Summary
What kind of a country do we want to be? Supreme Court to hear affirmative action challenge. Supreme Court agrees to hear challenge to affirmative action in college admissions. Supreme Court to review race- conscious admissions at Harvard and UNC.
Transcript
JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: Good evening, everyone. We begin THE REIDOUT with a question. What kind of country do we want to be? A diverse multiracial democracy where everyone regardless of race, gender, gender identity, or income or where you live has equal access to opportunity and economic health and health care and I don`t know, food and clean water? Or the kind of country we used to be when like much of the world the U.S. was essentially an oligarch with a small group of really rich white Christian men and their wives, many with inherited wealth, a small merchant class and lots and lots of poor people and people of color, mainly black people who were de facto unequal.
Indeed until the 20th century which many consider to be the great American century. Women couldn`t vote, black men could vote on paper but faced everything from local trickery to lynching to stop them. Immigrants were routinely routed to urban ghettos. Immigration was restricted as much as humanly possible to white Europeans.
We had rampant segregation in schools in schools and public facilities and it was a free for all for industrialists to exploit the un-unionized workers and drill and mine and pollute at will.
But by the end of that century, largely due to progressive democratic presidents, democratic legislative super majorities despite the Dixiecrats and very forward looking Supreme Court justices a lot about America changed.
And most people think it changed for the better. But not everyone agrees that the new deal, the end of child labor, the ability of American workers to unionize and expanded women`s liberty and voting rights are good things. And now the American right has just the kind of Supreme Court that can start rolling those things back. But to get to that, they first had to get the right president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The Supreme Court wields more power over your life than ever before. Its decisions carry supreme consequences. Judges do not simply appear out of thin air. They`re picked by the president you elect and the next president could appoint multiple justices to the Supreme Court determining it`s ideological direction for a generation or longer. We need to elect a president who understands the limited role judges should play in our government. The court is at a crossroads and your rights are at stake. That`s why every judge matters.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: So that was a pre-2016 election video from the Heritage Foundation, which most people don`t pay much attention to but which basically provides the list Republican presidents choose judges from. Note all the little while male icons just so you know who they were talking to.
And the Heritage Foundation has won that fight. Their handpicked nominees are now a super majority on the court and that means the repeal of the 20th century with its progressive reforms that largely benefitted black and brown Americans and women is well underway or at least it`s very much at risk.
Roe v. Wade, the Voting Rights Act, environmental protections and now the Roberts court has taken up two cases on yet another right wing boogeyman, affirmative action. And while we have to remain open to the idea that they could surprise us, as constitutional lawyer Lawrence Tribe puts it, it`s that feeling you get when you know exactly what each of the nine justices will do but have to pretend you`re uncertain while the justices go through the motion of deep thought for a year-and-a-half.
Joining me is Melissa Murray, NYU Law Professor and MSNBC Legal Analyst, OiYan Poon Associate Professor at Colorado State University and a Researcher on Asian-American and Affirmative Action, and Michael Beshloss, NBC News Presidential Historian and Host of Fireside History on MSNBC`s The Choice on Peacock. Thank you all for being here.
And I do want to start with you first, Melissa, because you essentially tweeted today that the Supreme Court members are in like YOLO mode. They`re like beast mode. They`re like, we`re just going to be heroes on the right, which is do what we are doing. Are you as pessimistic about the way that you kind of assume that they`re going to rule and the 6-3 verdict that I think is coming on affirmative action and if you can you just explain the two cases a little bit for us that are ahead?
MELISSA MURRAY, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Sure. So, these are two cases that challenge the use of race in higher education admissions. One concerns Harvard University, which is a private university, it is governed by federal statutory law.
[19:05:00]
So, the question is whether Harvard violates those statutes if it uses race in any way in shaping its class.
The second case involves the University of North Carolina, a public institution, and this is a constitutional question. Whether the University of North Carolina, if it uses race, is part of its holistic admission calculus whether it violates the equal protection clause, which that can only allow for the use of race classifications if it`s narrowly tailored to meet a compelling government need and that government needed some (INAUDIBLE) has been diversity and higher education.
This court has in the past taken up these questions multiple times, most recently in 2016. They`re in a 4-3 decision, Elena Kagan was recused and Justice Scalia had just died. The court upheld the use of race in limited ways in higher education admissions. But as I said in my tweet today, this is a 6-3 court that is defying all expectations of the marshmallow experiment. They have the votes. They can do this now. And I suspect, as Professor Tribe does, that they are likely to go all the way and dismantle affirmative action entirely.
REID: Yes. And just we`ve putting up there is at the previous 2016 affirmative action decision and those who vote in favor, Anthony Kennedy who obviously not there anymore with Ruth Bader Ginsburg who has passed, Sonia Sotomayor and Stephen Breyer, and then, of course, Samuel Alito who were a lot of people expecting to what a fiery decision knocking down affirmative action because, apparently, he thinks that it is a terrible thing.
