IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser.

Transcript: All In with Chris Hayes, 4/5/22

Guests: Stuart Stevens, Katherine Stoner, Kenneth Roth, Jamie Raskin

Summary

Republicans in Senate and the House turn to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson`s vote into a QAnon circus. Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene calls lawmakers who support Judge Jackson being pro-pedophile. After Zelenskyy speaks at the U.N. Security Council today, the United States and the European Union announced a new round of sanctions against Russia. Russian people have been told on state media is that Ukrainians and Russians were one people and they have been kept apart, divided by a small Nazi regime that was essentially occupying Ukraine against his will.

Transcript

JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: And that is tonight`s "REIDOUT." ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES starts now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST (voiceover): Tonight on ALL IN.

WHOOPI GOLDBERG, HOST, THE VIEW: Marjorie Taylor Greene took things a step further tweeting that Murkowski, Collins, and Romney are pro-pedophiles because they voted for Judge Jackson.

HAYES: From QAnon, conspiracy to the vanguard of the Grand Old Party, the new Republican tactic of smearing everyone who disagrees with them as supporting pedophilia. Then --

LINDA THOMAS-GREENFIELD, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE U.N.: I do not need to spell out what these so-called filtration camps are reminiscent of. It`s chilling.

HAYES: The allegations of war crimes grow as we get new insight into the chilling pretense of what Russia means when they say they want to de-Nazify Ukraine.

Plus, the January 6 Committees says Ivanka Trump is answering questions about her father`s role on the insurrection. Congressman Jamie Raskin joins me live. And old home week in the East Room with Barack Obama`s returned to the White House.

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you. Vice President Biden -- vice president -- that was a joke.

HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES (on camera): Good evening from New York. I`m Chris Hayes. A Democratic president is now poised to put a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court for the first time in more than a decade. As soon as this week, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson will be confirmed to the court with bipartisan support. And that`s despite the best efforts of some Senate Republicans who tried to essentially assassinate Judge Jackson`s character by painting her as sympathetic to child abusers.

The behavior by Republicans in the House and in the U.S. Senate, particularly at the hearings, has been disturbing. Shocking language and rhetoric used as a political smear by people who well, know better.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MASHA BLACKBURN (R-TN): I want to make certain that we protect children and that we continue to do our best effort to protect children. I also want to make certain that we`re going to have judges on the federal bench and justices that are going to protect those rights of children.

SEN. TED CRUZ (R-TX): Significant concern has been raised by myself and others about Judge Jackson`s pattern in sentencing criminal defendants guilty of either possession or distribution of child pornography.

SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): We`re talking about 8-year-olds and 9-year-olds and 11-year-olds and 12-year-olds. He`s got images of these the government said added up over 600 images, gobs of video footage of these children that you say this does not signal a heinous or egregious child pornography offense.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Just to be clear, that pattern that clip is talking about was nonsense. It was no different than many other federal judges coming from Republicans, some of whom who sailed through confirmation. And of course, not every Republican senator joined in that despicable behavior. In fact, three of them said they would vote to confirm Judge Jackson.

And for that crime, those senators were attacked by Republican Party star Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene who said they were being "pro- pedophile," pro-pedophile. When Greene first joined the House, her over sympathies for the QAnon conspiracy theory, which believes that Democrats, the so-called Deep State, and the media are secretly part of a massive child trafficking ring, that was a big deal.

She had to go back and like delete a bunch of posts, and it was something of a political problem for Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy. But alas, as time has moved on, the party`s only move towards Greene and embraced QAnon. And that`s why they tried to make Judge Jackson hearing a referendum on whether you are not, in Marjorie Taylor Greene`s words here, pro or anti pedophile. That`s what it is.

Republicans are cultivating this. They have been for a long time. You could trace it back to the 2016 election when these so-called pizza gate conspiracy theory came into being which emerged out of the hacked e-mails that were published. And that bizarre and inscrutable theory alleges that Hillary Clinton and prominent Democrats ran a child sex and sacrifice ring out of the basement of a popular D.C.-based pizza restaurant called Comet Ping Pong Pizza, which by the way, doesn`t have a basement.

