00:00The Trump administration pulls ICE back from Minnesota.
00:03European leaders reckon with a new world order,
00:06and parts of the U.S. government are about to shut down again.
00:10It is time for the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.
00:13That's The Atlantic's David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart of MS Now.
00:17Good evening, gentlemen. Nice to see you on Valentine's Day Eve.
00:22I can feel the romance.
00:25This is going to turn out quite differently.
00:27Absolutely. President Trump put, I'm talking about Minnesota,
00:32put his border czar in charge of what was going on there,
00:36and Tom Homan said, okay, we're going to now start to pull this back.
00:40David, what do you make of this development?
00:42Well, when Tom Homan is the reasonable and cuddly one,
00:45then you know we've come a long way.
00:48And, you know, I think it's partly because of the awfulness of those videos and the killings,
00:53but it's partly because of citizen power.
00:55You know, we've been talking a lot over the months about a civic movement.
00:58And the people of Minneapolis, in bitter cold weather,
01:02behaved in a self-disciplined, humane way
01:05that appealed to people across the political spectrum
01:10and in a disciplined way.
01:11And they turned up the heat,
01:13and they put the regime in an impossible situation,
01:15either behave brutally and generate more hostility,
01:19or lose control of the streets.
01:21And that's what a civic movement needs to do,
01:23put the pressure on the government
01:24and expose the moral distance between one side and the other.
01:30And I was with a historian yesterday,
01:31and she said, learn from the civil rights movement.
01:34Everybody should be studying the civil rights movement.
01:36That's what they did,
01:37and it worked in this case in Minneapolis,
01:40and even the Trump administration had to back down.
01:42Do you see it that way, too, that this is power of the people?
01:45Absolutely, and I saw it from the beginning.
01:47Remember, I went to college in Minnesota.
01:49And so Minnesota holds a special place in my heart.
01:54And I was just there.
01:55I wasn't on the show last weekend
01:56because I was at Carleton Board of Trustees meeting.
02:00And what you were talking about in Minneapolis
02:03wasn't just in Minneapolis.
02:05It was throughout.
02:06In Northfield, Minnesota, they were dealing with ICE.
02:09And they were dealing with ICE in a very quiet way,
02:12not the whistles and the horns, but text chains,
02:15people who were observing, taking license plates,
02:19letting people know.
02:21I went to do something on Friday,
02:23and the person who picked me up apologized for the vehicle
02:27and then said to me, I was, quote,
02:30underground railroading food all night.
02:33Wow.
02:34And so to David's point, you know.
02:36These are for people who feel that they can't go
02:38to the grocery store because they're scared of what they have.
02:40They had not left home.
02:41We're talking about people who had not left home
02:43in more than a month.
02:44And so what you had in Minneapolis,
02:47what you had in Northfield, Minnesota,
02:48what you have throughout Minnesota
02:52are people coming to the aid of their neighbors
02:55and their loved ones,
02:57standing up for their communities
02:58in the face of incredible,
03:02I don't know any other word to use,
03:03but oppression from the federal government,
03:06targeting their communities.
03:08We have still seen, though,
03:10this is now the third instance
03:11where ICE agents have shot people.
03:14One, this Venezuelan immigrant,
03:16plus the killings of Renee Good and Alex Preddy,
03:18where the federal government says one thing happened,
03:23and the video or testimonial evidence
03:25completely contradicts their story,
03:28and yet they stick to that story over and over again.
03:31And there's just an Orwellian quality
03:34to what is going on here.
03:35They will not budge.
03:36This has been a revelation since the first Trump term
03:38that so much of government is governed by norms.
03:41There's not rule.
03:42But you assume when you see a video like that,
03:44there's going to be an investigation,
03:46and heads will roll.
03:48And if you have an administration
03:50that's completely shameless,
03:52then there's going to be no real investigation,
03:54and heads will not roll.
03:56And even Kristi Noem,
03:57the head of the Department of Homeland Security,
04:00I mean, she, you would think she'd be in trouble.
04:04Right.
04:04And she's in desperate trouble.
04:05Calling Alex Preddy a domestic terrorist.
04:07In her agency,
04:08there was a fantastic Wall Street Journal piece this week.
04:11You know, she's firing a pilot
04:12because he forgot to bring her blanket off the airplane.
04:15But the key thing in that story was
04:18people were leaking from all across the agency.
04:20They're offended by how she does her job.
04:23And yet, Trump, again, has endorsed her.
04:27As I mentioned, tonight at midnight,
04:29we will start to see part of the government shutdown
04:31because the Democrats are putting their foot down
04:33and saying,
04:35we need reforms to these agencies.
04:37And some of the Republicans are saying,
04:39you're asking for too much.
04:41Do you think this is the fight worth having,
04:43that the Democrats are doing the right thing?
04:45Yes.
04:46And just give you two reasons.
04:49Renee Good, Alex Preddy,
04:51two American citizens who were killed
04:54by federal officers attached to that agency.
04:59And let's also keep in mind that, you know,
05:02the government most likely will go into a partial shutdown
05:04at 12.01 because everyone's gone out of town anyway.
05:08But keep in mind, ICE is fully funded
05:11for at least the next five to six years.
05:13So we're talking about other agencies,
05:15TSA and others that will be hit by this shutdown.
05:19The Democrats are right to demand not just reform,
05:23but some kind of accountability
05:25for what happened on the streets of Minneapolis
05:28and what could happen on the streets of other cities.
05:31Let's not breathe too much of a sigh of relief
05:34for what's happening in Minnesota.
05:36Great for the people of Minnesota and Minneapolis,
05:39but in talking to the folks there,
05:41they're also concerned about
05:42where will this be exported next?
05:45And I think that's what Democrats are also thinking.