OiYan Poon I want to read a little bit, you wrote an amicus brief. Your organization wrote an amicus brief on the Harvard case on behalf of social scientists who are studying Asian-American education issues. Because in this case, there -- what the right is trying to do is sort of pit in a sense Asian-American applicants against the African American applicants. So, you wrote opponents of affirmative action in race conscious admission placed Asian-American at the heart of today`s legal debate in an attempt to shift the narrative away from so-called reverse discrimination.
Holistic review helps prevent admissions professionals from evaluating Asian-Americans as a homogenous block into more accurately and realistically understand them as a highly diverse racial group by removing the consideration of race more harm would be inflicted on Asian-Americans. Talk a little bit about the sort of pitting one group against another and the way the right is skillful at trying to do it.
OIYAN POON, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY: Yes. As Professor Murray mentioned, there is more than 40 years of legal precedent establishing the legalities of race conscious admissions and there is also 40-plus years of research on the books that demonstrate how race conscious admissions benefits Asian-Americans and all students of color and all students, more generally. (INAUDIBLE) have realized they keep losing over and over and over again. Every lower court so far in both cases has affirmed that diversity matters, that race can be one of many factors.
And so they`re playing this Asian versus black and Latino game essentially playing a really cynical racist game to try to gain some ground on something that they keep losing on. And Asian-Americans remain overwhelmingly supportive of affirmative action and race conscious admissions. And as Mari Matsuda once said, we will not be used. Especially in the last two years where anti-Asian discrimination and bias and violence have been so top of mind and reality, we cannot end this tool that is so important and vital to combat discrimination.
REID: And yet I feel like we are. Michael Beschloss, you know the thing that -- the only thing that seems to have changed does as far as what I have been able to tell from sort of the Heritage Foundation sort of right has been their level of creativity, right? It used to be just a blatant argument that white people were being done wrong by all these changes, right, from Brown v. Board on, you know, the civil rights act, the voting rights act. This is doing us wrong somehow. There is more creativity now, it`s also doing this (INAUDIBLE) with us, but it does feel to me like the right is sort of on the verge of at least trying to aggressively repeal all that the 20th century meant for progress for everyone else.
MICHAEL BESCHLOSS, NBC NEWS PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: The right has been trying to do this for years. It`s been trying to rollback with progressive reforms of the (INAUDIBLE) court from the 1950s to the 1970s. They have been desperate for this, they finally got it.
And you know the other thing Joy, is look at the justices we`re talking about. If the Democrats had won the presidency in 2016, there would be a strong majority, we wouldn`t be having this segment. We could talk about something else. The other thing is this is a court one-third of the nine justices appointed by one Donald Trump. Every single one of them has a shadow. The first one, the justice -- first justice that was appointed should have been appointed and confirmed in 2016, should have been Merrick Garland. That was a stolen seat. Mitch McConnell and Republicans refused to confirm him, and as a result, we have Neil Gorsuch.
Seat number two, Anthony Kennedy was on the court.
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His son was a banker who bought Donald Trump, Deutsche Bank. By reports, the son was an accessory that Trump used to persuade Anthony Kennedy to leave the court, that`s how we got Brett Kavanaugh.
Vacancy number three, the election year of 2000 when Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, many people said, follow the president that was established by Abraham Lincoln, the similar situation, 1864, wait for the new president to be elected and then go through this. Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell refused to do that thing, they rushed through Amy Coney Barrett. So, as a result of all of these things, we`ve got instead of a liberal majority, we`ve got a strong conservative majority and a majority of three justices who is pretty predictable how they`re going to vote on these issues.
REID: Yes. And, I mean, Melissa you think about the right has been much more focused on this. You know, they`ve looked long-term and they have said, you know, we can`t win these in elections with the majority of people want progressive reform, they want child labor laws, they want people to be able to vote. And so the way we can get at this is the same way that I think a lot of them feel they were done wrong in cases like not allowing segregated schools to have a tax break.
They`re like, well, the court did that to us, we get to do whatever we want and we can just do it through these justices as a way to sort of do it with their hands -- with their sort of fingerprints off of it. What`s happened though in these courts now, the Supreme Court it rules almost 70 percent of the time for like the Chamber of Commerce. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce always wins. The corporate is always wins. The right seems to consistently win. Is this the way that they`re sort of rolling back all the progress that electorally has been created?
MURRAY: I think it`s very clear that this is a court that has deep, deep skepticism for regulation. I mean, we`re seeing this in cases, like the one they took up today on the Clean Water Act, which will likely narrow the scope of that administrative law regulation. But we`re seeing it on a range of different issues, including social justice.
