait until the weekend before. Its on monday. If you identify real problems, i also think to be honest i dont know that her performance in commander in chief forum was something that her team felt would be enough. Her performance was bad in commander in chief forum. Terrible. Taking this seriously and managing expectations about the hill she has to climb to stand on the stand is a smart strategy. Numbers in the polls that we just indicated, florida and North Carolina, i think theres a feeling from speaking to speak over there that, okay, we survived the worst. Were going to be okay. I think its more the case with her than it is with donald
trump. If she turns in a great performance, donald trump turns in a weak performance, i think that sets a dynamic in stone throughout the end of the campaign unless theres some surprise. She could actually im not going to say she could win it. She could go a long way to winning the presidency with a great debate performance. What donald trump can do is just put a whole lot more doubts in peoples mind that she doesnt have what it takes to be president. I do think donald trump will be judged differently by the country and the press in these debates. He was a novelty in those debates. His bluster and one liners and lack of policy was new and fresh and all those things. Now hell be hammered on detailed policy prescription. What do you mean well knock the hell out of isis and what do you mean the guy arrested in new jersey shouldnt have a lawyer . Shouldnt have a doctor. You go down the line and ask him those things so he could be he
can pobe exposed. Does Hillary Clinton have the nerve, does she have the stage presence to keep pushing . How are you going to knock the hell out of him . No. Tell me. They ask the next question. No. Were going to to get specific on one thing. How are you going to knock the hell out of isis . How . I know people hate when i actually talk about things that happened in my life before, but in my first campaign, i had a debate and he could ask people four questions. I asked my opponent the same question. She never answered. And so i actually said she was asking all of these wild, negative my fourth question is the same as my third, same as my second question same as my first question. Name one program in all of washington, d. C. That you would be willing to abolish. Wouldnt answer it. I won the debate. Won the election. But nobody has the guts. Give me a specific answer. How are you going to beat the hell out of them . What are you going to do . Its a very effective debate strategy to directly engage your opponent. If you look back at sort of recent debate history, you know, 2012 it was widely perceived that president obama lost that first debate. In 2004, we thought that president bush lost that first debate against senator kerry. So debates matter. I mean, they can we swung over 10 points between the end of our convention and the morning after our first debate. They matter a lot. For her if she can sort of, you know, reshuffle the dynamic and get the wind at her back, i agree it will put her in a strong position. One thing she has going for him is on the debate stage hes always graded on a curve by the viewers. He did wacky things in the republican primary. The viewers never sort of charged him a price for acting South Carolina debate performance was debacle. It was as bad as he won South Carolina a week later. Not only did he win it. As bad of a debate performance i had ever seen in my life. Next morning the cbs had a poll not a flash poll. Cbs news had a poll out the last morning saying they thought he won. He won the state running away. He won the military vote in the state of North Carolina. If you asked me what state loved george w. Bush more than any other state in america in 2016, i would say South Carolina. They loved him. Unbelievable. But r