made missiles and the fleet s headquarters in sebastopol was struck by missiles last year, the repeated humiliations pushing russian ships further and further away from ukraine and eventually leading to the dismissal of russia s navy chief in march, not so long ago, russian state media would celebrate the navy s single aircraft carrier, the admiral, cuz nets off the jewel in the crown. but the ship has long been plagued by mechanical problems and has been in dark for years and more months, some western analysts predict it will never set sail again despite putin s glorification of russia s naval prowess, many of its warships here are vulnerable to both air and sea attacks and lack the technology to compete with western navies. or even cheap maritime drones made and ukraine an air in the ukrainian say that while the russians might be gaining ground in other areas, they feel that they ve really hurt. moscow is black sea fleet and essentially rendered it ineffective and the ukrainian say they will continue to develop those sea drones to hurt vladimir putin s naval forces even more. aaron. all right. thank you very much tonight and thanks so much to all all of you. it s time now for ac30, 60 tonight on through 60, the former president goes to washington to formalize his almost total takeover of the republican party. what he told lawmakers behind and closed doors when it signals about his plans, if we elect it. also time, cnn s donie o sullivan and talking with trump s supporters about what they think will happen to the country if he loses and to appeal its are prize-winning historian. but what she thinks might happen if you wins. also breaking news on supreme court justice clarence thomas already under scrutiny for setting millions of dollars in gifts and travel over the years. now, the senate judiciary committee reveals three more trips he took did not disclose. good evening. thanks for joining us. we begin tonight. keep them honest with the former president s de in washington with his party, and that use the possessive to describe the republican senators and house members he met with today in separate closed-door sessions, each just steps from the capital is no accident because if he s done nothing else over the last three-and-a-half years. of insurrection and search warrants and indictments and trials and felony convictions. it has been to remake the party of ronald reagan in his own image at the house meeting, he made a point of reminding members that nearly every republican who voted to impeach him as either been voted out of office or retired? not that by this point, there s survivors really needed reminding listen to speaker of the house mike johnson was basking in the afterglow and majority whip tom emmer, a self-proclaimed tough on crime law maker, attacking the criminal justice system he said very complimentary things about all of us we had sustained applause. he said, i m doing a very good job. i mean, we re grateful for that. i m going to add anybody who thought that this president was going to be down after the sham trial after that crooked trial that we saw in new york i think again more than more than one member of congress and the house meeting told cnn that the former president has spent most of his time airing grievances about his felony conviction. afterwards that a house judiciary committee hearing democratic members were all too happy to bring it up. just a show of hands for anyone in the room who hung out with a felon today hey, guys. i everyone get your hands up i want to begin by quoting the jury in the manhattan hush money payment trial guilty guilty guilty. guilty now, it s remarkable because whatever you think it congressional decorum or for that matter, x presidential criminality. this is where we are, but we are a convicted felon leads the self-proclaimed party of law and order in his post-conviction visit, just a few blocks away from the place that his supporters attacked into filed is just another headline. and so is what one lawmaker in the rooms, as he told house members about former democratic house speaker nancy pelosi, after calling one of his daughters a quote, wacko he reportedly claimed that one of her daughters wants told him that he and speaker pelosi would have had a quote, great romance in another life. daughter christine, today responded tweeting quote, speaking for all four pelosi daughters, this is ally he also called milwaukee side of the republican national convention, quote, horrible, according to a source in the room, another lawmaker later saying he was only talking about crime. all from a single meeting. at this other meeting, his republic republican senator is also close to the capital. he spoke with minority leader mitch mcconnell for the first time since december 2020. the photo prompting this reaction from liz cheney, the staunchly conservative former republican congresswoman, who was drummed out while first out of the party leadership and then out of office for co-chair and the january 6 committee she tweeted and quoted words mitch mcconnell made on the senate floor in february 13, 2021. cheney wrote, mitch mcconnell knows trump provoked the violent attack and our capital, and then quote watch television happily unquote as his mob brutally beat police officers and hunted the vice president he knows trump reviews for hours to tell his mob to leave and quote, even then with police officers bleeding, he kept repeating his election leinz and praising the criminals she went on to say again, quoting mcconnell, he knows that trump committed a quote disgraceful dereliction of duty unquote, and is a danger to our republic here are some more of what mcconnell said on that day there s no question nod. their president trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day those are tough words for mitch mcconnell, but just 12 days later, after he said that on the 25th, senator mcconnell, eight, those words telling fox is brett baer, he would support the man he so recently criticized if he s nominated in 2024 talk, it seems is cheap. join his now with more cnn s meloni s and ohno. what else went on behind closed doors today with trump will anderson heading into these meetings, lawmakers are really hopeful that trump was going to be talking about a campaign strategy or laying out his vision for a policy agenda. and now there was some of that. one of the more substantive moments was on trump brought up the topic of abortion and any counseled republicans about how he thinks they should talk about this issue. and he said they shouldn t be afraid of it. they should frame it as a state s issue. and you also encouraged republicans to voice support for exceptions not come across as too extreme on the issue, but for the most part, according to all the lawmakers that i spoke to, these meetings were more of an airing of grievance it says it was a gripe session at particularly in the house meeting this morning, i m told that trump, of course, brought up the legal challenges against them, calling all the charges against him, quote, bogus he also referred for to the department of justice as quote, dirty, no-good according to some of the lawmakers that i talked to, he even at one point, complained about taylor swift, were endorsing his rival president joe biden. and he also gloated about how most of the house republicans who voted to impeach him over the january 6 insurrection are no lines hunger in congress. so it was very wide ranging speech, very freewheeling that member ce felt more like a pep rally or even a roast than a serious policy discussion. morning and taylor swift has not endorsed joe biden. do you have any more details on the trump mcconnell counter well, with trump and mcconnell, there was a very serious effort. i m told by both parties he s to really bury the hatchet after years of feuding and years of frost newness right before the meeting, trump and mcconnell shook hands, which was captured on a phone photograph during the meeting. trump credited mcconnell with helping to elect more republican senators, and then after the meeting, mcconnell praised trump and said the mean eating was very, very positive. so just a remarkable inflection point. i think anderson, we re going to look back on this moment similar to kevin mccarthy trekking down to mar-a-lago in the weeks after january 6 and really just captures how much the party, including some of trump s former critics like mcconnell, have really fallen in line in the years after january 6 and despite these criminal convictions, anderson, millions and thanks so much, jonasson. i was new york democratic congressman daniel goldman, congressman. any surprises for you today in the visit by trump not really. he didn t come to the capital, which was good good thing because this is where he fomented a massive riot and insurrection to try to keep him installed in office. he didn t talk much about policy because he doesn t really care much about policy. what he cares about is himself and what he cares about is his conviction 34 times for being a felon and what he cares about her as three other cases and getting revenge. and he wants to do that by tearing down our democracy and what he was effectively doing today is greases the wheels, trying to play nice with republicans who support he needs in order to become president. so that he can take his fat let s just authoritarian views into office if he were to win. and it is just a very telling i think that mitch mcconnell has now bowed down to the ring of donald trump someone who, you quoted what he said on january 25, where he helped donald trump responsible for the january 6 riot. and has resisted donald trump. but now he has clearly demonstrated graded that donald trump owns the republican party. there is no other faction of the republican party that has any influence other than donald trump his maga supporters, obviously, none of us, there s privilege privy to the inner thoughts and mitch mcconnell. but why do you think center mcconnell made this choice? i mean, after, you know the strong comments he made criticizing trump theta, the racist attacks trump made against me kennels own wife. i mean, what is mitch mcconnell get out of this anderson, what do any of these people who have i know good mccaul s running. i mean, it he could he could go out on i d like liz cheney, who at least, has taken a very strong stand ultimately mixed for the same reason since that mitch mcconnell refuse to give merrick garland a vote for the supreme court and then rammed any amy coney barrett through under the same circumstances, two weeks before the election? that s what connell has a very focused and narrowly tailored view of what he wants to accomplish. and at the end of the day i m sure mitch mcconnell views donald trump as the only possibility to get these type of conservative judges who have now overturned roe v. wade paid back into more into the our judiciary and into the supreme court and push forward a clearly minority favored agenda that mitch mcconnell has been pushing for decades. it was seeing melodies and i was reporting is that trump was telling lawmakers counseling them on how to run about and talk about abortion and to talk about states rights and to not seem too extreme do you have any belief that that s how he would be if he got into office? absolutely none. donald trump does not care. donald trump used to be pro-choice. he used to be a democrat. now, he s out there promoting and celebrating his own work and getting roe versus wade overturned he will do whatever he needs to do to secure the support for his fascist anti-democratic attacks on the rule of law to undermine our democratic institutions. and if that means that he ll give over supreme court nominations to mitch mcconnell or someone else on the far right who wants to roll back our individual freedoms, even more than the supreme court has done. he will do that in a minute. and if there here s a national abortion ban that the republicans pass donald trump will sign that in two seconds. do not believe donald trump whenever he says that he will stand up for abortion rights, he has completely flip-flopped in his career. he will do whatever benefits himself. speaker johnson was asked yesterday, the former president attempt the outcome of the election. i just want to play that for years really for the first time republican house and senate meeting with him since the january 6 attack on the capitol are you committed or have you spoken to him about basically not not doing anything like that again, in committing to respecting the sort of american tradition of peaceful transfer of course, he respects that and we all do and we ve all talked about it at nauseum i mean i mean yeah. i mean, i can anyone say with a straight face is donald trump respects the peaceful transfer of power that i want you to take that clip and run it over and over and over. that is everything you need to know. oh about mike johnson and the maga republican party. they will look you in the eye and they will lie directly to your face over and over and over. there is no question that donald trump does not respect the peaceful transfer of power he has made it a litmus test for his vice president that whoever that will be willing not accept the results. and that s why you have every single vice presidential candidates. so far refusing to concede or acknowledged that they will accept them the results. donald trump, it will not accept the peaceful a trap power. you don t have to ask me or trust me, he already did it so for speaker johnson to look in the camera and to say that of course he respects the peaceful transfer of power. put that on every bulletin board around the country. it is total bogus and it shows you what knowing liars the republicans are. congressman, i appreciate your time. thank you thank you. president biden met today with ukraine s president zelenskyy of the g7 summit in italy. the two signing a new tenure security agreement at the press conference afterwards, frozen biden spoke briefly when asked about his son, hunter i m extremely proud of my son hunter. he is overcome and addiction. he is he s one of the brightest, most decent man i know and i am satisfied that i m not going to do anything. i sat i said i advise by the jury decision. i will do that no i m not pardon him the present-day also ruled out commuting his one-sentence seen as mj lee is traveling with the president joins us now from from very italy. so mj, earlier in the week, the white house appeared to leave open the possibility of a commutation or that flee not commenting at essentially overturning the sentence, not a conviction. what specifically did the president say about that yeah. when the president was walking away from that press conference, some reporters yell loud. would you commute your sons sentence and he answered directly. he said no that was after he had more broadly addressed the conviction of his son, hunter, as you just play they re standing by his son, standing by the judicial system, and also reiterating his previously stated position pardoning his son. he said, i will not pardon him. anderson white house officials had suspected that it was likely he would get asked about the hunter issue at this news conference, given that it happened just two days ago, he had not publicly commented on in yet on it yeah they knew that the specific issue of the commutation was one that could come up if you ll recall yesterday, white house press secretary karine jean-pierre was asked by a reporter whether she would rule out that possibility and she wouldn t say yes or no. and that exchange, the white house, new had taken on a life of its own when in reality, i m told the issue was really that some senior aides hadn t had a chance yet to speak to the president about the commutation issue. corinne john p, or said yesterday to reporters, i haven t talked to him about this yet. i m not just i m not going to have anything more to say on this, but it certainly was a really remarkable moment. the president speaking on this kind of a stage. on the other side of the world about an issue that has been so deeply sensitive for his entire family, mj lee, thanks more in prison, biden s trip later in the program next though cnn s donie o sullivan talking to trump supporters as well as a historian of dictatorships and autocracies about donald trump and democracy. and later there s breaking news turns out there are even more undisclosed it s trips supreme court justice clarence thomas took paid for by republican megadonor ave heart failure with unresolved symptoms. it may be time to see the bigger picture heart failure and seemingly unrelated he did symptoms like carpal tunnel syndrome shortness of breath an irregular heartbeat could mean something more serious cold, eight ttr cm a rare under-diagnosed disease that worsens over time 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[ 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. colleague, 33 leaf filter today, more physically filtered filter.com i m under raja capitol hill. this the sienna prison. biden is billing his reelection campaign as a fight to preserve democracy. tonight, how that notion is going down with trump s supporters as well as one noted author who s made describing how democracies fail. her specialty more from cnn s donie o sullivan what happens if trump loses? i don t see him losing. i don t think he lost the last election to be honest. do you think he s going to win yes. yes. without a doubt. no doubt. you want if he doesn t this time what happens to the contrary where biden talks about democracy saving democracy. they re the ones that are killing democracy. obviously, there s a lot of criticisms of interim than he is bad for democracy, that he s bad for america i republican or republic are not a democracy republican. we re not or democracy one thing we ve been hearing a trump rallies like this over the past few months does that america isn t really a democracy. america s not a democracy as a republic. we get is not a democracy. okay? democracy? she is actually not as good as you think it is but for centuries, america has celebrated its democracy democracy is worth dying for democracy remains the definition of political legitimacy, but some republicans and pro-trump media are pushing the idea that america is not a democracy. united states of america kirk is not a democracy. we are constitutional republic. those things were america is not a democracy. you don t want to be in a democracy. we are not a democracy. we are a republic. is america a democracy america is a democracy. it was founded as a democracy. i ve heard a lot of conspiracy theories. i hear a lot of things out on the road but to hear americans, people who would describe themselves as patriots say that america is not a democracy that stopped me in my tracks. you are hearing people say america is not a democracy because there are people around trump who want them to be saying that who ve been planting that narrative? his america democracy i don t i think we ll never know, but yeah, we re republic. what s the difference i feel like democracy what do we think this through its government i don t see freedom in democracy freedom in the republic honestly, the word democracy and the word republic have often been used interchangeably. there isn t a meaningful difference between them. so much of the warnings and criticism about trump is that he is a threat to democracy, that he has anti-democratic. absolutely. if they can convince people that we don t have a democracy, then it s okay that trump is attacking democracy because it doesn t really matter that s why, like why has democracy become a bad word? because it s been used in a way to change the flavor of our country, which is a republic these words were used in different ways in the 18th century and it s true the founders didn t want direct democracy by which they meant people gathering on the town square. they wanted representative democracy. but i think the reason why does conversation about language has so now is because there is a part of the republican party that would like to rule as a minority and they need an excuse for why that s okay. and so they ve begun to say, we re not a democracy. were, are public and it s not 100% clear what that means. but i think they mean we want donald trump to be able to do whatever he wants some people i ve been seeing debt trump events recently. yes. have been saying american is not a democracy. it s a republic and we ve always been my pros. first of all we have sleek. we re use that freedom of speech and freedom of religion. we used to have that two. now they re picking on the christians and the jewish people i mean, how much more can we are you concerned if trump loses yeah. that there ll be another january 6. no. i think there will be a civil war that s what i think will happen during this whole democracy republican is fascinating. this is the first i ve, i ve heard of that new thing that there are now pushing those. it looks like folks on fox are pushing it. is there a reason the people you spoke with think that country isn t a democracy now, i mean, yeah, look, i mean, i understand some of those folks. no doubt genuinely believed that i might have believed for a long time, this isn t necessarily a new talking point. however, we have seen it just revive over the past few months and they re really the reason we did this piece was over the over the past few months, just unprompted. as i was speaking to a lot of trump s supporters, they would bring this very specific lineup i love this real, it s not a debase right about the former government here. it s not a debate about democracy really why this is happening. and you saw it there in that piece, some fox news and elsewhere on conservative and right-wing media people are trying to convince trump s supporters, others that america is not a democracy in the first place. and we actually saw i haven t noticed that this seem to pick up a bit after president biden speech in philadelphia, where he described trump as a threat to democracy. this is how they seem to be trying to twist language to try and neutralize describing trump as a threat to democracy. because if america is not a democracy in the first place, then there s nothing to worry about your winning a solvent. thank you very much. one of the pillars of a democracy is the rule of law and laws of course are enforced by courts and the highest court in the land supreme court is once again under fire tonight. over new ethics concerns, specifically the behaviors surrounding justice clarence thomas. late this afternoon, senate judiciary chairman dick durbin released new information from a major republican donor about more undisclosed trips provided to justice thomas. it follows previous reporting about numerous undisclosed gifts from that conservative billionaire harlan crow, which include private school tuition for a relative of thomases and decade s worth of luxury vacations. last week after the release of his 2023 disclosures, thomas said certain disclosures had been, quote inadvertently omitted wherever last month in a speech, who railed against the quote, nastiness and quote lies directed toward him. draw now by our justice correspondent, just cash snyder, also a former federal district judge, johnny jones, the third and former federal prosecutor elie honig. so jessica, what do we know about these additional trips now that thomas took on harlan crow plane? yeah. the details just being released tonight for i m senator dick durbin. the details are several new trips happened in 2017, 2019, and 2021. so first and may 20, he 17 justice thomas took harlan crows jet from st. louis to montana and then to dallas. then there was a march 2019 flight where he flew roundtrip between washington, dc and savannah and then in june 2021, he flu round trip between washington, dc and san jose, california. all of this on crows jet and really intersect. i mean, these newly revealed flights, it only adds to what we know were other luxury trips that justice thomas enjoyed, bankrolled by harlan crow. there was also but 2019 trip to indonesia where justice thomas stayed on crows mega yacht. so there have been a lot of previously undisclosed travel that s been gifted by harlan crow is a gop megadonor. he s active and conservative causes. justice thomas, though, i ll note anderson has always it s described him as just a dear friend and says they ve never had any discussions about cases before the court. they ve wow, i mean, that that s you you re hanging out with justice supreme court. that s kind of amazing to think. has justice thomas explained why he did not disclose these these trips? because he talks about his love of staying in for vrb travel and drawing ran on a bus yeah. so he hasn t directly answered about these recent disclosures, but his attorney just released a statement tonight. it says this. it says the formation that harlan crow provided to the senate judiciary committee fell under the personal hospitality exemption and was not required to be disclosed by justice thomas the judicial conference change this provision last year, and justice thomas has fully complied with the new disclosure requirement. so i ll expand upon this to really explain it up until last year there was in fact this personal hospitality exemption. so justices, in the way they read it, didn t have to disclose certain benefits, maybe from there wealthy friends, things like when they stayed at their friends properties or traveled on jets. it was just last year, anderson that exemption was removed. so justices now have to disclose these perks, but there s some question as to whether the disclosures need to be retroactive. there s nothing specifically saying justices have to go back now and