The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell - July 2 — Audio Only

[0:01] The Last Over with Lawrence O'Donnell starts right now. Hey, Lawrence. [0:04] Hey, Jen. I am so proud and grateful to our audience, as I always am, but especially last [0:11] night, because they took this book last night. This is a six-year-old book. This is Isabel [0:19] Wilkerson's Astonishing Book cast, and they made it number one on the Amazon bestseller list [0:26] overnight, where it's been before. And I'm sure they made it number one in some other booksellers [0:33] around the country. But Isabel was here last night talking about Ketanji Brown Jackson's opinion [0:40] in the birthright citizenship case, and doing so eloquently, Justice Jackson quoted this book [0:50] and quoted Isabel Wilkerson in her opinion. So it was great to have her here. But what I [0:56] really love about this is that kind of reaction in book sales tells you how our audiences are [1:05] attached to what is happening in what we're able to present to them here with just the best possible [1:12] guests on the subjects like this, like Isabel Wilkerson. I mean, she is incredible. But I also [1:17] think we learned, and I know this from going on your show with my book, you need a book club, [1:22] because I think people who are loyal watchers of The Last Word want to read what you're reading. [1:29] And that's another lesson, too. So, but that's incredible. She's incredible. [1:33] And hopefully it stays out there for a long time, up high on the list. [1:37] Yeah, it really deserves to be. President Obama has talked about this book. This is, [1:41] this is one of those books that will be with us and should be with us forever. [1:44] And I'm so glad to see it back up on top on those bestseller lists. [1:50] Yeah, me too. It's a good sign for the country, I think, or where we are, I guess. [1:54] Thanks, Jen. [1:56] Thanks, Lawrence. [1:57] Thanks. [1:57] Cooperation ends today. It is time for him to pay. Those rhyming lines were aimed at Donald Trump, [2:12] and they are from one of the many people Donald Trump hates. Today, as every Republican in Congress, [2:22] in the House and in the Senate who is running for re-election cowers in fear of Donald Trump [2:29] every single day of their lives, people who Donald Trump threatens, people who Donald Trump hates [2:34] as much as he has ever hated anyone, continue to stand up to Donald Trump. And one of them [2:43] is going to make him pay and pay very soon. Former special prosecutor Jack Smith came to this network [2:53] today to do the first interview he has ever done about his two federal criminal prosecutions [3:00] of Donald Trump. Did that interview with Nicole Wallace here at 5 p.m. [3:04] Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to imprison Jack Smith, and Jack Smith, who told Congress [3:12] in public testimony that he developed proof that Donald Trump is guilty beyond a reasonable [3:18] doubt, said today there is nothing Donald Trump can say or do to intimidate him. [3:25] I am not going to be intimidated, and there's no way in the world. If the thought was to go [3:33] after me so that I wouldn't speak up about the corruption that's happening or speak up to [3:39] defend these agents and prosecutors, that is a grave miscalculation. There is no way I'm going [3:44] to be intimidated. And E. Jean Carroll, who is now 82 years old and who has beaten Donald Trump [3:52] in court repeatedly in two different cases, is now telling Donald Trump it is time to pay up. [4:01] E. Jean Carroll's most recent crushing of Donald Trump in court came when the United States [4:08] Supreme Court unanimously rejected Donald Trump's appeal of the $5 million judgment that a federal [4:16] jury awarded to E. Jean Carroll three years ago after finding Donald Trump, as the New York Times [4:24] put it, quote, liable for sexually abusing and defaming Ms. Carroll. In order to pursue his appeal, [4:33] Donald Trump had to put the $5 million in an escrow account controlled by the judge in the case. [4:39] Both sides of the case, Donald Trump's lawyers and E. Jean Carroll's lawyers, at the time agreed [4:45] that the money would have to be paid as soon as Donald Trump got to the end of the line of his [4:51] appeals, which is, of course, the denial of a petition for the Supreme Court to hear the case. [4:58] And that happened on Monday. And immediately, according to E. Jean Carroll's lawyers, Donald Trump's [5:04] lawyers called E. Jean Carroll's lawyers to ask for an extension on paying the money that Donald Trump [5:11] now owes E. Jean Carroll in that case. Attorney Roberta Kaplan, who has successfully represented [5:18] E. Jean Carroll in this case at every stage, told the judge in writing, quote, [5:23] defendant's