if an airline learned that a pilot was talking publicly about being the chosen one, the airline would be looking carefully into whether this person should be in the cockpit. >> in my opinion, you vote for a democrat you're being very disloyal to jewish people and you're being disloyal to israel. >> so if a museum had a leader that insulted racial or religious minorities the board would be starting to act. >> you are so obviously biased and that's why the public has no confidence in the media. >> if the u.s. navy knew that one of its commanders was routinely lying and lashing out under criticism, the navy would not want that person in charge of a nuclear submarine. so again, as james fallows

explores in a great piece for "the atlantic" magazine, what if trump were an airline pilot? that's the question. >> you know, that's actually the question that, willie, we have been asking for almost three years now. >> yeah. >> if donald trump were a ceo for any fortune 500 company, if he were a professor, if he we were -- you know, the commanding officer of a navy vessel, whatever he was. he would long ago have been kicked out of his position. and certainly if that didn't happen before his actions this past week would have assured it. >> yeah. i'm looking for captain sully vibe up in the congress pit than a donald trump vibe. but that's not how we do things in the united states of america. there's no board to run president trump out. there's no way to fire president trump. you have to remove him through an election if that's what you want to do as an american voter. so it's on to the democrats at

this point, unless an impeachment proceeding comes forward in the next 14 months and removes him from office and it's up to the democrats to put a great candidate to remove president trump from the cockpit of this plane. >> well, again, we won't belabor this because it's not going to happen. but mika, wouldn't it be great if a handful of republicans found the courage and actually the foresight to understand that donald trump is not going to be -- not going to be serving much longer. that he most likely won't be re-elected. and now would be a really good time for them to speak out and not only defend their political futures, but to defend the republican party and defend the ideas of conservatism. >> and the values of this country. i would love to hear from john kelly or mattis or anybody who's worked in there. i would love to hear what they have to say. we'll get to that along with joe, willie and me we have msnbc contributor mike barnicle. republican strategist and msnbc

political analyst susan del percio is with us. pulitzer prize winner columnist and msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. and columnist and associate editor for "the washington post," david ignatius joins us this morning. so the president's weak standing among key parts of the electorate is coming in to sharp focus this morning. according to new a.p./nrc center poll 36% of americans approve, 62% say they disapprove. he's the only president whose rating has never been above 50% in the poll. a new monmouth puts his approval at 40% and 50% disapprove. in the poll he doesn't break 50% among men, 49% approve. while 62% of women disapprove of

trump's performance. underwater 31 points and his disapproval among nonwhites is 72%. one clear sign of trouble is trump's standing among noncollege educated white women. according to the latest nbc news/"wall street journal" poll, 49% say they would support the democratic candidate. just 43% would support trump. it is a dramatic drop among a demographic that he carried by 27 points according to 2016 exit polls. a recent cnn poll shows 40% of americans approve of his job performance. 54% disapprove. "the washington post" notes no president with an approval below 50% has ever been re-elected. >> so the numbers, susan del percio, are stark to say the least. 36% overall approval rating in the latest poll from the associated press. and then you look at the

monmouth poll and it's a number that we have been looking at for some time now as have a lot of political experts. and that is, donald trump's standing among noncollege white women. that number was well into the 60s when he ran against hillary clinton. it's now at 49%. donald trump -- or at 43%, i'm sorry, 43% the democrat at 49%. his numbers have collapsed again and i'll say it again, susan. this is not about what happens next year so much as what's happened over the past month and as we have said this racially tinged campaigning may solidify his 36% that support him now, but as we have all said all

along, this is going to destroy his chances in the suburbs. this is going to destroy his chances with higher educated americans. this is going to destroy his chances with women -- working class women. you can see that's exactly what's happening. >> right. because these people and a lot of men, but mostly women that we're talking about in is up burke ya and across the board and they're disgusted by president trump. they're not seeing enough benefit come out of their paycheck if you will. or other things. they don't feel the country is going in the right direction. and more importantly, i think they're horrified if their children came home and said some of the things that donald trump had said. so not only are they turned off, but what we saw in 2018 is that turnout in the suburbs among democratic voters was through the roof and that should really scare donald trump as well. >> and david ignatius, you

consider a 36% approval rating there's no way to sugarcoat it. it's a terrible number. it's not nixon at watergate or carter but it's bad for a president who's presiding over a decent economy, although a recession could be on the horizon. but the president of the united states in his 2 1/2 years in office has never cracked 50% approval rating in this a.p. poll. his range has been from 32 to 42 and right now he's sort of at the low end of that. >> you know, willie, i have a theory that the country is just frazzled. trump runs this daily show. he's got to dominate every news cycle. the issues become more and more bizarre. and i think people are just getting exhausted if the democrats can find a way to run a candidate who is reassuring, who makes you think that a stable, sane person is going to be governing the country again that simple fact will make a big difference.

these numbers are so low that it's hard to imagine the president -- as you said, these are good times. this is when the economy is still humming along, unemployment is unusually low. if president trump can't rise above these numbers now, i think increasingly people wonder how he gets across the line in november successfully. >> you know, rich lowry had talked -- he wrote an article a couple of days ago, gene robinson, about trump fatigue and how that may be a real challenge in 2020. i have been hearing that for some time. even from trump supporters who are just saying, just stop, i can't handle this. i go back to pensacola, a lot of people are we support him, but man, if he can stop the tweeting. if he can stop the insults. if he could stop the nonsense. but i want us to stop for a second and just once again take a deep breath and think back to

when he was leading crowds and fascist chants and send them back and when he was saying things they were racially tinged. that donald trump was going to try to use race as his primary focus. not a side issue but as the primary focus to get elected. now they want us to look at these numbers. and we can all exhale a little bit and say, you know what? the american people even some people who voted for donald trump in 2016 will punish him for that behavior. they did that after charlottesville and they did after send them back. >> yeah. >> yeah. yeah. and i fully expect people to punish him next year. the one person who doesn't seem to be exhausted by all of this is donald trump.

who does have endless energy. very negative energy but he has endless energy. he stood out there on wednesday, we all saw that insane literally performance on the white house lawn for 35 minutes in 90 degree heat. just spewing nonsense. offensive nonsense. just plain crazy nonsense. and i think people -- people look at that and yes, it's true that some people just are exhausted and just don't want to see it and don't want to hear it. but you can't escape it and you look at that and you say, this is the president of the united states. this is not who we are. this is not who -- this is not who we were, this is not who we must be. i think he hurts himself every time he does this sort of thing. but it's going to -- he's going to continue to do it. he's his own press secretary,

his own communications director. he thinks he's a genius at communicating. a genius at branding. and so now he's slapping all kinds of brands on himself. he's about to slap the brand economic failure on his forehead for his trade war that's destabilizing the world economy. and going to lead potentially to a recession. >> well, that genius is at a 36% now, and to follow up what gene ended on. you have been saying for the past week or two that you believe that even his -- his more unbalanced behavior that's been noted by atlantic and by jonathan lemire and it's been noted by gene and noted by conservative, the fascist chants of send them back, to the dual loyalty press conference that he held outside the white house this week, you believe that he's

been hearing from his aides inside the white house for the last week or two more bad news coming on the economy and it's been your opinion that's what set him off. >> and many believe it sets him off because if he loses re-election he's headed to a -- you know, to a bad place in his life. you know -- >> legally, there are -- >> legal challenges. awaiting him that would not be awaiting him four years later. so this is make or break for president trump. by the way, again, nothing to do with the state of the american people and how they're feeling, all to do with him. it's always something going on when he starts being so reactive and we have got this new data that will add to concerns about the state of the economy, concerns for the american people and i guess for trump himself. reports say officials in the trump administration are sounding the alarm to the

president. according to "the washington post," top advisers told the president earlier this month that some internal figures revealed the economy could slow noticeably over the next year. creating problems for trump's re-election bid. "the post" said the forecast showed the slowdown would stop short of a recession. the paper goes on to note how the white house's forecast which is one of several delivered to president trump contrasts sharply with the triumphant rhetoric he and his surrogates have repeatedly used to describe the economy. "the post" says that trump has told aides that he thinks he can convince americans that the economy is vibrant and unrattled through a public messaging campaign, but it's contributed to a muddled and often contradictory message. >> well, you know, mika, there are some things that you

can't -- >> can't lie about. >> you can't lie away about when you're tweeting. you have seen the new figures that have come out. the new figures came out yesterday that the manufacturing sector contracted for the first time in nearly a decade. now, this is important because donald trump said he was going to bring all of these jobs back to america. that manufacturing was going to explode. and yet, the initial reading for august came in at just below 50 with anything below that number signaling a contraction. experts say that trump's ongoing trade war with china has taken a big bite out of the sector. and mike barnicle, manufacturing is what donald trump talked about. he was going to make america great again. he was going to bring all of these jobs back to america. he was going to stop jobs from leaving. of course we have seen over the past month more heart breaking

news out of mccomb county where a gm plant closes down. more heart breaking news across the midwest where other manufacturing plants are being shut down. and here we are the manufacturing outlook, the worst that it's been in a decade. and we are now actually under trump contracting for the first time in a decade. >> yeah. joe, that's why perhaps the biggest story of the day today will be what jerome powell the chairman of the fed says in his address out in jackson hole, wyoming. every summer they have a gathering of the fed, he speaks after the gathering and how the united states reacts. every past president, every past administration knows that confidence and predictability are keys to talking about the economy in terms of taking care of the markets. so that wall street doesn't get rattled. so you get that being abused by the president and his advisers.