disclosed year s worth of trips. but it is still coming out and it came out tonight from the senate judiciary committee, judge jones, does this make sense you why wouldn t justice thomas just come clean about everything harlan crow has given him or paid for. why go through this kind of drip, drip, drip? you know, anderson, i have no idea but this has all the allure of a slow motion car accident. it doesn t look good. i toiled in the federal judiciary for 20 years and i love it. i respect it, but this tears that the fabric the code of ethics that the justices are subject to, which is, by the way, not enforceable says in the first canon that it is there to basically preserve the integrity and the independence of the judiciary now, under the circumstances to the point that was just made he amended his is 2023 ethic statement and he added a couple of his trips when you go to the question of retroactivity, i agree it s less than clear so why would you do that? and not include the other trips they re just revealed there s there s no good answer to that elie. i mean, do you agree with the statement from thomas s attorneys saying that because the personal hospitality exemption, he didn t need to not at all, the spirit of these rules is disclosure and these are not just a small gifts, these are gifts and not donations, but gifts worth tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars. and the whole explanation that this is just a friend doing something for me. i mean, i gotta get better friends that this is something more than just a friend paying for his friend. hundreds of thousands dollars over that here for private school tuition for flights, for hotels violates every cannon in this ethics code. and if you remember anderson about a year ago, the supreme court for the first time ever adopted an ethics code. the criticism we made was it s toothless and i think now we re seeing that judge jones i mean, go ahead, judge. while i was going to say it s interesting to ellie s point about having a friend. here s the acid test, and this is not hard and it s not in the statement of ethics at all if you are making a friend because you re on the supreme court of the united states. if that s why this guy is friends with you, then i would suggest to you that if he s providing hospitality, that s just wrong. it just shouldn t happen. and i don t think that s a hard a hard test for any justice or judge observe if i had done this as a district judge, us district judge, i would have been absolutely subject to judicial discipline of the the most pronounced kind, and i would have deserved it. and so to me, there s if clarence thomas was sitting on this circuit court or was the head of the eoc. do you think that harlan crow would afford him this kind of hospitality? of course, he would judge jones. thank you. elie honig, jessica schneider, as well, just ahead. present. biden, promoting democracy on the world stage with ukraine and making a campaign issued home former us ambassador to the un, susan rice it s joins us next welcome to the waiver hood with wave. finding your style is fine when the music stops grabbing it, doesn t matter if you re outdoors hello. i m sorry, carl. this is me and chair form. i don t see you. just perfect for you but you love it. i told you we should have done opinion data i explained how many died they re not sending you need to sit down every style, every home at fisher investments. we may look like other money managers, but were different. and how so we re a fiduciary, obligated to act in our client s best interests. so we don t sell any commission-based products, then how do you make money? we have a simple management fee structured, so we do better when our clients do the clients really come first then yes, we make them a top priority by getting to know their finances, family, health lifestyle, and more. wow maybe we are different at fisher investments were clearly different. let s get started no. where s your mask? 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if it s not binding on the next administration well, anderson, let s step back a second and thank you for having me on and take a look at what president biden is doing at the g7 in europe he is going back to his third g7 with, our alliances restored and rebuilt stronger than ever with the united states leadership embraced in respected and he has rallied the world to defend ukraine, including with a $50,000,000,000 loan that the united states led and negotiating this week using the interest off of the russian frozen assets. he s negotiated this bilateral agreement, which is very valuable in that there is always a cost for the united states when it reneges on its commitments, when it walks back its agreements and while it s not a legally binding treaty, it s a powerful statement of us support and intentions in addition, he s just this week led and imposing tough new sanctions on russia and china. so with joe biden, we have strong leadership that is strengthened our leinz is not only in europe, but in asia and around the world, which makes america more secure and we have a leader who s trusted and respected we contrast that as you did in your opening with donald trump who is so profoundly dangerous, he has not committed to democracy at home or abroad. he embraces dictators he is the president, former president whose own vice president? national security advisors, secretary of state secretaries of defense. yeah, pretty much everybody on the cabinets of staff. all have set are unfit. and what does that say when the people closest to you say you re unfit to lead, that s very, very concerning when you hear from say that vladimir putin would release wall street journal reporter it just adjust if he asked, what i mean, does that make sense to you like, why wouldn t he then just ask now for that to happen? well, that s a good question. i understand. no, of course it doesn t make sense. it s bluster. it s, it s all dishonest and every day we hear something dishonest out of donald trump s mouth. that is inherently self-serving and not anything we can rely on its. you don t just get to wave a magic wand and have a dictator who s hell-bent on not only taking over ukraine but western europe and more if we allow him. and what is donald trump s say? donald i m trump calls putin a genius. donald trump tells putin that he can do whatever he wants. the hell he wants with our nato allies. i mean, it s the height of recklessness self-interest, and danger, and it s not a future that we can be confident in at all, it would undermine our security profoundly at a time when the world is a complicated place, when you are us ambassador to the un, you obviously dealt with nations whose leaders disregard laws, carry out vendettas against their political opponents when you hear don trump talking about getting revenge or retribution does that seem i mean that seem realistic to you? do you believe he would do that? i do believe he would do it. i believe we have if we have learned anything we should listen to what he says and what he does is often exactly what he says and sometimes worse we have in donald trump a leader who is not running to be the president of the american people he s running for his own self-interest to try to stay out of jail and that is incredibly worrying. and when he says that on day one, he intends to be a dictator, that he will come after his political opponents and anybody who has rubbed i m tim the wrong way. i take that very seriously and i think we all should susan rice. thank you for your time thank you. anderson. way up next to cnn exclusive. been wiedemann talks with hamas spokesman in beirut about the remaining hostages they are holding captive in gaza he asked them how many are still alive and why hamas is yet to agree to ceasefire. his responses coming up this is country is corrupt. we ve got to save it do some terrible things for the greater good we need you build. for the soup, start rounding this up and dumping us off in kansas show me, wrap that doesn t sound good. ashley? 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you seem that count star from the beginning. let s start from beijing on. but one why to talk about the base of 7 october what about the israeli came after good luck to 7 october. it was a reaction against the occupation. what camps after that? it shows the real face of israel. it shows how israeli the cube buying the policy and lands demolishing the situation of the palestinians, killing the civilians. it s not the first time they are getting the civilians hamas is, is an organization. does it regret what it did on 7 october, given what happened afterwards? we are living with this for the last 75 years as palestine s yes now, cnn spoke to one of the doctors who treated the for israelis who were freed on saturday. and he said that they suffered mental and physical abuse. and what do you say when he is an israeli has to say what does lay authorities are asking him to say if you compare the images of both before and after releasing, you will find that they were better than before. i believe they have mental problem. this is because of what israel have done in gaza. but in addition to what has been said about the four recent hostages freed there have been also claims about the dire conditions others faced while in captivity. the fate of the remaining hostages hangs in the balance at the g7 summit in italy, us secretary of state antony blinken said, hoping hamas would agree to the latest us backed ceasefire proposal. response we got was unfortunately not the yes that we were looking for a yes that virtually the entire world has given. okay. mr. hamdan simple question. why hasn t hamas yet agreed officially to the us backed posel for a ceasefire who said it s a positive step but we need to see the facts on the ground. we need to know what exactly that president means by saying a ceasefire, i withdraw while what is left, what do you need we need an israeli ideally, a clear position from israel to accept the ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from gaza, and let the palestinians to determine their future by themselves are you optimistic at this point in time that you will reach some sort of agreement well, i think if the united states administration acted in the positive way, seeing the situation not only in the eyes of israel we can reach soon an agreement. and in the absence of an agreement, this war goes on with know site then i mean, this hamas leader justifies the october 7 attack by hamas. and as long as she had an others, which was a violation of an ongoing ceasefire, claimed, no one knows how many hostages are still alive. obviously there are people who know in hamas, any claims that the released, that the hostages who were freed just recently, the four hostages that they are actually better off than they were before they were taken into captivity. i mean, that s just absurd well, that s what he said, but you need to look at it through the lens of how it s been seen in the region anderson there lot of pictures circulating for before and after pictures circulating on social media of palestinian prisoners who d been freed from israeli jails hills the pictures show healthy people going in gaunt, sickly people looking out. no. mr. hamdan, like millions of other in this region are seeing the pictures of these for israelis who were recently freed from gaza, who on the surf base surface superficially looked to be okay. so that seems to be why he s saying this and we re hearing it from many other people as well. keep in mind also that osama hamdan is a political figure in hamas. he is involved in and then negotiating process, but he s not part of the military wing that holds the hostages in gaza, so he s probably not complete the up on the situation in there. and i think what you re hearing in that interview is more a reflection, perhaps social media then his knowledge of the specifics of the hostages themselves anderson, where she refuses even call hostages, but been wiedemann. thank you. appreciate it. we ll be right back three body serie a. city client uses city s financial expertise to help drive its growth and keep its supply chain moving some more pet parents can get everything they need, right when they need it keeping more pets and families happy for the love of moving our clients forward, for the love of progress grass whether you re moving across town or across the country now, you can count on pods to deliver when we say we will, which is why we were voted america s number one container moving company. hook your move today at pods.com, introducing new advil targeted relief. the only topical pain reliever with four powerful pain fighting ingredients that start working on contact to target tough pain at the source for up to eight hours of powerful relief new abdo targeted relief all these games on directv and no satellite on the roof. think about this blue jays cardinals orioles. what s missing? 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let s tsunami afghanistan, iraq. so many places we ve been all those stories we ve told, interviews and live shots and folders, endless days and sleepless nights, boring car rides and bad flights all those airports we ve rushed to getting, there, getting out how many hours have we waited? how many calls have you made how much could cajoling and talking? how did you come to know me so well time passes and memories fade but i hope i never forget all that we ve shared and all that you ve been and will forever be to me. charlie and i spend more than a month reporting from new orleans and the gulf coast in the difficult days after hurricane katrina. the last show we did was from a badly damaged street and it was all deserted and it was charlie and meeting maybe seven or eight others cameraman and engineers and satellite truck operators we ve finished around midnight. we broke down the equipment, we wrapped up the cables are other people did neal halls worth one of my cameraman two dozen years from the cooler on his truck and pass them around and we lingered there for time talking remembering the things we d all just lived through, not wanting that feeling we had to
from 1 trillion to 3 trillion in under a year. but video doesn t actually manufacture anything. they outsource that. they design still this is now the second largest corporation on our the planet with all our futures in its manicured hands toward holding this is the most complex highest performance computer the world s ever made. that that s why you have to care now, in the next few years, the competition is going to heat up in this marketplace for making the chips that train ai. but some analysts say that right now nvidia has maybe up to a 95% share of that market is they ve got a huge head-start on their main competitors intel and amd. amd just launched a new chip in video says are going to launch new chip every year that 3 trillion valuation peaceful world column. just said maybe that s an undervaluation medical. all right. thank you very much. nick watt. thanks for joining us. the situation room starts now property now, israeli police have just released video the moment hostages were rescued during a daring and deadly raid inside gaza. i get reaction from the us ambassador to the united nations, linda thomas-greenfiel d, chief standing by to join us lucidly, just minutes from now. and there s breaking news. the hunter biden case is now in the hands of a delaware jury the historic trial against the president since son potentially nearing an end as the panel waste three felony gun charges plus donald trump is taking the first step toward his sentencing. i m 34 felony convictions. the former president, holding a virtual meeting with a probation official this afternoon, and that interview could be a key factor as judge juan merchan decides on potential punishments for trump welcome to our viewers here in the united states and around the world. i m wolf blitzer, a urine the the situation room let s get straight to our top story tonight. the daring bloody israel kelly raid inside gaza, that operation successfully rescuing four hostages. but exacting a heavy toll on palestinian residents nearby the us ambassador to the united nations, linda thomas-greenfield, is standing by live will have a lot to discuss, but first, let s get all the latest developments from cnn s paula i hancocks in tel aviv new video from the israeli military shows the rescue of israeli hostages from central gaza. it says hundreds of personnel were involved in this rare daytime operation three hostages locked in an apartment in one multi-story residential building. another held in a flat 650 feet away in a densely populated neighborhood. models of the buildings were built weeks before to train in forces this is how israel s hostage rescue mission looked from the ground airstrikes explosions residents running to find safety. that doesn t have to exist in gaza hostages were flown by helicopter back to israel israel remains with family who had dreamed of this moment for eight months. families you only heard about the mission once their loved ones were safe. i haven t stopped smiling since my mug was returned to me, but the remaining hostages needed deal to get home safely there is a deal on the table we ask the israeli government to move forward with the deal the doctor who has treated the hostages since they arrived tells me, despite appearing in good condition, all for a malnourished or masses are extremely wasted. is damage to some other systems because of that, he says, they were moved frequently and beaten by their captors it was harsh, harsh experience with a lot of abuse almost every day, every hour both physical, mental, and other types and that is something that is beyond comprehension. dr. pessach also treated some of the hostages released in november and says the psychological damage of these four is significantly worse. all of them had faith but losing that faith. i think is where you get to the breaking point. and i m happy that this guy because i hear but there are others losing the faith in us. and human kinds residents in nuiseirat central gaza are in a state of shock, struggling to deal with the aftermath of saturday, which neighboring countries and the eu s top diplomat have called a massacre i m going to miss out this woman says, most of those trapped under the rubble of women and children. holmes s a filled with displaced people. israel committed a massacre the united nations security council passed a resolution votes this monday on a us proposal for a complete ceasefire in gaza. and the release of all remaining hostages. their work 14 votes in favor, zero against, and just one abstention from russia will follow. hancocks reporting from sylvia. thank you very much, sir. when i was in israel last november, i had a chance to meet with the family of almog meir, jan, one of the hostages just released by the idf i ll mugs a mother. all right. told me about the last time she spoke with their son as the hamas attack was underway. if you re me up and said to me, mom, they are rockets all over. and shooting. i don t know what happened. what is going? hey, non am i doing i ll call you every half an our mom, i love you i m so happy. of course, but i ll mug is home now with his loved one, sadly almost father yossi die just hours before his son s return to israel, authorities found yossi meir unconscious. and they went to notify him of all mugs rescue. he was later declared dead. i want to send my deepest condolences to the mayor family as they grieve yossi is passing and welcome almog home joining me mydata discuss all of this and more of the new united nations and to discuss the du, united nations resolution on a gaza ceasefire and all the other top stories from the region, the us ambassador to the united nations, linda thomas greenfield, ambassador. thank you so much for taking a few moments to join us. as you know, this is the first-time the un security council has officially endorsed they ceasefire plan. why now, after eight months of war we have been working on this for eight months for eight months. we have pushed for efforts to achieve a ceasefire. this resolution brings us the closest to getting that done. then we re ever been. and we thought it was important that the council s speak in a unified voice on that. and the boat today s show that if 14th or nothing with one abstention, that would be russia, president biden says this ceasefire plan is israel s, but prime minister netanyahu hasn t publicly accepted it, neither has hamas president biden has said it s time for this war to end. what will this resolution ambassador do to get both sides? to accept this deal? that s currently on the table i think the resolution is actually the opportunity to pressure hamas to accept the deal. israel has accepted the deal. the president has said that and now all we need is to have hamas, this deal, release hostages that they are required to do in phase one and move forward on an extended ceasefire this is an important effort that was made with the support of the qatari government and the egyptian government working with us on the ground as you said, you say, the israeli government has accepted this deal. that s currently on the table. but does the israeli leader, prime minister netanyahu, need to accept it himself he s avoided that but i can t speak for prime minister netanyahu. i can only speak what the president has conveyed and he has conveyed competence in the israeli acceptance of this. still, what we need dallas hamas to accept the deal, they welcomed the resolution immediately after it was passed. they need to take the next step and accept the deal and start to release hostages. as you know, ambassador this weekend s israeli operation freed four israeli hostages, but came with a steep to, of at least 274 palestinians killed. that according to gaza officials. are you comfortable with that trade-off luck? i can t get into the numbers for me. a singles civilian, innocent civilian killed is way too many. but what we cannot ignore the fact that hamas hides behind civilians they were holding hostages in civilian areas. they are firing at idf from civilian areas. so it is hamas that should be held accountable for any actions that are taken that lead to civilian deaths. they don t care about their palestinian billions. as long as they continue to use civilians as, as cover. but does this level of carnage ambassador risk? isolating israel even more so out there on the world stage. and is the us risky? it s international credibility by letting israel operate in gaza virtually unchecked well, if our international reputation is very strong and we have worked very closely with our israeli allies. they are not operating unchecked. we re engaging with them on a regular basis. du we agree 100%, not always but we re working very, very closely with them. israel has a right to defend itself from a terrorist group whose main purpose in life is to ensure that israel does not exist and all jews are killed. so we have continued to support israel s right to defend itself against these terrorists. ambassador, have there been any conversations inside the biden administration to try to negotiate what s being described as a unilateral deal with hamas to free the remaining american hostages who are still being held but we re trying to get all hostages released every single one we care very much about the american hostages who are being held. but all hostages should be released for hostages released who were actually brought home on saturday is just one small group. all of them could be brought home if this deal gets accepted by hamas ambassador linda thomas-greenfield, thanks so much for joining us and just ahead, there s more breaking news. we re following donald trump just finishing his meeting with a probation official in new york. what we we know about what the former president it was likely asked and how his answers will factor into his sentencing next month. plus a live update from delaware. the jury now deliberating in the federal case 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by in vet help call 1807, 10000. do you have an invention idea, but don t know what to do next. collin van help today, they can help you get started with your idea called i ll now 800 100020 the following more breaking news, donald trump has just wrapped up in an interview with the new york probation official, a key step just ahead of his july 11 sentencing hearing our chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst, john miller, is here to break it all down for us. john we know, first of all, about this interview. well, this interview was conducted virtually via zoom meeting between the new york city department of probation which is run by a commissioner and has probation investigators their job in this meeting, which was attended by donald trump on the screen and his lawyer, todd blanche, was to gather personal information in background, which is interesting because there isn t an awful lot that is not known about donald trump his life and so on. but to gather the kind of background that they could put in their report that psr pre-sentencing report to the judge? so he can consider their findings about whether donald trump would be a better candidate to be sentenced to jail or prison, or whether he would be a better candidate for probation given his his crime. so they go into things like his personal life has financial background, education, family s situation ration, things like that. but it was a relatively short meetings. cnn s kristen holmes tells us that this meeting lasted not much longer than than half an hour and covered the basic information was uneventful. yeah, very interesting. only half an hour. interesting