Summary
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) answers question about the January 6th Committee`s investigations on the DHS and Secret Service missing text messages prior to the January 6th insurrection and Rep. Kevin McCarthy saying he does not remember speaking to Cassidy Hutchinson. Rep. Colin Allred (D-TX) is interviewed about a bipartisan election reform bill to be passed by Senate. So the trial of right wing conspiracy peddler Alex Jones began this week in a case that will decide how much he must pay the family of a child killed in the Sandy Hook massacre. Some Pennsylvania Republicans are striking back against the anti-democratic actions and anti-Semitic allies of Doug Mastriano.
Transcript
AYMAN MOHYELDIN, MSNBC HOST: It`s been a momentous week for the effort to bring about accountability for the January 6th capitol riot, and let me walk you through it, and then we`re going to dive into today`s developments and where we might expect the investigation to go next.
On Monday, we learned that Marc Short and Greg Jacob, two of former Vice President Mike Pence`s top aides appeared before a federal grand jury last week. The very next day, "The Washington Post" broke the story of the summer when they reported that the Justice Department is investigating Donald Trump`s actions in a criminal probe.
According to "The Post`s" reporting, investigators are honing in on Trump`s "pressure campaign on Mike Pence to overturn the election and what instructions Trump gave his lawyers and advisers about fake electors and sending electors back to the states."
Now, on Wednesday, Cassidy Hutchinson, the January 6th committee`s super star witness was the next to name -- whose name was to come out as having cooperated with the DOJ investigators. Then late last night. "The Washington Post" dropping another bombshell. Text messages during the lead up to January 6th from Donald Trump`s Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli are missing and unlikely to bet recovered.
Now, the missing texts were reported to the DHS inspector general all the way back in February. But according to "The Post" the Office of Inspector General Joseph Cuffari did not press the department leadership at the time to explain why they did not preserve those records nor seek ways to recover the lost data, according to the four people briefed on the watchdog`s actions.
Cuffari also failed to alert Congress to the potential destruction of government records. Now, Inspector General Cuffari had already faced calls to step aside from the criminal investigation into the missing Secret Service text messages. And now there are growing calls for Attorney General Merrick Garland and the Justice Department to launch an investigation into that situation.
Here is what my first guest, Congressman Jamie Raskin, a member of the January 6th Committee said today about Wolf and Cuccinelli`s texts going missing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): I just don`t know why everybody`s texts and e- mails were suddenly disappearing all over the place. So, I assume it`s not just a technological problem, but we`ll get to the bottom of it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Today, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy became the latest member of team Trump to discredit former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson`s sworn testimony to the January 6th committee. Here`s what she told the committee about a phone call she received from McCarthy on January the 6th after Trump finished his speech at the ellipse.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CASSIDY HUTCHINSON, FORMER AIDE TO WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF MARK MEADOWS: He then explained the president just said he`s marching to the capitol. You told me this whole week you weren`t coming up here. Why would you lie to me? I, said I`m not lying. I wasn`t lying to you sir. I -- we`re not going to the capitol. And he, said, well he just said it onstage, Cassidy. Figure it out. Don`t come up here.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Now, a full month after Hutchinson`s under oath testimony, McCarthy says he doesn`t remember any of that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): If I talked to her, I don`t remember it. If it was coming up here, I don`t think I wanted a lot of people coming up to the capital, but I don`t remember the conversation.
MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Why were you concerned specifically about Trump coming to the capital?
MCCARTHY: I don`t remember that.
RAJU: You don`t remember being concerned about his comments?
MCCARTHY: No. No. But because I didn`t watch it.
RAJU: She said under oath that you told her throughout the course of the week or she told, reassured you through the course of the week that he was not going to come to the capital. So apparently --
MCCARTHY: I don`t -- I don`t remember having any conversations with her about coming to the cap -- the president coming to the capitol. I just, I don`t recall any of that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Joining us now is Congressman Jamie Raskin, a Democrat from Maryland. He is of course a member of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th attack on the capitol and served as the lead impeachment manager in the second impeachment of Donald Trump.
Congressman Raskin, thank you so much for joining us. I appreciate you staying up late for us this evening. Let me start with what we just heard there if I can, sir. What do you make of Leader McCarthy saying that he doesn`t remember having a phone conversation with Cassidy Hutchinson? If he wants to refute what she told you, shouldn`t he do it under oath?
