Summary
Former President Donald Trump invoked the Fifth Amendment during an appearance with New York investigators. Donald Trump appears to remain as popular as ever with his base as his endorsed candidates win their primary elections. In the aftermath of the extraordinary FBI search of Donald Trump`s home at Mar-a-Lago this week, Republicans rush to his defense. Caitlin Dickerson joins Menendez to talk about the secret history of the U.S. family separation policy.
Transcript
BEE NGUYEN (D-GA), SECRETARY OF STATE CANDIDATE: So, these are economic issues because people do not want to live in a state where the government is restricting fundamental rights.
JASON JOHNSON, MSNBC HOST: Georgia State Representative Bee Nguyen, also the Democratic nominee for Secretary of State of Georgia, thank you so much for joining us tonight.
And that`s tonight`s "REIDOUT". ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES starts right now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALICIA MENENDEZ, MSNBC HOST (voiceover): Tonight on ALL IN.
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You see the mob takes the Fifth. If you`re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?
MENENDEZ: What a difference a few years makes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Former President Trump in a new statement says he pleaded the Fifth Amendment today.
MENENDEZ: What we know about Donald Trump`s deposition in New York, what we`re learning about what led up the search at Mar-a-Lago, and a disinformation filling the vacuum as Trump lawyers refused to release the FBI search warrant.
Plus, how a new crop of MAGA primary winners raises the stakes for the Midterms. And explosive new reporting on the secret history of family separation.
JEFF SESSIONS, FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: The American people don`t like the idea that we`re separating families. We never really intended to do that.
MENENDEZ: The Atlantic`s Caitlin Dickerson has the untold story of an American catastrophe when ALL IN starts right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MENENDEZ (on camera): Good evening from New York. I`m Alicia Menendez in for Chris Hayes. 48 hours later, there are still many unanswered questions surrounding the FBI search of Donald Trump`s Florida home. Right now, the ex-president is not even in Florida. He`s in New York City to testify in a different investigation into his misconduct. This is the civil investigation into the Trump organization run by New York State Attorney General Letitia James.
Trump preemptively announced that he would not answer any questions, instead invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Something as you well know he has mocked others for doing in the past. We`ll have more on that case a little later in the show. But according to reports, it may not have been an accident at the execution of this search warrant happened while Trump was out of town.
It`s clear that the FBI wanted to conduct this search as professionally and apolitically as possible. The agents showed up when Trump was not in the state, avoiding any images of him present as agents marched boxes out of his home and onto a truck. They cooperated with Trump`s Secret Service details stationed at Mar-a-Lago. And the officials on the ground, they wear plainclothes instead of their traditional blue FBI jackets, avoiding the appearance of federal agents storming the property.
This was not a decision the Department of Justice took lightly either. The Wall Street Journal now reporting that the search came after "weeks of deliberations from top Department officials." And both the Wall Street Journal and Newsweek report that this was predicated on a tip from an informant who was aware of the additional documents at Mar-a-Lago.
And Axios is now reporting that Trump allies scrambling to find out who that person might be. Trump World is less eager, however, to share the contents of the search warrant. The source close to Trump telling NBC News "No, we`re not releasing a copy of the warrant."
From a purely political perspective, it benefits the ex-president to keep the circumstances surrounding the investigation as vague as possible. That way, you can more effectively cast himself as the victim of legal overreach, which he did again on his knockoff Twitter platform today, writing that the warrant was "a surprise attack and politics."
That is something experts have repeatedly said is not accurate. It`s not a reflection of the situation. But Trump has lots of incentives to pretend otherwise, as that same source also told NBC there has been "complete circling of the wagons of the Republican Party around Trump," even potential Republican rivals like former Vice President Mike Pence, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, they have closed ranks around Trump in response to the lawful execution of a search warrant against him.
But not all Republicans have been quite so full-throated in their support for the twice impeached ex-president. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell was a bit more muted in his belated comments.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yesterday, you released the statement in regards to the FBI raid. What are your initial thoughts about this entire situation?
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Well, the statement I released was that we need an explanation from the Attorney General as to exactly what`s going on. Hopefully, that`ll be forthcoming.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MENENDEZ: Where Mitch McConnell is right is that we do need to hear more from the Department of Justice about this investigation, or else we risk letting Trump and his allies fill the vacuum with misinformation and bad faith arguments.
