Transcripts For MSNBCW The Rachel Maddow Show 20181110 : vim

MSNBCW The Rachel Maddow Show November 10, 2018

Least phi people died while trapped in their cars trying to escape that fire in paradise, california. That one is called the camp fire. Its burning in that part of the state. But there are multiple large and dangerous fires burning right now in a bunch of different parts of california. Compounding the tragedy, one Southern California community that has been evacuated tonight because of the fires is Thousand Oaks, and this is the same Thousand Oaks, california, where wednesday nights mass shooting at a bar just killed 12 people. In the immediate wake of the shooting, a local Community Center in Thousand Oaks was used as a hub for families and friends of shooting victims. That was as of yesterday. Today that same location, that same Community Center had to be repurposed so it could be used to house people in the same community who have now been ordered out of their homes to escape these fires. So a compounded tragedy in Thousand Oaks and statewide. Just an incredibly dangerous and fastmoving situation with these large california fires today and into tonight. So were keeping eyes on that. Today is friday, november 9th, which means this weekend on sunday it will be november 11th. It will be veterans day, and veterans day is always a big deal in the United States. This is not a somber day like memorial day. It is a celebratory day when we celebrate the veterans among us. But this year veterans day is also the 100year anniversary of what gave us veterans day in the first place, the armistice that ended world war i. 100 years since the end of world war i. You now might remember that President Trump had initially demanded his own u. S. Military parade through the streets of washington, d. C. On the occasion of this years veterans day. The pentagon appears to have put him off that very expensive north korean style dream, and instead this weekend the president will be in paris for the commemoration of the end of the great war. And i mention that in particular because you should know that we are also expecting the president to do something during that paris trip that the white house is sort of desperately trying to play down. We are pretty sure that President Trump is going to be meeting oneonone with Vladimir Putin of russia during this trip to paris, even though the white house has announced no such meeting, the reason were pretty sure its going to happen is because the kremlin says its going to happen. And you know what . Frankly, the kremlin tends to be right about President Trumps movements and actions when it comes to russia, even when our own white house isnt. So keep your eyes open for that. Expect that, even though the white house has not told us to expect anything like that. Well have more coming up on that a little later on this hour as well. So there is a lot of big news going on, and this is probably going to be a very busy news weekend as well. The overarching story were still very much in middle of is the election and its aftermath. There remain whole bunch of races that have not been called. Five congressional races in california alone as of tonight. So the final balance of power in washington after this weeks elections doesnt yet have a fine point on it. But what is clear already is that in this election, the democrats have gained more seats. The republicans have lost more seats than any other Midterm Election since 1974. Now hmm, 1974. What was going on then, right . The 1974 Midterm Election was the immediate aftermath of president nixon resigning the presidency. Republicans have not lost this many seats in congress in a midterm since that occasion. So that historic margin by the democrats, historic gains by the democrats, historic losses by the republicans, that narrative about what happened this week is further bolstered by the democrats having done exactly what they wanted to do this week with key constituents, with key constituencies that will determine, frankly, how democrats are going to do in every election from here on out. You might remember there was a lot of handwringing in election circles whether or not latino voters would be motived to turn out this year. It turns out latino voters were motived to turn out this year. In the last three midterms in 2006, 2010 and 2014, the latino vote was about 8 of the electorate. This time it jumped all the way up to 11 of the electorate. That is the kind of jump that democrats have been trying to achieve for years. Thats the kind of thing they have been looking for. They didnt get it until this year. Latino voters are certainly not monolithic. There are plenty of latino republicans and latino conservatives, but overall, latinos did go for democrats by a roughly 21 margin. So thats a crucial part of this years Election Results and us understanding what it means and what it might mean for future elections. There was also lots of handwringing ahead of the election in democratic circles about whether or not young people would turn out. New data just released shows that a turnout of voters between 18 and 29, it actually spiked in this years Midterm Election, well above anything we have seen in decades for previous midterms. So democrats flipping more seats than they have since the immediate aftermath of nixons resignation in