RASKIN: Well, the first thing I want to say is I trust Cassidy Hutchinson who has proven to be right about just everything, who has no incentive to lie, no penchant for lying, no record of lying and no motive to lie.
[22:05:00]
And what she told us conforms to lots of other details of what we`ve learned. To me it defies the belief that Kevin McCarthy doesn`t remember anything about his feelings about Donald Trump not coming to capitol. He said, well, he didn`t want a lot of people coming so in other words he was grouping Donald Trump in with everybody else, with a big group of people that he didn`t want come to the capitol. So, I think you have to suspend disbelief a little bit to fall for that.
MOHYELDIN: Speaking of suspending belief, we learned last night that text messages from Trump`s acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli are now missing. Wolf and Cuccinelli both say that DHS deleted their text messages after they turned in their phones when they left the department.
Has the committee spoken to either Wolf or Cuccinelli? And what can you tell us about efforts to recover these whole host of DHS texts that have been missing in addition to the Secret Service messages that are also missing?
RASKIN: Well, we`re determined to retrieve all missing texts and to assemble all of the evidence that is technologically possible to access and we are planning to do that. Anybody who has tried to defy the legal authority of the committee by concealing evidence has been overcome by other people coming forward to help us get that evidence.
So, I continue to have confidence that we will, indeed, be able to find it. What`s troubling to me is that the Department of Homeland Security is supposed to be keeping a close eye on domestic violent extremist groups and domestic terrorist plots.
And so, my first thought when I heard that these texts at the top of the department went missing was that we were going to lose a lot of evidence that we would otherwise find about what the department was gathering in terms of information about the domestic violent extremist groups and their attempts to storm the capital, smash our windows, assault our officers, drive the House and the Senate out, go after the vice president, hang Mike Pence, and so on.
But of course, it`s also possible that other things could surface on those texts. I mean, if anybody in the department knew about various plots in advance, that is something that also could be missing today on those texts.
So, we really need to get to the bottom of that because we want to make sure that the Department of Homeland Security and its leaders were doing their job.
MOHYELDIN: Let me see if I can play for you and our viewers what the former acting chief of staff to President Trump, Mick Mulvaney, said. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICK MULVANEY, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE ACTING CHIEF OF STAFF: The one thing I guess that was missing, John, was that if you go to a deposition, there`s going to be another side and there was no other side. They were all questions by the committee designed to try and find out stuff that Mike made President Trump look bad. No one there asking the other side of the questions that might make President Trump look good, but that`s fine. So, it just reaffirms in my mind that the committee is politically biased.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: What can you tell us about the committee interview with Mick Mulvaney? I mean, what kind of questions do you ask about somebody who incited a riot and tried to overthrow our government to stay in power to make him look good?
RASKIN: Well, let me first preface it by saying I`m not going to response any detail because I wasn`t even there, I was in the other committee meetings at the time that that interview took place. Nobody is trying to make anybody look bad or look good. We are just trying to get to the truth of what happened.
And I have to assume that that`s some kind of preemptive pandering to the former president. But, in any event, we are a bipartisan committee that does not have a political objective at all. Our mandate is to discover the facts of what took place on January the 6th and the causes behind it and what we need to do to prevent coups and insurrections against our democracy going forward.
And of course, the vast majority of our witnesses have been Republicans, and the people that we`ve put up there for America to see have been Republicans like Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a lifelong Republican and big Trump donor, who told the truth about what Donald Trump did in trying to get him just to find 11,780 remaining votes.
[22:10:03]
And the same with Arizona Republican House Speaker Rusty Bowers and Cassidy Hutchinson who is a Republican who served as the special assistant to Donald Trump`s own chief of staff. It`s amazing to me the way that they turn on their own people and try to, you know, expel them from the party and discredit their Republican bona fides. It`s just amazing to me to see that happen.
MOHYELDIN: Congressman Raskin, please stay with me for a moment. I want to ask you and get your thoughts on a few other important things. One of the main ways Donald Trump and his allies try to overturn the 2020 election was by exploiting the Electoral College with their so-called fake elector scheme.