And I think one of the things this (INAUDIBLE) makes very clear is that this conservative block, which has been at war with itself at some points over the last couple of years is really assented and is focused now. They have five conservative stall warts. They don`t need people like John Roberts with his institutionalism (INAUDIBLE), his need for incrementalism, they don`t need him at all. And more and more of the question I think going forward is whether this chief justice is a chief justice in name only because he may have lost control of his colleagues and they are doing what they`re going to do.
And they took up the North Carolina case. There hasn`t even been an appellate court decision in that case. They are by passing the appellate court and taking this up together. And there may be practical reasons for that but it shows there is likely a chief justice who would like to stave this off given the hot button issues the court is facing but he wants to drive a (INAUDIBLE). The rest of this conservative majority wants to be in a Tesla.
REID: Yes. And, you know, OiYan Poon, I feel like they are running in such break neck speed, that this, the ideas of inclusions and diversity are going to die in this court.
POON: That would be awful if we recognized colleges and universities as places of teaching and learning and education. We have decades of social science research, which is who the amicus brief was written for with 678 social scientists with expertise on college admissions, higher education and Asian-Americans and race. And we know that without race consciousness in these practices, you have basically how admissions is run and that is not a good picture. You`ve got legacies, you`ve got, you know, as much as colleges and universities stay, they are blind. That is not actually true. And so you`ve got a really big concern that Asian-Americans stand to lose out as well along with black, Latino, Native Americans and indeed low income white students.
REID: And, you know, Michael, so the way you pull off the perfect crime is then you erase the teaching of history. What you specialize in, you say, we`re going to do these things and it`s the perfect crime because you can`t even teach about it.
BESCHLOSS: No. That`s exactly right. And so then we go to George Orwell. And the other thing goes back to what you said at the beginning, Joy, here, we have got a Supreme Court unlike for most of American history, there used to be a lot more turnover. You know, justices did not serve these long periods of time and that was because people didn`t live too long and they also were appointed at older ages than they are now.
There was a greater connection between public opinion and what justices did. People said there has to be some connection between the rulings of the court and where the country stands. Does anyone believe that the kind of rulings that we`re contemplating tonight with horror are the majority of the American people? I don`t think they are at all.
And the other thing is that oftentimes, throughout Supreme Court history, you`d have surprises.
[19:15:01]
You`d have a David Souter, who was more liberal than expected or Byron White, who is more conservative than expected. These people are so vetted that we know exactly what we`re getting that`s not what the founders wanted.
REID: The heritage foundation writes it and they read it. I mean they know exactly what they`re going to do and do exactly as expected. It`s a strange world we`re in. And Melissa Murray, OiYan Poon, Michael Beschloss, thank you-all very much.
Up next on THE REIDOUT what Bill Barr may have told the January 6 select committee as Newt Gingrich says a Republican house majority could throw those committee members in prison.
Plus the escalating tension on the Russia Ukraine border and now 8,500 U.S. yroops are on high alert for possible deployment to eastern Europe.
And JFK wrote profiles in courage but another member of the family could be the author of profiles in cluelessness and he`s tonight`s absolute worst.
THE REIDOUT continues after this.
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[19:20:05]
REID: Add one more to the list of people the January 6 committee is talking to, Chairman Bennie Thompson confirmed that they have spoken with Donald Trump`s former Attorney General Bill Barr. A committee spokesperson described it as informal conversations. Now, remember, Barr resigned at the end of December 2020, but not before contradicting Trump`s big lie, declaring that the Department of Justice had uncovered no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the election.
There`s increased interest in what Barr knows, especially following last week`s report of Trump`s draft executive order that would have seized voting machines following the election. The committee has said that topic has not been addressed with Barr as of yet.
This all comes as we`re starting to see retaliation against the committee. In Virginia, the new Republican attorney general has fired the top lawyer for the University of Virginia, who was on leave working as a staff investigator for the January 6 Committee.
The attorney general`s office said the decision had nothing to do with his work on the committee, but would not provide any additional details about the firing. And even more alarming is this from former Speaker and current Kevin McCarthy adviser Newt Gingrich over the weekend, which amounts to a banana republic-style threat to prosecute members of the January 6 Committee.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FMR. REP. NEWT GINGRICH (R-GA): I think, when you have a Republican Congress, this is all going to come crashing down, and the wolves are going to find out that they`re now sheep.
And they`re the ones who are, in fact, going to, I think, face a real risk of jail for the kind of laws they are breaking.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Joining me now is Congressman Ted Lieu of California, who was a 2021 impeachment manager.
And I want to get your reaction to this idea from Newt Gingrich straight out of the sort of banana republic world that they`re going to turn around if Republicans get back the House. And he`s advising Kevin McCarthy, who wants to be speaker, and prosecute and try to jail members of the January 6 Committee.
And I presume, after they`re done with them, they`re going to come after those of you who impeached Donald Trump.
REP. TED LIEU (D-CA): Newt Gingrich`s remarks are outrageous. We know the Supreme Court has already validated the January 6 bipartisan committee as a legitimate committee.
