Summary
New sanctions target Russian banks and Putin`s daughters. Russian forces fall back to regroup and resupply. Biden accuses Russians of major war crimes. Russian state media urges liquidation of Ukrainian leadership.
Transcript
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: That`s Paul Krugman tomorrow on "THE BEAT" on all of this. I encourage you to DVR or tune in.
That does it for us. THE REIDOUT with Joy Reid is up next.
JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: Good evening, everyone. We begin THE REIDOUT with the continued fallout over Russian atrocities in Ukraine. Today, the White House unveiled a severe new round of punitive measures aimed squarely at Putin`s regime. That includes full sanctions on two Russian banks effectively blocking their access to the U.S. financial system. President Biden is prohibiting all Americans from making any new investments in the Russia Federation and he`s now targeting Putin`s daughters as well as the families of top Kremlin officials freezing their assets in the U.S.
The administration has also authorized another $100 million worth of lethal military aid to Ukraine, which will arrive in a matter of days. This comes as the Justice Department cracks down on Russian cybercrime, announcing yesterday that they`ve shut down the largest criminal marketplace in the world, which was based in Russia. They`ve also disrupted a major malware attack planned by Russian military intelligence and they`re working with international partners to investigate Russian war crimes.
Meanwhile, having failed to meet their objectives in the north, Russian forces are pulling back to regroup for a new offensive in Eastern Ukraine. But as they complete their retreat from the suburbs of Kyiv, they`re revealing scenes of horror in their wake. And let`s just be clear, Putin`s senseless slaughter is of no strategic benefit to Russia. It serves no military purpose. It only proves the depths of Putin`s depravity.
Today, President Biden spoke about the atrocities in Bucha, where Russian forces deliberately massacred the civilian population.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: I`m sure you`ve seen the pictures from Bucha and outside Kyiv, bodies left in streets as Russian troops withdrew, some shot in the back of the head with their hands tied behind their backs, civilians executed in cold blood, bodies dumped into mass graves, a sense of brutality and humanity left for all the world to see unapologetically. There is nothing less happening than major war crimes. Responsible nations have to come together to hold these perpetrators accountable.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: We`re also getting new images from another war torn city, 15 miles from Bucha, where Russian forces targeted buildings that civilians used as shelters.
Here is NBC`s Richard Engel.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD ENGEL, NBC NEWS CHIEF FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT: Unfortunately, what these rescue workers are doing is not looking for survivors. There were shelters under these buildings, that building, another building right here. And local officials don`t know exactly how many people were in the shelters but they say hundreds at least, most of them women and children. And when these buildings came down, all the debris blocked access to the shelters entombing them effectively.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: The Kremlin is justifying the horrors in the name of the so-called de-Nazification of Ukraine. And yet, it is now clear that no regime of this century better resembles the Third Reich than Putin`s Russia. To that point, we`ve seen the Kremlin embrace genocidal rhetoric in state run media outlets, that includes a recent op-ed that brazenly calls for the lustration and liquidation of Ukraine`s leadership and a significant part of their population. That article was so incendiary President Zelenskyy said it should be used as evidence against Russia in a future war crimes tribunal.
The extent of the Kremlin`s atrocities underscores their deprave and historic indifference toward human life. We have seen that in Russia`s the eight-year war in Donbas, which has killed more than 14,000 people. We saw it when pro-Russian militants downed Malaysian Flight MH-17 over Ukraine`s border with Russia in 2014, killing everyone on board.
There is an even longer and darker history behind all of this because we`re seeing -- what we`re seeing today is reminiscent of the 1933 Russian genocide in Ukraine known as the Holodomor. That`s when Joseph Stalin purposefully starved to death upwards of 4 million Ukrainians under his policy of forced collectivization.
Joining me now is Julia Davis, Columnist for The Daily Beast, and Dr. Chile Eboe-Osuji, former President of the International Criminal Court, Professor of Law at Stanford University and author of International Law and Sexual Violence in Armed Conflicts. Dr. Eboe-Osuji, thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate you being here.
I want to allow you for a moment to listen to Secretary of State Antony Blinken commenting not just on the atrocities but on the documenting of them because there are journalists there.
[19:05:00]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: This is, in some ways, the most documented war in real-time that we`ve experienced because of technology, because of smart phones, because of the incredible courage of reporters who remained in Ukraine. But even so, there are things that we`re not seeing in real-time, including Bucha, and it`s only when that tide recedes that you see what`s actually happened.
