] ambient / laughing. ♪ ♪ it's a beautiful... ] ambient / laughing. ...day to fly. wooooo! on that note, and an

exceptionally long day, i wish you a good night. you can listen to every episode of the 11th hour as a podcast for free. scan the qr code on your screen right now but until then, i am signing off. from all of our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thanks for staying up late with me. i will see you at the end of tomorrow. tonight on all in -- >> [ inaudible ] >> the red tie brigade comes to court. >> i'm here in all of us are here as friends of donald trump. >> how trumps trial turned into a veep audition. is trump using his surrogates to violate his gag order? tonight, the ramifications for the defendant and what could

happen in court tomorrow then -- >> donald trump lost two debates to me in 2020. since then he hasn't shown up for a debate. now he's acting like he wants to debate me again. well, make my day, pal. >> president biden and former president trump come to terms but will the debate ever happen? goodness for the inflation front. senator elizabeth warren is here on that. good evening from new york. we will start with this. michael cohen testified against donald trump at his new york trial yesterday. the former president was joined by quite the entourage of defenders. according to reporting from rolling stone in the early days of the trial, the former president was infuriated at the lack of visible support from his allies in the courthouse. where are they, he complained

earlier this month. well, trumps allies no appear to have heard the complaint loud and clear. they showed up in full force in downtown manhattan. yesterday, trump received visible support for multiple members of his family, his son, eric along with his daughter-in- law, laura as well as a who's who of republican politicians. surrogates included former republican presidential candidate be back ramaswamy, north dakota governor doug burgum and even speaker of the house mike johnson. trumps entourage was united in their message as they all spoke to the cameras. >> all of us are here as friends of donald trump, supporting him. >> former president trump is innocent of these charges. >> the american people have already acquitted donald trump. >> the judicial system in our country has been weaponized against former president trump. >> where is the crime? there is no crime. >> are corrupt.

>> trump surrogates also use their time at the microphone to level more personal attacks against michael cohen and even judge one response family. the other clear intention of the trump gang was to bring the campaign to the courthouse. several surrogates were obviously auditioning for vice president. the entire group and coordinating outfits of gray suit and red tie. >> we are here in court with former president trump standing with him but we need you to stand with him, too. go to donald j. trump.com to support trump and his efforts to win this election. >> anything you can give would make a world of difference. we are here fighting the good fight. they cannot win. >> let's make america great again.

>> so, while trumps entourage may have provided some moral support, politics was clearly their main purpose. i'm joined now by congressman jamie raskin, democrat of maryland. congressman, your impression of the political support you saw for the former president this week. >> you know, they are all attracted to the mecca of the courthouse in order to demonstrate their complete obeisance and sycophancy to donald trump and i think it is a good thing that they are identifying themselves, the people who have completely allowed donald trump to devour their critical thinking skills and their political and moral independence. speaker johnson is a guy who has said that the bible is his guiding document and is basically the law of the land and yet, he has made the pilgrimage to new york to demonstrate how obsequious he can be to donald trump, a guy who is now an adjudicated

rapist, an adjudicated fraudster and is on trial for cooking the books for lots of money to cover up hush money payments to his adult film star mistress, so i am a member of the free thought caucus and we have been saying all along that speaker johnson's adherence to religion is just a form of political tribalism. it doesn't have anything to do with religious principle and now he is showing the world that is true. eye especially trusting since he is not on the list of potential vp pics. how is the fact that you have all of these sitting members of congress traveling to new york to do trumps political bidding impacting the workflow of the house of representatives? >> well, i know they have to move one farce, which is this

scheduled hearing and markup session about holding attorney general garland in contempt for actually complying with their order and turning over the complete transcript of donald trump's interview with special counsel her. now, they've decided that's not enough. they don't just want a verbatim transcript. they want the audiotape in order to salvage their completely discredited and humiliating impeachment voyage, they're trying to hold merrick garland in contempt. that was scheduled for 11:00 am tomorrow and we just got notice it is been moved to 8:00 pm because a bunch of members of the majority and oversight committee are traveling to new york so they can soothe donald