Those are not my words for it, by the way. E-mails uncovered by "The New York Times" this week show that even Trump`s team referred to the electors as fake and acknowledged that that plan wasn`t legal. Next week, the Senate is expected to hold a hearing on a bipartisan bill to reform the 135-year- old Electoral Count Act, and that would make it harder to overturn a presidential election.
Joining our conversation now is Democratic Congressman Colin Allred of Texas. He is a former voting rights attorney. Representative Allred, it`s great to see you again. Thanks for joining us. I`m glad we have you back on this because when you and I spoke on Monday, "The New York Times" had not yet released their reporting on Trump`s legal team who is trying to implement the fake elector scheme.
In an e-mail obtained by "The Times," one of the attorneys actually wrote, quote, "basically that all of us, Georgia, Wisconsin, Arizona, Pennsylvania, et cetera, have our electors send in their votes even though the votes aren`t illegal under federal law because they`re not signed by the governor. So that members of Congress can fight about whether they should -- can fight about, rather, excuse me -- whether they should be counted on January 6th."
Representative Allred, does that e-mail just go to the brazenness of Trump and his team and why reforming the ECA is so important at this point?
REP. COLI ALLRED (D-TX): Well, thanks for having me on, Ayman. I`m so glad to be here with my dear friend, Jamie Raskin. And, you know, of course, the plan here was to create chaos and to try and use whatever method they could to muddy the waters enough to try and pull off what they knew was against the law.
And of course, the Electoral Count Act has been much discussed, does need to be worked on. And the drafting of it, the original drafting is far too vague. But there certainly some things as we`re going through that process, you know, looking what the Senate is doing, that we have to make sure that we get right.
Because every step we take to counter attempts to overthrow legitimate electors, will also make it harder for us in some cases to counter when we may get, for example, a false slate from a state, which Jamie and I have discussed before. We know we have to be prepared for seeing in 2024.
MOHYELDIN: Congressman Raskin, you called the bipartisan senate bill to update the ECA, quote, "fine and necessary, but not remotely sufficient." Picking up on what Congressman Allred was saying there, what specific areas would you like to see improve in the bipartisan plan?
RASKIN: Well, look, Donald Trump and his team did not set out to over throw the electoral count act, they set out to overthrow the election at the local level, the state level, the federal level, and they set out to seize the presidency.
So, if we tweaked the Electoral Count Act to clarify, for example, that the vice president does not have unilateral power to reject Electoral College votes from the states, that will be very minimal progress indeed given that nobody ever thought the vice president have that authority, and nobody thinks that Vice President Kamala Harris would proclaim such authority.
So, we don`t want to get stuck fighting the last battle when really what we know is that the entire institutions of electoral democracy are under attack. And we see that with voters` suppression. And we see that with the gerrymandering of our districts. We see that with attempts to intimidate election officials.
So, we need a much broader analysis of Donald Trump`s entire plot and then also other weaknesses and vulnerabilities that strategic bad faith actors will try to exploit.
MOHYELDIN: Representative Allred, let me read for you this critique of the proposed reforms to the ECA from "The Washington Post" columnist Jason Willick.
He writes in part, "The reform bill would cut elected politicians out of the process, transferring most of the power to courts, and especially the Supreme Court. That`s right. To protect democracy, ECA reform would shrink the authority of the democratic branches of government and expand the authority of the least democratic branch. The bill deserves to pass. But the fact that it`s necessary shows that America self-governing capacities have diminished and there will be more trouble ahead."
[22:15:04]
Your thoughts on that characterization, sir.
ALLRED: Yes, I think when we last spoke about this, I mentioned I had some concerns with the judicial review provisions that are being put forward, both from the three-judge panel that this is calling for. Just so you know, Ayman, now currently, it would go to a single district court judge and then would be appealed to the normal appeals process.
The ECA reform that`s being proposed would call for a three-judge panel to be empaneled and then if appealed, the Supreme Court to hear that appeal on its merits as a mandatory thing instead of being a discretionary thing from the Supreme Court.
So, if you can imagine what happened in the last election, when the Trump legal team brought dozens of, you know, sham lawsuits, all of those would have to have been heard by their merits by the Supreme Court if they appealed. And of course, that would slow things down. But also, it is true, it would take more of the discretion away from the legislative branch and put it into the judiciary.