counsel contacted Carroll's undersigned counsel to inquire whether Carroll would consent [5:30] to a further stay of enforcement of the judgment in this action so that defendant can ask the Supreme [5:37] Court to reconsider its denial. And yeah, I'm kind of laughing about that because the Supreme Court [5:45] just doesn't reconsider their denials. I mean, theoretically, technically, it's possible, but [5:49] it's way, way, way less than a 1% chance. E. Jean Carroll's lawyer had a one-word answer for the Trump [5:57] lawyers, no. And then she immediately filed a motion with the judge saying, quote, [6:03] quote, the court should enforce the plain language of the existing stipulation and order and direct [6:10] immediate disbursement of funds because the $5 million judgment gains interest every day that Donald Trump [6:17] doesn't pay it. And it has been gaining that interest for three years now. The total that Donald Trump [6:23] actually owes E. Jean Carroll as of Tuesday was $5,779,783. And it has gone up since then because it goes up [6:37] every day that Donald Trump doesn't pay it. E. Jean Carroll's lawyer reminded the judge of all the delay [6:44] tactics Donald Trump has used throughout this case over the years and quoted the judge himself as having [6:51] said in the past that Donald Trump, quote, should not be permitted to run the clock out on a plaintiff's [6:58] attempt to gain a remedy. E. Jean Carroll's lawyer ended her nine-page motion with these words, quote, [7:07] To date, Carroll has agreed to each of defendants' many requests to delay the payment he owes her, [7:15] given the extraordinary lengths he has taken to avoid such payments, and that each of those efforts [7:21] has been denied in full. That cooperation ends today. It is time for him to pay Carroll. The judge [7:32] gave Donald Trump a deadline of next Tuesday, July 7th, to reply to that motion. It is at this point [7:40] impossible to foresee any other outcome than the judge ordering Donald Trump to pay the now almost [7:48] 5.8 million dollars that he owes E. Jean Carroll within a matter of days, probably within this month [7:54] of July. And so it's time's up for Donald Trump because E. Jean Carroll says it is. Time's up for [8:06] Donald Trump because our judicial system was designed to allow a private citizen to have the same rights [8:11] and powers in a courtroom that anyone else has, even if the other person in the case is currently the [8:18] president of the United States. And that is why Donald Trump has tried to destroy that system. [8:25] That is why Donald Trump has tried to poison the federal judiciary with incompetent federal judges [8:31] like the one he appointed in Florida, whose place in history will be having disgraced herself by [8:36] doing everything she possibly could to block Jack Smith's prosecution of Donald Trump for violations of [8:42] the espionage act and the illegal possession of classified documents after Donald Trump left the [8:47] presidency. That is why Donald Trump has poisoned the Justice Department by trying to fill it with [8:54] people, including an FBI director, with no allegiance or expertise and no allegiance to anything or [9:01] anyone other than Donald Trump. Donald Trump cannot survive in a federal criminal justice system that [9:09] actually works. And so he's done everything he can to destroy it, not because of some political or [9:15] philosophical belief, but entirely as a matter of self-protection, protection from brave plaintiffs [9:25] like E. Jean Carroll, who could not be intimidated by Donald Trump, and brave prosecutors like Jack Smith, [9:33] who could not be intimidated by Donald Trump. Donald Trump can afford the $5.8 million that he owes E. Jean [9:41] Carroll. And the federal judge handling the case knows that because like all federal judges in New York [9:47] City, he must read The New York Times, which has been delivering the best reporting on Donald Trump's [9:53] profiting from the presidency. Eric Lipton, whose work at The New York Times now is dedicated to putting [10:00] the financial dealings of the president of the United States under an investigative microscope, [10:04] will join us in our coverage this hour. Donald Trump did an interview with CNBC Today, the business news [10:11] network where he made it very, very clear that he does not care at all about the personal business [10:19] of economic survival in this country for people who continue to worry about the cost of living and [10:26] especially the affordability of housing. In a few days, it's going to become law one way or the other, [10:35] the housing bill, right? Are you going to sign it? Will it become law? Where do you stand on that? [10:39] Is it? I know you call it a yacht. He