Show: ALL IN with CHRIS HAYES Date: July 6, 2018 Guest: Mazie Hirono, Jay Inslee, Heather Long, Jason Candor, Mickey Edwards, Christy Goldfuss, Lachlan Markay
STEVE KORNACKI, NBC NEWS NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Thank you all for joining us. That is HARDBALL for now. Thanks for being with us. Chris Matthews will be back Monday and "ALL IN" with Chris Hayes starts right now.
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CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST: Tonight on ALL IN
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We want tough, strong, powerful borders and we want no crime.
HAYES: The divider in chief strikes again.
TRUMP: You saw that clown yesterday on the Statue of Liberty?
HAYES: Donald Trump`s risky bet on racial grievance and the evidence it may not be working.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When they go low, we go high and I went as high as I could.
HAYES: Then, day one on the trade war.
TRUMP: The war was lost on trade many years ago.
HAYES: Why it hurts Trump`s voters but not Trump`s support.
TRUMP: The war was lost but now we are going to win it.
HAYES: Plus, a fifth allegation against the founding member of the Freedom Caucus.
REP. JIM JORDAN (R), OHIO: This is no place for this kind of stuff and there`s no place for it.
HAYES: When ALL IN starts now.
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HAYES: Good evening from Chicago, I am Chris Hayes. Tonight, new evidence that the President`s midterm strategy message of preserving white demographic and political supremacy may be backfiring. Last night, campaigning with a GOP congressional candidate in Montana, the President once again painted all undocumented immigrants as violent invaders.
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TRUMP: Every day I`m president, we will track down the gang members, drug dealers, child predators and criminal aliens that we find. We will get them. We will throw them the hell out of our country or put them in jail.
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HAYES: Later he summed up his message with more wild demagoguery. "A vote for Democrats is November is a vote to let MS-13 run wild in our communities, to let drugs pour into our cities and take jobs and benefits away from hardworking Americans. Democrats want anarchy, amnesty, and chaos, Republicans want law, order and justice. Yes, law, order, and justice. That from a guy whose former Campaign Chairman is currently sitting in jail in solitary confinement awaiting two separate trials on a wrath of felony charges. And this is not just campaign rhetoric. It is the trump`s administration`s policy. The President`s demonization of immigrant vile rhetoric that he uses about them goes hand in hand with a broad push to restrict immigration to the U.S. especially by non-Europeans, cracking down on families crossing the border, asylum seekers, even at legal points of entry and even legal immigrants. An approach sanctioned by the Supreme Court in its travel ban decision last week. Earlier today, the administration asked a federal judge for more time to reunite the children that it ripped away from their parents at the border which it`s now required to do under recent order. This as the New York Times reports that records linking children to their parents have disappeared and in some cases have been destroyed. More evidence of the carelessness and or cruelty with what the policy was implemented in the first place. Now the President seems to believe that all of this is good for him, that stoking white grievance and fears of demographic change of calling 11-year-old Honduran children infestations is the key to motivating his core supporters this fall. And he may be right. This guy, for example, drove 12 hours to attend the rally in Montana last night through -- we should note -- some of the most sparsely populated stretches of the country in a t-shirt that neatly condenses the President`s message "F off, we`re full. But here the thing. We are seeing increasing evidence that this approach may be having a very different effect on the rest of the country consolidating oppositions of the president`s immigration policies, energizing a new movement of political activist. According to a Washington Post poll out today, 69 percent of Americans oppose the president`s now-rescinded family separation policy, a remarkable degree of consensus in this era of total partisan polarization. And in that same poll, Democrats hold a 10 percent lead of the generic ballot, just 37 percent of registered voters saying they would rather elect a Republican to the House. Now, a bipartisan backlash forced the President to stop separating families detained at the border along with organizing by the grassroots. And in the week since, we`ve seen mass mobilizations continue, mass mobilizations of protest across the country. We just saw 28-year-old Latina political novice win a huge primary upset on a platform of abolishing ICE among other things. We`ve seen more and more high profile Democrats rapidly adopt a similar position. This week on the Fourth of July, we saw a woman physically climbing the Statue of Liberty to protest the President immigration policy, staying there for three hours until law enforcement brought here down. A naturalized citizen from the Democratic Republic of Congo, she later said this about her act of civil disobedience.
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THERESE PATRICIA OKOUMOU, ACTIVIST: Michelle Obama, our beloved First Lady that I care so much about, said when they go low, we go high and I went as high as I could.
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HAYES: Not surprisingly, the folks over at Trump T.V. saw things a little bit differently.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Three things back and think about what you`re watching right here. Congo is a war-ravaged hellscape, a country noted for mass rape and cannibalism. Imagine escaping a country like that and being welcomed in our country of the United States. You`d be grateful, wouldn`t you? Many Congolese are grateful. This person is not grateful at all. She took over our monument to scream about how racist we are and progressive support her. They have gone insane.
