Updated
Summary
One revelation that stands starkly out of the released search warrant affidavit is just the plain confirmation that “probable cause exists to believe that evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed will be found at Mar-a-Lago.” A Russian speaking immigrant from Ukraine pretended to be a member of the famous Rothschild family and made several trips to Mar-a-Lago. When President Biden announced he was canceling a bunch of student loan debt for millions of Americans this week, Republicans like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, were there to whine about it. President Joe Biden in Maryland firing up supporters at the end of the week of remarkable achievement.
Transcript
JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: Is Alicia and LaTosha is still there? I have to say that brother won the week. I think, LaTosha, let him get on the bus. I want him on the bus, joins our journey.
LATOSHA BROWN, CO-FOUNDER, BLACK VOTERS MATTER: That`s right. The pinkest, prettiest bus all around.
REID: OK. I want him on the bus. And I`ll come hanging out with him too. That is tonight`s “REIDOUT”. Alicia, Latasha, thank you all very much. Thank you guys. Have a great weekend. Bye-bye. ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES starts now.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST (on camera): Tonight on ALL IN. Probable cause exists to believe that evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed will be found at Mar-a-Lago. Tonight, the unsealed affidavit from the search of Donald Trump`s home.
New revelations from the letter explaining the redactions. And if there was probable cause of a crime and evidence of a crime recovered, what happens now?
ANDREW WEISSMANN, FORMER LEAD PROSECUTOR, MUELLER INVESTIGATION: My big overarching takeaway is that the former president is going to be prosecuted.
HAYES: Plus, incredible new reporting on just how easy it is to infiltrate the resort home where Donald Trump stored national security secrets. And after an incredibly successful week, the Biden warning to Republicans ahead of the Midterms.
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: They are about to find out.
HAYES: When ALL IN starts right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES (on camera): Good evening from New York. I`m Chris Hayes. We have the affidavit filed by the FBI in support of its search warrant of the ex- president`s retirement home. Now, there are a lot of really fascinating nuggets and revelations throughout despite it`s quite heavy redactions. But one stands starkly out as it did during the initial reveal of the search warrant itself, just the plain confirmation in black and white that “probable cause exists to believe that evidence, contraband, fruits of crime, or other items illegally possessed will be found at Mar-a-Lago.”
That`s really the nub of it right there, isn`t it? That`s what it all of this has been about, the multiple back and forth with the National Archives starting last year, the visit from the DOJ back in spring, the subsequent subpoena, and of course, the raid itself. It was all building to this document where an officer of the law swore under penalty of perjury that there was a probable cause that someone at Mar-a-Lago, almost certainly the former president himself, was in unlawful possession of these documents, and that those documents were evidence of a crime. They requested permission to go there and recover the illegal documents. And it seems likely they did just that.
You also learned from the affidavit about an incident back in May when representatives from the National Archives went through the 15 boxes they already recovered from Mar-a-Lago before the search warrant. They found “documents with classification markings in 14 of the 15 boxes, including, “184 unique documents bearing classification markings, including 67 documents marked as Confidential, 92 documents marked as Secret, and 25 documents marked as Top Secret.
That`s more than just a handful of documents that slipped through the cracks. And again, those are the ones that they eventually turned over after being begged by the National Archives. Those are the ones before whatever they got in the search. That tranche of documents the one that the National Archives had to kind of like constantly wheedle them for, right, that they finally got from them, that`s nearly 200 documents marked anywhere from Confidential to Top Secret. You can imagine how the folks at the National Archives, when they got them started going through were like, what is going on here?
They also found, according to the affidavit, “what appears to be Trump`s handwritten notes, as well as documents labeled HCS, meaning, they pertained to confidential human sources, spies, documents related to FISA information, a.k.a. national security surveillance of foreign targets. This is just the stuff — again, just the stuff the DOJ knew about before the search warrant was executed, just the stuff that they had managed to shake free from Mar-a-Lago.
So, we definitely learned a lot from this affidavit, but there`s still a lot, of course, we don`t know. As we said before, much the documents are heavily redacted. DOJ said that it was important to protect, and this is an interesting quote, “a significant number of civilian witnesses involved with the investigation.” You got to imagine that sentence alone will certainly fuel Trump`s growing paranoia about what he has called rats in his inner circle.
