If it's Tuesday. 4. President Trump chooses the courtroom over the campaign trail as he attends a hearing in Washington, D.C. on presidential immunity while his primary rivals hit the trail, which was six days until Iowa.
Plus the Pentagon gives a prostate cancer diagnosis, is the reason behind Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's mysterious stay in intensive care. About the details on the pedagogy's condition and the growing questions surrounding the breakdown in the chain of command. And salacious and serious allegations filed in court against Holden County District Attorney Fonny Willis, claiming she had an improper romantic relationship with a top prosecutor in her sweeping election racketeering case against former President Donald Trump. Welcome to BE the PRESS now.
I'm Peter Alexander in Washington just six days before the Iowa Republican caucuses. Ron Desantis, Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy, they're all hitting the trail in the Hawkeye State, trying to turn every last Iowan into a caucus goer. But the racist front runner, Donald Trump took a very different strategy today. Appearing voluntarily in a Washington, D.C.
federal courtroom. Mr. Trump's lawyers are trying to get a federal appeals court to dismiss special counsel Jack Smith's criminal charges tied to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. In court today, the former president's attorney argued that the Constitution gave him sweeping legal protections and presidential immunity.
The judges, however, seemed highly skeptical of that argument. Could a president who ordered SEAL team sex to assassinate a political rival who was not impeached, he decided to criminal prosecution if he were impeached and convicted first? Your answer is? My answer is qualified.
Yes. There's a political process of have to occur under the structure of our Constitution which require impeachment and conviction by the Senate? Lawyers for the Justice Department echo the judge's comments with their own pushback. What kind of world are we living in if, as I understand my friend on the other side to say here, a president orders his SEAL team to assassinate a political rival and resigns, for example, before an impeachment, not a criminal act, President sells a pardon, resigns or is not impeached, not a crime.
I think that is extraordinarily frightening future. So we're going to get into the legal merits of the hearing and what it means for Mr. Trump's legal standing shortly. But first, the big picture politics.
Just six days, as we noted before the Iowa causes, with other candidates trying to reach as many IowaWANS as possible, Mr. Trump's choice to skip the trail and spend the day in court shows us a very different kind of calculation. The campaign appears to be betting that the Visual of Trump in a courtroom is more powerful as his closing message than the alternative as they try to convince Republicans that he is a victim. And it turns out this may be working.
Here's what we have been hearing from Iowans over just the last several days. He said they, they're not, their main goal is not to come after me. They're trying to stop me because they want to come after you. I feel like that's the main thing they're trying to do.
I say when Jesus died, he died for us. So he did it for us. So when Trump is facing all these things, he's doing it for us in our place. When they are indicting him, we are being indicted.
When they talk negative about him, they're talking negative about us, you understand? And then there is the fact that Mr. Trump lawyers in court are arguing for a maximalist view of executive power as the former president runs for another term, has indicated that he would use such authority. He pledged to act like a, quote, dictator on day one and yesterday threatened his likely general election opponent with a payback indictment.
After the hearing, Mr. Trump seems to again make the implicit threat that if he does not get immunity from criminal prosecution, then Joe Biden will not get it either. It's a very bad precedent, as we said. It's the opening of a Pandora's box.
And it's a very, that's a very sad thing that's happened with this whole situation. When they talk about threat to democracy. That's a real threat to democracy. If you didn't have, I mean, as an example, Joe Biden with the prosecutor.
We're not going to you a billion dollars unless you get rid of the prosecutor. That's after, that's after the company or his son or whoever it is they're after. But he wanted that prosecutor gone and he's on tape saying it. Or you could say the horrible job he's done at the border where our country is being destroyed.
Joining now for more on this Trump's legal latest is NBC News senior legal correspondent and my co anchor on Saturday Today, Laura Jarrett informed former U.S. attorney and NBC News Lee Lance Joyce Bance. Also with us is Vaughn Hillier, grave in the chilly elements in Des Moines, Iowa. This morning he's on the campaign trail.
Vaughn, we're going to keep you standing there in the cold for a little longer, I promise. We'll get to you in just a moment. Laura, I do want to see you with these headlines though we can very quickly so break down for us what we heard from both lawyers, both sides in today's hearing. Peter, the basic argument from Mr.
Trump's side here is that he should be completely immune from prosecution, as you laid out there, because he was acquitted by the Senate. They really sort of tie their entire wagon to that argument. Trump was acquitted by the Senate and wasn't convicted. They, for their say to bring this case now would be unjust in their view.
He would be essentially tried for the same thing twice. Even though, of course, that wasn't a criminal case. That was a political proceeding. That was not an argument that seemed by any purchase with the three judges on this court, two appointed by President Biden, another Bush appointee on that court, all seemed very, very skeptical of this argument.
The Justice Department in turn, peter, arguing that Mr. Trump is not above the law and that it should be frankly, frightening, in their words, frightening to give any credence to this position, which would essentially allow Mr. Trump to escape all criminal culpability. And Lord, to be clear, former President Trump had no legal obligation to be in the court.