they're all over the lot and they have to depend on a very unpredictable guy, donald trump, to make a ruling on what's going to be the strategy going forward. all of this happening at the same time that consumers are finding out that trump's talk on tariffs and how china is picking up the tab for all of the tariffs is blatantly false. because you're going back to school shopping for your children, okay. sneakers that cost 90 bucks in june now cost 95 bucks because guess what? you know, we're picking up the tab on the tariff, on the trade wars that are so easy to win for donald trump. but you know in the thread of the conversation that we're having this morning, it's possible -- it's entirely possible that once you separate all of the activists who are in iowa and new hampshire and all of the primary states there's a huge percentage of americans who have just tuned everything out. they have got mufflers over their ears and they're just

waiting for the chance to vote. they want things to calm down, but they're tired of this guy who breaks into their lives multiple times each and every day and that guy's name is donald trump. >> you know, david ignatius, a lot of people that voted for donald trump wanted a disrupter and certainly washington needed disrupting. and yet, you look around the world around you see actually the impact of three years of not just donald trump going up against china, but donald trump going up against denmark, against france. against britain. against all of our allies, so in the trade war against china, we can't stand shoulder to shoulder with our allies because he's fighting the eu at the same time. when we want to stand up to north korea or iran, we can't do

that shoulder to shoulder with our allies because again donald trump is fighting everybody at the same time. with no plan. so i think about a time like now where we really are at a critical stage for working class americans and middle class americans afraid that this economy may go into the tank. and today would be a perfect day for donald trump to sit down with his close ally at the g7 and put together a strategy to ensure that growth continues in germany. that growth continues across the g7. that growth continues in the united states of america. but donald trump can't do that because donald trump is too busy fighting germany. too busy fighting france. too busy fighting everybody to actually do what presidents do at g7 conferences and work to

build the economy for america and the world. >> you know, joe, it's sad that it's almost impossible to imagine trump having that kind of constructive conversation with his global partners. that's what the g7 -- once the g8 was all about. it was to deal with economic disruptions that matter to each of these great countries. you know, i'd make two brief points. first at home. i think i'm increasingly concerned about what extreme measures donald trump will try to take to keep this recovery alive. ways to keep the sugar high of tax cuts going with payroll or capital gains taxes that might not otherwise make sense. he continues to jawbone the fed and the fed chairman jerome

powell demanding that he cut interest rates when you can't find an economist who thinks that's wise. overseas what i see as the g7 meeting gathers at the ritz in france is increasingly a world in disarray. key allies to the united states are in trouble. we have japan and south korea. two critical allies in asia. who are withdrawing intelligence cooperation for each other, it's really very damaging to our security in asia. trump's done nothing about it. we have india and pakistan near what could be a conflict on their border because of the historic dispute about kashmir. again, donald trump has done nothing positive that i can see. where the heck is britain going? in all these ways it would be time for a president to go to the g7 meeting like this and be

a leader and instead i think people are regretting his arrival not knowing what fireworks he's going to shoot off, to get the stage to himself, to belittle others, to show everybody how great he is. but just note this is a world that's got an increasing problem, needs american leadership and it ain't there. >> well, coming up on "morning joe," david and gene have new pieces in "the washington post" and we'll read from those just ahead. plus, for many presidential candidates election day might as well be next week. we'll explore what could be a make or break moment in the primary race. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. this is rick blomquist.

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been ravaging the amazon rain forest over the course of this year. official figures show more than 75,000 fires have been recorded in brazil. in the worst eight months of this year, that's compared to 40,000 last year. speaking with reporters yesterday, jair bolsonaro says he doesn't have the ability to force the country's interior ministry to send a team to combat the fires, adding that if he could it would be only a team of 40 firefighters. bolsonaro doubled down on the claim that nongovernmental organizations were the ones setting the wildfires in the amazon to hurt his government. but admitted he has no evidence to back up his claim. conservationists have blamed brazil's government for the crisis in the rain forest to arguing that bolsonaro has encouraged the clearing of land by loggers and farmers, speeding up the deforestation of the rain forest as a result. we'll be following this story.

it's just horrific to watch. back now to politics. and joining us now, boston globe reporter, with ten candidates meeting the requirement for the debate next month, the latest reporting describes the urgency of the -- of the remaining contenders to qualify by next week's deadline. >> well, james, we have seen a shakedown -- shakeout a little bit. i like how somebody put it, governor hickenlooper went from being a david to being a goliath. he is now well ahead in the senate race in colorado. you have jay inslee going back most likely will return and run for re-election as governor for his third term there. and i suspect that his presidential campaign did nothing but to help those chances, but you're saying there are several other candidates that may go -- be going back to

their day jobs over the next couple of weeks. tell us why. >> that's right. i think we'll have another drop out this morning so we'll be at 21. if you qualify for the debate you work under the old rules of campaigning. campaign managers from dog catchers to president look at election day and many say on election day we need this many volunteers, this amount of staff. we need to advertise for four months. then they would work backwards. four months would be this day, that's when we start our advertising, et cetera. for the top tier candidates that doesn't change. iowa and new hampshire in terms of the presidential race are probably going to have their elections in february. they can work backwards but for that back half of folks, the majority of candidates, election day might as well be on wednesday. wednesday is the deadline to make the third debate for -- in terms of the dnc rules so for them it's an all out sprint. we have seen this the last couple of weeks.

kirsten gillibrand already cash strapped campaign, spending $1 million on air. you have to give her credit she's leaving everything on the field, but they're panicking to make the wednesday deadline or figuring out they'll never make it. >> so you killed hamlet in the first act there, but you didn't tell us exactly what happened. who is -- who is going to be dropping out today? >> can't say that yet. off the record. >> what do you mean -- >> wait a minute. i want to know. >> you can't? mike barnicle, i'm tossing this to you. >> it's the bottom half. for this reason, this person won't make the debate qualifications and i think the next couple of weeks we may see the field shrink by half. >> all right. let's go through the list and see what his face does. >> no. not playing this game. mike barnicle, jump in and get the answer. >> pick one, john delaney, seth

moulton, bill de blasio, marianne williamson. probably not her. >> she's -- >> she's doing it. >> hey, james, let me ask you this, because i suspect you won't answer that question at this point. what's the debate going to look at this time around? so many people want to be sure they finally get a chance to see joe biden and elizabeth warren or joe biden and bernie sanders have that debate because they occupy different lanes. are we having another two night debate that they're split up again? >> i don't know. right now we stand at ten candidates in the debate. abc news as you know is running the debate. they say there's ten candidates everyone will be on one night on a thursday night. if we get one more candidate to qualify, then we'll split it up into two different nights and may not get the match-up that you want. tom steyer and tulsi gabbard are on the cusp of making the debate. gabbard needs two more polls and

ironically both candidates were not -- on the cusp were not leaving it all on the field. tom steyer was on jury duty and tulsi gabbard is doing her commitment for the national guard in indonesia. to show the urgency in how hard this is for folks, they're trying to get four polls to show them at 2%. this week in the crunch people we only had one qualifying poll on tuesday for the national poll. they all pull julian castro in but that's where we are at. >> give us a quick new hampshire update. elizabeth versus bernie up there. >> it's a three-person contest. elizabeth and bernie and joe biden and i'll be with him today with a couple of events over the weekend. but right now it's a three-person contest. those three and then pretty much everyone else. warren as you documented on this show is the one with the energy and the momentum.

i talked to bernie's campaign manager yesterday. they're kind of going back and forth on whether this is a must win or a critical state for him. of course it's a must win. he won the state by 23 points in 2016. i think the progressive wing needs to figure it out and they'll probably figure it out in new hampshire. >> this is david ignatius. talking to some political pros i kept hearing the same thing which is that basically this is now a race between joe biden and elizabeth warren. that if biden cannot hold on, if people decide he's just too old, too tired, to whatever, that she has just gotten a degree of momentum, ability to move forward, money. supporters that she is now well positioned to take the nomination if biden doesn't. does that sound right to you? >> it does. for most of the summer, since the beginning of the campaign, there's an argument as to why

each individual person will not be the nominee, though you know one of them has to be. but now in the last couple of weeks when you talk to strategists, when you talk to activists and voters on the ground it does feel like you can begin to create a narrative as to how elizabeth warren is the nominee. she's got a very strong presence in iowa. that she can clearly -- she does well there. translate that into new hampshire. and then it's out to the ball game and i know joe biden will say i'm the electable candidate. you know, if you look inside the cross tabs in the latest polls people are changing their minds on wloornts -- on whether or not elizabeth warren is electable. she's a second choice for a number of the folks who say they like someone else better. as people begin to drop out you can watch her numbers grow. if joe biden is resting on south carolina, that's what rubio did. south carolina is a long way away but it's hard to stop that momentum. >> well, james pendal, thanks so

much. and susan del percio, we look at the field winnowing down. a lot of people are not going to make the next debate. just look out to colorado and see what a huge difference having a former presidential candidate is making in that race. governor hickenlooper already up by 13 points in the first poll since he entered that race. i'm sorry, but you have to look at some people who aren't on there and i know they don't want to hear it, but my gosh them jumping into senate races in their states could make the difference between whether mitch mcconnell is majority leader next time or not. >> that's absolutely right. i think now it's a person window because they can go in and still leave strong and saying i'm doing this and have a career within the party and go forward in politics, whereas if they hold on too long and they don't make the run for a senate seat or do other things they're just

going to look like spoilers at some point. it's clear that the democrats want to get behind a candidate as soon as possible. and for some of those like beto o'rourke they're better off just leaving the race. they're not in the top tier any longer. go back for him, go back to texas. and run a competitive race. if nothing else make people spend a lot of money. make the republicans spend a lot of money. >> yeah. up next, fighting with china over trade. while also trying to fight off a possible recession. can the president do both and win? jonathan swan of axios joins us with new reporting on that next on "morning joe." s thwi new reporting on that next on "morning joe. carl, i appreciate the invite here. as my broker, what am i paying you to manage my money? it's racquetball time. (thumps) ugh! carl, does your firm offer a satisfaction guarantee? like schwab does. guarantee?