indeed, john miller, thank you very much. want to get some analysis? it s from our legal experts who are here with me in the situation room. at least adamson is with us former federal prosecutor, at least walk us through what you expect. actually happened during this half-hour meeting yeah. i think it s important to note that this was a psi that was conducted after a jury verdict. so when a defendant pleads guilty, i think you can expect these introduced to take longer because at that point, most defendants, but they ve already accepted responsibility. they re going to show some remorse. they re going to explain why their actions are bad. they re going to use that time as advocacy to tell the judge probation through the judge threw probation, why they should be giving a more lenient sentence. i think it s not unexpected that today s interview was very short because the former president wants to maintain his fifth amendment right. he s going to appeal. he is going to maintain his innocence so i think today it was just simple questions. he was not going to go into the conviction. todd blanche was there with him, so he was just going to talk about his education, his his characteristics, how long he had lived in the state of new york, probably as residency in florida and just very basic background because really that s all he could safely share it s interesting, tim, because todd blanche s attorney was there with them coaching and presumably about this probation interview that was going on, how do you think trump is handling it? what do you think he s trying to do? well, i mean, he s obviously he s not happy about the conviction itself. and so i think that todd is trying to keep him on task of let s just talk about the issues here at hand and is released. just said when i have a case like this where it is a verdict after trial you would tell the probation officer, hey, don t ask him any questions. he s going to invoke his fifth amendment rights. so just stick to the history of biograph biographical information. so i think that the idea of donald trump being interviewed by a probation officer about where did you grow up tell us tell us your parents names and things like that i m sure that he finds it somewhat direct, degrading, but it is the same thing that every criminal defendant in that courthouse go, sir yeah. that s an important point as well. judge. grass. so what do you make of the fact that this interview lasted what, a half an hour? well, i agree with what the other panelists said. we wouldn t really have expected donald trump to go on at length about a sense of accountability and the things he s learned from this type of a situation. i think it was pretty perfunctory i mean, if he wanted, he could have tried without it without admitting anything or accepting liability for the offenses that he s still going to appeal on. he could have tried to maybe couch and in terms of while i don t think i did anything wrong, maybe we could have done things better along the way. some sense of humility or something like that, because the bottom line is this probation officer, is going to be making a recommendation to the judge on sentencing. the probation officer could very well recommend jail or prison time in this case so theoretically, a defendant might try and appear contrite. i doubt that happen here just from what we ve seen being in court every day and the general persona of this defendant. so putting all of that in context a half-hour is not surprising at all at least i didn t think today s interview that trump had with his probation official will impact judge varchar decision on july 11 to announce sentencing. yeah, i don t think it ll have that great of an impact these sentencing recommendations are meant to be persuasive. so i think judge merchan will take it into consideration. but once again, since this wasn t a very fulsome interview, the defendant wasn t sharing a lot of information that the judge will take into account. and then i also understand from new york legal expert tim, that the psr is in new york state are not as robust as they they are in the federal system, in the federal system, the probation officer does their own investigation. they colored their own understanding of the facts, and they use that as the basis of the recommendation. it s my understanding that that s not the same here. so given the relatively short duration of the interview and the fact that judge merchan presided over the entire jury trial and is very aware of the facts and the defendant and its behavior. i think while it might be helpful, i don t think it s going to impact his ultimate decision-making to trump s team is scheduled to submit its sentencing recommendation. is this coming thursday? what do you think they re going to ask where there are clear then asked for some type of a probation in this case. i mean i think that what they would be smart to do is to focus on not just this case, but the history of what donald trump has done in new york city, they should be talking more about what he did for woman skating rink, what he did for revitalizing the area around grand central terminal, all of the things that he did for the decades before politic some of the positive thing exactly, exactly. they should talk about all the positive things that he s done for new york city and say, in light of all these wonderful things that he s literally changed the skyline the line of the city versus these false business records. this is not something that even accepting the facts as the prosecution claims them is something that he should get jail for, especially for class e felony with a cooperating witness who admitted to a class c felony during the trial, where somebody is no criminal history. so i think that they have a very good argument for some type of probation the difficulty is going to be of course, the prosecution is going to point out everything that he s done as far as violating the gag order the statement city made about the judge just minutes after the verdict. it s it s a very unique case. will know on july 11, what the judge decides everyone. thank you very much. just add a live report with hunter biden s fate doubt in the hands of a jury following a dramatic day of closing arguments in the federal trial of the president s hey, mom, how many 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[ 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. scan the code now and ask about the bosley guarantee. the assignment with audie cornish. listen wherever you get your podcasts ricky news, jury deliberations in the hunter biden trial are now underway. the 12 member panel, weighing three felony gun charges against the son of the us president. our chief legal affairs correspondent, paula reid, has the latest from wilmington, delaware hunter biden s fate is now in the hands of a jury after six days of trial, 12 citizens will decide whether the president s son is guilty of three federal gun charges. in a major show of support, hunter s family members and pastor taking up three rows in court today have known the parameters you don t abandon your friends and family in closing arguments, prosecutors pointed to the gallery of supporters and said, those people are not evidence and reminded the jury that no one is above the law. the prosecution directly address the most difficult element they have to prove that hunter biden knowingly lied on a federal background check form when purchasing the gun at the center of this case, the defendant knew he used crack and was addicted to crack at the relevant time period, adding that hunter would have been aware from his time in rehab that he had a problem with drugs maybe if he had never gone to rehab, he could argue he didn t know. he was an addict at the end of his closing, prosecutor, leo wise circled back to testimony from hunters daughter, naomi, on friday, when she told the jury that when she returned or father s car to him on october 19, 2018, she did not see any the evidence of drugs, but why is reminded the jury hunter s former girlfriend, hallie biden, his brother, beau biden s widow, had testified that when she found the gun in the same car days later, she found it alongside drug paraphernalia defense attorney abbe lowell countered, warning jurors not to convict his client in properly adding it s time to end this case. he compared the trial to a magician s trick, trying to dupe the jury, saying, watch this hand pay no attention to the other one. he accused prosecutors of cherry picking evidence to present a more timeline of hunter s drug use and said his client was not lying when he marked down that he was not an addict on that federal form. lowell attacks, two of hunter s former girlfriends who both served as prosecution witnesses in this case. he noted zoe kestan took pictures of hunter with drugs, but not in the key month of october 2018. he also reminded the jury that hallie biden could not remember specific details about when she found the gun in hunter s car? and noted hunter was the one who told hallie to file a police report for the missing gun after she threw it out hunter did not take the stand to testify in his own defense in this case. a move that would have come with potential rewards and definite risks the jury will return to court here in wilmington tomorrow morning at 9:00 a.m. to resume their deliberations. but it s notable the prosecutors pointed to the first lady and other supporters who are there for hunter and reminded the jury that they don t matter, that suggests that perhaps the justice department is a little worried about that let s show of force for hunter and what it means for their case. but i was in court earlier today and watch the jury. they followed by line by line is the judge went through the instructions but they ll have to follow for this historic decision. wolf paula reid reported for us, paula. thank you very much. let s discuss what s going on with cnn, legal analysts. carrie cordero, and our senior political analyst, gloria borger carry lab. you start with you based on the closing arguments. what do you think are the best strongest points of each sayyed that they made? well, from the defense perspective, the biggest thing that they have going for them is that the prosecution, if it s going to prove its case, is doing so by info in other words, there does not seem to have been at the trial specific evidence of a witness or documents like a video, for example, in actual physical piece of evidence demonstrating that hunter biden was using drugs at the specific time. what there is is there s sort of tangential evidence of circumstances that would lead the jury to infer that he was using at the time. and so that s that s really what the what the defense will point to the prosecution on the other side is going to say, well, look at all these different circumstance dances. those all add up to a conclusion that he was using and therefore, he knowingly falsified the form. well, it was interesting, gloria, in reference to the biden family. yeah. the prosecution said during their closing arguments, they said this, i m quoting people sitting in the gallery are not evidence. you may recognize them from the news, but respect thankfully, none of that matters. what do you make of the optics of the first lady, jill biden and other family members showing up almost on a daily basis. well, i think that the prosecution might be a little concerned that the jury would have a lot of sympathy for somebody with that kind of family support. don t forget a lot of members of the jury have gone through issues in their own lives with drug abuse and you have the first lady flying back from france to come sit at this trial. you have his children, you have his pastor you have friends, family. they took up three rows, i guess and that s something that jerry pays attention to. and so it helps in the portrait of hunter biden as not an evil, a drug addict. it portrays him as somebody deserving of your sympathy and your empathy. and i think that helps him think you re probably right. did you think it was the right move for hunter biden not to testify? he could have testified if he wanted to. his lawyers presumably said don t do it. but what do you think? i think that s right. i m certainly any defendant has the right not to testify. and i think in this case, probably it would have opened the cross-examination would have open him up to delving into so many other areas that are potentially would have been counterproductive. so i think most defendants don t testify on around behalf, and i think in this case, it probably makes sense that he followed the advice of his defense counsel not to, you know, in an odd way though, you did hear from hunter biden because you heard from his book in which he audio books, his audio book. he wrote about this. he wrote about his drug addiction and that was used during the trial against him. but it was used. and so you don t voice you did here, right? and you did here? voice. so he didn t testify. but you did hear him talk about his addiction. you know, it s interesting. the president has vowed to accept the verdict, but is ruled out a pardon for his son very definitively, if he s convicted, though, how s this going to play out politically? you know, it s, it s really hard to say. i m not sure that it plays out that much at all. what congress is worried about. its financial and propriety that may have been committed between joe biden and his son, and they ve presented no evidence for that. if you notice, they ve been a little quiet during this trial. and if a hunter biden is convicted, i think that there will be some sympathy for for joe biden and for the family and all of this. but i m not sure that it plays out in a large political way other than the fact that it will affect joe biden himself. i think sure. it will gloria borger. thank you. carrie cordero. thanks to you as well. coming up. attorneys, preparing sentencing recommendations for donald trump after his meeting with a probation official earlier today, we re taking a closer look. at the options the former president is now facing the assignments are going on and the tornado here. i m thinking, i m going to die. and i thought that was it violin earth with liev schreiber, sunday at now i know on cnn nine out of ten people don t get enough fiber. bennett fiber is the easy, gentle solution for every day. it s plant-based prebiotic fiber nourishes good bacteria in your gut, working with your body to promote digestive health with so many ways to enjoy benefit here is your fiber, your way look in the hotels.com to find your perfect somewhere. ocd is more than what you see on tv. and in the movies, it comes with unrelenting intrusive images, thoughts, and urges. if you have ocd and need help, you can get better. who specialized treatment go to know cd.com to learn more? for me. it was that trouble losing weight and keeping our same discover the power 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plans yet! switch to comcast business and get started for $49.99 a month. plus, ask how to get up to an $800 prepaid card. call today! 090121. now chasing life with dr. sanjay gupta. listen wherever you get your podcasts or this just in to cnn, look at this. officials in arizona have just released rudy giuliani was mug shot. giuliani has pleaded not guilty to charges of allegedly conspiring to overturn the 2020 presidential election in that state. prosecutors accused giuliani and other trump allies of scheming to use fake electors to subvert the election there s more breaking news with donald trump taking a key step towards his july 11 sentencing today, judge juan merchan now is just over a month to determine how he ll punish the former president for his 34 felony convictions. cnn s bryan todd is taking a closer look at all of this for us, brian, what factors is judge merchan weighing as he decides sentencing? he s weighing several factors. wolf, including what trump might have just said at that pre-sentencing interview tonight, we have new information on the many possible forms of punishment the judge more sean could impose on donald trump i just went through a rigged trial in new york now that donald trump has completed his pre-sentencing interview with a probation official, a report on the interview will be sent directly to judge juan merchan, who has a few options for sentencing. trump, the most serious one, prison time, the crimes for which trump s been convicted, falsifying business records could carry sentences of up to four years, each, with a maximum of 20 years. but realistically, it s unlikely that someone convicted of this type of felony in new york with no prior criminal history would see much if any, prison time trump s advanced age experts say would also be a factor in not sending him to prison he turns 78 this week. another sentencing option, probation analysts say, well, that might be a more realistic choice. it would come with a host of inconveniences and indignities for the former president have it be drug tested, having to check in with a probation officer, there could be random visits by probation officers to your home, not with a search warrant, but they can come knock on the door. you need to let them in. home confinement also might be part of a probation sentence for trump, or maybe a restriction on out-of-state travel. if he were going to fly off to another state wisconsin, arizona, he would have to get explicit permission from the probation agency. trump could simply be fine for his convictions or he could do community service where he has to pick up trash on the subways. experts say a conditional discharge could be a sentencing option is a condition of your discharger, your release and you have to abide by those conditions. the court will say, don t get arrested, going, don t get in trouble for the next year or during the pendency of your saenz or for stated period of time. and that s it. you re not checking in? no one s following up with you. there s no probation is no oversight all options, experts say reflective of the striking uniqueness of this situation for the probation department, this is uncharted waters. they have never interviewed someone of this statute before. they know that their work their recommendation is going to weigh heavily in the judgment and decision by judge merchan legal analysts say acceptance of responsibility is often a key factor when a judge considers a sentence. and the fact that donald trump has shown no remorse for the actions he s been convicted of, and has repeatedly publicly attack the judge and witness in this trial could bring him a stiffer sentence. wolf, july 11 is a big day. we ll see what happens on that day, brian. thank you very much coming up back to politics with donald trump out there and the virtual campaign trail today, speaking today to an anti-abortion group but what it s what he didn t say that is making some news you 19th, cnn celebrates 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listen to the former president address a group of christian political activists today we ve done things that nobody thought were possible to have gotten done. you just can t vote democrat. they re against religion there, against your religion in particular, you cannot vote for democrats or let s get some more analysis now from republican strategist. sure. michael singleton and democratic strategists, maria cardona, she s a cnn political commentator what do you think should michael he was speaking to a group that calls for abortion in their words to be eradicated entirely. direct quote eradicated entirely without ever saying the word abortion. yeah, i m familiar with the group. i understand why the former president s spoke before the group. this is obviously a very dicey and touchy topic for republic blinken s. on mature, maria will talk about, we have two years worth of electoral data that showcases, we just don t do well on the issue of reproductive rights with that said, in that clip, you showed a lot of evangelicals. we ll do believe the cultural behavior and customs of behavior in the country are changing particularly as it pertains to their religiosity and the religious views. and they sort of do want someone to be a protector or defender of those views, even if that person is the imperfect individual to do so, how do you think this is going to play with moderate voters out there? certainly that s a group that trump is trying to win over moderate voters, suburban women, for example, how s it going to play? not well at all. will fan this is where i think trump is trying to have it both ways. and while it s no question that christian groups, christian conservative groups, who are completely against abortion are going to support him because he is responsible for overturning roe v. wade and he brags about it every chance he gets, especially in front of these conservative groups. but then suburban women, moderate voters, and frankly, the vast majority of americans who believed that women should have the right to do what they feel is best for their own bodies and their families they don t support this. they think that roe v. wade should not have been overturned they believe that women should have this right. and they are going to continue to punish republicans and donald trump at the ballot box if they continue to push this massive goal of taking away women s rights and freedoms. and that s how the biden campaign s smartly is messaging this whole issue let s just get your thoughts, your mic alone. i have you vice president harris called out congress, republican congressman byron donalds for his controversial comments on jim crow. during an interview with politico. that s first watch what he said. listen to this during jim crow. go back family wants to get during black not just conservative, by who always a pink conservative library more black people voted conservatively vice president harris responded to that by saying this and i m quoting her now. it s sadly at another example of somebody out of florida trying to erase or rewrite our true history i went to florida last july to call out what they were trying to do to replace our history with lies. and apparently there s a never-ending flow of that coming out of that state. what are your thoughts on what he would this congressman were saying? congressman jim crow. the jim crow era. yeah, i ve watched several interviews wolf with the congress and i m going to take him at his word that his intent was not to romanticize the jim crow era. this is a black man i m really going to presume that he s very aware of our history. and in this country, i hope that isn t but, but i do think the point that there are some areas within our community that we as a collective group have to focus more on. i wouldn t disagree with with that should we do some things? a strengthened a family? absolutely. can you do that through the policy realm? i think so, but i do think as you talk about the past, you do have to be careful not to have the appearance that you re romanticized and something that was very horrible for the black community. i have grandparents that are still alive who went through segregation. my grandmother was the first to enter into her high school in new orleans and first-time desegregating the school. and so i think there are people that are still among us who have those very real and raw my experiences. and i would hope that republicans, whether they re black, white, or anyone else for that matter, would be sensitive to the experience of those individuals who are still among us that s interesting on another subject, trump is launching what he s calling a latino americans for trump campaign to reach out to hispanic voters. what do you think? noise when a wolf whole issue of wanting to launch a program called latino americans for trump a couple of days after he brings onstage in arizona sheriff joe are pio, who has the most racist, the most xenophobic v, most anti-immigrant current sheriff, i think ever at least in modern history. and for donald trump to bring him on stage and hug him, and kiss him is he hiring him to be the head of latino americans? for tropics? that s what it looks like. and it is just indicative of how empty and how wrong-headed and misguided donald trump s focuses when he talked it s about latinos in this country and that i think just gives the biden campaign more ammunition to make the contrast between a 34 times convicted felon who is the most racist and the most xenophobic president we ve had ever versus president biden, who has had record job creation in the latino community. record business growth in the latino community, and they have a record with which they can make that contrast and that at the end of the day is going to win joe biden, the latino vote oh, sorry, maria. sure. michael, to both. out of time. thank you very much coming up details on why a meeting at an italian restaurant in new jersey, is taking center stage today. and the federal bribery case against democratic senator bob menendez the most anticipated moment of this election. and the stakes couldn t be higher the president and the former president, one stage two, very different visions for america s future that cnn presidential debate thursday, june 27, nine live i, cnn and streaming on max ocd is more than what you see on tv. and in the movies, it comes with unrelenting intrusive images thoughts, and urges. if you have ocd and need help, you can get better, with specialized treatment. go to know cd.com to learn more life, is better. with the credit god s on your side. rewards once available to if you, are now accessible to the many credit one bank get cashback rewards and lins large have heart failure with unresolved symptoms get maybe time to see the bigger picture heart failure and seemingly unrelated symptoms like carpal tunnel syndrome shortness of breath andrew irregular heartbeat could be something 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walmart and target for gentle dependable constipation really tries seneca. it works differently than others laxatives, because it s made from the center flat and natural vegetable active ingredient, gentle, dependable seneca also available in delicious gummy he s like minute 30 minutes okay one, remember, i don t want surgery for my duper trends contraction to i don t want to wait for my contract i m sure to get worse. three, i want to treatment with minimal downtime for i want to non-surgical treatment. good boy. and five and if not surgical treatment is an opera i ll get a second opinion let s go take charge of your treatment. if you can t lay your hand flat, visit, find a hand specialist.com to get started. i m jessica schneider at the federal courthouse in washington and this is cnn we re following the federal bribery trial of democratic senator bob menendez on the stance at a key witness for the prosecution, detailing the alleged scheme to trade favors for influence soon as jason carroll is joining us from outside the courthouse right now, jason update our viewers. in another dramatic day of testimony yeah. more testimony coming from jose uribe. this is the man who s already pleaded guilty to bribery charges. now cooperating with the prosecution and today we ll he gave more details about specific conversations he has. he says he had with senator menendez directly related to bribery. he spoke about one in particular, a dinner in 2019 at il bellagio restaurant in new jersey. he says, i get to ask again for the first time and explain what is worrying me so much. i asked him if anything in his power to stop an investigation. i ll explain about that in a moment. menendez is answer he would look into it. of course, you rebate was worried about these criminal investigations going on in new jersey wolf that could have implicated people that he was close to. so he told jurors what he did was he paid nadine menendez $15,000 so she could buy a brand new mercedes in exchange for the the senators influence. he then talks about another meeting at nadine menendez, his home, where he says he wrote down the names of people who were possibly implicated in this designation, put it on a piece of paper. he said senator menendez folded up the piece of paper, put it in his pocket, then in october of 2019, he says he got a call from senator menendez. he told jurors that he felt as though this situation had been resolved and he choked up. juror he choked up wolf as he was speaking about what had happened saying that this situation had been over, and he felt he was at peace then there was this