So, I think we`re going to learn a lot more in the days and weeks ahead. I`m afraid what we`re going to learn is even more horrifying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: And so President Zelenskyy has called for a Nuremberg-style trial over the atrocities that we`ve seen. Can that happen? And in your view, will that happen?
CHILE EBOE-OSUJI, FORMER PRESIDENT, INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT: Yes, that can happen if there is a resolve on the part of the international community to see it happen. It`s about the political will to do it.
There are two ways to happen, as we speak. There are four crimes known in international law, you have the crime of genocide, you have crimes against humanity, you have war crimes and then you have the crime of aggression.
The first three, except the crime of aggression, can already be engaged because of what`s happening on the Ukrainian territory. The International Criminal Court would have jurisdiction to try those three crimes. Genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, where there is evidence to prove that.
Where the ICC Cannot try because of the veto power that Russia has at the United Nations Security Council is the crime of aggression, because the big powers make sure that the International Criminal Court would not have independent jurisdiction of other crime of aggression unless the U.N. Security Council refers such a case to the ICC, where the culprit, so to speak, is not a member state of the Rome Statute, and Russia is not that. So, you will not have the Security Council referring the crime of aggression to the ICC because Russia is not a state party.
But the other three war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, if there`s proof for fact, the ICC can have the jurisdiction over that. So, it is possible to have trials for those three already.
Now, about the crime aggression, it requires the setting up of a special tribunal, which I understand some leaders, global leaders are making the move for. So, that`s, in a nutshell, the run of things relating to your question whether it can happen, yes, it can happen.
REID: And one just follow-up question. Would evidence that Russia has or its leadership has expressed the desire to end the existence of Ukraine, has deported hundreds of thousands, they claim 600,000 Ukrainians have been brought inside Russia, I assume they cannot leave, including lots of children, the idea that they claim Ukraine doesn`t exist.
The Canadian Broadcast Corporation actually sort of ran a translation of this op-ed that ran in Russia that justified erasing the Ukrainian identity. It claims that the word Ukraine itself is synonymous with Nazism and cannot be allowed to exist. The former Canadian ambassador to Ukraine said it essentially is the rhetorical license to kill. They`re essentially erasing the identity of Ukrainian people. Is that evidence, in your view, of genocide?
EBOE-OSUJI: Definitely serious evidence of intent to commit genocide if you -- it depends on who said it. If it`s the genocide, it`s more a crime of intent, really. Let`s say it focuses a lot on intent to destroy a national group, racial group, religious group or ethnic group, destruction of that group in whole or in part makes the crime of genocide.
So, once that intent is there, you do not need to kill a whole lot of people for you to have a crime of genocide. Evidence like that, if it has shown anybody who has killed anyone had that intent, you had yourself a serious case of genocide to be tried.
REID: Yes, indeed. And so, Julia, talk a little bit about what you`re seeing and hearing on Russian state T.V. Because one must presume that what you`re hearing of Russian state T.V. is what the Kremlin once said, therefore, they agree with it. You`ve been tweeting about and reporting about some of the really horrific things that they`re saying.
[19:10:03]
Tell us about those.
JULIA DAVIS, THE DAILY BEAST, COLUMNIST: There has been a continuous drum beat that sounds definitely like a genocidal language. They repeatedly say, including Russian lawmakers that in position to make decisions to speak to members of the military, they`re constantly saying that Ukraine does not need to exist. Even a small part of it cannot be allowed to remain. The same about Ukrainian identity, about Ukrainian language, and the article that you referenced specifically said that even though you Ukraine does not Nazi government, it does not have Nazi laws, they have decided to be creative about it and simply say that anyone who wants to be independent of Russia is a Nazi.
That would certainly explain their behavior in Bucha, where they killed random civilians probably because they did not embrace the Russian law. And that is what I`m hearing on their state media. And also what is extremely disturbing, they are already predicting that the so-called provocations will be repeated, so that means there are more atrocities that are yet to be uncovered and they already know what they have done. They`re already preparing their audiences that there will be more to come out.
REID: Just to be clear, Julia, are they articulating that the purpose at this point of this war is not territorial acquisition, it is extermination of any Ukrainian who refuses to become Russian?
