Updated
Summary
Highlights of the second day of the hearing included former Trump advisers and campaign aides pointing to Trump lying, no voter fraud, fundraising over election lies and Rudy Giuliani`s counsel to Trump while intoxicated. The January 6 Committee, on their second hearing, portrays making the case that Donald Trump knew he lost the election but spread false voter fraud claims anyway. Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and Grammy- winning rock star John Mellencamp joins THE BEAT with Ari Melber to talk about gun control and more athletes, artists, and CEOs` push for gun safety.
Transcript
NICOLLE WALLACE, MSNBC HOST: So for any reason you missed any of the January 6th Select Committee hearing this morning or you want to see us talk about it, Rachel Maddow and Joy Reid, and the whole gang and I will all come together again at 8:00 tonight, plus the committee member who led today`s questioning will be one of our guests as well as one of the witnesses. They`ll join us live. It all starts in two hours at 8:00 p.m. Eastern right here on MSNBC.
Thank you so much for letting all of us into your homes during these truly extraordinary times. We are so grateful. THE BEAT WITH ARI MELBER starts right now.
Hi, Ari. I`ll see in a couple of hours.
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: I`ll see you soon, Nicolle. I only have an insignificant question for you. Between now and then, are you focusing on coffee or food?
WALLACE: So I`m going to have dinner with my family, because I`m not going to make it home for dinner, so that would be curtain number two, food.
MELBER: Food. Food and coffee are both necessary.
WALLACE: I`ll bring you some. Yes. Yes.
MELBER: OK. Great.
WALLACE: OK. OK.
MELBER: Well, I know where you are, so I know where to find you.
WALLACE: Exactly.
MELBER: I`ll see you soon, Nicolle. Thank you as always, handing off to our coverage, and welcome to THE BEAT.
Our top story is the damning new testimony at this, today`s second January 6th hearing. Much of it actually led with highlights from the deposition with Trump Attorney General Bill Barr.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL BARR, FORMER ATTORNEY GENERAL: I was somewhat demoralized because I thought, boy, if he really believes this stuff, he has, you know, lost contact with — he`s become detached from reality. And when I went into this and would, you know, tell him how crazy some of these allegations were, there was never — there was never an indication of interest in what the actual facts were.
I saw absolutely zero basis for the allegations. I told him that it was — it was crazy stuff. Completely bogus and silly and usually based on complete misinformation. They were idiotic claims. They obviously were influencing a lot of people, members of the public. Complete nonsense.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Wow. And remember, everything you just heard is from a source that was not only very loyal to Trump whenever he felt he could be throughout his tenure, but was also really in a sense the top legal expert in the Trump era at that time. That`s what he thought of Trump`s lies under oath.
The public now getting these firsthand accounts from inside the White House, which, remember, you would not otherwise hear this if not for this investigation, if not for this committee`s subpoena power.
Mr. Barr also recounting a tense meeting after Trump was declared the loser. This was in late November.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARR: I came over to meet with the president in the Oval Office, and Meadows and Cipollone were there. It was a little getting awkward because obviously he had lost the election. The president said there had been major fraud and that as soon as the facts were out, the results of the election would be reversed.
How long is he going to carry on with this stolen election stuff? Meadows had caught up with me and — leaving the office and caught up with me, and said that — he said, look, I think that he`s becoming more realistic and knows that there`s a limit to how far we can take this. And then Jared said, you know, yes, we`re working on this. We`re working on it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: There`s a limit to how far he can take this. They`re working on it. Well, whether they believe that or not, he exceeded the limit. We had an insurrection. And the work, trying to get Trump to stop lying and stop agitating towards the coup that many around him were clearly planning, that`s been proven. Well, the evidence obviously shows Kushner failed at working to stop that.
You know, last week was the first hearing and in many ways it was riveting like a tragic terrible movie. That real video of the attack on the Capitol. And today was pretty different. Most of the time it`s what you would call more just legally riveting. But that`s important if you`re building a case. So three takeaways before I bring in our experts. One, Trump knew he lost. That came through over and over in the testimony today.
Not a debate about the facts, which does happen, but that Trump didn`t care about the facts at all. He was going with the stolen election claims before the election even ended, which means he was not confused about the tally, he didn`t care about the tally. And that goes to a potentially criminal mind state.