You don`t throw members of Congress in jail for serving on a committee. And you really see how fearful Republicans are now of the January 6 Committee, and they`re trying to do everything they can to intimidate the committee members and try shut it down. They will not succeed.
REID: What do you make of the purges that you`re now seeing in places like Virginia, where a lot of media folks tried to give Glenn Youngkin credit and try to say he wasn`t Trump?
Well, right now, his attorney general has fired somebody who`s involved in the January 6 Committee. They`re not saying why they fired him. They`re not owning the fact that they`re doing it because he was involved. But it sure does look weird.
LIEU: Glenn Youngkin sure is acting Trump-like with a number of his executive orders he`s issued.
And the attorney general of Virginia did not give any reason for firing what has been a perfectly fine lawyer. It looks like he did it because he was upset that the lawyer was on a January 6 committee. That is, again, a showing of how fearful the Republican base is of the January 6 committee.
And the committee is asking all the right questions, and they`re doing a fantastic job. And we look forward to their work product.
REID: I can tell you one person who`s not afraid is Liz Cheney. I don`t think Cheneys get scared of anything.
She responded to Gingrich`s threat, saying: "A former speaker of the House threatening jail time for members of Congress who are investigating the violent January 6 attack on our Capitol and our Constitution, this is what it looks like when the rule of law unravels."
And I do have to ask you. Should Republicans return to the majority in the House, do you expect Kevin McCarthy`s reign, assuming Donald Trump doesn`t take it from him and become speaker himself, to simply be an ongoing witch- hunt against Democrats like yourself?
LIEU: Well, let me first say that, last week, a YouGov/Economist poll had Democrats ahead in the generic congressional ballot. We have every reason and motivation and indication that we`re going to hold the House.
However, to answer your hypothetical, I think President Biden asked a very good question, which is, what are Republicans for? And right now, we don`t know what they`re for, other than for vengeance. And you see Kevin McCarthy saying he wants to throw Democrats off committees without even giving a reason as to what any Democrat may have done wrong.
And so you`re looking purely at a vengeance-motivated kind of campaign. They`re in this for power. They don`t have any policies for the American people.
REID: Yes, they`re in it for owning the libs.
"Rolling Stone" has a piece out. They have got a few really good pieces of this week, one of them, "Start the Steal: New MAGA E-mails Reveal a Plot to Hand the state of Arizona to Trump."
Here`s sort of the byline from it or the sort of bottom line here. Exclusive e-mails obtained by "Rolling Stone" and suppose an attempt to recertify the state as a victory for Trump and reveal top Trump world figures were complicit.
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We have had a couple of members of Trump`s legal team come on Ari Melber`s show and admit that their plan was indeed to basically decertify certain states to try to send them back, so they could put fake electors in, instead of the real electors.
What do you make of the openness with which these guys are admitting that that was the plan? And do you think that there were crimes committed in doing that?
LIEU: Let me first say that, when we made the presentation at the second impeachment trial, it was clear to us that this wasn`t just about the January 6 attack on our Capitol.
You had a lot of built up to January 6. You also had follow-up actions, all of which were designed to keep the former president in power illegitimately. The January 6 Committee has uncovered how broad and far this went.
The fact that the coup failed doesn`t mean that criminal laws weren`t broken. And the fact that they did this in the open doesn`t mean that criminal laws weren`t broken. So, we look forward, again, to the public hearings that the January 6 Committee will be putting out, and the final work product.
And I think there`s going to be a lot there for the Department of Justice to look into.
REID: Are we going to wind up seeing justice for any crimes that were committed having to come from the states?
We have now a grand jury that`s been seated in the state of Georgia to look into the attempts to steal that state for Donald Trump. Is that what we`re going to wind up looking to, see testimony compelled, people like Raffensperger having to testify because they`re subpoenaed hit by a grand jury?
Are we going to have to really starting to look there? Because it doesn`t seem that the DOJ is doing any active investigations in that realm. Even the January 6 Committee, they haven`t subpoenaed William Barr. They just asked -- they just talked to him informally.
LIEU: So, with the Department of Justice, they often don`t tell you what they`re doing until you see a publicly. So they could be doing all sorts of things. We just really don`t know.
I am pleased, though, that state and local prosecutors are doing their job. And if you just look at their law, you have got election interference laws. And if the former president is going to call up an election official and try to get that person to find over 11,000 votes, that is election interference.
And on Bill Barr, I`m very pleased that the January 6 Committee has already had discussions with him and gotten some information. And I want to remind people that, during the impeachment trial, we presented evidence that Bill Barr told Donald Trump to his face that the alleged conspiracy theories were -- quote -- "bullshit."
So, Bill Barr, I think, is not going to provide any good information in support of Trump. He might provide information that will be very helpful to January 6 committee.
