Updated
Summary
The parents and survivors of both the shooting in Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas are going to testify in Congress. New evidence shows that chief who was in charge of the situation did not have a radio with him and used a cellphone to call the police department. It’s now been 100 days since Vladimir Putin told his army to go invade a sovereign nation. And while Ukrainians have retaken plenty of territory from Russia, the war has no clear end in sight.
Transcript
MEHDI HASAN, MSNBC HOST: It’s called “Devil’s Advocate: and it airs 10:00 p.m. Sunday and on Peacock. But right now, it’s time for the LAST WORD with Ali Velshi in for Lawrence. Good evening, Ali?
ALI VELSHI, MSNBC HOST: Good evening, my friend. You are on some kind of screen a lot over the course of a week. And that is only a good thing because the —
HASAN: If — if you are saying, Ali, then that means Sunday because normally you’re the one — you’re the one regularly dominating the airwaves and never taking a break or a nap or a sleep.
VELSHI: I found it very hard to prepare for my show tonight because I was listening to your conversation with Jared Bernstein about the economy, which you know always piques my interest. And then your conversation about guns, and now this. So, thank you my friend for everything you do. I’d say enjoy your weekend, but you are not going to because you’re going to be working. But we’ll see you on TV soon, my friend.
HASAN: Thank you, very much. Who said I don’t enjoy working?
VELSHI: That’s — we do, and that’s what we will keep on doing. Thanks, Mehdi.
HASAN: Goodnight.
VELSHI: Anger into action. That’s what the White House oversight committee chair Carolyn Maloney said she hopes to achieve next week during a hearing were survivors and parents of victims of the mass shootings Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas will tell American lawmakers their stories.
NBC News reports that on Wednesday, the committee will hear testimony from the Zeneta Everhart, whose son, Zaire Goodman, was injured in the shooting at Top Supermarket in Buffalo, as well as from Uvalde’s sole pediatrician, Roy Guerrero, and Felix and Kimberly Rubio, whose daughter, Lexi, was killed at the city’s Robb Elementary School. Miah Cerillo, the fourth- grader who covered herself in a murdered classmate’s blood and played dead in order to survive will also share her story with lawmakers.
Tonight, the White House was lit in orange in honor of National Gun Violence Awareness Day. The families in Uvalde are still demanding answers as we’re learning some stunning new details about why police waited over an hour before confronting the shooter while students frantically called 911, pleading for help.
The Texas state senator, Roland Gutierrez tells NBC News that according to law enforcement officials, the chief of the Uvalde school district police department, this man, Pete Arredondo, did not have his police radio with him during the shooting.
Mike Baker of “The New York Times” will join us in just a moment, details how that lack of a radio dictated Arredondo’s actions, quote, “As two supervisors from the local police department were grazed by bullets fired by the gunman, he made a decision to fall back, the official said. Using a cell phone, the chief of police — the chief called a police landline with a message that set the stage for what would prove to be a disastrous delay in interrupting the attack. The gunman has an AR-15, he told them, but he is contained. We need more firepower and we need the building surrounded.”
This new revelation follows news yesterday that Pete Arredondo was not aware of the repeated 911 calls from students who were inside the classroom, including one from a student who warned that her teacher needed medical attention. According to “The Times,” “There is a lot of bodies, a 10-year-old student, Khloie Torres, quietly told a 911 dispatcher at 12:10 p.m. — 37 minutes after the gunman began shooting inside the classrooms, quote, “I do not want to die, please send help, send help for my teacher, she is shot but still alive.”
She stayed on the line for about 17 minutes. Around 11 minutes into the call, the sound of gunfire could be heard. We also learned that Ruben Ruiz, a school district officer was prevented from going inside the school while on the phone from with his wife, the teacher, Eva Morales, just minutes before she died. That’s according to “The New York Times.”
It’s unclear if details of their conversation were relayed to Pete Arredondo. “The New York Times” report breaks and other crucial details about the response to the shooting, including frustrated Border Patrol agents who eventually formed a group of officers and went against orders to kill the gunman. Quote, “No one entity or individual seemed to have control of the scene,” the person said. It was chaos.
Failure in police communication that potentially cost the lives, potentially the lives of 19 children and two teachers. The funerals of three more children were held today, including a joint service for two cousins who were killed in the attack. But now, local officials are refusing to answer any questions.
The chief, Pete Arredondo, has avoided any questions from reporters. There has not been a public press conference by police or state officials about the investigation since last week. Texas State Senator Roland Gutierrez, whose district includes Uvalde, now says that the district attorney, the latest official to run away from reporters who have been asking questions, has ordered the head of the Texas Department of Public Safety to keep him in the dark.