had nothing to say about it. Just went silent there. Nothing. [10:51] And then after dozens of rambling lines, including, quote, nobody knows more about housing than I do, [10:57] Donald Trump returned to the housing bill, but still wouldn't say if he would sign it. [11:09] But the housing bill is fine. There's a lot of Democrat points in there [11:17] that I don't even think are good. But it's fine. But I've made the case. I'd rather not sign anything [11:25] until we sign the Save America Act. And that's it. That's everything he said [11:36] about the cost of living and affordability in America, which is to say nothing. He said nothing. [11:44] As we have explained on this program before, if Donald Trump doesn't sign the bill, [11:48] it will automatically become law after 10 days unless he vetoes it. But saying the housing bill is [11:55] fine is an indication that he is not going to veto it. But not signing it proves that he is not trying [12:02] to rush help to Americans through a bill supported by most Democrats and most Republicans in Congress [12:10] who are concerned about the affordability of housing. Joe Kernan gave Donald Trump a sort of [12:16] predictable, perfectly reasonable question that most interviewers would give on the eve of a big [12:23] American birthday like the 250th. And Donald Trump had no answer to a question that has been a welcomed [12:35] softball for every president in history who has ever been asked this question, which is most of them. [12:43] Do you have a favorite president? Do you have a favorite president? Or do you think there's a [12:54] period that was so formative that if we've lost our way in any respects? [12:58] Yeah, we've had some very bad presidents. The president has got tremendous power in this country, [13:05] even before the decision that I got slaughter. They go with the slaughter decision, which is an [13:10] interesting name. But that's a very powerful decision. But it gave a lot more power to the [13:15] president. But it has been a strong presidency, not just me. It's been a strong presidency. It's [13:21] considered a strong office. You know, other presidents are not considered a strong office, [13:27] even if you're president, you can't do as much. But now with this additional, I mean, it's very special. [13:33] We are respected again as a country, maybe like never before. A year and a half ago, [13:40] we were laughed at. They're not laughing anymore. They respect us. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia told [13:45] me. And I said this numerous times. He said it. But many people said it. He said, President, [13:50] a year and a half ago, America was dead. They thought it was dead. And right now, [13:57] you have the hottest country anywhere in the world. And we do. [14:00] Well, let's hope for another 250 like that. Thank you very much. [14:06] Do you have a favorite president? That was the question. And the answer is clearly no. [14:21] Donald Trump was asked to think about someone else. And he just couldn't do it. He doesn't have it in him [14:33] to think about someone else. Every elementary school student in America has an answer to that [14:42] question. Do you have a favorite president? And Donald Trump doesn't. For Donald Trump, [14:49] there is nothing Abraham Lincoln did that could make him Donald Trump's favorite president. Nothing [14:54] Washington or Jefferson or either Roosevelt or Kennedy or Reagan. Donald Trump has spewed hatred for every [15:03] living president. His first line, his very first line on the eve of the country's 250th birthday when [15:12] asked if he has a favorite president, his very first line was, quote, we have had some very bad [15:18] presidents. That is what this man, full of hate, said about the American presidency. That was the only [15:28] thing he said. And he never said we've had even one good president. And that's what you get [15:39] from the 80 year old mind of a man who treats the presidency as a side job while his thoughts remain [15:46] locked on money, lies and revenge. He's right. We've had some very bad presidents. And that is the [15:57] category in presidential history where Donald Trump reigns supreme. He is the worst of the worst. [16:10] Leading off our discussion tonight is Iowa State Representative Josh Turek. He is the [16:16] Democratic candidate for United States Senate in Iowa. Josh, thank you very much for joining us [16:24] again tonight. And I think I think the audience here knows that we're not rushing around the country [16:31] trying to find every obscure candidate running in Republican territory who might have a chance. So I just [16:37] want to brief the audience on the latest here in the polling in Iowa, which is a return to an Iowa that [16:47] I'm old