REID: Yes, and that was somebody who was a complete flunky for Trump the entire time he was there. And even he said, nah, this ain`t even real.
Congressman Ted Lieu, thank you very much, sir. Really appreciate being here, as always.
All right, coming up: President Biden is cranking up the pressure, as the U.S. and our NATO allies try to keep Russia from invading Ukraine. The question remains, how far are we willing to go to defend Ukraine against Putin`s aggression?
We will be right back.
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[19:32:25]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Invading Ukraine, from a Russian perspective, is going to be a painful, violent and bloody business.
ANTONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: In the event that there is a renewed Russian incursion, Russian forces going into Ukraine, there is going to be a swift, a severe and united response.
JENS STOLTENBERG, NATO SECRETARY-GENERAL: We will always do what is necessary to protect and defend all our allies.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: International conflict is inching dangerously close to reality, as Russia continues to try to relive it Soviet glory days, hoping to swallow an independent country whole via violent force.
Earlier today, Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby announced that President Biden has approved a request from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to place 8,500 U.S.-based troops on high alert for potential deployment to Eastern Europe. That means they could be ready to ship out as soon as Friday if need be.
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JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: I don`t think anybody wants to see another war on the European continent. And there`s no reason why that has to occur.
This can be solved very easily by the Russians de-escalating, by moving some of these forces away, which they haven`t done. And so NATO, as a defensive alliance -- and it is a defensive alliance -- has a responsibility to its members to make sure that they`re able to defend themselves if needed.
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REID: If deployed, the troops would be folded into an existing NATO-led response force, which would decide where they go and what they do. No troops are intended for deployment to Ukraine itself.
Also today, President Biden held a nearly-two-hour call with his European counterparts to coordinate future responses. In a sign of how serious things are getting, NATO leaders laid out a robust deterrence plan, announcing that France, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Spain were prepared to send troops ships, warplanes, and fighter jets to Romania, Lithuania, and Bulgaria.
Over the weekend, the British foreign secretary announced that Russia is plotting to overthrow the Ukrainian government, with the goal of installing a puppet regime. On Sunday, the State Department urged the departure of nonessential staff and family members from the U.S. Embassy in Kiev. Roughly 100,000 Russian soldiers are lying in wait on the Northeast and Western borders of Ukraine.
More now from NBC News foreign correspondent Matt Bradley, who is in Kiev.
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MATT BRADLEY, NBC NEWS FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT: It really does feel like everything is headed in one direction, towards war.
But walking around the Ukrainian capital, it really just doesn`t feel that way at all. This does not feel like a population that is girding for war with a major global military.
[19:35:01]
No, the opposite. Everybody here seems pretty chill. The stores are open, I don`t see anyone packing their cars and trying to rush out west, trying to flee the front lines. Instead, the Ukrainian government`s official line is, stay calm, stay resolute in the face of what could be a major invasion, but also stay calm.
And there`s another reason why Ukrainians are not necessarily so affected by this. At the end of the day, there`s been an eight-year-long war in the east of the country against Russian-backed separatists. So this isn`t necessarily something that they see as something entirely different, even though there`s a lot of military hardware on their borders.
And, also, a lot of Ukrainians just don`t feel like they have been involved up until now. They don`t feel like they have had a role in the diplomacy and the negotiations. They have been left out. And that just figures into a frustration that`s been longstanding here in this country.
They`re tired of being seen by Moscow as a cudgel to beat the West. They`re tired of being fought over. They would rather be fought for -- Joy.
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REID: NBC`s Matt Bradley, thank you very much.
With me now is former U.S. ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, MSNBC international affairs analyst.
And I want to pick up on that point that our Matt Bradley was reporting. I mean, the idea of Ukraine being a sort of constant pawn, and being more or less sort of in a state of war since 2014, what I sensed from his reporting is a sense of exhaustion in that country at just being used, but not a lot of panic.
What do you make of that?
MICHAEL MCFAUL, MSNBC INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Well, they are frustrated that they`re not in the negotiations.
And we have had two rounds of bilateral negotiations now in Geneva without the Ukrainians there. That said, Secretary Blinken did fly to Kiev and met with the President Zelensky there. They talk to them, from what I can tell, pretty much every day.
And I don`t think there`s any daylight between the American position and the Ukrainian position. Both are threatened, right? The negotiators don`t have strong cards. Vladimir Putin has put over 130,000 soldiers on three different sides of their borders. And so he has a lot of leverage. The Ukrainians and the Americans right now don`t.
REID: And there`s even reporting from the British government that the Kremlin was developing plans to install a puppet regime, pro-Russian regime. And, of course, here comes the name we have heard before, a candidate link to Paul Manafort, which brings us back to where we were during impeachment.
That is an interesting development. Your thoughts on that?
MCFAUL: Well, I read that intelligence reporting obviously, not the classified, but the press reports of it. I have no reason to doubt its authenticity.
