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00:00for joining us here this hour. Really happy to have you here. Now, I'm not going to start here
00:03tonight where you think I might be starting, but just hear me out. Stick with me. You will see
00:08where this is going in good time. All right. Today, amid just the blitz of headlines of what
00:16has been a gigantic news day following a gigantic news week, you might not have noticed the news
00:23today. You might not have seen the headline today that today a federal court blocked the
00:28Trump administration from cutting energy funding just for blue states. This is billions of dollars
00:34Congress appropriated for clean energy projects of various kinds all over the country. Trump
00:39administration decided, and they admitted this, they decided that just in blue states, just in states
00:45that didn't vote for Trump, they would cut all of that funding. They'd leave the funding in place in
00:51states that voted for Trump. They would cut it in states that didn't vote for Trump. A federal court
00:57ruled that that is illegal and stopped the Trump administration from doing that. That ruling today
01:03came after another federal court today stopped Trump from shutting down a big offshore wind farm
01:11in Rhode Island and Connecticut. Trump's shutdown of that project, according to the courts today,
01:17was also illegal. And so yet another federal court blocked Trump on that as well. So that work on the
01:24wind farm will be able to go ahead. Both of those rulings today follow last night, yet another federal
01:30court blocking Trump, this time from cutting funding to the American Academy of Pediatrics. This is a
01:37doctor's group, a pediatrician's group that criticized the flock of ducks level insane quackery at Trump's
01:44Department of Health and Human Services under RFK Jr. Trump responded by canceling federal grants for the
01:51American Academy of Pediatrics. A judge has now ruled that that was illegal retaliation. And so Trump is
01:58blocked from doing that. That funding has to be reinstated. That ruling comes after another federal
02:03judge just blocked Trump from cutting off federal election funds to states in retaliation for them,
02:10not changing their election rules in ways that Trump wants. The judge said, quote,
02:15the Constitution assigns no authority to the president over federal election administration.
02:22And so Trump got blocked on that one, too. Shall I keep going? I could keep going.
02:27Another federal court just blocked Trump from freezing billions of dollars for child care
02:32and social services for kids, again, in Democratic run states as some kind of punishment against those
02:39states for electing Democrats, punishing them for that by cutting off the temporary assistance to
02:47needy families program. Because, you know, you know, what would Jesus do? Trump was also just blocked
02:55from a from doing that by by yet another federal court. It's it's almost like he is losing all the
03:02time
03:02and everywhere now. There may still be people in America who are shocked that Trump keeps breaking
03:09the law over and over again, blatantly and insistently. The courts no longer appeared to be
03:14shocked by that. And the courts now are just telling him no, very bluntly, every single day and often
03:21multiple times a day. And it's not even just the courts. As I know you are aware, last week in
03:28one
03:2948 hour stretch, we had a Senate vote for a war powers resolution to block Trump from any further
03:35military adventurism in Venezuela. Five Republican senators crossed over to side with Democrats to
03:42pass that war powers resolution. It was enough to advance that. It's going to get another vote in the
03:46Senate this week. That came right on the heels of 17 Republicans in the House breaking ranks with
03:53Trump and siding with Democrats on the Affordable Care Act to try to at least temporarily
03:58undo the disastrous decision Trump and Republicans made in their so-called Big Beautiful Bill,
04:05the decision to send tens of thousands of American families' health insurance rates through the roof.
04:1317 Republicans crossed over, defied Trump and joined with Democrats to pass that health care
04:18matter in the House. Now it's going to come to the Senate. Trump is now whining about how he might
04:23have to veto it if and when it passes in the Senate as well, because he definitely wants to make
04:27sure
04:28that people's health insurance premiums double or triple in cost for nothing other than something
04:35that he personally did. He apparently wants that. I mean, what we've just seen in Congress is one of
04:42the worst rebukes Trump has had from congressional Republicans since he has been back in office this
04:48whole disastrous year. And I got to tell you, this didn't get as much attention as it should,
04:55but right on the heels of that biggest rebuke that Trump has had in Congress, those series of
05:01decisions, both in the House and the Senate, Republicans crossing over to join with Democrats
05:05to rebuke Trump on multiple policy issues, right on the heels of the Senate giving Trump a one-finger
05:12salute on Venezuela and the House giving him a one-finger salute on what he did to people's health
05:16insurance. This did not get enough attention, but did you see this? Look, headline, Congress is
05:24rejecting Trump's steep budget cuts to science. Lead, Congress is racing to undo thousands of cuts
05:32to federal science programs that President Trump called for last year. Trump is trying to cut the
05:37National Science Foundation, 56 percent. Congress is now saying they will cut it less than one percent.