05:48Folks should not view this as a partisan issue.
05:51Folks should view this as holding the government
05:54accountable for what it is doing
05:56in the name of the American people
05:57to the American people.
06:00Can I disagree?
06:01Please.
06:03Just because it's Valentine's Day.
06:05Just thank you.
06:05I'll disagree emotionally.
06:09You know, we have a democracy,
06:10and when you have a disagreement
06:12and when something outrageous happens,
06:13you go to the voters.
06:15And I think that's what the Democrats should do.
06:16Look at what the Republicans are doing.
06:17I go to the voters.
06:18When you have a policy disagreement
06:20in between elections,
06:21you don't shut down the government.
06:23We haven't done that in the last,
06:24till Newt Gingrich walked into town,
06:26and he set a precedent,
06:27and now we're spiraling.
06:29And so when you shut down the government,
06:31A, it hurts the government.
06:32B, it hurts public faith in the government.
06:33It makes us look ineffective.
06:35And as Jonathan said,
06:37we're not taking this out on ice.
06:38It's the people at TSA
06:39who aren't going to get a check.
06:41So I believe that if you weaken
06:43the institutions as a democracy
06:45by shutting the government,
06:47every time there's a policy disagreement,
06:48and by the way,
06:49the Republicans are going to do this
06:50even more often in the future,
06:51it's just terrible for our democracy.
06:53I want to quickly pivot
06:55to what's happening overseas.
06:56We've been seeing some of Nick's
06:58tremendous reporting
06:59from the Munich Security Conference,
07:01where European leaders are grappling
07:03with this idea that America
07:04is not what America was.
07:06And Jonathan, when you look at this,
07:08how they are reckoning with it,
07:10and how Trump and his administration
07:12is pressing their case to the Europeans,
07:15how do you see that playing out?
07:17Well, I think the Europeans are right
07:19to look at the United States and think,
07:22you know what,
07:22we should probably not depend on them as much.
07:25We should come up with contingency plans,
07:27because the United States is no longer
07:29a trusted friend, trusted ally in many instances.
07:33Take, for instance, Greenland.
07:34It's become an adversary.
07:36And their wariness is not new.
07:39Four years ago, Vice President Harris
07:42went to the Munich Security Conference,
07:44gave a speech,
07:45and the first question to her
07:47from the president
07:47of the Munich Security Conference was,
07:51you know, President Biden said,
07:52America is back.
07:53But Madam Vice President,
07:54the question is, for how long?
07:56And now the Europeans have seen
07:58the answer to that question.
07:59So they're absolutely right
08:00to be skittish, wary,
08:02whatever synonym Mr. Thesaurus
08:05will throw out there.
08:06But David, we have seen some instances
08:09where European leaders have acknowledged
08:11that some of the things
08:12that Trump has pressed them to do,
08:14like to not rely on the United States as much,
08:17they are saying, some of them overtly,
08:21Trump is right.
08:22We do need to shore our own defenses up.
08:25But there's always a kernel of truth
08:27in every attack Trump makes
08:28until he overreacts and destroys.
08:31And I've said, you go to Trump,
08:32Trump is like, governs like,
08:34you go to the doctor saying I have acne,
08:35and he says, okay, we'll decapitate you.
08:37That will solve your acne.
08:38And that's what he does.
08:39He overreacts and destroys.
08:42And the difference is,
08:43somebody made, I think it was
08:44the German leader this week,
08:45said, we have shared interests still,
08:47but we don't have shared values.
08:49And I think that's the right distinction to make,
08:51because Trump fundamentally sees the world
08:53not as the Western alliance,
08:54which has been built since 1945.
08:57He sees the world as regional hegemons.
09:00And that's just not how Europe sees the world.
09:02And so he sees, Trump sees Russia over here,
09:05they're a hegemon, China's over there,
09:06they're a hegemon,
09:07we're a hegemon here in the Americas,
09:08and we get to rule our neighborhood.
09:11And the problem with that is that
09:13you're asking for an invitation for bloodshed
09:16over and over and again.
09:18And I mentioned this on the news era a month ago.
09:20If you go back to 2000,
09:22there were about 15,000 people dying in a war
09:24all around the world.
09:25Since 2013, it's been over 100,000 a year.
09:28That's death.
09:29That's death and violence
09:31caused by the destabilization
09:32of the American-led international order.
09:34And for people who didn't like that international order,
09:36wait till it goes away.
09:37I mean, I hear you.
09:39No one is here celebrating the idea
09:41that there's additional death.
09:42Do you think, though, Jonathan,
09:44that there is any utility
09:46in Trump driving a wedge here
09:49that has helped shoring up an alliance
09:52maybe in the long run,
09:53that when Trump is no longer here,
09:55that this will might clarify
09:57our alliance with our allies?
09:59I don't know.
10:00I don't see it that way
10:03in the way you pose it,
10:04because the way the Europeans
10:06are looking at the United States,
10:08it's this international order
10:11that's been eight decades running
10:14with the Western alliance,
10:15but the United States
10:16is the foundation of it.
10:18And so without the United States
10:20being there as a trusted ally,
10:23then what does it mean?
10:26What does it stand for?
10:28And, you know, great,
10:29they'll spend more money
10:29on their defense.
10:31They'll do all sorts of other things.
10:32But to David's point,
10:33if we're not sharing the same values,
10:36if Europe looks at us,
10:38the United States,
10:39and says, you know what,
10:40they're not like us.
10:42And so we need to just leave them out.
10:45In fact, hey, China,
10:47let's talk to you about more deals,
10:50more collaboration.
10:51Or to see some of that happening.
10:52Yeah.
10:54Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks,
10:55so nice to see you both.
11:27We'll see you both.
11:36You
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