DAVIS: Exactly. And they`re talking about territories as though they already are not Ukrainian territory. They say territory of the country formerly known as Ukraine. They`re talking about what pieces they want to partition and keep, what pieces they should offer up to Poland or some other country. They`re speaking about Ukrainians as though they have ceased to exist. They talk about placing them in reeducation camps, in forced labor camps and they`re talking generations of Ukrainians that will have to be reeducated to forget their Ukrainian identity and the rest would have to die.
REID: So, sir, Dr. Eboe-Osuji, does that sound to you like genocide?
EBOE-OSUJI: If you have facts, also declaration being made by an accused person, somebody who committed killings, somebody who committed deportation, somebody who committed removing children of an ethnic group to a national group to put them to another group, if you have that kind of declaration, , it points to that genocidal intent that international law has laid down.
I think it would be too much to debate, to expect much of a debate about that. I mean, if you have that declaration and then it is acted upon by the person who hampers that intent or who shares that intent, you have a serious case of genocide.
We saw that in Rwanda, for instance, people who -- desires of eliminating another ethnic group and subscribing to it and getting out and killing people, a lot of them were convicted, who were tried by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. I was one of those. I used to be a prosecutor at that tribunal. Yes, it worked well. So, people were convicted of genocide for that kind of talk or intent.
REID: And I`m glad that you brought that up because in the case of the Hutu and the Tutsi, they weren`t different ethnic groups. They had invented these differences that were colonial impositions upon them and decided to kill on the basis of it. It`s one of the most repugnant acts that we`ve seen in the world. And I`m glad that you prosecuted the people that were involved in doing it. That is a peaceful country now but they had the same sort of false divisions and claiming that these others were foreigners when they were not. But in the case of Ukraine and Russia, they`re different countries. Yes, I`m sorry, sir, go ahead.
EBOE-OSUJI: One thing here, when all this -- of course, we lawyers, we like to talk about how you prove a case and how you prove a case beyond reasonable doubt, and you have all these Russian leaders now denying what is going on.
One thing that worries everyone is this -- how it all started. This war of aggression is a crime in international law. And you saw this Russian president smugly declared himself to invade Ukraine under some special military operation.
[19:15:03]
International law doesn`t care what you`re doing as long as you have upped and attacked another country that has not attacked you or that`s not about to attack you, that is the crime of aggression. It is a war of aggression. It is a crime in international law. And it hasn`t described very aptly as the supreme international crime because it has within it a combination of all the other evils of the conflict or international crimes you can have.
REID: Yes, indeed.
EBOE-OSUJI: That kind of thing you have people commit genocide perhaps against humanity all rolled up into that crime of aggression. So, Mr. Putin, I would say, had himself, dug himself into that big hole after attacking another country on the 24th of February 2022.
REID: Indeed. Thank you for that education for our viewers. Julia Davis, I always appreciate you. Former ICC President Dr. Chile Eboe-Osuji, thank you so much.
And up next on THE REIDOUT, women have been fleeing the bounty law in Texas for Oklahoma to get safe, legal abortions there. But now Oklahoma is fast tracking an abortion ban that is just as bad, maybe even worse than the one in Texas.
Plus, Senator Elizabeth Warren joins me as President Biden announces new help for people struggling with their student loan debt. But does it go far enough?
And don`t be surprised to see the return of Trump`s itchy Twitter finger. Elon Musk is the new power at the social media giant and he is phoning the runways for the return of the trolls.
THE REIDOUT continues after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:21:28]
REID: The Republicans of Gilead strike again, approving a near total ban on abortion, this time in Oklahoma.
The measure was part of a wave of stringent abortion restrictions enacted by legislators in Republican-led states. And now far right, conservative- dominated Supreme -- the far right conservative-dominated Supreme Court appears poised to gut abortion rights entirely.
The Oklahoma measure would make performing an abortion a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $100,000 fine. The only exception would be to save the life of a woman in a medical emergency. It will now head to Republican Governor Kevin Stitt, who has vowed to sign every piece of pro- life legislation that comes to his desk.
These efforts to set our country back five decades are not just coming from state legislators. A new -- a few prominent members of Trump`s sedition caucus and others have also made very weird and, frankly, unhinged comments defending abortion bans in the name of their Christian faith, revealing their true beliefs on the purpose of women to be vessels for baby-making and serving men.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MADISON CAWTHORN (R-NC): Eternal souls woven into earthen vessels, sanctified by almighty God and endowed with the miracle of life are denied their birth by a nation that was born in freedom.
KAYLEIGH MCENANY, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: And the anecdote to darkness is light. And the anecdote to a really grim future is filling the world with a lot of Christian babies who could bring that light to the world.