I have a hard time connecting the dots, though, Joy. How do they do that? They`re not -- they can`t -- they don`t have the power to install somebody in Kiev. That would never happen.
What it makes me wonder is if this is part of the post-invasion planning. I can imagine if, God forbid, there was a massive military intervention, invasion, that this would be what they would do afterwards. I can`t see it before military intervention.
REID: And let`s talk about what it is that Putin wants. He does seem to have a complex, right, that the Soviet Union, I guess, in his mind should be viewed as great a nation as people view the United States, or at least they did before Trump came along. And he`s got a complex about it.
Fiona Hill, who was a former National Security Council official, she wrote a lengthy piece that I thought was quite good in "The New York Times.
And she writes: "Mr. Putin wants to give the United States a taste of the same bitter medicine Russia had to swallow in the 1990s. Putin believes that the United States is currently in the same predicament as Russia was after the Soviet collapse, grievously weakened at home and in retreat abroad. He thinks NATO is nothing more than an extension of the United States."
And by -- basically, he wants us out of Europe, period. Could this just be posturing, even with 130,000 troops, as a way to force the U.S. into making a decision to just pull troops out of Europe, which it doesn`t seem realistic to me, but do you think that`s what he wants?
MCFAUL: Well, it`s definitely what he wants.
But that`s a maximalist position. There`s no way that that is going to happen. There`s no way that the NATO alliance should or could agree to his terms. And I don`t think the president should or could.
By the way, everybody leaves out the domestic politics of it. Imagine, Joy, if President Biden began to intimate, oh, let`s pull out of -- let`s stop NATO, the open-door policy from 1949. There`s just no way that`s going to happen.
So it`s one thing to put out maximalist positions. It`s another to negotiate. And I negotiated with the Russians and Mr. Putin when I worked for the Obama administration. They put out maximalist positions when we were negotiating, for instance, the New START treaty.
But, at the end of the negotiations, they finally dropped them. And what we don`t know today is, is he bluffing with the maximalist positions? Because he knows -- he knows that we -- that that is not a possibility for President Biden.
Or is he just using it as a -- and then he`s going to get down to serious business about negotiations, or is this all just a whole ultimatum, ultimately a pretext for invasion? And I don`t know the answer that. And I don`t think anybody knows the answer to that.
[19:40:07]
I`m not even sure Vladimir Putin has decided the answer to that.
REID: And do you -- is Russia even sort of susceptible to economic pressure?
I mean, the reports are that Vladimir Putin himself is a multibillionaire and has skimmed enough money to make himself rich beyond his wildest imagination. But the country ain`t rich. They`re basically kind of a sort of broken-down sort of old ex-oil empire, an oiligarchy, if you will.
Is Russia subject to real economic pressures? Is there something Europe and the U.S. can do our NATO can do?
MCFAUL: Well, I want to be clear. I supported sanctions when Russia annexed Crimea and intervened in Eastern Europe -- Eastern Ukraine -- excuse me.
I would like to have seen them ratcheted up year by year. I think of sanctions like parking tickets. If you`re still parked there illegally the next day, you should get another ticket, right, not just you get one ticket to be there.
And I applaud what the Biden administration does -- has done to put together, I think, a pretty fantastic coalition sanctions. That all said, this is bigger than sanctions. Putin is not motivated by cost-benefit analysis for how his Russian banks are going to be affected. He sees his mission in a much bigger way.
And he said it very explicitly. He thinks his mission is to reunite the Slavic nation. He thinks Ukraine and Russia are part of that Slavic nation. And when you`re thinking in those terms, making cost-benefit analysis about how the stock market is going to react, I don`t think plays into his analysis.
REID: Yes.
And reunite them, whether they want to be reunited or not, because these countries seem to want to be part of Europe. And he`s like, no, you can`t.
It`s a fascinating character, and not in a good way.
Ambassador Michael McFaul, always great to talk with you sir. Thank you very much.
And stick around for tonight`s "Absolute Worst," because if a certain unhinged segment of the population is making your blood boil with frustration, well, join the God-dang club.
That`s next.
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[19:46:07]
REID: You ever just sit back and wonder how a fringe anti-vax subculture came to take over our country, with no sign of stopping anytime soon?
Problematic people with large platforms. That`s how, like Robert Kennedy Jr., Democratic political scion and prominent anti-vaxxer, whose group The Children`s Health Defense is a major source of vaccine misinformation.
On Sunday, he`s spoke at an anti-vax rally on the National Mall, doing all the things that COVID deniers love to do, spouting off conspiracy theories involving massive surveillance and 5G, but also, in what has become a disturbing feature in the anti-vax game plan, he compared vaccine policies to the Holocaust.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR., ANTI-VACCINE ACTIVIST: Even in Hitler`s Germany, you could cross the Alps into Switzerland. You can hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Anne Frank, of course, is the Jewish teenager who died in a Nazi concentration camp at the age of 15.