Luke Broadwater is a congressional reporter for the New York Times where he covers the many investigations into Donald Trump. He is on the byline of a recent article titled FBI search of Trump`s home pushes long conflict into public view. Luke Good to see you. There has been a lot of focus on that safe the agents broke into. You have reported it was ultimately immaterial to the search. Tell me more.
[20:05:13]
LUKE BROADWATER, CONGRESSIONAL REPORTER, THE NEW YORK TIMES: Right. So -- and I think a lot of good reporting and new details are coming out about this search. Obviously, Donald Trump could clear this all up very quickly by simply releasing the search warrant and the manifest of the items that were taken from Mar-a-Lago that the Trump lawyers have in their possession that the FBI left behind.
But this was the result of months and months of work by the FBI, including and paneling a grand jury, issuing a subpoena, and obtaining surveillance video from Mar-a-Lago, interviewing witnesses connected to Donald Trump about what they knew about these classified documents and how they may have been mishandled.
And ultimately, the Justice Department, it appears, lost faith in the good faith effort of the Trump team. They didn`t believe they`re being dealt with, honestly anymore. And so, they had to do this search to try to obtain the documents that they felt had not been properly given back to the National Archives back to the federal government. These are not -- these are not ultimately Trump`s documents.
MENENDEZ: To your point about the Trump team, you report that Trump White House aides, they knew this was going to be an issue. "Discussions were held within the White House by top staff members about how to get Trump to surrender his boxes, people familiar with the event said. It`s unclear whether Trump was ever asked directly or officials simply did not take the issue to him."
And presumably, Luke, those around Trump, they understood the consequences of not properly preserving classified documents.
BROADWATER: Oh, absolutely. And I think that`s why you see that the warrant was actually signed by Justice Department lawyers connected to national security because classified documents if they fall into the wrong hands at an unsecured place like Mar-a-Lago could produce -- could provide a threat to the country.
And so, some of the top people in Trump`s team actually had grown concern in the final days of the Trump administration because there was sort of -- Trump was having people carry boxes in and out, valets and aides. No one knew exactly what he had in the boxes, and they weren`t going through the proper record-keeping procedures.
And then on the final day, when he left, a bunch of boxes left with him, and it wasn`t exactly clear what was in them or who had them. And so there was a lot of confusion in the Trump White House. People -- the underlings did not know exactly what Donald Trump was doing with these boxes according to our reporting. And so, it took some time to figure out what he had and what he didn`t have. And the National Archives was very concerned. And as you know, they requested -- they referred this matter to the Justice Department.
So, it was the National Archives really that got this whole thing started because what was happening in the Trump White House was very unusual and in their mind potentially criminal.
MENENDEZ: Here`s the thing, Luke. We still know very little about the events that led up to Monday`s event. I have a lot of questions. You have a lot of questions. I know our viewers have a lot of questions. I wonder, though if this is a scenario where we may ultimately not learn much more than we know now.
BROADWATER: Well, there`s a potential. But there are -- there are places to get the answers. I do believe at some point somebody will get the search warrant whether it`s us at the New York Times or one of the other outlets. We`re going to get a copy of it. Everyone`s pressing very hard. And we will see the answers of exactly what happened here, what did Trump have that was such a threat to the -- to the national security of the country or such a violation of federal laws about records keeping that this action had to be taken by the FBI.
You know, Merrick Garland is a very, very careful, cautious person. He is not someone who goes off sort of in crazy directions on whims. And we have to remember, a federal judge signed off on this with illegal search warrant. So, you know, the idea that this was done carelessly or recklessly I think is -- should have proper skepticism brought upon that.
MENENDEZ: Luke Broadwater, as always, thank you so much for being with us.
Jennifer Rubin is an opinion columnist for the Washington Post. Her latest piece is titled The GOP`s crazed reaction to the search at Trump`s home shows its true colors. David Rohde is an executive editor at thenewyorker.com. His latest piece is titled after the Trump raid, silence is not an option for Merrick Garland. They both join me now.
And I referenced both of your pieces because I want to speak about both of them. David, beginning with you, because you argue that A.G. Merrick Garland needs to be more forthcoming about this investigation. "The best way for garland to counter the former president`s false narratives to create public trust in the Justice Department is to prioritize transparency over secrecy. Silence is not an option in the post-Trump era."
