- 1 day ago
The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell - Season 2025 Episode 236 -
Episode 236
Episode 236
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00Secretary in history told Senator Chuck Schumer today in a private meeting where Senator Schumer
00:03demanded that Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump release the video of the second deadly missile
00:10attack that struck the wreckage of a small boat off the coast of Venezuela that killed two people
00:17clinging to the wreckage of that boat. Pete Hegseth didn't have to study it when he released
00:23the first video of that same attack. The video that shows the first missile hitting that very
00:29small boat and killing nine of the 11 people on that boat. Pete Hegseth wanted you to see those
00:35nine people killed. He wanted you to see that first missile. There's something about that second missile
00:39he doesn't want you to see. Pete Hegseth didn't have to study any of the deadly videos he and
00:46Donald Trump have released showing them, with no legal authority whatsoever, executing people on
00:52small boats thousands of miles from the United States in the Pacific Ocean and in the Caribbean.
00:57Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth have loved releasing those videos. But now there is one deadly video
01:05of one missile that they don't want anyone to see. And today Donald Trump admitted that he has seen that
01:15video. Have you watched the video stopping? I watched everything. Yeah, I watch everything. I see a lot of
01:24things. And do you believe that that second strike was necessary? Well, it looked like they were trying to turn back
01:30over the boat, but I don't get involved in that. That's up to them. The admiral that did that was is a highly
01:37respected. As you know, a highly respected man. The last time Donald Trump was asked about the video,
01:45he said he knew nothing about it. Now he's admitting he has seen it. And when Donald Trump says it's not
01:50pretty, you can imagine how horrific it is. If Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump thought it would help them to
01:58release that video, they would have released it already. Last week on this program, Senator Mark Warner
02:04told us he believed the two men were incapacitated when the second missile came to kill them. He has
02:11seen the video. Today, Senator Warner said this. It's a little strange where administration officials
02:20say, well, we can release edited versions of videos that they like to brag about, but then not at least show
02:32the immediate moments up to including the second strike that took place on September 2nd. How you
02:40can suddenly say, well, we're going to release videos of the boat and then our strike action,
02:47but we're not willing to release the video when the survivors are identified before a strike takes
02:53place. In my mind, it doesn't pass any kind of smell test. And now Republican Senator Rand Paul is
03:00correctly identifying everything that is wrong with these attacks.
03:06I think if people were to see the images of people clinging to the wreckage, there would not
03:12be much sympathy for Secretary Hegseth. To order the killing of people who are shipwrecked is clearly
03:17illegal according to military justice, according to our own military laws. And even deeper than that,
03:23there is a question of are unarmed people that are smugglers part of a war? Are we in the middle of a war
03:29with unarmed people? Why don't they present evidence that they're in arms? Why don't they
03:33present evidence that these boats are even coming to the United States? These are small motorboats,
03:38often 2000 miles from our shore. If they have drugs, which hasn't been proven, if they have drugs,
03:44they're probably taking it to neighboring islands. So this is a crazy thing that we've never done before.
03:50And to make a crime into war is to stretch credulity to the point that I think a lot of
03:57common sense people don't buy. We have been raising all of those issues here on this program. And as of
04:03tonight, there is absolutely no publicly available evidence that any one of these very small boats was
04:10actually carrying drugs. As of tonight, there is absolutely no publicly available evidence that any
04:17of these small boats were headed to the United States. And as of tonight, there is ample evidence
04:22that none of these small boats powered by outboard motors could have reached the United States or
04:29survived a single storm that they might encounter on the way. These are not ocean-going vessels.