This was entirely voluntary. And in the eyes of a lot of folks, this was used as criminal, excuse me, as a political effort here. Correct. And we've seen him use that before, sort of using these courtroom hearings, which are routine, as almost campaign stops.
Now, this was not a place where he could in the hallways, as you've seen him do in his New York civil fraud case. That's why you see him resort to a hotel ballroom or rather conference room there. But he certainly managed to figure out a way to get his message out. With six days to go until the Iowa caucus, is spending his time in Washington, D.C.
voluntarily. So walk us through where we go here. What is next in this case? How soon do we expect the court's answer to this appeal?
Where does it go next? Is this likely up the Supreme Court? What does the next ever wish for most look like? Okay, I think it's pretty likely they're going to move fast on this within the D.C.
circuit, given how they already set this on sort of an expedited timeline. Usually an appeal like this wouldn't even happen today for months. But the fact that they heard it so quickly shows that the judges recognize sort of the gravity here. There is a trial aid set for March, which I think is fair to say is in jeopardy, but perhaps not completely doomed.
Obviously, a lot of steps could happen in between now and then. If Mr. Trump was to lose in front of the D.C. circuit on this argument that was heard today, he could then go to the full panel of DC Judges there, or he could try to go straight to the Supreme Court.
But any one of those moves takes time, and it's up to the judges and justices in the Supreme Court case to decide how fast they want to respond to it. So the timeline here really depends on what the courts want to do. Laura, thank you. Will you do some reporting?
Look forward to seeing you report on the news with Lester Holt this evening. Joyce, to you, if I can. I want your sort of legal take of Mr. Trump's lawyer's arguments today and their broad view that they argue presidential power and immunity.
Basically, the president's entitled to these unique powers and this unique presidential immunity. Right. So, Peter, Trump's argument at bottom is that presidents are kings, that a president doesn't act while he's in office. As long as there's even a theoretical argument that it's part of his official duties, that he's immune from prosecution for all time while he's in office after he was, he can never be held accountable.
And of course, his law said the panel judges aren't inclined to go there for the obvious reasons, but that would, in essence, be the end of democracy if presidents could do whatever they wanted to. It was the hypotheticals that the judges tried to test here that drove that point home, asking, for instance, whether it would be possible for a president to take a bribe in exchange for granting a pardon. And then so long as he avoided any form of conviction for impeachment, whether that was by early resignation or even by taking steps like having senators who would vote against him killed so he couldn't be convicted, whether that would release him from any threat of prosecution. And of course, Trump's lawyers had to concede ultimately that they fought the hypothetical, but had to concede that that would be the case because that is their argument that Trump is above the law.
The Joyce, we're a second. I think we're having a little trouble with your audience, a little quiet. I want to make sure we fix that so we can finish this conversation. Let me ask you if I can bond very quickly about the circumstances away the way they're being viewed by those Iowa caucus goers.
Trump campaign clearly thinks the best place to have their candidate six days out from Iowa is in a courtroom as opposed to in Iowa. What's the view on the ground there? I think that number one here, Peter, there's intense interest in what's happening inside of the courtroom. So Donald Trump's defense, you know, yes, this is voluntary for him to show up, but in real time, you know, I rely on likes of Joyce Vance and he relies on his legal team have an understanding of the fate of this election.
Federal election interference trial for Donald Trump who's just five days away here from Iowa caucus. And let's be frank here, Peter, the new Morning Console poll that just came out in the last 24 hours has him up 58% to Nikki Haley's 18% and Ron Santos's 15%. So these numbers are stark. And for him, he's made the calculation that he can go not only hear what's taking place in the courtroom, but then go and speak to the cameras, whether it's in a hotel room or whether it's in the case.
On Thursday in lower Manhattan following the opposing arguments that civil fraud trial, he can go outside the courthouse doors there and address cameras and speak to a wide national audience. I want to let you hear though from Donald Trump who continues to talk to right wing outlets. He will be taking part in the town hall here on FOX News on Wednesday. But I want you to hear a conversation he had with right wing provocateur Lou Dodds last night in which he talked about the economy as he gears up for a general election race against Joe Biden.
Take a listen. We have an economy that's so fragile and the only reason it's running now is it running off the fumes of what we did, what the Trump administration, it's just running off the fumes. And when there's a crash, I hope it's going to be during this next 12 months because I don't want to be Herbert Hoover per normal for the last eight years. Peter, you've heard Donald Trump there suggest that he has a software crashes over the next 10 months here before the presidential election.
And so while he has the legal ongoing, he has a campaign operation here in Iowa. Donald Trump is also good interviews as he looks towards a general election and his own view of how it should happen to the economy in order for him to have his best political prospects ahead here. VON Struggling here. The former president make those comments is excuse me, during the last campaign he was saying that if Joe Biden won the presidency that the stock market would tank.
In fact, we've seen the market get to record highs right now. Now the former president is rooting for it to crash down. I want to get back to this criminal case, this case that we're witnessing, the presidential immunity, his lawyer's arguments amount of factively the sort of broad view of executive power. How does that mesh with his vision for a second term?
