Updated
Summary
The January 6th hearings will outline the effort to overturn the 2020 election. Four states hold primaries, Nevada, South Carolina, Maine and North Dakota.
Transcript
CHRIS HAYES, MSNBC HOST: All right. That is “ALL IN” for this evening.
Guess what, folks?
[21:00:00]
A special Tuesday edition of THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW starts right now.
Good evening, Rachel.
RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: I did not mean to blindside you with the fact that I was going to be here on Tuesday night this week. When I said that last night during our coverage, you reacted like I shocked you, like I —
HAYES: My head around — you know, I like to keep it spicy, and only know who I`m throwing to when I get to that last line on the prompter, you know? But I was very excited.
To be honest, as a fan, I just got a little — I was a little psyched. I said, I`m curious about what Rachel has to say about all this tomorrow. So, that was my reaction.
MADDOW: Well, now that I know that you like to keep it a little — I don`t know, to the. And one of these times I`m going to sneak into your prompter and I`m going to put on Vanilla Ice.
HAYES: Unlike “Anchorman”, I will read anything.
MADDOW: You are so tempting me, man. It will happen. Thank you, my friend. Much appreciate it.
HAYES: Have a great show.
MADDOW: And thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. Happy to have you here. You are getting more of me than you bargained for this week, I`m sorry.
If everything goes as planned — which honestly is basically never, in the news business, but you can`t break your plans unless you make them in the first place, if all goes as planned, ha, I will be here tonight hosting the Rachel Maddow show and tomorrow night as well, and my usual time of 9:00 p.m. Eastern, hosting THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW, Tuesday night, tonight, Wednesday night, tomorrow, and then Thursday night, I will be here as well, with an all-star team of all of my MSNBC colleagues. Because Thursday night we expect to be doing another primetime recap of the January 6th hearing that is going to be happening during the workday on Thursday this week.
So, we will see, right? Hi, tonight. Hi, tomorrow night as well, my usual 9:00 p.m. Eastern Time. And then big special coverage starting at 8:00 p.m. Eastern on Thursday night, after the next January 6th hearing. That is the plan.
And the only reason we make plans is so that there is something to break when the news gods event inevitably throw a stand curveballs at once and the plans have to be thrown out the window. We will see how it works out. But that is the plan.
And I`m glad to be here. There`s a lot going, on a lot to be watching tonight, as my friend Chris Hayes was just hovering covering on his show, we`ve got eyes on this surprise development on possible gun safety reforms.
Last week, I think the whole country was pretty skeptical and it was announced that Democrats led by Senator Chris Murphy had persuaded enough Republican senators that they might, potentially, be able to pass a modest package of gun reforms, not only through the House but through the Senate. Republicans over the course of this past generation have not become just hard-liners, not just absolutists, but indeed sort of maximalist when it comes to the policy issue of how many guns there ought to be on the streets in the country and what kinds of guns Americans ought to have access to.
I mean, I don`t know why this has stuck with me and it has not stop with anyone else. I`m going to keep saying it and hope it sticks with someone else someday. Do you remember — I think we ought to remember what the Republicans did first, the last time they won full control of the U.S. government, right?
This was January 2017. So, it`s after Trump won the White House and Republicans win control of the House and the Senate. They`ve got control of all those branches of government.
The very first substantive thing they did, the very first real action Republicans took in Congress was, what? They changed — they changed gun laws to literally, I kid you not, to literally make it easier for people to obtain firearms if they had been formerly adjudicated to be mentally ill. Seriously, that was the first substantive thing that Republicans did the last time they got full control of the government. They set to work on the grave problem that people formerly adjudicated to be mentally ill were not having an easy enough time getting access to guns.
So, they fixed that as their first order of business, as soon as they got power. Given that recent history, I think if he`s understandable that there was considerable skepticism all across the country, about the idea that ten Republican senators and all the Democratic senators would agree on some package of gun-related reforms, that they would all agree should pass.
That said, lo and behold, maybe we skeptics were wrong. Today, the leader of the Republicans in the Senate, Senator Mitch McConnell called out of his shell and said he too supports this modest package of gun reforms, which would imply that it is not going to be just ten Republicans that support it, if their leader is supporting it. That means it could be a whole bunch of them, certainly enough to get it passed.
Now, we have all been burned to many times on this issue to actually believe this before we see it in action.