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welcome back to "morning joe." an estimated 2 million gallons of untreated sewage spilled into the flint river on sunday just months after officials warned that waste water infrastructure was quickly approaching a critical point there. state officials blamed a flash flood event for causing an overflow of the city's waste water treatment plant which pushed raw waste into the sewer that drains directly into the

river. this comes months after the city council approved $1 million in contracts with companies to upgrade sewage treatment infrastructure after officials warned the existing system was at a risk of catastrophic failure. >> you know, willie, the key word there was infrastructure. >> yeah. >> the fact that we could be doing so many infrastructure projects at very low cost given the interest rates, we could have borrowed a lot of money, tons of money, billions of money, in helping to rebuild america and we have not done it. this is what happens. not only in flint, poor flint. they don't have proper drinking water, but throughout the country, bridges, roads, tunnels. >> too little, too little for flint. the residents are being told to stay away from the river. let's turn back to president trump and the ongoing trade war with china. axios is reporting that sources close to the president say that the administration is in a bind when it comes to the stand you have with -- standoff with

beijing. joining us now is jonathan swan from axios. what is that bind for the president? >> so sources close to the president including senior administration officials are increasingly pessimistic about the chances of a trade deal with china. they say in recent weeks the trade discussion has become a national security discussion. you have people like mike pompeo, john bolton, mike pence very hawkish on china and the intelligence community worried about the chinese overreaching militarily in hong kong. so you have this conversation going on inside the administration about how to push back against china militarily. you have mark esper and mike pompeo going to australia earlier this month to meet with the officials there and giving them the unequivocal message there's no compromising with china, we're going to push against them wherever we need to and then you have a president

who has told people privately that he thinks it will be okay if the u.s. does no trade with china. so who seems quite comfortable in the private conversations with the idea of a decoupling with china. none of that is pointing towards a deal with china. >> david ignatius, this was the entire rationale we were told for the trade war, for the imposition of tariffs on china, which was it was going to be leverage to bring china to the trade table and now that is tough to improbable in the view of the white house. >> you know, willie, president trump talked about the trade war as being easy to win. will get, you know, quick improvements in the purchases of the chinese products, we'll chalk it up in the win column and we see how complicated it is. i want to ask jonathan i hear increasingly the idea that key people in the trump administration do see some sort

of decoupling of the u.s. and china as the appropriate place where this whole story ends. that -- as i read the president's comments on the lawn this week, you know, sort of goofy, i'm the chosen one. i have been chosen -- i have been say chosen to draw a new line between us and china, that's my -- that's the center of my presidency. what's that going to mean if he takes this seriously? >> privately in the oval office in late 2017 the president said maybe we should cut off all trade with china. they were like -- oh, that's kind of, you know, wacky. but more recently, he has said privately that i think we'd be okay if we did no trade with china. i don't know that that is -- that's far from a consensus view within the administration, but i will tell you on the national security side there is a view

that china is a profoundly bad actor and that there is no way of really coexisting with them in a productive way that would facilitate their rise in the way that, you know, if you go back and look at the tape of joe biden i think in 2011 saying the rise of china is a good thing and we can coexist. that's not the view of anyone i talked to at the senior level in the administration who has any kind of responsibility for national security. >> jonathan, gene robinson here. hasn't the president given xi jinping power over his political future? it's the china tariffs and the uncertainty of that economic relationship that's a major factor in destabilizing the markets and causing these gyrations in the dow and everything and so xi jinping is

sitting there and he sort of has the option of making a deal or not making a deal. does the administration see it this way and how do you think the president is going to tip which way toward his own political future or this sort of war against china that others in the administration want to wage? >> so i have no earthly idea of how to game theory donald trump heading into the election. i think certainly when i talk to people who are china hawks in the administration what they're worried about as they get closer to november 2020 the president panics and does a deal that they would see as weak with china in order to juice the economy and the stock market. right now, they're nowhere near that mindset but i think another way to look at it this is a way that people in the administration look at it who work on national security issues is that president xi is not in a

particularly comfortable position at the moment. he's got people around the world pushing back on belton road. he's got all the protests in hong kong and the unrest there and an increasing consensus with australia pushing back on huawei and 5g and the u.s. pushing back with the tariffs. i mean he's got a lot of problems and internal problems as well. so it's not like, you know, you have the president under stress and then xi in this wonderful armchair sitting back. yes, he is, you know, an authoritarian leader who doesn't have the same political concerns that president trump has, but he's got a lot of other concerns from what i can tell. >> jonathan swan of axios, thanks so much. coming up a number of federal judges and immigration court employees were emailed a link to an anti-semitic article this week. it was sent by the justice department. the details of that story ahead on "morning joe."

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the national association of immigration judges is calling for tougher scrutiny of the department of justice after an all staff email was sent laced with anti-semitic slurs. according to a buzzfeed news report, the doj's executive office for immigration review sent court employees and judges a link to a blog post from the white nationalist website in the monday morning briefing that included anti-semitic attacks on judges. the link allegedly detailed a recent move by the justice department to decertify immigration -- the immigration judges union. the post included pictures of those with anti-semitic terms preceding their names according

to buzzfeed. the union had called for an apology from doj following the distribution of white nationalist content. in response, a statement from the doj office reads quote, the daily eoir morning news briefings are compiled by a contractor and the blog post should not have been included. the department of justice condemns anti-semitism in the strongest terms. mike barnicle, how in the heck does that happen? >> well, there's a level of carelessness, mika. but that is not strong enough. how did this happen, we don't know. who's the contract, we don't know. we do know that the internet is the sewer filled with stuff like that, but the fact that someone provides a link to the website that literally attacks sitting immigration court judges and

demeans them personally, professionally, ethnically, it's outrageous that this occurred and the statement should be much tougher than it was. >> yeah. coming up on "morning joe" as far as donald trump is concerned, the conference of world leaders this weekend might as well be called the g1. we'll explain his insular position on the world stage. plus, joe biden heads to new hampshire today, just days after his wife told voters there to vote for him, even if they like another candidate better. we'll go live to the granite state next on "morning joe." te state next on "morning joe." every day, visionaries are creating the future.

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with 27 vitamins and minerals and 10 grams of protein. boost®. be up for life™. piccolini piccolin . a beautiful shot of new york city on this summer morning. welcome back to "morning joe." friday, august 23th. still with willie, joe and me, we have mike barnicle. republican strategist and msnbc political analyst susan del percio. associate editor of "the washington post" and msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. columnist and associate ed for for "the washington post," david ignatius. joining the conversation national security expert, columnist at "usa today," and author of the book "the death of

expertise", tom nichols. whatever there. a lot is going on. i think the president is watching. but that's -- >> yeah, willie, the most loyal viewer who told the staff that he still watches today and has watched for a decade now. but obviously watching, and didn't appreciate us spending so much time on his weak poll numbers. and now is tweeting that he actually is very popular among republicans. >> yeah. we were looking into that associated press poll in our last hour that shows him at 36% approval rating. he's pointed -- we pointed out he's never broken 50% in his run as a president so a few moments ago he tweeted this out. 94% approval rating within the republican party. thank you very much. didn't point to his 62% disapproval with women in that new a.p. poll or the other figures. again he's at 36% in that a.p. poll. >> yeah. well, you know, the associated press of course -- i know this

will shock people that have watched this show and followed the president's twitter time line, but actually he's at 79% among republicans. but i -- but 15% here, 15% there. but i have got to say, 79% among republicans, that's still pretty good. but that and a quarter won't even get you in line at a starbucks come next november. >> yeah. it will be bad. >> so it seems that the president is focused on our review of his poll numbers around actually -- and actually got his approval rating by the republicans wrong by 15%, let's go through it again and we'll slow down so everybody can absorb how bad the numbers are. for those joining us from the

west coast, it's important to remember that about a month ago that the president's poll numbers were at the highest. and when they were at their highest, the president started these fascist like chants of send them back. crowds started those fascist chants of send them back, send her back, send her home for americans, members of congress. women of color. >> yeah. >> living in america who were americans and then of course it's been chaos from that point all the way forward to this week. where just there is one anti-semitic trope after another coming from the president of the white house, we saw the anti-semitic trope about the dual loyalty where the president admitted that jews had a dual loyalty to america and of course his justice department sending out anti-semitic slurs to immigration judges across america. so again, those -- those

despicable actions i want everybody to take this into the weekend with them when they feel like donald trump gets away with everything. he didn't in 2018. republicans didn't in 2018. i say this to my republican brothers and sisters too, you lost by more votes in the 2018 midterm than any political party has ever lost. the greatest vote landslide ever in a congressional midterm election and that's what two years of trumpism brought you. now, mika, we see what one month of even unmoored behavior is bringing donald trump and those are extraordinarily low numbers. >> all right. i'll go through them again and, you know, they're pretty clear. >> dismal. that's sad. >> i hope you can hear me, according to a new a.p. poll,

36% of americans approve of the way that trump is handling his job. 62% say they disapprove. trump who feasts on polls throughout his candidacy is the only president whose rating has never been above 50% in that poll. >> wait. are you saying the only president ever that's never been above 50% in the a.p. poll? >> ever. since they started doing it. >> wow. that's bad. >> so a new monmouth poll put his approval rating at 40%. and 53% disapprove. >> you're still going to lose at 40% that means only four in ten americans is up sport what you're doing. >> so in that poll he doesn't break 50% among men. 49% approve and 62% of women disapprove of his performance. underwater by 31 points and his disapproval among nonwhites is

72%. so one clear sign of trouble is trump's standing among noncollege educated white women. according to the latest nbc news/"wall street journal" poll, 49% say they would support the democratic candidate. just 43% would support trump. it's a dramatic drop among a demographic he carried by 27 points according to 2016. that's a big swing. >> huge swing. >> and a recent cnn poll shows 40% of americans approve of his job performance. 54% disapprove. "the washington post" notes no president with an approval below 50% has ever been elected. zero. >> this guy is sitting at 40 and people are saying, gee, donald trump will get away with it again in 2018. i said he's at 40%. he's at -- that's only four out

of ten. you don't win when you have a 40% approval rating. willie, again, the president's numbers have been dropping precipitously, but the number that i think the white house is probably most focused on, the number that should cause the greatest concern has to do with women, with high school educations. or less. and donald trump won that group, what was it, 61% to 39% back in 2016. now he's losing by six points, 43 -- he's at 43% and democrat candidates are sitting at 49%. that's just cutting right to the heart of his base and it's not looking good at all for him. >> yeah, you said it. that's the heart of the base right there. also if you look at college educated women he is way under water. in the nbc poll he only had 30%

support among college educated women. those are the suburban women we talk so much about. some of whom maybe took a flyer on donald trump in 2016 and either are regretting it or reconsidering it. tom nichols, we'll say again that this 36% number is within the range where he has been at a low of 32, but never higher than 42% and 36% coming in relatively good economic times. we have talked a lot this week about what may be on the horizon. we have a trillion dollar debt coming next year. the job numbers from last year were graded back down this week. there are signs on the horizon that the economy -- we hope it doesn't happen, but there are signs that it could be taking a turn for the worse. so this is 36% in good economic times. who knows what comes next. >> the only thing that concerns me is that, you know, people will say that they disapprove of donald trump's approval rating because first of all, i'm always

amazed when people say it's 36%. i'm always amazed that it's that high at this point. because he does exhaust people and he is offensive and he does say things that are completely outlandish and crazy. my only concern is that once the democrats have a nominee a lot of the conservative voters will fall back into, well, i don't like donald trump, but, you know, the democrat is a socialist. i had a friend the other day tell me, you know, i get it that -- you know, donald trump is crazy, he said, but joe biden is just too far for the left for me. when joe biden is too far to the left you're looking for a reason to rationalize voting for donald trump. so i think we have to think about how bad these numbers are and they're historically bad. i mean, these are -- you know, donald trump has once again achieved a new first in american politics by having some of the most consistently bad polls in

american history. but a -- but there are a bunch of the people that are going to say, i totally agree with you he's a bad president and i'm going to vote for him anyway. >> but tom, one thing that's interesting about what you said, i agree there will be a frustration with the democratic candidate. but will those people stay home like they stay -- like democrats stayed home for hillary clinton? in 2016. i think you're going to see suburban women if they cannot vote for the democratic nominee they will stay home. they will not vote for donald trump again and what we saw in 2018 is that the voter turnout especially in the suburbs was so increased. we saw a lot of republicans hitting their numbers that they thought they needed to win. based on turnout. but it was overwhelming more what we call nonprime voters came out to vote in 2018 than ever before. so that's the only difference i see with the logic that you have. >> yes.