trump's wounded feelings that he wasn't supported. >> as you said, they are standing in front of the courtroom, doing fundraising appeals from inside the courthouse in service of a second trump term. when we talk about the potential dangers of that possibility reported in the washington post, he promised to ease regulations on the oil industry while asking executives to steer $1 billion to his campaign. you have now opened an investigation into that dinner. which details are you hoping together and how do you establish that as a quid pro quo? >> it is amazing how explicit all of this is. he is basically saying to the oil and gas execs, pony up $1 billion which will go in some part to his campaign, but mostly probably to his lawyers and legal expenses, and who knows how much of it makes its way back to the trump family but in any event, he is saying, give me $1 billion and i'm going to reverse the biden administration's actions on liquefied natural gas. i'm going to, you know, blow

the roof off the house in terms of allowing you to draw whatever you want to drill and so on and everybody knows where donald trump stands, but it's almost as if he wants to walk right up to the line of criminal bribery and state what the quid pro quo is. obviously there can be no criminal or civil action before the election. the trials are taking place now are based on things that transpired several years ago but at least the public can see this for what it is. donald trump is saying at events, if you want to come up and make a speech, give me $1 million, i'll let you do it. >> and two people said yes. two people jumped up on the stage. >> yes, and that in itself might be a campaign-finance violation. again, we have a kind of dysfunctional arrangement at the fec because the republicans blockaded the action but you know, he asked for $1 million, which is more, when you added

up, and all of the different elements he could actually be soliciting for but again, i don't want to place too much faith in the legal system, the campaign-finance regime. i'm putting my face in the people. the people of got to understand what is going on. we have two completely contrasting schools of thought about what government is. one says government must be an instrument for the common good and the other says government is a simple moneymaking operation, and instrument for private self-enrichment for the guy who gets in and his family and his businesses and that is what the gop has become and that is the scandal in the shame of all of these republicans who are taking the metro liner up to new york so they can prove to donald trump how much they love him. >> they may be learning the wonders of amtrak. congressman jamie raskin, thank you for getting us started. thank you for joining me on your day off. here's the thing that gets me.

the continuity of the rift. the fact that he begins as a grifter, the grifter carries through the campaign and then he almost teaches his supporters to follow in his grifter. the fact that they are now doing campaign ads from inside the courthouse so they can raise money not for down ballot republicans as the rnc would traditionally do, but rather for his own legal defense fund and then this thing with the oil executives, that it is not just about what he's doing as a candidate but what he imagines himself doing as president. >> in promoting a legal defense we know what he will do with the money. he's not going to use, i think, any of the federal funds he gets or any of the funds going into the general rnc accounts to do any down ballot support. it is going to all be for trump, who will use it as he wishes and some of it undoubtedly will be used to pay the legal bills, like has been done already and i think this is generations of

grafting coming home. donald learned this from his father, fred. he taught his children how to follow in his path. he ran his business this way and the party is being run this way and then you've got, you know, a series of politicians from the party showing up at a criminal fraud trial to give him support then slagging the judge, going after the judges father, going after the legal process at a time when all the institutions are under fire already and then on top of it, part of this prosecution involves donald trump overtly and i don't think there is any doubt in the evidence, he had a relationship with an adult film actor and mike johnson, who is a christian minister, is ignoring that to come up with his support so the grifter is financial, the grifter's moral, it is legal, institutional and pervasive. >> stephanie ruhle had an exclusive interview with