[21:05:01]
But honestly, this announcement today, by the Republican Senate leader, Mitch McConnell, it`s not nothing. I mean, after decades of nothing from Republicans, as the gun massacres have just piled up, maybe this new announcement from the Republican side in the Senate — maybe this isn`t exactly nothing?
But we shall see, when it comes time to actually vote on something. Caveat emptor, buyer beware, but we shall see. This might finally be the first not nothing we`ve had in decades.
We`ve also got eyes tonight on primary races. Some interesting ones are happening tonight in Maine, in Nevada, in north Dakota and South Carolina. There is also really confusing special election for congressional seat in Texas tonight. But just for somebody to hold that seat until January in and that seat will be up for a different kind of contest, the Texas special elections tonight is a very twist-y cone of soft ice cream, in terms of understanding the immediate implications of how that election is going to go.
But there are primaries in these other four states — Nevada, South Carolina, Maine, North Dakota. Most of the focus tonight has been on South Carolina. In South Carolina, there are two incumbent Republican members of Congress who are facing Republican primary challengers backed by former President Trump.
So, that`s worth watching, for sure, in terms of the overall balance of power in the House, ultimately, but also the power of Trumpism, not going away, in the Republican Party. They are going to get results from the races, from the great Steve Kornacki, as he`s monitoring those results for us tonight from his patented big board.
Steve, we will see you in just a few minutes.
Speaking of the former president and his influence over the modern Republican Party, today, you should know, is the former president`s birthday, Donald Trump`s turns 76 years old today. As the world`s worst birthday president for a former president, the New York state court system inform former President Trump and his son Don and his daughter Ivanka that they all three must show up and give sworn testimony in a civil case that is being pursued against the Trump family business by New York`s attorney general, Tish James.
Former President Trump and his family had been pushing very hard and — to avoid having to personally testify in this case.
You might remember when Eric Trump, the other son, the blond one, was compelled to testify in this same case last fall, that the New York attorney general says that Eric Trump, in that deposition, pled the Fifth. He invoked his Fifth Amendment rights against self incrimination more than 500 times in response to more than 500 different questions. He took the Fifth.
So, yeah, as of today, per the New York state courts, the eldest Trump sun, not the blond one, and Ivanka and former President Trump, they are all going to have to give sworn testimony nestle case next month. If you want to set your alarm for the inevitable public meltdown as that testimony approaches — right now, that testimony is on the books for July 15th. So, one month from tomorrow. Happy birthday, see you in court.
And, you know, it`s interesting, thinking about sworn depositions from the former president and more of his kids, in that case, which really does threaten the existence of the Trump family business. One of the things that just keeps becoming newly relevant, over and over again, about the former president, about this question of whether he will be president again, his continuing hold on the Republican Party, his efforts to transform that party into an anti-democracy sort of authoritarian force. The question of whether he will face state criminal charges in Georgia or federal criminal charges. Indeed, the question of whether he may lose his family business in the civil fraud case in New York, the question of whether he will succeed in overturning future U.S. elections the way he tried to overturn the last one — on and on and on.
As we continue to confront all these questions, one of the things that seems, I think, small at the start, of our understanding of him as a public figure — but it just newly-keeps becoming relevant, for all these important questions about the future of our country, there is this fact that we keep coming back around to, which is that Trump likes weird lawyers. He likes lawyers who put a little extra hot sauce on everything they do, he likes weird lawyers who do their jobs, not like normal lawyers.
Of course, we have a real focus on that at the moment, with Rudy Giuliani. I mean, a whole day of news coverage today as to whether or not Mr. Giuliani is even still denying that he was ostentatiously drunk when he reportedly advised President Trump to go out and declare victory on election night even though Trump had lost. I mean, Mr. Giuliani has had his law license suspended in New York.
[21:10:02]
He may be about to lose his law license in Washington, D.C. as well. I mean, Mr. Giuliani is Trump`s kind of lawyer. But he is not an outlier in terms of the kind of lawyer that Trump chooses.
I mean, this is a former president who is in more legal trouble than any American president has ever been before, by a factor of 10,000. But he likes lawyers like Rudy Giuliani. He likes consistently lawyers who approach their work, say, like this —
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
MICHAEL COHEN, FORMER TRUMP ATTORNEY: So, I`m warning you, tread very (EXPLETIVE DELETED) lightly because what I`m going to do to you is going to be (EXPLETIVE DELETED) disgusting. Do you understand me? Don`t think you can hide behind your pen because it`s not going to happen.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
MADDOW: Even before Rudy Giuliani became the highest profile Trump lawyer in the country, now is longtime Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, who, of course, was convicted of multiple felonies, who has since had a 180 turnover ground in his life. He`s now diametrically opposed to all things Donald Trump. He has, in fact, apologized for threatening that reporter.