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HAYES: Our monument. For more on the politics of the President`s bid on racial grievance, I`m joined by Democratic Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii. Senator, I think that --
SEN. MAZIE HIRONO (D), HAWAII: Aloha.
HAYES: Aloha. There`s a tendency I think from Democrats to be in a little bit of a defensive crouch about this issues sometimes. I`ve watched it happen time and time again, worried about the sort of efficacy of the kind of rhetoric the President is using, the blatant demagoguery, the racist and bigoted tropes, but they don`t seem to be that scared right now. Where -- what is the mood of the Democratic caucus as you face down both the midterms and the current immigration policies of this president.
HIRONO: As far as I`m concerned the President`s policies and especially the separation of children from their parents, literally ripping them from their mamas` arms as my friend Elizabeth Warren put it is galvanizing a lot of people in our country as to the misplaced priorities and the cruelty of this president. So as you mentioned, people all across the country by the millions are coming together and being engaged as a counter to the kind of divisive politics and rhetoric that spews out of the President`s mouth every single day.
HAYES: You know, the White House and the administration both in court and in other places seem to basically say like buzz off, leave us alone, we`re doing what we can. This was Senator Blumenthal talking about his conference call with HHS today about whether they`re going to reunite these under 3,000 children. "Just got off the phone HHS, I am furious and horrified after immigration conference call virtually no separate children of being reunified, no system, no plan, no path to a short reunification, no answers to key questions, strategy seems to be blame everyone else." Who`s going to hold them accountable?
HIRONO: Well, Chris, I was on that so-called conference call myself. I thought it was ridiculous. It was basically a monologue by Secretary Azar to base -- patting themselves on the back about what a great job they`re doing and bemoaning that the courts are creating of uncertainty etcetera. This is chaos that the President himself created and they take no responsibility for the trauma to both the parents and the children. It was -- I would say awesomely terrible in my view. I felt used. You know, I don`t know how many Senators were on that conference call so-called, but only three Senators are able to get through in the queue to ask any questions at all. That left the rest of us sitting on our hands. This is why I`m sending yet another letter to Chairman Grassley to say we need a hearing. We need hearings on this so that we can get to the real facts and that we ask questions not in a staged way as this conference call was.
HAYES: Do you think this White House cares fundamentally the President, his administration, do you think they care whether they get these kids back together with their -- with their parents?
HIRONO: No. Because if he really cared, they wouldn`t have done this in the first place. And it`s pretty clear to most of us that they didn`t think that they would be forced reunite these children by -- to their parents. And so one of the questions I wanted to ask was when you impose a zero-tolerance policy that require the children to be separated, did you even think about what it would take to bring them back together? No they did not think that. It`s very clear they did not think that.
HAYES: Final question. They tried to argue in court today that they can`t make the deadline for the under-five children. There`s a hundred and one of those I believe. They also said I think -- I think nineteen if -- I`m recalling this off my head that had already been deported. They try to argue we don`t have to reunite the one -- the children with the parents who have already been deported. What do you think of that?
HIRONO: As I said, they created this chaos and for them to not take any responsibility is par for the course from this administration. So first they create the chaos, then they blame Democrats or Congress or anybody else. They take no responsibility. And then as they try mightily to bring these children back together which -- who never should have been separated to begin with, they again take no responsibility. So you know, you`re right, Chris. This president engages in what started off as what I would characterize as dog-whistle politics as he descended his golden staircase or whatever it was in Trump Tower calling Mexicans rapists and then his first action as president was to impose a Muslim ban. You know, what started as dog-whistle politics to his base that he continues to have to throw red meat to, it`s turned into a bullhorn where he just every day he has to go out there and throw red meat to his base. But the good thing is that there are other people in this country by the millions who are coming together as a counter to his divisive policies and rhetoric and I say thank goodness that so many of us still believe in what this country stands for. And that woman who went up on the Statue of Liberty, you know what, they can`t take it that this is a person who is an immigrant who is actually grateful who looks to the Statue as a symbol of our country welcoming immigrants and being an inclusive country. They can`t take it and so they try to malign her they try to malign anybody who disagrees with them.
HAYES: All right, Senator Mazie Hirono, thanks for your time tonight.
HIRONO: Thank you.