Two, they all told him he lost. It`s never fun to have everyone that you know, everyone you trust, everyone you`ve hired say over and over you are the loser of this election, especially given what we know about Donald Trump. But just about everyone from the campaign to the government really spoke with one voice, and we now know this under oath because they all recounted it. They told him he lost, there`s no legal path.
[18:05:01]
All of them, well, with one exception. A now disbarred lawyer. More on him in a moment. He`ll get his turn. But I want to stay high level first.
Third and finally, in some key takeaways Donald Trump used election lies to haul in another $250 million from his own supporters for another lie. Trump supporters blatantly misled. They were told their money would go to this election defense fund that would somehow keep Trump in office.
But here`s the thing about putting people under oath. It is quite literally the last stop on the train to address your own lies if you have been lying. And Trump`s top aides in the highlights released today admitting another lie. That whole effort was literally just a marketing deception.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HANNA ALLRED, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN STAFFER: I don`t believe there is actually a fund called the election defense fund.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it fair to say that the election defense fund was another, I think we`ve called it a marketing tactic?
GARY COBY, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN DIGITAL DIRECTOR: Yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Yes,. I am joined now by Elie Mystal, justice correspondent with “The Nation” and Danya Perry, former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, a former deputy attorney general for the state of New York with an expertise on both federal and state criminal law.
Welcome to both of you. We`ll get to Giuliani and the other fireworks, but in those key takeaways, Danya, what did you see as legally being advanced today?
DANYA PERRY, FORMER ASSISTANT U.S. ATTORNEY, SDNY: As you said, I thought today`s testimony was riveting from a legal perspective, particularly — you know, we heard the big picture the last time, particularly from former Attorney General Barr. Today we got some of the details, some of the nuggets that really make this come alive and that flesh out, you know, the scaffolding that had already been set.
We heard a lot of specifics, as I said, where, you know, there`s one thing about Trump was told over and over, there is no fraud. You lost the election. Here he`s being told particular instances where the fraud was debunked. And then going out the next day in one instance that Barr testified about, and repeated the lie, knowing at the time that it was false. So what we now have it, all of his closest advisers, campaign managers, attorneys, are all tell him, as you said, with one exception, the same thing.
And so you can detach yourself from reality as Barr said, but that`s not a legal defense. That is — it`s what`s known in the law, I`m sewer Elie will talk about this as well, it`s conscious avoidance, willful blindness, it`s the ostrich defense. It`s all these things where you can try and stick your head in the sand and avoid knowing what is so obvious. And that is, there was no fraud, you lost this election.
MELBER: Yes.
PERRY: So it`s not a legal defense that could ever stand up in court.
MELBER: And Elie, not really fair to ostriches.
(LAUGHTER)
MELBER: While we`re at it. When you look at what was assembled here, the committee also seems to be showing, and by the way we`ll get into this, but 20 million plus people watched last week, this week, daytime hearing but it was airing on FOX News. It`s going out into the country. They seem to be trying to show that for all the political polarization in this country, there actually were many Trump Republicans who did not want to take personal criminal risk to join a coup, who did not actually think this was a good idea.
ELIE MYSTAL, THE NATION JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Eventually, right? Like, Bill Barr was there, and he`s all like looking good now because he`s using bad words and talking about — right? But in real time, when we could have used Bill Barr to stand up there and say, this is complete whatever and that Trump has no claim to winning this election —
MELBER: Well, let me —
MYSTAL: Where was Bill Barr?
MELBER: May I bifurcate you?
MYSTAL: Go ahead.
MELBER: Let`s take that second.
MYSTAL: OK.
MELBER: And go —
MYSTAL: Table that issue.
MELBER: Well, not table because you get to speak on it at this table. But first, from a legal analytical perspective, what was the committee doing trying to show that just about everyone under oath didn`t want to help steal the election when at least it became untenable.
MYSTAL: Yes, well, the key here is Trump — we`re trying to establish Trump`s criminal intent. It is important as a legal matter to know that if you are accused of stealing something, you have to know that it`s not yours. You have to know that you`re stealing it. It has to not be an accident. And so what happened today is that we saw Barr, Stepien, all of these people say to Trump, look, you lost the election. So
then when he tries to steal it, he knows that they are stealing, right. The only person — look, the way it works, you have to listen to the evidence that`s given to you. You can`t go, and say, you know, well, you know, my lawyers and my accountant says that I have to pay taxes, but I found some wino on the streets who says that I don`t have to pay taxes. And so I get off scot-free. Like that`s not how it works. Didn`t work for Wesley Snipes and it`s not going work for Trump trying to hide behind Giuliani and Sidney Powell.