Notably, the affidavit also does not mention so-called Special Access Programs, some of the country`s most secretive information which the National Archives previously mentioned it found in those 15 boxes obtained before the warrant, nor does it mention any nuclear documents which the Washington Post previously reported was one of the subjects that the search. Experts say both of those topics would almost certainly be among those redacted in the affidavit.
Now, taken altogether, it`s very obvious that things don`t look Do it for Donald Trump. In facts, even Fox News pundits agree.
[20:05:10]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KARL ROVE, FORMER WHITE HOUSE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF: It should be frankly, in all due respect to the former president, one, one request. You took documents that under the Presidential Records Act of 1978 should not have been taken from the White House, please give them all back. Now, he — they obviously ask him a number of times and he gave 15 boxes back, why he continued to hold on to, you know, almost a dozen more boxes is beyond me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: Yes, Karl Rove. He`s a weird dude. There is still much to learn. But the main point here is unwavering. I mean, again, the government had probable cause that at Mar-a-Lago, almost certainly Donald Trump, committed a crime. Not just any crime, according to the affidavit, a violation of the Espionage Act among others, specifically Part E of the Act which refers to documents or information, “relating to the national defense.”
And someone who either willfully shares it with someone they shouldn`t will “willfully retains the material, and again, fails to deliver it to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it.” In other words, someone who intentionally retains important national defense documents and fails to deliver them to their rightful handlers.
Now, that language relating to the National Defense obviously kind of vague but courts have standards to determine whether material is serious enough to be violation of the Espionage Act. One of those standards is if it is a closely held secret. One way the courts determine if documents are closely held as if they are classified. While we know very little about what exactly was recovered from the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago, the DOJ has revealed that many classified documents were found including Top Secret material.
As Lawfare Blog, put it, “Absent some evidence belying these labels, they are strong indicia the materials were closely held.” Closely held there meaning in the term of art for Espionage Act prosecutions. All right, so, we know the FBI had a search warrant to obtain documents that violate the Espionage Act. We know the FBI recovered documents that sure seemed to meet the definition of those that could violate it. Which means, since the FBI believe Trump had evidence of a crime, executed that search warrant, if they found that evidence, which certainly seems quite plausible, I would even say probable based on what we know, it really seems like the only next logical step would be an indictment of the ex-president.
At the very least, that`s what former FBI General Counsel Andrew Weissmann seems to think.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WEISSMANN: I have to say, my — when I read this today, my big overarching takeaway is — and I know this is just a prediction and speculation, but I say it`s an educated one is that the former president is going to be prosecuted. I don`t see how you cannot give in this information, not just that it`s so clear that there is an active, thorough investigation and just how much was done here. But when you compare it to precedent —
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: I want to bring in someone with a first-hand understanding of the burden of proof necessarily to obtain a search warrant like the one issued for Donald Trump`s property, as well as what it takes to ultimately bring charges against the suspect. Chuck Rosenberg, former senior FBI official and U.S. attorney who served a lengthy career prosecuting federal cases joins me now.
Chuck, let`s just start on that which I think is the most basic question here. It just seems almost as a matter of legal logic and institutional honor that if a sworn law — if a law enforcement official swears in an affidavit, we believe there`s probable cause of these crimes being committed, they get the warrant, they go find that evidence, it just really seems like one plus one equals two that you have uncovered the crime. What do you think?
CHUCK ROSENBERG, MSNBC LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, one plus one always equals two but be careful about what you`re adding up, Chris. Probable cause that a crime was committed and probable cause that you`re going to find evidence of that crime in the place you look. So, let`s say I am your no-good cousin occasionally sleeping on your couch, and I robbed a bank, you had nothing to do with it, and I take my ski mask and my gun and my money and I hide it in your garage.
The FBI can execute a search warrant on your house because they have probable cause to believe that a crime was committed and they`ll find evidence of the crime there. But you didn`t do it. So, what Andrew Weissmann said I think is generally true in most cases, but you also have to prove one plus one plus one more. Who is responsible for committing the crime? Often it`s the person at whose house you find this stuff. It could well be Donald Trump, but there could be other subjects of this investigation too.
HAYES: Yes. Say a little more about that because, you know, that line stuck out and I don`t think it was necessarily surprising. I think this is essentially what people like yourself and others had intuited of based on the available evidence, the multiple civilian witnesses involved in the investigation. What does that say to you?