And how do people there view it? Is this a case of sort of taking him seriously, but not literally? I think that's where a lot of the hypotheticals that Joyce just laid out, Peter, are very real. We watch, you know, for the unbelievable idea that the Supreme Court could potentially even kick him off the ballot on the 14th amendment.
We all watch the unbelievable attack on the Capitol. And there were serious constitutional debates that you were very much a part of. And I, Washington, D.C. were very much engaged in in the aftermath of January 6th attack before he left the White House on January 20th.
You'll recall it was in February of 2021, just weeks after leaving the White House, in which there were Republican senators who voted to not convict Donald Trump on the impeachment charges because they said it was not constitutionally sound and that they could not, the Congress could not impeach and convict a former president of the United States. And in fact, Donald Trump's own attorney arguing in those impeachment proceedings, Peter, made the case that that criminal action could be taken against a former president, which is now what you're seeing the special counsel do. And so now his legal team, his current legal team, is arguing the exact opposite of what his legal team was defending those impeachment proceedings was arguing in February 2021. So this is the part Donald Trump has had a lot of legal teams here, Peter, but there's definitely Trump is looking to expand the use of executive power come 2025, if you get back in the White House.
And that's where I think that a lot of these constitutional questions that have not been really challenged at this point are real. And that's why I think Joyce's observations here are so prudent and joyous. So with us, apparently the audio issue was my ear, not your microphone. So let's continue our conversation.
I do want to play for you some of what Mr. Trump's counsel's reaction was to the government's warning of a, quote, frightening future if the court were to side with Mr. Trump here it is. What he is forecasting is a situation where the floodgates will be open.
We are in a situation where we have the prosecution of the chief political opponent who's winning every poll upcoming next year has been prosecuted by the administration that he's seeking to replace. That is the frightened future that is tailor made to launch cycles for recrimination that will shake our republic for the future. Just want to get your reaction to those comments from Mr. Trump's council, Joyce.
Well, the government's reaction and oral argument was the best one, they pointed out that the floodgates wouldn't be open, but that any future president who did what Donald Trump did trying to interfere with the election should be prosecuted. The reason that they said there wouldn't be a flood of future charges is because our legal system has certain built in guarantees. Prosecutors are expected to behave in a professional manner regardless of who's in the White House. Grand juries have to vote on indictments before they can move forward.
Trial juries have to vote that the government has met its burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt before there's a conviction. And even after that point, we have appellate courts who review convictions. So this notion that there will be some sort of politicization of the criminal justice process, that's a uniquely Trumpian attitude. In fact, that's something that the former president has said he would do if he were reelected.
That is not a concern if Trump is held accountable for his arguably criminal conduct. Joyce, just to clarify, for those who keep an eyes on this and trying to keep track of all different cases going on right now, how bullish are you that these all get resolved in some form in court before the election, specifically this case in D.C. yeah, I don't think that they do all get resolved. The timeline is largely up to the courts.
This case, the D.C. prosecution could and should go to trial before the election. But as Laura explained, there are some issues that the court has to deal with in terms of whether they'll move this more speedily than the typical case. Normally, Trump would have a lengthy period of time just to take this appeal to the Supreme Court.
That March trial date I think is off the books because Judge Chapman has indicated she needs about a month to pick a jury before case starts. But it's not unrealistic to expect trial could start in April or May. We're going to be talking to you a lot over the course of next several months. Always a pleasure to have you with us.
I'll hear you, my friend, say warm out there. Good luck over the course of next week. And coming up here next, we are following new developments in the Trump trials in Georgia with the credibility of Fulton county district attorney finding Willis and her RICO case against the former president is now in jeopardy. The details of these allegations against Willis and the fallout is ahead.
Plus, the Pentagon now revealing the defense secretary Lloyd Austin has been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Amid growing scrutiny over the Pentagon's lack of disclosure surrounding Austin's recent stay in the icu. He remains hospitalized tonight. The latest details and reaction is coming up.
You're watching Be the press now. Welcome back. And turning now to breaking news at the Pentagon as we learn new details today about what led to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's mysterious stay in the ICU that officials failed to disclose to the public and the president. According to a new statement from Walter Reed Medical center, after routine health screening last month, Secretary Austin was diagnosed with prostate cancer and then underwent a minimally invasive procedure to treat and cure it.
That was December 22nd on January 1st. Austin was then admitted to Walter Reed and sent to the ICU the next day. Due to complications from that procedure with the public, the president, even Austin's deputy were left in the dark about the situation for days. During a briefing with reporters today, the Pentagon spokesperson said the department does not have any details on the timing of Austin's release from the hospital and this afternoon's White House press briefing, the National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said that President Biden also only learned about Austin's diagnosis today.
Joining me now is Courtney Kuby at the Pentagon for us. Courtney, what specifically did we learn new today and do we know why the secrecy around a relatively common medical condition for men of Austin Austin's age? This in fact, was an elective procedure. He went under general anesthesia when it took place in December.