senator romney. take a listen. >> i think it is a terrible fought for our country to see people attacking our legal system. that's an enormous mistake. i think it is also demeaning for people to quite apparently try to run for vice president by donning a red tie and standing outside the courthouse. i would've felt awkward. >> in net, the chief stands alone as he so often does and what he is saying is right. it's about the undermining of the institutions and the fact that it is going to have a longer tail than donald trump himself. >> it's interesting, i was thinking about tim miller, who during the state of the union when the republican members of congress were pictured, they all looked like many trumps, sitting there in their two big suits with there too long red ties looking rather ridiculous and you see that now outside the courthouse, but what that says to me is that the trump takeover of one of our two

major parties is basically complete. laura trump is the normal share of the rnc. the rnc is a pretty boring administrative job if you talk to people who know about the inner workings of that place. they don't really think she is running it day today but nevertheless, the image of her, someone with no experience to do this, in charge of a major party is significant, and see all these people taking time off of work and coming there to kiss the ring, treating it basically like mar-a-lago or like trump tower or any other time in trumps political rise, it is pretty pathetic. >> especially when you factor in the fact that every time he is on stage with people, he flirts with them and lets them think that maybe they are potentially on the vice president list and when you listen to these guys, that's clearly part of the motivation. >> he is at heart a reality show star. he really took to that medium

and helped define what that medium was in america and globally and that is how he has campaigned. it's how he has campaigned since the beginning of his political rise. >> what are you watching for tomorrow? >> i think todd blanche has about 10 seconds to get his reputation back intact because he gave a very poor cross- examination of michael cohen and i think -- >> is he making it about himself? >> not just about himself. he was not thematically coherent. he was bouncing around from topic to topic. he brought up all these names that michael cohen uses on social media, that i don't know the jury cares about. what the jury needs is a coherent narrative that breaks down michael cohen's credibility and undermines him as a credible source of information and instead blanche

jump from one attempted gotcha to another and he says you know, you're known as an attempted fixer and he said right knee said well are you fixing your problems or other people's problems and then i call and said both or something like that and he just hopped onto the next point it didn't connect that to any points he was making. >> trials, like campaigns, are about storytelling and the prosecution has presented a pretty clear narrative and so far there's not really a counter narrative being presented by the defense. >> you know, michael cohen would be an easy witness to fillet and you know, supposedly todd blanche prepared months for this cross-examination and it just doesn't show. his voice is shaky. he looks uncomfortable in the other problem is that he has a client who does not want to do a proper cross-examination. he has a client who wants him to stand up there and destroy the witness and insult the witness and sort of carry trumps emotional water and that does not make for a good cross- examination either. >> he has a client who is so problematic in so many ways. olivia, tim, thanks for being with us. coming up, as donald trump's criminal election

interference trial continues, could he face recrimination for using his toadies to get around the judges gag order. et around the judges gag order.

ah, these bills are crazy. she has no idea she's sitting on a goldmine. well she doesn't know that if she owns a life insurance policy of $100,000 or more she can sell all or part of it to coventry for cash. even a term policy. even a term policy? even a term policy! find out if you're sitting on a goldmine. call coventry direct today at the number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com. and they're all coming? those who are still with us, yes.

grandpa! what's this? your wings. light 'em up! gentlemen, it's a beautiful... ...day to fly.

donald trump is currently under a gag order which legally prohibits him from attacking the judge overseeing his manhattan criminal trial as well as the judges family so instead, he got his cronies to deliver the attacks for him. >> the judges own daughter is making millions of dollars doing online fundraising for democrats. >> you have a judge whose kids

are collecting money from democratic operatives. >> the only thing that's being done run -- wrong is by this judge. his daughter is making money. >> if trump is behind these attacks, how is this not a violation of his gag order. joining me now, two people who have been closely covering the trial. andrew rice is a contributing editor at new york agassi and we have an attorney and legal fellow. help me understand the timeline of what it is you witnessed. you saw him annotating, making notes on the remarks. >> yes, i mean, it's hard to speculate exactly what was going on there but i will say after lunchtime on monday, as i noted in my new york magazine article, trump was actually going through a printed out

