Summary
Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer officially announces his retirement. The U.S. economy hits its fastest growth rate in decades. The lies of FOX News and the ways some high-profile Democrats compare them to other media outlets are examined. A new twist emerges in the Matt Gaetz probe. A new study examines COVID and CBD.
Transcript
NICOLLE WALLACE, MSNBC HOST: THE BEAT WITH ARI MELBER starts right now.
Hi, Ari.
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: Hi, Nicolle. Thank you so much.
Welcome to THE BEAT. I am Ari Melber.
And I can tell you, right now, we`re tracking several big stories, including an upcoming special report that fact-checks FOX News in a big way and involves Biden and Obama. So, that`s coming up as part of our "Chai Day" tonight.
We begin with the top story, the president moving towards putting his imprint on the Supreme Court at a moment where Democrats now say that Biden suddenly has this turning point opportunity to deliver on both substance and politics, rallying his side heading into the midterms with a big decision about who will fill the new vacancy with Justice Breyer`s retirement.
[18:00:13]
Breyer and Biden appearing together today. And the spotlight is on the core, which has in its entire American history featured just two black people as Supreme Court justices ever. That`s just a fact, both of them men.
Biden famously pledging to put the first black woman on the court. And, standing by that pledge, the White House telling reporters and everyone this week they will nominate a black woman. That`s the plan, to deliver on the campaign vow that he made, which also echoes another candidate, Ronald Reagan, who vowed he would put a woman on the court.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The person I will nominate will be someone with extraordinary qualifications, character, experience, and integrity, and that person will be the first black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court.
RONALD REAGAN, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I`m announcing today that one of the first Supreme Court vacancies in my administration will be filled by the most qualified woman I can possibly find.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Well, law turns on precedent, and that is a very prominent precedent for how presidents can mix qualifications -- you heard them both reference that -- with an eye on diversifying the court.
It`s a comparison Rachel Maddow reported on amidst some conservatives now claiming that these Reaganesque pledges have suddenly become suspect.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RACHEL MADDOW, HOST, "THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW": When the conservative media and Republicans today have been pounding their chests and screaming about how wrong, just how wrong it is that Joe Biden made a pledge during his campaign that, if he were elected, he would put an African-American woman on the Supreme Court, they really ought to be asked if they were that mad about Ronald Reagan making that same kind of promise in 1980.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Indeed, if you want to take a note of optimism that transcends the rank hypocrisy that she diagnosed, let`s just say that Ronald Reagan and Joe Biden have one good thing in common.
They took the power of their office and made a transparent pledge about diversifying an institution that I just showed you is woefully behind and underneath the representation of the rest of the nation.
So, that`s what the White House is focused on today, with Breyer making that official appearance. Now there`s also some interesting science coming out of Washington, D.C., which is so quick to tear presidents down and then build them back up.
Well, the Washington class has gone from slamming Biden`s position last week, especially at those press questions at the press conference, to now almost frothing over new signs of life.
One nonpartisan "Washington Post" writer capturing the mood by saying that this court pick can now help Biden draw clear contrasts with the Republicans, moving off the focus on Democratic infighting that was associated with those spending battles and tee up a much-needed Biden victory in Congress.
Now, that`s a projection. It`s a long way from naming a nominee to getting to that victory. But others are also pointing to a very real-world victory that`s already happening today, the U.S. economy actually hitting its fastest growth rate in decades, amidst Biden`s stewardship and those economic packages he already won and pushed.
So, we just quoted Rachel. I will tell you, on this story, we`re going to actually end up quoting another colleague, Joe Scarborough, who, just this morning, was reporting on those economic numbers and saying the Biden can excel by focusing on this, more than endless internal negotiations in Congress.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE SCARBOROUGH, HOST, "MORNING JOE": He overperformed on job creation, record job creation the first year, 5.6 percent growth for our economy. That`s an overperformance, 3.9 percent unemployment, again, incredible job there.
He`s sitting in a pretty good position right now, if you look at the basics of this economy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Well, class is in session, and we have two professors, Morgan State University Professor Jason Johnson at NYU Law Professor Melissa Murray.
Welcome to both of you.
Jason, I want to start with that point about the economy, because, as Joe Scarborough, a former Republican congressman, was just saying there, and others are looking at this, it seems like a great result for a first-year president to hit at the time where he also has the wind at his back on these other stories.
JASON JOHNSON, MSNBC POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: Usually, cash rules everything around a president, Ari, but not in this particular case. People may not feel this economic growth, the way the numbers seem to be playing it out right now.
Look, you can have all sorts of great things happening in the stock market, you can have all sorts of fantastic things happening with large businesses, but on people`s day-to-day lives, they`re still seeing gas prices go up, they`re still seeing their food prices go up, and they`re still concerned about the safety of their job.
