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00:00All right, we begin tonight with a president in crisis, all of his own making.
00:04He's deeply unpopular with the American people, and over the next hour, we are going to discuss
00:08a variety of reasons and consequences for Donald Trump's tanking approval ratings.
00:13The economic news is bad, and voters don't think he's doing enough about that.
00:17We saw on Tuesday the enthusiasm at the ballot box is with the Democrats, not with Donald
00:22Trump's Republican Party, and now he's started a war that, according to lawmakers who've
00:26seen this nation's most sensitive intelligence, he had no legitimate reason to start.
00:31The administration has also admitted as much by offering multiple and, at times, conflicting
00:36reasons for this war.
00:38So, unsurprisingly, this is a war that, like the president himself, is deeply unpopular.
00:45Peter Baker summed it up this way in his analysis for The New York Times, quote,
00:49President Trump likes to assert that he has accomplished things no other president has.
00:53With the opening of his military assault against Iran, he has achieved another distinction.
00:58He is the first president in the era of modern polling to take the United States to war without
01:04the support of the public, end quote.
01:07Now, this war is unpopular because over the last 25 years, this nation has already been
01:11through two wars that dragged on and on and on.
01:15Far too many members of our military paid the ultimate price for those wars, returning home
01:20in flag-draped coffins.
01:22Far too many Iraqi and Afghan citizens were killed.
01:25Trillions of dollars were spent.
01:26And there's been precious little to point to from either war that can be called an accomplishment.
01:32And yet, somehow, here we are again.
01:35And according to every poll taken since this war started, most of this nation is watching
01:39in horror, wondering just what the hell is going on.
01:44Today, Donald Trump made his clearest comments yet on what he wants in his war of choice against
01:49Iran.
01:49It's regime change.
01:51He posted on social media, quote,
01:53There will be no deal with Iran except unconditional surrender and the selection of a great and
01:58acceptable leader.
02:01Who's supposed to surrender?
02:03What leaders?
02:04The citizens of Iran?
02:06Does Donald Trump think that they're reading his social media posts?
02:09And never mind that Iran's foreign minister said yesterday that Iran is not looking to
02:13negotiate with the United States, let alone surrender.
02:16That's even as Israel launched a new wave of attacks on Iranian infrastructure in Tehran
02:22tonight, including the country's primary international airport.
02:25Donald Trump and his top officials have not ruled out the possibility of sending in ground
02:29troops.
02:30Officials told The Washington Post about a sudden change of plans for the 82nd Airborne Division,
02:35which specializes in ground combat.
02:37Quote, The army in recent days abruptly canceled a major training exercise for the headquarters
02:42element of an elite paratrooper unit, fueling speculation within the Defense Department
02:47that soldiers specializing in ground combat and a range of other missions may be sent to
02:52the Middle East as the conflict with Iran widens.
02:56Today, we learned that Russia is providing Iran with intelligence that it can use to target
03:00American forces in the Middle East.
03:02Citing multiple sources, The Washington Post calls it, quote,
03:05the first indication that another major U.S. adversary is participating even indirectly
03:10in the war.
03:12Russia has passed the location of U.S. military assets, including warships and aircraft.
03:17Analysts said that the sharing of intelligence would fit the pattern of Iran's strikes against
03:22U.S. forces, including command and control infrastructure, radar and temporary structures like the one in Kuwait,
03:29where six service members were killed.
03:32But here's the interesting thing.
03:33Watch how Donald Trump dismissed a question about Russia helping Iran today.
03:40It sounds like the Russians are helping Iran target and attack Americans now.
03:47That's an easy problem compared to what we're doing here.
03:51But can I be honest?
03:53It's just I have a lot of respect for you.
03:57You've always been very nice to me.
03:59What a stupid question that is to be asking at this time.
04:03We're talking about something else.
04:06What a stupid question to be asking at this time.
04:10I wonder what left-wing liberal outlet the reporter who asked that question was from.
04:15Oh, it was Steve Doocy from Fox News asking a question about a war in which America is involved,
04:23in which so far six people have died, six service members have died, lots of other people have died.
04:28And the president called that a stupid question.
04:33In the next 12 hours, there will be a dignified transfer for six U.S. service members who lost their
04:37lives in Donald Trump's war of choice.
04:39It will take place at Dover Air Force Base at 10 a.m. tomorrow.
04:43As the Trump administration prepares to welcome home the first of what could be more dead U.S. soldiers today,
04:48the White House inexplicably released...
04:52I just want to make sure you're sitting down for this.