[22:05:00
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROLAND GUTIERREZ, TEXAS STATE SENATOR: The district attorney basically put a stop to any further reporting unless it goes out of her office. And so, my communications with Colonel McCraw, at least on these issues with regard to this investigation have stopped. He has been ordered by the district attorney.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: It makes no sense. Another issue that’s made the lack of communication for authorities even harder to contend with is that none of the information during the press conferences is being given in Spanish. That community in Uvalde is over 80 percent Latino. This week, “Axios” reported, “Texas authorities dealing with the Uvalde school shootings aftermath have so far provided public updates only in English, prompting criticism that the many Spanish speakers in the largely Latino community are being excluded.”
Leading off our discussion tonight from Uvalde is Paola Ramos, a Vice News host and MSNBC contributor, and Mike Baker, a national correspondent for “The New York Times.” He has been reporting on the training of the Uvalde police officers.
Welcome to both of you. Thank you for being with us. Mike, I have to ask you about this because we have been asking this question since the night that it happened. And that is that police since Columbine have learned that you do something differently now in active shooter situations. There is not likely to be a negotiation, you are not likely to get a negotiator. These perimeters don’t tend to help.
Most people get shot fairly early on. Some get shot later, but you need to go in, even at risk to yourself, something that is very counterintuitive for those of us who are not trained as police. But is supposed to be intuitive for police. What happened? How did Uvalde missed this and who else in America may have missed this memo that the entire active shooter protocol is different now?
MIKE BAKER, NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORK TIMES: Yes, and part of my question was, where they trained on that exact protocol? And they were as recently as two months ago. That was the training they were focused on. The first priority is to go in and stop the gunman. You may need to lay your life on the line to make that happen because the priority is saving innocent lives.
We still have lots of questions for the chief about what the decision was, why he made these calls in the hallway there. And they are really important questions to hear what he has to say. The general impression that law enforcement has given that he — he transitioned the scene from being one, focused on an active shooter, to one, focused on a barricaded subject. Someone who is inside the room and maybe there was a process to be more deliberative at that point.
VELSHI: Paola, it is remarkable because I was there right after it happened and it was a town, it’s a small place, people know each other. It was filled with grief. And literally every six hours that grief started turning to anger and confusion and frustration. What we didn’t know initially — and we learned at least a day later, was that the parents had been in confrontation with the police since the moment they heard it was happening.
There had been arguments with the police about how to handle this. And the parents were starting to feel very, very alienated. Now, they’ve been left to wonder whether they their children would be alive if the police did what the police were supposed to do.
PAOLA RAMOS, VICE NEWS HOST: Absolutely. I mean, that’s — that’s the only direction the stories evolving toward, right, how this anger and grief and pain is turning into all of these parents in the community wanting some form of action. Just today, I talked to one grandfather who lost his granddaughter and he had the same two questions that everyone in the community has in this moment, right? And that is, why did this gunman have access to an AR-15? And then the other question that keeps coming up is, why did it take so long?
And as you know, Ali, you are here, within 24 hours of bursting, you know this is how every single person in this town is just one degree of separation from the incident, right? Every single person, everyone I’ve talked to, I’ve only been here for 24 hours. Everyone knows someone that has been impacted by this.
So, the central question I have is, again, how will this anger turn into action, right? How will this one small Latino and immigrant community be able to change the direction of the state? The tension, though, that you feel and that not a lot of people are talking about is that this is a small town, right, that is within a county that overwhelmingly for Donald Trump in 2020, right.
VELSHI: Right.
RAMOS: He did six points better in 2020 than in 2016. So again, will this small Latino community and this one voice be able to change the larger political dynamic in what many have already described as Trump country.
VELSHI: Can you just tell me a little bit more about that because there are many people in Uvalde and around southern Texas who are many, many generations American. There are Latino heritage but there — they’ve been here for hundreds of years. And then there are new immigrants and there are some undocumented immigrants. It’s a very mixed community.
English seems to be widely spoken there. But you have ran into a lot of people who are only Spanish speakers or principally Spanish speakers. There is Spanish language newspapers, things like that. Tell me about this issue, about the communication between law enforcement officials, which is only English, and the fact that there is a large Spanish peaking component in that town.
RAMOS: As you said, it is deeply embedded in the community.