[18:05:08]
So, this is no longer a raw numbers situation. Joe Biden`s responsibility, in part, is to give people a sense of comfort, and money alone won`t do it.
I can tell you, quite frankly, that most people I speak to, including some of my students, who I just talked to at Morgan State earlier today, they`re not thinking about larger economic numbers. They`re worried about the safety of their jobs and their overall safety during COVID.
MELBER: Yes, well put and fair.
And before I get to the meat and potatoes, Professor, did you want to give a grade to Jason`s Wu-Tang reference?
MELISSA MURRAY, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: C-R-E-A-M, I like it. Cash rules everything around me. Well done, Jason.
(LAUGHTER)
JOHNSON: Yes, it`s pretty good. Dollar, dollar bill, you all.
MELBER: Jason, the C in this case -- in this case, the C is not -- the C is not a report card C. It`s just a cream C for that reference.
You grew up on the New York crime side. Staying alive was no jive, Jason, I mean, staying alive, as you say, when inflation is eating your wages. We could go on. I won`t.
I`m going to hand it over to the professor.
Take a look, as our law professor -- she mouthed "Don`t," which is fair.
(LAUGHTER)
MELBER: Take a look, our law professor, as we turn to the law.
This was Justice Breyer back in the day with the president who first appointed him briefly on a jog, Bill Clinton. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
QUESTION: Who`s faster, the judiciary or the executive?
STEPHEN BREYER, U.S. SUPREME COURT ASSOCIATE JUSTICE: Oh, no, he`s much faster. Much faster.
BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The Judiciary lasts longer.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: They`re both decent with a quip. We could add up to show you how much time has gone by, because here was Breyer speaking today back at the White House at the end of his career with this new president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BREYER: And we`re now engaged in a great civil war to determine whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure.
See, those are the words I want, to see, an experiment. That next generation, and the one after that, my grandchildren and their children, they will determine whether the experiment still works. And, of course, I`m an optimist, and I am pretty sure it will.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Professor?
MURRAY: Well, he said it himself.
Justice Breyer has been the court`s cockeyed optimist for a very long time. He has always had faith in institutions, always tried to be a consensus builder between the left and the right on a court that has moved very sharply to the right.
And one can`t help but wonder if this decision to retire, not just because of the looming midterms, but because perhaps he sees the writing on the wall that this might not be the time for consensus-building. There might be no opportunity for consensus-building on a court that is clearly tilted towards the right with a 6-3 conservative supermajority.
MELBER: Yes, that`s fair.
You look at this pledge -- and I showed what Rachel and others have said about it -- to diversify the court. And, Professor, you`re -- I will remind viewers, you`re raising the next generation of legal thinkers here.
Law is a profession that relates to who runs the country. If you look in the Congress, it`s the most overrepresented profession. We know the power the judges have. We live under these rules, whether that`s ultimately who decides whether there`s a right to choice or how police are overseen.
And yet it remains incredibly, as we point out on the show, incredibly imbalanced, unrepresentative system. ABA says under 5 percent of lawyers are black, for example. It`s very expensive these days to go to law school. The judiciary even less so.
I`m going to show you. Even Obama, who talked about diversifying and did it in certain ways, but on federal judgeships overall, I`m not sure people realize this, I`m going to put up on the screen just how few black women are on the federal courts, writ large. I`m talking to all of them, not just the Supreme Court. Obama put one black woman, partly because there were so few around at the time who I mentioned who are in lower courts.
Trump did zero. Here`s what Biden has done in one year. Of course, those other comparisons, they had more years. He`s already put eight on the court at the federal level, and he says he will do that on the Supreme Court.
Could you talk to us, Professor, for those who may not be aware of these disparities, just what that means?
MURRAY: There`s a huge disparity.
Women have, of course, been matriculating in law schools at the same rate as men for some time. But leaving aside the whole question of intersectionality and race and gender, even women are not reaching the top of the profession, the highest echelons of the profession.
And for black women, it`s even more acute. We are a stark -- we are starkly underrepresented in the ranks of general counsels. We are starkly underrepresented in the ranks of equity partners at large law firms. We are starkly underrepresented in academia. And I can say that from personal experience.
[18:10:08]
So ,there`s room to diversify at all levels of the legal profession. And I feel like I need to call out one of my fantastic NYU students, Taliah Scott (ph), who has founded her own nonprofit, Legally Black, to help young women, young black women, going to law school to prepare for that process and to be successful in it.
And she`s absolutely phenomenal. And we`re very lucky to have her doing that kind of work.
MELBER: Well, thanks for telling us about that too at the -- that`s a very individual, specific level. Shout-out to that.