04:36These are the kinds of boats you see being used for fishing or water skiing very close to shore
04:41or on totally calm lakes. These are among the smallest boats ever attacked by the American military
04:49or any military anywhere in the world. These boats are too small to carry even a ton of cargo. And Donald Trump
04:56pardoned a drug trafficker who was responsible for delivering over 400 tons of cocaine into the United States
05:04and got convicted for it. There is nothing more Donald Trump could do to prove that he absolutely
05:10does not care about drug trafficking. He doesn't really care about it. Nothing more he could do to
05:16prove that than pardoning the biggest drug dealers in history, which he has done. Today, Donald Trump
05:22proudly proclaimed that he doesn't know anything about a drug dealer he pardoned or the criminal case
05:30against that drug dealer that was proven to the satisfaction of an American jury.
05:37You pardoned former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez and let him out of prison,
05:42even though he was convicted in a massive international drug trafficking scheme.
05:46How is that zero tolerance on drug trafficking?
05:49Well, I don't know him, and I know very little about him, other than people said it was like
05:54a Obama-Biden type setup where he was set up. He was the president of the country.
05:59The country deals in drugs like probably, you could say that about every country. And because
06:04he was the president, they gave him like 45 years in prison. And there are many people fighting for
06:09Honduras, very good people that I know. And they think he was treated horribly, and they asked me to
06:13do it, and I said, I'll do it.
06:15Do you think that could send the wrong message to drug dealers?
06:17No, I don't think so.
06:20Unfortunately, the reporter did not ask Donald Trump to name a single person who recommended that pardon.
06:28So we have no idea what the real story between Donald Trump's pardon of the big drug dealer was.
06:36But some friends of Donald Trump obviously are connected to it. They were obviously making money in that
06:43transaction as lawyers representing that person. We're going to find it out eventually, but we don't know it now.
06:49And there was no questioning about that today. And according to that rationale that you just heard,
06:54every single person prosecuted by the federal government during the four years of the Biden
07:00presidency or the eight years of the Obama presidency deserves a Trump pardon right now.
07:06Every single drug dealer, because the Obama Justice Department or the Biden Justice Department were just
07:13incapable of doing fair prosecutions, according to Donald Trump, even of drug dealers. So that's it.
07:20They pardoned them all, according to that rationale. But of course, we know Donald Trump is lying.
07:27Every word he says about that pardon is a lie. Donald Trump will never reveal why he pardoned the
07:33drug dealing former president of Honduras or who told him to do it. He and that president,
07:39that former president now faces new charges in Honduras after Donald Trump pardoned him.
07:44So we'll see how much help that pardon actually turns out to be. The Washington Post reports that
07:49Hernandez is, quote, wanted for money laundering and fraud in connection with allegations that his 2013
07:55political campaign used stolen public funds. Because Donald Trump refuses to read, he is completely
08:04uneducable. But for some government documents, they're pretty easy to read. Some are easier than others.
08:10And the Justice Department description of former President Hernandez's crimes is simple enough
08:16even for Donald Trump to understand if he was capable of reading. But Donald Trump is too lazy to
08:23read anything that his job normally requires. So he happily goes into interviews declaring his full
08:31ignorance about the person he just pardoned. The Justice Department wrote that Juan Orlando Hernandez
08:39was, quote, at the center of one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies
08:47in the world. During his political career, Hernandez abused his powerful positions and authority in
08:54Honduras to facilitate the importation of over 400 tons of cocaine into the United States.
09:01Hernandez's co-conspirators were armed with machine guns and destructive devices, including
09:06AK-47s, AR-15s and grenade launchers, which they used to protect their massive cocaine loads as they
09:15transited across Honduras on their way to the United States, protect the money they made from the
09:22eventual sale of this cocaine and guard their drug trafficking territory from rivals. Hernandez received
09:29millions of dollars of drug money from some of the largest and most violent drug trafficking
09:34organizations in Honduras in Honduras, Mexico and elsewhere, and used those bribes to fuel his rise
09:40in Honduran politics. In turn, as Hernandez rose to power in Honduras, he provided increased support
09:47and protection for his co-conspirators, allowing them to move mountains of cocaine, commit acts of
09:55violence and murder, and help turn Honduras into one of the most dangerous countries in the world.