05:46Trump wanted to slash NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, you know, the weather.
05:52Congress's budget for NOAA is no cuts to NOAA, flat funding for NOAA. Trump wants to cut basic research,
05:59which has been the lifeblood of American technological innovation since World War II.
06:03Trump wants to cut basic research more than 33 percent. Congress instead is bumping up their
06:11budget, bumping up the budget for basic research by more than 2 percent. Trump is demanding all these
06:19cuts to science, and Congress is saying no, and this is a bipartisan thing. This started in the Senate
06:24as a bipartisan agreement. Last week, the House voted for it as well. I know it's like muscle memory to
06:32assume, A, that Congress does nothing, and B, if they ever defy that rule and do something, it's always
06:37something bad. But that is changing a little bit here, and it's changing all against Trump.
06:47And Republicans in the House are down to such a slim margin there now that if every Democrat is present
06:54at the moment, Republicans can only afford one defection on any given vote. They can only give up
07:00one Republican vote in the House and still pass things that their leadership supports.
07:08And they know they're going to get walloped in the midterms. And with moderate Democrat Mary
07:14Paltola announcing today that she's going to run against the unpopular Republican Alaska Senator Dan
07:19Sullivan, that means that Democrats are getting pretty close to a shot at taking over the Senate
07:24in the midterms as well. They've got a shot at taking over the Senate in addition to the near
07:31certainty that they will take over the House. We've got the courts pushing back harder and harder and
07:37now apparently losing that sense of shock they had that the administration really is just blatantly
07:42breaking the law all the time. The courts are finally getting it and pushing back and seeming to
07:48understand what it is they're up against. We've got the Congress, believe it or not, in some ways,
07:54pushing back. While simultaneously Republicans are losing any hope of hanging on to power in Congress,
08:00it looks like the Democrats will be taking over. Today, Democratic U.S. Senator Mark Kelly brought a
08:06new kind of fight against the Trump administration. He brought a high-powered lawsuit against Trump and
08:11against Pete Hegseth and the rando art collector fundraiser guy who Trump inexplicably named to be
08:17Navy secretary. Senator Kelly is suing to block their efforts to reduce him in rank and dock his
08:25retirement pay for the grave crime of saying out loud the true statement that U.S. service members
08:30are supposed to disobey illegal orders. He's now suing them for that. Speaking of suing the Trump
08:37administration, the city of Chicago and the state of Illinois and the state of Minnesota and the cities
08:43of St. Paul and Minneapolis have all brought major lawsuits tonight against the Trump administration
08:49to try to stop the attack by Trump's federal agents on those states and those cities.
08:56Trump's attack on Minneapolis in particular has been absolutely chaotic and bizarre and totally
09:04incoherent, even more so in the wake of the killing of Renee Nicole Good last week by an ICE officer
09:10who
09:10who last week shot her three times through her windshield and her open driver's side window.
09:16I mean, it's just been nuts in Minneapolis. In this one, Minneapolis home, these totally out of
09:21control, heavily armed officers broke down the door and rammed their way inside as the homeowner
09:28demanded to see a warrant allowing them to enter. The Associated Press reporting tonight that those agents
09:33didn't have a warrant from a judge authorizing their forced entry into a private residence,
09:38but they just did it anyway into a home with kids inside, apparently completely disregarding
09:43any applicable law. This was today in Minneapolis as well. A man named Christian Molina, a U.S. citizen,
09:50was driving south on 36th Street in South Minneapolis. He says he inadvertently made eye contact with an
09:57ICE officer who was lurking in an alley watching cars go by. The ICE agent then chased him and literally
10:03rammed his car into Mr. Molina, rammed his car into Mr. Molina's vehicle, into the rear driver's side of
10:12his car, and then demanded that Mr. Molina show his papers. Mr. Molina is a U.S. citizen.
10:18According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune tonight, quote, as agents confronted Christian Molina,
10:23dozens of community members came outside to disrupt them. The people who responded to that scene
10:28included a Minneapolis City Council member who told the paper that after Mr. Molina told the agents he
10:34knew his rights and that this was an illegal stop and he didn't need to show them anything. And after
10:39all those people poured into the street to support this guy, the agents, I kid you not, what did they
10:44do? They set off two tear gas canisters in the street and then ran away. That was their contribution
10:52to public order and safety in South Minneapolis today. Here's another standoff from this weekend.