So, it`s definitely a concern. I think we have to really think about very seriously how we`re going to do the judicial review portion of this because this reform is putting a lot of power in the hands of governors and then a lot of power in the hands of the courts in the review process and very little hands -- power in the hands of Congress.
And I`m sure that is by design because there is some concern over what Congress would do. But every action you take has a reaction, as Jaime and I have discussed. And when you gain this out, it`s very difficult to craft legislation to stop, basically, one party from trying to overthrow an election.
This is why you should -- we don`t have -- we`ve never faced this in this country before where we`ve had to try and plan out, you know, legislation for how are we going to try and deal with an organized and broad attempt to overthrow an election.
MOHYELDIN: Yes, and sadly, I feel like there will be another attempt so long as the Republican Party continues on its ways from what they have shown us so far. Congressman Jamie Raskin and Colin Allred, thank you gentlemen, both, for joining us tonight. I greatly appreciate it.
Coming up, the people of Kansas will be the first to have their say on whether there should be a right to abortion services in Kansas in the wake of the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe versus Wade. Kansas Democrat Sharice Davids joins me next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
MOHYELDIN: Kansas is set to vote Tuesday on a constitutional amendment that will impact abortion access in that state. Currently, the Kansas constitution protects the right to bodily autonomy, which includes the right to an abortion. If these new amendment passes it would strip abortion rights from the state constitution and open the door for the state legislature, currently under Republican control, to further restrict or even ban abortion outright.
Tuesday`s vote is the first time since the Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade that voters anywhere in the country will cast ballots on abortion. The ballot measure was planned before the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe. In fact, groups on both sides have poured millions of dollars into advertising.
NBC News reports that before the Supreme Court decision, outside groups spent a combined $1.6 million on ads. Since then, spending has more than quadrupled with groups shelling out nearly $7.8 million on ads through August 2nd. Here is one ad from the Kansans for Constitutional Freedom Pact.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNKNOWN: Abortion is already highly regulated in Kansas. Here are the facts. Taxpayer funding for abortion, outlawed. Abortion after viability, banned. Parental consent, required. But you should also know this. This confusing constitutional mandate amendment could lead to a full ban of any abortion in Kansas, with no exceptions for rape, incest or a mother`s life. That`s extreme and goes too far. Vote no. No unchanging the constitution.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Alright, joining us now is Democratic Congresswoman Sharice Davids from Kansas. Congresswoman, thank you so much for joining us this evening. So, you know, midwestern states have been especially impacted by the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe. Kansas is literally, and we have a map there on our screen for our viewers -- is literally the middle of the country.
And as a result, it`s going to have an impact on neighboring states not having any access to abortion. How will abortion access in Kansas and in the region be impacted if this constitutional amendment passes?
REP. SHARICE DAVIDS (D-KS): Well, it`s good to be here to talk to you about this because this is such an important topic and issue, especially given the Dobbs decision and the level of fear and anxiety and anger that folks are feeling right now.
If these amendments were to pass in Kansas, just like you said, right now, in the state of Kansas, we have a constitutional right under our state constitution to access the full range of reproductive health care services, including an abortion. And the -- right now we are seeing -- we`re seeing one of these extreme attempts to change our constitution.
And we`ve watched for months as neighboring states have enacted or attempted to enact total bans.
[22:24:57]
And you know, Kansans don`t want politicians making their personal health care decisions for them. And I think that that`s what -- that`s what we`re seeing right now, is a lot of folks showing up to make their voices heard on an issue of great importance.
MOHYELDIN: There was a recent poll, congresswoman, by a Kansas City-based polling firm that found 47 percent of people said they plan to vote yes to remove the constitutional protection to abortion, 43 percent said they plan to vote no. There were 10 percent that were undecided. Does that, you know, seem to reflect the mood of the Kansans you speak to and what would you say to the 10 percent who are not sure how they will vote?
DAVIDS: Well, I think that`s -- of course, polling is something that folks look to as a way to try to figure out what people are feeling, boots on the ground, what`s happening. And I can tell you in my conversations with folks at home, first of all, there are a lot of people who are -- I just, I have to keep coming back to this because so many people are, truly, their lives have been upended by this.