10:02That's right. Much more dangerous than Venezuela, the country Donald Trump continues to pretend to be
10:11thinking about invading. He threw that nonsense around again today in that interview, and he
10:17will never invade Venezuela. That is just classic Trump distraction bait on a day when another federal
10:25judge cleared the way for more of the Epstein files to be released. Donald Trump and his clownish
10:31secretary of defense threatened an investigation of our next guest because he said this.
10:39Our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders.
10:45Yesterday, we learned from reporting in the New York Times that Donald Trump's attorney general said
10:48the same thing. In writing in a friend of the court brief to the Supreme Court last year when she was
10:53working as a private lawyer, Pam Bondi wrote, military officers are trained not to carry out
10:58unlawful unlawful orders, and they know they may be held criminally liable if they did carry out such
11:04orders. The military would not carry out a patently unlawful order from the president to kill
11:11non-military targets. Indeed, service members are required not to do so. And here is video of Pete
11:20Hegseth saying the same thing that Senator Mark Kelly said.
11:27Military leaders saying you could not possibly kill the families of would-be terrorists and they
11:32would not follow the order. And his answer, Donald Trump's answer, and what if the generals won't
11:37listen to you when you say take out the values? Oh, they'll listen. That's really not the answer.
11:41No, I got some response from vets on that saying you're not just going to follow that order if it's
11:45unlawful. Military is not going to follow illegal orders. And so the Trump campaign was forced to change
11:49their position and say, we're going to try to change the law so that the military can operate
11:53within the law. That's a tall order also. Here's the problem with Trump. He says,
11:57go ahead and kill the families. Go ahead and torture. Go ahead and go further than waterboarding.
12:02What happens when people follow those orders or don't follow them? It's not clear that Donald
12:07Trump will have their back. Donald Trump is oftentimes about Donald Trump.
12:12Leading off our discussion tonight is Democratic Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona. He's a member of the
12:16Armed Services Committee and the Intelligence Committee in the Senate. Senator, thank you very
12:20much for joining us tonight. What is your reaction to hearing Pete Hegseth say a version of what you
12:26said that he is pretending needs to be investigated? Well, I mean, can you believe the hypocrisy of these
12:34folks? You know, and I think the thing that stuck out to me, here's the thing you need to know about
12:39Donald Trump, right? And we all know who Donald Trump is. He's a convicted felon. He has no business
12:46being in the White House. It is a, it's a travesty that this has happened to the American people,
12:54actually. And now this is something that we are going to, you know, have to deal with myself and my
12:59colleagues. We said something the president didn't like. And because of that, he said we should be killed.
13:05Yeah, he went far beyond just investigated. And we heard Marjorie Taylor Greene on 60 Minutes
13:13assign to Donald Trump the fault in the death threats that she has received since Donald Trump
13:20broke with her and started criticizing her. Yeah, I mean, she, my understanding is she's received
13:27a tremendous number of death threats. I have two, not only to me personally, but to members of my
13:34family, Gabby in particular, I'm no stranger to political violence. This is something we have
13:41lived with for, you know, 14 years when my wife Gabby was shot in the head meeting with her
13:46constituents. And this president, not only is he, you know, threatening us with being hanged and
13:53executed, he's also now threatening me with the full force of the Department of Defense with a
13:58court-martial. And he's getting Pam Bondi and the Department of Justice to come after us and
14:04prosecute us for something that his cabinet members have previously said.
14:11When, when your wife was attacked and, and attempt the attempted assassination there,
14:18that was not as a result of a president of the United States urging an action like that or
14:24encouraging an action like that. Uh, that kind of provocation was not out there at that level
14:30at that time. Uh, what does it feel like for you now, uh, to be basically, uh, targeted in this kind
14:38of way, uh, by the president? Well, I mean, I, we were surprised. I mean, this is not something we
14:46expected. We expected, even this guy, if he said anything in response to us telling the military
14:53that they should follow the law, we would have heard something like, of course. Um, but instead
14:59he said we should be killed. Um, I mean, it's, it's unprecedented in our country's history for
15:06a president to call for the execution of members of Congress. Um, and I hope we don't normalize this
15:14behavior. You know, some people always, they dismiss it and say, well, it's Donald Trump.