sheaf of papers that had quotes from individuals, including jd vance. if jd vance had been in the courtroom, one of the quotes said something like what's going on in this courtroom is a threat to american democracy. this, in fact, is something jd vance that outside the court. the timing of it was that the speech was given maybe an hour before trump was going through this. he was going through making notations. i think probably trying to figure out what kinds of things he might want to put on truth social later, perhaps. i don't know. the point is that everything that is happening in that courtroom is very coordinated. all the messaging is very coordinated. almost like a political convention in which convention speeches happen, but no one says anything on the convention stage that the nominee doesn't want them to say. i think they are all

explicating saying, talking points. there are things that donald trump would like to be saying if he didn't feel confined by this gag order. >> i am struck by the fact that some of those things are about the judge and about the judges family and those are strictly within the parameters of his gag order. help me understand as a nonlawyer how this then does not violate the gag order. the court can suppose a situation like this where you have someone who is under a gag order and yet using proxies to say the things he wants to say. >> i think one of the complications here is that obviously donald trump is the criminal defendant here, not these other individuals, so there is a difference, kind of a balancing act, when it comes to how you limit a person's first amendment rights. it would also be another thing if, for example, there was something that showed that donald trump was specifically directing these people to make statements. maybe that is, in fact, what is going on. i don't know. i did not see what andrew did in court the other day but i

think also what we have to keep in mind here is that it is up to the prosecution to decide whether or not they want to make a motion to once again have donald trump held in contempt for violating the gag order. it is their burden to bring that to the judge and make that argument. he has already been held in contempt 10 times. you have to wonder if maybe they think the trial is almost over. it may not be a fight worth fighting at this moment in time , so we will see, but again, just to underscore the big difference here is that there is a different first amendment calculus because these are people who are not the criminal defendants although it does raise certain questions about whether donald trump is directing this conduct. >> there is some new reporting into nbc news, a source close to all of this, saying that tomorrow the redirect with michael cohen is really going to be about his credibility. no

big surprise there. i wonder what you are expecting to see. >> i think what i'm expecting to see is the initial couple of hours of cross-examination that todd blanche did, primarily focused on the defense after 2018 so basically after michael cohen decided to become a cooperating witness so he demonstrated -- he questioned a lot about his podcast, question terrible things he'd said about donald trump and questioned him about the money he had made as a result of it so he has demonstrated, i guess, to the jury that michael cohen has a grudge against donald trump. he is definitely said as much. now i think what they're going to do, what they're going to try to do in the next go round is actually go to the facts of the case and try to poke holes and create some reasonable doubt about whether these payments were reimbursements,

explicitly, or the defense's story is presumably going to be that these were lead payments given to a lawyer for performing legal services and so i think they are going to be asking michael cohen, why did you call yourself a personal attorney to the president of the united states? were you not actually the attorney and questions like that. >> i think that's exactly right and i also think that if i'm the defense today, i'm listening to some of the reactions. tim o'brien just spoke about how convoluted and disjointed todd blanche dix cross- examination was yesterday and it truly was, someone who has been covering this case and been there every day in court,

it was very hard to follow any think what they will try to do in addition to continuing to attack the credibility of michael cohen by portraying him as a lawyer, focusing on his convictions or please for false statements to congress, that kind of thing, i think in terms of more defense strategy they are going to try to be more focused, more efficient, really more clearly bringing out some of these themes in a way that is not as disjointed, because they have had a day of hearing this reaction to that cross- examination. >> i think they really wanted to try to get under his skin right off the bat and that's why todd blanche went after him right off the bat with the tiktok thing and i don't think it landed all that well in the courtroom, in part, because michael cohen, contrary to his reputation, contrary to what all sorts of defense and prosecution witnesses have led people to expect, has presented himself as a fairly levelheaded and not emotional person understand.