But the conspiracy percolated in Far-Right media, and then this happened.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Under arrest in Washington, 28-year-old Edgar Welch accused of firing an assault weapon inside the Comet Ping Pong Pizza restaurant. Welch allegedly told police he came to investigate pizza gate, an internet rumor alleging a Clinton campaign child sex ring.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: An armed man gets himself to the pizza shop and shows up with an assault rifle which he fired because he had been told and believed that the Democrats were running a satanic child sex ring in the building`s non- existent basement.

[20:05:00]

That man, by the way, was sentenced to four years in jail by none other than then-District Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. But here`s the thing. Republicans were and still are actively cultivating the dangerous fringe beliefs that that individual held.

According to one recent poll, 16 percent of Americans, that 16 percent of Americans, not a majority, but a sizable amount, believe and I quote, "The government media and financial worlds in the U.S. are controlled by a group of Satan-worshipping pedophiles who run a global child sex trafficking operation."

Think about your belief system to answer yes to that question. 25 percent of the Republican Party identify as QAnon believers. Now, these Republican politicians and their allies in conservative media cannot just come out and say, there is an evil cabal of liberals running a child sex trafficking ring around the world dominated by George Soros, the Rothschilds, and the Clintons and they also worship Satan. They realize they sound nuts.

So, instead, they find these not so clever ways to play footsie with the people that do believe that, that make up at least a quarter of the base of their party like accusing Judge Jackson of being sympathetic to child abusers wink, wink, or adopting the slogan Save the Children which of course sounds perfectly noble, innocent enough on its face, but as Associate Press reports is actually become a dog whistle the QAnon supporters. Or more recently, through vague allegations of grooming, and aged smear to imply that members of LGBTQ community are trying to prime children for sexual abuse.

That appears to be the case in Florida and the basis behind the state`s so- called Don`t Say Gay Bill which prohibits the discussion, the discussion in class of sexual orientation or gender identity in classroom for young children.

Now, several Republicans will try to lie and say the bill is the laws about parents` rights are rather nonsense. But Republican Governor Ron DeSantis` spokesperson gave away the whole game. She sort of like Marjorie Taylor Greene, wasn`t quite like with it enough to kind of keep it quiet. She said, the bill that liberals inaccurately called Don`t Say Gay would be more accurately described as the Anti-Grooming Bill and "If you`re against the anti-grooming bill, you`re probably a groomer or at least you don`t denounce the grooming of 4 to 8-year-old children. Silence is complicity."

Just I want everyone to focus on what she is accusing people of here. There it is. She said the quiet part loud. If you don`t agree with the bill, you are actively acculturating young children to sexually abuse them. Everything you don`t like is the work of this nefarious cabal of pedophiles who are literally attempting to institutionalize systematic sexual molestation of children.

If you`re a Democrat, you`re either a pedophile or a pedophile sympathizer. If you`re a gay teacher who mentions, I don`t know, going away with your husband this weekend, you`re doing the same. And this rhetoric, it`s not fringe. That`s the spokesperson of Ron DeSantis become omnipresent in right-wing media.

Just this past week, Fox News had the collective meltdown accusing Disney, the Disney Corporation of all companies, of grooming children.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GREG GUTFELD, HOST, FOX NEWS: If you really want to talk to a 5-year-old or a 7-year-old or an 8-year-old about their sexuality and gender, that`s on you. You`re a pervert. You`re a weirdo.

SEAN DUFFY, CONTRIBUTOR, FOX NEWS: The fact that they want to sexualize our children and our children`s childhoods for their own political agenda is incredibly disturbing.

LAURA INGRAHAM, HOST, FOX NEWS: Why not just renamed the roller coaster, you know, sex mountain? Come on kids, it`ll be a blast.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: OK, there`s a lot to say about this. By the way, go look at the Disney canon and just like fire up the old Little Mermaid, OK, and see like -- you know, the teenager who sells her voice because a guy was cute, OK. So, just to start with, but to be clear, this is QAnon all the way down.

Republicans are repurposing old smears to take Democrats as part of a shadowy cabal of child sex abusers. And, again, what`s so disgusting and gross about this is that of course, child sexual abuse is an extremely real problem. Shockingly ubiquitous, in fact, everywhere throughout society, in all kinds of institutions across the political and cultural spectrum, liberal, conservative, secular, religious, just all over the place, no one`s got a monopoly on it.

