>> generally in those cases, the principal has an agent that is committing it if they're not doing it themselves. >> i think there are some problems with that we already had testimony his fingerprints were all over this and i think he has made a lot of public statements that, in fact, he did this and there's nothing wrong with it. so those are all admissible i think probably they are going to go where there was nothing wrong with this and that is a risky defense. >> her piece in the new york times, i think out yesterday, right? >> yep. >> thanks so much. >> thank you. >> that is all in on this wednesday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now. you're telling me donald trump has a questionable defense? >> yes, he does. but stranger things have happened. >> very true, my friend, thank you as always. demonstrators before dismantling tents that were part of a protest encampment police then clashed with protesters who numbered between 2 and 300 and arrested roughly

three dozen according to local then at fordham university here in new york city earlier this evening police wearing helmets andce carrying batons arrested pro-palestinian demonstrators placing them in zip ties as they took down an encampment inside a campus building. this is all, of course, part of a larger protest movement spreading across dozens of colleges. and while the demands of each individual protest vary, they're primarily focused on drawing attention to the tens of thousands of palestinian civiliansni killed in gaza and calling for their colleges to financially divest from investments connected to israel. protesters have been followed by dozens of counterprotests primarily in support of israel and against what supporters call rising anti-semitism. overall more than 1,500 protesters have been arrested in just the past two weeks. many of those arrests have been

brutal withar protesters forcedo the ground and forcibly removed. with a story this big it's important not to paint all of this with too broad a brush. all of this is made up of individual acts. all happening on different campuses with different responses from administrators and different responses from police. last night we saw two incredibly different examples of these protests and counterprotests and how they've been haldled by local police. here's how ucla's student newspaper, theen daily bruin, described what happened on its campus last night. fireworks, tear gas and fights broke out just after 10:50 p.m. on tuesday night and continued early wednesday morning as over 100 israel counter protesters attempted to storm the solidarity encampment. the way the daily bruin writes

that story that group of pro-israel counterprotesters tore down the barricades across the encampment, and once the barricades were down they started fighting the protesters. they shot fireworks into the encampment, hit protesters with sticks and used wooden planks and electric scooters at the protesters while chanting usa, usa. as far as the police presence wass concerned here's how the daily bruin's editorial board put it this morning. for hours itucla administration stood by and watched as the violence escalated. lapd did not arrive on the scene until slightly after 1:00 a.m. that was last night at ucla in los angeles. at columbia university here in new york city it was a very different story. here is now columbia's campus newspaper, the peckitator reportedws it.

hundreds of new york police departmentyo officers entered campus andre cleared the hall. minouche shafik authorized officers to clear encampments. if you'll recall from last night's footage officers entered the building through a window on the side of the t building and began clearing rooms while some officers had what appeared to be their guns drawn. in total the nypd made 109 arrests at columbia university last night. the department's commissioner of public information told the spectator that he commended the strength and position of his officers. meanwhile the peckitator opponents out one protester wuthrown down a flight of stairs, another lay on the ground unmoving while police stood over there, and others

were slammed with metal barricades and pushed to the ground. in this t first batch of footag put out by the nypd the ratio of police officers to protesters appears to be very, very uneven. it's actually kind of difficult at times to even find protesters in thisd sea of police. and then there is the matter of the second video put out today by the nypd. >> right now we're inside the hamilton building of columbia university. we're on the third floor looking for the student protesters that took over the building. behind us conducting operations. we're checking each floor, checking each door.