10:59A woman in Minneapolis ordered DoorDash and ICE apparently chased the woman doing the delivery
11:05for DoorDash, chased her into the customer's home where she was dropping off the food because she works
11:11for DoorDash. The homeowner, in a fit of righteous rage, absolutely stood her ground and told ICE that
11:19they were not coming into her home to get this woman, that they needed a warrant to do it. And
11:23if
11:23they didn't have that warrant, she was not letting them in. And she called the cops on them and she
11:27called her neighbors and her neighbors came out and everybody was standing there blowing whistles and
11:32yelling at them. And eventually they left and they drove away without the freaking DoorDash driver
11:40who they were trying to pursue like she was Osama bin Laden into the caves, right?
11:46They fled. They left. They drove away after terrorizing everyone in that home and on that block.
11:54Even today, an hour outside Minneapolis, in St. Cloud, Trump's agents, dozens of them tried to
12:00muster some kind of military style show of force at a mini mall parking lot in St. Cloud, Minnesota.
12:07They were soon surrounded by hundreds of local residents telling them to get out.
12:11They were so overwhelmed with the way the neighborhood responded, Trump's agents got stuck there in the
12:17mini mall parking lot. A Democratic state senator had to intervene to ask the crowd to please let the
12:23federal agents leave because they otherwise couldn't. Finally, after about an hour, people allowed these
12:30tough guy masked agents to turntail and leave with their tails between their legs.
12:35This is how they're conducting themselves. They would appear to have absolutely no clue what
12:43they are doing. This is not what professional immigration law enforcement looks like. What
12:47this looks like is military style weapons and gear given to masked, unbadged secret police who
12:55appear to have learned their tactics by playing video games about real wars and fantasizing about being
13:00scary to women. And if they think by what they're doing, they are attracting people to their cause
13:08or intimidating people into not turning out to protest against them or into, to not turning out
13:14to, to watch what they're doing, to record what they're doing. Well, they're very seriously wrong about
13:19that. I mean, this is also today in Minneapolis, local school kids in Minneapolis on mass walking out of
13:27their school, to tell Trump's federal agents to leave them alone and get out of their town.
13:34Tonight, we're going to talk about what Minnesotans are doing to try to protect their schools,
13:39forming human chains around Minnesota public schools at pickup and drop off. The Wall Street
13:45Journal reporting this weekend on a surge in, quote, volunteers, many of them moms already involved in
13:50their schools using Google Docs to divvy up tasks, such as delivering groceries to immigrant families.
13:57Volunteers are on hand at drop off and pickup at schools with whistles to blow in case ICE agents
14:03show up. The Immigrant Defense Network telling the Washington Post that they have trained about
14:092,000 people total to be ICE observers in the Twin Cities. About 2,000 people total. But then the
14:15day
14:16after ICE killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis, they got a huge surge. They had 354 people show up
14:23in one day, the very next day, to be trained to be ICE observers. 354 people showed up in one
14:32day.
14:34Here today is Minneapolis's mayor, Jacob Fry, flanked by the state attorney general and other state leaders
14:39talking about their big new lawsuit against the Trump administration. The mayor saying, quote,
14:43Donald Trump should know that as long as federal agents are in our city acting unconstitutionally
14:49against our neighbors, we will continue to push back with everything we've got.
14:55Here are Democratic members of Congress turning up at the local ICE detention facility, the local ICE
15:01jail in Minnesota, demanding to be let in because as members of Congress, they are allowed by law to
15:07inspect any federal facility like that at any time with no notice. But these members of Congress were
15:14nevertheless turned away. Today, Democracy Forward went to court to force ICE and force the Trump
15:19administration to let those members of Congress in because that, in fact, is the law.
15:26And again, if they were hoping that their shambolic and chaotic violence would dissuade Americans from
15:34standing up to them, well, they do not understand Americans. They do not understand how we are wired.
15:41It is having the opposite effect. These were some of the huge protests this weekend against ICE and
15:48Trump in Minneapolis. And it wasn't just in Minneapolis. It was literally everywhere over these last few
15:59days. This was downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado, where Renee Nicole Good is originally from. This was
16:06a big protest this weekend in New York City against ICE and against Trump. And it wasn't just big cities
16:13like Minneapolis or even New York City. This was Clayton, Missouri this weekend. Clayton, Missouri. This was
16:20Memphis, Tennessee this weekend. This was Washington, D.C. this weekend, including protests outside the
16:28White House. And hold that thought because there's something else that's going to be happening in
16:32Washington, D.C. tomorrow that you're going to want to know about. We'll have more on that in a
16:36moment. This was Boston this weekend. Really big crowd in Boston protesting against Trump and against ICE.