HAYES: Let`s turn now to Governor Jay Inslee of Washington. One of several states that`s suing the Trump administration over its immigration crackdown. Governor Inslee wrote a letter to the administration today signed by five other Democratic governors seeking information about the children still separated from their parents. And I want to start with what I thought was the most alarming part of your letter and something that I had not heard before and it though it jives a little bit with what the arguments we`ve heard for the administration in court. You write the following: "In a meeting with the governor`s offices on June 29th, 2018 Trump administration representatives shared that reunification may include the placement of separated children with any long-term sponsor regardless of whether that placement is with their parents, another family member residing in the U.S., a family residing their home country or in long-term foster care setting. Are you saying the Trump administration told you that they can place a child separated from parents in long-term foster care and count that as reunification?
GOV. JAY INSLEE (D), WASHINGTON: Yes, and perhaps we should not be surprised. This whole indignant and traumatic episode was based on inhumanity at the beginning. It was based on deceit in the middle and now it`s based on incompetence. These people have no idea what they`re doing. I`ve seen coat-checked windows operate with a better system. And now, on top of that incompetence, the secretary told us on a -- on a conference call that they do not have an intention to reunify these children with their parents. They`re going to call it good if they can find anybody else who could serve as a foster parent or might have some familial relationship when these kids don`t even know these strangers. We`ve got to understand the depth of depravity of this president. This was a system designed to be cruel and it has continued to be cruel and there just -- and their continued design is not to follow this judicial order. You`ve seen it when they -- when they told this yesterday they were going to comply with this order of five-year-olds and now today they admitted that they would not and then have no clue to do it. Now what is so disturbing to me is we have seen this movie over and over with this bunch. We saw it when we sued on the Muslim ban. We`re seeing it now when they`re trying to take away our grants to fight crime. By the way, they`re trying to take away our money to fight crime on the Byrne Grant -- on the -- on the Byrne Grant. They`re trying to take that money away from us. They`re not trying to help local communities to fight crime. And then they`re so incompetent -- they can run a two-car funeral. And so this is par for the course with them and that`s why we have to remain entirely dedicated. We have to stay on them every single day. The price of protection from the depredations that Donald Trump is eternal vigilance and I`m glad my state has sued them again on this. We`ll be suing them again on this Byrne Grant the thing in the future -- in the near future. So it`s clear they do not intend to be humane. They will continue on this course until he is removed from office. And by the way, at the upshot of the show, you talked about the consequences of this. I`ll tell you what, he`s going to lose this November. he`s going to lose seats this November because people are outraged by this traumatic abuse of these children.
HAYES: I want to make sure -- I want to just come back because I do want to make sure I understand this. I get a lot of e-mails, viewers of the show and there`s been kind of a conspiracy theory that has sort of floated out there they`re going to take these kids away, they`re going to put them up for adoption and I`ve even written back to some people and say there`s no evidence to that. I really don`t think that`s the case. But what you are saying is that you as a governor, your staff in calls with officials, they told -- communicated to you that they viewed placement in long-term foster care as equivalent to reunifying with a parent?
INSLEE: Correct. And that`s why we wrote the letter to him calling him on it and they have not responded which is also typical of them. We would think that the federal government would communicate with governors. We`ve written them repeated letters on this subject and they`ve ignored them all. So we called them on it and we should all be alarmed by this. Look, a five-year-old who`s never met a foster parent and we know there`s good foster parents, but they have their mothers and mothers ought to have their children. And this is a continuation of their -- I have to call it diabolical. I don`t know what else to call it. In order to use these kids as hostages to try to get his wall and force his wall --that`s what these children were used for -- and he`s continuing to do it. So I`m glad that we are continuing to beat this drum and shine the harsh light of truth on this abuse of behavior because only that will succeed in reining in this rogue president. We have to be diligent on this and I`m glad my state is doing that. By the way, we`ve also helping these parents. we are now -- my state and this is why it`s important to have Democratic governors. My state is actually helping provide legal attorneys for these kids so that they can get into court to enforce their rights. That`s the right thing to do. It`s not just Congressmen and Senators, it`s governors and that`s why I`m glad we`re going to elect some Democratic governors this year as well.
HAYES: Well, let me ask you a final question on the politics this. You heard Senator Hirono saying that she thought the backlash is bigger than that than the provocation as it were. What is your read of this?
INSLEE: Well, I`ve been in politics for 25 years off and on and I can tell you that I have never seen an issue of any dimension that have touched so many human hearts. I have never seen people coming up to me saying they`re losing sleep over this subject and asking what they can do. I`ve gone through the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights, this thing touched where people live because every parent who was separated for ten minutes looking for their child in a shopping mall knows the terror this provokes. And you know who else knows that is Donald Trump. That`s why he tried to use this as a weapon of terror. He understands that concern and that`s why Americans, Republicans, Independents, Democrats, whatever you are, people understood how horrific this was. And that is going to translate into people coming to vote because ultimately that`s what we need to do. I`ve had dozens of people say what we -- what can we do about this? Go vote and find somebody else to bring with you to vote this year. That`s how we restrain this president.