Like, I don`t know. Let me think of an example. Like, I don`t know, the longest-serving Republican Speaker of the House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER ALEXANDER, NBC NEWS CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: The fallout keeps growing tonight over the surprise indictment of former House Speaker Dennis Hastert. The allegations that Hastert was willing to pay millions to cover up sexual misconduct with a male student have shocked many, especially in Yorkville, Illinois. That`s where Hastert used to coach and teach.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Male students when he was wrestling coach there. It`s odd, isn`t it? The Republicans never bring up Dennis Hastert who was accused of child sexual abuse when they`re talking about the apparent cabal of pedophiles in the government. Or former Republican Congressman Mark Foley who of course resigned in disgrace after he was caught sending sexually explicit messages to teenage boys who work as congressional pages or failed Republican Senate candidate from Alabama Judge Roy Moore, who leading Republicans including Trump defended after he was accused of pursuing sexual relationships with teenage girls while he was in his 30s including one girl he pursued while she was 14-years-old and he was 32 after they met at the courthouse where her mother was appearing for a child custody hearing.

[20:10:37]

Think about that. Now, he denies this. But I`ll leave the word for that kind of behavior, again, if it happened, maybe you believe Roy Moore, is grooming. Right-wing media close ranks around Moore. The Federalist even ran an op-ed defending his conduct as alleged, writing, "To have a large family, the wife must start having kids when she is young. The husband needs to be well established and able support the family in which case he will typically need to marry when older. Again, a 14-year-old at her mom`s child custody hearing getting hit on allegedly by a 32-year-old prosecutor outside the courthouse.

Donald Trump even endorsed Moore`s run after the allegations surfaced, that that`s what he was doing, or I don`t know. Here`s another example. How about the time that Tucker Carlson decided to defend Warren Jeffs, the fundamentalist cult leader currently in prison for child rape.

Carlson said that he`s in prison for his "Weird and unpopular beliefs like the forced marriage of underage girls. He was convicted of two counts of felony child sexual assault." Tucker thought that was unjustified.

Actually, right now there`s a sitting member of Congress on the House Judiciary Committee, Republican Matt Gaetz who is reportedly under investigation, federal investigation for sex trafficking underage girl. That`s again, something he denies and, you know, innocent proved guilty. He hasn`t even been charged. But again, if you`re a party that`s super, super, super keyed into this, you might be a little worried about that, right? Maybe have a little conversation with him on what`s going on there?

Oh, yes. And Tennessee Republicans have a bill they advanced today, actually, that would -- and I am not making this up and I didn`t believe it when I thought so, but I actually read it through, to eliminate any minimum age requirement for marriage. Right now in 2022, right now it is a minimum of 17 years, and they`re going to just get rid of the minimum age.

Now, if Democrats did any of these things like that Tennessee bill, the right would lose its collective mind and it would call them groomers and pedophiles. But of course, again, this is all that faith. There`s not an actual interest in protecting children here. It`s not motivating it, which is part of what makes it so disgusting, because children do need protection.

But this is a disgusting and cynical attempt to render the political opposition, essentially as hateable as possible, as sort of irredeemably evil, like the worst thing you could be. It`s loathsome and they know what they`re doing.

Stuart Stevens worked on multiple Republican political campaigns. He is now a senior adviser to Lincoln -- the Lincoln Project, author of the book, It Was All A Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump. Stewart, I have to say, even with a relatively high capacity for shock in American politics in the year 2022, the casualness with which Republican figures are now rolling around this term groomer, like the casual allegation that a person with a different view is engaged in the like, intentional manipulation of children for the end of sexual molestation of them is really, really shocking to me still.

STUART STEVENS, SENIOR ADVISER, LINCOLN PROJECT: Yes, you know, I think we need to step back. I think there`s a direct connection between two stories here. What Putin is doing in Russia calling Ukrainians Nazis is the same tactic that the Marjorie Taylor Greene and these nutjobs are doing trying to accuse other people of being pedophiles and groomers.

It`s an element of pro-autocracy, anti-truth movement. So, you just make up this stuff, and then we`ll justify whatever you want to do, because you can`t have any discourse with someone try to reach a settlement if they`re a Nazi. You can`t do that if they`re a pedophile. So, it`s not about governing, it`s about your side winning, and you`ll do whatever it takes. And to what purpose? Just for the purpose of power.

HAYES: And I do also wonder about the, you know, the purpose of power. This does strike -- I mean, you know, I was thinking about the Glenn Youngkin campaign in Virginia and the -- and the kind of CRT moral panic and how that was sort of a classic example of a kind of what we used to call dog whistle, right?