[20:10:07]
ROSENBERG: A couple of things. First, I want to be very clear, you know, we talk about threats to witnesses and it seems almost like a throwaway line, you know, when the government says we have to keep this thing redacted. Having been a prosecutor for a long time, this is not some hypothetical abstract concern. It`s not just something that happens in the movies.
I`ve talked to scores of witnesses and I don`t think this is hyperbole, Chris, who are terrified at the notion of giving information and perhaps testifying, and particularly here magnified by the fact that Mr. Trump and his minions seem to go after witnesses with abandon. But multiple civilian witnesses have told the government something. I don`t know if it`s perfectly consistent. Generally, there are some inconsistencies in an investigation, but certainly enough to make out probable cause that this stuff would be found. And lo and behold, when we saw the search warrant inventory, they found more classified stuff.
Now, you have to figure out big next step. Who is responsible? It could well be Mr. Trump. It could be Mr. Trump and others. It could be just the others. And so, that`s the last part of that math equation — and I`m not quite satisfied that we have all the information we need yet.
HAYES: Yes, that`s a great point. I mean, the only — and we have nothing in any official filing, right? All we have is a reporting. That reporting almost exclusively from anonymous sources, although I think by reporters that I generally, you know, trust that Trump, for instance, went through the boxes, right, before they handed over that group — the first batch.
So, there`s some reporting indicating from sources that this was a Donald Trump project. But again, that`s — you know, reporting is not enough to meet your burden of proof. You`d have to get people — essentially, what you`re saying is, you`d have to get people who are saying this was his call, he was making the calls, he was the one who wanted it. He was in control this. This was a Donald Trump thing.
ROSENBERG: Right. And we sometimes shorten that to he intended this outcome. He had intent. It was willful, it was purposeful. And by the way, Chris, they might have that. We don`t.
HAYES: Right.
ROSENBERG: We don`t — we don`t have that in any publicly available document and the Justice Department properly is not talking about that. When they have something to say, they`ll say it in court. So, it may be there, we just haven`t seen it yet.
HAYES: There`s something that that I`ve just been eating away at me, and I`m not quite sure the best way to phrase it but I`ll try and I want to hear your thoughts on it, right? First of all, this just seems like so idiotic and reckless on Trump`s part. Now, that wouldn`t be the first time that someone created a crime out of out of idiocy and recklessness. In fact, that happens all the time.
His motives to me remain opaque, and they could be the most insidious motive as possible. He wanted to sell the secrets to the Saudis and the Russians, or they could be just the dumbest motives of vanity. Who knows, right? We just don`t know what they are. You can tell — it just seems to me like the dynamic here is the federal government, the National Archives, the FBI, DOJ did not want it to get to this point. But now that it`s at this point, what can you do, right? Like, it just feels like everyone is kind of walked to the point where you got to — you kind of got to jump.
ROSENBERG: Yes, it`s a great question, Chris. First of all, you don`t have to prove motive as a federal prosecutor. It`s not necessary. Whatever the motive is, if you committed the crime, you committed the crime. All right, let`s put that aside. So, what do you do now? So, there`s a couple of possibilities. One possibility is that they just wanted their stuff back because their stuff was highly classified and losing control of it can do grave damage to the national security of the United States. So, possibility one is mission accomplished.
HAYES: Right.
ROSENBERG: Possibility number two, as Andrew Weissmann suggested, is that Mr. Trump, and as I added, others perhaps could get indicted. I think if you`re Merrick Garland though, you have to sort of analyze this on two axes, two dimensions essentially. You have to have a really, really serious crime and you have to have very, very strong evidence. So, in other words, really good evidence of let`s say, near mishandling in my view doesn`t cut it.
HAYES: Yes.
ROSENBERG: And a very serious crime like espionage is not something you could bring with sort of mediocre evidence. So, the next step for prosecutors and agents is to figure out what can we prove and how strong is our proof, what elements of which statutes do we think we can convince a jury of by proof beyond a reasonable doubt? That`s harder than publishing it in the newspaper.
By the way, I think the reporting has been great. I don`t mean that as a slight against reporters at all. It`s just a different standard.
HAYES: I absolutely agree. And I think that`s actually a really useful way of thinking about it. Really strong evidence of a serious crime, right? There are high bars to clear on both of those before you`re looking at prosecution, but we just don`t know how close we are to clearing them. Chuck Rosenberg, as always, really great to have you on. Thank you very much.