and there are two bright spots in that. one is that there will be people who will say i don't like the democrat either but i was washing my hair that day or i had to walk the dog that day. or, you know, i had to -- i had to get a root canal that day. you may also -- you know, it may be that women in particular are going to save america in this next election by being the bloc that really defects en masse from donald trump. although interesting to see his numbers softening even with the uneducated or the -- you know, the high school educated white male base. so susan, i agree with you completely. i think that, you know, i always have this concern that people are willing to say that donald trump is doing poorly he's a bad president. but then they somehow you know bring it back to but i had to vote for him anyway. on the other hand, i agree with you there are bright spots with voters who may say, you know

what, i'm just staying home. i can't vote for anybody. or that a lot of the female voters have really had -- you know, understandably so have really had it with a president who really goes out of his way to be offensive and sexist and to say things disturbing to everybody but i would image on the a lot of women -- to a lot of women in particular. >> you know, voter intensity is so important. there's a "new york times" piece about joe biden and whether he lacks the voter intensity needed to win the democratic primary. but david ignatius, let's follow on this conversation. remember that in 2016, black voter turnout was -- went down for the first time in 20 years and yet a special election in alabama the next year, you had black voter turnout there reach record levels. in a special off year election the numbers were as high as they were for barack obama's 2008 victory. so much is going to depend on

that voter intensity and i wonder if evangelicals who say they support donald trump and loyal republicans who support donald trump, do just stay at home. that's what happens more times than not, these days when a candidate loses. it's not always getting out the vote on the other side. sometimes it's just the depressed voter turnout because trump has as we said last hour exhausted so many people even his own supporters. >> well, when i hear democratic political strategists talking about is this question of turnout and they focus in part on who biden would choose as his running mate if he makes it across the finish line and it's got to be somebody who will turn out democratic voters. turn out that democratic base. and interestingly there's

increasingly talk that it should be the person who is actually leading an effort to poll turnout, stacey abrams, who ran for governor of georgia, who in many ways is a charismatic, compelling figure and the argument is this is somebody who could pull the democratic vote in 2020 if she was on the ticket with biden. >> so james fallows has a piece in the atlantic entitled if trump were an airline pilot. if an airline learned that a pilot was talking publicly about being the chosen one or the king of israel or scotland orrer what, the airline would be looking carefully as to whether this person should be in the cockpit at all. if a hospital had a senior surgeon behaving as trump now does, other doctors and nurses would be talking with administrators and lawyers

before giving that surgeon the scalpel again. if a public company knew that a ceo was making costly, strategic decisions on personal impulse or from personal vanity or slight and was doing so more and more frequently, the board would be starting to act. if a university museum or other public institution had a leader who routinely insulted large parts of its constituentsy, racial or religious minorities, immigrants or international allies, women, the board would be starting to act. in the u.s. navy knew that one of the commanders was routinely lying about important operational details, plus lashing out under criticism, plus talking in chosen one terms the navy would not want that person in charge of say a nuclear missile submarine. if donald trump were in virtually any other position of responsibility, action would already be under way to remove

him from that role. the board at a public company would have him replaced outright or arrange to have him shipped out of power. of course he would never have gotten this far in a large public corporation. the chain of command in the navy or at an airline or in a hospital would check his fitness before putting him back on the bridge or in the cockpit or the operating room. of course he would have never gotten this far as a military officer, or a pilot, or a doctor. there are two exceptions. one is a purely family run business like the firm in which trump spent his entire previous career and the other is the u.s. presidency where he will remain as long as the gop senate stands with him. >> you know, gene robinson, any fortune 500 company would have gotten rid of donald trump long ago. we just had a ceo removed for

simply making a statement about the deep state yesterday. but donald trump would have been removed long ago by a board of directors and of course james fellows is right as usual. there is no board of directors here, but there's the united states senate. there are republicans that run that united states senate and they actually have, you know, corporate rules that happens to be called the u.s. constitution. i just -- i do wonder aloud people that i have known for a long time and respected, i wonder where they are right now. why they're not speaking out against this madness, against this anti-semitism, against this dual loyalty talk. against this fascist language of sending people back. i wonder where they are. we only had a few like tom cole come on the show and speak out against it. but where are the rest? and where are those like ben

sasse who has always put himself out as a paragon of morality and virtue? where is joni ernst. >> mitt romney? >> mitt romney has completely disappeared. is mitt romney all right with dual loyalty talk, is mitt romney all right with fascist chants in audiences? where are these people? >> some of whom must be in witness protection because you don't hear from them. you know, i think they're making a cynical bet and a wrong bet that their political survival and their political fortunes depend on sticking with donald trump no matter what and i think that's going to mean going down with this -- with this very leaky ship. you know, you look at those numbers and you would think in

the a.p. poll, you would think that even just in terms of survival of self-preservation, some republicans in the senate, which in this case is the equivalent of the board of directors because the senate gets to decide on removal ultimately. you would think they would be saying, you know, wow, this is -- this is not going well. this does not look like it's going to be a good election for us. you know, one of the worst numbers in that poll is actually that 79% number, 79% support of republicans for donald trump. if that is the case, 79% is low for an incumbent president in his own party. that's getting down to the point where you get a primary challenge and indeed there are some primary challenges coming out. so there are tough questions posed to the republicans in the senate and they have to come up with a better answer than they've got now. >> so speaking of the gop senate

standing with trump, senator tom cotton defended president trump's push to buy greenland saying he was the one that suggested trump purchase the country. he revealed wednesday that he met with the danish ambassador several months ago and proposed the sale of greenland to the united states. it's unclear if he was the one to initially bring up the idea to trump but cotton said the island is quote, vital to our national security and anyone who can't see that is blinded by trump derangement. cotton's comments come shortly after trump announced he was canceling his trip to denmark because the prime minister was not interested in selling greenland. >> i would say actually, mika, if you are fine with donald trump canceling a meeting with an ally on the spur of the moment because they wouldn't sell greenland, and you sit

quietly we're going to hear from a friend of ours from the national review in a minute talking about how trump derangement syndrome works both ways. you actually -- senator cotton, if he wasn't critical of donald trump for canceling a meeting with an ally, he's the one that has trump derangement syndrome. >> as we reference the trump derangement syndrome, the senior editor wrote this on twitter. trump deragement syndrome or tds is used to describe people who are unreasonable in their opposition to trump. fair enough. but it's normally people who would know better. in other words, derangement goes both ways. >> it's a brilliant insight. we could name friends and former republican allies that -- whose

views were consistent with ours for the past 30 to 40 years who now have been overcome by trump derangement syndrome. and now are acting like they never did before donald trump won the nomination in 2016. in fact, look at the words of lindsey graham before trump won the nomination. said that he was crazy, said that donald trump would destroy the republican party. that he would destroy america. and then look what he said after. you can look at what mike pence was quietly saying before hand to people saying he would destroy the republican party and then what he said after. mike pompeo talked about donald trump being an autocratic straw man. mike pompeo has been most affected by trump derangement syndrome and tom, this is what i don't understand. donald trump is going to leave

washington at some point. and this derangement they have, it's going to stay with them for the rest of their careers and if they think that donald trump will be loyal to them after they leave office, i can show you scars i have on me from bush's presidency and i was talked all the time by sean hannity as unloyal. i was attacked all the time by laura ingraham. i was attacked by these people for being unfaithful to george w. bush and guess what, the second he was out of power they threw him away in a new york second and they'll do the same to trump. >> i think a lot of those people are going to claim when all this is over, well, you know, deep down we were all part of the resistance or we weren't really behind him or we said what we had to say. i think a couple of things about the current state of the republicans is really important

to think about. first of all, their time horizon is short. they're not thinking about when trump is gone. most of these people are just trying to get through the day. the people in the administration i think are just trying to survive another day without getting fired. without getting thrown off the island. but the bigger problem -- you see it in the comments by tom cotton is the way that trump has infantalized the republican party, the way he's brought them down to his level of childlessness. you have tom cotton, who served in the military and he said he was a serious problem and falling on the sword -- unless he came up with the greenland idea, no, i thought of the greenland thing. don't worry, that was me. we all have thoughts like that. this is really disturbing because you have people now talking like donald trump. coming up with the same kind of crazy ideas like trump. i miss the old lindsey graham. those quotes, joe, that you just came up with. that's the lindsey graham i

think we'd all prefer to remember. but he's not going to be able to walk away from, you know, what a -- from all of these -- i think all of the republicans are in trouble walking away from the very north korean like statements of loyalty and admiration. there are things you can do that say, look, he's -- i think mcconnell you know does this with the senate majority he tries to cut this finely, i support the president, we support his agenda but that's not enough for the other republicans. they have really come out and said, boy, you know, he's a great golfer. he speaks 14 languages. he's -- one of the most wonderful person ever and it's cringe worthy. i don't think they can wash that off when that is all over. i think it does say something about the end of the republican party. >> well, and mika, just to be very clear, even if tom cotton said something about greenland a month or two back, there are many other examples of how he and so many other people in the

republican caucus have done other things to bend over backwards supporting donald trump they would have never done before he came in to office. >> tom nichols, thank you very much for being on this morning. >> willie? >> one of the images that claire mccaskill painted for us yesterday. she was there in the senate building for 12 years and she described the back stairwell there where members of the senate can avoid the press. she said you need a traffic cop on the back stairwell because republicans do not want to be asked about donald trump. but i guarantee you the press is waiting for them on all of these questions, an all of this stuff we have heard the last few days when they come back into session in the next couple of weeks. turning now to democrats, joining us from dartmouth college campus, mike memoli. you have been following joe biden on the trail, marking a milestone. tell us more about it. >> yeah, willie, good morning