enough to remember when Democrats could be elected to the United States Senate like Senator [16:53] Tom Harkin. And there it is. There it is. The Democrat, Josh Turek, 50 to 46 among registered voters. [17:02] And then when you get to the people who are really going to rush to the polls, it opens up 56 to 41. [17:11] And and Josh, I don't like to use polls in our coverage of of of campaigns and what's happening [17:18] and the issues. But this is one where I think people have to see this. And no matter what the outcome is [17:26] in November, as of right now, tonight, something really profound politically is happening in Iowa. [17:34] Is it about Donald Trump? Well, Lawrence, thanks for having me. It's good to be back with you, [17:41] my friend. Yeah, I'll tell you this. Iowans are ready for change in everywhere that we're going all [17:46] across the state. We're getting a lot of Republicans and independents that are showing up to our events [17:52] that are talking about they don't recognize the state or the country that they live in. I mean, [17:57] Iowa, we are uniquely struggling. We are basically dead last for every economic metric, [18:03] health care metric. We've closed 250 more health care clinics and we've opened in the last 15 years. [18:09] Only state with a growing cancer rate. And now because of the tariffs leading the nation in farm [18:14] foreclosures, Iowans are ready for change and the winds of change are here. I want to show an ad for your [18:22] campaign that is, as people will recognize right away, unlike any ad maybe any of us have ever seen. [18:31] That's all I'm going to say about it. Let's take a look at this. [18:33] Well, Josh, tell us, how did you win that House seat when no one said that was possible? [18:39] The blueprint is hard work, grit and determination. I went out every single day, [18:44] crawling those stairs, knocking doors, dragging my wheelchair up, having face-to-face conversations [18:51] with Republicans, with independents, with Democrats. It did not matter to party. The [18:56] very first thing they would say is, how in the world did you get up here? And I would say, [19:00] I crawled up here. I drove my wheelchair up here. That's how important it is to have a conversation [19:04] with you. Talk about red states and red districts and red Senate seats turning blue. Look no further [19:11] than Iowa. Josh, when I first became aware of your candidacy and understood your condition, [19:20] I immediately thought of President Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who we all now know, [19:26] spent his entire political career in a wheelchair. But he didn't want the public to know at the time, [19:32] and it was pretty easy, relatively easy to make that something people didn't know. He found ways [19:38] of pretending to be able to stand up on his own when giving speeches. We've come an awful long way [19:44] from that. And what has been throughout your career in Iowa, have people just ignored it the way [19:54] it feels the appropriate way to regard it? It just doesn't seem like a real factor in dealing with [20:01] you in any way, especially if you can climb up my stairs like that. [20:06] No, I don't think it is. I mean, honestly, when I would crawl the stairs, the first question they [20:11] would always ask me is, how in the world did you get up here? And I would say, I crawled. That's how [20:15] important your vote was to me. And in a five minute conversation, when people would learn about me, [20:21] learn about what I'm fighting for, common sense, prairie populism, fighting for the people, [20:26] not just for the billionaires and the large corporations, I would find over and over and over, [20:30] a lot of Republicans would say, I'm not going to vote for every single Democrat, [20:33] but I'm going to vote for you. And when you, earlier, I heard you talking about, [20:37] you know, President Trump not being able to talk about his favorite president. [20:41] I can tell you for me, one of my favorite presidents, without a doubt, is FDR. And I [20:46] say that one of my political North stars, my political philosophy is a quote from FDR, which is, [20:51] the test of our progress of a society is not whether we add more to those with abundance, [20:56] but whether we have enough to those with the least. [20:58] Josh Turek, thank you very much for joining us again tonight. Please come back as the campaign [21:05] progresses. Iowa is absolutely back in play. And depending on how you read that poll, [21:12] you're either way ahead or just ahead. Thank you very much. [21:16] It is in play. And if people will help us, Turek4Iowa.com, we can push for change here in Iowa. [21:22] Thank you. Thanks for joining us. And coming up, New York