>> i hope you guys enjoyed your one day respite from the courtroom. still ahead, president biden issues a challenge to his twice indicted predecessor. will the debates actually happen? that is next. lly happen? that is next. hi, i'm chris and i lost 57 pounds on golo. golo isn't complicated. i don't have to follow a restrictive diet, and i don't have to spend a lot of time making meals. using golo was truly transformative. it was easy, and inexpensive.

less than an hour after bidens video posted this morning, trump accepted the proposal. the earliest generant -- general election debate in modern history will be june 21st. presidential elections used to run like clockwork in america according to long-standing norms, like when you run for president you have to share your tax records. last year, donald trump, who famously refused in 2016 and 2020. candidates are also expected to share their health records. trump is not only refused to do that, he's trotted out physicians over the years to call him the healthiest man in the history of the white house. his personal doctor would later admit that snow praising trumps fitness was written by trump

himself. as president biden pointed out, it's been a long time since trump debated anyone. he counseled in 2020 and skipped out on this year's republican primary debates, watching them from home so he could quote, see who he might consider for vice president then of course there is the little matter of trumps ongoing criminal trial in manhattan leaving open questions of timeline and outcomes of here we are in the political era of trump where pretty much all the norms of democracy have been broken so you have to wonder, is he really going to show up to these debates, and if he does, will it force voters who had hoped to wait until november to turn into the selection to face the reality of what a second term presidency would look like sooner rather than later? k like sooner rather than later?

hi, i'm kevin, and i've lost 152 pounds on golo. i had just left a checkup with my doctor, and i'd weighed in at 345 pounds. my doctor prescribed a weight loss drug, but as soon as i stopped taking the drug, i gained all the weight back and then some. that's when i decided to give golo a try. taking the release supplement, i noticed a change within the first week, and each month the weight just kept coming off. with golo, you can keep the weight off.

month over month we came in with a gain of .3%. year-over-year, 3.4% was the headline estimate. >> if we look at cpi x food and energy year-over-year, this is 3.6. that is definitely cooler than the 3.8 we had last time. the 3.8 last time went along with the 3.6 this time is now the largest level of year-over- year core inflation since april of 21.

>> this morning's consumer price index report showed inflation may finally be slowing down. the cost of all goods and the economy came in below expectation. year-over-year inflation coming in right on target, a bit of good news for american consumers and president biden. senator elizabeth warren is a democrat of massachusetts. she serves on the senate's banking and financing committees and joins me now. good evening, senator. this is the last report before the fed is going to meet on interest rates. how might steer pole be looking at this? >> no, what he should be observing is both that inflation is headed in the right direction, which is down, but also that it is time to lower interest rates because the problems we have on pricing right now are not problems from some kind of overheated economy. what we really have is a problem with a lot of price gouging from giant corporations , and there is nothing about

fed interest rates that is going to change that. we also know the fed inflation number reflects housing costs, and the core problem we have right now is that when interest rates are high, that drives up the cost of housing. you don't get new starts for apartments and more investment in it and also homeowners, cost of gone up for them so it is time to start bringing those interest rates down. we are headed in the right direction and we don't need them. >> senator, when i talk to voters i hear about housing, what you just reference the night here about food. you have called on the president to use executive authority to lower food prices. how would that work? >> understand, look, this is president biden's, one of his central issues, to work on

bringing down costs for families, and he has been very successful at doing that on junk fees. you know, everything from buying airline tickets to concert tickets to junk fees on check overdrafts and credit card fees. he is pushing down costs for families. the other thing he has done is he has been bringing down costs on healthcare. we all know about $35 insulin and the fact that seniors now spend no more than $2000 and maximum cost per year on their prescription drugs. he is bringing down the cost of other prescription drugs for everyone, so that is a big one. he has canceled student loan debt for 4.5 million people. that helps bring down costs. he also has been focusing on grocery prices and has been bringing his administration to bear on this and it is particularly here where what we see is a lot of concentration in the industry. we see basically four major grocery chains that just kind

of around the world out there in the grocery space and backing up that supply chain so it is just a couple that are doing meat processing, chicken processing and it even goes further back. farmers are getting squeezed because there is so much concentration. they can only buy seeds from one or two suppliers and the consequence of that kind of concentration up and down the line is that at every point where there is not real market concentration, it means that the company can say not only are we going to pass along cost when they go up, we are going to lard on extra, extra, extra profits. so, what we have seen, for example, in profiteering by these giant companies is that profits increased by 75%.