In fact, I was talking to a doctor who is an emergency room doctor who lives in Kansas but works in Kansas City, Missouri. And Missouri is one of those states that Kansas has watched past a very extreme set of restrictions and essentially a total ban. And they are not able or aren`t sure if they can prescribe the regular course of treatment when someone comes into the emergency room who has been assaulted.
And I think that those are exactly the extreme types of situations, and frankly, dangerous situations that we do not want to see that in Kansas. We don`t want to see politicians deciding when doctors can and can`t treat a patient. Those decisions need to be made between a patient and their physician.
MOHYELDIN: Yes. It is going to be a close one and one that the country will be watching very closely come August 2nd. Congresswoman Sharice Davids, thank you so much for your insights tonight. We`ll be checking back in back with you later in the week.
And coming up, a Texas jury is deciding how much Alex Jones should pay for repeatedly lying about the children who were murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary School back in 2014. Elizabeth Williamson who documented the horrors those lies wrought on the families of those children has been in the court room. She will join us next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:32:15]
MOHYELDIN: All right. So the trial of right wing conspiracy peddler Alex Jones began this week in a case that will decide how much he must pay the family of a child killed in the Sandy Hook massacre.
For years, Alex Jones used his show "Infowars" to attack grieving parents by telling his audience that the Sandy Hook massacre was a hoax. Mark Bankston, the lawyer for the parents of six-year-old Jesse Lewis one of the 20 children and six adults killed in the Sandy Hook massacre asked the jury to award their clients $150 million. The "Austin American Statesman" reports that`s $75 million for damaging the parents` reputation and another $75 million for emotional distress.
Bankston said the 475 million figure represents $1 for every American who was duped by Jones` lies, according to a poll that found 24 percent of Americans believe the Sandy Hook shooting was staged or might have been staged.
It`s one of the three jury trials Alex Jones will face to determine how much he owes the families of the Sandy Hook victims in damages, and the first witness to testify was the lead investigator on the Sandy Hook shooting, retired Connecticut state police detective Daniel Jewiss.
He told the jury that law enforcement put the Sandy Hook deniers into three categories -- the mentally ill, those who believed false reports, and a third group.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANIEL JEWISS, LEAD INVESTIGATOR OF SANDY HOOK SHOOTING: The third group we believe were ones that absolutely knew that it was true, however, they were still going to use that opportunity to spin it for their own benefit, whether it was power or money. They were the most dangerous. And that`s where we put Alex Jones.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Joining us now is Elizabeth Williamson, a feature writer for the "New York Times". She`s the author of "Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth". It`s great to have you with us, Elizabeth.
Alex Jones wasn`t in the courtroom when retired Connecticut state police detective Daniel Jewiss took the stand. But he was there when the lawyers for the parents of Jesse Lewis told the jury they were seeking $150 million in damages.
What was his reaction to that number? And can you put that number in context for us.
ELIZABETH WILLIAMSON, FEATURE WRITER, "NEW YORK TIMES": Absolutely. So, he was really shaken by that number. You can see him sort of visibly blanche and he kind of shrugged. I was looking at the back of his head, I saw his neck turn red. And then he sort of charged out of the courtroom at the first break and started holding court in the hallway complaining that this was a kangaroo court, and that this was a show trial which is something he has been saying for years.
[22:34:56]
But the context that you asked me for is this. This is -- this represents, even if the jury were to award the full judgment, it would represent three years of his revenues of $50 million a year. And actually, that`s conservative, because it was much more than that some years.
MOHYELDIN: Tell us about the harm that Alex Jones` lies have brought upon these families who have already suffered the worst fates imaginable for anybody to experience in this country.
WILLIAMSON: Sure, so what happened was, and there was testimony today as to Alex Jones` reach and influence. He is by far the most influential amplifier of these conspiracy claims. And he has been that way since hours after the shooting.
So what has happened is that people who believed him, and it doesn`t take that many because he has an audience of tens of millions of people. So those who really believed that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax, a pretext for gun control, and that the families were complicit in this so- called government plot, people came up to them.
They dug through their trash. They looked in their windows. they confronted them on the street. They harassed them on line. They defaced and stole memorials to their lost loved ones.