[20:15:11]
ROSENBERG: Yes, sir.
HAYES: Coming up, what we learned about the national security threat posed by the classified documents Donald Trump kept in Mar-a-Lago and much more on what we`re learning from the unsealed affidavit next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: President Trump said that he declassified all these documents. Could he have just declassified them all?
BIDEN: Well, I just want to know I`ve declassified everything in the world. I`m president, I can do it all. Come on, declassified everything. I`m not going to comment. I don`t know the detail. I don`t even want to know. Let`s the Justice Department take care.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[20:20:17]
HAYES: That`s President Joe Biden`s response today on the questions about the reams of classified documents stashed away at Mar-a-Lago retrieved by the FBI earlier this month after an affidavit from the Justice Department. The former president also responded the release of parts of that affidavit today claiming, “Affidavit heavily redacted, triple exclamation point, nothing mentioned a nuclear, a clear reference to The Washington Post reporting that classified documents relating to nuclear weapons were among the items FBI agents were looking for at Trump`s Florida home.”
The problem, of course, is that we do not know if there was nothing mentioned on nuclear because the affidavit heavily redacted, triple exclamation point. There`s still a lot we did learn from the documents unsealed today. Joining me now to go through some of the big takeaways, Danya Perry, who served as Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division at the Southern District of New York, and Glenn Gerstell, who`s served as general counsel for the National Security Agency and Central Security Service.
Great to have you on both. Glenn, let me start with you as someone who practiced law for the government at very high echelons of one of the most secretive agencies we have, the NSA. From that perspective, anything jumped out to you about what we did see through the redactions today.
GLENN GERSTELL, FORMER GENERAL COUNSEL, NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY: Well, the redactions covered up a lot but they also revealed a lot too. And so I think there`s some important nuggets and some information in the affidavit that still remained this really significant.
Most importantly for me, what jumped out is the fact that it`s very hard after reviewing this affidavit, even with all the deletions and understanding the rich detail associated with the information that was in the 15 boxes that were returned to the National Archives back in January, and understanding the nature of the very sensitive documents that were there, coupled with the information now that the FBI had that there must have been additional documents, it`s almost impossible to see how you couldn`t exercise a search warrant and go ahead with this. It would be irresponsible on the basis of what information we already have to just say, oh, let`s take a chance and leave the documents there.
HAYES: Danya, how about you?
DANYA PERRY, FORMER DEPUTY CHIEF OF THE CRIMINAL DIVISION, SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK: I completely agree. There was no way around it. Once the FBI had this information that there were 184 highly classified, top secret documents that were retrieved earlier this year, and they had information from a significant number of civilian witnesses, and according to public reporting, that it had additional evidence as well, including surveillance evidence, they really had no choice but to go in there and execute the search to get those documents back.
And I heard what Chuck Rosenberg said before, I think there is certainly evidence that a serious crime was committed. It remains to be seen what all these witnesses have said, what their surveillance tape will say, what law enforcement agents have uncovered. But it certainly seems that it was committed by somebody and there`s certainly information that former President Trump knew about this ongoing issue that was going on for some 19 months, and is famously a micromanager of these things, and must have been must — have concerned himself, at least once the FBI and the Department of Justice at a high level became interested in it. But that`s probably in the redactions.
HAYES: Glenn, one thing that jumped out to me, and I`d love to get your thoughts on this, is that we have heard noises made by, in particular, Kash Patel who has worked for Trump and was over the Department of Defense in the final days, try to make this argument in public that that Donald Trump, again, in this kind of like, sort of Transubstantiation way had sort of waved his hands over these documents and declassified them, ergo, since the President has sort of authority over classification, they weren`t classified, so you can`t do anything about it.
The unredacted parts the affidavit actually grapples with that a little bit. I mean, basically it proactively rebutts that. And what what do you think about that section?
GERSTELL I thought that was fascinating. The affidavit specifically addressed the point that the government knew beforehand of this claim that the documents were declassified, and in fact that even cites Kash Patel`s media appearance. So, the government was aware of this assertion, and basically said, in effect to the judge, ignore that.
We don`t even need to worry about whether that`s accurate or not. It happens to be not accurate. But put that aside, because fascinatingly, the search warrant application did not even contain a provision saying that there had been a crime committed by removal of classified documents. That crime which is a separate one under Section 1924 of the — of the Criminal Code wasn`t even mentioned in the — in the search warrant.