I want you to give me a sense of what that transparency could look like and why it is so crucial in this moment.
[20:10:18]
DAVID ROHDE, EXECUTIVE EDITOR, THENEWYORKER.COM: Well, I think you`ve mentioned this. There`s sort of a vacuum. We`ve had no comment whatsoever from the Justice Department since this search was carried out. And Trump has filled that with false claims. He refuses to release the search warrant which would explain why the -- why the agents were there. And that allows him to dominate the narrative to sort of frame Garland and the FBI in this action in the way he wants.
I think Garland should be very careful going through these 10 boxes that were as you know, were taken out the new ones, and understanding what happened. But it`s a public event a search -- you know, this search. It`s - - we know that this happened. Garland would be called on The Hill by Congress to testify. So, he should describe, you know, why they did this process.
And frankly, if it was simply to, you know, to regain control of classified documents, that he doesn`t plan to charge Trump with a crime, he should make that public also because Trump is just going to continue with this messaging, you know, these false claims, this fundraising in portraying himself as a victim.
JENNIFER RUBIN, OPINION COLUMNIST, THE WASHINGTON POST: Which is wrong --
MENENDEZ: Jennifer, you have noted Republicans are already taking advantage of this moment to just spin this narrative. "The entire Republican Party with Defcon 1. What followed was a barrage of attacks on law enforcement, pledges of fidelity to a cult leader, undergoing multiple federal and state investigations and vows of revenge."
Even if the attorney general does issue a statement, is transparent, can that undo the damage that Republicans have already done?
RUBIN: I reject this entire framework. It is utterly unimportant and illegal, in fact, for the Justice Department to comment on the grand jury which apparently wanted these records. It is a contrary to Justice Department policy. It is the worst thing in the world. And over and over again, Merrick Garland has done the right thing. And Republicans know this is the right thing because they demand it in other circumstances.
They do not talk about investigations while they are ongoing. That`s because they are -- have secrecy obligations, not only with the grand jury, but with the execution of a search warrant. And it`s because it`s a bad practice. They are investigating crimes or investigating national security problems who don`t want to talk about it publicly.
They can call him up to The Hill and have whatever kind of dog and pony show they want but he`s not going to talk to them and he hasn`t talked to them. And I think the more we talk about this, why hasn`t Merrick Garland come forward as if he`s done something wrong, the evidence that we would want to know that is the manifest of the documents taken and the search warrant itself, perhaps not the affidavit that goes behind it, but certainly the manifest and the search warrant are within Donald Trump`s possession.
He doesn`t want to give them up because they obviously don`t help his cause. So, rather than trying to hound Merrick Garland and doing something that`s illegal, which it is under 60, that is revealing the goings on in a grand jury, I think we should focus on two things.
One, there seems to be very little doubt based upon reporting, that Trump did not return all the documents that were requested when they came out to visit him, and then they came back in June. That is a serious offense. And it`s such a serious offense that Donald Trump himself raised the penalty for this crime from one year to five years. When he was president, he signed a bill to increase the penalties.
There are many criminal statutes involved. And I would commend the work that Just Security has done laying out a whole bunch of criminal theories. And now, it is possible that they`re not pursuing, in this instance, a criminal investigation, that they`re investigating a national security breach, but that too, would be extremely serious. Because wasn`t there someone who said we should lock someone up for misusing classified -- a suspected classified materials? Wasn`t there someone who said that you were disqualified from office when you mishandled government documents?
I think that was Hillary Clinton who was the victim there and Donald Trump who is doing the accusation. So, I think we need to get back to what do we know, what did he do wrong, and oh, by the way, what the heck is the guy who`s running for president doing -- taking the Fifth Amendment?
MENENDEZ: Yes, David, I want to give you a chance to respond. I also want to ask you, if it does turn out that this investigation was about document recovery. Where does that then leave us? David?
ROHDE: Sorry, I didn`t -- yes, I`m sorry you cut out there. Could you tell me again? I just -- sorry -- to respond what Jennifer said, there have been -- there are announcements sometimes with the Justice Department in the course of investigations. During the 2020 election, Bill Barr said that the Democratic candidate Joe Biden was not, you know, a focus of John Durham`s investigation.