[18:10:03]
Sidney Powell who again they mentioned today said in her own deposition that it was unreasonable for people to take the things that she was saying as fact. So Trump can`t just go looking for the person who agrees with him. He has to take the best advice available. The best advice available was, you lost, you lost, you lost, and doing anything else is stealing.
MELBER: Right, and that again goes to this under oath conundrum. People say, what is the point of all this? Why are we spending all this time as a nation doing this? Sidney Powell under oath is really damning evidence against Sidney Powell not under oath. And you saw that play out. Now mentioned where you get your advice.
Our panel stays here but that brings us — I want to get into more of the newly revealed key testimony unveiled because just like last hearing, some of these greatest bombshells were actually highlights from the depositions which range from the deep internal splits among Trump aides, some dubbing themselves team normal, to aides testifying about Rudy Giuliani`s state of mind.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there anyone in that conversation who, in your observation, had had too much to drink?
JASON MILLER, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN SENIOR ADVISER: Mayor Giuliani. The mayor was definitely intoxicated, but I did not know his level of intoxication when he spoke with the president, for example.
RUDY GIULIANI, TRUMP ATTORNEY/FORMER MAYOR OF NEW YORK: I spoke to the president several times that night.
MILLER: I remember saying that — to the best of my memory I was saying that we should not go declare victory until we had a better sense of the numbers.
BILL STEPIEN, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN MANAGER: I didn`t mind being characterized as being part of team normal.
RICHARD DONOGHUE, FORMER ACTING DEPUTY ATTORNEY GENERAL: We looked at the video, we interviewed the witnesses, it was not true.
BARR: I told him that the stuff that his people were shoveling out to the public was (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
STEPIEN: The president`s mind was made up.
ERIC HERSCHMANN, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE COUNSEL: Are you out of your effing mind? I said, I only want the hear two words coming out of your mouth from now on. Orderly transition.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BERMAN: Two takeaways there. Trump`s most loyal defenders, including Barr, confronted the then outgoing president with his loss, and the only top Trump aide willing to go along with election lies was this now disbarred lawyer, Giuliani, who aides said could not stay sober on the biggest work night of the entire campaign, which is election night.
Now to some the testimony on Giuliani`s, quote, “intoxication” might sound like what is known in the law as a mitigation defense. Or as T-Pain and Jamie Foxx memorably put it, blame it on the vodka, blame it on the Henny, blame it on the al-al-alcohol. With Trump`s own aides thinking no sober minded person thought he had a case, and you would need some serious beer goggles or perhaps Henny goggles to think he won an election he so clearly lost. Elie?
MYSTAL: Yes, so one of the ways that we know Trump doesn`t actually believe that Giuliani was too drunk to give advice is that Trump has not brought a case against Rudolph Giuliani for ineffective assistance of counsel, right. That`s what I would do, if I was really felt like I was being given terrible legal advice and acting to the detriment of the country, by this point I would have turned it around on Giuliani. Trump hasn`t done that because the whole point is that he agreed with what Giuliani was saying, and that`s why he did it. It`s not because of the legal advice, right.
So I can go out tonight or I can find a drunk guy who thinks that I look like a Chippendale`s dancer. That doesn`t make it so. And if I start stripping, right, that`s on me, not on the drunk guy who thinks that I look hot that time, right. So like the idea that all of this is somehow going to come down to Giuliani`s state of intoxication, it does not. It comes down to Trump`s state of mind listening to drunk lawyers as he`s organizing his coup.
MELBER: Well, and Danya, that`s why the top lawyer for the president being according to evidence inebriated cuts both ways. Not a sentence I would ever say in journalism, even in the last few years, but here we are. And to Elie`s point, it cuts against basically the idea that this was at all valid counsel. But it seemed that the committee also wanted to use it in today`s hearing to show there were no takers for overthrowing the election and the coup arguments.
There were literally no takers among that brain thrust, and so then you pull in other people, people on the Capitol steps, Mr. Navarro who won`t testify, Mr. Bannon who wasn`t in the White House, but when it came to the — all the other lawyers besides Giuliani, and all the people on the campaign whose job was to win, and a lot of other loyal political aides, there were no takers except this, quote, “inebriated individual.”