Jason, your thoughts, because -- I emphasize this because there`s a thing in life and definitely in policy where people think they know something, and then they start talking based on what they think they know.
And I always would say, respectfully, cool, let`s make sure you know what you think you know is right or not. And I think -- I`m going to put that chart back up on the screen one more time, because this is the, . And these are facts.
Even recent history, even President Obama not able to really dent this. Clearly, both Joe Biden in the people around him in the White House Counsel`s Office and the other places doing the vetting, it would appear they care about this, Jason.
JOHNSON: Yes, they care about. And they should, Ari.
Look, the practicality is, if you want a judiciary that is remotely reflective of the country that we have, then you should have more black women on the judiciary, you should have more black men on the judiciary, you should have more people on the judiciary that didn`t come out of top five law schools.
These are all things that are necessary. If the people who are facing crimes and facing our criminal justice system, heck, people who are just dealing with fraud cases and environmental cases, they`re all coming from different kinds of backgrounds, so we should have a judiciary that`s reflective of that.
But I have to make this point because this is the thing that concerns me. As much credit as we want to give Joe Biden and as great as it is that he`s put these women on the bench, the fact of the matter is we are still -- as Melissa has mentioned, we`re still facing a situation with a supermajority on the court.
Even if he puts a black woman up on the court, it is still 6-3. Unless he thinks in a much more expansive way about maybe expanding the court or changing some of the processes for how you put people on the court, we will still face the supermajority, because everybody that Trump and Republicans and put on was basically a second-year law student. And those guys are going to be on the bench for the next 40 years.
MELBER: They are young. That`s definitely true.
I appreciate both of you giving us perspective and widening, I think, some of the perspective, because this is a heady time, as we look at the futures of court. These seats come up rarely, and really interesting to see the push for change.
Jason and Melissa, my thanks to both of you.
Let me tell folks what`s coming up.
I have a special report, going in deep, fact-checking FOX News and explaining how even some Democrats have underestimated the factual issues and the lies. We have been working on this. I`m going to share it with you coming up.
Also later, a new twist in the Matt Gaetz probe.
And there`s a new study about COVID and CBD oil, and we have one of the researchers involved. That`s later in the hour.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:17:13]
MELBER: Now to our special report on one of the most vexing challenges for Democrats in modern Washington and for President Biden: How do you deal with FOX News?
The answer is actually complicated and exposes some of the debates on the left over whether to engage or fight, an influential network that shapes so much political discourse, the right-wing opposition and has been busted in sued over it`s rampant misinformation, because here`s the thing.
While some progressives argue that establishment Democrats and sometimes Biden and Obama, basically, they argue, have fallen into traps and misfires on this very issue. And they have undermined their own interests.
For example, FOX draws influence from the perception that it is basically a news organization, like the AP or ABC News, when, in reality, there has been evidence for years which shows FOX routinely broadcasts misleading and false information, which is different than most news organizations.
More on the details of that in a moment.
But if you`re on the receiving end of that misinformation, if it`s designed to take you down, you wouldn`t want people to just take at face value the FOX materials they`re getting, treated as if it`s totally comparable to any other channel, like an ABC or NBC or what you`re watching, MSNBC.
Now, what I just said does sound obvious, but at that big press conference President Biden just had, he casually propped up and legitimize FOX News by likening it to just another news channel.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: The American public are trying to sift their way through what`s real and what`s fake.
The choice of what political coverage a voter looks to has as much impact on as what they believe. They go to get reinforced in their views, whether it`s MSNBC or whether it`s FOX or...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: That was the press conference by Joe Biden just last week. And it`s not just him.
Other top Democrats have used their megaphone to push virtually the exact same equivalence. Let me show you a perplexing riff from Barack Obama where he basically used that same sentence structure, treating FOX and Rush Limbaugh, which talked up racist birtherism against him, as just part of a larger media polarization.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: There are a couple of things that, in my mind at least, contribute to our politics being more polarized than people actually are.
The balkanization of the media means that we just don`t have a common place where we get common facts and a common world view, the way we did 20, 30 years ago. And that just keeps on accelerating.
And I`m not the first to observe this, but, yes, you have got the FOX News/Rush Limbaugh folks, and then you got the MSNBC folks.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[18:20:07]
MELBER: The way he puts it, his assertion is, all those different folks can`t agree on common facts.
That`s a false equivalence. You`re witnessing the most powerful Democrats minimizing FOX`s factual problems, which are different than, say, observing that there is opinion media out there.
It weirdly legitimizes FOX News through that false equivalence. It`s just one more polarized source.
Now, is this the whole story? Is this public concern about polarization in general a kind of political signal perhaps to swing voters and others, a quick way for someone like a Biden or an Obama to argue they`re above the fray?