And my, my goal here is that if they -- if they do come to a conclusion in this case they`re not planning to, you know, charge Trump, they should announce that quickly. Because I just think the longer this drags on, then it allows Trump to continue with his narrative of being a victim. And then if they`re going to charge him, if they have the evidence, you know, they should do that promptly as well, because I think that having a vacuum here helps Trump.
MENENDEZ: Jennifer?
RUBIN: Oh, how the worm has turned. When he did this with Hillary Clinton when James Comey came forward 11 days before the election and said, oh, I have more information I`m investigating, everyone properly threw a fit. This is why the FBI and the Justice Department do not comment and should not comment on ongoing investigations.
And the New York Times and others can go over to Mar-a-Lago and ask for that manifest, but it`s not coming from the Justice Department, nor should it.
MENENDEZ: Jennifer Rubin, David Rohde, thank you both so much. Still to come.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Like you see on the mob, right? You see the mob takes the Fifth. If you`re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MENENDEZ: After years of saying that, Donald Trump takes the Fifth. Trump`s latest legal woes next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:20:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Taking the Fifth, I think it`s disgraceful.
What happened? He pleaded the Fifth, right? He pleaded the Fifth.
Fifth Amendment. Fifth Amendment, Fifth Amendment, Fifth Amendment, horrible, horrible.
The mob takes the Fifth. If you`re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MENENDEZ: After railing over and over about other people taking the Fifth Amendment, today the ex-President did just that. Donald Trump invoked his Fifth Amendment right and refused to answer questions during a deposition before the New York Attorney General Letitia James who is leading a civil investigation into the Trump organization`s business practices. In a statement today, Trump wrote, "I once asked if you`re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment? Now, I know the answer to that question."
Andrew Weissmann spent years in the Department of Justice from working as an Assistant U.S. Attorney to leading the FBI investigation into Enron and serving as general counsel to the FBI. Most recently, he served as a lead prosecutor in Robert Mueller special counsel investigation into Russia and the Trump campaign. He`s also the author of Where Law Ends: Inside the Mueller Investigation. And he joins me now.
Andrew, apparently, the only question that Trump answered today was his name. What are the implications of him taking the Fifth since this is a civil case? Can that then be used against him?
ANDREW WEISSMANN, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Sure. So, the first thing that I want to say is I think it`s a really deplorable for anyone in the government and certainly, the president, to be decrying and denigrating the assertion of a constitutional right. Everybody has a right to assert the Fifth Amendment if they believe that truthful answer would tend to incriminate them. And I don`t think anyone should be vilified for that, whether it`s the former president or anyone else. It`s a constitutional right and that`s what it means.
In a criminal case, if you assert the Fifth Amendment, to answer your question, that can`t be used against you in any way, shape, or form. But the rules are very different in a civil case. If you assert the Fifth Amendment, as the former president did today repeatedly in response to numerous financial questions that were posed by the New York Attorney General, an adverse inference can be drawn against you as to each of the questions as to which you asserted the Fifth Amendment, and that it is permissible in a civil case.
So, you know, the President made a calculated decision here that it was better not to risk a perjury or obstruction charge or to make his situation worse in a criminal case and to take his lumps in connection with a civil investigation that is being conducted by the New York Attorney General.
MENENDEZ: I wonder after today, where you see this case proceeding from here?
WEISSMANN: So, that`s a great question. My view is, you know, in a civil case, once the defendant who you`re thinking of charging is taking the Fifth Amendment, you have an adverse inference. So, if you`ve got some evidence, you know, all you have to do is prove the case by preponderance. And once the jury is going to be told that there`s an adverse inference against the other side, your case is pretty well done. As long as the defense can`t rebut it, you should be in really good shape.
So, I do think that this may be the very end and the last thing that the New York Attorney General was doing before she was going to level her civil charges. So, you know, again, it`s all, you know, prediction mode, but I would think that this could -- this could wrap up in fairly short order.
MENENDEZ: Turning to this Monday`s search of Mar-a-Lago. Trump reportedly gave back 15 boxes of materials that were improperly taken to The National Archives in January of this year. Why did it take the DOJ seven months to come back and get this latest round of about 12 boxes?