[17:19:59]
Most people speak English, but many people speak Spanish. The first thing I noticed, again, within just hours here, I went to the local square. There was a prayer service that was being held in English and in Spanish. I talked to neighbors in both English and Spanish. Ali, I even called a local pawnshop to ask about guns and the operator, the machine, speaks to you in English and in Spanish, right.
So, to speak to this community — to not speak to this community in Spanish is offensive. The authorities here are supposed to not just keep the community safe but I believe they are also supposed to act as translators to the community. And so, to me it begs the question, does this sort of disconnection, did that translate into the response?
So, had these kids been white, had these families been white, would we have seen those images of those parents being pinned down, you know, those moms being handcuffed because they were brown voices, right? So, again, if words get lost in translation, it is — can be extremely dangerous, right? It can lead to danger.
VELSHI: Words are getting lost in translation even just in English in this particular instance, which is extra complicated, particularly for parents and families who have lost loved ones. Mike, you were talking about the police having been trained in the right way to deal with an active shooter.
One of the things that confuse me and I, sadly, I have covered many, many mass shootings, including school shootings. Was the number of various police and law enforcement officers and organizations involved in this — there are always a few, there’s always the local police, neighboring agencies and state police and the FBI, right — I can always get to four or five. We’re well upward of a dozen here.
So, between the lack of communication and the main guy in charge not having a radio, and apparently making some bad choices, you also have a lot and lots of different kinds of police who were involved in here, and I guess my question is, any one of them could have had bad training on active shooters at this point. Could you explain a little of this to me?
BAKER: Well, I think the interesting thing about having multiple agencies on scene is that is exactly why they do this training. And when they were doing it in the Uvalde schools, they were inviting different agencies from around the region, federal and local agencies were part of that conversation to figure out what would be the coordination.
What does this look like in real practice, in a real event? How do we work together? How do we communicate? How do we move through these hallways and have knowledge about where we are on what we are going to be doing?
And that’s the whole purpose of the training. So, to see this sort of breakdown of communication, it really does not match up with what they are doing to begin with.
VELSHI: And then tell me about this so-called do not breach directive. They were told, don’t do this. And then a bunch of law enforcement people, mostly Border Patrol who were very heavily armed, tactically armed, decided to sort of form their own group in the hallway of the school and go into the classroom and take on the gunman.
How did that decision-making occur because that also seems like a breach of protocol except, in this particular case, it was the right one, to take the gunman out?
BAKER: And in this because it was really more of an ad hoc response. I mean, this was not necessarily, you know, a specialized tactical unit were about to breach this door. But really an ad hoc group that had been in the hallway and was ready to go in. And as we heard from one person who is familiar with this, as they were going in, they could hear in an ear piece, do not breach, that don’t go in. And they decided to go in anyway. They were deciding to defy that directive and make it happen anyway.
VELSHI: Paola, I do want to ask you about something. You were commenting about the county and the voting there. There’s also another layer of complexity here and that is, I didn’t meet a lot of people while I was there who were not either gun owners or supported widespread gun ownership.
This is a tricky one for them to navigate here because a lot of people said to me, look, I think, I believe in the Second Amendment. I believe that everybody should have a gun. But this is not working for us.
RAMOS: So far, what I have noticed is that the majority of the people that I have talked to, specifically in this town, draw the line at the AR-15s. You’re right. I have already spoken to a couple of Latino families, many Latino folks. Many of them, if not all of them, do own guns.
Again, it’s part of the culture. They are not just Latinos. They are Texans, right? They are American. They draw the line at the AR-15s. Now, if you go a bit north of this town, then the discussion starts to change. I have also had discussions with other folks that are not necessarily from this town but from the county that are talking about the need to have these AR-15s because they want to protect themselves from, in their words, the illegals that are coming, right.
So, again, the discussion that starts to stimulate and resemble what you hear from a lot of these, like Trump communities, which is they need these guns and because we are just miles away from the border, would I have already heard is this connection between their safety and what is going on at the border.
VELSHI: It is a multi-layered complex textured issue and I’m glad, Paola, that you were there to get some of that things, not only close to the border but it’s on the main thoroughfare from the border. So, these are — these are — a lot of issues that one tiny, little under-resourced community needs to deal.
[17:15:06]
Paola, thanks for your great reporting today. We’re looking forward to more of it. Mike, thank you for your great reporting on this complicated issue.