STEVE BANNON, FORMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF STRATEGIST: Hey, if you want to save Western -- the Judeo-Christian West, if you want to save civilization, start by having babies. Simple. Let`s start there, right?
We will train them up. We will get it done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Lord Jesus.
Joining me now is Robert Jones, CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute, and author of "White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity," and Emily Wales, interim CEO and president of Planned Parenthood Great Plains, which oversees the region that includes Oklahoma.
And I do want to start with you first, Emily.
This bill is not just impacting Oklahoma. It`s also impacting Texas. I mean, a lot of Texas women were fleeing to Oklahoma because Texas has the bounty law. Talk about the impact of this law on women in your state and your neighboring state.
EMILY WALES, INTERIM CEO, PLANNED PARENTHOOD GREAT PLAINS: You`re absolutely right.
In the last seven months, we have been serving Texans in crisis. And, right now, we`re seeing more Texans than Oklahomans on a daily basis who need abortion care. We know what a crisis looks like and how desperate these patients are. We see it every single day in their faces.
And if Oklahoma enacts the same type of law, we will only be pushing patients farther out. People won`t stop seeking abortion care, but they will be fleeing if they have resources to neighboring states.
REID: And the bottom line being that Isn`t the goal here, in your view -- I don`t know -- I won`t say, is it?
I will just ask you if you think the goal might be to put a law up that is so extreme, a woman would have to literally be in an actual emergency, in an -- with an ambulance pulling up, in order to get a legal abortion now in the state of Oklahoma, that people like Planned Parenthood would be tempted to sue, and then it gets appealed and appealed and appealed, and it lands right there in the minimum 5-4 far right court that John Roberts can`t even stop from just destroying abortion rights altogether?
Isn`t that the fear?
WALES: No, we`re absolutely terrified that that`s going to be the situation.
We`re focused on patient care every day, but our patients are confused. They`re asking us why their constitutional rights are different in one state than another. And the Supreme Court has now had the Texas case a number of times and failed to intervene.
So, the reality that we could be living in the same situation here at home is very, very real to us. And our patients are scared. Already, we have patients who were asking us about their ability to get contraception or other services because they know their rights are under attack.
[19:25:08]
REID: Well, good. At least they`re awake. At least they understand what`s happening.
Robbie, I always like having you on. Look, right now, 2022 alone, I`m just going to read this from the Guttmacher Institute, 529 restrictions-plus passed in 41 states, 48 restrictions pass through one chamber, at least, in 13 states, nine restrictions in five states.
It`s going everywhere. And it`s really on a clip. And it`s only happening because they now have a 6-3 court. So, even John Roberts` institutionalism can`t stop them. You saw youth pastor Madison Cawthorn up there trying to act like he was preaching.
This is Christian nationalism. This is part of their dogma, no?
ROBERT JONES, CEO, PUBLIC RELIGION RESEARCH INSTITUTE: Well, I think you`re right to link this up. And I think you`re right to call it extreme.
There`s no issue that we really have more data on then the legality of abortion. We have five decades of data on what Americans think about this, right? It`s really clear. The latest data we have at PRRI, six in 10 Americans support the legality of abortion.
And there you hear the Christian language, right, Judeo-Christian, invoked, and as if this is a Christian issue. But the truth is, in the American landscape, there`s really only two religious groups in the American landscape that oppose the legality of abortion. They`re both evangelical groups. It`s white evangelical Protestants and Latino evangelical Protestants.
But white Catholics, Latino Catholics, African-American Protestants, Jews all support the legality of abortion. And, in fact, when we get down to looking at these near total bans or total bans, what`s also striking is that only 15 percent, that`s 1-5 percent of Americans say abortion should be illegal in all cases.
And there`s no state in the country, including the most conservative states, where more than a quarter in that state say that abortion should be illegal in all cases. And in Oklahoma, news flash, it`s 15, exactly what the national average is; 15 percent of Oklahomans, that`s all, support a total ban on abortion.
REID: But here`s the here`s the thing, Robbie. This comes back to what you wrote in your book and what you do in your research.
Do these people even care about that? Do they believe in the separation of church and state? Or do they not believe that Christian -- this Christian minority, even if they are only 15 percent of the population, ought to make the laws when it comes to what women are allowed to do with their bodies?
JONES: Well, I think it`s right to go there. You used Christian nationalism earlier. It is a kind of dominionism, right, a kind of Christian dominionism, that is not new.