Or does Joe Biden really believe this about FOX? Does he really believe that its most viewed anchors, like Tucker Carlson and its reporters, are just one more comparable source on a polarized spectrum? And will we ever know?
I mean, we can`t read minds, right?
But we can hear hot mics, which is why this story tonight is actually extra interesting, because, on hot mics, of course, the mic catches something that a speaker meant to be private. And that`s what happened to Joe Biden at the same presser where I showed you him making those remarks after getting a question from a FOX News reporter, whom he later called after the hot mic moment to try to make it right.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETER DOOCY, FOX NEWS: Do you think inflation is a political liability ahead of the midterms?
BIDEN: It`s a great asset, more inflation.
What a stupid son of a bitch.
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: "Stupid son of a bitch." Mr. Unity strikes again.
P. DOOCY: Within about an hour of that exchange, he called my cell phone. And he said: "It`s nothing personal, pal."
HANNITY: Did he apologize?
P. DOOCY: He cleared the air. And I appreciated it. We had a nice call.
HANNITY: He`s -- that`s not an answer. Did he apologize? That doesn`t sound like an apology.
P. DOOCY: He said: "It`s nothing personal, pal."
HANNITY: Oh, pal. OK, pal.
P. DOOCY: And I told him that I appreciated him reaching out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Now, this whole exchange can play as something small, a gaffe over language.
But, as I just showed you, it`s actually perhaps a window into Biden`s private thinking, that maybe he actually thinks FOX is not the same, which is why he had those harsh words. But he has other reasons to echo a kind of conventional wisdom here.
And this is a common refrain from certain voices. Take Bill Maher, who`s often on the left on many issues. He had once said MSNBC coverage of Chris Christie meant that: It was time to look at yourself, MSNBC. You`re turning into FOX News. Bridgegate has become your Benghazi.
So, this conventional wisdom keeps on cropping up. And, yes, full disclosure, this is an MSNBC segment about the topic.
But other independent journalists have roundly rejected that kind of claim. "The Washington Post" said Bill Maher misfires on saying MSNBC equals FOX. They went into the facts, noting the key FOX claims about Benghazi faced a punishing year-and-a-half of challenge and debunkment. So the story itself was off-base, while writing that MSNBC reporting on Bridgegate used on the record allegations of public officials, a core journalistic responsibility.
And that`s the point. This stuff matters. It affects politics and democracy. And I`m not here tonight to tell you what we think of our own work at this channel. And that wouldn`t be evidence.
I am here to report that this Biden/Obama/Maher equivalence does falter in the face of actual independent reporting. Take independent researchers. They found FOX is so routinely misleading that just watching it would make you less informed, and not just on hot political topics or your views of, say, Donald Trump.
FOX viewers actually accept falsehoods about COVID more than people who got their news from literally anywhere else.
Hmm. I wonder why.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Unless you have an immune system that`s compromised, and you are older, and you have other underlying health issues, you are not going to die, 99 percent, from this virus.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS: And the experts still think that parents should trust them and inject their kids with an experimental drug.
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS: These are, after all, experimental drugs, and they`re behaving like it.
HANNITY: The Cleveland clinic said that, if you had COVID-19, you don`t need any vaccine.
ALEX BERENSON, CONSERVATIVE AUTHOR: No one should get boosted. No one should get double-boosted. They are a dangerous and ineffective product at this point.
CARLSON: So maybe it doesn`t work, and they`re simply not telling you that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: We picked those misleading claims precisely because they`re not even about politicians, and because this is much larger than one media company and another, which is kind of how Biden put it, or me talking about somebody across the street.
[18:25:00]
We`re talking about information that affects what happens to people, including their own viewers, whether they get sick or potentially die in ways they didn`t have to.
Those were misleading claims pushed over and over. And recent studies found that kind of repetition made those FOX viewers more likely to be misinformed and act in ways that were dangerous to themselves and worsen the pandemic.
Or take the science about human activities making the Earth warmer. We know that it is. But if you watched FOX regularly, you might not, because about half of FOX viewers falsely think the Earth is just getting warmer by itself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They want you to be really afraid of climate change.
CARLSON: Climate change, they said, caused these fires. They didn`t explain how exactly that happened.
HANNITY: Using the deadly tornado tragedy across the Midwest to push their far left climate alarmism agenda.
MICHAEL SHELLENBERGER, AUTHOR, "SAN FRANSICKO": We`re not seeing any significant increase in extreme weather events affecting people`s lives.
GREG GUTFELD, FOX NEWS: The severity has been on the decline.
BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX NEWS: I think it was one of the coldest Julys we have had in some little while. I don`t know if that`s going to really fly with climate change.