So they made their lives a living hell. And so finally by 2018, the families had had enough and the families of ten Sandy Hook victims sued Alex Jones, in four separate lawsuits now combined into three. He lost all of those.
Whether or not he defamed them has already been decided. He did. He lost these cases by default, and now there are three. This is the first of three trials, exclusively for damages, in which juries will decide how much Alex Jones must pay these families for what happened to them after he spread these lies.
MOHYELDIN: Elizabeth, we are out of time, but do you expect Alex Jones will take the stand before the trial ends?
WILLIAMSON: Unclear right now.
MOHYELDIN: All right. Elizabeth Williamson, thank you so much for your coverage and for joining us tonight. Greatly appreciate it.
Joining us now is Charles Blow, columnist from the "New York Times" and an MSNBC political analyst. Charles, it`s great to have you with us this evening.
So this cast of characters from Trump world, you know, they believe that they can act with impunity. We`ve seen that time and time again, no matter what destruction they cause.
Alex Jones is finally facing accountability. Do you see this trickling down to the rest of Trump world?
CHARLES BLOW, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST: I should hope so. I mean what is happening with Jones and some other actors is that they see an opportunity for a tremendous amount of cash to be made by peddling these lies. You have to understand the psychology around why that works, which is that when you`re confronted -- well some people are confronted with a set of facts that they do not believe, believe in or don`t want to believe in, that make them uncomfortable, that make them afraid, the country is moving away from, there are criminals coming and you need guns -- whatever the set of facts is, it makes them open to an alternative set of facts because they want to believe in something that is counter to the set of fact that they have in front of them.
And so these people become open to this idea of, you know, conspiracy theories and lies. And there are some people, maleficent people who are smart enough to know that they can make a lot of money selling those lies to those people who desperately want to believe something other than a set of facts which is primarily about a country moving away from them in power, prestige and culture.
MOHYELDIN: Charles, Alex Jones calls him and a performance artist. The truth is, he speaks to millions of people who hear his message. And Sebastian Murdoch of HuffPost actually caught up with Alex Jones outside the courthouse yesterday.
I want to play you this and for our viewers. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALEX JONES, INFOWARS: The corporate media is on trial and so is the rigged judiciary here.
SEBASTIAN MURDOCH, HUFFPOST: But you, literally today, are on trial. Just to clarify.
JONES: You`re on trial.
MURDOCH: I`m not.
JONES: You`re on trial.
MURDOCH: Ok.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: Talk about the damage that Alex Jones` brand of disinformation can do to the American people, and the people who hear him. I mean as we just played in that clip right there, he`s in denial.
[22:39:42]
BLOW: Right. Well, you know, I want to take the liberty here of expanding a little bit beyond Alex Jones to say that much of the right -- Alex Jones maybe an extreme of it -- but much of the right has become a movement about, you know, collateral damage, right. That they accept tremendous collateral damage as the cost of doing business. Alex Jones may accept that collateral damage in harming these families tremendously in order to make a buck.
But there are other ways that the Republican Party has become the party of collateral damage. They will say we will take away all abortion rights, and the little girl who struggles to get -- to deal with a rape, a child -- I mean, a birth -- a baby that has been conceived by a rape -- that is just collateral damage. We will see mass shootings like Sandy Hook, but also shootings elsewhere, but they will say in order for us to protect gun ownership and the proliferation of guns, we will accept that as collateral damage.
And on and on and on. And so they kind of build in all of this pain and all of the suffering as collateral damage. This is just going to be the cost of doing business in our movement.
And that is what, to me, is most dangerous, about what Alex Jones and the rest of the Republican Party is doing.
MOHYELDIN: So how important is it that, you know, people like him face responsibility for this kind of rhetoric? I mean what do you make of those that say this is just simply free speech argument his supporters used to give him a blank check to say whatever he wants to say.
BLOW: I think that this is really important because I think we have to stop people from using free speech to excuse being held accountable for lying, right. And so every time one of these liars gets caught in their lies, and then gets held accountable for the lies, they say oh no, this is an attack on free speech. Right.
Trump, says I should be able to say whatever I want, and if they try to moderate it, that`s an attack on free speech. Alex Jones says I can say whatever I want to say about the Sandy Hook families and their dead children, and if you say anything about that, that`s an attack on free speech.