REID: No.
JONES: I mean, it`s been with us for quite some time, but it`s found new energy with Trump, with the Trump administration and afterward.
And so you gave the number of bills there. But we talked about before the number of bills that are against Critical Race Theory, the number of bills that are attacking LGBTQ rights in this country. They`re of a piece here.
And if you`re asking, what`s going on, what holds them together, I mean, maybe one more poll question -- since I`m pollster, I will give you one more -- is this question we have asked. It`s a very big picture question, but I think it links it all together. And that is a question that asks, do you think that American culture and way of life has changed for the better or changed for the worse since the 1950s?
The country is fairly divided on that question, but the two political parties are mirror images of one another. Two-thirds of Democrats say it`s changed for the better. Two-thirds of Republicans say it`s changed for the worse.
REID: Right.
JONES: But there are no groups that say it`s changed for the worse more than conservative white Christian groups.
So, part of what holds this together is this kind of, as these groups are declining, they`re no longer majority culturally or demographically in the country, it is this kind of last kind of flailing and extreme effort really to kind of drag the country back to a time when they really were the political cultural majority that they no longer are today.
REID: And I think everybody watching this show needs to understand, and you need to be really clear about this.
They were patient, and they built a 6-3 court, so that, again, even John Roberts` institutionalism can`t stop them. They are one Supreme Court decision away from making abortion illegal in the entire United States.
If you don`t think they`re going to also come for contraception, you`re fooling yourself. They want to create a white Christian identity movement that`s national and that cannot be stopped, cannot be stopped, because the Supreme Court will affirm it. Watch it happen.
You all don`t want to vote, you better vote, especially for senators, because that`s who decides who gets on the court. And they have built this court on purpose for a reason. You all got to wake up.
Robert Jones, Emily Wales, who is living this nightmare already in Oklahoma, thank you both very much.
Still ahead: Senator Elizabeth Warren is here to talk about the life- changing impact of the Biden administration`s extended pause on student loan payments and much more.
We`re back after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:34:24]
REID: We are just seven months away from the midterm elections, and the Republican Party has successfully ground President Biden`s domestic agenda to a slow crawl, which, let`s not forget, was always the goal. And they can thank Senators Sinema and Manchin for getting that done.
Today, we saw the fruits of their labor. A new Morning Consult and Politico poll shows that voters who received the expanded child tax credit payments in 2021 are no longer willing to reward the party that gave it to them. An increasing number of them are now inclined to vote for Republicans.
Democrats, who had a 12-point advantage with those voters in December, saw that lead evaporate. Because of Senate gridlock, President Biden has got to go it alone. This morning, the president announced an extension of the moratorium on federal student loan payments, interest and collections through the end of August.
[19:35:09]
More importantly, the administration also announced that it will give roughly seven million borrowers who are in default a fresh start. That means that their accounts would be restored to good standing.
Joining me now is Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
And, Senator, thank you for being here.
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA): Thank you for having me.
REID: Good to see you in person.
As somebody who took a really long time to pay back my student loans, and my husband, we`re still working -- I mean, he got all of his -- did his education through student loans. This is great news to me.
But there are a lot of people who create a moral hazard argument against helping people with paying back their student loans. And what do you say to them? They`re like, well, don`t do that, because I paid mine back. You should pay yours back.
WARREN: Sure.
Part of it is, we have to remember who takes out student loans. It`s not rich people, and it`s not people who aren`t trying. It`s people who just weren`t born into families that could afford to write a check for them to go to college.
And yet we want to invest in those people. Now, when I was hitting college age, the way we invested is, we made those public universities almost tuition-free. I went to college, graduated, $50 a semester, got my four- year diploma and became a special education teacher.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: That opportunity is not out there today.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: So, we say to young people, you need post-high school education, but good luck to you. The most we will do is lend you some money for it.
So they take on these loans. And the difficulty is now with the loans, 40 percent of them never graduate from college.
REID: Right.
WARREN: Life happens. They have babies. They`re working three jobs. Their mom gets sick. They have to move.
Do we really want to say, don`t even try?
REID: Yes.
WARREN: Because that`s what we`re saying when we say, you have got these loans now, that you earn at a high school graduate`s level, but you`re going to have to pay back all this college debt.
Or look at it another way. It`s a race issue, it`s a gender issue, it`s an equality issue. African-Americans borrow more money to go to school, borrow more money while they`re in school, have a harder time paying it off when they get out.