You`re talking about critical race theory and one set of people hears one thing, another set of people here another thing. You can kind of hedge the two together that you need to build a coalition. And you say things like, of course, we want to teach about racial justice. And of course, I don`t -- you know, I`m not a racist and I -- you know -- but the people who really are like real keyed up about that hear. This is not a dog whistle. This is just like a shrill screaming. I mean, it sounds to me not particularly politically smart.

[20:15:22]

STEVENS: Well, you know, I mean, what happens with these things, when you look at movements like, which is what the Republican Party has become, it`s become an anti-democratic movement, not really a political party in any traditional American sense, where they have a coherent ideology, as opposed to a Democrat coherent ideology and you argue about that.

Republican exists -- party now exists to beat Democrats. That`s why cartels exist. No one asked OPEC for higher purpose. You just sell oil. So, what you have here is a pattern where the absurd, gradually -- and extreme gradually becomes normalized. And it`s part of a predictable pattern of how autocracies take over. So, you know, they`ll start to be a legal justification for this.

There`s a propaganda wing and Fox, there`s a political wing that`s been established now in the Republican Party, it`s well-financed, and there are legal efforts to normalize what you now -- we now think is crazy, but then it will sort of gradually become the law of the land. And that`s how we lose this whole little thing we call democracy. It`s not going to die in a coup, it`s going to die in the ballot box and in the courtroom. And this is just part of that process.

HAYES: Stuart Stevens, as always, thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it.

STEVENS: Thank you.

HAYES: Charles Blows is an Opinion Columnist for The New York Times and an MSNBC Political Analyst. He wrote an Op Ed titled the using of Ketanji Brown Jackson. And he joins me now.

What is your reaction to the -- I mean, the connection, obviously, between them going on this line of inquiry with her, which only now to me makes a little more sense in this broader context?

CHARLES BLOW, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I think it`s actually broader than what we`ve been talking about so far, in the sense that before, it didn`t really work the QAnon logic of the ring of pedophiles, because it was an outlier. It was a dot list alone on the margins.

But what Republicans have done post success of anti-critical race theory is that they`ve lined up a lot of dots. A lot of the very -- the old moral outrages they had, they basically said, we will reorient and say not this is not because it`s upsetting some grouchy, old men, but it is an attack on children. And they lined everything up along those lines.

They`re teaching your children things that make your children uncomfortable. They`re exposing your children to books that make -- that are pornographic. They are girls who are participating in sports or having to compete against men who have transitioned to become women and that is unfair. They are teaching your children about sex and gay sex at an early age that you even talk to your own children about sex.

And they center children. And by centering children, people -- there was a larger data set and people said, maybe there is something to this idea that our children are under attack, including the possibility that there are pedophiles and that they are under attack in that way. And I think it`s a bigger issue.

HAYES: Yes, that`s smart. I think that`s true. There`s also to me on the -- on the -- you know, on the sort of Florida bill, right, there`s a continuity of very old -- very old smear of gay folks, of queer folks which is that they`re predators, right? And like, that`s not -- you know, that`s -- there`s nothing really that new about that. That`s very, very old.

And what I find really maddening about this discourse and feminist writer Jessica Valenti wrote this in her Substack which was look, if someone discusses their sexual orientation in the classroom like, I went on a trip with my husband, or even gender identity, like how they -- and you`re thinking of sex, that`s on you, dude. That`s on you. Because we talk about those things in hetero or gender normative circumstances all the time around kids, and no one says that`s sex.

You don`t say like, oh, me and my wife. Oh, you`re talking about sex? Well, no. I`m talking about sex, I`m talking about family information. If you`re thinking about sex, that`s on you.

BLOW: Right. And all the childhood stories have a mother and a father in a duck or whatever --

HAYES: Right, of course.

BLOW: Right. So, it`s always present that partnering of people. But what is interesting about the Florida bill is the person who does the language is the language that they use. They don`t use the word discuss, they use instruct.

HAYES: Yes, right.

BLOW: Which to the -- to the -- you know, kind of the untrained ear sounds like the teaching of how, rather than the discussion of why. And that is a whole different concept. And I saw poll that they had done with it. They had read the text of the bill to people and, you know, a lot -- you know, two times as many people agree with it as disagree with it.