15:19Um, it is a direct assault on the first amendment, the freedom of speech of all Americans. And this
15:27just isn't about me. Uh, yeah, he, he, he went after me personally, but this is about all of our
15:35rights. Uh, and it's wrong, but here's the thing, Lawrence. I mean, if this guy thought I was going
15:40to back down and be intimidated by him, there is no chance that is going to happen. We have to all,
15:47you know, stand up to this president when he does dumb things, when he's doing things and making
15:53decisions that are unlawful and not in the interest of the American people.
15:59Well, tonight in Pennsylvania, he's, uh, or, uh, he did say tonight that he thinks it's treasonous
16:04if you ask any questions about his health. So that's how far apparently his mental health is
16:10gone, uh, at this point tonight. Uh, what, what do you make of, uh, Pete Hegseth now saying there's
16:16suddenly one piece of video of, uh, Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth killing people at sea. There's
16:24just one piece of video that they really have to study before they release it. Yeah. What does that
16:30take? 10 minutes, study it, and then, you know, release it. This, they were so Pete Hegseth was
16:36so excited on that first strike and the subsequent ones to, you know, release video for the American
16:43people to see what he decided, what he did, what he commanded the U S military to do. Uh,
16:50and of course, we're not surprised. This is a guy who runs around on a stage when talking to
16:55admirals and generals and senior enlisted talking about hunting and killing people.
16:59And lethality. We've never had a secretary of defense like this. Somebody that's so
17:04fundamentally unqualified for this job. Um, so he wanted to get those videos out there until,
17:11until there was a little bit of a problem. And then when there was a problem, he's off blaming
17:16the admiral. He had no responsibility. He was not in the room. He does the opposite thing of what I've
17:22ever seen, uh, my leadership, people that I worked for do, whether it was in the military,
17:29or at NASA. And that is accept some responsibility. He's shirking his responsibility. He's trying to
17:36blame others. And he doesn't want the American people to see, uh, the results of bad decisions.
17:46Uh, are you confident that we will see that video or at least you on the armed services committee,
17:52all of you members of the armed services committee will see that video?
17:55Yeah, I think we'll see it. Uh, I don't know if it'll be this week or probably next week. I think
18:00the, the chairman and the ranking member do believe that's the right thing for the entire committee to,
18:06to see this. Uh, I'm not confident they're going to release it to the American people because they
18:11want to keep as much of this under wraps because I, they, they must realize that the decisions they
18:19made and the actions they took were questionable at best. And I mean, this is the kind of example
18:27that is used in the manual of war in the department of defense as something that is an unlawful order.
18:35So they're concerned. They don't want to accept responsibility. Uh, but it's our job on the armed
18:42services committee to provide, you know, that oversight for the American people.
18:48Senator Mark Kelly, thank you very much for starting off our coverage tonight.
18:52Thank you for having me on. Thank you. And coming up, Donnie two dolls is back. Donald Trump went to
18:59Pennsylvania tonight to lie about his tariffs and to tell people that the solution to affordability
19:05is to buy less stuff. That's next.
19:13Donnie two dolls is back. Donald Trump took his new affordability message to Mount Pocono,
19:19Pennsylvania tonight. And his new affordability solution is buy less stuff.
19:27You don't need 37 dolls for your daughter. Two or three is nice, but you don't need 37 dolls.
19:37That is the Trump solution. The Donnie two dolls solution to the skyrocketing price of dolls and
19:44toys from China. Thanks to Donald Trump's tariffs. Okay. So not 37 dolls. How many guns are two or three
19:52guns enough? That is Donald Trump's solution to all of the increasing prices in the American economy.