04:54They released this video mashup of old movies, cartoons, Breaking Bad, and War.
05:04Wake up, Daddy Sean.
05:06Welcome home, sir.
05:08Strengthen on us.
05:08Strengthen on us.
05:09What will you do without freedom?
05:11Mavericks end up.
05:16You can't conceive of what I'm capable of.
05:19I'm finishing this fight.
05:21Yeah, I'm thinking I'm back.
05:24I'm here to fight for truth and justice in the American way.
05:26I am the danger.
05:28Yes, sir.
05:29Time to find out.
05:31Maximum effort.
05:33Here it comes.
05:37More!
05:38Now in this!
05:40Slawless victory.
05:45That came from your White House.
05:47Over 1,200 people in nine different countries are dead since last Saturday.
05:53And according to UNICEF, more than 190 children have been reported killed in the region since the weekend's military escalations.
05:59This includes 181 children in Iran, seven children in Lebanon, three children in Israel, and one child in Kuwait.
06:08Many of those Iranian children were among the roughly 175 killed in an attack on a girls' elementary school on
06:14Saturday.
06:15And now we're learning that the U.S. is likely responsible for that attack, with the highest reported civilian death
06:21toll so far in this war.
06:23Evidence assembled by the New York Times, quote, indicates the school building was severely damaged by a precision strike that
06:29occurred at the same time as attacks on an adjacent naval base
06:32operated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and official statements that U.S. forces were attacking naval targets near the
06:39Strait of Hormuz,
06:40where the IRGC base is located, suggest they were most likely to have carried out the strike, end quote.
06:46Donald Trump's war is not making America stronger.
06:50In fact, our next guest, Professor Timothy Snyder, believes that the opposite is true.
06:53Quote, we are at war now, a war that is transparently one of a series of masculinity contests.
06:59Our American strongman is strong because he is stronger than the other strongmen.
07:03He can abduct Maduro.
07:05He can assassinate Khamenei.
07:06He is performing relative strength at huge cost to others.
07:10It's another question, of course, as to whether any of this makes the United States stronger.
07:14The use of force in this way is obviously illegal in terms of both international and domestic law.
07:19Breaking international and domestic institutions will tend to make the United States as a country weaker rather than stronger.
07:27That's a tragedy made all the worse by the lives lost on both sides in a war that is making
07:31this nation weaker.
07:33Donald Trump said something to Time magazine about that loss of life yesterday,
07:37and I think historians of the future will point to it as one of the most callous and confounding things
07:41he's ever uttered while in office,
07:44and that's saying something.
07:45Here's what he said.
07:52Today, at the funeral of the late Reverend Jesse Jackson, a different American president spoke words that feel like a
07:58true antidote
07:59to the nihilism of the current occupant of the Oval Office.
08:04Every day you wake up to, to things you just didn't think were possible.
08:11Everywhere we see greed and bigotry being celebrated and bullying and mockery masquerading as strength.
08:22So it may be tempting to get discouraged, to give in to cynicism.
08:29It may be tempting for some to compromise with power and grab what you can,
08:39or even for good people to maybe just put your head down and wait for the storm to pass.
08:48But this man, Reverend Jesse Lewis Jackson, inspires us to take a harder path.
08:57His voice calls on each of us to be heralds of change, to be messengers of hope,
09:03to step forward and say, send me, wherever we have a chance to make an impact,
09:10whether it's in our school, or our workplaces, or our neighborhoods, or our cities.
09:14Not for fame, not for glory, or because success is guaranteed, but because it gives our life purpose.
09:24Because it aligns with what our faith tells us God demands.
09:29And because if we don't step up, no one else will.
09:35Hey, earlier I played a recording of somebody asking the president a question about Iran's, Russia's involvement in the war.
09:41I said it was Steve Ducey, it was actually Steve Ducey's son, Peter Ducey, also a question from Fox News.
09:46A very relevant question that was asked of the president that the president laughed off and called him stupid for
09:52asking.
09:52Leading off our discussion tonight is Timothy Snyder, a professor of history at the University of Toronto.
09:56He's the author of the New York Times bestsellers on freedom and on tyranny.
10:00Timothy, thank you for being with us.
10:02I think it's noteworthy, for better or for worse, whether wars are justified or not.
10:07For better or for worse, generally when America heads into a war, even the last two that have been pretty
10:11disastrous for us,
10:12there's a rallying around the flag effect.
10:15There's some sense that we're all in this thing together.
10:17And then over time, that support tends to dwindle because body bags come in and costs go up and it's
10:23not clear what we're doing.