Coming up, it was a really bad day for yet another member of Trump world.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETER NAVARRO, FORMER TRUMP ADVISOR: Instead of coming to my door where I live, which by the way, is right next to the FBI. Instead of calling me and say, hey, we need you down at court. We got a warrant for you, would you gladly come? What did they do? They intercepted me getting on the plane. And then they put me in handcuffs, they bring me her, they put me in leg irons and they stick me in a cell. That’s punitive. That — what they did to me today, violated the constitution.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: What you just heard former Trump advisor, Peter Navarro, described is in fact not actually a violation of the constitution. It’s the process of being arrested and being brought to court, which is what tends to happen when you’ve been indicted for contempt of Congress. That’s next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[22:20:00]
VELSHI: Peter Navarro made history today as the first White House staffer to face criminal charges stemming from the investigation into the January 6th insurrection at the capitol. Navarro appeared before a judge this afternoon after being arrested and indicted for contempt of Congress.
He faces charges for failing to comply with a subpoena for documents and testimony, from the January 6th committee. Now, earlier this week, Navarro filed suit against the January 6th committee in an attempt to block its subpoena, as well as a separate criminal subpoena that he received from the Department of Justice.
Navarro has insisted all along his unable to cooperate with the committee because of issues of executive privilege. That is an argument we should note that has already been shot down by the court. So, how exactly does Navarro, whom you may remember served in the White House as Trump’s trade advisor and all that China stuff that they were doing. How does Navarro fit into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election?
Well, in a letter accompanying the subpoena, the committee chair, Benny Thompson writes, quote, “That Navarro worked with Steve Bannon and others to develop and implement a plan to delay Congress’ certification of, and ultimately change the outcome of the 2020 presidential election.” In his book, Mr. Navarro described this plan as the, quote, Green Bay Sweep.”
Indeed, Navarro has never been shy about his involvement in the so-called, Green Bay Sweep. He boasted on it, about it, right here on MSNBC to my colleague, Ari Melber.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NAVARRO: And my focus, Ari, was simply on the Green Bay Sweep plan, which was basically to have, and it started flawlessly, to have the battleground states challenge the results that would trigger 24 hours of hearings in the House and the Senate. And by that we, could bypass the media and get out the truth of what probably happened in the battleground states.
Quarter Mike Pence’s job at that point was to take 10 days and go back and give the state legislatures, who really are the ones who have the power to determine whether an election is fraudulent, to give them a second look.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: That conversation went on for a while, by the way. So that’s what we know that Navarro was up to in the lead up to January 6th. Not for many really good reporting because he actually told us here on MSNBC, without a subpoena, we don’t have subpoenas at MSNBC. We just actually book guests and ask them to come on our show.
But the fact is, he’s willing to fight this subpoena in court to risk jail time to avoid speaking to the committee after talking to anyone who would listen about this Green Bay Sweep thing, which begs the question, is there more about which the committee wants to talk to Peter Navarro because we all know this part of the story.
It’s less than a week until the January 6th committee holds its first primetime televised hearing. This is not the only big January 6th development today. “The New York Times” is reporting that on January 5th of 2021, with tension brewing in the White House over Vice President Mike Pence’s refusal to go along with Navarro and Bannon and whoever else’s plan, Pence’s chief of staff, a man named Marc Short, had a warning for the Secret Service, quote, “The president was going to turn publicly against the vice president and there could be a security risk to Mr. Pence because of it.”
Marc Short, for what it’s worth, has already testified to the January 6th committee back in January. Joining our conversation now is Paul Butler. He’s a law professor at Georgetown University, a former federal prosecutor and an MSNBC legal analyst.
We’re also joined by Ryan Reilly, a justice reporter for NBC News. He’s been following Navarro’s legal drama for us all day. Guys, good to see you. Paul Butler, let me ask you about this. If they go after Navarro and they convict him, he still doesn’t actually have to testify, right? He just goes to jail for contempt of Congress. So, explain to me what you think is going on here?
PAUL BUTLER, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: So, Navarro is charged with criminal contempt, which means if he’s guilty, he could be sentenced to prison for two years, but even if he’s convicted, he wouldn’t be required to testify to the January 6th panel or to turn over documents.
[22:25:01]
This prosecution is really about punishing Navarro based on his blatant disrespect for the congressional subpoena.
VELSHI: Ryan, talk to me about what you think they know about Navarro or what they want to hear. We certainly know that the January 6th committee calls in people to verify information they already have. But in Navarro’s case, as in the case of a bunch of people here, they’ve either written books or talked about it endlessly on TV. So, what’s going on? Why is — what’s Navarro’s problem? Is it just the — what he can construes as the illegitimacy of the committee?