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three-to-one, three-to-one today with violet birth, we have schreiber tonight, did nine on cnn welcome, to the whole, store i m anderson cooper, drag is an odd form that s been around for centuries, including shakespeare s times. women weren t allowed back then to appear on stage. so man dressed up to play the roles of female characters drag performances have evolved a lot over the decades, exploding in mainstream popularity in recent years with tv hits like rupaul s drag race. but now it s also become a political target. republican lawmakers and six days have passed laws aimed at restricting drag performances and places where children are present. the laws have been amended, blocked, are currently being challenged in federal courts. over the next hour, cnn s randy k digs into the colorful history of drag it takes a look at how and why its come under attack this. is how it begins yes, it is always starts with the foundation can sealer and foundation. right well, concealed. he just got some foundational not yet, but give me a few years. i probably well, we re going to let off quite how long does it take you to get all made up but phone drag it varies. would on average, you re talking 30 or 40 minutes, but the transition from your average homosexual to ravishing drag queen interesting it s good to see the process step by step. some can enjoy every bit it s my moment to just take myself into a whole another world and just be happy despite whatever going around at the palace bar and restaurant in miami south beach well, tiffany tiffany phantasia is lip-sync into the song, rather be by clean banded so she is slang. that s a drag term for killing it. she s been performing and drag for 20 years in drag. i feel more powerful i feel three. i feel independent. i feel love, i feel joy, especially when i m seeing some papers i love. the freedom of expression. i love making somebody has, i love the glitz and glam because no matter what i m going through a growing through somebody else, is that energy and for those five minutes nothing matters what do you think is the draw for an audience? why do you think people? i tend to directions because it s different. it goes against the status quo. it challenges society we are told as we grow up, you re supposed to act this way, talk this way to this man. that third and here s some body defying all events and performing for you. whether seeing live our lives, thinking or whatever they re defying the social norm, they re going against eagle and that s fascinating for a lot of people drag has fascinated audiences for more than a century there were hugely popular drag balls in harlem during the roaring 20s in the 50s and 60s, crowds packed into clubs featuring what were referred to at the time as female impersonators before a backlash shove, drag into the shadows but perhaps no one has helped bring dragged back into the spotlight today more than dragged superstar rupaul s with the tv competition show rupaul s drag race? sashay, away. but a hit show has been running for 16 seasons collecting a whopping 29 emmy awards along the way. rupaul s world. of wonder production company has built a drag empire launching drag race tv franchises. these type of good is minus zeta, a call in more than a dozen countries around the world. ready, i can show. was on drag race. the audience is connecting with the tenacity of the human spirit that s what that show is really about when you you tear it down to just nuts and bolts we all relate to someone who has been cast off and they prove us wrong. i remember, you can t love yourself. how the how you go, love somebody out. thanks in part to rue rupaul s drag has become more popular than ever. there are dragged branches, drag dinner shows, drag beauty pageants even drag bingo wright, eric, he was we re getting so close to me drag is the main attraction every new year s eve in key west, florida afraid at all, you re just kind of dangling up here a crowd of enthusiasts so revelers counts down to midnight as a drag queen descends from the balcony at this bar in a giant high-heeled shoe we found that queen of this. i ve reported live from these it s devotees for years. and now i m left wondering how did this can t be form of entertainment becomes such a target for the political right. like it is here in my home state of florida republican lawmakers and right-wing leaders across the country are pushing through laws restricting drag shows the law here in florida signed by republican governor ron desantis it aimed at banning children from attending drag shows. it blocks venues are publicly permitted events from admitting children to an adult live performance which according to the law includes any performance that quote, depicts or simulates the lwd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts there are these like these drag shows sexually explicit in what they re doing in luck adult entertainment, people can do what they want with some of that, but there should not be any of these kids. they re the law is up in the air now after a federal judge put it on hold pending a state appeals supporters of the restrictions claim that drag shows are harmful to children. some accused drag queens of being child a derogatory term often used to demonize members of the lgbtq community as pedophiles good the desantis administration filed a complaint against the miami restaurant. our house accusing it of exposing minors to what it called sexually explicit drag shows and threatening to pull its liquor license after a state investigation found no unlawful content in the performances the venue, which denied any wrongdoing, agreed to pay a $10,000 administrative fine and set a minimum age requirement of 18 for their drag shows read coming to your city. does desantis officials also threatened to yank the liquor licenses of the plaza live theatre in orlando, and the hyatt regency in miami for hosting an event called a drag queen christmas we re minors accompanied by their parents, were present even though a report by undercover state agents acknowledged they did not witness any lewd acts. both settled for a $5,000 fine. it is specifically intended with the heightened penalties ten $10,000 fines and fees the suspension of liquor licenses to create fear and to intimidate businesses out of wanting to host drag performances, especially when there are unclear about exactly what is allowed and what is not allowed representative smith, democratic carlos guillermo smith was florida s first lgbtq latino lawmaker. he s currently running for state senate it has led to a chilling effect with pride as well. several pride events across florida have also been canceled or restricted out of concern, drag queens might be seen by children in public resign, hit, particularly hard by the political backlash drag queen story hours like this there once was a boy with the rainbow harms they had signed saying that drag queens were pedophiles with aids. they were yelling and screaming at children and families. were you scared? i was scared. i was scared welcome to the waiver hood with waves. they re finding your style is fine when the music stops grabbing, it, doesn t matter i ll just dollars i m sorry, carl, this is me and chair form i don t see you this one perfect for you, but you love it. i told you we should have done opinion data i explained it how many dei then i d said you need to sit down every style, every home that they blocked the road trip everyone comfortable? yep. there s plenty of space hi, david gardner right. no, no going on one once arrive okay. i gave him and see despicable me before and theaters july 3rd rated pg last month, massive solar flare out at a 24 hour to the day, businesses are wondering what should we do with bacon and eggs 257, right? so spots from 20% with additional hour extra hour on thinking up the white power. now, let s put it through a book this is going to wreak havoc on overtime 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named mama ashley rows tell me just a little bit about your background. i was involved in church pretty much my whole life, which led me to get into ministry. and the whole time i knew i was gay, i knew i was struggling even through all that journey feeling of unwanted nus and unloved and never being good enough to where here i am today spreading this message that everyone it was love accepted, and wanted no matter who they are. i remember how it felt to not feel that way. so it s kinda drives me to do what i do today you were once a pastor at an lgbt church, was like pastor mike today, drag queen by night and again, the drag queen, it wasn t even just by night. we started doing events. we started doing fundraisers variety shows, drag dinner shows, drag gospel shows raising money for those in need perfect. it can be $100, could be a couple of thousand dollars. and our events and we not only focus on queer lgbtq plus charities, but we focus on animal shelters, domestic violence, mental health i always knew that my character, mama ashley rose was going to be something different. you re going to be wholesome, going to be not the club bar scene because it was never really my scene. and i just knew that i had to bring something to the table that no one else was doing i look forward to meeting oh, i can t wait for you to meet mama nice to reach. nice to meet you. good seeing you, to see you too. so tell me about you. so mama is just a southern lady that spreads a message to everyone is loved, accepted, and wanted no matter who they are. and we provide a safe space so my job is to make people for loved, make people feel safe, give them a little laugh, a little chocolate sometime i don t when people think of a drag queen this is not the look that i think most people think of. what if my life could bring. it s changed make somebody move absolutely. so drag is an art form and we know that art comes in all shapes, sizes types, and everything. and i love to tell people we have adult television, we have children s television, we have adult radio toluse radio, all that. so i m kinda like the disney channel of drag, who s ready for story time? all. kids if you can come up and have a seat on the floor. so for me, dragged story hour is first of all, teaching literacy. there once was a boy with, uh, rainbow heart it looks a little different. we know that illiteracy is an issue and the world right now. but teaching and reading about kindness, my books are about kindness, about love, about loving yourself. we read stories about how to handle bullies and the list goes on with that, just teaching life skills, you see it s literally just a person in a costume no different than a disney princess reading a story to kids and adults. my sparkly earrings, they see it as this like glamorous princess they re going to listen to a story from someone dressed in a costume before they will have just any random person what kind of backlash have you faced doing drag story hour up until last year? we had no issues and a year ago this december, we had neo-nazis show up outside this building. they had signs saying that drag queens were pedophiles with aids they were projecting on the side of buildings saying that grooming was in process. they were yelling and screaming at children and families. were you scared? i was scared. i was scared jason says he also had to find a new location for an annual drag pageant at the last minute, because the orlando venue was afraid of being targeted by the desantis administration they were really concerned about losing their liquor license so they asked us to make our event 18 up and my response was like, no, i m not going to make an event 18 up when it never has been we don t do 18 and up events. so we had four days to find a new venue to move a whole paget, a whole production show shortly after that in orlando high school was forced to cancel an event featuring jayson he had been scheduled to speak to the school s queer and ally alliance. i have been invited by students for years to go in and the students invite me and of course, with approval of educators and this after-school program, after school club. and i usually say, do you want me to come as json or do want me come as momma and always i mean, they wanted to drag queen, right? so a woman who is part of the moms for liberty, who is also on the orange county school board, basically had a shutdown educators and the principal and the dean were literally their jobs were being threatened if they allow this event to happen. that school board member, alicia for ronde, says she raised questions after hearing complaints it s from dozens of parents but an investigative report by spectrum news 13 in orlando revealed a majority of the emails for ron to received about the event were supportive of it. we have reached out several times different for a response to the report, but i ve heard nothing back i just wanted to be a drag queen and tell funny stories and make people laugh i had no idea it was going to be in this atmosphere. it s scary time. it was a scary time for us secondly, fear of threats, fear of safety the political backlash, jason and many others are now experiencing is familiar to me anyone who knows the history drag more on that next. every week, there ll be police raids every time there was a police raid, it was people in states of drag who were arrested the simons are going off and the tornado here i m thinking, i m going to die. and i thought that was violin earth with liev schreiber donated nine on cnn did you know sling has your favorite news progress for just $40 a month my favorite news for just $40 a month my favorite news for just $40 a month. $40 a month? my favorite for just $40 a month $40 get your favorite news. are $40 a month sling lets you do that with so many choices on booking.com, there are so many tina fey as i could be. so i hired body doubles to help me out splurge 18. it loves a hotel near row de you drive 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gorgeous, 200 page book outlining the history of drag and the political backlash against it. all intertwined with anecdotes from my own irresistible and unpredictable relevance to clean you re welcome why do you think the history of drag is so important? the history of drag is important because people don t know. and in fact, it feels like their cycles of acceptance and then backlash that have happened throughout history sasha grew up steeped in drag history one of sasha is biggest influences this was her grandmother dina she encouraged me to channel lane or diva. she coached me on how to make an inference and the gown the her condo had like one set of stairs coming down from the loft and i would put my costume on up there and then walked down the stairs dramatically. so i have a lot one of her grandmother s favorite hotspots, uh, clubs spotlighting female impersonators in san francisco called for nokia s she would go to for nokia on the weekends drive in from the suburbs of daly city and of course it was a club mostly targeted for straight audiences. and she loved the drag shows. she thought it was so entertaining, and she told you about it. and she told me about it as a little kid. i feel very lucky that i grew up with out shame around drag, at least at home female impersonator clubs across the country, including one in new york called club at t2, became all the rage during the 1950s and 60s the people. who came to the ad to club were everyday people your mom and dad may have come to the 82 club, but also it was packed with celebrities judy garland, milton, berle, elizabeth taylor, richard burton, errol flynn salvador dali, the surrealist, of course, loved drag and the ad he to club dragging the us has strong roots going back to harlem racially diverse groups of people flocked to the rockland palace for headline grabbing drag balls hosted by a black fraternal organization called the hamilton lodge during the harlem renaissance and the roaring 20s harlem drag balls were enlarge pageant deep masquerade experience. and it was meant largely for the black community later on, there started to be more and more white patrons alyssa max goodman wrote a book on the history of drag in new york city called glitter and concrete after a while, they re just became thousands upon thousands of people who would attend. there were prizes given for the best costumes. it was an affair that was i mean, i think it was considered social suicide. if you didn t go in the early 1900s, one of the biggest celebrities in the country, julian l tinge, performed in drag julia elton was one of the top paid performers in vaudeville of julia elton was a female impersonator. so there was this appetite for that type of entertainment we re looking to week four of the class, joey jeffries is a drag. his story, who also teaches a course on rupaul s drag race at the new school in new york city. and at new york university julia elton was very successful financially, artistically. julian elton had any number of plays with music on broadway julian l2 and had his on makeup line, his on magazines. julian l2 inch have a theater named after him el tinge also became a big movie star in films like the aisle of love featuring a van unknown rudolph valentino the premise of his movies was very much like the premise of his plays. which is also part of his identity. i m a guy. i m in some life-threatening situation that requires me to get an address and that is the only reason i am getting an address. it s the sum like get hot narrative it s a similar premise and the hollywood hit movie starring tony curtis and jack lemmon, as well as other hugely successful films like tutsi mrs. down, fire thank you for denia. don t fire drag was also popular among members of the us military. broadway productions and movies portrayed soldiers performing and drag shows for the troops drag was central to a morale effort during world war two. and to the point where eisenhower was giving commendations to troops that use dragged to say that you are doing a great job in your serving your country. in irving berlin, in stage musical, became a movie featuring soldiers and drag called this is the army starring none other than ronald reagan ready to the chorus curtain? but appearing in drag outside the movies and female impersonator clubs was a far different story. there were very strict rules at the club at two, for example, where he men had to arrive in men s clothes, put on their makeup, their and then leave in men s clothes that s largely due to a crackdown on what we now call drag queens and gaze during the mccarthy era in the 50s, that became known as the lavender scare. the attitude at the time that created the lavender scare was homosexuality was as much a threat to the us as communism. it was a dark period in the 50s four draft your performance because there was legislation out there that was stopping it banning it, and trying to restrict it somewhat in the ways that we re seeing today. we really never had a law that banned drag. but there was a law on the books here in new york that band masquerading and they started enforcing this ancient law against masquerade to cut down on people dressing up outside of their legal gender. if you re caught in a bar or walking the street and you didn t have enough pieces of the appropriate gender clothing on you literally would be taken to jail. being a drag queen was something shameful and you would maybe lose your job if people found out that you d like to dress and drag you could lose your family institutional and cultural stigma against drag was huge and it was deeply tied to fears of brown trans, people. and even around like gay people generally that harassment and discrimination against drag queens would go on to play a vital role in the uprising that ignited the fight for lgbtq rights that might finally, they d had enough of it they didn t enough of being pushed around it change that night next sunday on the whole story, the james webb telescope has delivered amazing pictures of our universe couldn t show signs of life on other planets. that s the holy grail. and we re searching the whole story with anderson cooper next sunday at eight on cnn the increase in wildfires is exponential unpredictable uncontrollable with overwhelming cottonwoods. the need to do something is urgent violet birth with we have schreiber next on cnn karni is golda. it s got a nassau them that s what i got. igneous harnik got to me. her name, but with more and useful michelin innovates once more with michelin acoustic technology reducing kevin noise by cushioning road vibrations michelin motion for life so far as helping me get my money right to achieve my ambition keep like saving for an epic shoe we re so by checking and savings, i pay no account fees and earned one of the best apy is in the lead. so parking help fund, all your ambitions. like helping the next next-generation achieved their a higher apy epic 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you. learn more at cisa.gov/secureourworld that s how we can secure our world! we can secure our world. don t just use a password alone. mfa sends a call, a text or a code to your phone. learn more at cisa.gov/secureourworld that s how we can secure our world! than american rush to walmart and find buttered mushrooms. the cnn presidential debates, june 27th, nine live on cnn and streaming un-backed next in the pre-dawn hours on a saturday morning in june 1969 trouble erupted in the heart of new york city s greenwich village, at a bar called this stonewalling he was the only place that we could come in and the ourself mark segal was a regular at the stonewall, a mafia run gay bar, which paid corrupt cops to look the other way at a time when being gay could get you arrested you were inside the stonewall inn when the raid happened that triggered the uprising. what do you remember about that lights blinking, which never happened while i had been in there before usually array and they happen too often. was pleased to come in, take a pay off, and leave this was a little different rather than coming in and coming through doors commonly, they burst through the doors they started throwing things around. they were pick up the bottles, throw them away they took people, slam them against the wall. they smashed everything they could possibly see somebody started throwing things to do or when the police wanted to leave a stone according to have them your pocket. those people who actually fought that night or street kids like me, marginalized people, drag queens so drag queens were on the front lines. the stonewall up absolutely almost everything we did in that first year, which i call the first magical year leading from stonewall to the first pride. all of that had drag queens involved in every aspect there wasn t a demonstration that they weren t present some way, shape or form. they were at the meetings giving their voice, getting their opinion two of the most prominent