How do you square that with what some are calling the T-Pain defense and what`s your view of that analysis?
PERRY: Well, this wasn`t a one-time, one-night only misstep or bad advice because of the henny goggles.
[18:15:02]
This was — there`s a through line, and this came out in today`s testimony and hearing. It all began, you know, many months before with Trump predicting that the only way he would lose would be if the election was rigged, and that continued to that night. It`s not advice, it`s not counsel, it`s not an opinion that he won the election. It`s a question of fact.
MELBER: Right.
PERRY: And no one had called it, so he`s just going in there making stuff up, and then it didn`t end that night, of course. He`s still saying the election was rigged. And you know, presumably he`s not drunk every time he`s saying it. So this was — I mean, maybe Giuliani. So it`s a — it`s a tough defense.
MELBER: Yes.
PERRY: And I think one of the lines that`s kind of funny but also quite tragic, you know, team normal and then team clown show or fill in the blank, I don`t think he finished what the other team was.
MELBER: Team Henny.
PERRY: Team Henny. Now we have a name for it. So, again, not a great line of defense for the former president and his team of enablers.
MELBER: Yes. Well, we covered more than one item as promised. I want to thank Danya Perry and Elie Mystal.
We have a January 6th investigator on the program live tonight. That`s coming up. Also, the committee debunking something else. You move past the henny and you end up with the Costanza defense. Neal Katyal is here to break that down. And by the end of the hour, we turn to this push and a potential breakthrough on gun safety. John Mellencamp is here live tonight. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:20:55]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, FORMER PRESIDENT: The only way we`re going to lose this election is if the election is rigged. Remember that. It`s the only way we`re going to lose this election.
SAMANTHA GUTHRIE, MSNBC HOST: We can now project that former vice president Joe Biden has been elected president of the United States.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI, MSNBC HOST, MORNING JOE: The third time has turned out to be to charm. Not only the charm, but possibly the most consequential election of our lifetimes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Donald Trump always intended to lie about his loss and try to steal the election. To cheat after the results came in, to stage a coup. That is the case these January 6th investigators made today, drawing on evidence like part of the clip I just showed from then President Trump speaking in public before election day and testimony about the similar plans he set in private all showing an attempt to lie and steal, as his advisers showed him he was still on track to lose. And that was the case on election night and after with all legal paths closing in more court losses.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPIEN: My recommendation was to say that votes were still being counted, it`s too early to tell, too early to call the race.
MILLER: I remember saying that — to the best of my memory I was saying that we should not go and declare victory until we had a better sense of the numbers.
IVANKA TRUMP, FORMER WHITE HOUSE ADVISER: The results were still being counted. It was becoming clear that the race would not be called on election night.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: And Trump`s lies about the actual vote then morphed into lies about the supposed fraud that would then reverse everything. Aides fact-checking him on that score.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONOGHUE: I essentially said, look, we looked at that allegation, and that allegation was not supported by the evidence.
DEREK LYONS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE STAFF SECRETARY: Eric and Pat didn`t, you know, told the group, the president included, that none of those allegations had been substantiated.
DONOGHUE: I said, OK, well, with regard to Georgia, we looked at the tape, we interviewed the witnesses. There is no suitcase.
BARR: I told him that the stuff that his people were shoveling out to the public was (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Now at some point all this evidence might seem repetitive or even to some viewers potentially tedious. Of course Trump was lying. Of course he knew he lost. The sayings go. But the committee is trying to build potentially a wider criminal case here, so it`s also knocking down potential defenses like that Trump somehow really thought he won or believed some reasonable staff input that claimed he won.
Well, after a thousand depositions, the committee is spending so much time on this right now today because investigators think it`s important that Trump cannot in any way hide behind a sort of smoke screen of his own asserted delusion because the evidence shows he was not actually deluded on this point. He was very much, they say, an informed coup plotter. Not some bumbling unemployed deluded goofball BS-ing in a, I don`t know, coffee shop?
In other words, the committee has a prebuttal to a very Trumpian concept that actually predates our current era. You may recall it from an iconic “Seinfeld” episode. The argument being if you truly belief the B.S. that you`re pushing then maybe technically it`s not a lie?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JASON ALEXANDER, ACTOR, “SEINFELD”: Jerry, just remember. It`s not a lie if you believe it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: It came to be known as the Costanza defense. It`s been used in households, in relationships around the country, but today`s evidence suggests that on this more serious matter, it is not legally available to Trump. Is that why the committee bore down on this point?