STEVE DOOCY, FOX NEWS: Global cooling, right.
KILMEADE: Right. Yes, global cooling.
DANIEL TURNER, POWER THE FUTURE: Climate change panic is so overblown that it is hyperbolic and silly.
SHELLENBERGER: Kids have a lot of things to worry about. Climate change should not be one of them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: FOX has been doing this for years in a way that is fundamentally different from other media and other even opinionated media.
Now, there were those public service announcements that said, "The more you know." Remember that? Well, back in 2012 -- this is a while back -- a study showed FOX viewers were also less informed than people who literally said they consumed no news at all. Think about that.
You spend your time watching something called FOX News, and you end up statistically less informed than people who don`t watch the news, period.
This is not journalism, what they`re doing, what those results show. It`s different than most other outlets. Take the independent Poynter Institute, which found FOX and MSNBC were not the same thing. While both did have strong viewpoints, it was FOX that spun its own reality.
And many media outlets do face all kinds of lawsuits. We report on them. FOX, though, tends to lose or settle quite a bit of their lawsuits. They had to settle with the family of a former Democratic operative, Seth Rich, because they had falsely linked him to a WikiLeaks e-mail dump and falsely suggested that somehow Democrats or the Clintons` leaks would have been linked to that tragic death.
It`s a specific example. I`m sure it was, based on what we have learned, horrific for the family. And it was false enough that they had to settle the case.
And other times, FOX`s falsehoods affect the entire republic we`re living through and its problems. There were a lot of misleading suggestions about that 2020 election, even though the network`s own decision desk counted up what everyone else found, the ballots that Biden won.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Some of the most brazen acts of voter fraud to date.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There actually is evidence of fraud.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sworn affidavit saying people are forging signatures.
INGRAHAM: Tampering allegations, to the dead people voting.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many dead people voted?
HANNITY: Interesting stories about dead people voting. Wow. Amazing. What free and fair elections we all have confidence in.
FMR. REP. NEWT GINGRICH (R-GA): A corrupt, stolen election.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The election was stolen from a president.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Another independent study found FOX cast doubt on the results about 800 times, they counted, just in two weeks after the election.
So, that affects FOX viewers as well. A poll found 82 percent of FOX viewers falsely and wrongly believe Trump won. That may be a contribution of both Trump`s statements, the Republican Party and FOX itself.
Dominion Voting Systems is currently suing FOX for defamation because it says many guests were allowed to repeat blatantly false claims attacking their voting machines.
This is not about opinion, which, as a free speech person and a former First Amendment-practicing lawyer, I will defend, including their opinions.
This is about an entity that has news in the title but continues to make demonstrably false claims about all these issues. We have covered the COVID angle before, and that is a danger to FOX viewers. People who don`t watch FOX at all may have better information. When we report on that, we report on it because it`s important and also out of direct concern about how a company that has its own vaccine policies and uses a lot of CDC-style rules to keep its own workers safe is telling its viewers false things that might endanger them.
And yet we turn back to the news hook, as we call it in our business, of what Joe Biden was talking about, why so many powerful Democrats would seem to give FOX cover with that equivalence, even though its own viewers are more susceptible to believing false theories on all sorts of issues, including the January 6 insurrection.
[18:30:06]
I should note there is a wider debate in the Democratic Party, which did ultimately reject FOX as a debate host in 2020, after having previously given the channel that honor to navigate and referee Democratic Party debates in previous cycles.
This is a debate within the party. There are Democrats who either truly believe or seem to accept the conventional wisdom that FOX is like other media, or maybe they`re trying to score some sort of centrist points by saying that.
And then there are others, including what we see in a newer generation, that`s so concerned about the cost, real world, of this propaganda, that they see FOX and some other right-wing media as far more sinister.
Take the Queensbridge artist Nas, who wrote a whole song warning about this channel, lamenting -- quote -- "Sly FOX, cyclops, locked in an idiot box. What`s a FOX characteristic? Censored misinformation, overstimulation."
And Nas` advice was, with FOX feeding us toxins -- quote -- "You better watch what you`re watching."
It`s an interesting take from an artist who was clearly concerned about what he called FOX propaganda. Now, people can decide for themselves whether they agree more with that or with this recurring equivalence of two presidents.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
OBAMA: You have got the FOX News/Rush Limbaugh folks, and then you got the MSNBC folks.
BIDEN: The choice of what political coverage a voter looks to has as much impact on as what they believe, whether it`s MSNBC or whether it`s FOX.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Why do top Democrats draw this false equivalency? Does it bolster FOX`s credibility? And is it something that the party should have further debate on?
Well, we turn to Obama vet Chai Komanduri when we`re back in 60 seconds.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MELBER: We have been talking about truth, lies and equivalence. And now we turn to a special day here on THE BEAT.