RYAN REILLY, NBC NEWS JUSTICE REPORTER: You know, it’s interesting because, you know, there’s been reporting and NBC News can confirm now that the DOJ is actually declined to prosecute two other Trump affiliates who were subpoenaed and who had been referred for a contempt of Congress, you know, prosecution, but has declined — the DOJ has declined to do so.
And that’s because they actually negotiated. You know, Mark Meadows actually worked in some way with the committee. And what Peter Navarro did here was just completely stonewall the committee. He did not engage at all. And he didn’t even, you know, when he was subpoenaed for his communications with the Trump lawyers, he did not also turn over that material, which he was supposed to give for the grand jury yesterday, on Thursday.
So, this is a pretty quick turnaround here. And you know, he went into as pro se defendant and was throwing around a lot of these terms that he seemed to have picked up on TV about prosecutorial misconduct and how this, you know, he believes his constitutional rights were violated when in reality, I mean, I think it was someone experiencing the criminal justice system for the first time in their 72-year life.
This is an individual who wasn’t necessarily handled in a different way than any other criminal defendant would be. In fact, you know, getting arrested at the airport arguably is a much better scenario than getting your door kicked in, you know, at the break of dawn. So, it’s not necessarily — not necessarily a great argument to make when you compare it to how many other people go through the system.
And I would also note that the magistrate judge here during this hearing, it was kind of remarkable, sat for an hour and basically explained how the system work to this pre se defendant.
VELSHI: Right.
REILLY: That’s not how a lot of people actually go through the system. That’s not how they experience this on an everyday basis.
VELSHI: Let me ask you, Paul Butler, because Ryan was just talking about the other two people whom the Justice Department has declined to comment. I’ll read from “The New York Times,” the reporting there, the Justice Department is saying, “Based on the individual facts and circumstances of their alleged contempt, my office will not be initiating prosecutions for criminal contempt as requested in the referral against Messrs. Meadows — that’s the former chief of staff — and Scavino. Matthew M. Graves, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, wrote to Douglas N. Letter, the general counsel of the House, on Friday. My office’s review of each of the contempt referrals arising from the January 6th committee’s investigation is complete.”
Can you give us some sense of why some of these contempt referrals work, and end up with an indictment and arrest, and some don’t?
BUTLER: So, Navarro and Steve Bannon basically told the House Committee to get lost. They’ve refused any kind of meaningful assistance. Mark Meadows, on the other hand, turned over thousands of pages of documents. He didn’t give the House panel everything they wanted, but he gave them a lot.
The Justice Department usually says no when Congress asks it to prosecute somebody for contempt, and that’s true whether it’s a Democratic or Republican administration. The department doesn’t want to get too involved in congressional disputes that are often rooted in partisan politics.
So, Ali, it’s actually more remarkable that the Justice Department in trying to lock up two people, Bannon and Navarro with close ties to Trump at this point, it’s too late for those witnesses to help the January 6th panel. So, DOJ is sending a message to other future congressional witnesses.
If you, like Navarro and Bannon, don’t even make an effort to respect the law, if you totally dissed lawful orders to testify, then you will get locked up. You will face serious criminal consequences.
VELSHI: Ryan, we are going to be — we’re going to be seeing these — the public testimony that’s going to go on before the January 6th committee. What is it that they are going to argue? We heard Jamie Raskin say that Donald Trump was a one-man crime wave. But what are they going to do that’s going to convince anybody who is otherwise unconvinced about what happened on January 6th, and what led up to it, to change their mind?
REILLY: You know, they have promised new video in connection, which is going to come out, which is amazing because, you know, a lot of the online sleuths who have been investigating this have turned up a ton of video, both from the defendants that they filmed themselves as well as all these closed circuit television footage from inside the capitol. So, there’s a lot that they could turn up there.
[22:29:54]
What I’m most interested in is the connections between some of the organizations, the outside organizations that actually went into the capital and preplanned to storm the capitol, including the oath keepers, who have been a number of whom have pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy. What kind of overlap that the committee has discovered between those efforts — those physical efforts to invade the capitol and these more legal efforts preceding January 6th to overturn the will of the American people? I think that there is some overlap between a lot of those groups.
We have seen some images of individuals affiliated with in Trump’s orbit who have also been right, you know, right next to these people. There is some footage from a garage, in fact between the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers.
So there’s a lot of really critical footage that they picked them up with and I will be interested to see what the committee does.
VELSHI: But for the fact that democracy might be at stake, the stories are pretty funny.
Guys, thanks very much. Paul Butler and Ryan Reilly, we appreciate your analysis and the context you provide on this very, very important issue because actually democracy kind of is at stake.