you can see they've setup an encampt in the classroom, sleeping bags all over the place. >> we're on the campus at columbia in the tent city, which here is cleared. just a remarkable plan and executionem by the nypd. >> this is not a tent city. this is new york city. it's our city, and if you're thinking about doing something like this,ki take a look around. see how fast we cleared it out. this could be you. >> sort of a half promotional video for the nypd, half a warning shot to future protesters. there's also a sound track you may have noticed and situation room footage as officers planned the columbia sweep like it was -- i don't know the bin laden raid. it was not what you might call a tool for deescalation. but it is worth noting that some colleges have actually managed toe do just that, to de-escala the tension on their campuses this week. both brown and north western university reached deals with student eaprotesters this week with protesters leaving

encampments. whether or not thatin can be replicated elsewherebe at this point is totally unclear. this is happening across the country with lots of individual actors making separate decisions, and thatto makes the story complicated, and that is important to remember, because we have actors in our national discourse right now who are very much trying to exploit this tension for very obvious political gain. many of them aren't even students, you know, and many of them come from foreign countries. where do they come from? and they do come from other countries and they areco paid. crooked joe is reportedly planning -- this is wonderful news for you people in wisconsin -- to bring massive numbers of gazans from the middle east. all live to your american towns, your towns and villages. joe biden seems determined -- he's just determined to create the conditions for an october 7thor style attack right here i

america. it's going to happen. >> joining me now is jelani cobb dean. professor dean, thanks for joining me. fall, dean cobb wrpg you've been compare in the middle of what's happening at columbia. i talked on the phone last night and you described the situation as tragic. in thisd sort of cold light of day i wonder how you assess what has happened at that university, and also we heard reports you were threatened with arrests last night. can you talk a little bit about what exactly went down? >> so i think the word tragic is probably the most apt descriptor for it. and even kind of looking out now the campus is eerily quiet. you know, it's completely locked down. there's elvery, very few people there. and sory as opposed to what wou typically be people at the end ofbe the semester, you know,

seniors eager to graduate and much more joyous environment typically. on the other side it's technically accurate to say but not really factual, i suppose. we were out there in a hallway, we're in a doorway of the building as officers said if anyone comes outside they'll get arrested. we were talking to a group of our lkstudents, so i went to th doorway to say, hey, i'm the dean, these are my students, so on. so it was not a kind of threat of arrest impending or anything like that. but once that kind of got out, i got literally like hundreds of messages from people. >> well, it is an incredibly emotionally pitched moment, right, people who saw that unfold. and there were no casualties, but it was an extraordinary picture to watch the police in riot gear go into hamilton hall and the arrests made

subsequently. peter, you tweeted, and i think this is worth calling attention to. i don'two agree with every slog of the protests on campus and some i really dislike. if that happen i think that's probably a good thing for national discourse. i do wonder when you see nypd video and hear donald trump spinning this into never neverland, joe biden is never inviting another october 7th here but it ratchets up unreasonable dialogue. >> i think inre progressive spas and especially the democratic party people are questioning why do wooio have unconditional support for israel. before october 7th there was almost no member of congress except a few members of the squad who supported military aid. the question of divestment from colleges, whatme exactly that

means we don't know.we there's a lot to be unpacked there. but why is it universities should be supporting any companies that involved in military action anywhere around the worldry for that matter? people are now starting to talk about that. they weren't talking about that. it may be many years before our system changes. think about the occupy movement. it rose and diminished and people thought it was gone. then it reappeared with bernie sanders campaign. it was that fervor. and then in '72 they nominated george mcgovern. the energy from this will change at least the democratic party's position. >> that's ati really good point the way this is not a linear thing. sometimes there are peaks anda valleys before real change comes. jelani, in terms of the conversations, it's hard to get an understanding of what exactly happened between students and administrators atnt columbia an whereni things go next. i think minouche shafik, the president noted today that,

unfortunately, the protests -- our academic leaders spent eight days engaging over long hours in serious dialogue and good faith with ooprotest representatives p now there's not much information what happens now the campus is where it is. >> iis can't really speak to th. but i can tell you that's true. we spent a lot of time all hours of the night through the day engaged in discussions in good faith on both sides. i think that the students are incredibly smart, thoughtful. they understood the issue. they were clear. and there was more or less -- i'll be honest with you there was more or less on the university side than i anticipated. the frustrating thing we didn't get tofr a kind of meeting plac in the middle, and we devoted a lot of time and energy trying to get there. >> do you think the outside kind