HAYES: All right, Governor Jay Inslee, thank you for making time tonight.
INSLEE: Thank you. You bet.
HAYES: Next, founding member of the Freedom Caucus Jim Jordan, you`ve probably seen him on cable news faces multiple accusations that he knew about systemic sexual abuse taking a place when he was a college wrestling coach. Tonight the NBC News Reporter who broke that story and has been cranking out scoops on it and Congressman Jim Jordan`s direct response to that reporting in two minutes.
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HAYES: President Trump rallying around a powerful Republican ally accused of turning a blind eye to sexual abuse of young athletes saying, "I don`t believe them, the accusers at all. I believe him. Jim Jordan is one of the most outstanding people I`ve met since I`ve been in Washington. I believe him 100 percent no question in my mind." Now, Congressman Jim Jordan was an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University when Dr. Richard Strauss allegedly abused athletes. And now at least five former wrestlers have accused Jordan of knowing what was going on and doing nothing.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I recall one day, Jim Jordan -- his locker was right next to Doc Strauss. Doc Strauss had just taking a shower, was dressing for you know, his -- to exit the building or go wherever he was going. He saw another male athlete come into the locker room with his shirt off. It was one of his -- what I call his favorites. He had his favorites. And as Doc was walking out, he saw the guy coming in. He actually stopped in his tracks. He turned around and went back to the locker undressed and went back into the shower and I recall vividly Jim Jordan looking at me and I was going wow.
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HAYES: Jordan has denied the allegations repeatedly including in an interview earlier tonight.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your reaction first to all of this.
JORDAN: It`s false. I mean I never saw, never heard of, never was told about any type of abuse. If had been, I would have dealt with it, our coaching staff, we would have dealt with it. These were our student- athletes.
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HAYES: Jordan had a different explanation for much of what`s since come to light.
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JORDAN: Conversations in the locker room are a lot different than allegations of abuse are reported abuse to us. Conversations in a locker room are a lot different than people come out of talking about abuse. Conversations in the locker room are a lot different than someone coming up to you and saying there was some kind of abuse.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So did you hear it in the locker room?
JORDAN: No. No type of abuse. We did not hear that.
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HAYES: With me now, Corky Siemaszko of NBC News Digital who`s done great, great work on this story.
CORKY SIEMASZKO, SENIOR WRITER, NBC NEWS: Thank you very much.
HAYES: Corey, let`s start with -- I just want to sort of start with what we know about the underlying allegations which is this doctor who was a doctor at Ohio State for years and appears to at least allegedly have sexually abused a lot of the athletes in his care, right?
SIEMASZKO: Yes. They`re saying that the estimate is some possibly 1,500 athletes over 15 different sports, not just wrestlers you know, lacrosse, football, baseball, you name it.
HAYES: So this is -- and this obviously calls to mind what we see in Michigan State with Larry Nasser where you had a doctor and this was over a long period of time in 15 different sports with it seems dozens possibly hundreds of victims over that period of time right?
SIEMASZKO: Absolutely. And it was -- all the abuse was done of the pretext of giving physicals and things like that and with the wrestling team in particular you`re talking about a group of -- a group of young men many of them from small towns who you know taught brought -- you know, raised to respect and listen to authority who basically you know, were subjected to these you know, unnecessary physicals and didn`t know any better and didn`t realize what was happening to them until it happened.
HAYES: Yes, there`s one story of someone going in with a busted thumb and the doctor Dr. Strauss telling to take his pants down and him being sort of aghast at that. That`s just an example of the kind of allegations here. Now, we -- there are five people on the record whose -- what have specifically have they said about Congressman Jordan who is assistant wrestling coach at the time while Strauss is there? What did they said about Jordan`s level of knowledge of what Strauss was allegedly doing to these young men entrusted in his care?
SIEMASZKO: Well, they`re basically saying that there`s absolutely no way he could have not known what was going on because it was common knowledge. It wasn`t fact locker room talk. It was like widespread. They would joke about it. They would -- they would nervously talk about it all the time. You know -- you know, one of them actually came forward and said you know, something happened to me and you guys need to do something about it and we`re talking about the young man who was wooden for the -- for a sprained thumb and protested when the doctor ordered him you know, started taking down his pants. I mean, he said that -- he said that flat-out to you know, what are you doing to me? And he told Jordan, he says he told Jordan and he says he told the head coach Russ Hellickson and they both -- and they both responded.
HAYES: I just want to be clear on this because there`s a difference between had to know and a specific recollection in this case of an individual on the record saying I was -- I was groped by this doctor inappropriately, I then reported it to my coach and assistant coach who was -- who was Jim Jordan.