16:41This was Carson City, Nevada this weekend. This was a protest this weekend in Huntington Beach,
16:49California, a famously MAGA city in Southern California. People out this weekend, they're
16:54protesting against Trump and against ICE. This was a really big protest this weekend in Texas,
16:59San Antonio, Texas. This weekend, there were big protests in Houston and in Dallas and in Fort Worth,
17:03but a big one in San Antonio. This was South Elgin, Illinois. This was Providence, Rhode Island this weekend.
17:11Last week, we told you about locals in Roxbury, New Jersey, protesting furiously and repeatedly
17:17against plans to build a new ICE facility in Roxbury, New Jersey. They protested this weekend
17:23against ICE and Trump. We're told that Roxbury is considering a resolution on that proposed ICE
17:27facility tomorrow. The mayor is expected to speak on it. This was Fairbanks, Alaska protests against
17:34Trump and ICE. The temperature at this protest in Fairbanks was minus 25 degrees.
17:40And look at people turning out to protest against ICE and the Trump administration.
17:46I have to tell you, I'm only scratching the surface here. Usually when we have this many
17:50protests to cover all over the country, it's because there's been some long planned thing
17:54where people had weeks of notice, right, for some, you know, upcoming next big protest. That was
17:59true with the first No Kings Day and the second No Kings Day. Also, the big hands-off protests that
18:05happened last spring. People had weeks of notice for those. There was lots of national organizing around
18:09them. People had a chance to get ready and make their plans. What happened these last few days
18:14was not that. This was essentially spontaneous, a spontaneous reaction to the killing of Renee
18:20Nicole Good. And it happened everywhere. Well over a thousand protests taking place over these last
18:26few days in every state in the country. And some of them, yes, were loosely organized under the same
18:31banner under the name, Ice Out for Good, honoring Renee Good. But again, this was not a, this was not
18:39a
18:39big, long lead time national organizing thing. This was spontaneous and instinctual everywhere.
18:48And so today's one of those rare days when I can actually show you the protests,
18:51not by just me individually giving you like first person coverage of every protest by people who were in
18:58them. I can actually today show you media coverage and headlines about the protests because every news
19:06outlet in the country covered these protests over the past few days. They were big. They were instant.
19:11They were instinctual. They were spontaneous. They were self-explanatory. They happened for a clear
19:16and obvious reason that everybody in the country instantly and instinctually understands.
19:23And so every paper in the country, every news source in the country had headlines like this,
19:27the Associated Press, anti-ice protesters assemble across U.S. after shootings in Minneapolis and
19:33Portland. USA Today, thousands march in Minneapolis and elsewhere to protest ICE. New York Times,
19:39anti-ice protests spread nationwide. CNN, anti-ice protests held across U.S. after agents' fatal
19:46shooting of a woman in Minneapolis. NPR, nationwide anti-ice protests call for accountability
19:52after Rene Good's death. Daily Beast, anti-ice protesters flood 500 cities days after Minneapolis
20:01killing. The Guardian newspaper in London, U.S. protests condemn ice killing of Rene Good and quote,
20:07a regime that is willing to kill its own citizens. Looking around the country, you see this everywhere.
20:14Salt Lake Tribune, ice out for good protests unfold in Salt Lake City and other Utah cities
20:19after Minneapolis killing. WFAA in Fort Worth, Texas. Hundreds gather in Fort Worth for ice out
20:25for good protest. In Nebraska, KETV, ice out for good protest draws protesters to central Omaha,
20:32Nebraska. KSHB in Missouri, a thousand demonstrators attend vigil and protest against ice in Kansas City.
20:40Spot on Alabama, locals protest ice shooting of Minneapolis women outside Huntsville, Alabama City Hall.
20:48In South Carolina, WACH, protesters at South Carolina Statehouse demand justice for Renee Good shot by
20:55ice. In Kentucky, WLKY, hundreds gather in Louisville to protest after ice agent fatally shoots woman in
21:02Minnesota. Calo News or Calo News in Arizona, quote, she was assassinated. Tucson residents pour out in
21:08protest after ice kills Minnesota woman. The Bonner County Daily Bee in Idaho. Over 200 attend Sandpoint,
21:18Idaho. Ice out for good protest. WSYX in Columbus, Ohio, killing our own citizens. Ohio protesters call
21:26for ice to leave, outraged by shootings. WTXL in Tallahassee, Florida, protest and vigil at Florida
21:33state capitol after deadly ice confrontation in Minnesota. I mean, all over the country, Wichita,
21:39Kansas, Charleston, West Virginia, East Cobb, Georgia, Rapid City, South Dakota, everywhere.