Coming up, it’s now been 100 days since Vladimir Putin launched his entirely unprovoked and unjustified war in Ukraine. In that time, the united people of — the people of Ukraine have united against Vladimir Putin. The NATO nations have united in their resolve to help Ukraine win.
Admiral James Stavridis, the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, joins me after this.
[22:31:21]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELSHI: It’s now been 100 days since Vladimir Putin told his army to go invade a sovereign nation. And while Ukrainians have retaken plenty of territory from Russia, the war has no clear end in sight.
The “New York Times” editorial board writes, “It is the Ukrainians who must make the hard decisions. They are the ones fighting, dying and losing their homes to Russian aggression. And it is they who must decide what an end to the war might look like.”
An NBC News report on the war at 100 days shows that the Ukrainian people remain steadfast in their resolve. Quote, “Of course we want peace . But we want our territories back,” said Anna, Ockmanko whose house in a small village outside of Kharkiv was destroyed when the Russian forces invaded.
Quote, “If not, then what are we suffering for.”
Olena Ruban said, “I understand even more clearly now that compromise is not an option. We still believe in victory.”
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg says this week that member nations have to quote, “be prepared for the long haul,” end quote, in Ukraine. To that end, the U.S. is sending advanced rocket launcher systems and a thousand javelin missiles to Ukraine as part of the Biden administration’s latest round of military systems.
President Biden said the weapons will enable the Ukrainians to more precisely strike key targets on the battlefield in Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Washington obtained a commitment from Kyiv not to fire long- range missiles into Russia because they are concerned about escalating the conflict.
Joining us now is the retired U.S. Navy admiral and the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander James Stavridis, he’s an MSNBC chief international security and diplomacy analyst. He’s the author of the new book, “To Risk it All: Nine Conflicts and the Crucible of Decision”.
Admiral, it is good to see you again. Thank you for being with us this evening.
ADM. JAMES STAVRIDIS, MSNBC CHIEF INTERNATIONAL SECURITY AND DIPLOMACY ANALYST: My pleasure, Ali.
VELSHI: Let’s talk about something that you and I have been talking about more than three months about the Ukrainian people. You are a military expert. We can discuss all of the pros and cons of the Ukrainian military versus the Russian military. But in the end, the unknown here has been the Ukrainian resolve to fight, the actions of their leader and the fact that the people — and I saw it while I was there — it is gruesome, it is horrible what is happening to them and yet they say we will fight on.
That is not something that Vladimir Putin seems to have calculated all that well at the beginning of this war.
STAVRIDIS: Yes. And it’s a mystery to me. He ought to understand a fellow Slavic nation better than he appears to have. And you know, I commanded Ukrainian troops in combat. They are not obviously NATO members. But they deployed alongside NATO, Ali, to Afghanistan. So I had plenty of them under my command.
They also were a part of NATO missions in a number of other places. They are tough. They’re professional. They have great war fighting spirit. And let’s face it, if Vladimir Putin is going to invade the country and you are a Ukrainian on the front lines, you look behind you and what do you see? You see your family, you see your elders, you see your cities. You see your civilization. That is immense motivation.
Putin really missed it on this. And frankly, I attribute it to the way that he has isolated himself, particularly over the last decade. 20 years of absolutely power not only corrupts absolutely, it makes you absolutely ignorant about what is really happening.
VELSHI: Let’s talk about these long-range weapons that Ukraine is getting. They needed — America had second thoughts about this and really wanted an assurance from the Ukrainians that they will not use these weapons to launch into what we all agree is Russian territory. They can launch into the now Russian-controlled Ukrainian territory.
[22:39:54]
Explain this to me. Why these nuances? Because most of the world believes that the U.S. is leading an alliance in a fight against Russia with all but U.S. and NATO troops on the ground doing it.
STAVRIDIS: You are exactly right. All but NATO and U.S. troops on the ground. NATO and U.S. jets in the air. NATO and U.S. warships in the Black Sea. And NATO and U.S. weapons landing in Russia.
So it’s really actually quite consistent with the game plan, which is, put the weapons in the hands of the Ukrainians but don’t allow them to be used in a way that creates confrontation between a nuclear-armed Russia and a nuclear-armed NATO alliance.
It is a pretty narrow sea to sail. But I think the administration has it about right.
VELSHI: So it’s a narrow sea to sail. And you understand that as an admiral. Does Russia?