[20:25:14]
HAYES: Right.
GERSTELL: And I think that`s a very revealing deliberate decision by the government. They said, we don`t even need to get into the classification declassification question. I might add, since you`ve raised it, that I think the idea that he just had this automatic declassification principle makes no sense at all, his own former national security adviser and Chief of Staff have both said they haven`t heard of any such rule. It makes no sense at all.
HAYES: Danya, what do you make of the volume here? I mean, one thing that`s so strange, I keep — I keep having to remind myself that we`re talking about different categories, the volume of stuff they`re talking about, right? I mean, the chain here is, we tried to shake this loose, we finally got some stuff from them, 15 boxes, we went through it, and there`s just tons of classified intro. We all freaked out. We brought the FBI. And now, we`re trying to get more because we think they still have stuff. Just the sheer scale of this seems irrelevant, and certainly seems irrelevant when they keep capitalizing 15 boxes in the affidavit.
PERRY: It certainly seems irrelevant. It is not a factor. It`s not an element to prove up this crime. It does not matter what the volume is. Many people have been prosecuted for much less. But it does underscore the seriousness of this. And likely, the intent behind it. There — you know, it`s not yes, the affidavit makes clear that. A lot of it was interspersed with, you know, other kind of random materials and, you know, not even documents. So, maybe there was some messiness there.
But when you`ve got that number and particularly when they — whether or not it`s an element of the crime, and as Glenn just pointed out, it`s not an element of any of the three statutes that are listed in the search warrant application, but you know, whether or not it is, it`s marked top secret, that`s probably an indication that, you know, you shouldn`t be storing them in your basement or in, you know, in your residence.
So, I do think that the volume really is just another factor here of why the FBI and DOJ felt that they had to go in there.
HAYES: As we noted, above, Glenn, the Special Access Programs, which is something that was mentioned I believe in the National Archives letter but is not mentioned in the redacted affidavit. Presumably, we think it`s probably redacted because — we the National Archives told us basically that that high level classification was present in these documents There`s two markings that stood out to people. HCS was one of them. Just explain a little bit for those of us that aren`t familiar with this what that indicates.
GERSTELL: Sure. So, to begin with all of these documents, there — you can`t miss the classification. It`s printed in capital letters in red on the top and bottom of every single page and the cover page. So, it`s not like someone`s going to overlook some classified document. The particular codes that you referenced the at the top of the document, it`ll say, Top Secret, for example, which is the highest classification level, but within Top Secret, there are special categories, one of which has to do with sensitive — Special Access Programs, which are information that`s so sensitive, it`s limited to just a handful or two perhaps of people who have a specific reason to know that information.
Human source information might indicate that the underlying intelligence came from spies from say, the CIA or the FBI, in other words, as opposed to electronic surveillance. And the information that was marked FISA refers to information that involves the targeting of a foreign intelligence, targeting of a foreigner for intelligence purposes. So, there`s a lot in here at the very, very sensitive level within the Top Secret category.
HAYES: All right, Danya Perry and Glenn Gerstell, thank you both. That was really illuminating. I appreciate it.
GERSTELL: Thank you.
HAYES: Still ahead, the FBI says Donald Trump was keeping top secret files at Mar-a-Lago, which makes this new report of an imposter who gained access to the club and the former president even more shocking. One of the reporters who broke that wild story joins me next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:30:00]
CHRIS HAYES, NBC NEWS HOST: Mar-a-Lago where investigators recovered 26 boxes of archival material including top secret files and classified intelligence is a notoriously unsecure place to keep national secrets.
The ex-president`s retirement home is basically a resort, it`s a private club, event space, people hold weddings, attend New Year`s Eve parties where (INAUDIBLE) is performing. It might go up to the omelet bar on a Sunday morning.
It was played throughout the Trump presidency with security breaches. For example, back in 2019, two different women from China were arrested in two separate instances and charged with trespassing at Mar-a-Lago. Criminal complaint for one as she was found with “four cellular telephones, one laptop computer, one external hard drive type device and one thumb drive, a preliminary forensic examination thumb drive determined to contain malicious malware.”
Today as we find out new details in the FBI about the stash of closely guarded secrets Trump had squirreled away at Mar-a-Lago, there`s brand new reporting from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about another apparent huge security breach there.