10:24We're starting underwater on this one.
10:26The majority of, the overwhelming majority of Americans are not interested in this war,
10:30do not believe this war is legal, and do not understand why we're doing this.
10:36Yeah. I mean, it's as though we've gone through the first year of the war in the first minute or
10:40the first day, right?
10:42Like, we're already at the point where Americans understand that there was no plan.
10:46We're already at the point where we understand that their leaders have lied to them.
10:50We're already at the point where we're feeling the costs of it.
10:54And I think the reason why we're already at that point is that it's pretty clear that the reasons that
10:59this war started had nothing to do with American national interest.
11:03At best, they had to do with the interests of oligarchs around Mr. Trump and not necessarily American ones.
11:09And it's also pretty transparently obvious that insofar as this has to do with America, it has to do with
11:15the manipulating Americans.
11:16It has to do with trying to get us to rally around the flag.
11:19It has to do with getting us to give up on our right to elections.
11:23I think people have already seen through all of that.
11:26Talk to me about, there's an issue here, and this, there are a lot of people who have real issue
11:32with the Iranian regime.
11:34They are murderous. They are dictatorial. There are a lot of bad things.
11:38But we had a deal with them back in 2015. Then Donald Trump pulled us out of that deal.
11:42Then he apparently wanted to get back into some sort of a deal.
11:44And even if he did succeed, the Iranians seem to claim that they were further along in these discussions than
11:49the Americans say they were as of last Thursday.
11:52But let's say that were true. How does anybody make a deal with Donald Trump anymore?
11:58Yeah, I mean, I can't help but comment on what you say.
12:00We did make a deal with Iran, and we tossed that deal out the window.
12:04And the reason we did it was because Trump needed to take credit for it, and he had to take
12:09credit away from Barack Obama, because Barack Obama is not allowed to succeed in anything.
12:13And so then here we are, right? Here we are fighting a war because you can't negotiate.
12:19And not only do we not negotiate in good faith, we then essentially said, OK, we're going to send you
12:24home, and we're going to try to kill you, the first tier, the second tier, the third tier, the fourth
12:28tier of your government.
12:29We're going to try to kill you all.
12:31How can anyone negotiate with us after that?
12:35I agree completely.
12:37So here's the issue.
12:40It's unclear.
12:41When we were bombing boats in Venezuela, and it was supposedly about drugs, and then we went into Venezuela, we
12:46took out Maduro, and it wasn't about drugs.
12:48It was actually about oil.
12:50Now we're – the president's not even asking for Congress, for the legal authority to prosecute this war.
12:56It sort of just seems we're all being set up for the idea that Donald Trump doesn't – isn't going
13:01to follow any rules.
13:02And I don't know where that leads.
13:03I don't know whether that leads to the invasion of Greenland or the taking over of Canada or the federalizing
13:07of elections.
13:08But it's – he's setting the – he's set the table well for the idea that Donald Trump doesn't have
13:12to follow rules.
13:14Yeah.
13:14I mean, on the one hand, this is already a successful attempt to take powers that he doesn't have, right?
13:20He is the commander-in-chief.
13:21But this isn't a war.
13:23He hasn't gone to Congress.
13:24He's exercised – people are letting him exercise an authority that he doesn't really legally have, and that's terrible.
13:30On the other hand, it's rather good that this is incredibly unpopular.
13:33It's rather good that people are observing it.
13:36And terrible though it might be, in every respect, it's also useful to see how incredibly incompetent he is around
13:44this.
13:44Because the way we're not going to get to the electoral scenario, which is the one that matters, is that
13:50people recognize,
13:51hmm, I don't want to sacrifice my political life, my future, my reputation to somebody who's doing this to the
13:58country.
13:59I don't want to wreck the republic on behalf of this guy who's making a mess of the world.
14:05Well, people associate you with the study of democracy and tyranny.
14:08You're a student of war.
14:09You've studied wars, including the war that's going on between Ukraine and Russia.
14:15They're never as simple and easy as Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth would have you believe.
14:21First, it was going to be really short.
14:22Then it was going to be four weeks.
14:23Now it's going to be eight weeks.
14:24So within the first day, it had gone from four weeks to eight weeks.
14:27We are fighting a war against a country with 93 million people that is heavily armed and has asymmetric ways
14:34of fighting wars against us.
14:36This could end up very badly.
14:39Yeah.
14:39I mean, all the usual rules apply.
14:41War is always unpredictable.
14:43The enemy gets a vote.
14:44And the reasons you start a war, if you have any, right, but the reasons you start a war are
14:49usually not the reasons you finish the war with.