Times Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, [21:27] Eric Lipton now has one of the most difficult assignments at the paper, following the money, [21:35] the Trump money. Eric Lipton will join us next. In their important bestselling new book, [21:49] Regime Change Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump, New York Times reporters, [21:53] Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan write, there was so much capitulation, so much conquest, [21:59] so much corruption, it became hard to follow. And that is exactly where Eric Lipton picks up the [22:05] baton. Our next guest Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times investigative reporter, Eric Lipton, [22:10] is following the money in the Trump family businesses. Eric Lipton's byline is on five different [22:18] stories just this week, and it's only Thursday. On Tuesday, Eric Lipton was part of the New York Times [22:24] team reporting that, quote, President Trump reaped a stunning windfall in his first year back in the [22:30] White House, including about $1.4 billion from his family's cryptocurrency businesses and new filing [22:36] shows. All told, the president pulled in at least $2.2 billion, a figure that includes other parts of [22:43] his vast holdings, such as his real estate assets. That compares to a minimum of $622 million his [22:50] enterprises pulled in for all of 2024 before he returned to the presidency. Yesterday, Eric Lipton [22:56] and his colleagues at the Times reported the president's 927-page financial disclosure showed [23:02] how Mr. Trump and his family reaped huge financial rewards in 2025 through his money-losing Trump media [23:10] venture and a separate cryptocurrency firm called World Liberty Financial, even as routine investors [23:18] suffered vast losses. He also amassed hundreds of millions through deals that involved foreign [23:24] governments or corporations with agenda items pending before the Trump administration. The week [23:30] began with Eric Lipton and the investigative team breaking news on Sunday under the headline, [23:36] Trump cut a billion-dollar mining deal, his sons stand to profit. An agreement between the U.S. and [23:43] Kazakhstan has given a group of American investors with ties to the president and the Commerce Secretary [23:49] Howard Lutnik access to one of the world's largest untapped reserves of tungsten. The Times reports, [23:58] the arrangement is hardly an outlier. One of both of the families have financial ties to at least 14 [24:05] companies that are actively working with the federal government and on critical mining deals, [24:12] including the Kazakhstan project, according to federal filings examined by the New York Times. [24:17] All 14 of these companies have either benefited directly from offers of financial assistance from [24:23] the Trump administration or have pending permit applications before the Commerce Department, [24:30] which Mr. Lutnik oversees. The Times found the total amount of federal funding that the Trump [24:37] administration has provided or is considering providing to the companies exceeds $8.9 billion, [24:46] according to public statements by the companies and federal government. [24:50] In his interview with CNBC today, Donald Trump defended all of this this way. [24:55] Ziege O' Well, I feel badly, in a way, for my kids, because every time my kids do, [25:01] if they invest in a stock or if they go and do a bill, anything they do, because the presidency is so [25:08] powerful, so big, everything, if they buy a cupcake company, well, the energy to make the cupcakes [25:16] is, you know, sort of like, how's my energy policy? So, therefore, you have a conflict. Almost anything [25:23] they do if they want to buy a truck, if they want to buy, you know, if they buy an energy [25:28] efficient truck, they have inside information. And Jerry S. Now is Pulitzer Prize winning [25:35] New York Times investigative reporter Eric Lipton. Eric, if there's anything in what [25:40] Donald Trump just said that you ought to respond to, that's fine. It's the usual [25:44] mismatch of stuff that he's saying there. It doesn't seem to apply to anything. [25:48] But the disclosure forms that you've got, these federal disclosure forms, 900 pages, [25:56] they're not as specific as people might imagine. They don't have, in some instances, [26:01] they don't have very specific dollar items. They just have ranges of possibilities. [26:07] How do you get a picture of the whole in looking at that? [26:13] A lot of them, when it comes to President Trump, do in fact have individual, [26:17] you know, specific dollar amounts of revenues that the Trump organization saw from different [26:23] operations, be it Mar-a-Lago or the Doral Hotel or the World