of political overlay changes thc contours of the discussion or -- >> absolutely. >> can you talk a little bit about that? >> if i can take a little bit of context, when we look back at the congressional hearings where claudine gay and the president of mitt was there and people criticized them for giving academic answers and so on. well, they're academics. they're supposed to be thoughtful and give nuance. that's what universities do best is get into this gulf of misunderstanding and provide information and data and analysis and history and all the things that we can give to help people draw firm conclusions about something. you can't really do that in a context where there are politicians breathing down your neck and where the discourse on your campus is being dissected not simply like whether people are right or wrong, are these

ideas useful or not useful. but are these people treasonous, are these people dangerous? are these people -- you know, in that kind of sense it makes it almost impossible for universities to fulfill our mission. >>fu on that note the idea this- it feels like -- and i'm paraphrasing my brilliant colleaguebr chris hayes here. it has become less about what we should doss in israel i'm seein this nationally, than a sort of usefulis cudgel to beat the lef with,ud an anti-woke. it's law and order running up against the woke liberal elites andke their spoiled children. >> and you know what part of that is because it's actually now almost impossible to support the war. even in israel people ipisrael's military a are admitting this war is not going to destroy hamas, that thaconsequences of this warce is actually going toe bad for israel, it's actually going to create a generation of

palestinians more radicalized from israel then we've seen before. this is a distraction. people should be talking about why were all these people for months p upon month after month supporting this utterly catastrophic destructive war that willve make everyone less safe? >> how do you grade the biden administration on d that? because they too have focused on the unrest on the campus without necessarily getting into the specific demands, for example, that protesters are asking of their college administrators. >> yes, and the biden administration keeps sending more weapons to fight this war even thoughth i don't believe f a second they believe this war is going tobe make israel safer. and they know that it is producingat a catastrophe in ga that will haunt us for generations. it saw a u.n. study that said the t war ended tomorrow gaza would return to the gdp that it had in the war they started in 2093. that's how long we're going to

be living with this catastrophe, and the biden administration did not need to go all in on this. they made the choice. >> some of the people active about anti-wokism are the same people who had dinner with nick fuentes. there's no accounting for the reality of these actual battle lines republicans have drawn. >> i think it's curious these people have not seemed to notice the anti-semitism in virginia in charlottesville where we saw the tiki torch out there. or many of the other instances we can talk about. there's just a curious absence there. >> i was going to say do you have an answer i for that? >> because they don't really care about jews. they're using jews to attack the universities. and they hate the universities they hate the idea the

universities are teaching things subversive to the founding myths of america they are so invested in. it's not a coincidence ron desantis is the same governor prevent from teaching about america's history and whiteea supremacy. i say this as a jewish person, it is not a good thing for us to be used by elise stefanik and donald trump and all these people to attack universities and people with a history of oppression in the united states who want to speak about their experience. we should not be in that business. >> that war on cancel culture is a selective war. thank you so much for joining me tonight. really appreciate it. coming up we will speak to the time magazine reporter who sat down with donald trump to discuss what he has planned for a potential second term. spoiler alert, it is not good. but first speaker mike johnson continues toke weaponize campus protests for political gain. we'll talk about his latest effort andut whether house making the right move in saving the speaker from the rebels in his party. that is next. ng speaker from

the rebels in his party. that is next

i mean this is right and wrong, this is good versus evil. there's no gray area here. and, you know, we're trying to speak with moral clarity. we're trying to use the responsibility of congress to address the issue in an appropriate manner. >> that was the republican speaker mike johnson talking about a bipartisan bill that passed the house today called the anti-semitism awareness act. the law would mandate the department of education adopt the international holocaust remembrance alliances, a very

broad definition of anti-semitism when defining discrimination laws. that defines anti-semitism as a certain expression of jews. under this definition opposing zionism or holding signs that oppose a revolution could cost the school federal research grants and its funding. while this bill passed the house overwhelming on a vote of 320-91 it made very strange bedfellows among those who opposed it. republican congresswoman marjorie taylor greene voiced her opposition to the anti-semitism bill by deploying an anti-semitic trope. joining me now is congresswoman