21:47The American people are reacting instinctively to what Trump is doing to us now. The American people
21:53are using their small d democratic muscle memory to respond reflexively
22:01to what is happening, to use our right of free speech, our right to freedom of assembly,
22:07to use it, to say no.
22:11And from this point that we're in this place of profound weakness for this historically unpopular
22:18president, no president at this point in his second term has had approval ratings
22:23this low other than Richard Nixon. And at this point in Richard Nixon's second term,
22:29he was less than a year away from resigning. From this point of profound weakness and unpopularity
22:36for this president, fueled by near universal moral revulsion at what he is doing to the American people,
22:44something that he apparently thinks he should respond to by becoming more extreme and more violent
22:49and more morally repulsive, thus radicalizing more and more American citizens against him every day.
22:54From this point of profound weakness and political malpractice, now he has decided to take a wild swing
23:04at the American economy and the U.S. dollar by threatening the chair of the Federal Reserve
23:10with criminal prosecution.
23:15Fed Chair Jerome Powell responded last night in an I will not be intimidated video statement.
23:23Multiple Republican senators have responded with their own moral and political revulsion,
23:29saying not only that they're against what Trump is doing and they're supporting Jerome Powell,
23:33but crucially, if this is how Trump is going to use the U.S. Justice Department,
23:38then maybe it's the U.S. Justice Department that needs to be investigated by Congress.
23:43It's Republican senators saying that. The Republican chairman of the House Financial Services Committee
23:49is condemning this Jeremiah against Jerome Powell as well. The rabidly right-wing Wall Street Journal
23:57editorial board is out tonight with an editorial calling this a, quote, self-defeating fiasco and a
24:03self-defeating scheme that should result in the, quote, firing of those responsible
24:08before they can be the cause of, quote, any more embarrassment.
24:16And, you know, economically, maybe you voted for the Republicans because you thought,
24:21oh, Republicans good with money. Trump has brought job growth in this country down to a 16-year low.
24:27Trump has dragged factory activity and manufacturing levels back to the Stone Age.
24:33At the micro level of individual American families finances, Trump's policies, not random
24:39external factors, but Trump's specific and deliberate policies have created deliberate man-made
24:48financial harm on health insurance costs, which he apparently accidentally exploded,
24:54on electricity costs, which he apparently accidentally exploded. And now for millions of Americans,
25:00he's going to be garnishing their wages for their student loans, too. Again, none of these are
25:05externalities. None of these are economic factors that are imposing on his presidency. These are all
25:11policies that Trump chose to choose, all of which are deliberately hurting American families
25:17economically, while he has broken the job market and absolutely failed in any rational attempt to
25:26tackle inflation. And now he's threatening to jail the Fed chief, which should devalue the dollar
25:33and inch us that much closer to needing a wheelbarrow full of bills to buy a loaf of bread.
25:41Who's on his side at this point? Who's he winning over?
25:47They said it couldn't be done, but Congress is waking up. Yes, this Congress. And I can hear you
25:55scoffing at me through the television. I can. Look up what I said about the science funding. I know you
25:59don't believe me. Just look it up. The Congress in its way is waking up. The courts are waking up.
26:05The people are absolutely fully awake. We are getting there, you guys. We are not even a year
26:12into this mess yet. And already it is all systems go. Stay with us tonight. We got a lot to
26:20get to.
26:25If the idea of killing Renee Nicole Good was to make people afraid to protest or afraid to go out
26:30and be
26:31an observer of ICE operations, you know, following agents, blowing whistles, monitoring what they're
26:36doing, taking photos and video of what they're doing, that kind of thing. If the idea was to scare
26:40people off doing things like that, it really seems to be having the opposite effect. If the idea was
26:47to make American cities and Americans who object to what ICE is doing back down, that very extra
26:52clearly is not working specifically in Minneapolis. Today, the state of Minnesota, along with the twin
26:58cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis, sued the Trump administration. They're calling the massing of
27:03Trump's federal agents there, quote, a federal invasion. City of Chicago and the state of Illinois
27:09filed a similar lawsuit today seeking a court order essentially to evict the plague of Trump's agents
27:15who have invaded their city and their state. If the point of surging thousands of federal agents into
27:22downtowns and strip malls and neighborhoods, the point of shooting people was to frighten Americans out of
27:29protesting against them and following them around and watching them like hawks, that is definitely failing.