In fact, let me just give you one stat on this. And that is, we have now studied people who are 20 years out. And the average white borrower owes about 5 percent of what they originally borrowed. Ten, 20 years, they`re still paying, but the end is in sight.
The average black borrower, 95 percent. And I got -- it`s got to look like you`re going to pay until you drop.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: The president could cancel $50,000 of student loan debt.
And, if he did, that would help close the black-white wealth gap for people with student loan debt by 27 points. There`s not a single thing the president of the United States could do to help close that gap more.
REID: Well, why doesn`t he do it?
Because the other thing is, doing the moratorium -- and he`s only extending it until August.
WARREN: Yes.
REID: There`s an election in November. Good policy is often good politics.
WARREN: Yes.
REID: One of the things you hear the most about is student loan debt from younger voters...
WARREN: Yes.
REID: ... who are now discouraged and don`t want to vote for Democrats, and they would if they were interested.
But this is an issue to them. Why not extend it? Why not do the $50,000? What is the political argument from the White House that you hear back about why they won`t do it? Is it a Manchin-Sinema thing? They will get punished by Manchin for someone else?
WARREN: So, I`m not going to try to take the other side of this argument, because I really just don`t believe it.
The bottom line is, it`s a way to help close the racial wealth gap. It`s a way to help close the gender gap. Women now carry two-thirds of all student loan debt. And, by the way, black women are the single biggest -- they are carrying the biggest debt load of any group.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: So, keep that one in mind. It`s an equality opportunity. But here`s the thing.
Even if you don`t have student loan debt, even if you don`t know anyone who has student loan debt, which means there are like four of you out there. But, no matter what, you still would be helped if we cancel student loan debt. And the reason is because this is about investing in our economy overall, in the same ways that we invest in roads and bridges, we invest in public education, because, ultimately, it helps us all.
This student loan debt burden is keeping young people from moving out of mom and dad`s house.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: It`s keeping them from buying homes.
REID: It`s like a mortgage payment.
WARREN: It`s keeping them from starting businesses.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: This is data out of the Treasury Department, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
We help get rid of that debt burden, then that frees up a whole lot more people to be part of this economic engine.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: In other words, canceling that debt, oh, it profoundly helps those people.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: But it helps our whole economy.
REID: And those -- you just described the people in the Democratic base, especially black women and young people, because the reality is, I -- look, I can remember coming out of college...
WARREN: Yes.
REID: .. and that automatic payment that gets sucked out of your bank account.
[19:40:03]
That means do you cannot spend that money on anything else.
WARREN: Right.
REID: You can`t invest in a business. You can`t do anything, but just, basically, you`re slave to that withdrawal every month.
WARREN: Exactly.
REID: I have to ask you something else.
WARREN: Sure.
REID: You are an Oklahoman. A lot of people associate you with Massachusetts, but you`re originally Oklahoman.
WARREN: Born and raised.
REID: This law that`s passed there -- we just talked about it in a previous segment -- that essentially bans abortion, number one, I want you to comment on it.
And, number two, are you worried that, if the Planned Parenthood side of things, and the normal -- those of us, the majority, if it`s appealed, and it winds up in the United States Supreme Court, that could be the vehicle for ending Roe v. Wade altogether?
WARREN: So, look, I grew up in Oklahoma, and I grew up at a time when abortion was illegal.
But, even as a little girl, I understood that women still got abortions.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: Rich women just went somewhere else. They could travel and had plenty of access to abortion. And poor women went to back alleys.
Understand that, even if Oklahoma says, we`re going to prosecute people for trying to get an abortion, those abortions will still occur. It`s just a question of how much danger, how much risk, and how hard this falls on the poorest and on the most vulnerable.
I see what`s happening in Oklahoma as just one more piece of evidence that an extremist Supreme Court is no longer just laying down the rules. They are emboldening people in the state legislatures to actually break the law.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: Right now, today, today, Roe vs. Wade is still the law of the land.
REID: Yes, it is.
WARREN: And yet the Oklahoma state legislature is clearly just thumbing its nose at that law, because it believes that, ultimately, an extremist court will back them up.
REID: That`s right.
WARREN: Which is why I want to pick up on what you said earlier, the importance of voting.
Keep in mind, Roe vs. Wade, we don`t have to wait until we take back the majority in the Supreme Court. Two-thirds of all Americans want to see Roe vs. Wade as the law of the land.
REID: Could pass in the Senate.