[20:25:09]
WEISSMANN: So, you know, we don`t know yet. There`s so much that we don`t know in terms of the back and forth. You can be pretty darn sure that with people like Merrick Garland and Lisa Monaco leading the Justice Department that they tried very hard to resolve this without resort to a search warrant. You know, I strongly suspect and I think we`re seeing indications of this in various reporting that they got information that there is classified information of such an important and singular nature that was in the possession of a civilian, that is the former president, that it needed to be retrieved, and that the risk to national security was so grave. And they could not trust the former president in his claims that he had returned everything when he had not.
So, you know, I suspect that they got that information from somebody during that seven month period. And so, while they may have been negotiating for months thinking that there wasn`t anything there, an insider could have clearly tipped them off that there was a real problem here. And just to take --
MENENDEZ: I want to --
WEISSMANN: You know the most outrageous example, I mean, imagine that the Justice Department got information that the former president didn`t just have that in his possession but was talking to people about it or giving that information to, you know, God forbid, an -- you know, a national adversary of ours. So, those are the kinds of things. Again, that`s all speculation, but those are the kinds of things that would warrant the Justice Department acting quickly.
MENENDEZ: Andrew, I want to get you in on something that we`ve talked not as much about and that is that yesterday, the January 6 Committee interviewed Trump`s Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, another member of Trump`s cabinet. Do you think there is a possible 25th Amendment angle here?
WEISSMANN: I don`t. I find the 25th Amendment is interesting because I find it interesting that people were talking about it at the time and they were understanding the volatility of the president during those last few weeks. But I think the idea of invoking the 25th, there`s so many hurdles that you have to go through to actually had the 25th Amendment become effective that in those few weeks I don`t think that was probably a terribly likely scenario.
But I think it`s an indication of the real concern and fear of people in the administration about the former president`s mental state and what he might be capable of doing during those last weeks in order to retain power.
MENENDEZ: Andrew Weissmann, as always, thank you.
Coming up, despite Donald Trump`s ever-increasing legal troubles, his grip on the Republican Party remains firm. What that means for his party`s Midterm chances next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:30:00]
MENENDEZ: In the aftermath of the extraordinary FBI search of Donald Trump`s home at Mar-a-Lago this week, the ex-President appears to remain as popular as ever with his base. His continued hold over the Republican Party, well, it was on full display last night when four of the five primary candidates he endorsed won. Among them is the newly-minted Republican nominee for governor of Wisconsin Tim Michaels. He`s a wealthy businessman who regularly touted his support from Trump on the campaign trail.
Michaels defeated the establishment candidate former Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch with the backing of former Governor Scott Walker and Vice President Mike Pence. Trump`s other big win last night came in Connecticut where the Senate candidate he endorsed just last week came through with a surprise victory. Leora Levy beat out the more moderate former State House minority leader who had the backing of the State Republican Party.
And that comes on top of all the wins he has already racked up in dozens of previous primaries and other states most recently in Arizona where his chosen candidates for Governor, Secretary of State, and Senate won their primaries last week.
Plus, in Michigan, the ex-president`s picks for Governor and Secretary of State will all be on the ballot in November. And in Washington State, Joe Kent, the Trump-endorsed candidate in the third congressional district just defeated sixth-term Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler, one of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump last year.
And of course, these wins come amid all sorts of legal trouble for the ex- president. In addition to the FBI search this week and the Department of Justice`s criminal investigation into the mishandling of classified documents, January 6 investigation into the insurrection continues in earnest with at the DOJ and in Congress. Yesterday, that committee interviewed Trump`s Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. And the New York Attorney General is advancing her investigation into Trump`s business practices.
Today, the ex-President appeared in person for a deposition where he pleaded the Fifth. Despite all of that, at least for now, Trump maintains the status as the kingmaker of the Republican Party. He`s still calling the shots in a party full of leaders that have placed fealty to him or her loyalty to our democracy because instead of leading their base, they`re following it into the abyss.
What does it all mean for the Midterms, for 2024, and with those big consequential tests democracy itself? That`s next.
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[20:35:00]
MENENDEZ: We do not know exactly what the FBI was looking for in their search of Donald Trump`s home at Mar-a-Lago or what they may have found. But we do know that this completely unprecedented move pertains to the federal investigation into the handling of classified documents that Trump allegedly removed from the White House and brought with him to Florida. And none of this, none of this has stopped Republicans from overwhelmingly rallying around the ex-President.