Transfer was powered, was power was transferred then, but nothing was communicated about exactly what the circumstances were until today to the president. Yeah. So we, we know his diagnosis, this prostate cancer diagnosis actually came in early December. But as we just heard from the White House podium today, the White House was not even informed about his cancer diagnosis until today.
And I can tell you senior official bank I also not informed about it until today. So December 22nd, he had this prostatectomy which is a surgical procedure to remove this prostate cancer. He spent the night in the hospital to read and was released the next day with what doctor said was a good prognosis. Well, about 10 days later on New Year's Day, he started experiencing some severe pain in his abdomen, his hip, his leg and nausea to the point where he was transported via ambulance to back to Walter Reed that evening.
Now initially, Peter, he was diagnosed with urinary tract infection. By the next day, they realized that he had this buildup of excess fluid in his abdomen and it was impairing the function of his small intestine. They had to conduct a procedure to get that excess fluid out and there was ensuing infection, all of that. Now apparently according to the statement, he is on the mend from that, but they do acknowledge it would be, it would be a slow process for him to completely recover from this.
So Secretary Austin still in the hospital. Now, we don't have a date on when he might get out, but we should expect him to be in there for several more days at this point. But that gets to the bigger question here, which is the fact that all of this has been kept not just from the public, not just from the senior officials here in the Pentagon, but from the White House, from the president of the United States. Secretary Austin being diagnosed a month ago with prostate cancer, never sharing that with his commander in chief.
This led to a couple of reviews, one here at the Pentagon that's looking at the notification process, process. How is the secretary of defense taking the ambulance to a hospital, placed in the intensive care unit and the White House not notified for three days? How does that happen? We'll get answers to that.
About 30 days, maybe 29 days since it was notified yesterday. But now there's also this new memo out of Jeff Signs, the White House chief of staff, also looking at the reporting procedures and directing cabinet officials that they need to do a better job of notifying in cases like this if you're hospitalized or if there's a transfer of power or authority. Yes, somebody questions still unclear, unanswered. We'll be watching you on NIGHTLY NEWS tonight.
Courtney, thank you so much. We want to turn now to those new and salacious serious allegations against the top prosecutor in Donald Trump Georgia election interference case. One of the former presidents co defendants filed a motion in court yesterday alleging the Fulton county district attorney finally wills was engaged in an improper relationship with a top prosecutor on the case. The co defendant who made those claims is a former Trump staffer.
His name's Michael Roman. Lawyers for Roman told the court they have evidence that the district attorney had a, quote, ongoing personal and romantic relationship with Nathan Wade, whom Willis hired as a special prosecutor to lead the case. According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution that first broke this news, quote, the bombshell public filing alleged that special prosecutor Nathan Wade, a private attorney, paid for lavish vacations he took with Willis using the Fulton county funds his law firm received. The filing does not lay out any specific evidence to back up those allegations, but the spokesperson for the DA's office has not yet denied them.
The office says it will respond in a court filing. So to get a better understanding of all this, we're joined now by one of the journalists that first recorded the story for the ajc, Tamar Hallerman. Also with me is NBC News legal analyst Danny Savalos. Tomorrow, let me start with you.
If I can. What corroboration, if any, have you received in terms of this story? We know the allegations. Have there been any independent corroborating facts that we've been able to uncover?
Not really. There have been some invoices basically that special prosecutor Nathan Wade had filed with his law firm that were attached to this court filing. But in terms of some of the most salacious allegations, particularly related to some of these vacations that DA Willis allegedly took with Nathan Wade, we haven't seen any corroborating evidence yet. And the lawyer who ended up filing these allegations, actually Merchant indicated that a lot of them are tied up in divorce proceedings that Nathan Wade is in the middle of with his ex wife.
Those records were sealed. The attorney believes they were improperly sealed and she's attempting to get them unsealed. But in the meantime, it's left these uncomfortable allegations out in the open without the detail to back it up. Ashley Merchant is a long time defense attorney here in Atlanta.
She's well respected. She has a history of uncovering stuff, especially the judges who are talking about clients of her she was able to uncover. So I don't take it lightly. But at the same time we still don't have those corroborating details.
So why don't we think the DA's office has denied this yet? It's unclear at this point, but I think they believe that the best forum to respond to all this is in court filings, which is generally the tact that they've taken over the course of this investigation. It will be very interesting to see what they say about this, if anything at all. During a parrot hearings on Friday in front of Jeff Scott McAfee who's overseeing the case, he's considering a bunch of motions that don't have to do with this specific filing.
But of course it will be the first time we've seen everyone in court since these bombshell allegations became public. Did he help us understand the serious of this? How significant should we view these allegations right now and what real impact could they have? As this process is pursued, we have to take a look at the objective of this motion.
The motion wants to completely dismiss the prosecution. I'm not entirely sure that that would be the remedy. Even if there is an improper relationship, far more likely might be to disqualify those individual prosecutors. But I didn't see a lot in the motion that challenged the fundamental prosecution itself.