I mean, Russia has said this is all an act of war. This is all aggression. At what point — is it a legal thing, where the west can say we are not attacking you? Our troops are not attacking you. Our weapons are not landing in Russia.
Explain to me why this is important. Because I think most people watching us would say, it feels like a proxy war, the way old-fashioned proxy wars did.
STAVRIDIS: And let’s face it, old-fashioned proxy wars had the purpose of avoiding direct combat confrontation between the major powers backing factions. And thus, you create a kind of thunder dome inside of Ukraine.
Look, this is not the creation of the west or NATO. This is the creation strictly of Vladimir Putin. And I am kind of tired of this argument I hear sometimes, that oh, NATO is at fault because it has expanded. NATO simply allowed the former Warsaw Pact countries to join NATO. They wanted to join NATO because they’d spent decades with a Russian boot on their throat.
It is no mystery to me why they joined NATO. And as your graphic shows, we were glad to have them. We welcome them. But Ali, no NATO tanks ever rolled to the east. There have been plenty of Soviet tanks rolling to the west, into Budapest in ’56, into Prague in ’68, around Warsaw. We have seen those Russian tanks rolled out west. So have those nations. That is why this war has started.
VELSHI: And of course, on that map that we just showed you, we added Sweden and Finland with the caveat that they are expected to join which is, by the way, the opposite of what Vladimir Putin wanted out of this. He wanted less NATO and it seems that he’s going to end up with more NATO as a result.
Admiral, always great to talk to you. Thank you for the remarkable content in history that you bring to us.
STAVRIDIS: Thanks a lot, Ali.
VELSHI: Admiral James Stavridis. The new book is “To Risk It All: Nine Conflicts and the Crucible of Decision”. It’s available now. We appreciate your time.
All right. Coming up, unemployment is steady, the markets are on a rollercoaster and the price of oil continues to go up. What the White House is doing when it comes to the economy and why President Biden says Congress has to act as well. That’s next.
[22:43:01]
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VELSHI: All right, drumroll. The May jobs numbers are in. The United States added a better than expected 390,000 net new jobs. That’s all the new jobs minus jobs that were lost, you come out with 390,000. The unemployment rate held at 3.6 percent. It’s an important number — it’s low. I tend not to like the unemployment number, because the denominator changes each month.
You want to be looking at the net jobs created or lost — 390 is a good number. More jobs, lower unemployment mean higher wages, which I happen to believe is a really good thing, but it also happens to be a key component in inflation.
Gas prices are another component in inflation. They have reached a record high, the national average — I don’t even know why I need to tell you this. If you drive, you know it — $4.76 a gallon. Good luck if you live in California or Hawaii.
And there are continued global supply chain issues that are causing higher prices across the board. The Federal Reserve continues to raise interest rates to try to tame inflation. But throwing the kitchen sink at inflation could lead to a recession.
Here’s what President Biden said today about the May jobs report.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I know that even with today’s good news, a lot of Americans remain anxious. There is no denying that high prices, particularly on gasoline and food are a real problem to people.
The Americans can tackle inflation from a position of strength. Still a problem. We can tackle it from a position of strength.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELSHI: That’s actually a really, really important economic point.
Joining us now is Betsey Stevenson, a professor of economics at the University of Michigan. She served as the chief economist for the Labor Department during Obama administration.
Key point, Betsey that President Biden makes. Inflation can hit you when things are down and it can hit you when things are up, when the economy is moving quickly. It is just simply more people than the goods and services that are available.
The president is making the argument that if we had to deal with inflation, which is bad, we are in a better place to deal with it than we could be.
BETSEY STEVENSON, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN: Oh, I mean absolutely. It is a good thing to have a job. It is a good thing to see wage growth. It’s a good thing for people to see the enormous number of opportunities that are out there with employers having, you know, just record numbers of job openings.
[22:49:53]
With that means is that you really have a chance to look around and find the right job for you one that’s going to be a great match for your skills, that’s going to provide you the wages that you want. Maybe live near family or friends where people can provide childcare or relatives you need to give elder care to.
It’s really — it’s a great time out there to get the job that you want. And so that is good for a lot of people.
Now, this is also happening at a time when prices are rising. And that is hard on people. And there is no denying that. But if we are looking at what is causing the price rises, you know, we saw a clear link between Putin invading the Ukraine and gas prices starting to spike.
And so there is not much the administration or the Fed can do about rising gas prices. That is just a pain we are all going to share. Obviously, the Fed needs to take some steps to bring inflation down. But realize that a lot of the things that are causing inflation is what you describe — supply, we don’t have quite enough to meet demand. So what the fed is going to try to do is tamp down our demand by raising interest rates.