SIEMASZKO: Yes, that`s exactly what the -- what the guy -- what Mr. Yetts said. He said what happened to me happened to me and when after I protested, I went out -- I flat-out to all the coaches. I told Jim Jordan, I told Russ Hellickson and then they did -- they went and talked to Dr. Strauss.
HAYES: Now Jordan, basically -- the President and Jordan are saying that everyone is lying and that -- and that more darkly Jordan is sort of intimated some kind of deep state conspiracy. This has to do with his role and going after the Mueller investigation. I mean, it seems to me the gentlemen that you`ve talked to, some of them admire Jim Jordan. I think one of them has donated to his campaign. They call him Jimmy. They have fond memories of him. Is your sense there`s a vendetta they`re pursuing?
SIEMASZKO: Absolutely not. What -- you know, the overriding feeling that we`re getting from them is dismay. Here`s a man that they respected, that they groomed with on, that they relied on his coach, that they trusted. I mean, they would have these you know, talking sessions where they would talk about this that and the other. And one of them said that at one point coach Jordan mentioned how he wanted to run for President one day. You know, they trusted this guy and for him to come out and flat out and say well, I didn`t know anything about this, they`re just totally amazed. It`s kind of like -- it`s kind of like saying you know, the earth is flat or you know, night is day or December is January. It just doesn`t make any sense to a lot of them. I mean, they just don`t get it. And basically they`re waiting for an explanation and there hasn`t been one forthcoming.
HAYES: Well, my sense is that there will be more developments on the story, not just with respect to Jordan but to Strauss more broadly if the scope is what it appears it may be. Corky Siemaszko, thank you for this fantastic reporting. This has really been great work.
SIEMASZKO: I appreciate it. Thank you, Chris.
HAYES: All right, next, mark this day on your calendars. The day that Donald Trump officially started what could be we`ll see, who knows, the largest trade war since World War II. Why Trump country stands to get hit the worst right after this.
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HAYES: China`s Commerce Ministry today accused the Trump administration of igniting the biggest trade war in economic history after Washington imposed tariffs on $34 billion worth of imports from China and Beijing retaliated with $34 billion in tariffs on imported U.S. goods like soybeans and pork. Trump had already imposed tariffs on imports from Europe, Canada, and Mexico which responded in kind as well as Japan. He`s threatening an additional $500 billion in tariffs on Chinese imports. The forecasters are now warning that his trade war could destroy four percent of global trade potentially costing the global economy $800 billion.
And while today saw the release of relatively positive jobs report overall, the trade war fallout could hit Trump`s base hard. Countries have specifically targeted their retaliatory tariffs to hurt vulnerable communities, especially in the Midwest, that voted for Trump.
With me now to discuss the impact of Trump`s trade war and the response from Trump supporters, former Missouri secretary of state Jason Candor, a Democrat running for mayor of Kansas City now. Also with me is Mickie Edwards, former Republican congressman from Oklahoma, and Heather Long, an economics correspondent at The Washington Post who has been tracking the trade war fallout.
Heather, let me start with you, part of the issue here is the timing and the scale, right. So, there`s been a lot of pricing in of expectations of cataclysm that have hurt markets. Right now, the actual numbers are relatively small, but they are in existence. Like the tariffs are happening, a; and b, the fear is that they start to escalate, right?
HEATHER LONG, THE WASHINGTON POST: You`ve got it, Chris. It`s significant amount of tariffs that we have in place as of today, but it`s not cataclysmic. This isn`t going to sink the economy into a recession.
And a lot of the effects just haven`t taken an impact yet. So with the U.S. and China both putting these tariffs on 12:01 a.m. this morning, you are not going to the store on Saturday or Sunday and suddenly see higher prices. We just don`t react that quickly. Companies aren`t able to raise prices.
At the moment, only about 4 percent of U.S. imports have any sort of tariff effect, so again we are still talking about a very small percentage. Economic models tell us that the average family will end up paying about $80 more this year. So, most people just are not feeling it yet, and they may not.
HAYES: Although, right, the sort with these sorts of things is they`re concentrated in terms of the pain. I mean, the sort of consumer price is one part of it, but here is NPR talking to a rancher -- Buck Taylor who is a rancher in a remote section of Oregon, flies a Trump flag on his property. Take a listen.
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BUCK TAYLOR, RANCHER: Any hit that we take now will be superceded by some accomplishments that he will probably make to make up for it.
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HAYES: Jason, this has been one of the dynamics that I keep seeing and sort of marveling at is that, you know, they are targeting these areas the president one in industries like, you know, soy bean exporters, that they anticipate to have a lot of his supporters, and then interviewing people who say, yeah, well, this is going to hurt us, but I am still with the president.