activist to emerge from the movement where drag queens, marsha p. johnson and sylvia rivera, both women of color, who became icons of the fight for lgbtq rights. the two form to trans rights group and open north america s first lgbtq youth center i think one of the most impactful things that sylvia rivera and marsha p. johnson did was found a house that became a safe place for young queer and trans people for teenagers who had escaped home for homeless kids living in new york to come and live. and they called it the street transvestite action revolutionaries, or star house the became like an, an activist organization as well as a hub and a home for so many in need to do around the same time, gay and transgender kids founded another safe haven in an emerging underground drag scene called the house ballroom. it s like forcing into the looking glass captured in the critically acclaimed documentary. paris is burning and depicted in the tv hit post forum started in harlem in the 1960s it was created by drag queens of the time latino and african-american drag queens, who wanted to create her own pageants because that s what they were in the beginning. they were pageants. they were tired of competing in the patch since that were downtown and losing to their white counterparts beautiful. felix rodriguez get is as a filmmaker who has been documenting house ballroom culture for decades seen on his youtube channel, old school ballroom a boil is like the super bowl for black and latino, where people it s where all these houses which are like teams come to this venue to compete against each other it s a group of people that are together as a family. they can be compared to everything from be similar to fraternity and sorority to being a gay gang. it was a time when gay men and trans people pool of color were thrown out of their houses, literally from their family. and they had to find a place to live houses were the communities that welcomed people they ll situations a competitive new dance style also came out of the ballroom scene bogeying, which is very powerful hello, in a lot of people think that madonna created it, but she had vogue dancers in her tour and created song logan became in popular but vogue ing started in the ballroom scene and still continues to be in the ballroom scene the ballroom culture is still thriving today. in fact, the venue where we interviewed felix rodriguez is a brooklyn club named $3 bill that host weekly ballroom competitions called ota, or open to all right now, but back when ballroom was still under to ground, another drag phenomenon was also hitting the scene he was wearing mohawks and shoulder pads and waiting boots. let s just say that the repo of today look had not yet come together lady bunny is now an iconic drag queen who s been making audiences laugh for more than 40 years they tried to make me go to rehab and i said, you know what, that s done? an idea are you nervous not at all, but she got her start back in the 80s when drag was far from mainstream, along with another relatively obscure performer at the time named ru paul oh you want once they send that to the audience we met in atlanta and we re instantly as thick as thieves so what was the scene like? did you bond there will ruin. i did bond there at one point, we became homeless to get i came to new york with root paul. we can to the pyramid this is in 1983 and i was drunk i lip-sync to, i will survive halfway through it. there s that little low in the song. where did she comes back with the big gone now, go during that low, i had fallen lost a shoe and the wig was hanging by a thread, but i got up there on that one shoe and finish the rest of the number and i was a favorite at the pyramid wir sind then at the time all of this drag and all of this fun was happening at the pyramid. the specter of aids was raised and of course we were young and sexually active. we didn t know what to do. you found in wig stock yes. to help raise funds for the aids crisis? yes i started wig stuck in a park across the pyramid. i wanted to showcase the many different kinds of talent it. was drag queens who lyptsi lip-sync for example i just felt that there was this wealth of talent that could appeal to a wider audience. and my hunch was correct aids was running, ramping through new york how was drag and wigs docx a, a political reaction to what the reagan administration was doing or not doing. i think that the political statement was that there s no shame in our game that there s nothing wrong with us that we love what we do. and then it s entertaining so i felt like what my role was to be a jester and to put on a fun show to make us forget about aids, to make us forget about everything except we re still here and we re glad that we re here. and let s celebrate week stock went on to draw crowd swelling into the thousands stock, as well as becoming a subject of a welding receive documentary week stop. the movie, launching lady bunny into the limelight root. paul began rising to start ms well, transforming her punk drag look into the glamorous glitz of her breakout hit supermodel and paul definitely knew how to work in growing up, i knew i would be famous. i knew i wanted to be famous. i didn t know how i was going to be famous drag presented itself to me and i thought, okay, this is is the rest is root hall would say is history you may leave the stage rupaul s drag race over the past 16 years has hot rotted dragged back into the mainstream public consciousness. it makes drag accessible not only as an art form, but in a place that people can watch it right there on their television screen or streaming all that success may drag a huge draw for detractors to do no such thing as a family friendly drag show. we re going to make that clear in the state of florida coming up, a sponsor of the florida law aimed at drags speaks out and drag queens clap bashing. do i look like a stripper anderson cooper 360 weeknight today 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juicy reducing kevin noise by cushioning road vibrations michelin motion for life welcome to the waiver hood with wave. finding your style is fine the music stops grabbing. it, doesn t not dollars i m sorry, carl, this is me in chair form. i don t see you come on. perfect for you. love it. i told you we should have done opinion ada i explained it is how many died they re not sending you need to sit down, a slow network is no network for business. that s why more choose comcast business. and now, we re introducing ultimate speed for business our fastest plans yet. we re up to 12 times faster than verizon, at&t, and t-mobile. and existing customers could even get up to triple the speeds. at no additional cost. it s ultimate speed for ultimate business. don t miss out on our fastest speed plans yet! switch to comcast business and get started for $49.99 a month. plus, ask how to get up to an $800 prepaid card. call today! to claim your five-dollar trial duties celebrating freedom and legacy. wednesday, june 19 at ten on cnn. close captioning brought to you by ru la law. i kinda brands up to 70% off retail at roulette law.com, rubella you never pay full price sees the deals on top before their car southward like their sisters at stonewall drag queens and florida are fighting back this was the scene in tallahassee in april of last year when hundreds of drag artists and their supporters marched on the florida state camp to protest the law aimed at restricting grab former democratic state lawmaker carlos guillermo smith, address the crowd from the state house steps they are fabulous are urea if you look at the current law in florida, it does not specifically mention a ban on drag shows. so what s wrong with it well, it doesn t have to directly mentioned drag queens for it to be targeting this community. in particular, when this legislation was filed it was filed by a republican lawmaker who made many ugly assertions and baseless attacks on drag queens as being a threat to children well, guess where else drag queens aren t and brynn mention in a big long list in the 20 line definition of this bill that republican lawmaker, he s referring to, is this man, florida state representative randy fine this bill didn t talk about drag queen it doesn t mention the word drag queens deals yet when representative fine, introduced the bill, which further restricts laws already on the books, protecting children from adult live performances he posted on facebook that would ban the city of melbourne from welcoming drag queen adult entertainers from grooming our children. it s not mentioned in the bill, but you have mentioned it in a post that s fair point, but that is the kind of entertainment that inspired me. to do the bill. you hadn t men dressed as strippers effectively performing as such in public? i don t care what consenting adults do, but i think we should keep this stuff away from our kids. what was the goal of the bill, the gold the bill to protect kids. what specifically do you think children need to be protected from? well, i think they need to be protected from sexualization. it s totally unnecessary and the fact that we already have so many good laws to protect children from adult performances. it exposed that this bill was really just about targeting drag if you think the law is targeting drag shows and drag queens, why not just mentioned that directly? because if they overtly mentioned drag performances in the letter of the law, it would have immediately been obvious to any attorney in any the judge that this is an unconstitutional censorship of their first amendment freedom representative fine argues that while the law mentions prosthetic breasts, which many drag queens where it spells out other criteria that would be necessary to make drag shows admitting children illegal so wearing prosthetic breasts does not equal an adult life performance. it has to be that and three or four other things. this is all meant to be vague. it s meant to intimidate, isn t there a danger in intimidating some of these venues from hosting drag? performances or not intimidating them were laying out what the definition is and we re saying if you do these, there s going to be consequences. do you think drag queen shows and drag queen story hours can be family-friendly no, i don t. that doesn t mean they re all illegal. that doesn t mean they re all adult life performances. but no, i don t believe it s appropriate for kids do you see drag queens as a threat to children i think that s a challenging question. that s like saying, do you think adults are a threat to let me put it this. i do think drag queens are looking to groom children. are they groomer? i think some are. i don t understand why a man wants to dress up like a woman. and then read stories to children. i don t think it s that complicated that doesn t mean that 100% of those violate the law. i want to be clear about that. how would that be harmful to children? because i think it confuses them drag queen story, our says our goal in doing this is to celebrate gender fluidity. there is a purpose behind this, and it is to confuse and indoctrinate children in a majority of this legislature, we do not believe in gender fluidity we do not believe in transgender science. do you know of one case of a child who attended drag queen story hour and then decided to become transgender. i do not know. have you ever been to drag queen story hour? no. have you ever been to a drag show not that i can remember. most of these people and i ve seen have never even been to a drag show. they ve never experienced the drag is an art and seeing that there are different types of drag jayson to dechambeau traveled to the florida capital when the bill was being debated. he did to testify before the legislature in full drag mama ashley robes. i have a question. do i look like a stripper? well, i walked up and my first response and comment to those do i look like a stripper because many politicians have said that i dress like strippers, like i don t dress like that. do you see yourself as a threat to children? no, i do not see myself as a threat to children nor do i see any drag performer threat to a child. drag performers know that if you re in a club, if you re in a nightclub, fearing a bar 18 and up, you perform differently, right? especially in our events, are performers know that when we have family here they dress different. they perform different. so now we know threat. but the overall message and the reason why you do drag story hour as what to teach that message that your love accepted and wanted no matter who you are and let you know that everyone should read the idea of the grooming that dragged does is just the message of tolerance. and that the message of acceptance could be so dangerous that it would brainwash a child. maybe if they don t want a world of tolerance they should be afraid of us because we are fighting for that. you know, about the history of drag. having written a book about it, do you worry about the history repeating itself? the history is repeating itself currently all around us. for awhile, it felt like we were getting progress they say if you don t learn the past, you re going to repeat it i think there s a lot of strength to be found in history to we see the way that despite being thrown in jail, despite being fine, despite losing their jobs queer people continued to gather together and put on shows and find ways to keep existing and stay true to ourselves. so if they can do it, we still have a chance today how much do you think gender identity and sexuality are playing a role in? these new laws that are targeting drag, gender, identity and sexuality are the reason that drag is being targeted. because if it was just costumes without any possibility of queerness, i think it would be fine they re ignorant and the ruud and homophobia i would tell ron desantis, we are not your political pawns stop using that s for clickbait the one and only miss tiffany fantasia there are tim million other things that you need to be taken care of and put policies in place to circumvent the problems of the average flow of radiant here we worried about a dam drag show. we re not doing anything, but making sure that you people i haven t a good time and not worry about the problem that they have because you re not doing your job governor desantis has not responded to our request for comment in her drag show called don t bring the kids, lady bunny takes on republican lawmakers pushing anti legislation with a parody of adele s song. rumor has it but given the guns birthday is that hooters with your under gop hypocrisy can t take it no more dreadfully aren t the people is d to watch out for groomer? is it? rumor? is it despite the crackdowns, these drag queens insist the drag show will go on. i would be a miss to stay. i wasn t scared. i d be a miss to say that i there are times i just want to pack the makeup up and not do it again but i m not going anywhere. we re going to keep fighting there is a fighting spirit in drag we can make magic with nothing and even if they take everything, like for a month we re still going to find a way to put on a show to entertain the thing i ve found is people love drag if we have a chance to put on a show for you, you re going to fall in love legal battles over drag performances continue. so far, laws proposed in florida texas, tennessee, and montana had been blocked by federal judges on constitutional grounds. the states are appealing those decisions. thanks for watching the whole story. i ll see you next sunday
Geopolitics of the cold war through the lens of two double agents who were pulling the strings behind the scenes threatening, did he stabilize diplomatic efforts? all right i always i think the early version, at least from the agency who really had a pretty good understanding of how the kgb worked there are no other the powers our everyday was so for little black he d write these studies. everybody would read them and say, oh, that s really great work, rick and then that would. be the end of it. you know, they didn t really send it anywhere and all new episode of secrets and spies, a nucleus and now, the hbo original series, real time with bill maher . how are you doing? how are you doing? thank you very much. i appreciate it. thank you, people. thank you very much. i appreciate it. all right. good to see you. thank you. please, there s so much to get to. oh, wow. i feel great about that. yes, the big news this week is hunter biden s trial. let s get right to that. it led to absolutely fucking nothing, but let s get right to it. i know the republicans they are like, if you take down trump, we are going to take down hunter biden and the democrats are like, knock yourself out, we barely care about joe biden. [ audience reacts ] but, this trial is only about one thing in america which is very important, you cannot mix drugs and guns! seriously, we don t take a lot seriously in this country, but this is one we are very serious about, and hunter biden was buying a gun on crack i mean, at the moment, he was literally on crack and buying a gun, he almost had the gun in his hand. so, the prosecutor gets up and says, no one is above the law in this country, it doesn t matter who you are or what your name is and all the republicans stood up and fist pumped and went, yeah. and then they went oh, wait. yeah, that s [ audience reacts ] that s not what they were saying last week, was it? interesting. in april, they took a survey, 17% of republicans said it was okay only 17% okay for a felon to be president. now, they took the survey again, 58% said it is okay for a felon to be president. gosh, what happened? usually, to change this drastically in the space of two months, hormones are involved. i [ laughter ] but, if hunter biden does get convicted, this will be a historic first. it will be the first time republicans ever objected to somebody buying a gun. [ audience reacts ] and there was testimony from hallie biden, because she was married to hunter biden s brother, who sadly died, beau biden. and then, hunter went out with her. so, she is the ex-girlfriend and the widow. i know. she is she testified that when he was with hunter, she got her into crack, and she is ashamed and embarrassed about that part of her life. really? [ audience reacts ] you bang your dead husband s brother and the part you are embarrassed about is the crack? okay. but [ audience reacts ] she said she found hunters going at one point, she knew she couldn t have it, so she took it away and threw it away in the supermarket dumpster, perfectly. [ laughter ] so, when hunter throughout found out she threw away his gun, he called her insane, called her stupid, said, are you on crack? if you are, can i have some? we all saw this stuff from hunter biden s laptop, right? they did a reality show about hunter biden, it would be called naked and afraid of running out of crack. and it s just [ audience reacts ] and it is just bad optics for the president. the jury is looking at sex tapes of hunter biden and the rest of us are worried about if his father can walk all right. kidding. well, actually, joe was doing the d-day thing. you saw that yesterday? he did very well. i thought he did very well. he was over there commemorating the 80th anniversary of d-day. in america, you know what they did? non-congressman oh, gosh nine congressman dressed up as military people. world war ii, you know, vintage stuff, and jumped out of a world war ii vintage plane to commemorate d- day. sadly, they were wearing parachutes. [ audience reacts ] [ laughter ] and george santos you know, when i do dress up, you bitches make a whole thing out of it. well, yes, it is pride month again, and the spirit of pride [ audience reacts ] so, listen to this. this is a pride month story, five dry greens in philadelphia did a children s books reading as they do, made a guinness book of world records for the fastest way to get trump re- elected. [ audience reacts ] not that there aren t still bigots in this country, but did you see this? this is the head of the colorado republican party sent out an email saying, calling gay people godless horrors, which in california is not even an insult. i get my hair cut at a place called godless groomers. we have a great show. we have matt welch, abigail shrier, but first up, the democratic senator from the great state of pennsylvania, john fetterman! welcome back, it s been too long! good to see you. welcome back to the show. it s been 13 years. it s an honor to be here. i am a fan boy, so right back at you. i have been badgering my staff for a long time now to get you on this show, and i will tell you why i have been badgering them, and eyeglass i guess they badgered you. when i have seen you the last couple of years, you speak so freely. you speak like politicians who i get on this show who aren t in politics anymore, the ones who are out of office, and they can be honest, that is the way you speak now, and it is a beautiful thing. [ audience reacts ] well, honestly and this is true you speak for a lot of democrats that are afraid to say a lot of that stuff. it is a lot of release for a lot of democrats who are like, thank god, somebody is actually platforming like that. no, i think we are very much on the same page. but, it is very rare i don t have to worry about being re- elected, except by the audience. [ audience reacts ] it is, i think, even more brave for you to do it. the question i want an answer to is, is this connected to some of your health issues? when you have gone through what you have, both physical and mental health issues, does it give you a freedom? like, what can you yeah, absolutely. there is a line from the first batman, joker is like, i have been dead once already, it is liberating. that is not reckless, that is really just freeing. it is just freeing, in a way. and i think after being all of that, i would just be able to say the things that i really believe in, and not be afraid if there is any kind of blowback. and what about mental health in america, at-large? what is the prescription for this? because we are going to talk about it on the show to a degree tonight. it is certainly a big issue in this country. we have, what, 50,000 suicides in the last year? absolutely. this is an outstanding number, i think. what are your thoughts on this? well, actually, after i signed myself in to walter reed to get help, with depression, it is not really a big clinical winter, to talk about depression. and when i started to have that conversation, i realized that if i started to be honest, i have to talk about self-harm, you know, harming myself, because you pointed at the 50,000 americans who took their lives, and i started talking about that and said, hey, i have been in that place. i now tell people, i promise you, i am begging you, please, don t harm yourself. stay in the game. now, i am being contacted by people on the regular saying, hey, thanks to hearing this, i got help, or it even saved my life. i never thought that would resonate and that is why i decided to have that conversation, because i was lucky i got help and got better, and now i want to be the kind of guy that can say something, that could have helped someone like me, who was in that situation. [ applause ] so, let s talk a little politics here, because that is your game. pennsylvania is going to be probably, could be, come down to three states, pennsylvania will definitely be one of them. i have always said, pennsylvania picks the president and there really is no legitimate path for the president if he doesn t win, and i believe he will win, actually, because trump was able to flip pennsylvania and that helped deliver his first victory. but, joe biden carried it in 2020 because he has a really strong connection thereto pennsylvania and i believe he will again, but it will be close, and that is the same conversation i have been having with pennsylvania, that it is going to be very close, because trump has a strong connection in pennsylvania and it will be very competitive and all of that. i have also been saying, i don t think that whole trial is going to be anything meaningful with people who have already decided, that is my guy. i will never understand why somebody would say, i love that, or i want four more years of that. but, i do believe joe biden is going to carry pennsylvania and he is going to win. [ audience reacts ] but, as he was as he has not, yet, officially been nominated by the democratic party, is he really the best one to put forward? joe biden? yeah. yeah. he is actually the only american that has ever beat trump in an election, and i do honestly believe that he is actually the only democrat that could win. and let me just say this let me just say this, i know it might be provocative but the last time there was a hotshit governor with $2 million, thought he was going to beat trump, then trump through him in the wood chipper and he finished third in his own state, in florida. and again, trump is pretty tough, and that is what the republicans want and i can t imagine why how he is feeling right now, but trump has a very and i do believe joe biden has that ability to win, and we have a great bench. it is a distinct kind of situation right now. i m surprised at that, but i will move on. i m sorry, i m not on the same page there, but okay. it is probably going to be joe biden and i will vote for him. but, you mentioned desantis. this is very curious to me, desantis wants to ban fake meat in florida, and you agreed with him. i don t get this? really, it is not so much about making it illegal, but it is also just talking about i really wanted to stand with american farmers and ranchers, and those kinds of things, and i don t believe it is helpful, and that is the direction