WARREN: In a democracy, that means it ought to happen.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: So, we could pass it in the Senate, we could pass it in the House, if we could get enough votes.
REID: Yes.
WARREN: So, help us get rid of the filibuster. We actually already have the votes to support Roe vs. Wade in the Senate.
REID: But you don`t have 60.
WARREN: Get rid of the filibuster, and that`s one of the things that we could do in order to do what the American people sent us here to do.
REID: Indeed.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, it`s always a pleasure.
WARREN: And it`s always good to see you.
REID: Thank you very much. All right.
Up next: From free speech to individual freedoms, the so-called free state of Florida is exporting its own pick and sample of legislative hypocrisy, and other Republican-led states are lapping up the Kool-Aid.
Stay with us.
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[19:47:30]
REID: If Republicans have their way, we will all be Florida.
Look no further than Ohio, where Republicans introduced a copycat parental rights or, as opponents call it, don`t say gay bill. It combines elements of Florida`s law prohibiting discussion of gender or sexuality in primary schools with another one banning the teaching of -- quote, unquote -- "divisive concepts" about race.
Sounds like fascism the kind Ron, the junior Don, DeSantis is pushing even further with his war against Disney over its opposition to Florida`s don`t say gay law. He signaled support for revoking a 55-year-old law giving Disney special privileges of self-governance around its theme park in Orlando.
It seems that Florida`s largest private employer taking a stand against the law that hurts its employees and their families has triggered Ron`s brand of bro fascism, freedom for people like him, while he spends his gubernatorial time bullying LGBTQ people and teachers and women and people of color.
His Stop WOKE law also mandates how businesses in Florida can talk about race. Hmm. I thought right-wingers hated mandates. Ah, yes, they only hate mandates that keep people from dying of COVID, which is why Ron has gone to war over vaccinations, giving Florida the authority to fine companies over their mandates.
But it`s not just chairman Ron. The party of giving corporations whatever they want has a new stance, but only when companies stand up to them. Those companies get punished for so-called wokeness.
In Georgia, Republicans targeted Delta Air Lines and Major League Baseball for daring to voice opposition to their Jim Crow voting law. And Ron DeSantis` message is crystal clear: Disagree with me, problems for thee.
Ron is mad that Disney is not being obedient and instead is defying him on his anti-LGBTQ law, even though he once included a big old carve-out for Disney in his anti-tech, please love me daddy Trump law punishing social media companies for banning politicians.
He`s now calling that same law, which his staff helped write, embarrassing. Apparently, special privileges are over when you`re not on Ron`s side.
But, anyway, DeSantis` punitive free speech anti-tech law was put on ice by a federal judge for potentially violating free speech. But fear not, right- wingers. Another bro fascist is waiting in the wings to defend your right to spew bile online in the name of free speech.
And that is coming up next week.
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[19:54:01]
REID: Fear not, right-wingers. Another fighter in the battle for -- quote -- "free speech" is stepping in.
Elon Musk was appointed to Twitter`s board of directors a day after the disclosure that the billionaire space cadet is now the company`s largest shareholder, after buying up nearly 10 percent of the company. Twitter decided to let a fox mine the henhouse, since Musk has recently questioned Twitter`s commitment to free speech and mused about a potential new social media platform. I guess TRUTH Social ain`t it.
And right-wingers are just giddy about the self-proclaimed free speech absolutist joining Twitter`s board. The House`s dumbest member, Lauren Boebert, wasted no time asking Elon to bring back the bad orange man. Twitter says it has no plans to reverse any policy decisions.
But others who got the boot are also openly lobbying to be reinstated. From his purgatory the Telegram, loud and proud white nationalist Nick Fuentes also beg -- was also begging for his account back, adding that banning him was a bigger deal than banning Trump.
With me now, Anand Giridharadas, publisher of The.Ink newsletter and author of "Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World."
I want to point you to an Anil Dash tweet, which I think kind of sums it up well: "I`m trying to imagine any other context where a publicly traded company has seen a customer use their product to break federal law and try to destroy the lives of innocent people and then added that person to the board."
[19:55:11]
Elon Musk has been sued for comparing -- I mean, he compared Justin Trudeau to Hitler. He was sued for defamation for calling a British cave diver pedo guy. Like, he`s not exactly, like -- I don`t know -- your thoughts on him now basically being Twitter`s biggest owner.