And I think if I had heard just as a layperson the word instruct my children about something around sex rather than be exposed to the possibility that families come in all different forms, that people express themselves in different ways, and that that is a very healthy thing. Instruction becomes a tricky, tricky, devious word. And whoever did that is very clever, actually, because it changes how people think about what is happening and takes it out of something that is innocent and makes it devious.

[20:20:28]

HAYES: Yes, it`s a great point. And it lines up with your thesis before about how this is all sort of recasting all these very, very worn culture war issues, not as sort of senior reaction, right, but as the supple young minds of the child.

BLOW: Because if you think about it, they`d already lost the gay rights argument.

HAYES: Yes.

BLOW: The gay rights polling change faster than any metric ever.

HAYES: Right.

BLOW: Because that was because it was about old crotchety, old people saying, we don`t like the way other people are coupling. But when you change it and you say it`s about children, it changes the dynamic.

HAYES: All right, Charles Blow, great to have you on board. Good to see in person. Thank you so much.

Within the last few hours, the January 6 Committee wrapped up an interview with a central witness they`ve been trying to get for months, someone who had a truly front row seat to whatever it was Donald Trump was doing while violent mob ransack the Capitol. Tonight, Congressman Jamie Raskin on Ivanka Trump cooperating with the investigation and what happened in her eight hours of testimony. Don`t go anywhere. We`ll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:25:00]

HAYES: There`s only been three days since Ukrainian military retook the town of Bucha, northwest of Kyiv and discovered what appear to be the mass murder of civilians by Russian troops. Today, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke remotely before the United Nations Security Council where he played a video produced by his government showing some of the civilians who were killed across the country, much of which we cannot show you because the images are just so disturbing.

Zelenskyy also demanded accountability for the atrocities that numerous independent observers say Russia is committing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, PRESIDENT, UKRAINE (through translator): The massacre in our city of Bucha is only one, unfortunately, only one of many examples of what the occupiers have been doing on our land for the past 41 days. And there are many more cities similar places where the world has yet to learn the full truth.

We are dealing with a state that is turning the veto into the U.N. Security Council into the right to die. This undermines the whole architecture of global security. It allows them to go unpunished. So, they`re destroying everything that they can.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Now, Zelenskyy`s pleas have not gone entirely unheard. And today, the United States and the European Union announced a new round of sanctions against Russia including, and this is interesting, U.S. preventing Russia from withdrawing funds held in American banks to pay its debt obligations, a U.S. ban on all new investments in the country and the E.U. proposing to ban most Russian ships and trucks from entering the block as well as Russian coal imports.

But the question is, are these enough to force Vladimir Putin to reconsider or withdraw? Katherine Stoner is the Director of the Center on Democracy Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. She is author of Russia Resurrected: Its Power and Purpose in a New Global Order. And she joins me now.

Katherine, maybe first, we can just start with what these sanctions are going to do that previous rounds have not and your reaction to the announcement today.

KATHERINE STONER, DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER ON DEMOCRACY DEVELOPMENT AND THE RULE OF LAW, STANFORD UNIVERSITY: Sure. So, this is just one more step to make the financial situation for the Russian government more and more difficult to try to impede its ability to fund this war. So, this will make it harder for Russia to pay back loans that is taken on bonds. It`s got two big payments coming up.

And by not allowing it to access the money that it has held and American banks in U.S. dollars, it`s either going to have to default on those bond payments or find other ways to meet the payments. And the other sanctions that we`ve put on have limited access to dollars and euros and other forms of what they call harder tradable currency. So, it`s made things harder yet again for the Russian Government to pay its debts.

HAYES: Let`s talk about the fossil fuel sector because, I mean, I think there has been some -- a little bit of surprise at the ruble, right? So, I mean, again, the sort of technical backdrop of why this happens and how current account deficits work in dollar-denominated transactions and assets is a little complicated, but when you cut off a government like Russia from its supply of dollars, what you should see is its currency fall in value quite a bit against the dollar.

And at first, we saw that we saw you know how many rubles it takes to buy a dollar go up to 130. And now it`s essentially restored back to where it was. And then independent of that, a lot of people are looking at its revenue from oil and gas sales which due partly to its own invasion have jacked up producing projections of revenue that might be $230 billion more this year than last year. And they say, is this really going to -- is enough being done to effect Putin`s calculations?