Liberty Financial or the meme coin. [26:29] And so, and then all these international deals involving, you know, Saudi Arabia real estate [26:34] company or in Vietnam, you can see the lined items for each element of their business operations and [26:39] see how much revenue, not necessarily profits, but revenue they made. [26:43] So we saw in Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan's reporting, a sense even from them, you know, [26:52] these dogged, attentive reporters, that the amount of this financial activity is so vast and so complex [27:00] that it's hard to follow, as they put it. None of us could follow it. [27:04] What is your own sense of how much you and the team at the New York Times have been able to follow? [27:11] Do you think you can see at this point the basic shape and size of the entirety of it? [27:18] Or do you feel you're at the tip of an iceberg or the middle of an iceberg? Or what does it feel like? [27:24] It is overwhelming. And it's required adding more and more people to spend, you know, [27:29] just really a global operation to try to dig into this. And I think, you know, for the last year [27:35] and a half, we have been amazed at just the reach of these efforts to make money by the family that [27:41] overlap with directly with the authority of the president and his actions and the cryptocurrency [27:46] and the predictions markets and critical minerals and defense spending and drone spending. [27:51] All of these things are businesses that the Trump sons are now in or that the president himself [27:55] is benefiting from directly financially. But it was still, like, pretty incredible to see the totals. [28:02] I mean, we all knew that he was making a great deal of money on these business operations. But [28:06] I don't think I just didn't imagine just a one and a half, you know, a $1.4 billion from crypto, [28:14] because particularly given that we know that most of the people that bought that meme coin, [28:19] almost, you know, the largest share of them, they lost billions of dollars by following him. [28:24] He enticed them to bet on him and his meme coin. When most meme coins are such speculative platforms, [28:30] they almost always, they rise and they fall. And there are, you know, hundreds of thousands of [28:35] people that followed his suggestion and that they're losers. They lost money and he walked away [28:41] with hundreds of millions of dollars from their losses. And it's just sort of astounding to think [28:46] that this happened involving the president of the United States. [28:49] Eric Lipton, we cannot thank you enough for this reporting. I think we have a sense of how difficult [28:55] it is. And thank you very much for staying with it. Thank you for joining us tonight. [28:59] Thank you. [29:01] Coming up with the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence upon us, [29:06] Professor Eddie Glaude's new book is titled, America, USA, How Race Shadows the Nation's [29:14] Anniversaries. Professor Glaude will join us next. [29:17] Last night, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Isabel Wilkerson, whose most recent book titled, [29:29] Cast, The Origins of Our Discontents, was quoted by Justice Ketanji Brown-Jackson in her opinion [29:36] on birthright citizenship. And she said this. [29:39] I just find it so fitting that the Supreme Court, you know, for all of its mysteries, [29:46] reaffirmed birthright citizenship, you know, the foundation of what it means to be an American. [29:50] And, you know, to do this on the eve of the 250th anniversary of the United States, [29:56] I think, is extremely meaningful. You know, it reinforces the language that she was using also, [30:02] which was this idea of the second founding, which was the remaking of the country through [30:07] the Reconstruction Amendments, you know, after essentially the Civil War practically broke the [30:13] country apart. So what it does is it calls upon us to recognize that, you know, unlike the old country, [30:19] from which we declared independence, we are a nation of people from all over the world, [30:27] from all over the world. And we, you know, together made a country that had never existed before. [30:33] And so the idea of this being reaffirmed on the eve of the 250th anniversary feels like it's a full [30:40] circle recognition, particularly with all that we've been through as a nation in the last, [30:43] you know, in recent times. This seems like a fitting moment for this to have happened. [30:51] Princeton professor Eddie Glaude Jr. seems to have anticipated all of this in his new book, [30:59] America, USA, How Race Shadows the Nation's Anniversaries. He writes, [31:06] With every anniversary of the nation's founding, the divided soul of