i want to move in that. but, if somebody wants to consume that, that is okay. but, i think there are going to be states that are going to decide, i don t want to ban this, or i really want to invent and create that time, so the product stays the same. i wouldn t eat it either, quite frankly, but i wouldn t ban it. that is what desantis wants to do, so you can t get it. i thought that was the freedom part of this freedom country. if people want to have fake meat or fake anything, fake tits, fake anything. it is los angeles. [ audience reacts ] i don t yeah, i don t know about that, either, but i don t know if that is going to solve anything other than i don t get why that would appeal to anybody. you have been very up front about legalizing weed, marijuana. yeah, of course. i ve heard that from you, too. [ audience reacts ] i heard that, john, that is just a character i play on television. never in my life look, i heard you once say, or maybe read it, a tweet, you said once, i am not a progressive, i am a democrat. what does that mean? because i don t think i have used the word progressive, i think i have said woke. i know that word triggers a lot of people because it has a great beginning as a meaning, but words migrate and it went to something else. i think there is a difference between an old-school liberal and woke person, you say old- school democrat, how do you describe this? look, i agree and i have been saying that for years, actually. i didn t leave the label, it left me on that front. and after that happened on october 7th, i really knew that the whole progressive stack would be blasted apart and they are not going to have anyway for the democrats to reply to that, or respond to that, and i really decided early on that i was going to side with israel throughout all of that, and i knew that democrats would continue to peel away and kind of walk away from standing with israel on that, but that is where i decided how do you explain that, if you can, that the people who considered themselves the most liberal have abandoned israel which was always a liberal drawing for the terrorist organization, for the people who outwardly say that they want a genocide, who outwardly are the one side of this who is against the two state solution. so, now that they wound up with then, why do you think that is, and will this split the democratic party? well, it does, because there is an appeal there. and you talked about it, last week, you really hit it with the gender apartheid. talking about some of these issues, some of the most progressive and left parts of the democratic party are standing for the kind of side that has organizations like hamas, or these kinds of nations where there are no rights for women and they certainly don t embrace the lgbtq lifestyle, and even in philadelphia, the queers for palestine blocked the pride parade in philadelphia, and i never saw that on the bingo card. but [ audience reacts ] all right, well, it may seem lonely out there sometimes when you are brave like you are, but you have a lot of fans. you have a lot of fans here and a lot of fans all over the country. when i told people you were coming on, a lot of them were really excited that you are here, but they all have one question they wanted me to ask you, which is, what is the deal with the wardrobe? [ audience reacts ] people are very curious. it doesn t involve me, i m just saying, people are saying, p please ask him. last year, i know this, you had a great joke, you really nailed it, you put up a picture of me, you said, she dresses like a guy where the airline lost his luggage. and it s true! it s funny, because it s true. and i know i dress like a slob and i am not making a statement or anything, but, i am into comfort, it is just comfort, and it is kind of like i don t have to iron, and [ audience reacts ] but, it is kind of hard to find suits and all of those things. but, i never understood why anybody thought that was interesting. and i want to be clear, i wasn t behind the changing of the dress code or anything, i really wasn t. but, more people seemed more concerned about me wearing a hoodie on the floor, as opposed to, we have senators taking bribes from foreign entities, and [ audience reacts ] but, i m learning. i m learning. i m still a freshman. you seem like you are in a really good place. oh, well, i m sitting across from a great person. but you know, having a near- death experience and going through that kind of a blowtorch of $100 million and attack acts and all of those kinds of things to emerge on a side where i am grateful to be sure, both with you and back with my kids, my family, everything, and i just decided, i really want to be the kind of voice that is consistent, and has a moral clarity on issues that may not be controversial for democrats, but i am not sure why any of that is democrat controversial for democrats, whether it is about israel, or the border, or because people just want to bitch these days, john. everything is controversial to everybody, but you keep doing what you are doing. i appreciate it. [ audience reacts ] all right. see you again, john fetterman. hi! all right, here is the editor at large at reason magazine, met matt welch is back with us. a journalist and author of the new york times best-selling book, bad therapy , abigail shrier. great to see you. okay, so, this is the week where we celebrated the greatest generation saving democracy so we can learn about hunter biden smoking crack. i feel like that has been this week in a nutshell. i feel like this is one of those stories where both sides have a lot of wrong in their handling. i remember when the laptop came out, the left-wing media would not even admit it was a thing, it just had to be a hoax, or it had to be russian disinformation, it just didn t exist. they went right about it, that was wrong. and the right is wrong to pretend it means something, except possibly about joe biden s parenting. the question i want to ask because i know your book is about it, you have written about parenting okay, why do all of the political families have this fuck-up family dynamic? is it just because they are famous, and if we went into every family that had a billy carter, a roger clinton george bush himself was the ne er-do-well. since the beginning of time, we have learned that children basically need three things, and these are essential. they need parental authority, they need to hear no, they need independence, and loving community. kids with high profile families often get none of those. no one is willing to tell them no, they don t get independence because they don t want anyone to make them look bad, and they don t have loving community they are raised in a political battlefield. unfortunately, too many american kids today also don t have those. the way you describe it, it sounds like everyone is from a prominent family, because i read in your book when kids go off to college and they have never heard the word no, or the word wait, then that s right. kids today are under a microscope, they are under a microscope, literally, because of the projection of social media and whatnot, but also because their parents are so afraid of traumatizing them, they have been told by mental health experts that saying no, can be punishing and traumatizing, so they don t assert their authority. we basically have a generation raised with these kids that are miserable. and a link with your d-day tie in, which is that we understood that generation and others, but especially that one, to have a sense of stoicism. like, you are going to go through some bad stuff, you are going to fail, there is going to be unfair things that happen to you. the question is, what are you going to do with that? a 15-year-old and a 9-year-old, they are not teaching a lot of stoicism in the public school system, last time i checked. at some point, she starts to use it as an excuse to get out of chores. like, that is not my journey. [ audience reacts ] [ laughter ] it doesn t make sense to fold the laundry, so they are making fun out of it, but there is something to that. but also, when you think about the greatest generation, they probably could have used a little bit more therapy than they got, right? yes, there is a happy medium. you mentioned d-day, but i couldn t help but think of it because the new york times said ptsd among adolescents is surging. ptsd. the fact that we have so [ audience reacts ] my father was in that campaign, he wasn t in omaha beach, but he was on that campaign. anyone who would allow kids to think they have ptsd? that s right, they don t have ptsd. kids raised gently in suburbs don t have ptsd. but, combat those our combat vets sometimes do have ptsd and they need treatment when they have it. always. it is real. but, that is not what kids that universities have. what they have, what i call in my book, bad therapy , they have emotional hypochondria. they have focused so much on their own bad feelings that they magnify these feelings, they make them an organizing principle of their lives, then they have trouble escaping them. so, here is my thing, we had a reckoning of my sex in 2017, a racial reckoning in 2020. i feel like there is a parenting reckoning coming. a lot of rollback, pushback on gentle parenting. i think people are realizing that this kind of stuff has raised a lot of fucked-up kids who have [ audience reacts ] another statistic, but 49.5% so, let s just say half of adolescence, at some point have a mental health disorder. so, half of the kids in the country are diagnosable? either they really are that fucked-up, or we are over diagnosing. it is the latter. we are way over diagnosing them. this generation has had more mental health intervention in schools, more mental health treatment, 40% of them have been in therapy, they have had therapeutic parenting, and it is making them worse. these kids don t need therapy, they need less therapy, they need to be told, i love you, you will live, now get out of my house and have an adventure. [ audience reacts ] and it is worth pointing out that this generation, let s say 15 to 22, they got banged up during covid pretty bad and the more you were in places with schools and society bogged down, the more banged up you got, and also that is tied up with social media, and what you are doing on your phone all the time, like john hyde talks about. so, i think there is a legitimate mental health thing going on with teenagers, and especially teenage girls in this country. the question is, are we teaching them to get out of it, and also to have fun, and take some kind of initiative in their lives? or, are we encouraging them to think of themselves as victims? and i hope it is not the latter because you are not going to get much past your 18th birthday walking around and saying that it is somebody else s fault. [ audience reacts ] so, this is so obvious and we all agree, who is still defending this? i think the trauma industry is. the trauma industry? right. you are right. that is basically what we have now, we have convinced this generation any stress is trauma, now you have a disability and you have to live with that forever, and these kids are behaving like mental patients. right. [ laughter ] right. i mean and they are medicated, then. that, to me, is when it really goes off the rails, because a lot of them are on whatever psychiatric drugs they put them on. you know, when i think about the two big ones that i see always talked about that are now pathologist, shyness which is social anxiety disorder, as we pathologist isaac. and depression i mean, that is just being bummed out. my whole adolescence, my whole childhood, past college, was about those two things. i just had tons of both of those things and drugging me would not have helped. i discovered part when i was 19, that drug helped. organically. but, yeah, okay. so, i read about sel, and for those that don t know what this is, this is social emotional learning. this takes front and center this explains a lot to me, one, why they are so stupid. because this is the priority above learning, is that right? that is right. and what is obviously, it sounds like it is? reportedly, it is supposed to teach kids like things like emotional regulation, which we want them to have. but, how do you teach kids to handle bad emotions? because we are not worried about them having too much joy, we are worried about them having too much sadness, regret, bad feelings, so it always goes negative, it becomes a kind of group therapy, and it forces kids to ruminate, to pathologically focus on their bad feelings, on their pain, and those are the number one symptoms of depression. and it is interesting, 70% of very liberal students, they say this is from the american enterprise institute, so they are a little right- leaning reports feeling anxious 52% of conservatives. but, it does seem like the liberals are more in their own head, and are suffering from this. is that right, and why? i have seen that statistic and looked, the reason why i think so, that might be, is because those are the parents, in general, who are getting their kids more therapy, they are highly educated, and they are more anxious because they are highly educated, they are more anxious themselves, they are pushing their anxiety onto their kids. we know you can communicate anxiety. parents need to be tougher for their kids. they need to set an example here and they need to stop obsessing over kids happiness and start worrying about making kids strong. [ applause ] all right. so, parenting is also involved in the other book you ll wrote, that book you wrote that was banned, irreversible damage, which is about gender reassignment, as we have called it. now, we have the cast review from england which says, you must feel somewhat vindicated by this because america is now an outlier country with this. the scandinavian countries that were doing it, england that was doing it, they all pulled back. the cast report says the evidence of using puberty blocking drugs and other hormonal medications is remarkably weak. why is america so behind? usually, when we look at those countries, we say, this is what the liberals are doing, so we are just going to no, we are alone on this. yes, we are. two reasons, england had national, centralized healthcare, so they got into this faster, and they were also able to shut it down faster, and because our healthcare is obviously decentralized, it is harder to shut bad medicine down in this country, but there is something else but i have to say. they had something really special in england, they had a j.k. rowling, and she helped gender critical feminists pry away from the progressive left on this issue and stand up to the bodily integrity of girls, and stand up for the integrity of medicine. [ applause ] i think as part of that peer pressure element, it is worth pointing out to the extent that your audios audience might not, that abigail s book was targeted by people who work for the aclu saying, it will be the highest thing to do, to block the distribution of this book. it speaks to a kind of aggressive, illiberal conservative that takes place. not just on this issue, but many other issues, dealing with covid. i think it is kind of a new thing. the last 10 years, especially, there has been a semi-deranged moment, were people who were involved with journalism, or academia, or whatever, have said we have created a new taboo, you are on the wrong side of the taboo, we must attack this person, other people who have been working in this. yes, it hurts their careers, but we don t necessarily have to cry to them she is on bill maher, so she is doing okay. but, it hurts them. that is what people don t get. when you block off the information that is coming in, particularly on a contested subject, particularly that is affecting kids in life and death situations, and you are blocking off the information by enforcing a taboo, you are hurting yourself. it is one thing to critique, it is another thing to say, nobody should even be able to look at this, to even read it, as if you are some sort of crazy person. i will just say one thing, in the three or four years it took between the time i wrote my last book and talked about the same risks that are in the cast report, two until the mainstream media worked up the backbone to actually do some reporting, tens of thousands of american children were harmed. and what you are saying i certainly wouldn t be the one saying that there aren t trans folks who, we do need some transitioning, sometimes. what you were just saying is, there are no guardrails on desperate and these are children. this is not the bodies of adults, they can do whatever they want with their bodies. using children as cannon fodder in their culture wars, is what it looked like to me. i don t want you to move. i m gonna miss you so much. you realize we ll have internet waiting for us at the new place, right? oh, we know. we just like making a scene. transferring your services has never been easier. get connected on the day of your move with the xfinity app. can i sleep over at your new place? can katie sleep over tonight? sure, honey! this generation is so dramatic! move with xfinity. i see this week s google has been caught doing something why did the tech companies do this? they have been caught collecting and sometimes leaking personal data of users, so you might want to erase that browser history. but, we thought it would be a good time because of this to do one of our favorite bits on the show, called revealing google searches. [ audience reacts ] we believe here at real- time, that when you look at somebody s google search, it does look a lot about them. for instance, melania trummp google, two felony convictions violate a prenup? rfk jr., where does brain work brain worm go? nick cannon, how many kids does nick cannon have? elon musk, baby names that sound like license plates. oh, justice samuel alito googled fit flags that mean not fascist, just pussy- whipped. richard dreyfus googled safe amount of opiates to take before a public appearance. wow. ben affleck googled divorce lawyers that accept batman memorabilia. kanye west googled, what to say when woman asks if anyone else at the party will be naked. rupert murdoch, name of woman who recently married rupert murdoch. and lauren boebert, could you get an std on your hand? terrible. terrible, terrible. [ applause ] all right, airlines configure these first-class seats that feature a for curve the 22 inch screen for a cinematic experience but only if they are paired with those double-decker seats in economy. [ laughter ] on a new carrier called inequality airlines yes, inequality airlines there is something special in the air, it is just not you. [ applause ]. don t bring your kid to the office if your office is the united states congress. tennessee representative john rose did just that while making a furious speech denouncing trump prosecution, and look what happened? someone acted [ audience reacts ] yeah, someone acted like a goofy, childish more on, and this poor kid had to sit through it. [ laughter ] new rule, let s stop rewarding every family that has too many kids with a reality show on tlc. [ applause ] the latest one is the baldwin s. seven kids born in a 10 year span. wow. guess there were no blanks fired in that house. [ audience reacts ] well, they shouldn t prosecute him. that is the serious point. they should not. , now that a remote amazon tribe has connected to elon musk s starlet styling internet and become addicted to , i say, congratulations. oh, sure, the liberal inclination is to promote the encroachment of modernity on such an innocent, unsettling people, but that is not what the amazon tribes themselves are saying. they are saying, thanks, elon, it sure beats jerking off to this tree. [ laughter ] new rule, now that researchers say marijuana use has surpassed alcohol as america s drug of choice, they have to answer this [ audience reacts ] you re welcome. they have to answer this question. if alcohol use is declining, why is it still not safe to eat at a waffle house? i mean not to always be the marijuana advocate, but do you know what the stoners are doing while the fight is going on? eating their waffles! [ audience reacts ] and finally, new rule, someone has to look into the puzzling paradox of why it is that rape jokes are completely unacceptable, unthinkable, and totally out of bounds, but raped-in-prison jokes, fucking hilarious! never a bad time to do the one about how you drop the soap in the prison shower, better not bend over for it. and look, with all the talk now about trump possibly going to jail, we have all been doing it, i mean, it is not just trump. given the opportunity, it is natural to want to imagine him getting fucked in the ass. [ audience reacts ] i m just saying, maybe we shouldn t. if not for him, then for the nearly 2 million people behind bars at any given time during this country. that is more people than 12 states. they should have their own two senators, and one can be bob menendez. america has a higher incarceration rate than russia, or china, or almost any of the other evildoer countries who we are always shitting our pants over, and for someone, everyone everything at walgreens is still locked behind plexiglass. but, for some reason, americans simply accept that not only do we lock up way more people, but that if you are a criminal of any time, yes, sodomy is the appropriate comeuppance. they say, if you want to survive prison, the first thing you do when you get there, what you have to do, is go up to the biggest, baddest guy, and punch him in the face, which i find also works if you are a passenger on delta. [ audience reacts ] as a prisoner here in america, you will either be alone, in solitary which drives you out of your mind or, completely on top of everybody else heard inmates in america are routinely forced to sleep on the floor and to fight for access to toilets and showers. of the world s 25 most dangerous prisons, four are here in the u.s., the san quentin, the super max in colorado, and the state pen in new mexico. where, for $45, oh, yes, you can tour the cellblock, where 33 inmates were killed in one of the worst prison riots in history. so, bring the kids, and don t forget to get that salt for the gas chamber. [ audience reacts ] here in california, the prison in dublin made headlines because it is where they sent lori loughlin after her college cheating scandal, but have since closed. why? because the rape club that the guards had going was so impervious and ingrained it was just easier to shutter the whole place. and prison in america is a place that forces the people in it forces them to become racists. if you are black, you are with the brothers, if you are white, you have to join the aryans in it. there is no leave me out of it, i like everybody. let s just all get coexist tattoos on our knuckles. yeah. i mean [ audience reacts ] what kind of society is cool with all of this? we call them correctional facilities, but that is like calling the nfl a brain development program. and look, i am not saying that it is not okay to lock people up. it is. of course it is. diddy does it all the time. [ audience reacts ] but, it is not okay to deliberately violate the eighth amendment s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. fake tough guys think, hey, if prison is bad enough, it will incentivize people to stay out of trouble after they get out, but they are long. it actually does the opposite. within a year of released, around 40% of prisoners are rearrested. within 10 years, it is 82%. and i don t think they want back in because they miss the toilet one. if we are trying to make inmates into criminals for life, it is working, because prisoners like linkedin for lowlifes, you can t beat the networking. it is a taxpayer-funded criminal mentorship program. but, here is the thing. around 95% of all inmates eventually to get out, so the question becomes, who do we want returning to society? some hapless broke dude goes in for selling drugs or passing a bad check and if you years later, he comes out a sexual predator with white power written on his neck. and we sort of just accept that light, that is how prison words. you go in bad, you come out worse. if you are lucky, when you get out, we will let you work the carnival, or the toll booth, or date britney spears. [ audience reacts ] jesus. it almost makes stealing catalytic converters not worth it. but, it doesn t have to be this way. we could change. there are even places in the world that offer a model as to what that would look like. norway s recidivism rate is 20%. prisoners there do yoga, they learn a trade, there is a playground for their kids when they visit, and the guards aren t maniacs who failed the police psych exam. and it is a place that looks less like our prisons and more like what you would find on an american college campus only, of course, with less anti- semitism. [ audience reacts ] of course, the big difference is that unlike here, scandinavian countries don t have private, for-profit prisons. that is what we have here. and corporations, it turns out, don t run prisons to improve society, they run them to make money, which means putting more people in the system, and the more prisoners, the more profit. this is why they lobby congress with three strikes rules and keeping weed illegal. they don t want them rehabilitated. they want to return customers. all right. that is our show. if you enjoyed this editorial we have more just like it for you, right up there! if that is not a father s day press, i don t know what is! june 21st and 22nd, with the music hall in boston june 26th. thank you, matt welch! now, we are going to watch overtime on youtube. thank you.