ANAND GIRIDHARADAS, PUBLISHER, THE.INK: Yes, I`m glad you brought up winners take all, because, although there was 300 pages of book there, there was really one simple idea buried in that 300 pages, which is that we live in this moment in which the arsonists are cosplaying as firefighters.
The people who cause our greatest social problems, global problems are trying to con us into thinking not only that they`re OK, but that they are the solution to the problems they have caused.
So, look at Musk. Musk has built his business through government subsidies years ago, and now turns around, stiffs the government on taxes and explains how inefficient government spending is and he can do everything better privately in space and elsewhere.
He is building in Tesla a documentedly racist company that perhaps reminds him, gives him nostalgic memories of apartheid South Africa, where he grew up. And on social media, to the point of your intro, he has been charged by the SEC with misleading investors and paid millions in fines.
He`s, more than that, an embodiment of what I would say is Twitter`s biggest strategic problem, which is a hostile, cruel, dangerous online environment, especially for women, especially for people of color, women of color in particular.
Ask anybody if you don`t -- if that`s not your experience of it, ask someone who might know.
REID: Oh, it is.
GIRIDHARADAS: And Musk embodies that bullying, that bro harassment, the pedo guy, saying -- you can`t do that unless you`re one of the world`s richest people, just call someone a pedo with no basis.
And he won the case, even though he did it, because he`s the world`s richest guy. And so here we have now, after someone who has helped make Twitter worse every day, the arsonist, is coming back to cosplay as firefighter. He is going to be at the board seat, Joy...
REID: Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: ... discussing how to make Twitter safer, how to make it better.
And his agenda has been telegraphed very clearly, less control. At a moment when Twitter`s greatest opportunity and need is for greater control of Nazism on the platform, of doxxing and brigading of women and ruining women`s lives for having opinions on Twitter, controlling that, he wants the opposite. And they have welcomed him to their board.
REID: And the thing is, he wasn`t even honest about -- I mean, he broke the law already. So he delayed filing this form that he`s supposed to do, when he`s supposed to disclose that he`s bought 9.2 percent of the company. He didn`t do that. He delayed it.
He made 100 and -- what does he -- what did he earn here? He made $156 million by delaying the disclosure of his stake. He made a ton of money, waited more than 20 days to do the disclosure. So he made money. But that`s not even legal. He will get away with that too.
And I don`t know if you -- I worry about part of what you said there. We are coming up to an election where you`re going to probably have now a flood of misinformation again, maybe Trump back in play, all the dangers, all the little Nazis that used to be on there, the QAnoners, he might bring them all back.
What`s the danger of that? Will it actually break Twitter?
GIRIDHARADAS: Our democracy doesn`t have terrific odds right now, as you cover every night on this broadcast for a gazillion different stories that are all kind of intersecting and coalescing in one historical moment.
It doesn`t have great odds. One of the things, making those odds even worse every day is that a growing chunk of Americans, a significant minority, are no longer dwellers of the land of reality. They live in a fantasy.
And it`s not a fantasy of their own private bedroom concoction. It is a fantasy manufactured by some of the richest and most powerful and intelligent people on Earth, who know better, and profit from making those people believe those things, so they can get right-wing, authoritarian, fascist governments to give them a tax cut, cut some regulation, repeat and rinse.
And Elon Musk is the fox coming into the henhouse. And it is shameful that Twitter, which has a fiduciary obligation, I would think, to protect people who actually use it, the millions of people who actually use it. Did they ask a single woman, a single woman? Was a single woman consulted in this?
Was a single person of color who just uses Twitter...
REID: Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: ... who made the mistake of using Twitter and needs it for their job, needs it to amplify the stories they do, needs it for the reporting...
REID: Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: ... they do -- did they consult with anybody?
I reached out to Parag Agrawal tonight, a couple days ago, when this news broke...
REID: Yes. Yes. Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: ... saying, let`s have a conversation.
REID: Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: You`re brown. I`m brown. Let`s -- I would love for you to hear from someone...
REID: Yes.
GIRIDHARADAS: ... who doesn`t have this point of view.
REID: Yes. It was a no.
GIRIDHARADAS: I guess he only has time to respond to Elon Musk.
REID: Yes, there you go.
Anand Giridharadas, thank you very much my friend. I appreciate it.
And before we go, really quickly, I want to send condolences from the entire REIDOUT family to the family of Eric Boehlert. Eric was not just a great, invaluable guest, but a fearless man who held all of us in media accountable.
That is tonight`s REIDOUT.
We are sorry to see him go.
"ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES" starts now.