JASON CANDOR, FORMER MISSOURI SECRETARY OF STATE: Well, I mean, anecdotally, that is not what I have seen here lately. I mean, I was just talking to a friend the other day in southeast Missouri who -- he is in the rice business, or actually was talking to a farmer there who telling me about folks in the rice business there who are all very upset, all folks -- you know, he told me some of their names. I know some of these people. Who have been pretty big Trump supporters who are saying things like I`m not going to vote for any Republicans, because they look at, for instance, this thing -- you know, escalating this trade war with China -- I mean, this is getting into a trade war with no exit strategy.
Whether you`re talking about a trade war or a conventional war, you don`t go in having no idea how you`re going to get back out. I have done a trade mission to China on behalf of my state, I went over there with rice producers. The average farm over there is about an acre, which means they have to buy from the rest of the world. They`re not going to buy from us, they`re not going to buy from the folks who are growing it here in Missouri and across the south and Midwest, if the president is getting his ego in the way like he is right now.
HAYES: One dynamic I think that is fascinating, Mickey, is the fact that of all the policies the president has pursued, I would say this has probably gotten the most vocal backlash from both Republican politicians and sort of diehard Republican constituencies -- the Chamber of Commerce, the donor class doesn`t like it. There is a list of Republicans who sort of spoken out again, including Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and the Texas governor, Wisconsin governor, Iowa governor, Alabama governor, Utah Senator Bob Corker, and yet they haven`t really done that much to do it. A lot of this is being done on a very dubious national security authority. Congress very -- constitution very explicitly gives congress this power, it`s one of the chief powers congress has, particularly the time of the nation`s founding, and yet they do nothing.
MICKEY EDWARDS, FORMER REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN OKLAHOMA: Yeah, so hearing them continue to talk about how awful this is, it is just blowing hot air because they gave the president that power. They can step in now and do something about it.
You know what I think Donald Trump obviously cut some of his classes in business school. Because I think it was 1930 we passed the Smoot-Hawley tariffs. At first, they weren`t really bad. They ended up wrecking the economy. They made the depression worse. They had a big effect in Europe, which may very well have helped, you know, the autocrats who rose in power in Europe because of it.
And what he`s doing is going to -- the people who voted for him, Chris, are the ones who are going to pay the price. They`re going to pay the price with every product they buy, with every bit of equipment they need to buy for their farms or their companies, and they voted for him because he said I will make it better.
Well he is making it worse. And they are not stupid. They are going to see it.
HAYES: Heather, Mickey sort of lays out an important dynamic here, right, which is it`s -- there is a lot of different factors that play where of this goes, right. So, it is not just the U.S. is the single actor here. There`s a lot of other actors. And the fear -- what is the fear at the sort of upper end, right? What does the really bad situation look like in terms of the people that you have been talking to?
LONG: The really bad situation looks like Trump`s next step putting those tariffs he`s threatened to do another $200 billion or even up to $500 billion of tariffs on China, or to put those tariffs on autos coming from Europe, coming from Mexico, coming from South Korea, coming from Japan. That just escalates this immediately. Suddenly the effects go from about $80 on the average family to several hundred dollars on the average family. That`s a totally different circumstance, companies like General Motors, Harley-Davidson are warning that they would start to do layoffs.
Chris, I think the key here, Trump ran on a platform of jobs, jobs, jobs. The key to watch is if a lot of small businesses and medium-size businesses, whether they are farms or manufacturing plants, when they start to do layoffs or when they start to shut down, that is what is really going to change the minds of Trump voters.
HAYES: And there has been, there have been some few instances, there`s the Harley-Davidson relocation of some production to Europe, which the president has been lashing out at, Jason. And from political economy standpoint, I am sort of fascinated by watching the sort of, the powerful titans of American capitalism not seem to get too exercised about this, Jason. They get very exercised about the estate tax, but they seem to be laying relatively low on this.
CANDOR: Well, they are afraid of him tweeting at them. I mean, I think that`s the same reason that we don`t see congress and Republicans in congress stepping up the way that they should, right. Because they`re just -- I mean, look, he is making trade policy that is small enough and simple enough to fit in a tweet. And he thinks -- or they think that if they say something about it, he is going to tweet at them.
I mean, he has driven down the stock price of American companies with tweets before. He`ll do it again. You know, there`s a nail factory in southeast Missouri that is closed. They went very public. I am sure that that person risked the president actually lashing out against him, not to mention, by the way, just how this affects, we haven`t had infrastructure week yet. We keep thinking maybe we will actually get it. But if we ever actually get it, I mean, the steel tariff, for instance, makes it a whole lot more expernsive for us to actually do any infrastructure work in municipalities around the country, and, you know, that is why you see people at the city level stepping up so much against this whereas congress is not really doing what it should.
HAYES: All right, Jason Candor, Mickey Edwards, and Healther Long, thank you all for being with me. Appreciate it.