During World War II, she hid with her family and a secret annex in an Amsterdam house for two years. Her enduring legacy and what she symbolized amid the darkest of horrors inspires millions even today, which is all to say that Kennedy`s comments are deeply offensive, historically inaccurate, and objectively outrageous.
It also echoes the Republican gaslighting technique that equates anything they don`t like to a totalitarian state. That gaslighting has real consequences for people who don`t have Kennedy`s star power or large platforms or buckets of money, people like educators and parents and children, who are navigating a chaotic landscape regarding their very own safety.
Today, in Virginia, the Trumpy new governor, Glenn Youngkin, kicked off his new anti-mask optional mandate, a mandate that seven school boards are suing to stop.
For parents and teachers, the toll of school closures is tremendous. Many have hit pandemic rock bottom. And now, in Virginia, they`re up against a governor who is anti-mask, let`s face it, just to rally the base. They`re also up against the megaphone of Robert Kennedy Jr., who is spreading not just COVID, but lies and hate.
So, to those who say the COVID response is worse than living under the Nazi regime, while creating terrifying conditions for those who are just trying to keep their kids safe and get through the day, you are the "Absolute Worst."
And up next: Some weaponize Holocaust analogies to attack COVID policies, while others are simply over it. Why a once-in-a-century pandemic does not care whether you`re over it or not.
Stay with us.
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[19:52:48]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARI WEISS, JOURNALIST: I`m done with COVID done. We were told, you get the vaccine. You get the vaccine, and you get back to normal.
And we haven`t gotten back to normal. And it`s ridiculous at this point. This is going to be remembered by the younger generation as a catastrophic moral crime.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: My God, she`s so bored.
You know who isn`t done with COVID? First off, COVID itself. The U.S. is now averaging more than 2,000 COVID deaths a day. There`s also those who have no choice but to have to deal with COVID, educators, parents, unvaccinated children, those with disabilities or medical conditions, the elderly, the uninsured, and those who have been on the front lines of this unprecedented global crisis for two whole years, health care workers, some of whom spoke to "The New York Times" about leaving the profession, not just because of COVID, but because of chronic understaffing by profit- driven hospitals.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I hope to be able to leave the bedside within this year.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don`t know how long I can do this physically, mentally, emotionally.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I will never work in a hospital setting again. I will never subject myself to that sort of frustration.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Joining me now is Wajahat Ali, columnist for The Daily Beast and author of "Go Back to Where You Came From," which comes out tomorrow.
Happy pub day.
WAJAHAT ALI, AUTHOR, "GO BACK TO WHERE YOU CAME FROM: AND OTHER HELPFUL RECOMMENDATIONS ON HOW TO BECOME AMERICAN": Thank you. Thank you.
REID: And it`s so great to have you on.
I have been coveting your presence on this network for quite a long time. So I`m really excited to see you, Wajahat. Congrats on the book.
So let`s talk about this a little bit, because Bari Weiss is, like, so bored with COVID. She`s like, oh, my God, can I just go to the spa and, like, live my life with my friends and, like, do like "Sex and the City" fun things? Like, well, gah.
But when she was saying it, I`m thinking to myself, well, health care workers don`t have their lives back. What do you make of this sort of attitude toward COVID?
ALI: The Bari is so low for some people who whine and complain about cancel culture from the most prestigious platforms, these smug cynics who use their contrarianism as a shield for their selfishness. They`re selfish.
I`m sorry you`re not over COVID. COVID ain`t over you; 950,000 Americans are dead. And I`m over COVID. I got two kids, virtual schooling in Virginia, because my daughter is immunosuppressed.
[19:55:04]
We have been in lockdown for three years, eight months before COVID, because of my daughter`s stage four cancer. They wear masks, Joy, ages 7, 5 and 2. They wear masks, they sanitize, they social distance, because they realize they`re human beings who have to be empathetic and care about a community, because it takes all of us to flatten this curve.
So, I don`t care that you`re annoyed about your dinner dates or about your brunches or that you go on Bill Maher and you`re just over COVID. The rest of us human beings who care about one another, we`re over COVID, but we`re doing the right thing.
And the last thing I will say is, people who are really upset at this watching this right now, we`re not asking you to storm the beaches of Normandy.
REID: Right.
ALI: You don`t have to cut off your arm like the people in "Snowpiercer" to feed your friends. Just wear a mask once in a while. Get a vaccine social distance. And then we can all eat brunch together.
REID: You know, I`m sort of coining the term pandemic libertarians, because it`s a combination of -- I am still stressed out about the number of people who died on 9/11. I still -- that gave me nightmares. And that was 2,000-some-odd people.
I think about the Titanic. I will watch those films, and I cannot sleep just thinking about that many people dying at once.
I am sort of amazed by the number of people who just don`t give a damn; 860,00, 800,000, 900,000 people die, poof, and they -- it doesn`t bother them at all.