America, this idea of the [31:12] country as a beacon of freedom and a white republic is experienced in convulsions around race that [31:18] threaten to tear the country apart. American anniversaries are often moments to turn a blind [31:24] eye to the evils of the past and the present to suppress the fact of America's divided soul. [31:31] And joining us now is Eddie S. Glaude Jr., distinguished university professor of African [31:36] American studies at Princeton University and an MS now political analyst. His new book, [31:41] America, USA, How Race Shadows the Nation's Anniversaries is available in your bookstores [31:47] and online now. Professor Glaude, thank you so much for joining us tonight. And your title says it all. [31:54] And here we are. Here we are on the eve of one of these big anniversaries and race returns to the [32:02] subject. Yeah. I mean, we thanks so much for having me, Lawrence. We are in that moment where, [32:08] you know, the contradictions at the heart of the country are in full view. And one has to ask the [32:14] question, what will we be celebrating come to July 4th? Will we be reaching for that storybook version [32:22] of the country that secures our innocence and virtue in order to turn a blind eye to the ugliness of our [32:27] current days? Or will we in so many ways try to tell ourselves a story that reveals our shortcomings [32:34] such that we can actually imagine how we're going to get to the other side of this madness? [32:39] As I was listening to Isabel Wilkerson last night, I was thinking about, you know, the history that [32:46] informs and shapes, right, the context of the assault on the Reconstruction Amendments. I was thinking [32:53] about the slaughterhouse cases. I was thinking about the USA versus Cruikshank. I was thinking about the [32:59] civil rights cases of 1883, the very ways in which the 14th Amendment was under assault almost immediately [33:06] afterwards. And the context that led to not the end of Reconstruction, but its murder and what happened [33:14] in that period. And how that in so many ways shapes and informs the birthright decision arguments that [33:23] we're grappling with in 2026. The I think it's possible that the person most quoted in more than [33:32] just the Chief Justice's opinion, but Justice Jackson's, Justice Thomas was Frederick Douglass, [33:39] who in your book, you quote his famous July 4th oration where he said, [33:46] the rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your forefathers [33:53] is shared by you, not by me. This 4th July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice. I must mourn. [34:04] Yeah. And that voice was very present in this decision this week. [34:12] Yeah. And in American USA, I try to pull that voice into our current moment. What does it mean [34:17] for us to celebrate July 4th and the gutting of the Voting Rights Act? What does it mean [34:22] that Associated Press is reporting tonight that ICE has arrested over the last, over the end of the [34:28] June, 10,000 people disappearing them into these detention centers? What do we do with the end of [34:35] TPS, the redrawing of districts in the South? Here we are. You know, Douglas said that America was full [34:42] of the apostles of forgetfulness, right? Those folk who would not, who would disremember. He said the [34:48] country was destitute of political memory. And in that July 5th speech, Lawrence, he gave a warning [34:54] to the nation. Even as he embraced our special mission, he said that we had to remove the serpent [35:01] coiled in the bosom of the nation. And in some ways, he was saying that's the only way we could [35:07] release us, release ourselves into a different way of being in the world. One has to ask the question, [35:14] since he's being invoked 200, you know, in the 250th year of the country, whether or not we listened. [35:21] Professor Eddie Glaude, thank you very much for joining our coverage tonight. [35:24] Thank you for having me. And coming up, we'll consider how Donald Trump's disastrous handling [35:31] of the reflecting pool on the National Mall reflects his disastrous handling of his war in Iran. [35:40] That's next. Donald Trump was thrilled to make this announcement last week. Six people have been [35:51] arrested and seven people have been cited for the damage they did to our country's now beautiful [35:55] reflecting pool. Good luck finding a Washington, D.C. jury who will convict them of that Trump [36:01] accusation. And Donald Trump's newfound worry comes long after he pardoned the worst vandals [36:09] in Washington history. The thousands of Trump supporters on January 6th trying to overturn the [36:15] presidential election in a conspiracy against the United States of America for