that is not inflation. that is profits going up because these companies have figured out that what everyone is talking about inflation, that is the time to raise prices and by the way, don't take my word for it. take the word of the ceos themselves, who get on these quarterly calls with their investors and basically say, inflation has been good to them because it is let them raise prices way above costs, and that is a problem and we want to see the president use more tools to attack it. >> let's talk about those tools because there was actually some big news on capitol hill today. the faa reauthorization bill past the house and headed to the president's desk. what did it require to get the

traveling provision in there? >> this one is really good news both for anyone who ever flies, buys a plane ticket, but is also good news for anyone who just believes in basic fairness. here's the deal. you buy an airline ticket that it turns out they just cancel your flight. you think you get your money back, right? well, the airline companies -- there is this part and jump through this hoop and then do a dance backwards and maybe will give you a credit or a voucher. the airline companies are now sitting on billions of dollars in vouchers for flights that maybe someday customers will figure out how to cash in on so basically, the biden administration said no more, and so the department of transportation said when an airline cancel the flight, they have to refund automatically, the price that the person paid for the ticket.

unless the person wants to rebook, they're going to have to give the money back. after all, they all ready have the credit card information. they know what happened to the flight. give people their money back. yay, we all celebrate in the airline industry which i've just got to say, talk about a ferocious lobbying outfit. they are there all the time, but with faa reauthorization, they are high-speed ready to go, so the airline industry lobbied and pushed and four days after the biden rule comes out, the new faa authorization house just a little line buried on page 429 that says after the customer applies, then you have to give the money back and of course, who's going to determine how you apply? it's going to be the airlines. so, the biden administration came roaring back. i did an amendment was joss holly and was ed markey and said no, it's going to be automatic. we thought, we got it into the bill, and now, that is exactly what is going to be.

if they sell you a ticket then cancel the flight, they have to give you your money back. basic fairness and one more time , of joe biden out there fighting not for the rich airlines, not for their lobbyists, but fighting for regular folk who just want a level playing field, a little fairness. this is joe biden doing joe biden at his best. >> senator, i want you to listen to what your colleague, ted cruz, had to say. >> i got to say this is one of the silliest stories i had ever seen so the faa reauthorization bill is a bill that came out of the senate congress committee unanimously. every republican, every democrat supported it. it also came out of the house committee unanimously.

we just took about yesterday on the senate floor. the vote in favor of moving the bill was 89 to 10 so your say no there's a lot of controversy over this. you know what the controversy is? one tweet by elizabeth warren. >> senator, now that it is headed to the president's desk, your response? >> well, ted, it turns out that a lot of people, once they discovered what page 429 said, did not like it and so the bill that passed the senate and past the house today and is going to the president of the united states says we are going to have automatic refunds and i get it. ted cruz, he is out there pushing hard to try to help those airlines be even more profitable and this is going to cost the airline some money. boo-hoo. but, for somebody who things in basic fairness that if you don't deliver the product you want to have to give the money back, that is what joe biden thinks and that is what we managed to get through and i just want to be clear, it is now

the law. as soon as joe biden signs it in, it is the law. airlines have got to give your money back and that is right and fair and that is what joe biden does for us. >> senator elizabeth warren, as always, thank you so much for your time. still to come, as the republican front runner promises to cut funding to schools that encourage diversity, look at the right- wing takeover of a texas school board. what happens next? as school board. what happens next? ah, these bills are crazy. she has no idea she's sitting on a goldmine. well she doesn't know that if she owns a life insurance policy of $100,000 or more she can sell all or part of it to coventry for cash. even a term policy. even a term policy? even a term policy! find out if you're sitting on a goldmine. call coventry direct today at the number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com.