[20:30:11]

STONER: Right. So, lots being done but we can always do more. And so, you`re right. There are really two reasons why the ruble has more or less stabilized. It`s back around 84 rubles to the dollar. I think just before the war started a week or so before, it was about 75 rubles to the dollar. And there are two reasons for this.

One is, as you mentioned, the revenue from Russia`s energy exports. It is a huge exporter of oil and natural gas, and primarily to Europe, but also to China and to India, which is a -- which is a problem actually, because while Europe may consider cutting off oil imports from Russia in particular, which is going to hurt the European economies to some degree, it`s going to be hard to get other countries to do the same, specifically China and India.

HAYES: Right.

STONER: The other reason is currency controls. That is for the rubles rebound currency controls that were instituted by the Russian government in early March limiting how much Russians can -- how many dollars Russians can via euros for six months. So, that`ll go in -- stay in play until September.

And then also limiting Russians who have hard currency accounts in Russian banks to a withdrawal of no more than $10,000. So, this has made it so that they`re basically has been digging the dollars that they have now. And this is why the U.S. government has done what it`s done is tried to make the squeeze even tighter by limiting access to other reserves of dollars.

HAYES: Right. There`s a direct connection between that sort of status quo and today`s announcement with a sort of desire to sort of put more pressure on their ability to pay dollar debts and possibly even default on some of these loans. We`ll see how much pressure that exerts in the coming weeks. Katherine Stoner, thank you very much.

STONER: Thank you very much for having me.

HAYES: Still to come, the chilling Russian pretense of the so called de knots suffocation of Ukraine, and how it`s what is driving the ongoing commission of war crimes. That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:35:00]

HAYES: In the wake of the horrifying images we`ve seen come out of the city of Bucha in Ukraine where it appears summary executions and horrifying acts are committed by Russian troops, it does make you wonder what exactly are these soldiers being told that enable them to commit these kinds of atrocities?

Russian state media is providing an answer that. The story the Russian people have been told on state media is that Ukrainians and Russians were one people and they have been kept apart, divided by a small Nazi regime that was essentially occupying Ukraine against his will. And they were told that Ukrainians would welcome Russian soldiers as liberators from this regime.

But of course, as we know, that has not been the case at all, and in fact quite the opposite. The Russian army has been repelled by an unprecedented display of national unity by Ukrainians in opposition to them. But for the Russian state media, the conclusion they broadcast to their people can`t be well, we got that wrong. Instead, the conclusion has now become the Nazi problem must be deeper than we thought.

That sentiment is summed up in this op-ed posted by a Russian state news agency which includes the following chilling passages. These are translated in English. Denazification is a set of measures aimed at the Nazified mass of the population which technically cannot be subjected to direct punishment as war criminals. However, besides the elite, a significant part of the masses of the people who are passive Nazis are accomplices to Naziism.

They have supported the Nazi authorities and indulge them. The just punishment for this part of the population is possible only as the bearing of the inevitable hardships of a just war against the Nazi system. No neutrality in the ideological and practical sense is compatible with denazification would be possible. Denazification will inevitably include de-Ukrainization.

For more on what`s driving the Russian atrocities in Ukraine, we turned to Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch, which just issued a report documenting what appears to be war crimes in Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine.

Kenneth, welcome the program. That language is deeply, deeply, deeply chilling and unnerving and has echoes across ages and regions of the world for the kind of logic used to justify crimes against humanity.

KENNETH ROTH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: That`s true, Chris. If you look at cases of mass atrocities, they almost always are preceded by an effort to dehumanize the perceived enemy. So, with the Rwandan genocide, for example, the Hutu Genocidaires spoke about Tutsis as being cockroaches, not people, but just you know, things that can be stamped out.

In the case of Ukraine, it`s actually taken a step further, in that as you just outlined, Putin has this anomaly. He claimed that Ukraine doesn`t exist as a nation, that Ukrainians would welcome in. But it turns out that even the ethnic Russians in Ukraine would prefer their nascent democracy to Putin autocratic rule.

So, how do you explain that? Well, they must be Nazified. But that -- you know, being a Nazi is a threat. Obviously, the Soviet Union Russia had a terrible experience with the Nazis German material. So, when soldiers go in and they actually come to perceive the local population as Nazis, that has, you know, lay the groundwork for atrocities.