Still ahead, Scott Pruitt is the latest in the Trump administration`s record setting departures. What it means for the governing of the country coming up.
And tonight`s Thing One, Thing Two, starts next.
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HAYES: Thing One tonight, Great Falls, Montana was the scene of Donald Trump`s latest publicly funded ego boosting campaign style presidential rally, ostensibly Trump was there to drum up support for a pair of Republican congressional candidates, one of whom, you`ll remember, assaulted a reporter and then lied about it.
But as usual, the president managed to find time to talk up himself.
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TRUMP: I wrote best sellers. I guess I speak well. You know, we turned away thousands of people. They never say I am a great speaker. Why the hell do so many people come? What`s -- I don`t...
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HAYES: It is true, the president does turn out crowds of MAGA fans. The ghost written "Art of the Deal" was, indeed, a bestseller, but that bit about him speaking well, well, I am going to let you be the judge. And that is Thing Two in 60 seconds.
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HAYES: President Trump`s fans will cheer just about anything he says, even his latest claim last night that he is, quote, a great speaker.
Now, just take a listen to what came out of the president`s mouth after bout that.
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TRUMP: I have broken more Elton John records -- he seems to have a lot of records. And we -- and I by the way, I don`t have a musical instrument -- I don`t have a guitar or an organ -- no organ. Elton has an organ and lots of other -- people, help me. No, we`ve broken a lot of records. We`ve broken virtually every record, because, you know, look I know need this face. They need much more room. For basketball, for hockey, for all the sports, they need a lot of room. We don`t need it. We have people in that space. So we break all these records.
But really, we do it without, like the musical instruments. This is the only musical, the mouth, and hopefully the brain attached to the mouth, right? The brain, more important than the mouth is the brain. The brain is much more important.
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HAYES: Now I just want to make sure you got all of that, quote, "so we break all of these records, really we do it without like the musical instruments. This is the only musical, the mouth. And hopefully the brain is attached to mouth, right? The brain. More important than the mouth is the brain. The brain is much more important, end quote.
Truly, a great speaker.
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HAYES: The man who ran Donald Trump`s campaign in the summer of 2016 is right now in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, that`s according to a new court filing from Paul Manafort`s legal team, which says Manafort is being kept in solitary in order to, quote, guarantee his safety.
They argue the situation has made it impossible for Manafort to adequately prepare his defense for his two upcoming trials and that he should, therefore, be released on bail.
Now, let`s remember why Manafort is currently in jail. He was indicted on charges, including obstruction, money laundering, and conspiracy against the United States, yet he was still being allowed to walk free before his trial where -- while wearing ankle bracelets that tracked his location. It was only when Manafort allegedly sought to use that freedom to tamper with witness testimony that a judge then ordered him put behind bars. He now sits in the VIP wing of a Virginia jail.
The treatment of Manafort, a man accused of some of the serious crimes in the country, at least in the context of our election, has been too much for some on the right. Former Trump lawyer John Dowd described Manafort`s placement in solitary confinement as a, quote, outrageous violation of Paul`s civil liberties. And an American Conservative Union chair Matt Schlapp tweeted, quote, "and not convicted of any crime as of yet. Even terrorists at GITMO were treated better."
Now, let`s be clear, there is definitely, definitely a case against the use of solitary confinement, and pre-trial detention in the U.S. legal system, a very good case, in fact. But you don`t hear that case coming from most people on the right until the person being subjected to such treatment is someone like Paul Manafort, someone powerful, conservative, wealthy and white.
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HAYES: Bill Shine is settling in to his brand-new job at the White House. He was ousted from his old job as co-president of Fox News last year amid allegations that he helped cover up Roger Ailes sexual harassment. Shine becomes the seventh person tapped for White House communications director since Trump`s victory. Jason Miller was the original communications director until he resigned in scandal after three days, then Sean Spicer, then Mike Dubke, Sean Spicer again, then the Mooch did it for 11 days, then Hope Hicks, and now Bill Shine.
A substantial amount of turnover that`s reflected in the rest of the Trump administration.
At this point in his presidency, Donald Trump has the highest turnover rate of top level advisers in recent history, 61 percent. The turnover rates for Obama and George W. Bush were 14 percent and 5 percent respectively.
And with the ousting of disgraced EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt yesterday, Trump has had more turnover of cabinet level position than any president at this point in their tenure in the last 100 years.
For more on this record-setting dysfunction, I`m joined now by Lachlan Markay, White House correspondent for The Daily Beast, and Christy Goldfuss, who is a former managing director of the White House Council on Environmental Quality under Obama.