No it`s not. You are free to say whatever you want in this world, but some of that is defamatory and that is against the law. And if you defame someone, you have to pay for that.
And I that think drawing the line here and saying this is not just a back and forth volley in the media where one person says one thing and there`s another side of it. No there are actual laws where some things you say you have to be held accountable for those things.
If you defame someone, you must be held accountable for that. And if the justice system is about to do that to Alex Jones, more power to it.
MOHYELDIN: Charles Blow, greatly appreciate your time this evening. Thank you for joining us.
BLOW: Absolutely.
MOHYELDIN: Coming up, some Pennsylvania Republicans are striking back against the anti-democratic actions and anti-Semitic allies of Doug Mastriano. One of those Republicans who is actively working to elect Democrat Josh Shapiro will join us next.
[22:42:57]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MOHYELDIN: This week, the Associated Press reports that some Republicans are warming up to supporting Republican nominees for governor of Pennsylvania state senator Doug Mastriano writing, quote, "As the general election season intensifies, the GOP machinery is cranking up to back Mastriano`s campaign."
That`s despite the heartburn that Doug Mastriano has caused Pennsylvania Republicans because of his extremist views. His embrace of right wing fringe groups, his election lies.
Doug Mastriano was at the Capitol on January the 6th. He has consistently push Donald Trump`s election lies, and has worked to overturn Pennsylvania`s own election results back in 2020. He was also the point person designated by Donald Trump`s lawyers to lead the fake electors scheme in Pennsylvania, that they knew was illegal.
As the "New York Times" detailed, quote, Mr. Mastriano needed assurance to go along with a plan other Republicans were telling him was illegal," according to a December 12th email, that also referred to Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City. Mastriano needs a call from the mayor. This needs to be done. Talk to him about legalities of what they are doing. Electors want to be reassured that the process is legal, essential for greater strategy."
Our next guest, Craig Snyder, joins a group of Republican though supporting Josh Shapiro, the Democratic nominee for governor. Craig Snyder who served as chief of staff to Senator Arlen Specter and a group of centrist Republicans have formed the Republicans for Shapiro PAC in opposition to Doug Mastriano.
If election denier Mastriano is elected governor of Pennsylvania, he could appoint a secretary of state who will overturn the election outcome in Pennsylvania if a Democrat wins the presidential election there.
And the Republican-controlled Congress could accept the fake electors sent by an election criminal operating as Pennsylvania`s governor. That is what is at stake in that state.
Joining us now is Craig Snyder, political director of Republicans for Shapiro. As I mentioned earlier, he served as chief of staff to former Republican Senator Arlen Specter.
It`s great to have you with us, Craig. What is at stake here with Doug Mastriano on the ballot in Pennsylvania? Why is his platform so dangerous in your opinion?
[22:49:52]
CRAIG SNYDER, POLITICAL DIRECTOR, REPUBLICANS FOR SHAPIRO: Thanks, Ayman. Well, you know, Lawrence, on this show has been absolutely right. It`s not hyperbole to say that this is the most important governors` race in the country this year and maybe ever.
The question on the ballot, as I see it, is whether the American Republican form of government created in Pennsylvania in 1787 is going to be mortally wounded here in Pennsylvania in 2022.
Mastriano is not a traditional Pennsylvania Republican, like my old boss, Arlen Specter, and some of our past governors-- Scranton, Thornburgh, Ridge, et cetera. He`s a radical. As you have described, he is practically Trump`s vice president for the big lie. And he believes -- seems to believe, at least, that he alone will get to decide where Pennsylvania`s crucial 19 electoral votes will go in 2024.
He has been cozy with 9/11 deniers and with Neo-Nazis on Gab. He`s views on abortion might make him the government appropriate to be governor of Oklahoma, but not Pennsylvania. I mean you could just go on and on. The guy is outside the mainstream in a way that we think significant numbers of Pennsylvania Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents are going to reject.
MOHYELDIN: And yet, despite that I have to ask you about what the Associated Press is reporting, Craig. Many Republicans are watching Mastriano`s efforts to mend fences with the party, raise money and broaden his appeal to swing voters. Some say they see him focusing more on standard GOP talking points such as inflation and trying to move away from the top of 2020`s election denial and banning abortion.