[20:40:10]
Yesterday, this group of conservative lawmakers from the Republican Study Committee led by Congressman Jim Banks of Indiana made a pilgrimage to Trump summer residents in Bedminster, New Jersey. They have dinner and posed for this cheerful photo full of smiles and thumbs up. But can the Republican support for Trump remain this high with multiple investigations swirling around him?
Joining me now, David Jolly, former Republican Congressman of Florida and Charles Blow who wrote in the New York Times today about the political fallout of the Mar-a-Lago search. Good to see you both. Charles, Midterms, 2024, I want to be clear, we`re not talking about horse races. We`re talking about the future of democracy itself. We talk about Trump`s continued grip on the GOP. I want you to lay out for me what is actually at stake?
CHARLES BLOW, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Well, the stakes are incredible because the Republican Party keeps nominating and in some cases electing people who say that they did not believe that the 2020 election was rightly decided and that they want to overturn it. So, I mean, it`s basically you`re voting for democracy or not in 2022 and in 2024.
But you know, it is impossible to know how this is all going to impact either of those races. Three months ago, we would have thought that this election would have been about a referendum on Joe Biden, and this kind of cockamamie whipped up frenzy around parental rights, whether that be about teaching appropriate history or trans girls and sports. That was the topic.
And all of a sudden, Roe v. Wade is overturned, and that becomes the main push. And now, you have another push, which is a president who says that he`s being persecuted and the Republican Party believes that he`s being persecuted because they believe in an ideology of persecution. They`ve been you kind of increasing their belief in this for decades now.
As they lost elements of the culture war, they took on the perception that they were the ones who are being persecuted. And because -- and when you are being persecuted, anything is fair. Anyways you fight back, no matter how brutal it is, it`s fair because it is unfair to be persecuted. And so, the raid at Mar-a-Lago actually strengthens Trump in that regard, because there is no bigger victim in America than Donald Trump. And he will play that persecution card every single time and it works.
MENENDEZ: Yes, David, there`s danger happening on multiple tracks where I want to talk about at least two of them. So, you have Trump endorsed candidates continuing to win in primaries. And I think that`s particularly important when you consider roles like Secretary of State which is going to have a lot of influence over elections in these states.
And then there`s also the fact that it`s not just that Republicans are wrapping their arms around this idea of Trump being a victim. It`s this language that they use about they`re not coming after Donald Trump, they`re coming after you.
DAVID JOLLY, FORMER REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN: That`s right.
MENENDEZ: That I have to imagine they know how dangerous that is.
JOLLY: They do. And I would also point out a nuance, Alicia. There are a lot of leading Republicans, Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, and others who are condemning the deep state, the police state, DOJ`s politicization is their accusation, but they`re not actually rushing to the defense of Donald Trump. There still is kind of this intellectual concern that we don`t know what`s going to happen with Donald Trump, so we don`t have to hug him closely to actually condemn the actions of DOJ.
That`s a nuance with very little difference if Donald Trump decides to make this a time for choosing. And I think, you know, you hit on `22. You`re right. The pretext for 24 is 22. Electing Secretaries of State and governors like in Pennsylvania that might be willing to rig or steal the `24 presidential election.
But if Donald Trump seizes on this moment and says, now is the time, this is the battle that we have been waiting for, it is the catalyzing moment that allows him to actually clear the primary and regain complete control of this party going into `24. That is a very dangerous moment, Alicia. I mean, I don`t think it`s hyperbolic to say in 2024, the fate of our Republic could be on the line if Donald Trump chooses to take the investigations that have been brought upon him and turn that into a catalyzing moment to divide neighbor against neighbor within the country going into 2024.
MENENDEZ: Well, Charles, to that point, as we`re coming on air, there was new reporting from the Washington Post that President Biden met with a group of historians this week -- last week at the White House. They told him that our democracy is, "teetering comparing the threat facing America to the pre-Civil War era and to pro-fascist movements before World War II.
I think it`s important to sort of note here to also zoom out, Charles. If this had not happened what happened at Mar-a-Lago, if Trump pleading the Fifth had not happened, we wouldn`t be talking about the ambitious Democratic agenda that is currently being unfurled. You have the house coming back to vote on Friday about the IRA, you have the Chip Deal.
I mean, there was a lot to talk about that was showing how government works. And now the attention has pivoted away from that and back to Trump.