And when you look at really there is a core to the motion that has more merit, I think, than just the salacious Allegations, for example, the allegation that the special prosecutor may have been improperly appointed. That procedure was not followed. That is probably a strong argument. It might have been made without all of the other allegations of the improper romantic relationship.
There's also an allegation, for example, that essentially the salary paid to the special prosecutor is improperly used, allegedly because it was used to take go on vacations as part of the relationship. Look, these are really, really scandalous allegations, if true, But I'm not entirely sure they achieve the objective sought by the defendant or that they'll help. But they certainly put the pressure on the prosecution. Whether it's proper pressure or improper pressure, that's for the court to decide.
And Danny, what is the threshold to achieve an allegation like this? Are there risks to Roman in filing this claim? It turns out that there's no merit to it. Strangely enough, you are more privileged to make allegations in a filing than you would be out in the public or even here on air.
Things that would be defamatory on air in a newspaper are often privileged when made in a filing or in a question in open court, for example. So here's the rule that generally applies for attorneys, because we often have to file things without the benefit of discovery upon information and belief, as we often put in our pleadings, hopeful at that. When we get to discovery, we'll learn, we'll confirm what we believed that we alleged. So we are given some leeway.
I think the real red flag would be if this was a filing made knowing that it was false, which I don't see any indication that there's knowledge of falsely. I'm just giving an example. But you don't need a tremendous amount of rock solid evidence before you make an allegation. That's the essence, unfortunately, of allegations.
We often make them without the benefit of the documents that we want to confirm those allegations. We get those later in discovery. To be clear here, as Danny indicated, a possible remedy, and this is way down the road at this point, would be basically to remove those prosecutors who are, you know, accused of this. Well, that would remove the top prosecutor, and it would remove.
Fine. Well, so it was a DA here. Give us a sense of, you know, what sort of impact this is having down there and the impact this is having potentially on this case. Well, it's a massive impact, and we're already starting to see it reverberate, especially in our state legislature.
Today is the second day of the legislative session, and you're already hearing Republican critics, longtime Republican critics of this probe using these allegations as a way to push forward some changes that they'd like to make to a new oversight council that was created last year for prosecutors here in Georgia. The Georgia Supreme Court recently ruled that basically kind of mooted this commission's existence. While legislators now want to go in and change the state law to make it to give it more teeth, Democrats so far are not saying much. I think they're really worried about the objects.
They don't want to get ahead of the DA here. But certainly if this were if DA was for to be removed from this case, that would be huge. And it could potentially mean the death of this case, depending on who would end up being appointed to replace her. If, for example, it's the Georgia attorney general, well, that's a Republican who probably wouldn't want to oversee this.
You can imagine Donald Trump and plenty of other co defendants in that case are keeping real close eye on these latest allegations right now as we try to get better understanding of what's true and what is not in this situation. To our hollowman, we appreciate you being with us. Danny Savoy, thank you so much. Next right here and battle Democratic Senator Bob Menendez responding to new federal corruption charges on the Senate floor, what it means for Congress, Corruption and U.S.
politics. Our panel is here next. You're watching MEET THE PRESS now. Welcome back.
We are now in the final days, believe it or not, of two crucial countdowns. As we said at the top of the show, there are now only six days until the caucuses in Iowa, the start officially of the 2024 primary season. Only a few days after that, Congress is facing yet another government shutdown deadline, the first of what could be a few expected in 2024, with funding for key programs set to run out just what, 10 days from now. And joining me for our con panel, Dan America, national political reporter at the messenger, kimberly Actin, store columnist at the Boston Globe and NBC News political analyst, and Sarah Chamberlain, president of the Republican Main Street Partnership.
Dan, let me start with you. Not even a week until Iowa, believe it or not, we're finally counting down the days. The frigid temperatures there are a dead giveaway for it being time for the caucuses here. Donald Trump in these waning days with a big advantage in Iowa right now, has made the strategic decision that it's better to be in a courtroom here in Washington, D.C.
than it is to be in a hall alongside those caucus goers in Iowa. Clearly, this is the strategy, right. Basically focus on what he says is my grievance and why you should care. It's a strange flex, but it's working.
I mean, he's showing that he doesn't have to be in Iowa to win the Iowa caucuses. He doesn't need an answer to win the amateur primary. And that has kind of blown a hole in this whole idea that you got to shake hands. You gotta have three conversations with voters to win them over in Iowa.
Donald Trump has pretty much proven that that's not true because he has a huge lead in Iowa. He has been poly a lead in New Hampshire. So why not, if you're him, go to this trial, say what you want afterwards and make your political point. There's a lot about grievance that he's agreed and he's gonna attack, but he's doing it on behalf of you instead of going to a Peter Ranch in Iowa where he's up by 30 points.
And it seems like voters respond enough that his courtroom antics happen in the courtroom. He doesn't really need to be in Iowa. And Sarah, fundamentally, I mean, all the other Republicans efforts, their arrows, they just keep sort of bouncing off Donald Trump right now, right? They try to say this is about him.