pramila jayapal. thanks for joining me and helping me understand what exactly went down today. my first question is the language of this bill and why it's so broad. do you have a thesis as to why the scope was so large? >> yeah, alex, i do, and that is that unfortunately i think republicans are trying to weaponize anti-semitism. they want to bring bills to the floor that actually divide democrats. and what we really need to do if we want to tackle anti-semitism, which i believe every democrat does want to do and many republicans, we would do a -- we would bring a bipartisan bill, and we would have a whole of government approach that involves educating people what anti-semitism is and what it isn't and making sure we're all speaking with one voice. i think it's incredibly hurtful to the cause of eliminating anti-semitism for republicans to weaponize it and to be

hypocrites about bringing forward something that is about pure political gain, not about fighting anti-semitism. i think that's why they brought this bill because they knew it would not get full democratic support because it doesn't get full support from the jewish community. it doesn't get full support from people who have looked at this issue and said we have to be very careful about how we define this and especially by the way this is being targeted and tied to educational funds that go to colleges. so it has incredibly important ramifications. >> well, it's sort of a dual pronged attack on liberals and democratic institutions of higher education. speaker johnson's machinations have not been secret. he challenges president biden to come up there, he makes this a moral litmus test from everybody at the same time he's under

threat from the far-right flank of his republican congress. it just seems intended specifically to shore up support among those right-wing rebels in his conference. and i just wonder democrats seem to have made a decision this week they will say, speaker johnson, if a motion to vacate is put on the house floor. do you think that's the right idea? >> well, i think this is as leader jeffreys has defined it, a very narrow single-use get out of jail free card for democrats to vote -- some democrats to vote to table the motion to vacate the speakership. this would be a marjorie taylor greene motion if came, and then there would be a motion to table it. and i think there would be some democrats who will agree to save the speaker this one time in part because of the need to get

that ukraine funding to the floor. i do believe this is directly tied the speaker finally after five months brought that bill to the floor and allowed us to have a vote on it. but i will say that leader jeffries has been clear and i've been clear to him and many of our members have been clear to him that we are not going to consistently save this speaker who is anti-choice, anti-immigrant, anti-democracy, went down to mar-a-lago to kiss donald trump's ring and talk about how, you know, all these lies about how people are voting that shouldn't be voting, anti-lgbtq, and really using division, hatred, xenophobia, to drive a political agenda. i don't think we can be part of doing that again, but i do understand that this is a one-time opportunity to make

sure that we continue the work of the house. we have a little bit more work to do, and the speaker did bring that ukraine bill to the floor. i'm not going to be voting to table that motion, alex, but i know that there will be some in our party. and leader jeffries has said we should feel free to vote our conscience. >> yeah, because on some level it's congratulations you've got ukraine funding secured. it's a republican priority. only in this strange bizarre upside down world where the gop is led by the likes of margery taylor greene is u.k. funding even an issue. to that end margery taylor greene and her motion to vacate feels like the support has dissipated a bit or the bang for her buck for her lesson. do you think the not governance

governance is on the way out the door given just the chaos that has colored the last two years? >> i think there's been so much chaos on the other side, the republicans cannot govern the american people have seen that over and over again. hakeem jeffries has essentially functioned as a shadow speaker. democrats have to give votes for republican rules, alex. that is unheard of. the number of times rules have failed on the house floor because a majority can't pass their own procedural rules so that they can bring a bill to the floor is quite remarkable. and so i think marjorie taylor greene is trying to continue to create chaos over there. and i think that there are many republicans who don't want to go into a another session of weeks and weeks on end without a speaker. and i think they're worried about that because of what happened last time. but i want to be clear that the

house is still in chaos. on every major vote you and have have talked about this, it has been democrats who have had to come forward and essentially be the adults in the room to get a bill just about appropriations or about the debt ceiling, basic governance that the majority -- the republican majority has not been able to do. so i think she is losing some support here in terms of throwing the house into chaos. but let me be clear, her brand -- donald trump's brand even mike johnson's brand of extreme maga ideas from stripping away abortion rights from women to, you know, the extreme trans bans to cutting social security and medicare, that is what the republican party whether it's mike johnson as the speaker or marjorie taylor greene, you know, as the inciter of a lot of chaos over there, they all stand for that.