[20:45:26]
BLOW: Yes, but we had no choice. Either we`re a country of laws or were not. And the idea of trying to play chess about if you do -- if you don`t do this, then we -- you insulate politically your narrative? If you do hold him accountable, then there`s a danger in that. You can`t do that. You literally have to say, did the man break the law or not? Because if I go into the local corner store and I steal a Snicker bar, I go to jail, right?
Why should every other American be held to the law and the President not be held to the law? Either we`re a country of laws or not. What we have to understand is that the Republican Party has basically given up on the idea of democracy because they don`t -- it no longer fits their ambitions. And once you understand it in that context, you understand that there is no win here. There -- you can`t hold off and say, you know, we won`t do it now because that`ll make them angry. We won`t do it now because that`ll make them excited. We won`t do this now, because it`ll make them circle the wagons and that`ll be bad for the next election.
They no longer believe in it. If they are electing these people in office who are saying that they are going to overturn elections or they`re not going to count legally cast votes, you cannot do that and say that you believe in democracy as we understand it here in this country. And therefore you have to. You have to. If there is evidence that Donald Trump committed crimes, you have to pursue him.
MENENDEZ: David Jolly, Charles Blow, thank you both.
Still ahead, new reporting confirms the point of Donald Trump`s child separation policy was to make families suffer. The reporter who broke that story joins me right here next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:50:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (text): When they told me it would only be five days, and then they would reunite us so we could be together, I thought it would be soon, only a matter of five days, because they had told me my kids would be waiting for me at the place they were transferring me.
When I arrived at the processing center, I asked, where are my kids? And they told me, who told you that your kids would be here? And that`s when I started feeling a strong sense of agony.
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MENENDEZ: Where are my kids? That mother was taken away from her two sons when they crossed the border back in 2017. She did not see them again for nearly four years. They were one of more than 5000 families torn apart under the Trump administration`s intentional child separation policy. Advocates say over about 1000 families remain separated to this day and that was no accident. Those families were deliberately kept apart.
It`s all a stark reminder of how destructive the Trump administration`s policies were and how they continue to devastate families even now. And that is all highlighted in a new investigative report by Caitlin Dickerson in The Atlantic Magazine. Dickerson writes, "The Trump administration declared that separating families was not the goal of the policy, but an unfortunate result of prosecuting parents who cross the border illegally with their children. Yet a mountain of evidence shows that this is explicitly false. Separating children was not just a side effect of the intent. Instead of working to reunify families after parents were prosecuted, officials work to keep them apart for longer."
I`m joined now by Caitlin Dickerson whose excellent new investigation into Trump`s cruel zero-tolerance immigration strategy is titled, An American Catastrophe: The Secret History of the US Government`s Family Separation Policy. Everyone, Caitlin, needs to read this. I want to start with the origin story of family separation. What did you learn?
CAITLIN DICKERSON, STAFF WRITER, THE ATLANTIC: The idea that separate families comes out of 9/11 actually when our country really rethought its approach to border enforcement. So, the George W. Bush administration establishes the Department of Homeland Security with this goal of preventing a terrorist attack on American soil in the future. And in doing so, they start to look really differently at illegal border crossing.
You know, in the past, you`re talking mostly about migrant laborers who were committing a misdemeanor crime that the prosecutors and judges really let go, it wasn`t a principal concern for Americans. But this desire to make sure that a terrorist attack never happened again, it also manifested in in just this idea that a single illegal border crossing was one to many.
And you know, we`re talking about illegal border crossings, but of course, jump ahead to zero tolerance. We`re talking about families who are seeking asylum. It`s a -- it`s a legal process, and it`s complicated. We can get into it. But basically, you have this idea of cracking down on the border that gets harsher and harsher and harsher over time until it culminates in the separation of families.
MENENDEZ: One of the things that was most striking about your reporting -- and again, it is a lot of words. You spent many months on this investigation, so I want folks to be able to read it. But there were a lot of bureaucrats in meetings who didn`t even realize that the meetings they were in were about family separations. How was that possible?
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DICKERSON: One of the things that was most striking to me was this very low baseline of knowledge in Washington about immigration policy. I mean, I`ve been covering immigration for years. I know it`s complicated and it`s hard, but you would expect officials in our federal government who were in charge of this issue area to really understand the nuts and bolts of it, and they didn`t.