which Donald Trump [36:20] was indicted by Jack Smith. The real vandal of the reflecting pool on the National Mall in Washington, [36:29] D.C. is, of course, Donald Trump himself. On May 7th, Donald Trump's motorcade actually drove into the [36:37] empty reflecting pool after it was painted and sealed and before it was refilled with water. And the weight of [36:45] those vehicles surely did serious damage to the integrity of the bottom of the reflecting pool. How [36:53] profoundly stupid do you have to be to drive a car on the bottom of a pool? And how lazy do you have to be that you [37:01] couldn't walk? The New York Times reported at the time that an expert, quote, said he was also concerned by Mr. Trump's [37:07] decision to drive his motorcade across the pool's surface. That might have put huge amounts of weight [37:14] on the notoriously leaky and newly repaired joints between its concrete slabs. If it were my project, [37:22] I'd require an immediate inspection, Mr. Arhan said. Donald Trump has reached the point of his presidency [37:29] where it is obvious to anyone that he cannot get anything right from war with Iran to getting clean [37:35] water in a pool, something millions of swimming pool owners in America are enjoying right now at [37:42] their homes because they are better at pool maintenance than Donald Trump or Donald Trump [37:48] and his no-bid contractor. In a New York Times podcast hosted by Daniel Wiken, columnist Tom Friedman [37:56] draws a connection between Donald Trump's reflecting pool failure and Donald Trump's failure in Iran. [38:05] There is a parallel between Trump's failure to clean up the Persian Gulf and his failure to clean up [38:17] the reflecting pool at the Lincoln Memorial. And because both, to me, are failures of a commander-in-chief [38:25] because both were done in their own way through no-bid contracts. And no-bid contracts, which don't [38:32] allow any other bidders than the one the president anoints, always gets you in trouble. So in the case of [38:38] the reflecting pool, we know that the National Park Service bypassed competitive bidding and gave the [38:45] $1.7 million contract to a firm called Greenwater Services, which happened to be run, Shaq, are you [38:52] sitting down, Dan? By a Trump campaign donor. What happened? Instead of turning the reflecting pool blue [39:00] as the way Trump wanted for the 4th of July, it's turned into an algae of green blooms that have [39:10] basically wrecked the whole scene. Now, why do I compare that no-bid contract with the U.S.-Israeli war [39:20] against Iran? Because in a way, Trump approached it, too, in a kind of no-bid fashion. Let's go back to the [39:28] reporting of our colleagues Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan from the key decision-making in the [39:36] Situation Room at the White House. Trump invited in Bibi Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel. He was in [39:42] the Situation Room. It was a no-bid moment where Netanyahu then brings onto the screen the head of the [39:50] Mossad, and the Mossad tells Trump that through aerial bombing, they can decapitate the regime and trigger a [39:58] popular uprising in Iran. And of course, none of that happened. Trump didn't even have in the room his [40:06] energy secretary, his treasury secretary, and his own experts, the director of the CIA, called the [40:15] Israeli idea farcical, and his secretary of state, Marco Rubio, called it ****. But Trump went with his gut [40:25] no-bid contract with Bibi Netanyahu. And the result has been the Strait of Hormuz has been turned from [40:33] blue into green, red, and white, the colors of the Iranian flag. No-bid contracts get you in trouble, [40:44] whether they're in the mall or in the Gulf. [40:47] Pool surprise winner David Ferenthal, New York Times investigative reporter, who broke the news [40:55] about the no-bid contract for the reflecting pool, reported, Katie Martin, the spokeswoman for the [41:00] Interior Department, said that the department had not been aware of the political affiliation when it [41:06] awarded the contract. This company was selected because they had the expertise, workforce, and [41:12] materials needed to complete the job in time, she said. Ms. Martin and a White House spokeswoman both [41:19] said. The White House was not involved in the selection of this company. Katie Martin works for [41:25] a president who was recorded telling over 30,000 lies in his first four years in the White House. The [41:30] Trump regime has refused to reveal exactly who decided to give the contract for the reflecting pool to [41:43] this guy who has given Donald Trump $350,000 in campaign contributions since 2016. We'll be right back. [41:55] That is tonight's last word.