But what I am going to do to you is going to be F-ing disgusting? Right? When he was working for Donald Trump, that`s how we talk to reporters. That`s what Trump was looking for from his lawyers.
Here`s another gem from that crowd.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: His attorney, John Dowd, has promised to appeal those convictions. This is the video I was talking about. CNBC caught up with Mr. Dowd a short time ago.
REPORTER: Would you like to comment to CNBC?
JOHN DOWD, ATTORNEY: Get the (EXPLETIVE DELETED) out of here. That`s what I`ve got for CNBC.
REPORTER: Wow!
(EDND VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: That`s what I got for CNBC, yeah, take that! Rudy Giuliani, now, with Michael Cohen before him, what I`m going to do to you is going to be F-ing disgusting. That`s the guy who Trump chose to be his lawyer for the Mueller investigation, you might remember.
He also hired this gentleman to be one of his lawyers at his first impeachment. This was the Trump lawyer who went to the floor of the House and made the argument out loud that Trump shouldn`t be impeached, Obama should be impeached.
This is the lawyer who made the argument that President Obama is the real traitor and he should be impeached, not Trump. That was his defense of Trump in 2020. Impeach Obama, four years after President Obama had left office, which I am sure Trump thought was awesome. He likes his lawyers with extra hot sauce. He actually hired that guy away from his law firm after the impeachment, he liked him so much. He brought him on as a Trump White House lawyer because that`s what he likes as a lawyer.
It turns out, though, that if you have really who otrey tastes in terms of what he wants from a lawyer — you want the guy with a hair dye running down his head, somebody else threatening to do something F-ing disgusting to a reporter, running an impeach Obama campaign from the floor of the House, four years after Obama was out of office, while you are being impeached. If that is your taste in lawyers — well, you are also going to have to live with that being the character of the lawyers that you are up against when they all, inevitably, turn against you, just like everyone has who has ever worked with you or for you in any capacity.
And so that, right now, is why we got these particularly pungent slashing criticisms from one of Trump`s kind of lawyers, from that man, Eric Herschmann, who he brought into the Trump White House after his particularly bombastic performance as a Trump impeachment defense lawyer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ERIC HERSCHMANN, TRUMP WHITE HOUSE LAWYER: It was a combination of Italians, Germans, different things that had been floating around as to who is involved. Hugo Chavez and the Venezuelans, he has an affidavit from someone that says that he wrote a software, and something with the Philippines. It`s just all over the radar. I thought the Dominion stuff was — I never saw any evidence whatsoever saying those allegations.
What they were proposing I thought was nuts. And their theory is also completely nuts.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: That`s Trump White House lawyer Eric Herschmann, part of his deposition testimony of the January 6th investigation. You can tell he`s a Trump lawyer because he`s got a baseball bat behind him that says justice on it. That`s exactly the kind of hot sauce that Trump likes and a lawyer, right?
But in this case, he`s not defending Trump anymore. He`s not saying, impeach Trump, no, go back in time and impeach Obama. This time — this time, he is taking apart what he depicts to the January 6th investigators as just the stupidity of his characterization, of some of the farfetched claims of supposed fraud that the president wanted to use as an excuse for overthrowing the U.S. government.
[21:15:01]
I mean, that testimony that we just saw — that I just played here moments ago, we saw that testimony from him before today. But then this evening, the January 6th investigators released a new statement from Republican Vice Chair Liz Cheney. And she included at the end of her statement something else from Trump lawyer Eric Herschmann, to get us ready for what`s coming next from the investigations` next hearing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. LIZ CHENEY (R-WY): In our next hearing on Thursday, the select committee will examine President Trump`s relentless effort on January 6th, and in the days beforehand, to pressure Vice President Pence to refuse to count lawful electoral votes. As a federal judge, he`s indicated, the slightly violated to federal criminal statutes.
President Trump had no factual basis for what he was doing. And he had been told it was illegal. Despite this, President Trump plotted with a lawyer named John Eastman. And others to overturn the outcome of the election on January 6th.
To give you a sense of the gravity of these issues, here is a clip of one of President Trump`s own White House lawyers, Eric Herschmann, who talks to Mr. Eastman the day after January 6.