27:36One of the places it's failing is in schools. For the countless and varied volunteer ice watch groups in
27:42Minneapolis right now, schools have become a real priority. I showed you footage earlier of school kids in
27:48Minneapolis walking out today in protest of ICE. At schools, drop-off and pick-up have been where
27:55volunteers have been forming human chains to protect students and staff as they come and go.
28:01The group Take Action, Minnesota, telling the Wall Street Journal that they've mobilized around a thousand
28:05volunteers, mostly parents, for public schools in Minneapolis. Volunteers have been showing up at drop-off
28:12and pick-up. They've been signing up to help immigrant families delivering groceries to them if that's what it takes,
28:17if they're too afraid to leave home. But they've got whistles when they're doing this work, whistles to
28:22blow in case ICE shows up to let everybody know what's happening to give people a chance to protect
28:27themselves. One leader of Take Action, Minnesota, telling the Wall Street Journal, quote, we wanted to have
28:33folks ready to respond. Amanda Otero continuing, quote, everyone is all aligned. We don't want ICE in our schools.
28:43Joining us now is Amanda Otero. She is a Minneapolis parent. She's co-executive director
28:47of Take Action, Minnesota. Ms. Otero, I really appreciate you taking the time to be here tonight.
28:51Thank you. Thank you for having me, Rachel. We showed a bunch of footage in the previous segment
28:59about some of the really chaotic violence that's been carried out by Trump's federal agents in your
29:06city and the way people are responding, the way people are responding both to the killing of Rene Good, but
29:12also
29:13responding spontaneously when those acts of violence are happening around the city. Let me just ask you how you're
29:19doing, how your community is doing, how you think people are holding up.
29:26You know, I'm really angry. A lot of us are angry. Let me take you back to last week, Tuesday
29:33morning at my child's
29:34preschool, as, you know, three and four and five-year-olds were getting dropped off in their little
29:40snowsuits. Parents and teachers looked up and not a block away. Federal agents were tear gassing neighbors and
29:48arresting legal observers. Parents and teachers worked quickly to get the kids inside and safe. And that's
29:54becoming a daily occurrence here in our neighborhoods. And so I'm, yeah, I'm feeling devastated at the
30:02trauma and the terror that we're putting our kids and our neighbors through. And I will also say I'm
30:09feeling really proud of Minneapolis. We have a lot of love and courage and folks are showing up to take
30:17care of each other. And we're not going to stop doing that. In terms of folks showing up, we've heard
30:24from some nonprofit groups and some sort of recently formed activist groups saying they've seen a real
30:30surge recently in volatilism and people wanting to do this kind of ice observation or kind of community
30:37response work, especially in the past week, especially in the week of Ms. Good being killed
30:42by an ice agent. Have you seen the same surge in interest at your organization?
30:49Absolutely. You know, we have had a surge of federal agents on the ground since December 1st,
30:56when Operation Metro Surge began. And every day that goes by, more and more people are joining us
31:03and playing all kinds of roles. As you've mentioned, Ice Watch and patrolling pickups and drop-offs,
31:09but also giving rides to students to school, delivering groceries for families, running errands for them,
31:16doing everything we can to keep our neighbors safe.
31:20In terms of the kind of involvement that you're seeing, are the people who are volunteering and
31:26working with your organization doing those kind of things you just described, is it generally people
31:30who have an activist history, people who've been involved in other sorts of activist groups and
31:34other issues over the years? Or are you finding that just regular civilian folks who've never really
31:40been involved in things before feel like this moment is different and this is a time to get involved,
31:45even if they haven't done this kind of work in previous parts of their lives?
31:50I do really feel that everybody, everybody whose values are being violated by this violence on our
31:56streets, many people who haven't necessarily, as you say, been an activist before are doing something.
32:03And, you know, there's a lot of roles to play. There's a lot of ways to plug in. And people
32:08are
32:08really, yeah, people are really meeting the moment. People who are inspired by what they're seeing in
32:15terms of the Minneapolis community response right now and by groups like yours, do you have any
32:19lessons learned or any advice for people in other cities around the country who are thinking they
32:23may want to do that kind of work or set up that kind of organization where they live?