democrats don't, and we just have to continue to make that distinction very, very clear. >> yeah, margery taylor greene calls congress the uni party, but i beg to differ. thank you for your time tonight. >> thank you. still to come this evening donald trump heads -- where does donald trump head? he goes back to court where he may face more punishment for violating a gag order. and a new bombshell interview reveals trump's vision for his second term. we're going to talk exclusively with the reporter who got so many of trump's highly controversial plans on the record. stay with us. ntroversial plans e record stay with us

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see why comcast business powers more small businesses than anyone else. get started for $49.99 a month plus ask how to get up to an $800 prepaid card. don't wait- call today. because of donald trump more than 20 states have abortion bans. more than 20 trump abortion bans. and today this very day at the stroke of midnight another trump abortion ban went into effect here in florida. >> that was vice president kamala harris speaking in florida today where that state's near total ban on abortion has officially gone into effect. florida has the third highest population in the country, but it's not just the millions in that state who are now affected by this ban. until today florida was among the last places in the south

eastern united states where women could travel to get an abortion. depending on how advanced their pregnancy is people seeking an abortion in the south will now have to travel as far as virginia or kansas or even illinois in order to obtain a legal abortion. in addition to a health care crisis, florida republicans have also created a political disaster for republicans nationwide. that same dynamic is at play in arizona where the state supreme court recently allowed a civil war era abortion ban too go into effect. arizona republicansvise been all over the map on whether or not they support that ban. in just the past few weeks arizona senate candidate kari lake has taken multiple opposing positions on the ban, and donald trump himself has been urging arizona republicans to repeal the law he helped resurrect. that could be because abortion right advocates in arizona have been mobilizing to put abortion access on the ballot in arizona

this november, a move that could drive democratic turnout in a critical swing state. and so today two republicans in the arizona state senate sided with democrats to repeal the state's 1864 abortion ban. arizona's democratic governor, katie hobbs, is expected to sign the repeal of that law tomorrow. but arizona still has a 15-week abortion ban on its books, and abortion right advocateerize pushing to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution this november, so abortion could still very much be on the ballot in arizona this fall. and florida voters will also have a chance to overturn their state's extreme abortion ban come november. this week florida man donald trump was asked how he plans to vote on the state's abortion rights ballot measure in a wide ranging interview with time magazine. this was his i guess you could say response. i don't know tell you what i'm

going to vote for, i only tell you the state's going to make a determination. we have an exclusive interview with the time magazine reporter who interviewed mr. trump, an interview president biden today called a mandatory read. that's next. t biden today called a mandatory read. that's next.

basically the states decide on abortion, and people are absolutely thrilled with the way that's going on, and it's been an amazing process, and it's

something that was very important to get done. >> that is how donald trump views the current state of reproductive rights in this country where 21 republican led states have either banned abortion outright or severely restricted the procedure. thrilled and amazing. as it happens this month's "time" magazine cover story offers crucial insight into what trump plans to do as it relates to abortion and other key issues if he becomes president. again, joining me now is the perp who conducted that interview, "time" staff writer aaron cortelesa. it is an essential interview, i'm not just paraphrasing joe biden, but it's the first time we hear trump talk with any specificity about his policies. trump has his line here which is let states decide, i have nothing to do with it, take it back to the states. as you were interviewing him, did you sense he was confident in that position, or did it feel like he understood his

vulnerability there? >> i think donald trump understands this is very delicate terrain for him. he doesn't want to alienate his core base and white evangelical voters who most prize the fact he was able to install three supreme court justices who were essential to overturning roe v. wade. but he also knows that a majority of americans support abortion rights for women. and so he's trying to thread a needle by making this a states right issue. and, you know, i asked him president trump would you be comfortable with states prosecuting women who get abortions after the ban? he said it's irrelevant whether i'm comfortable or not, i don't have to be comfortable, the states are going to do decide. and i said, president trump, what about states monitoring women's pregnancies to know when they've gotten abortions after the ban. he said they must just do that. he also said he'd allow for states to have abortion laws in