all russian and soviet dictators, their problem is they always think that they re the last line of defense. you are in power. you have the right to, if you decide, to destroy it so nobody else will get it. the united states doesn t even notice that the soviets are on edge. they didn t even put the soviet reaction into ronald reagan s presidential daily brief. [indistinct radio chatter] [narrator] before andropov can act, the able archer operation wraps up on schedule. [pilot] roger that. [narrator] andropov is finally persuaded that this really was just an exercise. this time. [tim] the united states didn t know to ratchet down the tension when it really mattered. that is an indicator of just the lack of understanding that the united states and the soviet union had of each other. but in a nuclear confrontation, lack of understanding can have catastrophic consequences when adversaries have nuclear weapons pointed at each other and don t understand each other. every day in every state across the country, our political system is bankrolled by an army of fund-raisers, pulling in millions of dollars a race. sometimes it looks like you might imagine knocking on doors, calling every name in the phone book, and emails so many emails. but for all those little fish throwing $100 to their local race, it s the whales those campaign fund-raisers really need powerful, rich individuals and companies. and when they donate $25,000, $100,000, a million dollars, they want a favor.or 10. it should be obvious that s corrupt, but with a wink and a nod, political deals toe the bribery line every single day. and we may never have noticed that if a certain illinois governor hadn t flung back the curtain with an unrepentant ego, a political corruption crime spree, and a set of unprecedented audio recordings that shined a bright light on the inner workings of american political power. ladies and gentlemen, meet rod blagojevich. it was early morning, cause i used to get up every morning and turn on the 6:00 news, and, you know, like, you re kinda waking up, and then you re like, well, wait, what? [helicopter whirring] oh, sh , they outside of blagojevich s house! they got cameras, they got cars, and then they march him out. and you re like, that s our governor, joe. breaking news the illinois governor, rod blagojevich, charged with plotting to sell barack obama s former senate seat. tapper: remember this guy? he sure hopes you do. governor rod blagojevich went down in a blaze of infamy for one of the largest political corruption scandals of our time. the governor was allegedly trying to sell the illinois senate seat vacated by president-elect obama. in fact, part of the governor s sales pitch was that the seat still had that new obama smell. [audience laughter] appointing someone to the senate is a rare opportunity when the will of the people is swapped wholesale for a gubernatorial power trip. blagojevich had the sole authority to place whomever he wanted straight into the halls of the u.s. senate, and he was not shy about wanting a little something in return. with the fbi recording his phone calls, for the first time since nixon, the public was able to listen in on raw backroom politics, and there s nothing quite like hearing it from the horse s mouth. reporter: the criminal complaint quotes blagojevich as saying the senate seat was a valuable thing. you just don t give it away for nothing. another quote i ve got this thing, and it s bleeping golden. [blagojevich speaking] i ve got this thing, and it s [bleep] golden. -yeah. -[audience laughter] and i m not just giving it up for [bleep] nothing. [laughter] was there a second [bleep] in there? tapper: racking up a staggering 24 criminal charges, governor blagojevich s actions essentially boiled down to four things extortion, bribery, corruption, and wire fraud. and it wasn t just about the senate seat. blagojevich was also found guilty of extorting a children s hospital. you can t write this stuff. he s an arrogant punk who thinks that, you know, he s bulletproof. well, he s not. he was convicted on 18 total charges and sentenced to 14 years, the longest sentence ever handed down to a governor. people loathed blagojevich for the way he politicked, but was what he did so blatantly criminal? cause the truth is that the line between what s illegal and what s allowable is much murkier than we d like to think, and this is where the rod blagojevich story gets interesting. let me reassert to all of you once more that i am not guilty of any criminal wrongdoing. [camera shutter clicks] was rod a corrupt politician or just a politician operating in a corrupt system that still thrives to this day? so, governor, thanks for doing this. thank you. so you ve been out of prison now for almost two years. a little over two years. and you re still very outspoken about how you feel like the case against you was unjust. there isn t really an argument about what you said. -right. -it s on tape. right. the question is whether it was illegal and whether it was morally wrong. look, if you re saying, do we have a fund-raising system in america that you can arguing is legalized bribery? i think there s truth to that. but did i do anything other than that standard that every other person in politics does, from president biden on down? i did the same as them and nothing worse. there is this real problem in american politics today where prosecutors are weaponizing themselves, criminalizing routine illegal practices in government politics, and i think it s wrong when they do it to bill clinton. it s wrong, i think, when they did it to president trump cause i have strong views on that, and i know it was wrong when they did it to me. okay, lot to unpack there. let s talk about the chicago and illinois system, because you re hardly the first governor in history, even in recent history, to to go to prison. what s the situation here that causes this to happen? well, i think it s time-honored here, and there s a long history in chicago politics, illinois politics, where pretty much everybody gets rich. ah, chicago politics. it s like going to a pay pond when you go fishing. like, if you are a prosecutor, you cannot be in illinois and not get something. illinois is steeped in a rich history of political corruption that dates back a century to the prohibition era, when bootlegging gangsters such as al capone bought off politicians and police departments, keeping them drunk on power and.also just drunk. in rod s lifetime, illinois has developed a rap sheet that any mobster would be proud of more than 1,700 convictions for corruption, including nearly 30 chicago aldermen, eight stage legislators, two u.s. congressmen, and before rod came onto the scene, three governors. in an odd way, the very people who should hate the idea of corruption are kind of proud that this is al capone s illinois. chicago is a wink and a nod town. -it s a shot and a beer town. -[clink] lot of it has to do with family relationships, because a lot of the political leadership in chicago and illinois are family-related. there s the daley family, the madigans. all of these families sort of become part of this mafia. -yeah. -a political mafia, and they re the ones who make the rules. i didn t come from that. i had to marry into it. i met a girl on the 6th of march, 1988. she was wearing a red dress, and she happened to be the daughter of an old-fashioned chicago political war boss. and she s my wife patti. we fell in love. patti blagojevich is a loyal wife, she is a tough customer, and she s the daughter of dick mell. she s complicated. that budding relationship between those two is how rod goes from this nobody politically, finding a way to kind of imbed himself into one of these big political families in chicago. they have so much power. i don t think it was, you know, some great surprise that, like, you know, when it comes time to meet the parents, that dick mell was the father-in-law and the the powerful city council chieftain. we re gonna try to work together to put this great city back together so that we re all part of it and we all feel free. dick mell was a guy who always had the voice in the backrooms. he was a power broker in that kind of chicago classic sense. before politics, it was a nice relationship, but for the most part, respectful. and then because i was in the family, and i was actually pretty good at helping her dad, local politics, knocking on doors and trying to get him votes, there was an opportunity to run for office. in rod blagojevich, mell could see a guy that eventually, if he does it right, i could sort of pass the mantle toward. rod was an immediate hit with illinois voters, who sent him first to the state house in 1992 and then to the u.s. congress in 1996. dick mell says, i can see you being governor. and i gotta be honest, i m sure if i m looking at it from dick mell s position, he s saying, man, if i can elect this guy governor, i can run the whole state. reporter: the campaign for illinois governor has gotten pretty lively. you ve got chicago congressman rod blagojevich. what s that name again? -bala-jo-vich. -reporter: bala-jo-vich, huh? -bala-jo-vich. -you sure? positive. tapper: during rod s 2002 governor s campaign, dick mell s membership in the old school chicago elite was a definite bonus, but it was rod s working class bonafides and people skills that did all the rest. coming from the family he did, he had a real working class chip on his shoulder, and his two heroes were elvis and richard nixon, both because they were guys who came from the wrong side of their tracks and fought their way up and were kind of disdained by the elites. in fact, if those two gritty 20th century icons fought their way into a single person, you might actually end up with rod blagojevich, for better and for worse. the rod blagojevich that i first met was youthful. he was energetic. he had this kind of mane of black hair that was super thick, and you could tell it was filled with hair product. the hair so iconic in its own right, that it became a comedy staple on every late night show. -the hair. -the hair. really, it looks like you re wearing a toupée that s also wearing a toupée. [audience laughter] he had a huge infatuation with elvis presley. his charisma was disarming. [cheers and applause] [amplified voice] thank you. thank you very much. [cheers, whistles, and applause] but the elvis of illinois was itching to lose his colonel parker, because despite the many benefits of dick mell s patronage, rod was still in his shadow. you know, he really became known as dick mell s son-in-law first. and i know he hated that. he didn t know how to both be his own man and not let dick mell foreshadow him. the only way for rod to survive outside of his father-in-law s machine was to create his own cash flow. so his first step was to hire two of chicago s most bare-knuckled political fund-raisers, chris kelly and tony rezko. chris kelly and tony rezko could generate big bucks. they were fund-raisers. they were donors. you know, let s just call em what they were. they were influence peddlers. they wound up being able to shake the bushes here and help rod raise money. they promised access and favors if blagojevich won, and they got results. where dick mell s good old boys would fetch $2,000 at a time, kelly and rezko would shake loose 50 grand. all that money plus rod s appeal to voters who had felt ignored by the entrenched chicago political dynasties well, it proved to be an unstoppable combination. he ran on some things that were uniquely important to black people. healthcare for kids is a good idea. when he said, free rides for seniors on public transportation, that resonated with black people specifically. blagojevich became governor in 2003. -congratulations, governor. -thank you. may god bless you. [cheers and applause] how do you view your your time as governor apart from the scandals? how do i say this in a way where i don t sound like a guy without any humility? but i truly believe i was a great governor. i can t think of any governor in my life that did anything for anybody i knew that can walk around and say, you know what? thank you, governor. my daughter had healthcare through you. free public transportation for seniors and the disabled? i did that cause they raised the sales tax, which hurts working people and poor people and seniors. with the legislature raising taxes that hit lower-income illinoisans hardest, and rod striking back with policies to offset that, it s no surprise that his populist agenda made him a lot of enemies amongst the big political families. to the people and the masses, he was on our team, and to the aristocracy and to the political elites, he was this guy that was taking their resources and giving em to the peasants, and so he became robin hood. i knew the reality that i m gonna have resistance from the old guard, the old ward bosses, the madigans, daley to some extent, my father-in-law, and so the goal was raise money now and raise a lot of it so that you can afford to make enemies, and you can afford to lose support. right, but some of these people that you were that you were relying on like chris kelly were were corrupt. -right? -turned out that chris had problems in his own personal business, and he was found guilty of those things. had nothing to do with me. but, like, a lot of the people in the world of fund-raising are not necessarily. -they are not. -.upstanding individuals. -no, they re not. -yeah. -no, they re not. what s the saying? ignorance is not a defense ? tony rezco and chris kelly they started compiling this list of different entities that were state contractors, and they hit all those people up for money, probably with rod s assistance. hey, you got a contract? you wanna keep it? or you want to get more? you gotta pony up. a lot of people in play have scalpel-like tendencies when they fund-raise, and rod was probably more of a meat cleaver. [beeping] -[telephone rings] -kelly and rezco were using government levers to squeeze anyone they could for a campaign contribution kickbacks like a cushy job or a fat contract, a little light extortion such as holding up teachers funds. they had deep pockets to fill and a financial machine to do it. you can t trade official actions as a governor in exchange for campaign contributions or jobs. i mean, there is one simple word for that. it s called graft. graft is simply the use of political power and authority in exchange for personal gain. to state the obvious, appointing unqualified people to state positions because you wanna use the government as a vending machine for your political campaign that s completely illegal. the m.o. was to make money from every state petitioner possible, and small-town hospital ceo pam davis looked like just another easy mark. but in this case, the whole shakedown process is recorded by the hospital executive who was getting shaken down. [laughs] woman: he needs to reset your wire. [laughs] oh, god, another wire. sorry for, uh. -i don t care. -just in here. uh, the governor really wasn t on my radar, um, at all until i experienced an extortion attempt through one of his, um, colleagues. pam s hospital system wanted to build a new facility in plainfield, illinois. seems pretty straightforward, but there were red flags right away when she went to get government approval for the project. davis: in my case, the governor had appointed individuals to this board who had either contributed money to his campaign, so they bought their way on, or individuals that were controlled by the governor and other individuals and would approve only those projects where a kickback was going to be given. turns out the board was willing to approve the hospital. all she had to do was use builders and lenders who were in their pocket and pad the contract so the board could take. let s call it a transaction fee for their trouble. it became clear to me that this was a major extortion attempt, and i was furious. so i called the fbi. the feds set her up with a wire so they could listen in on her meetings with board members and get the dirt straight from the source. she d be meeting with these players, and they would be basically laying out the whole scheme to her. davis: the contract would be padded, um, by roughly $10 million so that that money would go then to the various players. at one point, i decided, i wonder if this goes up to the governor, because the governor appoints these individuals to the various boards. the feds were wondering the same thing, and over the course of their investigation, their suspicions proved to be spot on. out of the public eye, rod s fund-raising goons, chris kelly and tony rezko, felt safe to strong-arm money from donors across illinois. but unbeknownst to them, the fbi was following their every move as part of a far-reaching corruption investigation into the blagojevich administration. as the money rolled in, their role in rod s administration only grew, which had his father-in-law, dick mell, feeling as though he d been served divorce papers. as dick mell famously said, he got replaced by a trophy wife or trophy wives. those were the people who were getting the love that he should have gotten and wasn t getting. we all know that you got here because of dick mell. rod says, i got my own team, and so don t talk to dick mell. not only does he not do what you wanna do, but he said, don t talk to my boss. i m the boss now. well, dick mell ain t feeling that, and dick mell is not the type to be like, so, may i talk to you privately? mell wears his heart on his sleeve, his anger on his sleeve. .leave me out! he can love you today, and if he starts hating you tomorrow, he can, you know, pull the switch just like that. and mell becomes more and more resentful of being cast aside, and so that fueled this tension in that family to the point where it eventually exploded. [explosion] that explosion came in 2005, and though it may not have aired on reality tv, it was still inextricably linked to garbage. rod blagojevich closed down this landfill which dick mell was a part owner of. rod said that this was for environmental issues. tapper: what did he want you to do? leave it alone, and i had learned that it was operating in violation of the environmental laws. i had knowledge of that. uh, ultimately, i decided i had a duty, that i had to shut it down, and then he made some accusations that really unleashed the furies. dick mell called a press conference and basically accused rod blagojevich of selling board and commission seats within state government. reporter: mell has had a falling out with his son-in-law, the governor. this is a family at war. so your father-in-law, dick mell, accused chris kelly of selling political favors for campaign contributions of $25,000 to $50,000 at a time. tell me about where were you when you heard that he was leveling this accusation. i remember vividly. it was early january of 2005, and this was the consequence of me shutting down his landfill. the very next day, he called a press conference, and he was clever enough to accuse chris kelly, not directly me, but that s me. i don t think he envisioned that it would turn into something that would ultimately land me in prison, but i know he did this to hurt me politically and cause me problems with the fbi. tapper: mel s allegations backed rod into a corner, giving the fbi room to prosecute his inner circle, until in 2008, the feds secured a secret wiretap on the governor himself. feeling the squeeze, rod started looking for some kind of escape route, and then a golden opportunity landed right in his lap. at this defining moment, change has come to america. [cheers and applause] now that senator barack obama is president-elect barack obama, someone will have to take over his senate seat. this is the governor s decision. uh, it is not my decision. the criteria that i would have for my successor would be the same criteria that i d have if i were a voter. senator obama becomes president obama. he resigns his senate seat. according to the law here in illinois, you as the governor get to name his replacement. now you re excited about this, and you say on tape, i d like to get the [bleep] out of here, and you re talking about options for yourself. does that mean, i d like to get the [bleep] out of here, you were sick of being governor? that s absolutely the things i was saying, of course, and i was looking at all kinds of options. so he attempted to trade obama s seat for a golden parachute. he begins to be heavily courted by all sorts of people who would love to be that u.s. senator. they saw something really valuable here a very valuable bargaining chip that could elevate his power in some way or or benefit them monetarily. when i said i wanted to get the eff out of here, it s because the fbi people and my persecutors were all over me, and it s the sort of thing, when that stuff s swirling around you, you know that stuff s swirling around you. -right. -and it s there. it s everywhere, and it and it was just very clear to me that they were determined to get me no matter what. i guess one question i have is knowing that they were looking at you, why did you talk about this stuff that way? look, i had 2,896 days in prison to ask myself a thousand questions, including that. but you know what? what s the alternative? i have all my staff and lawyers. we all go to saunas and get naked and talk to each other so nobody s got wires on em? -no, or -what s the alternative? or you just don t say anything, or you just say, like, this seat is very important, and we wanna make sure the best person gets it. and separately, i am thinking that i d like to not be governor of illinois anymore. well said. i don t make a habit of telling politicians how to avoid jail time, but here