20:01Just don't buy as much stuff. He's never applied that to guns, but maybe he'll get around to that.
20:08In other words, Donald Trump has no idea how to reduce any prices anywhere on anything.
20:15And of course, Donald Trump told his usual lie tonight about his tariffs.
20:23Bringing us hundreds of billions of dollars. I just helped our farmers out because they're starting
20:30to do really well. Tariffs are bringing us nothing. Every dollar of Trump tariffs,
20:39every dollar is paid by Americans. No foreign country has ever paid a single penny of Trump
20:47tariffs and they never will. No foreign country has ever paid an American tariff. That's not how it
20:53works. Everyone who pays the Trump tariffs is an American person or an American business. Those
20:59tariffs are paid only here in the United States when the goods arrive in the United States. So they're
21:07paid by us. So all of the money that Donald Trump is now giving to farmers, $12 billion because they
21:15are suffering economically, is money coming from us, American taxpayers and no one else. American
21:23farmers who produce far more food than the United States can possibly consume depend on selling their
21:30agricultural products to foreign countries. And because of the Trump tariffs, foreign countries have
21:34retaliated against the United States and are not buying American agricultural products. So Donald
21:40Trump has ruined the American agricultural economy. Pennsylvania's governor, Josh Shapiro, issued a
21:46statement tonight saying, Trump's tariffs and economic policies have raised prices at the grocery store,
21:51shuttered markets for our farmers, hurt our manufacturers and dramatically increased the cost
21:57of living for Pennsylvanians. And today, Donald Trump finally revealed the Trump healthcare plan
22:03in that interview with Politico. What I want to do, for example, I want to give the money to the people,
22:10not to the insurance companies. Why didn't anyone else think of that? Oh, yeah, because when you give the
22:17money to the people, they then have to buy health insurance with the money. So it's impossible to give only the
22:25people the money and not eventually let some of that money go to health insurance companies and giving people the
22:33money to pay for their health insurance is exactly what the Affordable Care Act does, among other things. And it gives
22:40people that money in the form of tax credits, which Donald Trump and the Republican Party in Congress have killed,
22:46thereby pushing health insurance far beyond affordability for many millions of people using the Affordable Care Act.
22:54In his Politico interview today, Donald Trump got the lazy, childish question that is a favorite of Washington
23:01interviewers, how would you grade yourself on the economy? Donald Trump gave the childish question
23:08an even more childish answer.
23:11I wonder what grade you would give? A plus. A plus. A plus, plus, plus, plus, plus, plus.
23:21A plus, plus, plus, plus, plus. Five pluses for Donald Trump by Donald Trump. Joining us now is
23:27Pennsylvania Democratic Congresswoman Madeline Dean. She is a member of the House Appropriations
23:32Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Thank you very much for joining us tonight. So did
23:38Pennsylvania get the message tonight? All they have to do is buy fewer things, buy less stuff, spend less
23:45money, and that's their affordability solution. The inane statement of buy fewer dolls. I don't even know
23:55where it comes from. No, unfortunately, the president, remember, the affordability thing is a Democratic
24:04hoax. So why is it that he decided to go and start a tour about affordability in my home state of Pennsylvania if it's
24:12just a Democratic hoax, a scam? Of course, you laid it out very, very well. Sadly, a combination of what the
24:22Republicans did in passing the big, beautiful bill and the harm that that does to people in terms of their pocketbooks and
24:29Medicaid, SNAP benefits and the rest. And then, of course, Trump with his chaotic tariffs, raising the
24:37price on everything, making businesses so uncertain. And in my home state, prices are up. Electricity prices
24:45up 15 percent. Beef up 15 percent. Some other coffee, 20 percent. Bananas that I kind of famously had
24:56a conversation with Secretary Lutnik about, up 7, 8 percent. So prices are up. People know it.
25:04And how odd that the president chose to go to a casino, Mount Pocono Casino Resort, to talk about
25:13affordability. Because I don't know about you, but when times are tight for me, I head to the casino.