across america, some of the most grueling battles on the

conservative war on woke are being fought in school districts. southlake, texas is an affluent, mostly white suburban dallas. back in 2018, a viral video of students surfaced, chanting the n-word. then came the backlash for conservative takeover of the school board became a model for right-wing activists across the country. mike is a senior investigative reporter for nbc news who has been on that story. he has a brand-new book out entitled, "they came for the schools, one towns battle of her race, identity, and to do work for america's classrooms." congratulations, my friend. why the schools? >> the schools are where america tries to teach the next generation what this country is about, what is right and wrong, and so of course, when these fights over race and identity and belonging takeoff in national politics, the schools are the place where they are

the most intense. i wrote this book so that if you are a teacher or a parent in a community where you have seen angry neighbors come to school board meetings complaining about critical race theory or woke gender identity or trying to ban library books, that you can get a sense of understanding for why that is happening. the way i do that in the book is by telling the story of one town where that fight has been really intense. >> one of the most compelling parts of your book to me was the fact that people want you to believe these are moms and dads that have come to this of their own volition and in reality, this is a well-funded, well-organized effort. >> yes, in 2021, as you are seeing backlash to pandemic safety restrictions in the

protest for racial justice, black lives matter there were parents showing up at school meetings concerned about di programs but then what happened is the chris benenson donald rufo and donald trump saw that as an opportunity and for the last five years americans have been fed a really scary story about public schools that have been taken over by this shadowy liberal cabal whose mission is to indoctrinate and teach white children to hate themselves, to get kids to change their genders. it is kind of the strawman very scary image and folks -- some parents really have taken in that message and worked to try to push those things out of the schools even though those things aren't really happening. >> if you see they came for the schools in part as a guidebook for parents, grandparents who may see this happening in their own community schools, what is then your counsel for how you begin to push back? >> i think the big thing is

understanding how this moment has a much longer history. one of the things i do in the book is k'nex now, mom's for liberty of 2024, to a long history of reactionary movements in america that have sought to halt or walk back social progress or cultural change by controlling what kids learn in schools. what is happening now is maybe unprecedented in that scale and how much is connected to national politics but this type of thing has happened repeatedly throughout our history and i think knowing that in recognizing that helps us understand where this is all going and how we fit into that story. >> you also tie in white christian nationalism. right in alabama, a lawmaker introduced a bill to allow children to pray aloud over campus public address systems. in oklahoma, they were pushed

to open the nation's first publicly funded christian charter school. >> there has been a long campaign in america by a segment of the christian right to undo the separation of church and state in america. that predates what is happening now, and what started to happen in the beginning of 22 -- 2022 and last year some of those folks saw the backlash in schools as an opportunity to push that forward so we are seeing laws being passed in texas and elsewhere trying to hang the 10 commandments in every classroom, putting chaplains in the schools, bringing prayer back into classrooms and the goal of that work is to draw a test case, to get the supreme court to chip away at this. the attempt to create a catholic public school in oklahoma is an explicit, open attempt to try to draw a supreme court test case and remake some of these foundational principles. >> i want to just underscore this. right donald trump's rise to power had up profound impact

inside america's school. where does this go if you get the second term? >> southlake revealed that the department of education found civil rights violations so the federal government might come in and impose some of the changes southlake rejected. if trump is in office that goes away. he's talking about abolishing the education department, has talked about ending enforcement of civil rights policies and sending them back to the states so i think there is a line in the book that you know, ron desantis ran, saying make america florida. in some ways we are talking about make america southlake. >> mike, congratulations. thank you so much. his new book, the came for the schools, is out now and available wh y