We call it "Chai Day." It`s when political strategist and this cartooned operative Chai Komanduri, a veteran of three presidential campaigns, joins us.
Thanks for coming back, sir.
CHAI KOMANDURI, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Good to be back, Ari. How are you?
MELBER: I`m great.
We just walked through a lot of evidence, which was not to offer my view of our own channel`s work, but to look at why a president you once worked for, Obama, and the current president, Biden, draw this equivalence and whether you think they are correct.
KOMANDURI: Well, frankly, it`s unfortunately, conventional wisdom in the media, in D.C., in much of the country that FOX is a legitimate news source, like MSNBC or CNN.
The problem with this thinking is that it`s not true, and I would argue it is extremely dangerous. FOX traffics in disinformation and dishonesty about climate change, democracy, and COVID.
If you took the advice that FOX hosts were giving to you about COVID, you could have possibly died. And I do think a lot of the anti-vax people, hundreds of thousands of them who did die, did exactly that. So the stakes are extremely high.
This was a movement that FOX cheerled. This is something that was hypocritical on the part of FOX, considering that FOX itself has a vaccine mandate. It all makes FOX, to me, much closer to Alex Jones and Infowars than it is to MSNBC and CNN.
MELBER: So, when Joe Biden says that, why, as someone who`s so integrated into the Democratic Party as you are, and you have worked these campaigns, why does he say that?
Do you think he says that because it`s kind of a sop to centrism and, as you say, he`s playing within the conventional wisdom that exists, while privately trashing Peter Doocy and other FOX reporters, because maybe that`s what he really thinks?
[18:35:04]
Or do you think the conventional wisdom has seeped in so far that he believes it?
KOMANDURI: Well, I don`t think he necessarily believes it.
I think he was actually saying that to appear more centrist, to appear more moderate. There is a bias in our culture, in the media, in D.C. towards this both-sides-ism. Both sides are essentially equal.
The way the media covers the two sides here, the Democratic side or the Republican side, the FOX side and the legitimate news side, is they cover them sort of like a bickering couple in a romantic comedy. Think of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in "Sleepless" -- in "You`ve Got Mail," actually. I was going to "Sleepless in Seattle."
No, it`s "You`ve Got Mail," where they were the bickering couple, actually.
So, the theory there is that, oh, can`t these folks get along? Can`t they get together? Can`t they work things out? That`s very much the media narrative. It`s also the media narrative that tends to root for bipartisanship, regardless of the policy consequences for the American people. So I do think that that is a major problem.
The reality is, when you talk about FOX, you`re not really talking about a romantic comedy. You`re talking much more about a slasher film. FOX`s information is out to kill democracy. And it does and it has killed Americans.
FOX News, in my opinion, is much more Freddy Krueger than it is Tom Hanks.
MELBER: Fair.
And then you look at the way they have covered recent events, which Biden`s got to be aware of. Here was their coverage of the insurrection.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRET BAIER, FOX NEWS: It does not appear violent. It`s not like it`s a siege, it doesn`t seem. It seems like they are protesting.
INGRAHAM: An overwhelming majority of them,. 99-point -- more than 99 percent, had to be, were peaceful.
SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): It is a constitutional right to engage in peaceful political demonstrations. It is wrong to go after law-abiding citizens who are engaging in their constitutional rights.
INGRAHAM: Reports that Antifa sympathizers may have been sprinkled throughout the crowd.
CARLSON: So FBI operatives were organizing the attack on the Capitol.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: All of that is misleading. Much of it is directly false. Whether it was defamatory is a higher legal bar. I mentioned the lawsuits against them.
What do you think, at the political level, which is the other part of this, the Democratic Party needs to do?
KOMANDURI: I think we need to really push back on the idea that conspiracy theories are somehow equivalent to conservative opinion. They are not the same thing.
I think a lot of people, for example, listen to me and say, hey, you`re a Democrat; of course you feel this way about FOX News.
Well, think about this as a thought experiment. Imagine if we had Bill Kristol or George will running FOX News. They would not run a single segment that I, as a Democrat, would agree with. However, it would be nothing like the FOX News that exists today, the FOX News of Marjorie Taylor Greene, the FOX News of ivermectin enthusiasts, the FOX News that is the favorite news channel of Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban.
That is what FOX News has become. And I think that that disinformation is extremely dangerous. And I think it`s very necessary that Democrats really push back on these -- the idea that this -- FOX is really peddling conspiracy theories, not conservative opinions.
And I do think Democrats have kind of done this on some level, I think Nancy Pelosi, by bringing in, say, Liz Cheney, someone she probably doesn`t agree with on any single issue, except the fact that America should be a democratic country, has begun the process of distinguishing conservative opinion...