25:18Yeah. Yeah. Yes. So if you tried to tell one of your constituents that the solution to their
25:28affordability problem is to buy less electricity, that's the solution to the price of electricity in
25:37their home going up. Just buy less of it. Use less electricity at home. What response would you get
25:44from that voter? Well, they would think I was insane. I could tell them also, you know, have one
25:51cup of coffee, not two. You can't have two. It's just too much money. They would think I was insane.
25:57And really, my constituents are talking to me all the time, whether it's a neighbor in a grocery store,
26:02saying, what is going on with this president? Why has he done this to our economy when the economy
26:08was coming back? And he's just wreaked havoc with it in an inane way. He cannot be, I guess,
26:17explained to that the very thing you said is the truth. When products come into this country,
26:23it is the businesses, the people picking them up. They have to pay that tariff. And then what do they
26:29do? They're going to pass it on to consumers. And that's what we are seeing. The marketplace has been
26:35really made difficult. And I want to layer in the health care problem that the president and
26:40Republicans are doing nothing about. You quoted Josh Shapiro about farmers. Over the weekend,
26:45we saw in the Philadelphia Inquirer, 31,000 Pennsylvanians opted out of penny, the state
26:52exchange for health care as a result of the premium increases. Josh Shapiro, my governor, has said also
26:59that he estimates 150,000 Pennsylvanians will just simply say, I can't do it. I can't afford it.
27:06The cost is too high. And then add that to the estimated 300,000 who are going to lose as a result
27:14of the Medicaid cuts from the big, beautiful bill. That's almost a half a million people in Pennsylvania
27:20who will struggle over health care costs and access. And then when they lose their health insurance,
27:26that's when health care bankruptcies occur. People end up losing their homes. They get hit with a huge
27:32medical bill that they have no health insurance to cover. It's just a thing that keeps spiraling
27:38against them. Congresswoman Madeline Dean, thank you very much for joining us tonight.
27:42Good to be with you. Thank you. And coming up, another judge ordered the release of more of the
27:48Epstein files today. And this material is going to make it a lot harder for Donald Trump to pardon the
27:54convicted sex trafficker, Ghislaine Maxwell, his old friend, Ghislaine Maxwell. That's next with
28:01Congressman Ro Khanna. The new law is working and it's working fast. Today, New York federal judge,
28:10Paul Engelmeyer issued an opinion in order to release significant portions of the Epstein files that are
28:16part of the criminal case against child rapist and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein's co-conspirator,
28:22Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted of sex trafficking in 2021. And the first line of
28:28his 24 page ruling today, Judge Engelmeyer cited the Epstein files transparency act signed into law
28:35on November 19th, 2025. The judge's order unseals grand jury material in the investigation of Ghislaine
28:41Maxwell and so-called discovery materials that Ghislaine Maxwell's lawyers obtained from the government's
28:48investigation. Donald Trump, who has pardoned some of the biggest drug dealers in American history,
28:54has not ruled out a pardon for his old friend Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted co-conspirator of
29:00Jeffrey Epstein, who was Donald Trump's closest friend for 10 years.
29:06Have you ruled out a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell?
29:11I haven't even thought about it. I mean, I haven't thought about it for months. Maybe I haven't
29:17thought about it at all. You're just asking me a question. But I don't talk about that. I don't
29:21rule it in or out. I don't, I don't even think about it.
29:25Genius now is Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna of California. He's a member of the House Oversight
29:29Committee and he got the bill passed that was cited by another judge again today.
29:35Congressman Connell, what is your reaction to the judge's ruling today?
29:39Well, I'm pleased on behalf of the survivors, because I'll tell you, when that information
29:44comes out, the grand jury information and the discovery information, there is no way that Donald
29:50Trump is going to, with a straight face, be able to pardon Ghislaine Maxwell without having the outrage
29:57of the country. I mean, Maxwell, from the survivor's description, was involved in the abuse and in the
30:04recruiting. I'm also encouraged that they're releasing all of the discovery and the judge
30:10explicitly is overturning the protective order and the Justice Department asked him to do that,
30:14which leads me to believe that we're going to see actually a lot of these files.