HERSCHMANN: It was the day after. Eastman, I don`t remember, he called me, or he texted me, called me, wanted to talk with me. He said he couldn`t reach others.
And he started to ask me about something dealing with Georgia, preserving something, potentially for up to appeal. And I said to him, are you out of your F-ing mind? I said I don`t only want to hear two words coming out of your mouth now on. Orderly transition.
I said, I don`t want to hear any other F-ing words coming out of your mouth no matter what, other than orderly transition, repeat those words to me. Eventually he said, orderly transition.
I said, good John. Now I`m going to give you the best free legal advice who are ever getting in your life. Get a great F-ing criminal defense lawyer, you are going to need it. And then I hung up on him.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: That was released tonight by the January 6th investigation. Get a great F-ing criminal defense lawyer, you are going to need it, and then I hung up on him. This is the best free legal advice you are ever getting in your life.
Note to self, you like to hire bombastic lawyers who talk like this, when they defend you? Well, they are also going to talk like that when they decide they are not going to defend you anymore because now they`ve come to believe you are part of a criminal enterprise, and they`re willing to testify about that under oath.
The substance of what`s Mr. Herschmann is sort of blustering at here though, with the bat over her shoulder to send home the points, the substance of what he`s blustering at is a real thing. John Eastman was another of this illustrious pantheon of Trump lawyers, he really knows how to pick them. Eastman has been litigating in federal courts, against subpoenas that he has received from the January 6 investigation.
And he has said in his litigation that he was acting as an attorney, to President Trump. And there is such a thing as attorney client privilege, that`s a real thing, it`s prosecutors basically aren`t allowed to see communication that happens between a person and their lawyer. A person isn`t title between confidential legal advice that you can`t keep secret from the government even in the face of a subpoena.
That said, the attorney client-privilege is not limitless. And in the case of Trump and his lawyer John Eastman, in the litigation where Eastman is trying to keep his communications and a document secrets. Keep them away from investigators. A federal judge is ruled twice in recent weeks, that Eastman has to hand over these communications and documents over to the investigation, even though he was acting as Trump lawyer, because even though there is such a thing as attorney client privilege, you can`t use it to cover up a crime. You can`t use it to keep secrets the evidence that`s a lawyer and a client were actually planning crimes together.
And a judge has ruled already that Trump and Eastman were making forth with the climbing. And therefore, Eastman has to hand over his documents and communications because crime. Because there is a crime fraud exception to the attorney client privilege, the judge believes that that is likely implicated in this case. That they were plotting a crime together, and therefore his documents and communications have to be handed over to the investigation.
And that is a very substantive thing for a federal judge to conclude.
[21:20:02]
And that is why, Eric Herschmann, in classic Trump lawyer language told the other Trump lawyer John Eastman, that he was going to give him the best free legal advice wherever getting in your life, get a great F-ing criminal defense lawyer, you are going to need it, then I hung up. That is why you are getting that between Trump lawyers.
And that also, what Liz Cheney was getting at in this little part of her intro, in the specific part of it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHENEY: President Trump`s relentless effort on January 6th, and in the days beforehand, to pressure Vice President Pence to refuse to count lawful electoral votes. As a federal judge, has indicated, the slightly violated two federal criminal statutes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: Trump`s effort on January 6th and the days beforehand, to pressure Vice President Pence, that he should refuse to count the electoral votes, likely violated to federal criminal statutes. That is Liz Cheney saying that.
Per a federal judge ruling, president Trump and his lawyer, John Eastman, likely violated to federal laws when they pressured Mike Pence the way that they did. And what she specifically describing, you could check in on the judges ruling, are these two federal statutes. 18 U.S. Code, Section 1512c, at 18 U.S. Code, Section 371.
In plain English, that is obstruction of a official proceeding, and it`s conspiracy to defraud the. United States. And, you know, there`s been all this talk in the last, I hate people in the media doing media criticism but he`s going to say this because I feel like this is an issue that kind of needs to offense put around its kind of becoming — getting blown up into a bigger deal than it actually is.
There`s been all this, over the past few months, but particularly in past couple of days, about whether or not the January 6th investigation, at the end of their investigation, whether they are going to make formal referrals to the U.S. Department of Justice, about prosecuting crimes that the investigation has turned up. There`s all this focus on whether or not all the members of the committee feel the same way about that issue, what they`ve said about whether they are going to issue criminal referrals or whether they will not issue criminal overalls.