MELBER: Right.
KOMANDURI: ... from conspiracy theories, from the kinds of things that we are seeing on FOX News.
MELBER: Yes, when you put it like that, it`s a much clearer contrast, because, when you listen to what we played from both Obama and Biden, it was a kind of a warmed-over Beltway noodle kugel, if you will, that made the argument that somehow you have to get back to common facts by having less of FOX and a bunch of other types of media.
KOMANDURI: Right.
MELBER: The evidence we just showed and some of what you said is, actually, no, to get back to common facts, you have to remove the conspiracy theories, wherever they are.
And if the studies show -- again, I`m telling folks. Don`t take my word for it. I quoted Poynter, WashPo, a bunch of other independent sources, quantitative research.
KOMANDURI: Right.
MELBER: If they all show that`s where most of the conspiracy theories are, then, to get rid of them, you got to go there, and you may not sound like you`re matching the conventional wisdom, the kugel, as I call it.
You just have to be clear about what the recipe is and bring people to that with the facts.
So, it`s really interesting, because we -- Biden said that. It caught our ear. But we have had a lot of other news, but I thought it made for a "Chai Day."
And, Chai Komanduri, thanks for being here.
KOMANDURI: Thank you, Ari.
MELBER: Absolutely.
Coming up: We know Biden called it the BFD. A new Obamacare record.
But, first, this bombshell revelation from a new witness appearing in the Matt Gaetz sex crimes probe, and a special guest who knows all about Florida law -- when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:43:43]
MELBER: Turning to the Matt Gaetz sex crime probe, a witness saying they allegedly saw Gaetz convicted former ally Joel Greenberg tell Gaetz on a phone call that a teenager that both men had paid to have sex with was actually -- quote -- "underage."
Two sources telling The Daily Beast this. NBC News has not matched this reporting. The witness is reportedly Joseph Ellicott, a friend of Greenberg.
Now, investigators secured a plea deal from him in a separate investigation, but he`s also required to cooperate, according to "The Washington Post," fully with the government.
The Florida congressman has not been charged with any crimes. He`s repeatedly denied allegations of wrongdoing and put out a new statement this week regarding this development, reiterating his denials.
This is a story that`s been brewing for some time.
And we turn back to an expert who knows the law of the land. Dave Aronberg is the state attorney for Palm Beach County.
Welcome back.
What does this mean?
DAVE ARONBERG, PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA, STATE ATTORNEY: Thanks for having me back, Ari.
Well, it`s bad news for Matt Gaetz. I think he thought that, because it was a delay in this case, it was taking forever, that there was light at the end of the tunnel, but it turns out that the light was just an oncoming train. And this is bad for him.
But I think it`s worse that the ex-girlfriend testified before the grand jury. She really is the linchpin between Matt Gaetz and child sex trafficking and the Mann Act, which says it can`t transport individuals across state or federal lines for purposes of prostitution, and witness tampering.
[18:45:08]
When it comes to big Joe Ellicott, he`s more a corroborating witness, or that phone call on September 4, 2017, that Greenberg made to Gaetz in a panic, because he just found out that one of the girls that they were with from the Seeking Arrangement`s Web site was underage.
MELBER: Now, all of that sounds really bad on the evidence and the underlying potential offense.
Gaetz`s side not only have denied, as I say, but they tend to argue that the evidence, though, is not as bad if it has to hang on a phone call or a secondhand account of a phone call. Why would that kind of information you call the corroboration matter if investigators have underlying better actual evidence, rather than just discussion?
ARONBERG: The feds don`t want their key witnesses to just be Joel Greenberg, who`s a walking criminal enterprise, and then a 17-year-old girl who lied about her age and had a profile on SeekingArrangement.com, and then became an adult film star.
And not to bash anyone`s choice of professions, but let me tell you, juries don`t like that profile. And so they`re looking for corroboration. I think that`s why this whole thing has been taking so long. And now they have someone who was in the room when it happened, at least the room where the phone call happened.
And why is Joel Greenberg calling Matt Gaetz with mayday, mayday, because he just found out that this girl was underage? Well, you can then surmise that it`s because they both were with this girl inappropriately.
But the key witness here is the ex-girlfriend, who has no axe to grind with Matt Gaetz. They had an open relationship. She doesn`t have major credibility issues. She used to be a Capitol Hill staffer, and she could be the key witness, because, when you before a grand jury, Ari, it`s not a place for minor details, but it is a place for details about minors.
MELBER: Well, you have really walked us through the exact legal nuance here, because, as you mentioned, as we have reported, the underlying offenses are very serious.
But whether some of the individuals that might be used by the feds to go at Gaetz have their own credibility and criminal problems goes to how they may be trying to stack the evidence.