14:51All those usual rules apply.
14:53But then there are a couple of riders.
14:55Number one is that Trump and Hegseth and, unfortunately, many of the people around them are very, very incompetent.
15:03And this is a point that cannot really be overstated, because as terrible as the Iranian regime is, they're not
15:10stupid.
15:11And I'm afraid that the people who are running the war on our side, I'm afraid that adjectives of that
15:15sort could be usefully applied to them.
15:18And the second rider that has to be applied is that our goals here are far more incoherent than usual.
15:25The idea is that they're going to regime change and they're going to unconditionally surrender.
15:30It's unclear who regime changes to what, who's going to unconditionally surrender.
15:34And I'm noticing today that Mike Johnson is basically saying, well, they don't have to, we're not actually at war,
15:40so we can decide whether they've unconditionally surrendered or not.
15:44And we can just go home, right?
15:46We can just say this was never a war and we can just turn around and go home.
15:50If only it were that simple.
15:52Tim Snyder, thanks as always, my friend, Professor Timothy Snyder at the University of Toronto.
15:56All right, coming up, the Constitution is unambiguous about who decides when the United States goes to war.
16:02Our next guest, Judge J. Michael Ludig, will join us to discuss why Donald Trump's war in Iran is illegal.
16:09That's next.
16:12The Constitution is very clear about who decides when the United States goes to war.
16:17The Congress shall have the power to declare war, it says in the Constitution.
16:21More than two centuries ago, James Madison warned that, quote,
16:24the executive is the branch of power most interested in war and most prone to it.
16:29Writing to Thomas Jefferson in 1798, Madison said that's why the Constitution, quote,
16:34vested the question of war in the legislature.
16:37But over time, that balance has shifted.
16:40Presidents of both parties have gradually taken on more authority to act militarily
16:45without explicit approval from Congress.
16:48The Republican vote against the Iran War Powers resolution this week
16:51may be the clearest example yet of that shift,
16:54or at least how complete that shift has become under Donald Trump.
16:58A shift that under Trump has become far more explicit than it's been in earlier years.
17:03Trump says he was using his authority to carry out strikes on Iran
17:06because the United States faced an imminent threat.
17:09Or as he put it, quote,
17:10it was my opinion that they were going to attack first.
17:13It was my opinion that they were going to attack first.
17:16On Wednesday, the Democratic Congressman Jim McGovern said this.
17:21Why wasn't Donald Trump in favor of regime change until this weekend?
17:25Why did he campaign on swearing he would never send American kids to fight and die in the Middle East?
17:32Republicans can't answer because they were against war with Iran
17:36until exactly the second Donald Trump decided to go to war.
17:40And now they're all running around sounding like neocon lunatics.
17:44America can't take this level of gaslighting.
17:47I went to the classified briefing.
17:49There was no imminent threat.
17:52I guess unless Republicans want to redefine the word imminent to mean stretching back 47 years.
17:58This whole thing is just so transparently built on lies.
18:04Our next guest, Judge J. Michael Ludig, co-authored a piece stating that Donald Trump, quote,
18:09has embroiled the United States in another illegal war.
18:12Less than two months after an unconstitutional and unauthorized U.S. military operation in Venezuela,
18:17Trump has launched a full-scale bombing campaign against Iran.
18:21The fact that presidents have long elided this law and Congress has let them do so
18:25should not detract from its plain language and intent.
18:28Trump's decision to go it alone in violation of this vast corpus of constitutional statutory
18:33treaty and other obligations has not only resulted in the deaths of at least four American
18:38service members, but also has caused widespread civilian death and injury across the Middle East.
18:44The bombing of a girls' elementary school in Iran with about 150 casualties is an ominous
18:50sign of what could come if this war continues.
18:53Dictators and aspiring dictators all too often start foreign wars to distract from or build
18:59support for their subversion of democracy at home.
19:02The United States remains a democracy.
19:05Our president should not be allowed to use war to subvert the rule of law at home or abroad.
19:12Joining me now is Judge Michael J. Michael Ludig, who served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for
19:16the Fourth Circuit.
19:17Judge Ludig, thank you for being with us.
19:19You are you're a jurist.
19:20We use you for a lot of things having to do with democracy.
19:23But you actually have specific expertise with respect to this topic.
19:27You served in the White House in the early 1980s.
19:30You worked in the Department of Justice in the early 1990s.
19:33And some of your work actually involved war powers issues and the inherent conflict between
19:38Congress and the executive on issues like this.