And you know, that is kind of a thing that has to work across the board. It is not going to necessarily solve the direct problems of high energy prices —
(CROSSTALK)
VELSHI: Yes — it is not a stiletto. It’s a sledgehammer. And part of the problem here is that they use a lot of data. Economists like you and the Fed, they study, study, study data. But it is as much art as science.
What is the danger here? What are people worried about? The Fed has been pretty clear this week — yet another Fed official came up and said, we’ll get this. We will tackle inflation. And Betsey, the truth is they can’t. There is a way — inflation can be solved. The problem is the Fed can try and solve it so hard that we end up in a recession.
STEVENSON: Right. So, the whole thing the Fed is trying to do is make sure that demand is not greater than supply. So they can bring demand down. The problem is that they bring demand down a lot and then we end up in a recession.
So they want to bring it down just enough, the right amount. That’s why you hear a lot of people talking about the Goldilocks economy. We want to see them bring demand down enough that we get rid of some of that pressure on prices, but not so much that people start losing their jobs. And that could be a tough place for them to land. That is actually why they moved slowly.
You don’t want them raising rates really rapidly, all in one meeting, you write this sort of 50 basis points at a time and let’s see how the economy is cooling. Let’s make sure we don’t cause a lot of job loss. But we do need to get prices down. The way to do that is to get people to basically spend less.
VELSHI: Are you worried about some kind of a switch changing in the economy, where people go from, all right, I am buying stuff, I’m finding it a bit expensive, I’m a bit unhappy about it into suddenly, credit card interest rates, and mortgage rates — all of these things skyrocketing, to the place that everybody shuts down for a while?
Is that a harder hole to dig yourself out of than having inflation that is too high?
STEVENSON: I think — one thing I just want to be clear about is, you know, that inflation hurts a lot of people. People don’t like it. But it is a shared pain. Unemployment really hurts the people who lose their jobs. And it is actually more of a disproportionate knock on those who are the ones who lose their jobs, who get laid off, who get pushed out of the labor market.
So, you know, there are two different kinds of pains. But I think we should stop —
(CROSSTALK)
VELSHI: This is an interesting point. So every one of us feels inflation. Every one of us does not feel unemployment.
STEVENSON: Absolutely.
VELSHI: If 8 percent of the population is unemployed, the rest of us do not feel it?
STEVENSON: Exactly. I do think that that is worth keeping in mind. And I think that’s why we don’t want to move too quickly. What we need to do is make sure that people can believe that the Fed can bring down rates, so we don’t start to adjust our inflation expectations.
The reason this jobs report was such a great report is it showed us two things. One, everything we did in terms of fiscal policy and monetary policy, gave us the fastest recovery we have ever had historically. That is great. That has put most people back to work. We are almost back to where we were prepared pre pandemic in less than two years.
It took us eight years to get to this point following 2008. So that’s a real victory. And yes we’ve got have to bring down prices. But, right now, employers want to hire a lot of people and a lot of people are showing up to take those jobs. They were able to add 390,000 jobs this month because they wanted to hire. And people came in from the sidelines, increasing the labor force participation in order to take those jobs. As long as we see labor supply expand, we don’t have workers contributing to the inflation problem.
VELSHI: Another discussion —
STEVENSON: We don’t have inadequate supply of workers.
VELSHI: Another discussion for another night because we are actually — we do have a labor supply problem — imagine if we actually had good immigration policy. But another conversation for another night, Betsey.
Thank you as always for joining us —
STEVENSON: Sure.
[22:54:53]
VELSHI: Betsey Stevenson is a professor of economics at the University of Michigan. She was the chief economist for the Labor Department during the Obama administration.
Tonight’s LAST WORD is up next.
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[22:59:46]
VELSHI: All right. That’s tonight’s LAST WORD.
You can see me again tomorrow morning on my show, “VELSHI”, 8:00 a.m. Eastern right here on MSNBC.
Tomorrow we’re going to introduce you to a group of women who worked underground to provide safe, illegal abortions in the days before Roe v. Wade, going up against the police, the mob and the Catholic Church to do it.
These women are out of the shadows. They’re telling their own story in a brand-new HBO documentary, just as the Supreme Court is poised to turn back the clock to the very time when they had to risk jail time to get women the health care that they needed.
That is tomorrow morning at 8:00 a.m. Eastern on “VELSHI”.
“THE 11TH HOUR WITH STEPHANIE RUHLE” begins right now.