We turn to Neal Katyal to discuss a probe that is definitely about something when we`re back in 60 seconds.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:26:08]
MELBER: We`re back with former acting solicitor general Neal Katyal.
Why does it matter that the committee says it has evidence that Trump knew the whole time he lost?
NEAL KATYAL, FORMER ACTING SOLICITOR GENERAL: Well, you know, Ari, I saw you bring up this whole kind of Costanza defense this morning in the live hearing, and I thought it`s a really good point that you`re making but of course Donald Trump is not a “Seinfeld” character. I mean, maybe he could be if one of the writers had a stroke while writing his lines or something like that. I`m pretty sure that the only thing that Trump and George Costanza have in common is that both of them don`t want to you know their SAT scores and maybe that their parents should have hugged them more when they were young. I don`t know.
But legally I think you`re absolutely right here. You know, Trump`s defense has always been I genuinely believed that I won this election, and the testimony today just destroyed that claim. It wasn`t from Democrats, it was from Trump`s inner circle, like all those clips you were just showing. Bill Barr, his campaign manager, others saying that this was wrong, and it becomes then at that point hard, if you`re thinking, Ari, as I know you are, how`s a jury going to evaluate this? Should there be a criminal prosecution?
When Trump ignores basically his entire Justice Department from Bill Barr down to the prosecutor in Atlanta that Trump put in there, BJay Pak, you know, it`s hard for him to say, for Trump to say, I was accepting in good faith the allegations of an inebriated Rudy Giuliani as opposed to all of this other stuff, and that`s why I think it was such significant testimony.
MELBER: Yes. All great points. And then when we widen out, Neal, people who lived through the whole Mueller era remember, were there going to be star witnesses? Many of the Trump administration tactics delayed. Don McGahn was factually a star witness in the Mueller report, but getting him out in front of the world the way you had in the Watergate hearings or other witnesses did not happen. I think people remember that timeframe.
Here, in some ways Bill Barr today, as more and more of his deposition comes out, is a star witness, which is distinct from his overall record. So we wanted to both show viewers the news, what he said under oath, bad for Trump, but also get your views on this wider idea that, you know, he did resign in December 2020, and we`re getting more of his claims under oath about why, and yet let`s look at the official resignation letter, because we do comprehensive news here.
First paragraph, he says he appreciates the opportunity to update the president on the voter fraud allegations and they would continue that probe. Then he also says Donald Trump had unprecedented achievements, a historic legacy. This is a person who, as I mentioned in the Mueller probe was throwing the full weight of his public words and leadership to basically selectively quote, to interfere with the Roger Stone sentencing. Here`s what Bill Barr was saying, though, today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARR: I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff which I told the president was bull (EXPLETIVE DELETED). And, you know, I didn`t want to be a part of it, and that`s one of the reasons that went into me deciding to leave when I did.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Neal, I want your assessment, having worked inside the Justice Department, to be as fair as possible. There are times when internal concerns are not best aired in public in real time. This seems like a very abnormal situation where he says he`s resigning in part over this, he`s concerned about the president detached from reality trying to overthrow an election.
Should he have spoken out in some way?
KATYAL: Absolutely. I mean, you know, Bill Barr, I think, is running to try and launder his reputation like some of the others who are testifying today. But, Ari, it`s not — you know, I totally agree with the idea that you don`t air out all your dirty laundry when you`re a Justice Department official. But Barr did the reverse. In this fawning resignation letter that you were just pointing to a moment ago.
[18:30:00]
That`s like the equivalent of Donald Trump on January 6, saying to the insurrectionists, go home, we love you, you`re very special. That`s what that letter reads us. And remember, this is the attorney general, who basically enabled a lot of the machinations over the election in the first place. He broke with the long-standing Justice Department policy, Ari, that said that election claims of fraud should wait until after certification that you don`t do it ongoing.
And indeed, the chief of the Justice Department`s election integrity unit resigned because he felt that Barr was manipulating things. And so many prosecutors voiced their objections at the time. That policy is since, you know, on day one of the Biden administration been restored, which is a long-standing bipartisan foreign policy, administration to administration. So, it`s a little bit too late now.
I think, for Barr to sit and say, oh, I thought all this was B.S., and so on. The guy did nothing until he wrote his book and testify now. And I`m glad he testified, because this testimony is really important, as we were talking about a moment ago in establishing that criminal prosecution.