What they prioritize is, they need to have their convenience. And so your immunocompromised kids are just an annoyance to them. They don`t want to have to do anything for them.
What is that about? Is that like a social disease in this society? What is it?
ALI: I mean, it`s a -- it reflects America`s cruelty, right? We`re a generous country. But, at the same time, we have also had cruelty, white supremacy, misogyny.
America says go ahead and die, but just don`t die on my lawn. And we`re going to respect the Greatest Generation, but F grandma and grandpa. And, by the way, we love the kids, we`re pro-life, but you know what? I`m perfectly fine with my kid getting COVID, rather than them getting a book written by a black person talking about racism, because it makes me feel inconvenient.
And so we`re dealing with selfish people with their inconvenience and materialism, who just can`t sacrifice the bare minimum. And, again, you don`t get to storm the beaches of Normandy. Wear a mask once in a while.
But it shows a selfishness that is at the root of this country. And some of those forces get elected. And some of those forces have a major political party, where it`s civility for us, cruelty for you, law and order when we want power, but, for the rest of you, eh, we don`t care.
REID: And you`re...
(CROSSTALK)
ALI: As long as you -- you have to accommodate us. That`s what it is. You always have to accommodate us, our whims and our power.
REID: Exactly.
And you`re in Virginia, which Glenn Youngkin has formed an entire sort of political movement around the idea of essentially making it less safe for your kids and other kids to go to school. I mean, you`re going to wind up having school closures because there are going to be COVID outbreaks.
Has there been a buyer`s remorse that you have detected at all in Virginia for electing this clown?
ALI: Yes, because when it came to the dog whistle of racism, when it came to parents` choice, when it came to CRT that is not being taught, because I got two kids -- it`s not in any lesson plans or curriculums.
A lot of white and suburban parents were like, you know what? Diversity makes me uncomfortable. F them kids. Let`s get Youngkin.
But now he does the anti-mask and anti-vaccine mandates, and their kids are going to be exposed to COVID. And a lot of these Republican parents in Alexandria and Arlington are like, wait, wait, wait, not my kids.
Yes, your kids too. We`re in this together.
REID: Yes.
ALI: There`s a cost to white supremacy.
REID: What do you make of the sort of Aaron Rodgers of the world?
I mean, I just heard today that Aaron Rodgers was saying that he would not play in the Super Bowl had he now -- I see what you did -- right. I see what you did there -- had he had to deal with the COVID.
Yes, you would have made, man. You would have gone right to the Super Bowl. You want that second ring so bad.
But I, mean, people like the Robert F. Kennedy Jr.`s the people with big platforms that are using them to be anti-mask and anti-vax -- and this Holocaust analogy is bananas.
ALI: It`s anti-Semitic. It`s -- anyone who makes a Holocaust analogy, go to Poland, like I do. Go to visit Auschwitz, like I did. Jews were systematically murdered.
You never want to make that analogy, because no one`s murdering you. No one`s torturing you. No one`s asking you to be in a concentration camp. We`re just asking you to wear a mask and get vaccinated.
If you choose not to, then us in the majority, we will move forward. The caravan, we will move forward.
REID: Yes.
ALI: And I want to say this real quick.
America should thank the 49ers. First and foremost, we beat the Cowboys. When a Cowboy fan cries, an angel gains its wings. And then a week later, we beat Aaron Rodgers, the anti-vaxxer who was immunized against COVID, but not against the 49ers, who are 4-0 against him in the postseason.
So, thank you, America. Root for the 49ers.
REID: Let me tell you, I`m still mad about Kaepernick, but I`m with you on that, as a -- growing up Broncos fan, if you beat the Cowboys, I just love you.
Real quick, tell me about your book. Tell us all about your book.
ALI: "Go Back to Where You Came From" is coming out tomorrow, my first book.
It`s about loving a country that doesn`t always love you back. It`s an elegy for the rest of us who are still not seen as the co-protagonists of America. It`s about stretching and expanding this country to include the rest of us, as there are forces right now, Joy, as we`re speaking, trying to restrict us and only make one hero, the hero with the white complexion, the right complexion.
But the rest of us, we`re not trying to replace you. We just want a piece of the delicious American pie.
REID: Yes.
We can`t see your shirt, because there`s the sort of banner under you. But can you stand up a little bit so we can see your shirt?
I love that. This is your dad`s message to you.
ALI: "Beta, why don`t you do something..."
REID: "Useful."
(CROSSTALK)
ALI: ... told me that.
REID: That`s every immigrant parent. Every immigrant parent sounds exactly like that.
I want one of those shirts. And I`m going to get a copy of your book.
Wajahat Ali, thank you very much, man. Appreciate you. Congrats.
ALI: Thank you.
REID: That is tonight`s REIDOUT.
"ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES" starts now.