There's gonna be chaos. Nonetheless, these caucus goers we've been hearing from the course of state over the course of the last several weeks, they're like, no, no, no, he stand up for us, right? They'd love him. In my opinion.
There's never anything like this in history. I mean, he can do no wrong. When he said he could shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue and his fans, which I call them fans, his believers wouldn't leave him. They're right.
I mean, it doesn't matter. He is solid. He's going to win overwhelmingly in the next two or three caucuses. There's no question that he's probably going to be the Republican nominee.
I was going to say that's one reason why he's doing things like showing up at these courthouses and making his speeches there. I'm certain that he will be at the Supreme Court next month, too, when that case is argued. And make that case here, because he's in full general election mode. He is looking past the primary and trying to reach voters like those that are interviewed in places like New Hampshire that say as of right now, they don't want to vote for him.
But they also think that all of these cases against him are nonsense, that it's government, that it's political. He's going to try to reach them too, to try to make that same case. I am Working for you. They're after me because I'm here for you.
I'm just curious what any past Republican candidate for president would think of the likely nominees saying things like, hey, I hope the stock market crashes in the course of the next 12 months. I mean that, like, why doesn't that stick for those who are listening to it? I know we did this in 2016, maybe in 20. The argument.
White House folks who work for Donald Trump's ideas. You guys take this also literally, right? He's just, yeah, the president, the former president. United States is rooting for the economy to crash and it's helping him instead of hurting him.
I've talked to some of the fellow Republicans who ran and they're like, we've never seen anything like this. If we did this, we wouldn't even get out of the primary. There are Democrats who believe that this catches up to Trump at some point when the election becomes a choice, that when it is, and both of these candidates are looking down the primary. That's actually one of the weird things they have in common.
They both are looking past their respective primaries and their Democrats who believe that once it becomes the choice, it is Biden versus Trump, that some of those comments do kind of mount on top of each other. Maybe they're wrong, maybe that's not the case. But at some point, you know, voters are going to be paying attention and those comments will resonate as well. They've said that before.
And the comments keep getting worse. Nothing catches up. Our focus right now, by the way, on Iowa, but New Hampshire, I think there's a lot of this stuff gets decided right to make this thing interesting or even perhaps defeat them in New Hampshire, then we extend the race. But if she doesn't, if she loses by double digits there, we got a long way to go, then all things are up in the area.
Let me ask you about Secretary Austin, if I can, for a second here. I was covering this on the Today show this morning. And even as I was writing the script for the show this morning, I was just trying to make sense of this whole circumstance. It doesn't make a lot of sense.
I mean, this has been a scandal free as it relates to cabinet members administration. But on this one, why not communicate to the White House how do they put this behind them? Because it really does take to the issue of competence. Yeah.
Unless there is more information that is forthcoming, this really feels like a self own. I mean, it is a serious diagnosis. So we hope that it gets better and is treated well. But it's not unusual.
Officials in Washington are diagnosed and treated for cancer while on the job. Has happened all the time. It happened with Ruth Theater Ginsburg three times. That in itself is not the scandal.
Notwithstanding the statement from the Stolzman saying that this is deeply personal. He's the head of the Pentagon. He has to keep the public and most definitely the White House by the way with tensions in the Middle east at least 14 strikes against basis that house of Americans Iraq and Syria over the course of this hospitalization 100% and so at any time he has to do that at this point he definitely has to be blaming a staffer with a flu is not a great look. This is something that was a self amen and the White House clearly wants better policies and you can't blame him.
And there are some who said like he's a private man. That's I respect that you're a private person but this is the life you've chosen. Right. You took the job.
You know that it comes to the level of publicity this stuff is going to come out. That's just kind of a life you chose. Joy Biden is making clear he's taken with no interest, no plans to fire him. Austin has no plans to resign right now.
Can that hold? I think it can depending on how long this lasts. I mean I think there's it is prostate cancer. We all hope that he recovers fully.
Joe Biden is a you know I would say he's an empathetic person certainly when it comes to these issues, medical issues. I don't think he has any desire to lose this record as well as somebody who's a very stable cabinet. And you know the Republicans are trying to push for Austin to get out. I do think in a matter of weeks at some point this is going to die down and he will recover and this will become another one of the stories that you remember in a few you know once the Biden administration is over I'm not sure it's going to be value taking a step back.
And remember the chaos that we saw during the last four years as related to the cabinet when the president of the board plane and by the time he got off the cabinet member was fired in some of the context of what we witnessed asking Hernandez if I can really quickly right now obviously he is facing a firestorm of controversy and criticism right now here he was on the Senate floor today addressing this new superseding indictment against him. Let's play that for you. United States attorney's officers engage not in a prosecution but A persecution. They seek a victory, not justice.
I'm innocent and I intend to prove my innocence, not just for me, but for the precedent this case will set for you and future members of the Senate. I am, however, alarmed that the greatest and most ardent defenders of the Constitution in this body are among the most vociferous and calling to my resignation. So Republicans say there are two systems of justice in this country, but the Justice Department is going right after Senator Menendez right now. Does this undercut that argument?