[20:40:12]

But I think it`s important to note too that it`s not just this propaganda, you also have to look at how Russian commanders are acting because it`s not as if they`re sending a signal to troops on the ground, you know, respect the Geneva Conventions don`t execute civilians. You know, these are the same commanders who are indiscriminately bombing Kharkiv or Mariupol. They, you know, bombing the theater in Mariupol where there were hundreds of civilians taking refuge.

So, you know, from the top, you`re getting the signal, who cares about the Geneva Conventions? So, should we be surprised that the troops on the ground, you know, proceed in similar fashion? But they are, as you know, they`re talking about denazificaiton. Human rights researchers in Bucha are interviewing people who said that the soldiers were preoccupied with, you know, getting rid of the Nazis. They kept saying, we`re going to cleanse you from the dirt. And the dirt being the Nazis. And it supposedly explain why Ukraine don`t want Putin war.

HAYES: Yes. I want to read actually from the Human Rights Watch report that came out of Bucha on that account from a woman named Tatiana and just to -- just to elaborate that because I think it`s important. At one point, they brought in one young man, then four more. The soldiers ordered them to take off their boots and jackets. They made them kneel on the side of the road.

Russian soldiers pulled their T-shirts from behind and over their heads. They shot one in the back of the head. He fell. Women screamed. The other four men were just kneeling there. The commander said to the rest of the people at the square, don`t worry, you`re all normal, and this is dirt. We`re here to cleanse you from the dirt.

You really see it in that operating on the ground. I guess one question I have here is, you know, someone who is at Human Rights Watch, to cynics who say, well, all armies do terrible things in war and that`s just what war looks like. What is your response to that having looked at the reports coming out here of the Russian army, how its conducted itself, and also in Syria before this?

ROTH: Well, firstly, it`s just not true that this is every war. You know, most militaries try to abide by what`s known as international humanitarian law, which is designed to spare civilians and non-combatants as much as possible to hazards of war including, you know, capture combatants who have the same status as civilians. They cannot be mistreated or executed.

Now, the Russians are notorious for simply shredding the Geneva Conventions and ignoring them. That`s what they did in Grozny during the Chechnya war. That`s what they did in Syria where they decimated eastern Aleppo or Eastern Ghouta or deliberately targeted Idlib hospitals, schools, markets, apartment buildings. So you know, this is a government that when it encounters military resistance, responds by attacking civilians. That is Putin`s strategy.

HAYES: Kenneth Roth of Human Rights Watch, thank you so much for sharing some time with us tonight.

ROTH: Thank you.

HAYES: Tonight, the house investigation has a new cooperating witness as Ivanka Trump testified before the committee for nearly eight hours. Congressman Jamie Raskin heard it all and he joins me ahead.

Plus, for the first time since leaving office, President Obama returns the White House. And needless to say, the scene was a far cry from the last time he was there. That`s next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:45:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Vice President Biden -- vice president -- that was a joke. It is good to be back in the White House. It`s been a while.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Former President Barack Obama was back in the White House today for an event commemorating the signing of the Affordable Care Act. And as he said there, it`s been a while since the last time he was in the building.

In fact, it was five years ago, January 20, 2017, the beginning of our long national nightmare, this scene right here is he and First Lady Michelle Obama received Donald and Melania Trump for a pre-inauguration reception. It`s a time warm tradition. The outgoing President welcomes the incoming one and a courtesy that, of course, Donald Trump would not extend to the Bidens in 2021, although really thankful for that.

About an hour later, they left for the Capitol. It`s the last time Barack Obama walked out of the White House. But in his visit today, he clearly enjoyed time in his old home.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: We didn`t get everything we wanted. That wasn`t a reason not to do it if you can get millions of people health coverage and better protection. It is to quote a famous American, a pretty big deal.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Now, I`m going to sign in an executive order. And Barack, let me remind you. It`s a hot mic.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HAYES: Well, it was a throwback to when presidents used to celebrate legislative accomplishments at the White House or announced new executive order, initiatives to try to fix a loophole that`s been hitting millions of families in the Affordable Care Act. That`s not really what the last president did. He used his time to celebrate a coup with his daughter by his side.

And today, that daughter, Ivanka Trump, went before the January 6 Committee. Congressman Jamie Raskin was there and he joins me next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:50:00]

HAYES: The story we have been told about Ivanka Trump on the day of the January 6 insurrection is that she was in the White House as her father, the President, sat in the private dining room watching the riot unfold on TV, apparently reportedly with joy, presumably, we can assume eating as he was rewinding the good parts of the deadly riot to watch over again.