In fact, the Republican Governors Association also hasn`t ruled out supporting Mastriano just yet. Does it concern you that more Republicans, at least for now, seem to be willing to coalesce around a Mastriano candidacy?
SNYDER: Look, I think it`s just a reality of a hyper partisan times that we live. There`s a team loyalty on both sides of the aisle that`s extraordinarily strong. But it`s not universal.
There is still ticket splitters in a place like Pennsylvania. And our group, Republicans for Shapiro -- please visit us Republicans4Shapiro.com, that is with the number 4. We are going to mobilize those folks who are willing to listen to reason.
We are chaired by longtime former Republican Congressman, Jim Greenwood. So far our membership includes GOP representatives from the Pennsylvania state house and the state senate, a former lieutenant governor, a former senate pro tempore, cabinet members from the last three Republican governors administrations. So there are significant Republicans who are trusted voices. And we think if we bring those trusted voices to the true swing voters in the state, that we can convince those folks to do what I think they already know which is that they can`t vote for Doug Mastriano.
MOHYELDIN: Craig Snyder, our thanks to you. I have to agree with Lawrence and you. I do think the Pennsylvania race, the governor`s race is going to be one of the most important in the country, not in this election cycle, but in the modern era. So much is at stake, a lot of people are going to be watching what happens in Pennsylvania.
Greatly appreciate your time this evening, thank you.
SNYDER: Thanks, Ayman.
MOHYELDIN: Before we go to break we have some breaking news we want to tell you about. Carol Leonnig at the "Washington Post" is reporting that the DHS inspector general came up with a plan to recover missing text messages from the Secret Service and other agencies around the time of January the 6th, and then abruptly abandoned the effort according to records.
The "Washington Post" reports that the Department of Homeland Security chief watchdog scrapped its investigative teams efforts to collect agency phones to try and recover deleted Secret Service texts this year. According to four people with knowledge of the decision and internal records reviewed by the "Post".
But later that month inspector Joseph Cuffari, his office decided it would not collect or review any agency phones. A senior forensics analyst in the inspector general`s office took steps to collect the federal protective service phones, the people said.
But late on the night of February 18th, that is a Friday, one of several deputies who reports to Cuffari`s management team wrote an email to investigators instructing them not to take the phones and not to seek any data from them. This according to a copy of an internal record that was shared with the "Post".
"Washington Post reporter Carol Leonnig will join my colleague Stephanie Ruhle coming up on "THE 11TH HOUR" in just a few minutes.
We`ll be right back with more.
[22:54:38]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MOHYELDIN: So on the very same day of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, the Governor Greg Abbott was hundreds of miles away surveying some wildfire damage in Taylor County, Texas.
And then he attended a fundraising event for his reelection campaign at a private home in Walker County, Texas. That is all according to his campaign.
The fund-raiser was about 300 miles away from Uvalde in Walker County, Texas. Gregory Abbott faced criticism for attending that fund-raiser. But the next day he defended himself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R-TX): On the way I stopped and let people know that I could not stay, that I needed to go. And I wanted them to know what happened. And get back to Austin so that I could continue my collaboration with Texas law enforcement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOHYELDIN: I stopped and I let people know that I could not stay. Now that seems reasonable enough, but a new reporting from the "Dallas Morning News" indicates that is not what happened.
After the Uvalde school shooting, Governor Greg Abbott spent nearly three hours in Huntsville at a campaign fundraiser that he was criticized for not canceling.
[22:59:56]
MOHYELDIN: Newly-obtained campaign finance reports and flight tracking records show that Abbott, using northeast Texas rancher businessman Ricky Bakers loaned jet, arrived in Huntsville at 4:52 p.m. on May 24th. He was driven about two miles to a local supporter`s house and didn`t depart the city until 7:47 p.m.
Abbott`s campaign was asked to respond by the "Dallas Morning News", the campaign insisted Governor Abbott told the truth but offered absolutely no evidence to prove it.
That is tonight`s LAST WORD. I`m Ayman Mohyeldin. Thanks for watching.
"THE 11TH HOUR WITH STEPHANIE RUHLE" starts right now.