[20:35:09]
According to the paper, a Russian speaking immigrant from Ukraine pretended to be a member of the famous Rothschild family and made several trips to Mar-a-Lago. She was even photographed with the ex-president and South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham at a nearby golf tournament.
One of the reporters who broke this incredible story is a two time Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Michael Sallah. He`s a deputy managing editor for investigations at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. And he joins me now.
Michael, first, just give us what we know about who this individual is, and why we think there`s anything possibly suspicious going on here?
MICHAEL SALLAH, INVESTIGATIONS EDITOR, PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE: She or my colleagues at the OCCRP and us work pretty hard at developing her background. She is a Ukraine Russian speaking immigrant who came to the United States 12, 15 years ago, and reinvented herself in the last few years as Anna de Rothschild. She flies in private jets, she drives a brand new Mercedes.
She started by working her way through with major developers in South Florida, trying to get financing for various ventures, which she wasn`t really even a part of and found herself getting invited to Mar-a-Lago and that started the beginning. And she was there last year for several trips, and for at least a year, everybody thought that she was indeed a member of the Rothschild family.
HAYES: What — is there an investigation now happening to describe what — how you guys got on to the story?
SALLAH: There is an inquiry by the FBI and Canadian law enforcement into how she got in, but also her background. She formed a charity which was found to be rife with fraud. There`s hundreds of thousands of dollars missing. She has traveled the world. There`s allegations of all sorts of crimes and criminality, which she has vehemently denied.
But there is an active investigation. And I think they`re just trying to determine, you know, a lot of her background and how she found her way in there, and what she may have represented herself to be in what she did when she was there.
HAYES: Do we know — I mean, how do we — how did she end up playing golf with Donald Trump and Lindsey Graham?
SALLAH: She got invited by a friend of a friend. And she — there was a tournament that weekend. It was called the Trump Graham Classic, and it was a fundraiser to basically kick off the midterms.
They raised around a million dollars, and she was invited to golf. She spent — she was able to meet the president, pose with him. She went back to Mar-a-Lago in and out and she was driving a brand new Mercedes Benz SUV, and she at least five to six trips in and out of Mar-a-Lago with really nobody checking her I.D., nobody really finding out like who really is she.
All the guests in there thought she was a Rothschild. They thought that she was a member of this, you know, in theory, famous banking dynasty family from Europe, and she pretty much — pretty much everybody captivated.
HAYES: Yes, you have multiple quotes from folks at Mar-a-Lago who say, yes, we all we thought she was a Rothschild, and we were kind of a little star struck and thought she was, you know, from this very fancy family. Where is she now?
SALLAH: She is believed to be in the Miami area. The last thing she said to us is she was meeting with the FBI, multiple people have already been interviewed. It`s an ongoing case and there`s a criminal investigation in Canada as well.
A lot of it`s in her financial dealings in which he`s represented herself to be. But I believe also they`re looking very closely at, you know, the time that she spent there, what her background is, she`s very involved in the Russian community of South Florida. And she`s a, you know, she at this point in time, we really don`t know the status of the investigation and where it`s going right now.
HAYES: Yes, and I just want to be clear here, like she has not — just for everyone watching this, she has — she denies any allegations of any criminal conduct, and she has not been formally charged, indicted or anything at all for anything criminal? Just so few people are crystal clear about that, right?
SALLAH: That is correct. No, he has not been charged. There`s been no — not even there have been some filings in court, you know, making allegations about her. But other than that, she is still out there. And she`s professing that she had never represented herself as Anna de Rothschild, which is clearly not the case. There are enough people who —
[20:40:14]
HAYES: Right, I mean, — yes, and she`s got multiple documents appearing to call her that even though that that is not actually her real name.
It says something about how you get in and out of Mar-a-Lago and how easy it is. This story made me wonder how many Anna de Rothschild are golfing at Mar-a-Lago on a given weekend?
Michael Sallah, thanks, thanks so much for your great reporting. Appreciate it.
SALLAH: Glad to be here. Thanks.
HAYES: Still to come, this you? Not the White House Twitter account torching hypocritical Republicans, why it`s never bad to have someone from New Jersey in your corner? Next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[20:45:00]
HAYES: When President Biden announced he was canceling a bunch of student loan debt for millions of Americans this week, Republicans like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, were there to whine about it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): It`s completely unfair and taxpayers all over the country, taxpayers that never took out a student loan, taxpayers that pay their bills and you know, maybe even never went to college or just hard working people. They shouldn`t have to pay off the great big student loan debt for some college student that piled up massive debt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HAYES: First of all, I just want to be clear here because I`ve seen this talking point a lot. No one is paying it off. No one`s taxes are going up. Marjorie Taylor Greene does not pay for it, its deficit finance, like a lot of stuff we`ve done. So, that`s just nonsense.