The story, at least as it does come down to us through anonymous sources largely, is that Ivanka would periodically enter the dining room to say something along the lines of oh, daddy, won`t you please do something to stop this awful violence at the Capitol, only to be ignored by the man watching his supporters ransack the Capitol on TV and bash in the head of cops.

This is also reported -- she`s also reported to defended the honor of Mike Pence on that day calling him a good man. And that`s most of what we know about her actions. So, the committee investigating the Trump Riot has been looking to hear from Ivanka herself for obvious reasons about these interactions and everything else she witnessed in the White House that day.

[20:55:37]

Today, they finally got that chance as Ivanka Trump finally sat for an interview with the committee spending nearly eight hours via remote video link. Congressman Jamie Raskin is a Democrat in Maryland who serves on the January 6 Committee. He was there for the interviewer and he joins me now.

Congressman, I know you can`t get into specifics, so I`m not going to ask you specifics, but at least tell us why Ivanka Trump was an important witness for the committee.

REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): Well, Chair Bennie Thompson said afterwards that she was a cooperative witness. And in that sense, she exemplifies the vast majority of the people who we have contacted who have come before the committee who have told exactly in a lot of cases, mostly what they know in other cases, but essentially, people are cooperating.

Now, tomorrow, I`m taking to the floor contempt motions against Dan Scavino and Peter Navarro who have not given us a single document and have not spent one minute before the committee interacting with complete contempt for the Congress and the American people.

So, we`re going to continue to continue to insist upon everybody`s obligation to testify before the committee. But the remarkable thing to me is how many people want to testify to unburden themselves and to tell us the truth about what took place on that fateful day.

HAYES: You know, Ivanka Trump, I think, was the last big possible cooperative witness that was sort of dangling out there. Chairman Thompson said he didn`t see a need for Mike Pence to come testify. It does seem to me like the big names have all either testified or sort of said they`re refusing and are now either, you know, being referred or in the process of being referred. Is that a fair characterization?

RASKIN: Well, you know, I`ve been reading Peter Navarro`s book, and it`s interesting that some of the hatreds that he shows towards other people like Jared Kushner, or Sidney Powell, or Mitch McConnell, kind of track the people who are being cooperative versus the coterie, the entourage around Donald Trump.

The people who are most ferociously sticking to the big lie, are the ones who are least likely to cooperate, the ones who are trying to maintain the pretense that Donald Trump won the election, that January 6 was, you know, rioters presenting flowers and hugs and kisses to the officers. Those people are the ones refusing to participate.

And then there are some people who seem to want to rejoin the rule of law and the constitutional democratic framework. And I think it`s all to the good that this major schism has erupted within the ranks of the Republicans.

HAYES: You know, one big question, and this is again, nothing -- you know, this is all public record, right? This question of what exactly was the president during in that period of time, many of the committee have asked that question. In your letter to Ivanka Trump, you said you`re particularly interested in discussions inside the White House and with the president before and after his 2:24 p.m. tweet.

That`s the one where he basically, you know, points his fury at Mike Pence saying that he didn`t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our country and in our Constitution, giving states a chance to certify a correct set of facts, not the fraudulent or inaccurate ones which they were asked to previously certify. USA demands a truth.

There`s others who have talked about the way the President behaved during that period of time. Are you confident that you can actually get to the bottom, that you will have a body of evidence that lays out what was going on during that period of time?

RASKIN: Well, we`re filling in a lot more of the detail, I will tell you, Chris. I mean, I have felt from the days of the Senate impeachment trial that the tweets spoke for themselves. Donald Trump was trying to inflame the mob and further unleash its fury against Mike Pence. It`s what the political scientists call a self-coup, where the President engages in a coup against the constitutional system. And here, Mike Pence was the target to try to force him to reject Electoral College votes from Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania.

But some people want to hear what Donald Trump was actually saying, what led in to those tweets. People want to know what were the behind the scenes struggles. And I think more and more of that information is surfacing. And of course, we did no phone calls going in from family members and from high-ranking political officials on both sides of the aisle begging Trump to intervene in him, rebuffing all of these overtures.

HAYES: All right, Congressman Jamie Raskin, thank you for your time tonight. That is ALL IN on this Tuesday night. "THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW" with Ali Velshi starts now. Good evening, Ali.