from hanover where all of a sudden it feels like early fall but we have been talking throughout this campaign about the real pillars of joe biden's strength in this campaign. and for his candidacy. the first is one that we have talked about already. this perception of electability. one we heard jill biden talking about bluntly earlier this week and brought up in the first television ad in iowa and the other is one we'll hear about today. of course that relationship with president obama which we mark the 11th anniversary of -- the biden campaign does today. it was 11 years ago that the campaign put out a video talking about in president obama's own words that was the best political decision he ever made. calling biden the best vice president in american history. but there's a third pillar which we don't talk a lot about and that's the sum total of relationships that joe biden has built. this is of course the third time that biden has run for president in his -- in both of the

previous candidacies he never made it to new hampshire. we have a great new piece from julia jester and our embeds and they talk to a lot of people who are here in new hampshire who are part of that circle with joe biden. people who he's kept in contact with over these years. when you talk about as "the new york times" does in the piece about the enthusiastic gap you see, there are candidates who inspire. joe biden is certainly a candidate who relates. you see him now in a position to leverage those relationships that he's built over the course of decades and continue to cultivate now as he's running for president in his campaign thinks that's a real advantage going forward. >> so mike, we have seen some of the gaffes, many gaffes, on the campaign trail from joe biden. we have seen sort of subpar performances in a couple of debates and yet he's held his spot at the top of the polls. you can see the challengers like kamala harris who shot up in the polls after a strong performance in that first debate going after joe biden kind of recede a

little bit. how is the campaign feeling about vice president biden's performance on the campaign trail and its relationship to his standing in the polls? >> yeah, you hear from the campaign advisers is really an unfair effort by media to lump in the kind of misstatements, verbal miscues that other candidates might be prone to themselves but folded into this gaffe narrative and what we have seen really time and time again as you point out, willie, is that the strength of biden's support, the durability of his support is something that outlasted the moments that we focus on in the media. you can hear from the voters that my colleagues talk about. they're not necessarily worried about the gaffes they understand who joe biden is. they still believe he's the best candidate that the democrats can put up against donald trump. but this is one of the problems with the argument from the campaign so explicitly about electability.

if you see more and more of the missteps on the trail, that undermines that argument very quickly. it could undermine his support ultimately. >> mike memoli on the trail with joe biden in hanover, new hampshire, on a foggy morning there. thanks so much. joe, so we have seen joe biden as we said make these gaffes. have performances that disappointed some democrats and even his supporters and yet, there he sits with the lead with elizabeth warren approaching rather quickly. >> and today is a day of course that joe biden has circled on the calendar for some time, the day that president obama selected him as the vice president. he's gone up 1% since april this this poll. 11 years ago i received a phone call from the president and -- i mean, the poll numbers look great. you see kamala harris actually up 4% in this poll. she's dropped in others but sometimes things happen in

campaigns that nobody expects. and things break away, mika, you don't expect them to break. that's what happened in the second debate where i still -- i'm laughing because i still can't believe it happened. joe biden was the only person on stage defending president obama, a man who's in the 90s among democrats in the approval ratings and the other candidates made such a massive miscalculation. and any stumbles that joe may have had in the second debate, boy, voters looked right past that because it was joe biden that was defending perhaps the greatest democratic legislative achievement since lbj and that was the passage of the affordable care act. the passage of obamacare which eight in ten democrats still support. so i certainly -- i would expect

democrats to be a little smarter, the democratic challenges to be smarter next time and not spend all of their energy attacking barack obama because joe biden will waltz -- he will waltz to the nomination as long as attacking barack obama is their strategy. >> for many reasons. still ahead, while president trump has hailed a total defeat of isis, a new report blames the troop withdrawal for the resurgence. we'll talk to a correspondent for vice news who spent years covering the islamic state. >> we have david ignatius who has been to syria on several occasions also talking about what he saw over there and some of the growing concerns that he heard firsthand when he was in syria with americans who were fighting to keep isis down. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. wn you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. it's time for the biggest sale of the year on the

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president trump heads to france this weekend for the annual g7 summit and once again he's proving to be the wild card of world leaders. according to "the washington post," he's already shaken up the schedule by calling for a last minute meeting on sunday to discuss the global economy. his message to allies according to reuters -- be more like the u.s. officials say he will tell the world leaders to follow his economic model of tax cuts and deregulation. we're told trump will hold individual meetings with leaders of britain, france, germany, japan, india and canada. he's expected to press the summit's host emmanuel macron on france's digital tax on u.s. tech companies. trump has already threatened to put tariffs on french wine in retaliation. canadian prime minister justin

trudeau is expected to hear from the president on trade and angela merkel on defense spending. he tweeted out a chart earlier this week that shows how much the u.s. spends on defense compared to allies posting quote, nato very unfair to the united states. based on trump's performance at last year's g7 it is no wonder why world leaders are bracing for his arrival. last year he arrived late with white house advisers telling nbc news the president -- he's the president and there's a lot on his plate. he also left -- sorry. >> well, you know, he's got to watch early -- >> got to watch "morning joe." >> he watches "morning joe." >> yeah. that's three hours. got a lot on his plate. >> go have a big mac and then he goes back and watches -- >> got little tweets to do. got "dancing with the stars." >> he tweets about "dancing with

the stars." he's got a lot on his plate. >> come on, man. all right. he left the summit early to meet king jong-un in singapore leaving an aide to represent the u.s. trump arrived behind schedule for a session on gender equality. here you can see him strolling in to the meeting that was already in progress. >> yeah. >> great. the president was also slammed by world leaders for backing out of the communique over trade at the last minute. and in fact, his trade battles with the canada and the european union left him largely isolated during talks with world leaders. after leaving the summit early, the president slammed its host. justin trudeau, for being quote dishonest and weak on trade. the meeting was summed up by this iconic photo released by germany. wow. a spot on representation of trump's solo status on the world stage. >> seriously, that picture, keep

that picture up for a second. >> yikes awful. >> that's a classic picture. >> angela. >> i wish norman rockwell were still with us so he could actually do a -- do his version of that. let's bring in david ignatius and get his latest reporting on the summit and also with us, we have former dod official and from the graham talent, dr. evelyn farkas from the german marshall fund and a msnbc national security analyst. david, let's start with your reporting. again, as we said last hour it would be wonderful if he could talk to the g7 leaders and come together with a strategy to help an economy that seems to be -- the world economy that seems to be moving towards recession. but he's set up on twitter and in other places a laundry list of petty grievances that will

probably stop that from happening. and in effect will hurt working class americans and middle class americans. >> joe, this is the kind of moment that the g7 in a sense was invented for. we do have a slowing world economy, coordinated policies that boost demand around the world. to show leadership from the u.s. as the dominant economic power. those ought to be the order of the day. instead, you have from my reporting anxiety among just about every one of the other leaders. what is trump -- what tantrum will he throw, what new special pleading will he make? one european referred in print to this becoming the g6 plus one. in other words, everybody else and then donald trump. that's a terrible image of the united states in a key global leadership role. i think again this is a moment as we said in the last hour

where there are big problems around the world. two key allies, south korea and japan, are really feuding. the u.s. should be dealing with that clearly. india and pakistan are nearing real conflict over kashmir. the u.s. should be dealing with it. clearly and directly. this president has a way of picking petty fights. last year it was justin trudeau and this year with the president of denmark or prime minister fredrickson i think her name is. this -- attacking her for her nasty comments when she expressed astonishment over his desire to buy greenland. it has people scratching their heads. i hear foreign leaders increasingly saying things like when it is it going to be over? it's as exhausting for them as the american people, especially on a weekend like this. >> evelyn, one thing that the president arrives there later

tonight he spent the last couple of days attacking the prime minister of denmark because she wouldn't sell him greenland that's one way he's treating a nato ally and the only way we know where he stands on the g7, he wants russia readmitted because they were outmaneuvered by president obama and they were booted out. but that's not what happened. what would be some of the objectives of the united states entering the g7? >> i love that, willie. i think we should remind ourselves what the normal situation would look like. >> right. >> so normal situation, you would have a president saying okay, we have an economic -- a global economic slowdown in a normal situation of course our president wouldn't be causing that through the trade policy bus never mind that. you know, the g7 as david just said is actually designed to have the biggest economic powers, the most -- the strongest, the most sophisticated economic entities get together and make decisions

so they would be dealing with that and the other thing is by the way the planet is on fire literally. so they would be doing something as president macron has suggested in the tweet yesterday about this climate crisis. and those are just two issues. you know, in addition to the ones david mentioned there's of course syria which we'll talk about in a second i believe. and then north korea of course is still a problem. hong kong they may actually be able to say something on that because it looks like the white house and the president himself is now speaking more clearly about the need for restraint on the part of beijing. >> all right. now to continue -- the continued threat that isis poses around the world, a new special episode of vice news tonight looks at one father's unrelenting search for his children being held by the terror group. take a look. >> i was threatened by somebody for saying that he is holding my children and he was asking

$20,000 for within one day. >> you're talking about isis? >> isis. why are they holding them? because they're american. i would send them a picture -- >> he's threatened to kill you? >> finding these kids is going to be almost impossible. there's nobody taking names. all we have is the photos so even if they were able to go out alive, it's going to be incredibly difficult to find them. >> it's been exactly four years. my children are lost. >> the new special report from vice news tonight is entitled "taken by isis." joining us from vice news tonight is sebastian walker. thank you for being on the show this morning. tell us what has happened since i guess this has been put

together and the fate of those children. >> yeah. i mean, this story is the product of about six months of reporting and it's essentially following one american father's journey to try to find his kids who have been taken by the islamic state. his wife took the kids without his knowledge from their home in miami, florida, to the middle east before being smuggled into syria in 2015 and this story looks at his search to find them and to try to get them back and i think it really highlights a couple of things. one is the kind of appeal of the group, how pervasive that was, pulling in people from all around the world, around 18 nations people joining the caliphate, including the united states. the second one is the group's staying power. i mean, a lot of our story focuses on this refugee camp in syria. where there are tens of thousands of former citizens of the islamic state caliphate who have been in legal limbo since the victory announcement came

five months ago today and i mean right now the group is really making somewhat of a resurgence in both syria and iraq and we have been seeing, you know, very concerning signs on the ground that the strength of isis is slowly growing and they're filling in those gaps where the local security forces are not able to hold territory that was taken back from isis. >> sebastian, this is gene robinson. i watched the report. it sounds just heart breaking but do you have any idea how many children are in this position? how many parents are looking for them and how does one even begin trying to find children who were taken away and are being held like this? >> i mean, it's really complicated. very hard for civilians to get access to syria. a lot of the people in the camp are citizens of western

countries. there are -- you know, over 10,000 foreigners in this camp. i mean, foreigners means not from iraq and syria, that's the categorization. and a lot of the countries in europe -- i mean, the uk included have not been very keen to take their citizens back. so really these families -- a lot of them are in limbo and the situation in the camp is extremely dire. the conditions inside -- i mean, there have been dozens of children who perished in the months since those families were taken in to the camp. and what's really concerning too is the amount of influence that isis starting to have. there are signs in the last few months that the group has slowly started to organize within the population of the camp, the security guards really don't go in to some areas of this. there are only a few hundred local guards from the syrian

democratic forces which is the u.s. backed militia that actually fought the islamic state to end the caliphate and the camp is really just kind of in some places too dangerous to go into. at the end of the story we go into the camp to try to find the kids and the situation we find in there is just -- i mean, it's a very complicated place to operate and it's very hard for anyone to really locate people inside. so these kids are still somewhere in the camp. >> all right. the vice news special tonight, a special report "taken by isis." it will premier on hbo. seb walker, thank you very much. we appreciate you bringing this to us. david ignatius, earlier this week we had the warning from the pentagon that isis is reforming and becoming more powerful in iraq and syria.