But that critique is also of course, particularly rich coming from a woman who had her own government loans forgiven, something that was pointed out by lots of people on social media, including, kind of surprisingly, the official White House Twitter account, which pulled up this you?
Responding to that video of Greene saying “Congressman Marjorie Taylor Greene had $183,504 in PPP loans forgiven.”
In fact, the White House Twitter account made a thread of six Republican members of Congress pointing out the hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions of dollars in Paycheck Protection Program loans, which were set up to help small businesses pay their employees during the pandemic that those Republicans didn`t have to pay back.
It was a very successful program, helped a lot of people just like student loan forgiveness. The White House did not have to go that hard.
I for one, wonder how an official account that usually tweeted banal press releases was suddenly tweeting out clever responses to Republican hypocrisy.
And then I learned that Megan Coyne had been hired as part of the White House social media team at the beginning of this month.
Now, that name may not be familiar to you, but she was part of the brains behind the official New Jersey State Twitter account that drew acclaim for a Twitty (PH) posts like picking fights with neighboring Delaware and saying hi to the haters.
Most famously responding to the question of who let New Jersey have a Twitter with “your mom”.
That tweet remains one of the funniest things I`ve read on my website. I still love it. If one of the people responsible for that team are working in the White House Twitter account, Republicans might want to lay low on social media for a while.
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JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: MAGA Republicans don`t have a clue about the power of women. Let me tell you something, they are about to find out. Oh, yes. Oh, yes.
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HAYES: President Joe Biden was in Maryland last night firing up supporters at the end of the week of remarkable achievement. I mean, inflation is continuing to slow, consumer prices even ticking down month over month. Today we got new data from another inflation measure, showing things softening.
The president unburden millions from student loan debt, lessen the burden for millions more, reformed the rules around repayment. His party over performed in recent elections, particularly in that New York 19th congressional district special election, offering a cautiously optimistic outlook for the fall or at least a fighting chance. Even the president`s approval rating is rising, ticking up six points in the past month according to Gallup.
Congressman Ro Khanna is a Democratic California. He`s been out in the Midwest recently trying to keep up the momentum for Democrats. And he joins me now.
First of all, let me — let me start with how you`re feeling. And I know you guys are in recess. So, I don`t know how much you are in contact with other members of the House. But how you would describe the general mood after the last few weeks?
REP. RO KHANNA (D-CA): Chris, the president has had so many wins that even Democrats on the Hill are optimistic. And genetically, Democrats are always anxious and paranoid, but you have text chains members who are saying, look, I think we have a real shot to keep the House, people are bullish on the Senate. There`s genuine enthusiasm starting with when we passed the climate bill, the CHIPS bill, the president`s student loan forgiveness. I mean, it`s a mood — I haven`t seen this optimism, frankly, since he was inaugurated.
HAYES: You know, it strikes me that a few months ago, well, you know, remember when the — when the headline was about that BBB was dead. Manchin was pulling out. And, you know, it was over.
And, you know, it was — it was going to be hard to say to go to voters, right and say, look, yes, we got Afghanistan although that was obviously brutal. And we passed the — we passed that big rescue package, and we got the infrastructure bill.
But that was all last year, like it was — it was going to be hard to go voters and say, here`s what this trifecta did. Now, that list of — I mean, whether you like it or not, right? Some people don`t like it. Some people like the student loan thing. But there is a list to say this is what we did. This is what we want to do more of.
KHANNA: And Chris, it`s a list about making things in America. I mean, Donald Trump`s whole campaign was we`ve offshored our jobs, we need new factories. There were no new factories, no new industry with Donald Trump, the trade deficit actually increased.
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President Biden is actually delivering, CHIPS Act $52 billion to get semiconductor manufacturing in the United States, two new plants coming in Ohio, that the president is going to be there for the groundbreaking.
The Inflation Reduction Act is about making solar panels here, making batteries here, making sure we`re making things here and not in China. That`s resonating not just in California, but in Indiana and Ohio, where I was.