It does a little bit. And frankly, Senator should resign. I mean, it is a Democratic state. It's not going to flip, suck and change the Senate.
He needs to go. It's just hurting the Democrats. We eventually cleaned up our problem in the House. They should clean up their problem in the Senate.
And it's really interesting for him who is his constituency right now, because there's not a person that I spoke to in the Senate who does not think that he needs to resist. Even Cory Booker, who is a person who gets to say we stand with him more strongly than anybody else and listen, yes, he is innocent until proven guilty. But the point they're making is focus on that. Focus on your criminal case.
But in the meantime, you are a distraction to the very serious work that this is going to be a political issue and he's up for re election this year. There are polls that show him at literally I think it was zero percent, you know, people asking if you support Bob Menendez and New Jersey, reach out to me and I know like please email. They all know why it's gonna be political issue. He's probably not gonna win the primary and there's no way he can win the primary.
He has two seriously talented, well funded candidates reign against him. It's just I think it's goo he's gonna even if he doesn't bow our forced out, I think he's gonna lose the group. Thank you guys for being with us. We appreciate it.
After this break, released leaders delivering a warning of the United States over the rising civilian death toll in Gaza as the Secretary of State Andy Blinken meets with the Israeli prime minister and his war cabinet. We're gonna take it live to Tel Aviv with the very latest next you're watching. Welcome back. Secretary of State Andy Blinken is back in Tel Aviv today for another round of high stakes meetings with Israeli officials there.
During a nearly hour long meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Blinkin said that he reiterated prior calls to avoid civilian harm and protect civilian infrastructure inside Gaza and that he also discussed ongoing efforts to secure the release of the remaining hostages, more than 100 of them. Still, Lincoln also delivered a message to Israeli officials from Arab leaders about the need for a viable two state solution even as the war between Israel and Hamas rages on. In a news conference after his meetings, Blinken said he spoke to Israeli officials about a plan to help return displaced Palestinians back home. We've reached down a plan for the UN to carry out an assessment mission.
It will determine what needs to be done to allow displaced Palestinian civilians to return safely to homes in the north. Palestinian civilians must be able to return home as soon as conditions allow. They must not be pressed to leave Gaza. As I told the prime Minister, the United States unequivocally rejects any proposals advocating for the resettlement Palestinians outside of Gaza.
And the prime Minister rearranged me today that this is not the policy of Israel's government. Joining now is Raf Sanchez. He is in Tel Aviv for us again. Raf, Secretary Blinken seems to be back in Israel with the same message that he had during his last visit in November.
What was new today and how effective is the US Effort there right now? President Biden himself was in South Carolina yesterday and says he's doing everything he can right now trying to get the Israelis to sort of reduce the civilian death. And yet it continues. Yeah, Peter, the US Has a lot of leverage with Israel.
The question is how much is it using it. The administration from President Biden on downwards has made the calculation that they will have more influence by holding Israel close. But there's a lot of criticism from around the world from Palestinians that the US Needs to do more to rein in Israeli strikes in Gaza. Two main headlines out of Secretary Blink's marathon meetings today with Israeli officials.
One that sounds that you play it. The Israeli government has agreed to allow the UN to start looking into how to get some of those million plus displaced Palestinian civilians returned to their homes in northern Gaza. Secretary Clinton saying that's not going to be an overnight process. That, Peter, frankly, is an understatement.
Some analysis shows more than half of all of the buildings in northern Gaza have either been damaged or completely destroyed. It is going to be a very long time before everyone is able to go home. But you, the secretary, say it is vital that Palestinians do go home and that the United States unequivocally rejects these calls from some far right members of the Israeli government for Palestinians civilians to be forced out of Gaza into other countries. The other big headline, Secretary Blinken saying that the prospect of peace between Israel and other Arab nations like Saudi Arabia is still on the table, something we've been talking about for a long time before October 7.
But he says Israel will need to make concessions. The war will have to end. Israel will have to agree to resume negotiations towards a Palestinian state and it will have to agree to allow the Palestinian Authority to return to Gaza after Hamas is defeated. It is not clear, Peter, whether Prime Minister Netanyahu and his right wing government will be able to make those conditions, those concessions to their right wing voter base here.
Ralph Sanchez on the ground for us on Secretary State Andy Blink's visit there. Raph, thank you so much. Still to come right here, it has been five months since Maui was devastated by the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century.
The long road recovery and Washington's role in helping wildfire survivors across the country. That is next. You're WATCHING me, the president, Welcome back. Remarkably, yesterday marked five months since deadly wildfires devastated the Laha community on the Hawaiian island of Maui.
Blazes there were some of the deadliest in modern American history. They left 100 people dead and displaced more than 12,000 island residents, many of whom remain without permanent housing. Today as the fire destroyed thousands of businesses and homes across Lahaina, the island's historic city. Rebuilding efforts are underway, but of course, they are expected to be slow going and costly due to limited labor and resources.