19:43That's correct, Ali, especially during my time at the Department of Justice when I headed what's
19:50known as the Office of Legal Counsel within the department.
19:54That office is responsible for resolving constitutional and other legal disputes within and for the
20:03executive branch.
20:04In that role, the head of the office and I, during the years that I was there, dealt essentially every
20:13day with the war powers of the United States, including the constitutional power to declare war in Article
20:23Article 1, Section 8.
20:25Ali, you know, the listening to your opening, there has been a gradual shift over the past 250 years
20:37in favor of the executive over the Congress.
20:43But what we are witnessing today with this war in Iran is anything but the gradual next step, if you
20:53will.
20:54This is a step unlike any other that any president has taken in the conduct of war up to this
21:04point.
21:04For instance, this is seriously more than his attack of Iran earlier.
21:14But with every unconstitutional action this president takes, he proves over and over and over again the wisdom of the
21:24Constitution
21:25and the genius of the Constitution's separation of powers.
21:30Before the launch of this attack, the reasons the president gave were regime change and an imminent threat to the
21:39United States.
21:41Neither of those were sufficient to justify a war without congressional authorization.
21:47And every day thereafter, as your previous guest noted, the president and his administration's reasons for the war
21:56and the objectives for the war have shifted daily, every day.
22:03Meanwhile, every day, the war has grown in both scope and projected duration.
22:11As we were just told today, you know, the president demanded an unconditional surrender from Iran.
22:22Well, if this isn't a war, then what are they unconditionally surrendering to and for?
22:31The president of the United States believes this is a war and so does the Congress of the United States.
22:38But the Republican members of Congress are, you know, pretending to the American people that it's not a war
22:45because they don't want to be held accountable for their exercise of the war making power.
22:56Frankly, it is their power and their power alone clear to the American people now that the Congress of the
23:03United States
23:04has abdicated its powers almost across the board, you know, to this president.
23:10You write in The Contrarian, a piece for The Contrarian, you said,
23:15absent approval from the U.N. Security Council, the use of military forces permitted only in self-defense under Article
23:2251.
23:23Trump's openly expressed objective of initiating regime change does not fall within the narrow exception for self-defense
23:29outlined in Article 51 and is thus an illegal use of force.
23:33In addition, deliberately targeting a head of state, even a dictator such as Iran's supreme leader,
23:38is an illegal act of aggression under international law.
23:41And launching strikes during active diplomatic negotiations, which were ongoing during February,
23:46arguably violates the principle of good faith enshrined in Article 2 of the U.N. charter.
23:51I mean, this assumes that Donald Trump knows anything about the U.S. charter or would read it,
23:57but your point as a retired judge is that there are laws, there are international laws, there are U.S.
24:04laws.
24:04Nothing supports this action.
24:08Nothing supports this particular waging of war by this president.
24:14Nothing whatsoever.
24:15But as you recite those various applicable provisions of law, I'm reminded that through all of contemporary history
24:28and with the use of military force abroad,
24:35I have always believed, with respect to every single incident by every other prior president,
24:43that there were good faith reasons and good faith reasons in law to believe that the president
24:52could conduct the military operations that he did without congressional authorization.
24:58This is unlike any of those instances in all of American history.
25:05There is not even an arguable basis now, days into the operation,
25:13even if there were an argument on day one, which there was not,
25:19that this president could have gone to war without authorization from Congress.
25:27It's worth noting, as you just did, that Congress could have provided authorization
25:35for a military operation without declaring a war.
25:42And the president of the United States understood that, but he didn't want to ask Congress for that.
25:49He didn't seek it.
25:50No.
25:50He did not seek an authorization of the use of military force from them.
25:54So it's a weird situation.
25:55You describe tensions in the 80s and 90s that are built into the system.
26:00This isn't even tension.
26:01The president didn't ask.
26:02Congress didn't give.
26:03And now we are apparently in this weird state of limbo that looks and smells a whole lot like war
26:09to the rest of us.
26:10Judge, good to have you here.
26:11As always, thank you for joining us tonight and offering your expertise.
26:14Judge J. Michael Ludig.
26:16All right, coming up, Donald Trump's economy is failing.
26:19Gas prices are soaring as Trump's war in Iran continues.
26:21And terrible new jobs numbers here at home have the unemployment rate moving in the wrong direction.
26:26We'll talk about that next.
26:29Dow falls 450 points, posts worst week in nearly a year as oil tops 90.
26:35Jobs data disappoints.
26:37That's how CNBC summed up a brutal day for the American economy and for Americans struggling
26:41with the cost of living.