Honestly, it`s kind of moot. I mean, here tonight, in this video, released on Twitter, Congresswoman Liz Cheney is making criminal referrals, right? Laying out the evidence, the committee, the investigation has been lying at the evidence that they have found potential crimes. They have named the federal statutes they believed were violated. And they have named the people who they say did it.
I mean, that`s a criminal referral, whether or not you write it down or you say it in the video that`s posted online from the official Twitter account of the January 6 investigation, that`s it. When else do you want? This is the January 6th investigators serving the volleyball over the net to federal prosecutors.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHENEY: As a federal judge has indicated, this likely violated to federal criminal statutes. President Trump had no factual basis for what he was doing. And he had been told it was illegal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: He had been told it was illegal. It was not based on any factual truth about the world, meaning he did it and he did it with corrupt intent, which means it`s prosecutable, in the view of January 6th investigation vice chair, Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney.
In terms of what happens next year, the next January 6th hearing is not going to be tomorrow. It`s going to be Thursday. And the Thursday hearing is going to be about the pressure on Vice President Mike Pence that he had to overturn the election.
The original plan had been that there would be another hearing before that, there would be a hearing tomorrow about Trump`s efforts to use the Justice Department to force the overthrow the government. That hearing, we are told, will still happen. By that has been delayed. They are basically going to skip that one for now.
They are going to slow down and try to do two hearings a week instead of three hearing a week, it seems, and that honestly seems fine. Take as much time as you need, do it at whatever pace you need to get it right.
But with all the hearings we have got on deck, I think we now realize that, from the list of witnesses we are told to expect — from the witnesses we`ve seen already, from the depositions we know have been taken, I think we can see, you are going to see a bit of the same pattern network, throughout. You are going to see Trump lawyers and Trump`s kind of lawyer, guys like Bill Barr, who frankly, in Bill Barr`s case, happily spread Trump lies before and after the election, that Democrats were perpetrating some kind of terrible shenanigans around the election.
Bill Barr, who was as much of a problem on this issue in terms of making false claims about the election ahead of things really going to hell in a hand basket around January 6th — Bill Barr, for all that he did wrong, specifically on this issue, nevertheless, Bill Barr is bailing out on Trump now and testifying under oath that everything Trump was pushing to the public was ally and he knew is a lie.
Another Trump lawyer, Richard Donoghue, who was number two at the Justice Department after Barr left, he was right there, along with Bill Barr, actually inserting himself into the process and making the Justice Department spend real resources investigating these made up, ridiculous on their face fraud the justice the justice department spend real resources investigating these made up, ridiculous on their face fraud claims, as if they were real things.
Richard Donoghue helping very much in that regard — but in the end, nevertheless, bailing out when he was asked to do too much. And now Richard Donoghue, as well, will be testifying under oath that everything Trump was pushing was a lie and he knew it was a lie. Lawyers like Eric Herschmann, the impeach Obama, Trump White House lawyer to the end, he`s now bailing out in testifying under oath that everything Trump was pushing to the public was a lie. And he knew it was a lie.
We are going to keep getting this, from more and more in them, on every aspect of the scene. And every because it`s the way that Trump likes his lawyers, we are going to get it all with extra hot sauce. And extra bluster and extra swear words. And apparently, with referrals for federal criminal prosecution, live and out loud in real time, as they roll out the evidence.
And yes, it is getting through. Again, I am allergic to media criticism, go up to the upper left corner of the country — here`s “The Anchorage Daily News” today, front page. Trump`s inner circle warned him election fraud claims were false. Go to the upper right corner of the country — here`s Portland, Maine, “The Portland Press Herald” front page, advisers told Trump election fraud claims were false. Go to the middle of the country.
Here`s the “Detroit Free Press” front page today — aides warned Trump to stop. Here`s the “Star Tribune” in Minneapolis, Minnesota, today`s front page: Allies warned Trump election claims were false.
I mean, what you are seeing here is distilled. These are the headline versions of what Liz Cheney is a spilling out as a predicate for federal criminal charges.
So much ink and so much hot air has been spilled. Will this get across? Will this sink in? Will people get it?
It`s getting across, people are getting. It`s getting across the country it`s clear as you can get it, thanks in part to Trump`s own taste in lawyers. And thanks to them it`s getting through with some extra sauce on it, which makes it even harder to miss. And more to come.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[21:32:01]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY MACE (R-SC): Hey, everyone. Congresswoman Mace here. I`m in front of Trump Tower today. In 2015, when President Trump announced his run, I was one of his earliest supporters. If you want to lose the seat once again in the midterm election cycle to Democrats, then my opponent is more than qualified to do just that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: Notice sort of the air of sadness about that video. This was South Carolina Republican Congressman Nancy Mace earlier this year. She recorded sort of sad slightly gravelling campaign video, while she sat outside Trump Tower, in New York City.