watergate, and democrats turning out key constituencies they had really worried about, like young voters and latino voters, that is a worst Case Scenario for republicans. It is a best Case Scenario for democrats. It looks like democrats are on track to pick up something on the order of about 37 seats in this weeks elections in the end. Thats in the house. Now when it comes to the senate, republicans have been buoyed that they were able to turf out some incumbent Democratic Senators where trump had had doubledigit victories in 2016. Not to take away from that at all, but there are a couple of senate races still to be decided where on Election Night republicans really thought they won where now a few days after the election looks like republicans might not have won those seats, both in the Arizona Senate race between republican Martha Mcsally and Kyrsten Sinema. And in the Florida Senate race tween bill nelson and rick scott. In both of those races we dont yet have a winner. Were in overtime in both states in terms of getting the ballots counted and figuring out who won the close contests, but republicans are starting to freak out a little bit about maybe having lost both of those seats. As of tonight in arizona, democrat Kyrsten Sinema appears to be ahead by about 20,000 votes, 20,000 plus. If you want to measure how freaked out republicans are about how that Arizona Senate race is going and how it look likes it may be going to Kyrsten Sinema, the president today freaked out online and demanded that there be a new election held in arizona. A new election, really . Thats even before they are done counting the ballots. In florida, things are way more off the hook than that. We saw fairly ugly protests today at the board of elections in Broward County, florida. Multiple lawsuits were filed on both sides yesterday and today in florida. Emergency hearings were held on some of those lawsuits today. The Florida Governor who is one of the candidates in this disputed Senate Election in florida, he has been threatening to use florida Law Enforcement to settle the election to investigate or do something the counties that are continuing to count votes. Its getting crazy quickly. Its getting crazier quicklier. Quicklier . Its getting nuts in florida. And we can see it going this way sort of as of last night. We are looking at recounts in florida of both the senate race between rick scott and bill nelson and the governors race between republican ron desantis and democrat Andrew Gillum. Both are going to be recounted, and things are crazy enough down there today that our show actually sent two producers down to palm beach and broward counties today so we can have some of our own staff on the ground there just able to see with their own eyes whats going on to help us get our arms around this story, help us wrangle people to talk, to help us the legal fight and whats happening in terms of protests. So were going to be checking in with our own producers who we sent down there today as well as a lawyer involved in one of the legal fights. Thats coming up in just a minute. But there is one more thing we have to talk about tonight on what is pretty unbelievably busy news day, and that is the now intertwined story of the president s own legal trouble and the election drama from this week. The reason these are intertwined, right, is as you know, the morning after the election, President Trump fired the attorney general and installed a handpicked replacement. Now the means by which the president did that and what we know now about the person who he installed as the acting attorney general, both of those stories have led to stronger and stronger suspicions, stronger and stronger appearances that the president may have made the sudden postelection move out of selfpreservation. So this handpicked acting attorney general could interfere with or shut down investigations that are threatening to the president. We got Jeff Sessions fired two days ago and replaced with this new guy trump picked for the job. Now all of the sudden we have all this new reporting on what kind of legal jeopardy the president might actually be in that might potentially have led him to make this sudden move so this new guy at the Justice Department might be able to protect him from the jeopardy he finds himself in. On the front page of the wall street journal right now, there is detailed new reporting about the president s direct personal involvement in the Campaign Finance felonies to which his personal Attorney Michael Cohen plead guilty in august. This is a major new story from the wall street journal. They found that, quote, mr. Trump was involved in or briefed on nearly every step of the Campaign Finance felonies to which cohen plead guilty. In addition to these published details, newly published details in the wall street journal about trumps direct involvement in those crimes, which of course were are things that are hinted at in Michael Cohens statements in court when he plead guilty to these felony, when he said he had been directed to commit these felonies by a candidate for federal office, in addition to that, the wall street journal further reports tonight that, quote, the u. S. Attorneys office in manhattan has gathered evidence of mr. Trumps participation in the transactions. So its not just that this is in the paper. Its not just that Michael