26:43Triple A reports that six days into Trump's Iran war, the national average for gas has jumped
26:47to $3.32 a gallon.
26:50Today is the first Friday of the month.
26:52That means it was the first jobs report day of the month.
26:55You got Friday.
26:57We had February's jobs out now.
26:58You know, the day when the government reports how many jobs have been created.
27:02Negative 92,000.
27:04This country lost a net 92,000 jobs in February, pushing the unemployment rate up to 4.4 percent.
27:10And that's not all.
27:11The New York Times reports revisions to previous months bolstered the case that the job cuts in
27:15February were consistent with a broader decline rather than a blip.
27:18In December, employers shed 17,000 jobs, down from an earlier estimate of a gain of 48,000.
27:25Hiring figures for January were also revised downward slightly to 126,000.
27:31Taken together, the job growth for the last three months effectively slowed to zero.
27:37Even Trump's Labor Secretary, Lori Chavez de Reymour, could not deny how bad this jobs report
27:42actually is.
27:46Madam Secretary, 92,000 jobs out in February.
27:51Fewer jobs in health care.
27:53Fewer jobs for information services because of AI.
27:56The weather hurt things.
27:58Government employment down.
27:59If you add it all up, it doesn't look good for the Trump economy.
28:05Yeah, I couldn't agree with you.
28:07I think we have to address the fact that this is not a good report in its raw numbers.
28:11But we have to also talk about why this possibly has happened, this snapshot in time.
28:17It was mentioned, the weather.
28:19We saw health care numbers go down.
28:21We saw a record strike in California, over 30,000 jobs lost there.
28:27But that has been resolved.
28:29We're recognizing what happened this month, and we're going to stay laser focused to bring
28:32those jobs numbers up.
28:35Laser focused.
28:37I think we know what it looks like when Donald Trump is laser focused on something, and it's
28:41not jobs.
28:43The most beautiful ballroom, I believe it's because I built many a ballroom.
28:47I believe it's going to be the most beautiful ballroom anywhere in the world.
28:51What a view.
28:52This is the door to the ballroom.
28:54We're ahead of schedule in the ballroom and under budget.
28:56It's going to be, I don't think there'll be anything like it in the world, actually.
29:02He can focus on the ballroom because, as he said, he's solved inflation.
29:05Given all that, it's no surprise that a new poll shows that 61% of Americans disapprove
29:11of how Donald Trump is handling the economy.
29:14Take a look at that.
29:1438% approved.
29:16Donald Trump's handling the cost of living.
29:1732% approved.
29:1967% disapprove.
29:20It's very hard to find these kinds of numbers.
29:22And by the way, Donald Trump, as you know, that 30, 32% is kind of as low as it
29:26gets for
29:26him.
29:26So it's kind of his equivalent of zero.
29:28Here's what people in the same poll said about the prices they're paying compared to early
29:332025.
29:3581% said they're paying more for groceries than a year ago.
29:3979% say their utility costs are up.
29:4171% say their health care costs are up.
29:4365% say they're paying more for housing.
29:4651% say they're paying more for gasoline.
29:49We should note this poll was mostly conducted before Trump's Iran war sent oil prices surging.
29:56So this could all change.
29:57Joining us now is Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union.
30:01Heather, nice to see you.
30:02Thank you for being with us.
30:03Notwithstanding the fact that, generally speaking, prices go up.
30:06And if they're not going up, you have a different sort of economic problem.
30:09There is a sense amongst Americans that prices are going up faster than their wages are going
30:14up.
30:14And that was the case for a long time.
30:17It sort of evened out a few years ago.
30:18But there is certainly a perception amongst Americans that something's happening.
30:22Prices are getting away from them.
30:24No doubt about it.
30:26And there's a there there.
30:27There's a reason that affordability is top of mind for Americans.
30:30And a key reason is it's I call it whack-a-mole inflation.
30:34So just when one area of your budget gets under control, like we finally have the egg prices
30:40have come down, something else spikes.
30:43And recently, it's been a big spike in utility costs and those electricity costs.
30:47People are right about that in that polling data that you just showed.
30:51Utility costs are growing way faster than wages for people.
30:55And you have to pay that.
30:56You have to keep the lights on.
30:57And medical care costs have also been spiking recently.
31:01And look, then there's the ongoing child care and housing costs that continue to be years
31:07of well outpacing wage growth.
31:09So you put all that together.
31:10And it's no wonder that there's a big strain for a lot of American families right now.
31:15Yeah, because if your if your wages are going up, let's say, three or four percent and inflation
31:19is up two percent, you won't have the sense of dread about the whole thing.