So, I think you have explained that well.
I will reiterate, because this is, of course, an important story, the Gaetz side has denied all wrongdoing. We will report out this investigation wherever it ends, including if it ends with no charges.
Dave Aronberg, thank you so much.
ARONBERG: Thank you, Ari.
MELBER: And let me tell everybody what we have coming up, because it is a very different look at a story that -- yeah, we talk about COVID and Omicron all the time, but what if I told you I had good news about new science and information that you might hear people buzzing about?
We`re going to go to the source. We`re going to get the goods. That`s next.
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[18:52:02]
MELBER: Turning to the latest on COVID, there are signs Omicron is fading, COVID infections declining across the U.S., while deaths continue to rise.
And there is plenty of COVID to go around. In fact, we have continued to see different lab studies deal with learning about this evolving and mutating virus. There`s a new one raising lots of interest, 33 scientists finding that CBD could prevent COVID from replicating in the human body.
They observed real-life patients who were already taking CBD, which is associated with marijuana, to treat epilepsy, in addition to lab testing. The experts say a clinical trial would now be needed to draw any definitive conclusions.
And this is a study about learning what`s working. It is not advice about what to imbibe or take to fight COVID at this juncture.
Now, one of the researchers from the CBD study joins us right now, Glenn Randall. Glenn Randall is a professor of microbiology at the University of Chicago.
Welcome.
GLENN RANDALL, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO: Hi, Ari. Nice to be on.
So...
MELBER: What did your study find?
RANDALL: Yes.
So, we started looking at CBD because it has some anti-inflammatory activity. And we thought maybe it would prevent this later stages of disease, where inflammation goes haywire.
And my colleague Marsha Rosner came up with the idea. And we tested it. And, to our surprise, it actually directly blocks virus replication in lung cells. And so we tested it in animal models with our colleagues at University of Louisville. And animals taking CBD had significantly less replication.
And then, finally, as you mentioned, there are patients who take CBD. It`s an FDA-approved version, not oils, to treat epilepsy. And then comparing patient records of those with other epileptic patients that were not taking CBD, there was a lot less CBD in that patient population.
And so with that, we thought interesting enough to published last week and really to call for more definitive, well-defined human clinical trials to see, is there really some therapeutic potential now? Because I should emphasize, we don`t know the answer to that question, until we have those clinical trials.
MELBER: Right. Right. A lot more that`s not known yet.
CBD is associated with marijuana, but it`s not the THC that people think of that gets you high. Your literature suggests you`re dealing partly with people, as you mentioned, who were taking it anyway.
In plain English, if possible, can you tell us what is it about CBD that did seem to work?
RANDALL: Yes, so our body has genes that fight virus infection. And CBD activated those genes, and, additionally, turned off some of these bad players in the hyperinflammation.
So, it might actually be that CBD could work at sort of both stages of the COVID disease process.
MELBER: And, finally, I just want to emphasize this because there`s so much information out there. And this is an interesting study, and we have talked to a lot of people.
We had one of the first people to ever try the vaccine when it was experimental, before all those studies.
[18:55:02]
But if someone hears about this, reads about this online and says, oh, that means they want to then try to take CBD or marijuana to deal with COVID prevention, that`s wrong because why?
RANDALL: So, two reasons.
First of all, we showed that THC, which is the active component of marijuana, actually blocks CBD`s ability to work. So, marijuana in our results should not have any effect.
And then the second reason, of course, is CBD is no substitute for preventative approaches that we know work, like vaccines and masks, from preventing serious disease. And so it shouldn`t take the place of those better characterized approaches.
MELBER: Got it.
I got to say, for a scientist, you`re pretty understandable. That`s a journalistic tip of the hat.
And I appreciate you walking us through your study, sir.
RANDALL: All right, thanks, Ari. It was a pleasure being on.
MELBER: Thank you.
Our thanks to Glenn Randall.
And we will be back with one more update, as mentioned, on Obamacare.
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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: This is a big (EXPLETIVE DELETED) deal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: I don`t know. It must be hot mic night on THE BEAT. We have been doing a lot of Biden hot mics. But that was how he described the Obamacare act there when it passed with his then-President Obama.
And, today, some news, sign-ups for Obamacare insurance reaching a record high all time, 14.5 million annually, beating the previous record by over two million.
It`s signs of how this has become a central policy in American life, at a time within the pandemic and a lot of work changes where people need health care.
And a note: Tomorrow, here on THE BEAT, the legendary actor Brian Cox from the hit HBO show "Succession," he is my special guest, making his BEAT debut. We`re going to get into all of it, including the billionaire class.
That does it for me. "THE REIDOUT" starts right now.