Cohen has alleged this in court, its that prosecutors have all this information. Now according to the story in the wall street journal, had Michael Cohen not plead guilty in august, what he would have been hit with is an 80page detailed indictment that would have spelled out not only his crimes, it would have spelled out granularly what President Trumps involvement was in these crimes. The only reason that indictment never saw the light of day is because cohen instead plead guilty and then started cooperating with prosecutors as they continued to pursue elements of this case. Well, now we can add this from nbc news. Current and former Law Enforcement officials tell nbc news that when it comes to these Campaign Finance felonies to which Michael Cohen has already plead guilty, if it were not for donald trump being the president of the United States right now, current and former Law Enforcement officials tell nbc news that donald trump almost certainly would have been indicted himself in this matter. Now, as you know, there is very controversial Justice Department policy that arguably precludes the criminal indictment of any sitting president or Vice President. Were it not for these policies, sources are telling nbc news that the president would have already been criminally charged. Well, now we know from history that when prosecutors discover clear evidence of criminal behavior by a sitting president or a sitting Vice President , when they believe the evidence they have uncovered would warrant criminal charges, but they cant bring those criminal charges only because the president is president , or the Vice President is Vice President , one of the other options that prosecutors have in terms of what to do with that evidence theyve collected about a president s criminal behavior, one of the other things they can do is they can put that evidence together in a report, and they can convey that report to congress. So congress can consider whether or not that evidence of criminal behavior by the president or Vice President should be used as the basis for impeachment proceedings. And that is what brings us back to the election this week. Because the democrats did just clearly win control of the house, that means the democraticcontrolled Judiciary Committee would be there to accept such a report from federal prosecutors if prosecutors decided to convey information about the president s criminal behavior to congress for potential impeachment investigations. That said, as soon as the president learned that the democrats would take control of the house, he put someone new in charge of the Justice Department, who would now arguably be in a position to block any federal prosecutors, including Robert Mueller and the special counsels office from doing that. He presumably would be in the position to prevent prosecutors from collating the evidence they have gathered about the president s crimes so that information can be conveyed to congress. Now, its hard to know whether jeff session or Deputy Attorney general Rod Rosenstein in the role he used to have overseeing the Mueller Investigation, its hard to know whether either of them would have blocked prosecutors from conveying information to congress, or i guess conceivably to the public about evidence of the president s crimes. But it seems pretty clear that Matt Whitaker, the president s handpicked new guy at the Justice Department, he might have been installed specifically for that purpose, specifically to block prosecutors from doing anything with the evidence that they have collated about the president s crimes. Again, the wall street journal reporting tonight that federal prosecutors have direct evidence of the president s personal involvement in federal Campaign Finance felonies to which one person, Michael Cohen, has already plead guilty. And so this Matthew Whitaker appointment right after the election ends up being very, very important, right . One of the things that quickly came to light about Matt Whitaker once the president announced that the president would be installing him as acting attorney general is that whitaker has been extensively involved with a floridabased company that bought busted earlier this year as a gigantic fraud. Its a Company Called world patent marketing. Matt whitaker was apparently on their Advisory Board. The company bragged about him being on the board to lure and assure clients that the company was aboveboard, almost in comical language. In december 2014, the Company Issued a press release that quoted Matt Whitaker as saying, quote, as a former u. S. Attorney, i would only align myself with a firstclass organization. World patent marketing goes beyond making statements about doing business ethically and translates them into action. Federal trade commission filed a civil suit against this world patent marketing company, describing it as, quote, an invention promotion scam that has bilked thousands of consumers out of millions of dollars. The company was shut down last year, and then arrived at a settlement with the ftc to pay 26 million for having been caught as a fraudulent scheme. Now, the federal trade commission, the ftc paper trail about this scam company that Matt Whitaker was involved in, its provided a number of interesting leads for enterprising reporters. The

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