30:19Yeah, the judge is very, very specific in here and has obviously studied all of the evidence in the
30:24case against Ghislaine Maxwell and seems to know exactly what is coming here. As we go forward,
30:33what will be the sequence? This order is basically saying to the Justice Department,
30:40yes, release all of this material as part of what you're supposed to release, according to the law.
30:46You're absolutely right. Look, Pam Bondi obviously obfuscated and she could have released more.
30:51But one of the arguments that justice made when they did not release all of these files is they
30:57said, well, these judges have protective orders. These judges have said we can't have the grand jury.
31:02Well, now there's a clear law passed 427 to 1 in the House, 100 to 0 in the Senate. And the judges,
31:09both the judge in Florida and the judge in New York is saying you can now release all of this.
31:14And the good news is the Justice Department is asking actually to be compliant with the law.
31:19So obviously we have to be vigilant. But so far, it looks like the judges and the Justice
31:25Department are making an effort to finally comply with the law. And that means these survivors,
31:30these thousand survivors are finally being seen by the wheels of American government.
31:35As I studied the judge's ruling, he's specifying that they release things that include photographs.
31:42He's specifying locations that have relevant evidence, including a kid's camp that Jeffrey
31:49Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell personally visited. We reported that on the show. That was all in the
31:54testimony of the case against Ghislaine Maxwell. This this is going to make this is this is in effect
32:02going to replay the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell to a national audience with this material released, it seems.
32:09Absolutely. Plus information that was never made public before. One of the things that always surprised me
32:16or took me with with a lot of impact is that the survivors would say we need the photographs.
32:22Congressman, we need the photographs out. And I do think we're going to get a lot of the photographs
32:27and some of the actual documents on the computers. And that may be chilling as people start to see them.
32:33Well, this is the kind of evidence that no one really knows about the case file on the president
32:39of Honduras. They don't know about the, you know, 400 tons. They don't know of cocaine. They don't they
32:46don't know about the millions of dollars. They don't. I was just trying to familiarize the audience with
32:50that evidence tonight. But by the time this comes out and when it comes out, we will all be covering this
32:57evidence very, very thoroughly. And that seems to be the only thing that could possibly inhibit
33:03what appears to be Donald Trump's desire to give Ghislaine Maxwell a pardon.
33:08And that's why I'm relieved it's coming out. Like you, Lawrence, I've spent a lot of time with the
33:12survivors. When Maxwell's name would be mentioned, when this idea of a pardon would be mentioned,
33:18they would be outraged. It would be almost a triggering event, uh, reminding them of their
33:24trauma. Uh, so the fact that mountains of this evidence is going to come out is one going to shock
33:30the country about how heinous these crimes actually were. It is going to, in my view, implicate other
33:36people who were involved. Uh, and it's going to be such overwhelming evidence that the president
33:42literally would have to have total cruelty and difference to, at that point, pardon, uh, Maxwell.
33:49Carson Ro Khanna, thank you very much for joining us tonight. Thank you, Lawrence.
33:54And coming up where we see nothing more creative minds can see something to make a little magic. That's next.