32:30You know, there's no special formula. And it's really just about neighbors looking out for
32:38neighbors and doing the regular things that we do. Again, groceries, rides, looking out for each
32:44other on the street. And, you know, what I really want folks across the country to know about what's
32:50happening here in Minneapolis is that we need every single person, not just here, but everywhere,
32:56off the sidelines, calling for ICE to leave our state, to get out of our communities. And we need
33:03every elected official, you know, from the highest levels of government on down and from every
33:09political party joining us in that fight and in advocating to get ICE out of our communities.
33:16Off the sidelines. Amanda Otero, Minneapolis parent, co-executive director of Take Action Minnesota.
33:23Thank you so much for your time tonight. And good luck. Stay safe.
33:30All right. Much more news ahead here tonight. Stay with us.
33:36I mentioned at the top of the show this giant wave of protests across the country that we saw
33:41this weekend and over the past few days. Peaceful, clear, rapidly organized protests in response to
33:48the ICE killing of 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis. There's more protests on the way,
33:56including an atypical one that we're going to be watching closely tomorrow in Washington, D.C.
34:00The reason I say it's atypical is because this one is going to be at the headquarters of U.S.
34:06Customs and Border Protection in Washington. A vigil and protest there tomorrow. Democratic Senator
34:12Chris Murphy, Democratic Congressman Maxwell Frost, both expected to be there. Senator Murphy and
34:17Congressman Frost have both said they'll vote against any funding for the entire Department
34:22of Homeland Security as long as Trump keeps sending immigration agents to attack American cities.
34:28Ahead of that protest at CBP headquarters in D.C. tomorrow, organizers are asking Americans
34:35to do their part wherever they live. The group Indivisible is one of the organizers. They're urging
34:40Americans to contact their member of Congress, no matter who your member of Congress is,
34:45to tell your personal member of Congress that they need to vote no on any funding for the Department
34:51of Homeland Security unless DHS changes the way federal immigration agents are operating.
34:56The message from Indivisible is, quote, tell Congress to rein in ICE now. Ice out for good.
35:05Joining us now is Ezra Levin. He's the co-founder of Indivisible, which is one of the organizations
35:10behind tomorrow's rally and vigil in Washington. Ezra, it's nice to see you. Thank you very much
35:14for being here. It's been great to see you, Rachel. I want to ask you about this planned
35:20event tomorrow, but I want to ask you to open the aperture a little bit and talk to me about
35:27where you think we are right now, almost exactly one year since Trump was inaugurated for his second
35:32term. In terms of who is standing up against Trump, how people are standing up against him and what the
35:42protest movement in particular against him is accomplishing, what the status of it is. What's
35:49your view? Rachel, I hate to take us back to early 2025, but if your viewers don't mind, I'd like
35:55folks
35:55to remember how dark everything was back then. It wasn't just that Trump was coming in with his regime
36:02and his Project 2025 agenda. Everywhere we looked, elites were collapsing, whether it was media
36:08institutions or law firms or universities or leaders of the Democratic Party. They were looking for ways
36:14to just bow down to Trump. And I think the story of 2025 is the story of elites collapsing in
36:22the face
36:22of an authoritarian threat. And normal, everyday people saying, uh-uh, we're not going to accept
36:30this. Starting with hands-off in April with 1,300 events nationwide, to No Kings 1 in June on Donald
36:36Trump's birthday, to No Kings 2 in October. We saw three of the five largest protests in American history
36:44last year. And we're 12 days into this year, Rachel, and we've already seen another one of the largest
36:51protests in history against this regime. And these were organic protests that came together, as you
36:58said, in the speaks of 48 hours. So I think where we are now is one, an authoritarian regime that
37:06is
37:06undeniably weakened compared to where it was a year ago. Its support is drastically lower. It has
37:13met defeat again and again and again at the ballot box and in the courtroom and in the court of
37:18public
37:19opinion. And also, we, us pro-democracy Americans, we have not won yet. Because a weakened authoritarian
37:28regime is in many ways more dangerous. And I hate to say this, Rachel, but I believe it to be
37:32the case.
37:33I think it's going to be worse before it gets better. But I think it's going to get better because
37:38we're going to make it better. We saw what making it better looks like. We saw organic outrage,
37:44which is the responsibility of Americans everywhere, to display outrage right now at what this regime
37:51is doing. That outrage is our job. The event tomorrow is with elected officials. Elected officials can
37:58display outrage. I like some outrage from elected officials. But their job, their job is to act, to use the
38:06leverage that they have to make our lives better. And that's what Chris Murphy, and that's what Maxwell
38:12Frost. And that's what some leaders at the local level are talking about doing now. We, as Americans,
38:17need to cheer them on. And for those Democrats and other elected officials from any party who are not
38:23standing up in defense of their constituents, we need to put the pressure on them so we see some change.