And I think that that making things in America, new production is something that this president really can claim credit for, reversing frankly, offshoring and globalization for the past 40 years.
HAYES: I mean, the other way to look at this right is that, you know, gas prices are like the killer metric for any president. Gas prices is high, you`re in trouble, gas prices low, you`re in much better shape.
It does seem to me so significant that gas prices have come down, and it now seems like inflation is cooling. And I got to imagine that inflation is something that you — whatever district you`re in, whatever politician you are, you are genuinely organically hearing from constituents about.
KHANNA: That`s right. I mean, when gas was almost 6.50 in my district, I mean, it`s the first thing people have talked about, and food prices are still high, but the trend lines are in a positive direction. And the president deserves credit for this with this strategic petroleum reserve that he released, with the fact that we have gone after big oil and the hearings that we`re having on the climate agenda that we`re passing.
And by the way, Chris, on your show, you had Ed Markey and me on, you were a big part of that in that show, because you said look, get climate compromise. And that was actually the start of progressive saying we are willing to take climate and $300 billion in climate was a big deal. And that was a lot of work. And the fact that we got that done, also shows that this party is capable of governing.
HAYES: Well, that was — I mean, to me, that was — I said this in the show before from a domestic policy agenda, that it was kind of pass fail, like you either get climate when you have this unified governance or you don`t. If you don`t, you failed, just straight up, like that`s it. You get — you get a shot to do this.
How — I know that — I know that you had been in Pulitzer (PH) reports, and you`ve been in touch with Joe Manchin. I know that there was a lot of stuff behind the scenes. Like, how did that end up happening?
KHANNA: Well, I think it happened because a lot of folks, progressive groups, environmental groups, were saying we want to get something done. They have the similar view that you were early saying pass bill, take the deal, make climate the highest priority. Now a lot of groups saying that and all I did is convey it to Senator Manchin that if you have a significant number on climate, it can`t be window dressing. But if it`s north of 300 billion people on the house will say, yes, the environmental groups will say yes.
And we talk to every couple of weeks. And the one thing I knew about Senator Manchin is while I would have had more sticks, but he wasn`t for the sticks, but he was for the spending on innovation. And this is going to unleash a lot of private sector investment as well. It`s something we can be very proud of, it`s the biggest down payment on climate in American history.
HAYES: The big news obviously, this week, it`s been really interesting to follow the aftermath of the president`s announcement on student loan forgiveness.
It`s notable to me, I had Tim Ryan on the show last night, we didn`t get into this but he came out against it, said he sent the wrong message. Michael Bennet, who`s got a probably a competitive Senate seat, he`s at least in cycle, came out with a sort of lukewarm statement about it. Cortez Masto I think who`s also in cycle Nevada didn`t sound psyched about it.
Do you think there`s — they`re worried about backlash? Do you think that backlash fear of oh, here, look at the Democrats rewarding the college educated at the expense of the plumbers, which has been the line from Mitch McConnell, which is rich? Do you think that has teeth?
KHANNA: I don`t, because a lot of the people who take out student loans are the first generation — in their family, first generation to go to college. A lot of them are from working class families.
And look, Chris, I took out $100,000 of student loans. I was fortunate in life, I paid it back. I don`t have any resent that other people who didn`t have the same breaks that you are I have and took out those loans, get some relief.
I mean, since when in this country do we believe that everyone should go through the same exact hardship that you went through? Is it the whole idea that we want to make the country better, that we want people not to have the same burdens and no other nation in the world do you have to go into $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 of debt to get a college education and you didn`t have to in this country from 1860 to 1960.
So, we — Democrats need to lean in and you know what, let`s not be anti- intellectual. If people want to get vocational and trade education, I`m all for it. But if they want to go get a college degree or a PhD, celebrate that. Like, don`t back out and saying that education is good because it`s whenever we become the party that`s afraid to stand up for education?
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HAYES: I`m glad you made that point because someone said something the other day snarky about people with philosophy degrees and I did, you know, got my backup a little bit about people with philosophy degree. Some of us are doing all right.
Congressman Ro Khanna, thank you very much.
KHANNA: And our founders, Chris. American founders, James Madison, you know, philosophy did have to deal with the American founding.
HAYES: That`s right. Good to see you, Congressman. That is ALL IN for this week. “ALEX WAGNER TONIGHT” starts right now. Good evening, Alex.