34:04When you have nothing, nothing gets thrown away. When we delivered new desks like this one
34:17to this girl's elementary school in Malawi last month, some of the desks arrive wrapped in protective
34:24plastic covering. And as usual, the kids carried the desks from the trucks into the classrooms themselves,
34:31singing songs of joy all the way. And when they unwrapped those desks, they gathered up all the
34:37plastic wrapping, all of it. They saved it, saved all of it. Some of them to bring it home so that
34:43their parents might find a use for it. None of these children have toys. None of them have any possessions
34:50other than what they are wearing. Half of them don't have shoes. They're never jealous of kids who have
34:55more than they have because they never see kids who have more than they have. And perhaps
35:01because they have nothing, they have more creativity. They make toys sometimes out of twigs and sticks and
35:08other objects that they find. And those sticks bring as much joy to their faces as the joy we see on
35:15Christmas morning when some of our kids are showered with gifts. When this girl grabbed her piece of the
35:22plastic covering from her desk, she immediately styled it into that hat. And then other girls followed
35:32her example. And soon we were in the middle of an impromptu fashion show of plastic wrap belts and hats
35:39and big smiles. This was the first time that I delivered desks with a protective plastic covering
35:46on them. So it's the first time that I saw this particular burst of magical creativity. A new
35:54dimension of the magic that I've seen happen for 15 years of delivering desks to schools in Malawi,
36:01thanks entirely to your generosity to the Kind Fund, a partnership I created with UNICEF to deliver
36:07desks to elementary schools in Malawi that have never had desks. The head teacher of the
36:13Chapita Primary School, Damson Senzani, told me that he was overwhelmed to learn that we would be
36:20delivering desks to his school where over 800 students were sitting on the floor.
36:27learners were struggling to write good handwritings while seated on the floor. Even girls, they would feel
36:36shy to stand when they're responding to questions from teachers. But now with the coming of the desks,
36:43because they'll be seated comfortably on a desk, they'll be writing comfortably on the desk,
36:49I feel that I still have a full hope that there will be a change in terms of handwriting of my learners,
36:56the performance of my learners. I'm expecting a lot of learners to transfer in from other schools,
37:03because now they'll say, no, let us go to that school that has desks slide from the first class
37:09up to the last class. I feel that it will change the performance of my learners at the school.
37:15It will change the performance of the learners at this school. I hear that every time from teachers
37:24in Malawi seeing desks in their classrooms for the first time. The Kind Fund also provides scholarships
37:30for girls to attend high school in Malawi, where public high school is not free, and the girls'
37:34graduation rate from secondary school is half the boys' graduation rate from secondary school.
37:41For the nation to develop, for the community to develop, even for the family to develop, we need to
37:50educate the girl child. Education improves one's understanding of issues. So when one is educated,
37:57the understanding improves. So development got improved. Everything goes high once a girl child has been
38:06educated. So when I see a girl child not going to school because of school fees, I feel very sorry.
38:15I feel very sorry. There is a saying that says if you educate a girl child, you educate the nation.
38:23If you educate a girl, you educate the nation. That is the message echoed by Michelle Obama in support of
38:31girls' education when she went to Malawi in November of 2023, just a few weeks before I traveled to
38:37Malawi that year. You can go to lastworddesks.ms.now to contribute any amount. No contribution is too small.
38:46To help provide desks to schools in Malawi or scholarships for girls to attend high school in
38:51Malawi, you can make a contribution in the name of anyone on your holiday gift list, and UNICEF will send
38:56them an acknowledgment of your gift. Damson Senzani knows how important role models are for kids growing
39:05up in Malawi. Damson Senzani is one of those teachers who is regarded with awe and love by all of his
39:13students at his school. He carries himself with humility, authority, and the joy of doing the work
39:20that he wants to do. When I was at primary school, I was not very sure as to what I would be in the future.
39:30In fact, in those days, the person whom I was admiring was just the teacher, because the one whom I was
39:37exposed to. Those people, they would tell me that I am a doctor because I went to school. I am a teacher
39:43because I went to school. So that motivated me. That motivated me. And that's why I felt like I should
39:53be a teacher, so that I should impart that interest in the learner under my class, that he, she should
40:00have that feeling to say, when I got educated, I should be like that one.
40:05I should be like that one. That really does seem to be the feeling that so many kids in Damson School
40:15have when they look up to him as the hero that he really is. And we all have something to learn
40:24from the children of Malawi like this girl who sees something where we see nothing and finds new ways
40:33what it is to brighten her world and our world.
Be the first to comment