The air of sadness there is because that was the day after former President Trump had endorsed not her. Former President Trump had endorsed her Republican Party primary were potent.
And when you heard Nancy Mace say in that video that she was one of Trump`s earliest supporters, that`s true. In 2016, she was the coalition and field director for Trump`s 2016 presidential campaign. She was one of the very few early paid staffers on that campaign.
When she went on to win a seat in the South Carolina state legislature two days later in 2018, this was the headline in “Charleston Post and Courier”, “Nancy Mace gives South Carolina legislature it`s for a state lawmaker with clear ties to Trump”.
But then there were some minor league fraying threads on those ties. When Trump White House advisor Steve Bannon defied a subpoena in the January 6 investigation, Nancy Mace was one of the members of Congress that said Bannon should be held in contempt. She also just publicly voiced dismay about the events of January 6th themselves.
And you wouldn`t think either of those things is a cardinal sin but apparently those things were enough to get her a Trump backed primary challenge for her seat in Congress in South Carolina. That election has been held today, in South Carolina. We`re going to get results thus far on that from Steve Kornacki who is all over this tonight, he is standing by.
You should also know though that Trumpy but not Trump enough Republican Congresswoman Nancy Mace is not the only one who is up against this particular kind of wall tonight.
South Carolina Republican Congressman Tom Rice is another one. He was one of ten Republican members of Congress who actually voted to impeach Trump for his role in trying to overturn the government with the January 6th attack. That vote from Tom Rice was a surprise. But it was enough to earn rice a Trump backed Republican challenger in South Carolina.
Let`s check in on both of these races with the great Steve Kornacki at his big board.
Steve how is it looking for these two incumbents tonight?
STEVE KORNACKI, MSNBC NATIONAL POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: In a word for Tom Rice, grim. This is where things stand with three quarters of the vote counted. He is running far behind his Donald Trump backed challenger state legislator Russell Fry. The key here is South Carolina does have a 50 percent rule. You`ve got to get 50 percent in the preliminary or it goes to a runoff with the top to advancing.
So, if Fry does not hit 50 percent, this will advance to a runoff in two weeks.
[21:35:00]
We have been watching this Fry number, though, tick up and up, and up. As more votes have come in, let me show you what`s going to basically decide this way. Now he is up 49.4 percent. He`s got to get the 50 percent plus one. If he does, that he went out right, and Rice is done.
Where we are waiting for the most votes continues to be the biggest parts of this district. This is Horry County., half the voters in here. This is Myrtle Beach, this is Conway, this is the mother lode of votes in this district. And you see that Fry is running I think this is critical, he is running over 50 percent in the biggest part of this district right now.
So what they are counting up right now mainly, are the same day votes, the folks who went out and voted in person today. And by is doing a bit better with those voters that he did with the mail that it ballots, then what he did with the early votes that were counted up earlier. So there`s a definite opportunity for Fry ire with a lot of those still to be counted. Same day votes to be counted, here in Horry County, where he`s already running at 51 percent, and 51.2 percent.
There is definitely an opportunity for Fry to get over 50 percent into wind that this thing outright tonight. Even if he falls short, and Rice ends up in a runoff, take a look at the roster of other Republicans who are in this race. Basically, all of them have also condemned Rice`s vote to impeach Donald Trump. Has said it inspired their candidacy, et cetera.
So, if Fry goes into a runoff with Rice, he`s going to start with a giant lead from tonight, and there is the potential there coalesce a lot of the other support from the other candidates. Because they`ve all condemned rights as well. That`s a story in South Carolina seven.
In South Carolina 1, about half the vote is in right now. A closer contest. Nancy Mace is leading right now. The margin is about six points. There is a geographic split that is emerging in this race right now.
You are basically saying in Charleston County, big chunk of Charleston but not all of it, is in this district, Mace is cleaning up. You can take a look in Berkeley county, Arrington has the advantage there right now.
Big thing that I think is going to decide this potentially, Beaufort County, this is down where Hilton Head is, Hilton Island is. No votes yet from Beaufort County, big chunk of this district, it looms as a potentially decisive right now.