31:24One of the things about oil, we've seen a big spike in the price of oil.
31:27There are estimates that it could be much higher at the moment.
31:31Ships are having trouble getting through the Strait of Hormuz.
31:33The American military, the Navy, is capable of keeping that straight open.
31:38But people who have to ship their oil through are a little worried about this because they
31:41have to ensure that unlike tariffs, which sometimes get passed on to the consumer and
31:46sometimes a company absorbs.
31:47That never happens with oil.
31:49One hundred percent of the cost of the increase in oil gets felt at the gas station.
31:54And people are already seeing it as you flashed up.
31:57The data were up over 30 cents just in the past week.
32:01That begins to add up for most households.
32:04That's about at least a fifteen dollar increase a month.
32:07And it looks very likely now that the West Texas Intermediate crude has gone to ninety dollars a barrel.
32:15That usually results in four dollar a gallon gas in the United States.
32:20And we could see that at some point next week.
32:23And I think that's a big psychological shift to see four dollar average gas again.
32:29We haven't seen that.
32:30We saw it briefly in September 2023.
32:32But we really haven't seen that since the dreaded summer of 2022.
32:35And I think that's I worry a lot that people not only does that cost about fifty dollars more a
32:41month for the typical family, but people begin to worry and fear that all their costs are going to go
32:47up again.
32:47And that's when you could really start to see some sort of inflation spiral.
32:52And by the way, like like you mentioned about your electricity, it's not you can't do much about that.
32:57If you're if you are an American who drives to and from work over time, you may be able to
33:02carpool or do whatever to downsize your car.
33:04But fundamentally, that's not an immediate choice you can make.
33:07Oil probably before all this nonsense started, oil was hanging around fifty seven bucks a barrel.
33:12That seems like where where it was.
33:14And then there was about a ten dollar what we call a risk premium built into it because there was
33:19a fear of that war.
33:20And there were some there was some talk last weekend before oil started trading after the attacks on Iran that,
33:26well, you know what?
33:26The risk premiums have been built into oil, so you probably won't see much of a spike.
33:30And since then, we've worked our way up to to around ninety dollars a barrel.
33:34So clearly there's more of a fear about what happens to oil than we than we all thought.
33:40Well, definitely. And there's also the overriding question, which is how long does this war last?
33:45And clearly it's going to last longer than just a few days, which may have been the initial assessment that
33:52it would be over quickly.
33:54I think you're also starting to see before this started, there was an oversupply of oil on the global market.
34:00I mean, it was one of the bright spots for the Trump administration.
34:03Gas was below three dollars just a week ago, below three dollars a gallon.
34:07And a lot of people were noticing that. But look, the reality is that many parts of the Middle East
34:14have been hit
34:14and many oil capacity is is now greatly reduced.
34:19And you are really starting to see these prices not just shoot higher,
34:23but it's hard to imagine that even if things wrapped up miraculously over the weekend,
34:29that oil would start flowing quickly again.
34:32Heather, great to talk to you, as always. Thank you for being with us, Heather Long.
34:35All right. Coming up, Democrats think they've got a good shot at retaking the House of Representatives this fall.
34:39My next guest secured his spot in one of those House races,
34:42is winning a key primary in North Carolina earlier this week.
34:45I'll ask him how he did it and how he plans to beat his Republican rival next.
34:52Donald Trump's second term has been a master class on how to turn off independent voters.
34:57According to the Pew Research Center, Trump got an even split of independents in the 2024 presidential election,
35:02about 48 percent. Fifteen months later, things are a whole lot different.
35:07New polling from Fox News, this is an unbelievable number, shows that 72 percent of independent voters disapprove of Donald
35:15Trump's job performance.
35:17Seventy-eight percent think he is focused on the wrong issues.
35:20Overall, 57 percent of all Americans disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing.
35:26That is according to Fox polling.
35:28This has Democrats feeling pretty good about their chances of retaking the House of Representatives
35:32and maybe even the Senate in the 2026 midterm elections.
35:35And the Democrats overseeing congressional races have a list of candidates that they think can beat sitting Republican members in
35:42November.
35:43And among them is my next guest, Jamie Ager, a fourth-generation farmer.
35:46He secured the Democratic nomination on Tuesday in North Carolina's 11th congressional district,
35:51which covers a mostly rural area in western North Carolina that includes the city of Asheville.
35:56The Democratic National Committee is also backing Ager, posting on election night,
36:00quote, while Republicans continue to hemorrhage support as Trump's failed policies raise costs on North Carolina families,
36:06the DNC is all in to support Ager, who will lower costs for hardworking North Carolinians and protect health care.