we just heard from a reporter, seb walker, who was there on the ground, that he is seeing concerns of an isis surge in iraq and syria. you of course have been to syria quite a few times on this issue. and you warned of this months ago. tell us -- tell us what you know right now and tell us your main concerns. >> joe, i was in syria traveling with the u.s. special forces a month ago and had a chance to talk to the syrians about the resurgence of isis. i don't want to overstate this. we're talking about sleeper cells that are beginning to be formed again in areas where isis was strong. we're talking about isis fighters in the desert between syria and iraq and they're still out there. i thought seb walker's report

was very powerful about these families, often families of isis supporters who are in big camps, tens of thousands of people. i should also note that there are 12,000 isis prisoners. these are hardened fighters who are being held by the syrian democratic forces, syrian kurdish allies including about a thousand europeans. these are people if they could slip out of the camps would make their way through turkey back in to europe. back into belgium, france. germany. britain. and with the intent to wreak havoc. this is a dangerous, serious problem. i had lunch this week with the former governor of kirkuk in iraq who said isis is moving back in to kirkuk city and the towns around kirkuk. so i want to stress this is a problem that's still there.

and we need to keep our eye on the ball. it's not an explosion of isis, but good, sensible measured policy is what's needed. >> evelyn, listening to david talk about the resurgence of isis in kirkuk, mosul, parts of syria, isis' presence now in afghanistan, clearly vivid and dangerous. it strikes me and i'm wondering whether it strikes you or not, our definition of defeat is drastically different from a crew like isis is. 50 years ago we would say we defeated the north vietnamese but they never went away. and now we're saying we have defeated isis in parts of syria, in parts of iraq and in afghanistan. but they clearly are not going away either. >> yeah, i agree, mike. i think in this day and age, especially when you're talking

about nonstate actors who have an ideology based on, you know, it can start with personal grievance and then, you know, they fight as fundamentalists against the west. it's not going to go away. it's not going to and the problem here is that our government does not have an overall policy that is going to work to manage the threat from terrorism. why do i say this? because the president withdrew forces. he said i'm going on withdraw forces from syria and he went back and forth on the numbers, but he doesn't have a plan to work out a diplomatic agreement that would minimize the threat after, frankly speaking, syria regains control. because we know right now the syrian forces are fighting. they're bombing. they're actually bombing turks now, too, so turkey is upset and they're rushing to have a discussion with russia about this because, of course, the russians are letting the syrians do what they can. but the war seems to be wrapping

up, if you will. the syrian government is probably going to take consider even of those areas where the u.s. now has forces. i mean, i don't know. but ultimately, that's what it looks like. so we need a diplomatic solution that will say what happens to the prisoners that dade just mentioned, what happens to the citizens of the kuunited states. how do they get home? all these things need to be worked out. >> evelyn farkas, thank you so much for being on this morning. still ahead, in the wake of mass shootings in texas and ohio, there have been dozens of people arrested for makesing threats of mass violence. we'll talk about what's being done by law enforcement next on "morning joe." w enforcement nex "morning joe."

three weeks after the mass deadly shootings in dayton, ohio, and el paso, texas, at

least three people have been detained for threatening mass shootings. the back to back massacres in texas and california have authorities and residents on high alert. law enforcement officials are asking the public to report suspicious activities that may be noticed, but not reported by peers and relatives of potential assailants. joining us now, state attorney for palm beach county, dave errenberg. joe, you hear so many times after the fact that this person or this shooter had these thoughts that he was posting online or saying things and it seems people are really acting on their fears. >> well, acting, acting on fears, but also a lot of people being inspired by these acts of domestic terrorism. yet, dave, i'm so glad you're hear because we have a lot of former prosecutors coming on shows, new shows. you are a prosecutor right now

on the front lines. maybe you can tell us, what are you concerned about the most right now and how can we get laws that actually outlaw domestic terrorism? it's insane that we don't have those yet. >> yeah, i agree. you know, fbi director christopher ray recently testified that a majority of domestic terrorism is now organized by white supremacist violence. but yet when you look at the resources in the fbi, only about 20% of their counterterrorism resources are directed to domestic threats. that needs to change. and we could use a statute on domestic terrorism. we don't have one. and that makes the fbi and other federal groups more passive, more reactive instead of being proactive against these organizations. and they often depend on state laws and state prosecutors. >> would that help your cause? >> oh, yeah, yeah. >> would that help your cause if there were actually a law that outlawed domestic terrorism?

>> yeah, it would help our cause. it would help investigations. there would be some opposition from civil libertarians, but it would help us investigate some of these white supremacist groups. in addition, it would help in another way. you are very familiar, unfortunately, with the case of christopher hassen. that's the white supremacist arsenal guy who had a manifesto and a hit list and yet he was nearly released from jail pretrial because we couldn't charge him with domestic terrorism. we could only charge him with weapons offenses. had he pledged allegiance to isis instead of while nationalism, there was no doubt he would be kept in jail pretrial. that's because international terrorism is treated very differently than domestic terrorism. one of the tools in fighting terrorism might actually begin with local police departments. with local knowledge of the neighborhoods they patrol, the streets they walk, whatever. no matter whether it's in palm beach county or midtown

manhattan. so when they hear about particular people anecdotally, watch out for that person, and they do hear things like this, what would prevent them or maybe they are doing it as we speak from checking out that person's facebook entries right then. that person's twitter account right then. because sometimes there are huge flags involved in those postings. >> yeah, yeah, the fbi does some of that. and they do what's called disruption. if they see something, they'll go and knock on the person's door and they think that could disrupt the activities. if they know that someone is watching. but ultimately, you do need more and that's, to me, why we need a domestic terrorism statute on the books. but the issues are that there are first amendment and second amendment concerns that don't apply to international terrorists that do apply to american citizens. and that's why you see a lot of opposition to this. and then you see that within the trump administration, the opposition comes from within the white house because there's a deep mistrust towards the fbi

and i think it's also because some members of the administration probably believe that their own supporters could get caught up. some of their supporters could get caught up in such a law. the pib recently released a bulletin that named the conspiracy as a domestic terrorist threat. i don't see that we'll get a statute that we need anytime soon. >> wow. >> well, i want to talk about this some more, dave. we're up against a hard break on the hour. if you could come back on monday, we want to continue had conversation on monday. state attorney for palm beach county, a guy fighting on the front lines right now, dave, thank you so much. >> thank you. and still ahead, the president is tweeting about his poll numbers this morning, but where is he getting his information? we're going to run through the slew of new public polling that should have his re-election team very worried. "morning joe" is back in 90 seconds with a packed 8:00 a.m. hour. conds with a packed 8:00 a hour we call it the mother standard of care.

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good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is friday, august 23rd. and we start this morning with a question. what if trump were an airline pilot? >> so somebody -- excuse me. somebody had to do it. i am the chosen one.

>> yeah. if an airline learned that a pilot was talking publicly about being the chosen one, the airline would be looking carefully into whether this person should be in the cockpit. >> in my opinion, you vote for a democrat, you're being very disloyal to jewish people and you're being very disloyal to israel. >> so if a university or museum had a leader who insulted racial or religious minorities, the board would be starting to act. >> you are so obviously bias and that's why the confidence hpubl confidence in the media. >> if the u.s. navy knew one of its commanders was routinely lying and lashing out against criticism, the navy would not want that person in charge of a u.s. submarine. so, again, as james fall lows explores in a great piece, what

if trump were an airline pilot. that's the question. >> you know, that's actually the question, willie, that we've been asking for almost three years now. if donald trump were a ceo for any fortune 500 company, if he were a professor, if he were commanding officer of a navy vessel, whatever he was, he would, long ago, have been removed from his post. what he said last week would have assured it. >> i'm more looking for a captain sully vibe up in the cockpit than a donald trump vibe. but that's not how we do things in the united states of america. there's no board to run president trump out. there's no way to fire president trump. you have to remove him through an election if that's what you want to do as an american voter. so it's on to the democrats at this point unless now an

impeachment proceeding comes forward in the next 14 months and removes president trump from office. it's up to the democrats to put forward a great candidate to remove president trump from the cockpit of this plane. >> well, again, we won't belabor this because it's not going to happen, but mika, wouldn't it be great if a handful of republicans found the courage and the foresight to understand that donald trump is not going to be serving much longer, that he most likely won't be re-elected. and now would be a really good time for them to not only speak out and not only defend their political futures, but to defend the republican party and to defend the ideas of conservatism. >> and the value owes of this country. i also would love to hear from john kelley or mattis or anybody who has worked in here. we'll get to that along with joe, willie and me. we have mike barnacle, susan del

percio, eugene robinson and david ignatius joining us this morning. so the president's key standing mun parts of the electorate is coming into sharp focus this morning. 36% of americans approve of the way trump is handling his job. 36%. 62% say they disapprove. trump is the only president whose rating has never been above 50% in that poll. a new monmuth poll puts his approval at 40% while 53% disapprove. and in that poll, he doesn't break 50%. among men, 49% approval. while 62% of women disapprove of trump's performance. under water, 31 points.