But Arrington trailing Mace by 6 percent. Mace makes in quite a fight there. And Rice, very, very close at this hour to be done for good.
MADDOW: Fascinating, and we got a lot of vote it but certainly not a determined about. This is going to be interesting to watch down to the wire.
MSNBC Steve Kornacki, that`s why we got you here for, thank you very much my, friend we will be checking back with you.
KORNACKI: You got it.
MADDOW: In the meantime, we got much more ahead here tonight. Do stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[21:42:18]
MADDOW: Another cooperator. Today, another member of the pro-Trump right wing paramilitary group, the Proud Boys, pled guilty for his role in the January 6th attack, and also agreed to cooperate with prosecutors. This makes three now, three members of the so-called Proud Boys, who have pled guilty. One of those is cooperating and cooperating in the seditious conspiracy case, the Justice Department has brought against the group.
There`s also a seditious conspiracy case pending against the members of another proto-fascist, pro Trump, paramilitary group called the Oath Keepers. Seditious conspiracies is a specific, rarely charged, very serious crime that the Justice Department has had a heck of a time in previous cases, proving it. The very few times it`s ever been used in the U.S. criminal law.
But one of the things we are learning from the indictments and from the court filings in the seditious cases, and in the public hearings for the January 6th investigation, is that these paramilitary groups were apparently, an important integral part of the plot to try to overthrow the government, to stop the certification of the last election by using force inside the U.S. Capitol. The January 6th investigators have laid out how hundreds of these proud boys march to the capital, hours before Trump directed the crowd and his rally if they should go to the capitol. They started attacking police just as Trump started sending the big mob their way.
They were effectively the tip of the spear. They breached the Capitol, and then the mob was there to roll and behind them. The chairman of the January 6th committee says that the upcoming hearings, witnesses will describe conversations between these paramilitary groups that led the breach of the capitol and people in the orbit of that President Trump. They are charged with sedition. And then there`s him.
But, you know, these aren`t the only fascist, right wing, paramilitary groups that are operating on the bleeding edge of right-wing politics right now. Just this past weekend, for example, there was this.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These guys stopped a U-Haul full of dudes.
REPORTER: A swarm of extremists who Idaho police say, came to riot, 31 suspected white nationalist zip tied and arrested, blocks from a pride festival.
LEE WHITE, COEUR D`ALENE POLICE CHIEF: They were each one smoking gun rights. There was multiple shields.
REPORER: Coeur D`Alene police Saturday described that a crowd in a U-Haul after a caller described seeing a little army at a local hotel, with masks on their faces and slogans like reclaim America on their shirts. Police charging all 31 with conspiracy to riot noting they planned to swarm several parts of Coeur D`Alene, and carried paperwork similar to an operations plan that a police or military group would put together.
[21:45:05]
They traveled and from states all across the country allegedly united by white nationalism.
LEE: They appeared to be affiliated with the group Patriot Front.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: They call themselves Patriot Front. They have ridiculous little uniforms, you might recognize them by their distinctive matching khakis, which is supposed to be menacing instead of making it look like they all just got off work to get at Best Buy. But this was them in D.C. last year trying to intimidate with their little homemade shields and their jayvee soccer shin guards.
This group is a renamed version of one of the white nationalist groups that took part in the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017. The group renamed itself after one of its members killed Heather Heyer, a counter protester, and seriously injured a ton of other people, when he deliberately drove his speeding car into a crowd of anti-racist protesters. But them targeting the pride event in Coeur D`Alene, Idaho, this weekend, one of the most unnerving things about the reporting on this, was that Patriot Front was apparently not even the only armed far-right group, that was targeting that particular pride events and that particular part of Idaho this weekend.
Another so-called Patriot Group, had planned a show off your gun event to coincide with a menace that same pride gathering in Coeur D`Alene. The same weekend, a different group of Proud Boys stormed into a library in the San Francisco Bay Area and disrupted a children`s story session, shouting anti- gay and anti-trans threats, because the story time was led by a drag queen, so they were there to break it up by force.
You will notice that that targets of these various fascist pro-Trump paramilitary groups, like Patriot Front, Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, you`ll notice that their targets are the political targets of our current Republican Party. The paramilitary groups are providing physical attacks, physical intimidation, to reinforce political attacks.
Democrats, deep state actors are trying to steal the election, well, these will be the gross that will be the tip of the spear that violent lay storm into the capital, to stop that. Gay folks, trans folks, are going after our children, right? Well, these groups will storm part festivals, and supposedly objectionable children story groups, and menace people with weapons and with threats. They will put physical force behind the political threats from the Republican Party.