36:13Joining me now is Jamie Ager. He's the Democratic nominee in North Carolina's 11th congressional district.
36:18Jamie, welcome to the show.
36:19You come from one of the most beautiful parts of one of the most beautiful states in this country,
36:24Western North Carolina, I think, got out of hand in inventing that.
36:30Yes, we're super lucky down here in Western North Carolina.
36:33We're definitely the prettiest part of the country.
36:35And thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it.
36:37Well, congratulations on your victory.
36:40Let's talk about this.
36:41North Carolina is so interesting to us on this show because it's not obvious what North Carolina is.
36:48It is—you have Democrats who win statewide office when Republicans otherwise win things.
36:54You have Democrats like Roy Cooper who win when Donald Trump otherwise wins.
36:58So one can never assume anything in North Carolina.
37:01Your particular—NC-11 has a rural center and then an urban center and a whole lot of rural areas.
37:08You've got sort of Democrat concentrations and Republican sort of looser affiliations.
37:13Tell me what you think your advantage is in a district like that.
37:17You know, Western North Carolina, we have the 16 westernmost counties in Western North Carolina.
37:21So we're really here in the Appalachian Mountains.
37:25And, you know, my background for the past 25 years, my wife, Amy, and I came back to my family
37:31farm.
37:32I'm fourth generation here at Hickory Nut Gap Farm.
37:35And we started selling local pasture-based meats for generatively raised grass-fed, you know, stuff like that.
37:42And really over the past 25 years, we've really built a small business for small business owners.
37:48And people here in Western North Carolina see us in the context of small business owners, community members, people who,
37:57you know, basketball coach.
38:00We've raised our three boys in our community here.
38:02And I think folks in Western North Carolina really want to see leaders who are less interested in partisan politics
38:09and more interested in being a neighbor, being a community member.
38:13And that's kind of the campaign we're trying to run right here.
38:16And we find that across the country, but we also find that in this particular moment, particularly when people are
38:21concerned with things like affordability and health care.
38:24They don't seem to think as ideologically as we in the media would like to think that they think, right?
38:31They think about, who can I elect who's going to actually work on the problems that I'm facing?
38:36Yeah, I think that's right.
38:37I mean, you look at things like health care folks in our community, health care premiums went up, some folks
38:45up 300 percent just this January whenever the subsidies went away.
38:51Here in Western North Carolina, we have a very service based economy, a lot of tourism and a lot of
38:56folks moving into the community and buying up houses.
39:00So housing is very expensive here in Jackson County, North Carolina.
39:03There was a study done that showed that if you're to buy a starter home, you need to be making
39:08close to $150,000 a year.
39:10That's just unrealistic for so many folks.
39:13And here we run a farming operation and, you know, to expect people to make these big high salaries is
39:19just unrealistic.
39:19And we have three sons and we'd love to have them return to the community and be able to to
39:25live here and buy a home.
39:26But oftentimes for so many folks, it feels out of reach.
39:29And, you know, nowadays we're seeing everything else go up with groceries, everything else.
39:34And that's just really discouraging for so many families.
39:37And I think when people get discouraged about their ability to to work 40 hour a week, put in their
39:42hard time and they can't afford to live in those communities or afford to get ahead and save money, then
39:48they start to get discouraged.
39:50And to me, that's a really big problem with our democracy because people feel like it doesn't work for them.
39:55Yeah. People should be able to work and get their fair share according to what they understood to be the
40:01case.
40:01Jamie, nice to meet you. Thank you for being with us tonight.
40:03We'll follow your campaign very closely. We hope you'll visit with us again.
40:05Thank you so much for the opportunity.
40:08Jamie Ager, Democratic nominee in North Carolina's 11th congressional district.
40:11That is Western North Carolina. We'll be right back.
40:17What if the Allied forces never defeated Germany?
40:20What if fascism had won in the 1930s?
40:22That what if question is explored in the science fiction classic The Man in the High Castle by the late
40:27Philip K. Dick.
40:28The novel eerily explores an alternate reality where the U.S. is split between the Nazi-ruled American Reich to
40:34the east and the Japanese-occupied Pacific states of America to the west.
40:38We'll discuss The Man in the High Castle for tomorrow's meeting in the Velshi Band Book Club.
40:42I hope you'll join us 10 a.m. Eastern right here on MS Now.
40:45And that is tonight's last word.
40:47The 11th hour with my friend Stephanie Ruhle begins right now.