s the thing. being more cautious could have gotten rod everything he wanted and kept him out of prison, but caution is not really in rod s dna. [blagojevich speaking] [line disconnects] jackson: you know they taping you, so you can t say that out loud, right? breaking news the illinois governor charged with plotting to sell barack obama s former senate seat. reporter: illinois rod blagojevich was arrested tuesday morning by federal authorities and charged with corruption. dude. dude! dude. you know they trying to get you, dawg. but why? why? reporter: the day after being arrested on corruption charges, illinois governor rod blagojevich walked out of his house and headed back to work. -[camera shutter clicks] -tapper: all in all, rod blagojevich was facing 24 charges connected to four specific events the attempted sale of obama s senate seat, withholding legislation that would benefit a children s hospital and racetrack in an attempt to get political contributions, and the attempted extortion of a highway contractor. [amplified voice, chanting] 2, 3, 4, blago must go! i personally think he should at least step aside if not resign. my husband is an honest man, and i know that he s innocent. jackson: he thought that he had the moral high ground. i don t believe there s any cloud that hangs over me. -man: governor, governor -well, getting back to that, can we discuss your i think there s nothing but sunshine hanging over me. he didn t show any of the humility or anything. you just can t stick your finger in the eye of the federal government. let me reassert to all of you once more that i am not guilty of any criminal wrongdoing, that i m confident that at the end of the day, i will be, uh, properly, uh, exonerated. [reporters speaking at once] i represented rod blagojevich in two of his criminal trials. i mean, he wanted to fight his case. he believed he was innocent, and he was working to that end to try and prove his innocence. anyone who believes that this was a selling of some senate seat doesn t understand politics. every single day in politics, that is what happens, is this horse-trading. and if you really listen to this in context, what you heard was talking with various people, getting annoyed, talking about nonsense, and then the end. nothing really that was ever acted on. later, rod blagojevich s lawyers would argue that what rod did specifically with the senate seat was no worse than when president eisenhower appointed earl warren as chief justice of the supreme court. back in 1952, dwight eisenhower s about to win the nomination to become the republican president. earl warren, the governor of california, is withholding the delegation s votes. governor warren tells eisenhower, i ll deliver the delegation for you on one condition. i wanna be the next chief justice of the supreme court. ike, the great war hero, shakes hands, says, you got a deal. he wins. one year later, earl warren is the chief justice of the united states supreme court. rod wanted a political appointment from obama, and for that, he was prepared to trade obama s old senate seat, which is actually legal. otherwise, eisenhower would have gone to jail, and americans would not have liked ike. do you see yourself as somebody who was just trying to function in perhaps an inherently corrupt but legal system, and that theoretically almost any politician could be snagged the way you were? absolutely. of course i do, except i m giving me higher marks. because i was using that money that that and that power gave me to fight an established system that served itself on the backs of the people, and when you do that, you piss a lot of people off, and they wanna get rid of you. but do you think that you re earthier about it? like, more outspoken about it? well, i wasn t hiding any of it, but these because it s legal, and that s how you govern. abraham lincoln was able to get the 13th amendment passed at congress, which ratified the emancipation proclamation, freeing slaves. he had to make political deals with members of congress to get the votes to pass it. -that s how you get things done. -you re not comparing yourself to abraham lincoln. -by no means. -okay. -and please say that. i m not comparing myself to abraham lincoln. you re not or the emancipation proclamation. okay, right. he s a lot taller than me, and i never did anything as great as that, of course not. -but you re also not talking about the i mean, the emancipation proclamation of course i m not. governor blagojevich tried to sell the appointment to the senate seat vacated by president-elect obama. the conduct would make lincoln roll over in his grave. you re very critical of pat fitzgerald. yeah, he s an evil guy. he s a wicked guy. he s a scoundrel, and he deserves to get an ass kicking. you know? and he s a big coward. anyway, go ahead. sorry. well, i think he would take issue with everything you just said. you know, he has a reputation for being the choirboy, for being, you know, an upstanding, moral person. he sees himself as, i am trying to uphold some basic standards for our politicians. that s how he views it. governor blagojevich has been arrested in the middle of what we can only describe as a political corruption crime spree. we had a political and public narrative that we had to overcome, and when the entire potential jury pool believes that your client is guilty before they ve even heard the evidence, you re going into the trial like if it s a basketball game, you re losing 100 to nothing. or it s like if you re a governor, and you re getting impeached 114 to 1, and the lone vote in rod s favor his sister-in-law, deb mell. done from office and eager to prove he was not a crook, rod knew exactly where to plead his case. please welcome to the program governor rod blagojevich! [applause] you are a charming dude with the best set of hair i ve ever [bleep] seen. [audience laughter] so i want this to be real. got some challenges ahead, but, uh, i m gonna trust in the truth and as it says in the bible, the truth shall set you free. rod blagojevich just.kept.talking. how are you? you wanna get on tv? come on in. i think he was able to warm himself a little bit with the public. better to be seen as a klutz than a crook. sure, everyone loves a good laugh, but oversaturating the talk show circuit may have had unintended consequences, as david letterman told rod when he appeared on the late show in 2009. the more you talked and the more you repeated your innocence, the more i said to myself, oh, this guy s guilty. [laughter] so during the period from your impeachment to your trial and your sentencing, you did a lot of media appearances. what was the strategy behind that? my feeling was like, look, i didn t do any of that stuff, and what does somebody do who s being lied about? but you have a tremendous desire to get out at the highest mountain and yell out, i didn t do it. well, letterman said that the louder you yelled it, the more it made him think you were guilty. yeah. yeah, i mean, i didn t i didn t convince him, but, uh, i think i convinced donald trump. that s why i got invited on celebrity apprentice, right? i have great respect for your tenacity, for the fact that you just don t give up. but, rod.you re fired. what i saw over the course of rod s career was a guy who started off as kind of a charming rogue and a guy who really did give voice to concerns that people had to someone who became almost a parody of himself. and by the time that trial came around, he really was his own worst enemy. see you in court. he thought that the court of public opinion could save him, but he had disturbed forces that decided, it was a wrap for you, dude. don t poke the feds, fam. just don t do it. man: blago, can i get your autograph? reporter: at verdict today, in a notorious case that federal prosecutors did not want to hear, rod blagojevich was convicted today on only one count. -see you guys! -man: way to go, baby! tapper: the jury was hung on all but one of the charges against blagojevich, and without unanimous consent, the result was a mistrial on the remaining 23 charges. the jury, like a lot of people to this day, just could not agree on whether what he d done was actually illegal. in that first trial, the jury deadlocked on everything except for lying to the fbi. -right. you were convicted of lying to the fbi. -right. -do you acknowledge that you lied to the fbi? -no. no. i don t. i ll tell you about that. it was about how much of your associates that were fund-raising for you, the degree to which you knew what you were doing. yeah, it was the issue was i said, i didn t, as a practice, track fund-raising. and who got contracts? i didn t. i didn t look into who got contracts. i wasn t interested in that. i had 27,000 contributors. i wasn t tracking who gave me money, who got what. the first trial was too confusing for the jury, and they had a lot of paper documents. it was a lot of witness testimony. man: governor, are you anxious for this to begin? i feel great. absolutely. what the government did in the second trial is they pared down their their case, and they believed that everything was in the tapes and they needed to make this trial a lot simpler. [blagojevich speaking] he was swearing a lot. .and upset and not appreciative of the position that he had. and i think that was more influential in the jury s decision than than anything. it made him look bad. breaking news right now the jury has reached a decision, convicting blagojevich on 17 counts of corruption. -reporter: wire fraud. -bribery. blitzer: attempted extortion. solicitation of a bribe. blitzer: racketeering. conspiracy to commit bribery and conspiracy to commit extortion. rod blagojevich was convicted on almost all counts and sentenced to 14 years. patti and i are obviously very disappointed, uh, in the outcome. i, frankly, am am stunned. when did you realize, oh, shit, i might actually be going to prison ? -from the beginning. -really? -i knew i was a dead man. -really? -yeah. -why? cause they have so much power and resources, and i, you know, wasn t really surprised when i got 14 years. the justification for the judge was, you treated this like a golden glove boxing match, but those corrupt liars are lucky dueling is outlawed, cause i d have challenged them to a duel. rapists and murderers get so much less time? that s why this system is so wrong and so broken. let me offer you an alternate theory. sure. my alternate theory is that the entire system of justice that we have in this country depends on prosecutors and police who are incentivized to get convictions. -mm-hmm. -period. what do you think of that? well, i think you re almost right. [laughs] i never took a penny. no one says i did. i keep saying that cause that s so important to me. i don t want people to think that i was some one of these corrupt politicians that was taking cash. tapper: but remember, even though he never actually got that envelope full of money, that was because the feds closed in before the senate deal was done. the offers being considered, campaign contributions or a lucrative job in a nonprofit, the fact of accepting them that would have been simply illegal, hence, the charge of conspiracy to commit bribery, which he was definitely guilty of. rod s argument is no cash changed hands, but prior to that, there had been plenty of money changing hands. there s ample evidence these government positions, these government contracts they were effectively for sale. it does not matter if rod blagojevich actually won the argument and got the money or the donations he was seeking. it s the ask. if something goofs it up, but the burglary or robbery s interrupted, it doesn t make it less of an intended burglary or robbery, right? he had his day in court. that 14 years was what the system gave him. so you went to prison for almost eight years? 2,896 days. and let me tell ya what gets you through prison when you have to face something like that. it s love and it s faith love for my daughters and my wife. you know, when i was arrested, within days, the vegas oddsmakers had it 9 to 1 that she was leaving. so in that sense, i ve been so lucky and blessed. after he was sent to prison, patti proclaimed his innocence, and she did try and go to any leader that she could find to have him either pardoned or commuted. and when all else failed, patti blagojevich knew exactly who to appeal to next. after rod goes to prison, patti was essential in keeping their life together. more than anything else, maybe, she got in donald trump s ear. trump had a connection with blagojevich cause rod was on the apprentice, and patti blagojevich was on fox news every day. you know, we know that president trump is a kind man, and he s compassionate. he s always been kind to my family. and when you speak on fox news, you have a direct connection with donald trump. today the president sprung from prison former illinois governor rod blagojevich, who was convicted after attempting his own quid pro quo. yes, uh, we have commuted the sentence of rod. i watched his wife on television. quote, um, i watched his wife on television. -yes. -end quote. how did how did that happen? i think he just saw he he would tell me he liked the fact that i was fighting back. i remember him saying something like, uh, you know, i have friends that go through what you re going through, and they re in a corner. they can t even move, and you re out there throwing punches. i think he liked that. i m so grateful to him. sometimes things happen in life where god intervenes in the most unbelievable ways. trump, blagojevich, fox news? i m not sure how much god played a role in any of this. when rod came home from prison after eight years, his daughters had grown up. how are your relationships with them? they re good. i m i m getting to know them. our family was broken for a long time. the difficulties that i talked about with my father-in-law, those were heartbreaking, because in spite of everything, i love him, and he s been good to me in so many ways. and, uh, you know, it s been a tough road for my wife. our lives could have been so much simpler, so much better. understandably, rod looks back on the time away from his family with regret, not for what he did, of course, but that he was sent to prison in the first place. but what else would you expect from rod? i am a political prisoner. i was put in prison for practicing politics. wait a minute. you re a political prisoner? nelson mandela was a political prisoner. political prisoners have no due process. i was thrown in prison and spent nearly eight years in prison for practicing politics, for seeking campaign contributions without a quid pro quo. you do have an obligation to at least admit what you did wrong, and you refuse to do that, and you re creating a whole new alternate universe of facts, and that may be big in politics today, but it s still, frankly, just bullshit. a reporter, uh, asked you if you wanted to say sorry to the people of illinois, and you said, sorry for what? -do you still feel that way? -very much so. i ve done a lot wrong. criminal? none. you and your defenders argue that the persecution, prosecution of you is about the criminalization of politics. in other words, there is horse-trading that goes on in politics. you do me this favor. i ll do you this favor, and that s all you were doing, and that it s legal, but they made it out to be illegal. well, first of all, it s not illegal. now you can argue whether we should improve our laws. that s a valid thing. i would think there s a lot of room to improve the fund-raising laws, but that s not illegal at all, and it s a common practice. now ultimately, after i ve been in prison for four years, the appellate court reverses that big lie of the sale of the senate seat, and they said it s routine political logrolling. and look, that s partially true. the court did vacate the conviction related to obama s senate seat, but they never said he did nothing wrong. the court said there was a jury instruction issue, and they upheld the remaining 13 counts. so contrary to his claim, he has not been exonerated. and for the love of elvis, we can only hope that rod s crimes are not routine. if there is a big lie, it s that he s a victim, especially since every other charge was upheld, including the extortion of a children s hospital. gandhi, he ain t. this isn t some sort of mystery, that, gosh, i didn t know. i had no idea. it s so gray. really? i think most of us have some gut sense of when we re beginning to get in trouble. i don t believe blagojevich has ever done any reflection on right and wrong. extorting a hospital never occurred to him that that might harm the citizens that he was elected to protect. he he has no ability to look at anything but himself. that s it. that s it. what s the worst thing that can be said about you that s accurate in your view, other than you were stupid to say that stuff? sure. look, i ve been accused of being a narcissist. i might plead to a misdemeanor on that, okay? um, i think i my judgment of some people was way off. i think i should have been a lot more vigilant and see some of the warning signs. i knew they were aggressively out there raising money, and i didn t slow it down because i wanted to raise the campaign money. i could have been more vigilant on that in retrospect. close, but no cigar. whether or not rod trusted the wrong people, he set them loose on illinois because they brought him the most money. whether the rules on political fund-raising are flimsy guardrails at best,
Big day for him. you had a big speech and panel at the st. petersburg economic forum, which is extremely important. for a russian leader and there he reiterated two things again, obviously, very angry about president biden s words, very angry about the the us allowing the ukrainians to strike and russian territory now, saying that for the russians they say that they don t know why they don t have the right to, for instance, give adversaries of the us similar weapons to threaten american assets, not just in the us, but of course also around the world as well. all the russian leader did say wolf, that s something like that was not imminent. and then we heard another thing from a vladimir putin where he wanted once again parotid russia s military arsenal and its nuclear arsenal saying that russia has a lot more nuclear weapons as he put it, then the united states and then the europeans, of course, he once again said, right now, there s no eminent use of a nuclear weapons and it s something that the russians obviously don t want to do, but it is something where he is trying to predict object that military
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Politically, but that really remains to be seen is yes, the crowd over there in phoenix there is on kristen holmes. thank you very much. i want to bring in some of our political experts to break all of this down. and kristen salt, salt is anderson. what s your takeaway first of all, from trump s return to the campaign trail after his felony conviction. well, i thought it was interesting that kristen holmes pointed out two themes in his speech today immigration and the trial donald trump does best with swing voters when he s talking about issues, issues like immigration, issues like the economy, the sorts of things were voters who swung very heavily toward the gop in the last fewer to, where he does not fare as well as swing voters is when he is talking about things like his own legal troubles, when he is talking about what he intends to do on that front, if he were to ever take office and so it s interesting, you re going to see this push and pull between donald trump talking about issues and donald trump talking about his legal peril one of
Speech and panel at the st. petersburg economic forum, which is extremely important for the russian leader. and there he reiterated two things. again, obviously very angry about president biden s words, very angry because the us allowing the ukrainians to strike and russian territory now saying that for the russians, they say that they don t know why they don t have the right to, for instance, give adversaries of the us similar weapons to threaten american assets, not just in the us, but of course also around the world as well. all the russian leader did say wolf, that s something like that was not imminent then we heard another thing from a vladimir putin where he once again parotid russia s military arsenal and its nuclear arsenal, saying that russia has a lot more nuclear weapons as he put it, then the united states and then the europeans, of course you once again said right now there s no eminent use of a new clear weapons and it s something that the russians obviously don t want to do. but it is something where he is trying to project that military power that the russians have. of course, the
Back to you. the next election debate of this year s campaign is happening tonight on bbc one. representatives from seven political parties will be questioned on their plans and policies, including by voters in the studio audience. our political correspondent hannah miller has been to see how the set is coming together, and what we can expect to hear. we ve just come inside the radio theatre here at broadcasting house, a hive of activity ahead of tonight s debate. there have been people choking sound, checking camera angles, making sure that you can see and hear everything that all the representatives from the seven parties have to say. this is the stage that they will be taking to, as they try to win your votes. there will be nigel farage, representing reform uk, he of course pitching himself as a bit of an alternative for disillusioned conservative party voters. the other party, really, trying to pitch themselves