the other side of the direction, too. so president trump is really staking out this states rights issue when it comes to abortion. >> yeah, i mean, but you did paint a fairly draconian picture there that states monitor women's preg naepss. and by virtue of thought opposing that, isn't that sort of a tacit acceptance of that and do wonder he can get way with it, because joe biden certainly doesn't think that's a tenable position and has been saying that on the campaign trail. i think they made an act to that effect. you asked him specifically a handmaid tale like end times scenario. >> i didn't get any hesitation from trump at all. i think he's decided this is where he's going to be politically, and that is basically the way in which he's going to navigate this issue. >> you also pressed him repeatedly i might add on the subject of immigration where he

has in the words of "time" magazine described kind of the imperial presidency. i'll read an excerpt. to carry out a deportation operation designed to remove more than 11 million people from the country trump told me he'd be willing to build migrant detention camps and deploy u.s. military both at the border and inland. you press him on the complications of this. do you get the sense he fully has grappled with the law as it stands and the potential court battle that would ensue if he tried to do that. >> i think he understands many of the things he want today do on abortion would effectively engineer court battles, right? president trump when i asked him, sir, you say you want to have a massive deportation operation that will remove as many or more than 11 million migrants, how do you plan to do that, and his answer was he would rely on the national guard to conduct this operation inland

to find and haul away undocumented migrants. he'd be willing to use the military if he felt it was necessary. he'd also try to induce state and local police departments to participate by tying federal funding to their involvement in the effort. i think president trump understands he mind face lawsuits trying to challenge him, but this is one particular matter where he plans to pursue his agenda with alacrity. >> can i say, though, your sort of rebuttals or the fact you went -- you kept taking a bite of the apple asking him specifically how he'd execute, and it felt like you had done more thinking about the execution of these policies than he necessarily had. even on the issue of tariffs, right, because trump loves talking about trade. he agrees he's floated a 10% tariff on all imports. he's agreed he's floated i think more than 6% tariff on chinese imports, and then he says it may be more than that, may be more

derivative of that, he asserts tariffs don't cause inflation. do you sense he actually understands economic policy? because it felt like he was very much responding to you but did not have a sort of proposal that was clearly outlined even in this own head. >> well, i think that donald trump operates on instinct, and i think he has a very specific kind of instinct when it comes to trade. and this is a trumpian fixation that dates back to the dawn of his political emergence. he thinks the united states is getting ripped off on trade arrangements. he thinks we're on the losing side of trade deficits specifically with china. so he thinks of it much more as a business transaction. he may not be steeped in white papers on, you know, the implications of trade policy. he understands the vast majority of economists say that tariffs will increase prices because businesses will pass along the cost of the tariff along to the consumer. they won't just eat it.

but president trump sees it from a very specific framework of sort of transactional dynamic of kwaer on the losing end of this deal so we need a better deal. >> yeah, he definitely sees it in black and white fashion. eric, it is a really important interview to read especially in a year ewhere we have so few sit down interviews with either one of these candidates i might add, and we have not really had any debates. so it's one of the few times we get a window into how this candidate would approach his second term. thank you so much for your time tonight. >> thanks for having me. coming up donald trump spent the day campaigning in wisconsin and michigan, but tomorrow he will be back in court for day ten of his manhattan hush money trial. we're going to preview tomorrow's witness testimony coming right up. tomorrow's witness testimony coming right up. it's fineeeeeeee! [splash] before advil: advil dual action fights pain two ways. advil targets pain at the source, acetaminophen blocks pain signals. advil dual action.