And so as a result of that, when this idea is proposed as kind of this innocuous prosecution initiative to crack down on, you know, "illegal border crossing," people didn`t realize that that meant children were going to be put in the care of an entirely separate federal agency, one whose computer systems didn`t speak to those of DHS or DOJ, which was housing the parents. And so, it was, you know, nearly impossible to bring the parents and kids back together. People just had no idea.
MENENDEZ: It was nearly impossible to bring them back together. But even when they could, they were keeping them separated for longer. How did that become policy?
DICKERSON: So, that`s right. And that`s just one more piece of evidence that prosecutions were not the goal with zero tolerance, they were separation. Separations were the goal. You know, I uncovered lots of documents that show this to be true, but perhaps the starkest are these emails that show even in cases where parents were prosecuted quickly enough, that their children were still waiting in border patrol facilities, they hadn`t gone over to HHS yet, meaning a swift reunification could happen.
You had officials within DHS and its components saying, we can`t -- literally, "we can`t have this." This is going to take away from the goal behind this policy. It`s not, you know, "the consequence we had in mind" and basically pushing to keep these families apart for longer.
MENENDEZ: You also really got a very vivid sense of what these separations look like. Give us a sense of that.
DICKERSON: That`s right. So, I worked for months to try to get Border Patrol agents to tell their side of the story. For years, I had only heard what -- from parents and children what separation looked and felt like. And I felt it was important to have those stories corroborated. Border Patrol agents wouldn`t talk to me. I can`t tell you how many canceled interviews, you know, declined to come forward in the first place.
But I met a woman named Nerise Gonzalez, who was a Salvadoran consular worker. She watched the separations take place at a Customs and Border Protection processing facility. She described it as being like a war. I mean, she`s still traumatized by these images today literally watching hundreds of kids being separated. She said that you would have, you know, in some cases of Border Patrol agent yanking on one arm and the parent yanking on another arm, you know, of the child. Everybody, you know, in tears and inconsolable, you know, screaming.
She spent a lot of her days in the -- in the cells where children were held. And they would swarm around her. You know, they grabbed onto her. She said they grabbed onto my pants, you know, my belt, my arms, my hands, anything that they could. They begged me not to leave at the end of the day. They begged me for information about where my parents are.
I thought that was really important. Her story matches with what I`ve been hearing again for years from parents. But it was important to hear it independently from a government official but we`re still waiting to hear from American officials their side of the story about, you know, how they believe this look. But why, you know? All these details.
MENENDEZ: Also, so many stories here of children then being reunited with their families and having experienced such extreme trauma that they`re completely dissociated even as they`re finally returned to their parents just to speak to sort of the long-term trauma that was inflicted upon these children.
Of all the players here, the role that Kirstjen Nielsen played is really one that you dig into, because she argues to you that she did not want to sign off on this facing an enormous amount of pressure. What did you learn?
DICKERSON: So -- and the goal is not right to absolve her of any responsibility. Kirstjen Nielsen was the DHS Secretary and she signed off on zero tolerance, full stop. But the backstory about how and why that came to be I felt was really important, because it speaks to these inherent weaknesses in our system, in our federal government that exists today.
She basically was told several things that were untrue. One, that this type of prosecution initiative had been pursued in the past which said to her that, you know, these outcomes wouldn`t have come up because she must have figured, if these prosecutions had been done in the past, she would have heard about them if they were to go as badly awry as they ultimately did.
She was also assured that there were systems and processes in place to prevent prolong separations to ensure families would be reunified. And importantly, these assurances didn`t just come from the top, didn`t just come from the White House and people like Stephen Miller who people expected to provide them, but also from people like the head of Customs and Border Protection and the head of ICE who are career experts in immigration enforcement, had served both Democratic and Republican administrations, and should have known and should have conveyed to her that in fact, these systems did not exist.
MENENDEZ: Caitlin Dickerson, this is absolutely extraordinary heartbreaking reporting. Thank you for all of the work that you`ve put into this and for continuing to follow this story.
DICKERSON: Thank you.
MENENDEZ: That is all I have this time on ALL IN this Wednesday night. "MSNBC PRIME" starts right now with Ali Velshi. Hi, Ali!
ALI VELSHI, MSNBC HOST: Alicia, good to see you again. You have yourself a fantastic evening and we`ll see you tomorrow.
And thanks to you at home for joining us this hour.