And indeed, just Trump`s wrongdoing is a moral matter, as a political matter, as a matter of integrity. So, it`s great that we`re getting this but you know, this does not make Bill Barr any sort of hero or anything like it.
MELBER: Great to get your perspective on all of it, including that tension there in his public statements. Neal Katyal, thank you. When we come back, we`ve got updates on multiple stories, including a breakthrough in gun control protests.
Working Republicans giving some ground. John Mellencamp is here later tonight. But first, the January 6 panel, what did we learn today and why did they set up the case this way, we have a member of the committee, Elaine Luria when we`re back. Next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[18:36:12]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JARED KUSHNER, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISOR: He was upstairs, I was — we were kind of on the first floor, so not upstairs. We were with mostly with Ivanka and her brothers —
IVANKA TRUMP, FORMER TRUMP WHITE HOUSE ADVISOR: It was becoming clear that the race would not be called on election night.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My recommendation was to say that votes were still being counted.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And did anybody who was a part of that conversation disagree with your message?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who is that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president disagreed with that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: The President disagreed. We`re joined now by January 6 committee member, Elaine Luria, at a busy time. Thank you for being here. What do you think the committee`s evidence proved today?
REP. ELAINE LURIA (D-VA), JANUARY 6 COMMITTEE: Well, today, what we wanted to show was that President Trump knew he lost the election. He was told this by his former attorney general, by his Department of Homeland Security, by his campaign manager, by his children, by everyone surrounding him. Yet, with that knowledge, he continued to go out. And on January — I`m sorry, on November 4th, right after the election, he stood up and told the country he wants.
And he continues to perpetuate that lie moving forward. And, you know, what we`re trying to establish the course of these hearings, is to show that truly his words, his actions, led to the violence that we saw on January 6, then as we closed out the hearing, you saw some of the people who were here on January 6, and how it influenced them.
They were here because they believed in this big lie. They believed what they were being told. And I think it`s very clear today, with all of the testimony that we heard, that the former president knew he lost the election, acted in bad faith, and continued to tell people a lie, and that he had won.
MELBER: If that`s true, will you issue a criminal referral against Donald Trump?
LURIA: So, Ari, this is one of those questions, it keeps coming up repeatedly. And we know the ruling from Judge Carter and the Eastman case, and strong evidence that he broke the law. But you know, what I want to focus on is that, why do we have such a low bar for the president of United States? 330 million people in this country and the only thing we`re trying to determine is did he break the law?
He has a responsibility under the Constitution, the take care clause, to make sure that the laws are faithfully executed. And we have shown through our current testimony and evidence and will continue to show that he didn`t do that. He actually tried to undermine the laws of this country. And he has a duty, and this duty — 187 minutes he sat there on January 6th.
MELBER: When you refer to what you`re discussing the troubling, perhaps betrayal of a constitutional oath and legal duties. That sounds like an area of the law that`s different than committing a crime. Should we infer that your — this committee is unlikely to end by referring him criminally to the Justice Department?
LURIA: So, Ari, that is still something that the committee is working through as we continue to collect evidence and as we present it to the public. So, there`s not a determination made on that. But I can say personally, from my own perspective, that this man, he broke the law, he tried to undermine it, and he was the one person responsible for upholding the laws for the entire country.
MELBER: Yes, striking. We discussed some of the new evidence released testimonial evidence about Mr. Giuliani. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was there anyone in that conversation who in your observation had too much to drink?
JASON MILLER, FORMER TRUMP CAMPAIGN SENIOR ADVISOR: Um, Mayor Giuliani. The mayor was definitely intoxicated, but I did not know his level of intoxication when he spoke with the president, for example.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: Is the committee offering this evidence chiefly pursuant to Mr. Giuliani or former President Trump?
[18:40:00]
LURIA: Well, I think it`s both. I mean here you have the president. He`s taking bad advice from people who are not sane and thinking logically and providing good advice based soundly and the law. And on top of that, there were numerous witnesses who told us that he had had too much to drink. He was intoxicated. So even furthermore, I think that brings into question the soundness of the advice that the president was receiving. And we know he was acting off of as he perpetuated this lie.
MELBER: Let me press you on that a little bit because I understand both. But at the end of the day, if it`s primarily mostly the lawyer`s conduct, that really is more for like a bar disciplinary hearing, than a federal investigation, literally. And so, I guess what I`m asking you is, was the inference today that the only person who could possibly agree with Donald Trump, you know, wasn`t even of sober mind on his team, or is that taking it too far?