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so, ditch the other guys and switch today. buy one line of unlimited, get one free for a year with xfinity mobile! plus, save even more and get an eligible 5g phone on us! visit xfinitymobile.com today. donald trump will be back in court tomorrow for day ten of his mush money tile. the first witness on the stand will be keith davidson, the

lawyer who represented both karen mcdougal and stormy daniels. yesterday prosecutors revealed both text messages and e-mails exchanged between davidson and michael cohen discussing the $130,000 hush money payment to stormy daniels a month before the election. we spoke on friday october 14, and you said funds would be wired today. no funds have been received as of sending this e-mail. daufb udson remembers cohen as replying my guy in five states today, there's nothing i can do. i'm doing all i can. davidson understood why guy to be donald trump on the campaign trail as a presidential candidate. he also believed trump was behind a hush money deal. here's the prosecutor. did you ever believe that michael cohen was going to be the source of these funds. davidson, never. never prior to funding, no. prosecutor, where did you understand the money would be coming from? davidson, from donald trump or some corporate affiliation thereof.

joining me now msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin. thank you for staying late. i know you have a busy day tomorrow. is keith davidson's assertion it's my guy is that sufficient to establish trump is pulling the strings here and that this is politically motivated? >> no. but luckily prosecutors are not depending on keith davidson alone. they're constructing a narrative so think about keith davidson as a piece of the puzzle as opposed to the puzzle himself. he corroborates much of what david pecker has told us, but he also had his own interactions most notably with dylan howard who's the chief content officer of ami and sort of deputized by pecker to get the stuff done. >> right, he was the action man. i do wonder how you look at

the -- each side's defense and prosecutorial argument here because it feels like the prosecution is offering a lot of information. they're coming at it from a number of different angles and the defense is effectively playing catch-up. we know that trump according to the "the new york times" is asking todd blanche to attack witnesses, attack the jury pool, and attack juan merchan. does that seem to be borne of frustration or feeling his defense is inadequate? >> i think it's borne from going to the cohen school of law, which is not what i would consider an adequate or appropriate legal foundation. donald trump is not a lawyer. there's a reason why. what he considers an effective political strategy and not an effective jury strategy, attacking the witnesses, attacking the judge, being more aggressive than todd blanche has been i don't think will win the case and alienate jurors, and

that at least i can tell that being in the room todd blanche, pardon the pun blanch is being that person, he's not that guy. and bovi if you want to attack a witness and dismantle him, he's your guy. >> it also seems blanche or whoever is going to be the attack dog here is going to be the replacement because trump is gagged. the judge is having another hearing on the gag order tomorrow morning. what is your expectation there, and sort of what's the long-term game here as far as judge merchan? >> let me say two things. one, trump wants everyone to believe he's totally gagged. he has a lot more to talk about the case than he has let on. i do think judge merchan will find at least three or two of the alleged violations will constitute further instances of criminal contempt. however, because he didn't warn trump until yesterday that

further violations would result in incarceration -- >> jail. >> i don't think that tomorrows which will add up to a total of let's say at most 13 or maybe a couple fewer would be the thing that swings the needle. i think we're going to have to take one more crack at it or trump will have to trigger that other crack at it for prosecutors to eventually make the argument that trump deserves incarceration. >> wow, just the fact that we're there day ten we're talking about him being incarcerated, he's also bringing some support -- support staff, if you will, into the courtroom. can you talk a little bit about that. >> yeah, i mean trump has sort of adjusted his courtroom behavior around the criticisms that folks in the media have lobbed at him. and so bringing additional support to the courtroom is just one more of those in the latest sort of call in response between trump and his court strategy. you'll notice yesterday not only suzy wild was there and ken paxton was there and even karen

page but trump was there and looking at times to be uncomfortable discovering these documents for the first time. i felt for the guy just as a son and family member having to be the pawn in that political game and the jury game trump seems to be playing. >> that is our show for tonight. and a reminder you can listen to every episode of "alex wagner tonight" as a podcast for free. you can search alex wagner tonight wherever you get your podcasts. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is coming up next. and some people are thrilled at the concept of exactly because everybody's basically wanted to get it out. it's wrong to be in the federal government. they wanted to get it out. the states now decide on abortion, and you go to the states, and the states come out, and they