Lachlan, you and Asawin have been reported about this. And I guess -- I`m always skeptical of anything that portrays the White House - like things in the Trump White House as like getting worse, or like increasingly bad, like any adverb attached to the Trump White House I`m skeptical of. And yet it does seem that this is the most acute kind of personnel crunch that they`ve had yet.
LACHLAN MARKAY, THE DAILY BEAST: Well, the relationship between Scott Pruitt and the White House was particularly fraught over the last couple of months as scandal after scandal dropped and Pruitt`s image just kept getting worse and there was no end seemingly to the bad press that was surrounding him.
You really saw John Kelly in particular, the White House chief of staff, you know, constantly sort of pushing and pushing, trying to get Pruitt out of there and get him replaced by his deputy, now acting administrator Andrew Wheeler, or essentially anyone else who wasn`t going to be saddled with all this baggage that Pruitt was, the idea being that virtually any other official in that post would be pursuing the same policy agenda, but wouldn`t be bogged down by these constant ethical and spending and travel scandals that really have followed Pruitt now for months.
HAYES: Christy, I wonder sometimes, the people that are not supporters of the president, who are sort of opposed to the Trump agenda, what should they be hoping for vis-a-vis the functionality of this White House? Like, is it -- do you want the place fully staffed and humming and operating smoothly, or do you want it to be a dysfunctional mess?
CHRISTY GOLDFUSS, FORMER MANAGING DIRECTOR, WHITE HOUSE COUNCIL ON ENVIRONMANTAL QUALITY: Look, you need to have transparency in government. I mean, the EPA`s main function is to keep our water clean and to keep our air clean. And what we had was a scandal an administrator who was defying all of that, and the public deserves more.
So, even if there`s a change in administration, what we should hold from this administration is they are able to at least be transparent. So those 18 investigations that Scott Pruitt was facing, need to be finished so that we can get the full look at the amount of corruption that was happening at the EPA.
So everyone at all sides of government and all sides of the political spectrum can have a sense that the government is carrying out the mission that it`s supposed to, even if it`s not responding to, you know, your political beliefs, you should see transparency in staff.
HAYES: OK, right. But the question is this, right, so Pruitt`s a perfect example, the person who`s coming after him, Andrew Wheeler, who is a former coal lobbyist who worked for James Inhofe, sort of the most notorious climate crank on Capitol Hill, I think it`s fair to say, you know, the idea is like, yes, a less ostentatious but malevolently competent individual is not an improvement. And I feel like that sort of applies throughout the administration, like aren`t you worried about Wheeler?
GOLDFUSS: Of course, we are very worried about Wheeler. He is a coal lobbyist. He is going to undermine the mission at EPA as well. And part of the reason that it`s so important that these investigations are carried out, and really Andrew Wheeler in his acting position shouldn`t go forward with any policy decisions until we get a full sense of the corruption within the agency. He`s part of that problem right now. Until he steps out and says that he`s not going to really carry out all the problems and all the scandal that we saw with Administrator Pruitt.
HAYES: Lachlan, I sometimes am amazed at the White House sort of gets through the day, given what I have heard about how it operates and just the sheer amount of vacancies they have and the processes that do not seem to be in place to just make the place function smoothly.
MARKAY: Right. I`m not sure the place does function smoothly. And there`s kind of a constant deference to the man at the top, which is why you saw Scott Pruitt sort of remain in his post for so long as he continued to have the ear and the appreciation and the respect of the president. So, within the White House itself, and the administration to a certain extent more generally, it`s sort of very siloed with very, you know, not as much communication as you expect or probably like between the various offices.
But, you know, this is all flowing up and this is all flowing towards the president. You know, the idea is to please him and he sets the overall message and everything else is just sort of subordinate to that. And to the extent that any of it runs contrary to what the president wants the message to be or what he`s saying publicly at any given moment in time, that obviously takes precedence and everyone else just sort of adjusts what they`re doing to fit with that new reality.
HAYES: Yeah, Christy, is that -- how is that different from the Obama White House?
GOLDFUSS: Well, the Obama White House was a lot about -- I mean, it had a high, high focus on process, on interagency communications. I can tell you at the Council on Environmental Quality, we were constantly bringing agencies together, hearing different opinions and really making sure that we worked all of that internally.
From what I`ve heard, there is none of that interagency process. There`s no vetting, There`s absolutely no way to make sure you get the policy right.
HAYES: The Obama White House were process fetishists in my experience. Lachlan Markay and Christy Goldfuss, thanks for joining us.
I have some exciting news. This Week, our podcast Why is This Happening? passed over 1 million downloads. If you`ve been listening, thank you, thank you, thank you. There`s been some great responses to our latest episode with Eliza Griswold. You can download that on TuneIn or wherever you get your podcasts.
That is All In for this evening. The Rachel Maddow Show starts right now.
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