LURIA: I don`t think that`s really what we were trying to get across more so than, you know, he assembled a group of people who are providing him bad advice. And above and beyond that those people were not even acting with their full faculties because on key points, essentially, immediately before he got on national T.V. and told the nation that he won an election that he lost. He was receiving that advice from someone who was inebriated by all accounts of those presidents.
MELBER: Yes. Congressman Luria, as mentioned, you`re busy right now. I appreciate you making time to come on THE BEAT.
LURIA: Thanks.
MELBER: Thank you.
LURIA: Thank you.
MELBER: We`re going to fit in a break. There has also been a breakthrough on actual gun safety legislation in Congress. Some people told you it could never happen. At least incrementally, they`re wrong. And John Mellencamp, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer is my special guest`s live next.
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[18:46:03]
MELBER: We have understandably been covering this insurrection hearing and new evidence for much of the hour. Now we turn to the other big story. That`s actually quite significant. And I`m going to start it off like this. I`m going to ask you a question. What if it turns out much of what people say about gun control is just wrong? Gun advocates insist that the current rate of mass shootings deadlier here than anywhere else is just unavoidable.
And it`s wrong to respond to shootings with reform proposals. That a lot of pundits say, well, there just are not votes right now to overcome Republican obstruction in the Senate. So, it`s futile to respond to shootings by talking about reform. Some even liken it to a waste of time. And they dismiss grassroots activists as naive. They don`t know how this works.
And after many recent shootings, including the buffalo rampage, which was the deadliest of the year when it occurred, it`s true that at times, outrage and protest did not move the Senate. But protest is not a single point in time. It is all about building pressure over time, across the nation. We know that from history, and just this weekend, with everything else going on protests continuing, and tonight, there`s news that there are signs that it`s working.
Pressure, bringing over Republicans that you see here to a Democratic-led bipartisan framework, which members say has the votes to pass the Senate. Now some of the items in here do not directly restrict gun sales. There`s mental health programs, for example, there is some incremental gun control in the package like stronger background checks where people at least under 21.
Negotiators are still hammering out the actual bill and detail. So, in the coming days along with everything else going on. We will keep reporting on that and try to pin down actual legislators, possibly here as guests on the program, about the substance because this is incremental, and much is to be determined. But tonight, with these signs, the pressure is working.
We continue what has been also part of our series, not just talking to lawmakers, but talking to people in this clash from teachers and students to victims` families, to people across society and culture who`ve been joining this as an ethical cause. And that brings us to a voice known to so many, a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, Grammy-winning rock star who has been speaking out on this very issue, John Mellencamp.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN MELLENCAMP, MUSICIAN: Ain`t that America.
Home of the free, yeah.
Little pink houses for you and me.
We`re all easy targets. They got pistols in their hands
Seems to me they don`t like the farmers farming the land, they just don`t want them to own their own land.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MELBER: John Mellencamp is here making his BEAT debut. Very excited to have you, as always wish it was for a different reason. But appreciate your work. Thanks for being here.
MELLENCAMP: Thanks for having me.
MELBER: What do you think is important, sir, that has moved you to work on this issue. And some people out there do listen to you. What do you want to tell them about this issue?
MELLENCAMP: Well, for one thing, you know, I don`t know if you`re old enough. But I remember when Vietnam first started and it was a conversation on the news. But then when they started showing that teenagers, people did something about it. And the country united. I think that we need to start showing the carnage of these kids who have died in — if we don`t show it then they`re dying in vain.
Because they`re just going to pass more bullshit walls like they`re trying to get through now. Show it. Let the country see what a machine gun can do to a kid`s head. Show it. It`s your responsibility as a news network to show it. Let`s see it. Show the people what it — what really talking about, because just to go — oh, 13 kids killed, most people just go, well that happened again. Sorry, that happened.
[18:50:00]
And people can say, well, you`re being insensitive, John. Now, this is not the time to be insensitive. Murder is not the time to be sensitive. Which is exactly, you know, what`s happening. Make these kids heroes. The same way that we looked at heroes in Vietnam. The same way we looked at heroes a World War II. These kids are dying because we don`t have proper laws in place.