There are historical and sociological reasons behind the existence of fascist, paramilitary, organizations in the United States. This is not our first rodeo with these clowns.
But, it`s a different thing altogether when paramilitary groups like this start playing a political function, adjuncts to one of the two major parties in our country. That is a very, very bad sign. We`ll have more on that next.
Stay with us.
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[21:52:33]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Police charging all 31 way conspiracy to riot, noting they plan to swarm several parts of Coeur D`Alene, and carried paperwork similar to an operations plan that a police or military group will put together. They traveled in from states all across the country allegedly united by white nationalism.
LEE: They appear to be affiliated with the group Patriot Front.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: Why are white nationalists targeting a pride parade in Idaho, or anywhere?
Historian Kathleen Belew is the author of “Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America”. She`s an expert on these kinds of movements.
Professor Belew, thank you so much for making time for us tonight.
KATHLEE BELEW, HISTORIAN: Thank you for having me.
MADDOW: So, I`ve learned a lot of what I know about white power groups, and this country, and paramilitary movements in this country from your scholarship. But I wanted to ask you about this impression that I have from recent news, from the sedition indictment for the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys, for what we saw this weekend in Idaho.
I have this sense, this impression, that these groups are now operating sort of as an adjunct, to pretty close adjunct to what`s happening in very right-wing electoral politics. They seem to be targeting the same targets at least that are being singled out by right-wing put Republican politicians. That feels unnerving to me and I wanted to ask you if that stands out to you?
BELEW: I think that`s very concerning. And we don`t know as much about that interface between mainstream politics and paramilitary white power, activism in the militant right, as we do about the fringe of the movement. But we do know is that these groups are inherently opportunistic and they are prepared to use any open window to recruit, and radicalize and implement violence. And this is worth mentioning that when we say the word white nationalists, sometimes people think that means overzealous patriotism.
But for these activists, the nation they invasion is not the United States. It`s a transnational group of white people. It is a white ethno state. It`s not the America defined by democracy and multiculturalism, and multiracial identity, that is the one that we live it. It is an imaginary, all white states.
So this is a very extremist movement. It`s drawing in people as you mention, from all over the country. And the reason that we are seeing so many of these stories at the same time, about Oath Keepers, Patriot Front, Proud Boys, the January 6th hearings, all of these things are happening at the same time, because this is the story about any one of these groups.
[21:55:01]
This is a story about a groundswell, and even though it appears to be disconnected of activism, it`s meant to do that. What it is, is a nationwide paramilitary army, that is prepared to do battle for its own purposes.
Now how much that can be wielded by the Republican Party even on the very French? I think is open to question.
MADDOW: What do you make of the reports including from NBC News that after arresting these Patriot Front members in Idaho, the actual police officers who arrested some of them, the police department are getting doxed, and they are getting threatened. Why are they threatening the police?
BELEW: Yeah. You know, this is the kind of a push poll and social media, there is often been an issue with overlap between some of these groups, and some people in law enforcement, and I would not paint that with one brush at all.
But, you know, Coeur D`Alene has a long history of dealing with these movements. Coeur D`Alene was a sight of Aryan Nations compound which is an epicenter for this activity in the 1980s. It was nearby that the headquarter actions for Phineas Priesthood, which is the similar movement in the `90s.
Folks up there are not new to this. And they are very aware of how violence it can become and how dramatically it can impact their community. So I think, one thing that stands out to me about the law enforcement response, and the sort of emblematize in the doxxing, is that even structures of power are very much in the crosshairs of these kind of movements.
There are other issues that people`s homes being bombed in Coeur D`Alene, of people being ran off the road, of people being harassed out of town. It goes on and on like this. And, you know, bank robberies in nearby Spokane, Washington. These activists and the movement they come from have done incalculable damage in Coeur D`Alene overtime.
MADDOW: Kathleen Belew, the author of “Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America”, which is an essential reference book for our times. I`m sorry.
Professor Belew, thank you so much for your time. Appreciate it.
We`ll be right back.
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MADDOW: All right. That is going to do it for us tonight. May I remind you that even though this is not necessarily when you are used to seeing anymore, I will be back again tomorrow night, Wednesday night, 9:00 p.m. Eastern, for another special edition of THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW. You are just going to have to stand it.
Now it`s time for “THE LAST WORD WITH LAWRENCE O`DONNELL”.
Good evening, Lawrence.