and his disapproval among nonwhites is 72%. one clear sign of trouble is trump standing among noncollege-educated white women. according to the latest nbc news "wall street journal" poll, 49% say they would support the democratic candidate, just 43 would support trump. it is a dramatic drop among a demographic that he carried by 27 points, according to 2016 exit polls. a recent krn poll shows 40% of americans approve of his job performance. 54% disapprove. "the washington post" notes no president with an approval below 50% has ever been re-elected. >> so the numbers, susan del percio, are stark, to say the least. 36% overall approval rating in the latest poll from the associated press. and then you look at the

monmouth poll and it's a number we've been looking at for some time now as have a lot of other political experts. and that is donald trump standing among noncollege white women. that number was well into the 60s when he ran against hillary clinton. it's now at 49%. donald trump -- or 43%. i'm sorry. it's 43% the democrat had 49%. his numbers have collapsed, again, and i'll say it again, susan, this is not about what happens next year so much as what's happened over the past month. and as we have said, this racially tinged campaigning may solidify his 36% that support him now. but as we have all said all along, this is going to destroy

his chances in the suburbs, this is going to destroy his chances are higher educated americans, this is going to destroy his chances with women. working class women. and r you can see this is exactly what is happening. >> right. mostly women that we're talking about are looking at the behavior of donald trump and they are disgusted by it. they're not seeing enough benefit come out of their paycheck, if you will, or other things. they don't feel the country is going in the right direction and, more importantly, i think they're horrified if their children came home and said some of the things that donald trump had to say. so not only are they -- they turned off, but what we saw in 2018 is that turn out in the subbeshs was through the roof. that should scare donald trump, as well. >> and david ignatius, a 36%

approval rating, that is a terrible number. it's not nixon at watergate or jimmy carter in '79 or george w. bush at the depth of the iraq war, but it's very bad for a president who is really, right now, providing over a decent economy, although we've talked a lot about the signs that a recession could be on the horizon. the president of the united states in his 2 1/2 years in office has never cracked a 50% approval rating this ap poll. his range has been from 32 to 42 and right now he's sort of at the low end of that. >> i have a theory that the country is just frazzled. trump runs this daily show. he has to dominate every news cycle. the issues become more and more bizarre. and i think people are just getting exhausted. if the democrats can find a way to run a candidate who is reassuring, who makes you think that a stable, sane person is going to be governing the country again, that simple fact will make a big difference. these numbers are so low that

it's hard to imagine the president -- as you said, these are good times. this is one the economy is still humming along, unemployment is unusually low. if the president can't rise above these numbers now, i think increasingly people wonder how he gets across the line in november successfully. >> you know, rich lowery had talked, he wrote an article a couple of days ago about trump fatigue and how that may be a real challenge in 2020. i've been hearing that for some time, even from trump supporters who were just saying, god, stop, i can't handle this. when i go back to pensacola, a lot of people there support him, but, man, if he could stop the tweeting, stop the nonsense. but i want us to stop for a

second and take a deep breath, think back to when he was leading crowds in chants of send her back, take a deep breath and think back to when he was saying things that were racially tinged, that donald trump was going the try to use race as his primary focus get elected and now i want us to look at these numbers. and we can all exhale a little bit and say, you know what? the american people, even some people who voted for donald trump in 2016, will are punish him for that behavior. they did that for charlottesville. and they did after send them back. >> yeah. >> yeah. and i fully expect people to punish him next year. i mean, i think those numbers will go lower because the one person who doesn't seem to be exhausted by all of this is donald trump who does have

endless energy. very any energy, but he has endless energy. he stood out there on wednesday. we all saw that insane literally performance on the white house lawn for 35 minutes in 90 degree heat just spewing nonsense. offensive nonsense. just plain crazy nonsense. and i think people look at that and yes, it's true that some people are exhausted and just don't want to see it and don't want to hear it. but you can't escape it and you look at that and you say, this is the president of the united states. this is not who we are. this is not who -- this is not who we were, this is not who we must be. and i think he just -- i think he hurts himself every time he does this sort of thing. but he's going to continue doing it. he is his own press secretary, his own communications director. he thinks he's a genius at

communicating, a genius at branding. and so now he's slapped all kinds of brands on himself. he's about to slap the brand economic failure on his forehead for his trade war that's destabilizing the economy. and still ahead on "morning joe," it's a lot easitory make up a lie about voter fraud than it is about the economy. how will president trump manage his message to supporters when they're seeing a real negative impact on their lives? they're se impact on their lives? chair is just a chair. that a handle is just a handle. or... that you can't be both inside and outside. most people haven't driven a lincoln.

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[ sigh ] introducing an easier way to move with xfinity. it's just another way we're working to make your life simple, easy, awesome. go to xfinity.com/moving to get started. sounding the alarm to the president, according to "the washington post," to be add member administration advisers told the president earlier this

month that some reveal the economy could slow noticeably over next year, creating problems for trump's re-election bid. the post says the forecast showed the slowdown would stop short of a recession. the paper goes on to note how the whose's forecast, which is one of several delivered to president trump, contrasts sharply with the triumphant rhetoric he and his surrogates repeatedly used to describe the economy. the post says that trump has told aids that he thinks he can convince americans that the economy is vital and unraveled through a public messaging campaign. but the internal and external warnings that the economy could slip have cob attributed to a muddled and often contradictory message. >> there are some things that you can't -- >> you can't lie about. >> you can't lie away about when you're tweeting. and you've seen the new figures

that have come out. new figures came out yesterday that the manufacturing sector contracted for the first time in nearly a decade. now, this is important because donald trump said he was going the bring all of these jobs back to america, that manufacturing was going to explode, yet the initial readings for august came in at just below 50 with anything below that number signaling a contraction. experts say that trump's ongoing trade war with china has taken a big bite out of the sector and mike barnacle, manufacturing is what donald trump talked about. he was going to make america great again. he was going to bring all of these jobs back to america. he was going to stop jobs prosecute frfrom leaving. we've seen over the past month more heartbreaking news on out of mccomb county where a gm plant closes down, more heartbreaking news across the

midwest where other manufacturing plants are being shut down. and heesh we are, the manufacturing outlook the worst that it's been for a decade. and donald trump contracted for the first time in a decade. >> and that is why perhaps the biggest story of the day today will be powell. the chairman of the fed says in jackson hole, wyoming, every summer they have this gathering of the fed. he speaks after the gathering. we will see what he has to say and how the president of the united states president of the united states reacts. when it comes to the economy, every past president, every past administration knows that confidence and predictability are keys to talking about the economy in terms of taking care of the markets so that wall street doesn't get rattled. so you have that being abused by the president and his advisers. they're all over the lot and they have to depend on a very

unpredictable guy, donald trump, on making a ruling on what's going to be the strategy going forward. all of this happening at the same time that people are finding out china will be picking up the tariffs is blatantly false. sneakers that cost $09 in june now cost $95. because guess what? we're picking up the tab on the tariff, on the trade wars that are so easy to win for donald trump. but, you know, on the threat of the conversation that we're having this morning, if dshg it's possible, it's entirely possible that once you separate all of the activists who are in iowa and new hampshire and all the other primary states, there's a huge percentage of americans who have just tuned everything out. they've got mufflers over their ears and they're waiting for the chance to vote. they want things to calm down, but they're tired of this guy who breaks into their lives

multiple times each and every day. and that guy's name is donald trump. >> come up on "morning joe," trump's end game on trade may be lost in translation. not with china, but with his own administration. axia says new reporting on how the president is in a bind in beijing. morning sdwroe is back in a moment. beijing. morning sdwroe is back in a moment we have to be able to

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2 million gallons of untreated sewage spilled into the flint river on sunday months after officials in michigan warned wastewater infrastructure was quickly approaching a critical point there. state officials blamed a flash flood event for causing an overflow at the city's wastewater treatment plant which pushed raw waste into a sewer that drains directly into that sewer. this comes after they approved monies to upgrade the structure after officials warned it was at a risk of catastrophic failure. >> you know, the key word there was infrastructure. the fact that we could be doing so many infrastructure projects in this cup right now at very low cost given the interest

rates, we could have borrowed a lot of money, tons of money, billions of dollars in helping to rebuild america. we have not done it and this is what happens. not only in flint. poor flint, they still don't have proper drinking water, but throughout the country, bridges, roads, tunnels. >> once again, too little too late for the city of flint. residents there are being told to stay away from the river which now has 2 million gallons of untreated sewage flowing through it. axios is reporting sources close to the president say the administration is in a bind when it comes to a standoff with beijing. joining us now, national political reporter for axios, jonathan swan. what is that bind for the president sflp sources close to the president including senior administration officials are increasingly pessimistic about the chances of a trade deal with china. they say in recent weeks, the trade discussion has become a national security discussion. you have people like mike

pompeo, john bolton, mike pence, very hawkish on china. and the intelligence community increasingly worried about the chinese overreaching militarily in hong kong. so you have this conversation going on inside the administration about how to push back against china militarily. you have mark esper and mike pomp payo going to australia earlier this morning meeting with senior officials there and giving them the unequivocal message there is no compromise, china. we are going the push back against them wherever we need to. and then you have a president who has told people privately that he thinks it will be okay if the u.s. does no trade with china. so who seems quite comfortable in his private conversations with the idea of a dekubling with china. >> this is the rationale we're told with the trade war is that

it was bog the be leverage to bring it to the table with china. now we're told that deal is tough to improbable. >> president trump initially talked about the trade war as being easy to win, we'll get quick improvements. just chalk it up in the win column. and we're now seeing how complicated it is. i heard increasingly the idea that key people in the trump administration do see some sort of decoupling of the u.s. and china as the appropriate place where this whole story ends, that -- as i read the president's comments, you know, on the lawn this week, you know, sort of goofy, i'm the chosen one, i've been chosen, i've been chosen to draw a new line between us and china. that's my center of my

presidency. what is that the going to mean if he takes that seriously? >> people didn't take him seriously when he first said this. privately in an oval office meeting in late 2017, the president said maybe we should just cut off all trade with china and they were like, oh, that's kind of a bit wacky. but more recently, he has said i think we would be okay if we did no trade from china. that is far from a consensus view. but on the national security side, there is a view that china is a profoundly bad actor and that there is no way around the coexisting with them in a productive way that would facilitate their rise in the way that -- if you go back and look at the tape of joe biden saying the rise of china is a good thing and we can coexist. that is not the view of anyone i talk to at this senior level in

the administration who has any kind of responsibility for national security. >> jonathan, gene robinson here. hasn't the president inadvertently given xi jinping an enormous amount of power over the president's political future? it's the china tariffs and the uncertainty of that economic relationship that's a major factor in destabilizing the markets and causing these gyrations in the dow and everything. and so xi jinping is sitting there and he sort of has the option of making a deal or not making a deal. does the add ming administration see it this way?