I don`t know, Ari, in Australia, they had the biggest mass murder ever. And the government came in and said, all right, that`s it, no more guns. And everybody went, that sounds reasonable. And they gave up their guns. And it`s been like 15 years. No more mass murders in Australia. Coincidence, or you know — so I know, it`s a big challenge. And I am far to the left, you know, but we need to — people need to turn in their guns.
I understand people, you know, liking guns. I got two kids and like guns. But I have to tell you when that — when the Second Amendment was written, they were talking about muskets. They were talking about muskets.
MELBER: Yes, that`s true.
MELLENCAMP: No bang, bang, bang, you know, one shot. They had no idea that there would be guns that would go bam, bam, bam shoot 100 rounds in a minute. They had no idea that with that. So, and people go, you can`t change changes. This is the second amendment. It`s an amendment, it`s already been changed. So don`t say you can`t change this the Second Amendment, you can change the Second Amendment, change —
MELBER: Well, you could also argue to your point, Justice Scalia, changed what was the understanding of the Second Amendment in the Heller decision because up until that moment, it had never been understood to identify an individual right. To your point at a sort of a jurisprudential level. I want to let you build more on the point you`re making which some in the journalistic community and some frankly, in the victims` families, communities might disagree with you on but again, we air things out here.
You`re making a point, and you`re a storyteller. And the stories you`ve told to your art are a type of truth that connects with people. And you`re saying — helped me understand, that you think the way this has been covered to some degree, acts to, in your view, obscure some of the truth of the real horror of this that people need to face?
MELLENCAMP: It absolutely does. You know, when Walter Cronkite got on the news, and they started showing 18-year-old kids being slaughtered in Vietnam, there was an uprising. But just to hear about it, and to talk about it, and to, you know — now is not the time to be sensitive. I mean, I — murder is not a sensitive topic. You know, if you`re — if you`ve got your arm around your buddy, that`s the time to be sensitive.
But you know, I`m sure that these people whose children are being slaughtered, day after day after day after day, every weekend, that they would prefer their kids to be remembered as heroes. Who, you know, they died for a reason. They changed the laws, they change — because I know what this new bill is. It`s bullshit.
It`s just you know — these people — these people are connected to the gun lobby, you know, and the guy that you showed a picture of that guy from Texas, you know, he`s connected to the gun lobby. Nobody wants to mess with the gun lobby. They all want to be elected. They don`t get — they don`t care about us, Ari. They don`t care about those kids. You know, now is not the time for our tears and prayers, and good wishes.
Now is the time for action. Show what a gun will do to the kid`s head, show the American people what`s really happening and what everybody`s so afraid to see. The same way they were afraid to show what was really happening in Vietnam.
MELBER: Yes. Let me ask you before I lose you, since you make the Vietnam analogy, that was also a time and full disclosure since you said it. No, I wasn`t there. But I read. So, I`ve read about it, but I didn`t live through it. But that was also a time when the culture that what was once called the counterculture really stood up and united.
And you had a lot of people across cultures saying this isn`t about politics. Is it you put — there`s other issues, people debate, but this was a moral issue. You know, it was the — it was young people going out and campaigning that. Then eventually got LBJ to not seek re-election.
It was unheard of when they started and so I`m curious, do you think that the — what we`re seeing from people like yourself, in arts, in sports, does that matter to potentially convert this issue to a national ethical issue?
MELLENCAMP: No, I mean, yes, I mean, you know — look, I`m sure there`s people sitting at home, go, Mellencamp shut up and sing. I mean, I`m sure that — that`s what some people are saying. But I don`t care, you know, I have a right to speak my mind just like anybody else. What I`m saying is, is that show what really happened.
[18:55:00]
Quit tippy-toeing around a very, very, very sad situation for this country to be in because some senators and some congressmen want to stay involved with you know — we have a right to carry arms. If I`m not mistaken, that amendment says to protect against the government. No gun that we can have is going to protect us against a nuclear weapon that the government has if they want to come after —
(CROSSTALK)
MELBER: But yes, refers to a well-regulated militia. But then you have people saying, oh, they`re going to — they`re going to protect freedom, as you say, writ large. I got to hand it to Joy Reid. We air all views here. And John, I`m glad you came on THE BEAT.
MELLENCAMP: Thank you.
MELBER: Yes, sir. Thank you. There will be more coverage of these hearings today. Rachel Maddow on tonight. But first, keep it locked. “THE REIDOUT WITH JOY REID,” is next.
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