Last week, Hawaii's Governor Josh revealed a new interim housing plan for nearly 6,000 people still sheltering in the island's hotels. We're joined now by Jennifer Ray Thompson, the CEO of after the Fire, an organization focused on improving wildfire recovery. It's nice to see you. Thanks for being here to have a part of this conversation.
There's so many things going on the world, it's hard to believe five months have now passed since Lahaina as our attention spans are so short, so many people, you fear forget about this. But there's so many challenges that you still face in that community. What are the biggest challenges to rebuilding? How is it going right now?
What are the obstacles you're addressing? Well, you know, I just took a delegation of 13 people who were fire survivors to professionals who'd run major programs at the federal level to line about a month ago. And we spent a week actually sitting with people all the way from fire survivors to county to Bob Fenton, who's the FEMA administrator. You know, it's a very complicated fire.
We have to consider it more of a masterclass. And how to recover from a fire meeting. They're going to need all of our talents, everything we can do. They're really doing some innovative things in Hawaii and in Maui.
And so we're optimistic for them. It's going to be incredibly complicated. What are some of the unique challenges? What are the biggest challenges right now?
Right now, housing is the biggest challenge. What they do, oh my gosh, where to put these people on an island that already had housing crisis. Now they have about 12,000 empty units of short term rental housing, which is three times more than what they need. And so we're pretty optimistic that they're going to be able to place people in those homes.
But it's also in the rebuilding process because it is an island. It takes 120 days to actually get things there for the materials. You can't just send things there like some trailers where they will always, always be there. 120 days to get the necessary resources for building or trailers, whatever else it may be.
I want to ask you about the governor in Hawaii, of course, Josh Green, unveiling this interim housing plan, Maui in housing plan, I think it's formally named. How is that going right now? Does it go far enough to sort of address this, expedite this need? Well, some people are worried it doesn't go far enough.
But I don't really share those worries. I think it's very innovative. We've not seen that kind of public, private, nonprofit effort to really, really rehouse that many people into a specific situation. So we actually think that while we will help Lahaina and Maui recover and rebuild, we also believe that they are inventing things there, that we are going to be able to re to use and adapt to other communities in the future.
I want to talk about some of the visits you've got here. Speaking of lawmakers, as you were telling me in the break, you're going to do it for the next couple of days as well. Imagine you're receiving a good reception from the lawmakers here who I hope share your passion, our passion to help rebuild this beautiful part of this country. Right now, tax relief is so critical as it relates to legislation.
Why is tax relief so important for them? Well, there's an error in the tax that says that if you receive a wildfire settlement, which we anticipate will be true on Maui as well, you have to claim that as personal income tax and in doing so pay that rate and you cannot deduct your attorney's fees. It's really because the Arab mega fires is only about 6 years old. And so this was not an anticipated outcome of our tax code.
But at the same time, we really need Republicans, Democrats, Independents to work together to make sure this bill is passed and passed right now. We don't have time to wait. Will lawmakers open to that? Those who supposed to, you know, they're very open to it and we are very optimistic.
But it really takes political will and we're here to make sure we are negotiated in and we are not negotiated out of the. That's my question. Because right now they're still a lot fighting about all sorts of data for other parts of the planet. The canonism agreement on what to do for Ukraine, for Israel, for the border.
Right. There's a lot for this Congress to juggle right now. This should be a no brainer, I would think, for a lot of lawmakers. And nonetheless, so it remains a challenge.
You know, we've been working on this for two and a half years and no matter where we go, Republican, Democrat, everybody agrees it's a very important issue. They all agree with it. What we really need is political will and desire to get this done for the American people. This goes far beyond.
There's anybody who thinks that our bill is a bad idea, but it's really expanding that political will is what we need from both sides of the aisle. We have a tendency in this business to cover the disaster, not be there for the recovery. You guys started this organization after all the wildfires in Northern California where I grew up, where you live, back in 2017. They were disruptive.
There have been more fires since then. What is the state of rebuilding in those six years since? And is the progress? Is there sufficient progress there?
Yeah, it really depends on what the county has. In our case, I come from a wealthier county in Sonoma County. In Sonoma county, so we are about 95% rebuilt six years later. But another county, especially rural and frontier, that doesn't have as many resources, like paradise, amazing community, but they're only about 30% rebuilt five years ago.
And the biggest takeaway from this conversation of which there were several ideas that can take four months to get the necessary resources. So why? Because it's an island chain. Right.
You can't just drive that thing from the mainland. It's a real challenge. Jennifer Thompson, it's nice to meet you in person. Thank you for being with us.
Thank you for having me. That's gonna do it for us this hour. I'm back tomorrow with more Meet the Press. Now the news continues with Hallie Jackson right now.
He was a young Marine. She didn't care about convention. They made a life together. Then one night, the Marine died.
And then the death investigation took a wild, unexpected and utterly bizarre turn. I'm Josh Mankiewicz and this is Trace of Suspicion, an all new podcast from Day Land. Listen to all episodes of Trace of Suspicion now, wherever you get your podcasts.