38:30Ezra, I started off the show tonight talking in part about what's going on in Congress, where we do
38:35actually see some signs of life. The War Powers Resolution against what Trump did in Venezuela
38:41in the Senate, the discharge petition in the House on health insurance premiums, on the Affordable Care
38:49Act, even an effort that didn't work, but an effort mounted, a serious effort mounted to overturn
38:55two Trump vetoes. We are expecting more from Congress, including in its funding bills. We are seeing them
39:04act to, for example, completely counteract Trump's demanded cuts to science, including basic science
39:13and the National Science Foundation and these things. And I can feel, I can feel through the ether
39:20people responding to that by dismissing it and saying, oh, Congress doesn't matter.
39:24The legislative branch of government doesn't do anything. They're only a source of outrage or
39:29disappointment. There's no reason to look to them for anything. But if we are standing up our
39:34democracy, if we are trying to backstop our democracy, part of it is Congress asserting
39:38itself. I feel like what you are talking about tomorrow from Senator Murphy and Congressman Frost,
39:43bringing them to CBP headquarters, talking about defunding homeland security,
39:49what we are seeing, the sort of little sparks of life in Congress is actually, to me, quite central
39:55to the process of defending small-D democracy and making sure that our constitutional republic survives.
40:02I wonder if you have the same sense of American cynicism about that right now, but also its
40:08possibility.
40:10Look, Congress is our voice in the federal government. The good news about the event tomorrow is while it
40:16is in Washington, D.C., and it's at 5 p.m., please come on down if you're in the area,
40:20you don't have to go
40:22to Washington, D.C. to have your voice heard, Rachel. You've got one U.S. representative and two U.S.
40:28senators.
40:28And at the end of this month, not after the midterms, not sometime in the distant future, at the end
40:34of this
40:35month, those representatives and those senators are going to vote on whether to empower Trump to launch
40:42more wars and send more secret police forces to your communities to terrorize and murder residents of those
40:50communities. They have power. The question is whether they use it. How do we get them to do their job
40:56to
40:57use the power that they've got? We use our power, which is our voice. Now is the time to make
41:02some
41:02noise, Rachel. Now is the time to make some noise. So you should be calling your members of Congress if
41:08you're watching this tomorrow. You should be showing up at their district offices and telling them,
41:14now is the time for you to stand up for me. I am outraged. It's your time to act.
41:20Ezra Levin, the co-founder of Indivisible. Ezra, thank you very much for your time tonight. Good luck.
41:26We'll be right back. Stay with us.
41:30All right. This involves both a scoop and something to watch out for tomorrow.
41:35Back in September, the White House put pressure on Trump's handpicked U.S. attorney in the Eastern
41:40District of Virginia that he had to bring charges against former FBI Director James Comey and New
41:46York Attorney General Tish James. Trump's U.S. attorney in Virginia quit in response to that
41:51pressure. So Trump replaced him with Lindsey Halligan, a White House aide who had never before
41:56prosecuted a case. She actually did manage to bring charges against Comey and Tish James for a hot minute
42:02before a federal judge dismissed the charges, finding, among other things, that Lindsey Halligan had been
42:08illegally appointed to that job, that she was not, in fact, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District
42:14of Virginia. The Justice Department is appealing that, but apparently the administration has
42:19nevertheless been trying to resurrect the case against James Comey anyway, and now they have
42:25failed at it again. Today, MSNOW's Carol Lennig and Ken Delaney were first to report that
42:32Trump's Justice Department has fired now the second-in-command under Lindsey Halligan at that
42:38U.S. attorney's office because he also declined to pursue the Comey case. And this is maybe not the
42:45best time for Lindsey Halligan to be without a second-in-command in that office because, get this,
42:50in a totally different case, a different federal judge has ordered that Lindsey Halligan has until
42:56tomorrow to explain to the court why she is still going around calling herself the U.S. attorney for
43:03the Eastern District of Virginia when, legally and plainly, she is no such thing. The judge has
43:08ordered that, quote, Ms. Halligan shall further explain why her identification does not constitute a
43:14false or misleading statement. The judge says that could, quote, constitute misconduct and be grounds for
43:21discipline. Again, she has to explain why she's still calling herself a U.S. attorney. That response
43:27from Lindsey Halligan is due tomorrow. Watch this space.