>> so i have no idea of how to game fury donald trump when it comes to the election. certainly when i talk to china hawks in the administration, what they are worried about as they get close to november 2020, the president panics and does a deal that they would see as weak with china in order to juice the economy. but i think the other way to look at it, and this is certainly the way other people look at it, is that president xi is not in a particularly comfortable position at the moment. he's got people around the world pushing back on belgium road. he has all the protests in hong kong and the unrest there. and an increasing consensus with australia pushing back on huawei and 5g. he has a lot of problems and internal problems, as well. so it's not like, you know, you have the president under stress

and xi in this wonderful arm chair sitting back. yes, he is an authoritarian leader who doesn't have the same political concerns that president trump has, but he has a lot of other concerns, from what i can tell. >> jonathan swan of axios, thanks so much. we appreciate it. coming up on "morning joe," breaking hate. we'll preview a powerful new piece from msnbc on racism in america and the path to countering it. that's ahead on "morning joe." t. that's ahead on "morning joe."

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i know better than anyone that change doesn't happen overnight. it's a difficult, sometimes dangerous road. once jeff goes public, he will be branded a race trader and could face retaliation. jeff is a father of five. he wants to keep a low profile and his family safe. instead of meeting at his home, we pick up our conversation in a

parking garage. >> are you story for lead ago group that, frankly, scared the [ bleep ] out of a lot of people? do you feel any sort of remorse? >> you have to understand. i'm still working through a lot of the processes. there's -- obviously, there's a lot of things i regret doing. i'm so used to being commander of the national socialist movement and giving speeches and saying those things, so this is very difficult. if i'm lying, anybody can see right through it because it's not in my nature to lie. >> did 6 million jews die in the holocaust? >> well -- >> wow. a look there at this sunday night's new episode of msnbc special "breaking hate." joining us now, the man featured in it, christian peachalini, a

former white supremacist who helps other escape the movement he once helped build. also with us, host of msnbc's politics nation and president of the national action network, rev rant al sharpton. good to have you both. mr. petrolini, i'll start with you. if hate can be broken and that's what you're proving, what is the process you were talking about there in that clip? it's a long process. >> well, it's a long process of self-reflection to try and repair the harm that we've caused. you know, for somebody like jeff scoop who has been a part of the while supremacist movement for 30 years, since he was 15 years old and now a man who with is in his 40s, it's a long process of unlearning hate, of unlearning the habits of hate and of self-reflecting to understand his motivations for why he initially went there in the first place. so there is a lot of hard work that he has to do for himself and for society around him to

try and repair the harm that he caused. >> and i think it's important to look at as you speak from experience at how you gained that hatred in the first place. was it your lack of economic opportunity, was it -- how did you get in that position to hate so deeply? >> all the things you mentioned are what i caught potholes. it can be trauma, it can be social circumstances, it can be privilege, poverty and joblessness. it's typically never being born into kind of a racism mind-set, people typically find groups like that to attach themselves to because they're searching for community, identity and purpose. i was 14 years old. i wasn't raised a racist. my parents are italian immigrants and they were often the victims of privilege.

i was lonely. i felt abandon. i didn't feel like i had much self-esteem or confidence. at 14 years old, somebody found me, a vulnerable young kid, and promised me paradise. >> we've seen the deadly outcome of this kind of hate. it's always been there, but we're seeing it more. we're seeing it more prominently and expressed explicitly in the case of el paso when we talked about the invasion of immigrants coming to this country. at least at this moment, it's top of mind in american culture. at least at this moment, the fbi is acknowledging most of its terror arrests are based in white supremacy. we know the problem because it's showing itself. what do we do about it is the question. >> one, we have to acknowledge it and know it. the idea that the marches and the protests people identify with is to raise public

awareness. and i think chris is saying people are exploited at very weak, vulnerable moments in their lives, recruiting into something and it gives them their identity and they really believe that this helps them to evolve. and i think that unless we start exposing it, we will never get to the solution. clearly, you need to criminalize it and make sure that you first remove it from society, but you also need to dig deep as christian apparently has done in this special to say where does this come from? how is it cultivated to where people are comfortable doing this? 30 years ago today in new york a young man was killed in a section of brooklyn called bensoners because he was black and they said we don't allow blacks in the neighborhood. what gives people that mentality? why do you think it's all right to kill somebody because of how god created them? and i think that's the value on of what christian is talking about and that's what we try to expose with our dramatic marches

and all to say wait a minute, there is a problem, give it some attention. >> so let's go back to the 14-year-old that you were just talking about. you were lonely, isolated, friendless. what is the deal with you at 14. where were your parents? why didn't you have friends? why did you feel so lonely? didn't you go outdoors? did you play little league? what did you do or not do? >> you know, i had a very good family life. my parents loved me. i knew they cared about me. but as immigrants, they had to work seven days a week, sometimes 14 or 16 hours a day. so i didn't see them very often. and as a young person, you know, we're not mature enough to ask ourselves why that might be happening. i blamed myself for them not being there at the time. and then, you know, i was idealistic. i was driven. but i also wasn't accepted by anybody, so i was very isolated. and when a man approached me in an ally at 14 years old in 1987 and promised me empowerment would take me --

>> what kind of -- what did the empowerment entail, going out and throwing a rock on a black kid? what was the deal? >> it was more than that, really. it was about trying to instill in my this false sense of identity, community and purpose. i didn't know who i was before then. i didn't know if i was italian or american. i didn't know if my family wanted me and i didn't know what i wanted to do in lye. through narratives that falsely built me up, you know, it pushed me in a direction where i thought at first i was saving the world. it did empower me. it did offer me camaraderie, until it didn't. until i realized that it destroyed me and everybody else around me. >> 1987, you were 14 years old. now fast forward to 2019 to that 14-year-old who doesn't need to be approached by someone in person. they could be online. and my question to you is how mainstream has this -- you know,

white nationalism, white supremacy become in our media that you can go down a rabbit hole potentially and find yourself in this type of hate group? >> well, that's exactly it, mika. i had to be standing in an ally at 14. it was a very face-to-face recruitment process. nowadays, there are alienated marginalized young people who spend most of their time online with real people. it's very easy to find this narrative. it's very easy to step into this rabbit hole of propaganda and to spiral further down into it. they're finding a sense of identity, community and purpose online in toxic ways and we're seeing that manifest in real life now, as well. >> i think that is critical because i think as we look at the politics of what's going on, that because people are vul ner knowledge and you have now social media, people that have real insecurities, real problems

with self-esteem feel like they become part of bigger i'm going to save the white race, i'm going to save civilization from them. and then you have people like trumps, my words, not christians, that it's them, the mexicans, it's them, the blacks. and people that don't feel enough of themselves to hold on to hold on to that to try and define themselves. and i think that's a danger, particularly when we normalize it. and to reverend's point -- >> the all new episode -- >> and i was just going to see to the reverend's point, the things that the president is saying do absolutely motivate people in this movement to act. i can tell you that 30 years ago, there were words that i said that were identical, words like invasion and animal that caused people to commit acts of violence. and that was just from a 16-year-old skin head kid in an ally in chicago. this is the president of the united states saying the same thing and moevenating people to violence today. >> absolutely. the all new episode of "breaking hate" airs sunday at

9:00 p.m. eastern on msnbc. christian, thank you so much for being on. and nbc news has just confirmed that philanthropist and political activist david koch has died. the billionaire businessman helped fund millions of dollars for republican political advocacy groups and campaigns, along with elder brother charles. the two, the koch brothers, have been a force in american politics for nearly four decades. in 1980, david was the libertarian party's pick for vice president on a ticket with ed clark. david retired from his family's business, koch industries, last year due to health issues. in a statement, charles kch writes this about his late broert. quote, he believed he had a responsibility to a world that had given him so many opportunities to succeed. david's fall an anthropologic dedication to education, the arts and cancer research will

have a lasting impact on innumerable lives. and that we will cherish forever. david koch was 79 years old. mike barnacle, thoughts? >> well, you know, mika, naturally, this story will be played out and there will be a lot of conversations, a lot of things written about the impact that the koch brothers have had on american politics. and it will all be justified and it will all be accurate. but they also have had an enormous impact as has just been pointed out on the arts, on our culture, on hospitals around the country, even went to koch brothers wings at various hospitals in boston, new york. you can walk past lincoln center and see the david kch section donated philanthropically. they've had an enormous impact on american life, absolutely no doubt about it. >> you can't overstate the influence they have had on politics in particular and conservative causes. but they are complicated boogie

men. david koch was progressive on social issues. he was for a woman's right to choose. he was a leader against the war on drugs. he was against the iraq war. but, obviously, he and his brother had a massive impact on american politics, funding the conservative movement for a generation. >> absolutely. certainly did. now, rev rentaerend al, we wantt your take on new reporting about joe biden. the former vice president has been leading in the primary polls and head to head matchups against president trump, but according to the times, there is a disconnect between its poll numbers and excitement on the ground in iowa. the first in the nation caucus state. the times reports that in conversations with county chairs, party strategists and dozens of voters, many democrats in iowa described a case for biden that reflected shades of the one his wife, jill biden, bluntly sketched out on monday when she told the new hampshire

vo voters, you may like another candidate better, but you have to look at who is going to win. according to the paper, voters in iowa repeatedly emphasized that their support for biden was closely linked to what they perceived as his strength against president trump. a monmouth university poll from earlier this month showed biden lead, 28% support from likely auto what caucus goers. but the director of monmouth's polling institute told the "new york times" those numbers did not give the full picture of biden's support in the state. he said, quote, i did not meet one biden voter who was in any way, shape or form excited about voting for biden. they feel that they have to vote for joe biden as the centrist candidate to keep somebody from the left who they feel is unelectable from getting the nomination. so, reverend al, i actually agree with jill biden's approach. it's realistic. the democrats' party has a wide

swath of candidates. and you may like pete buttigieg, you may really like beto o'rourke. but who should you vote for? i think that's what she's saying and i think it makes sense. >> well, i think, mika, the chairman of the joe biden campaign is donald trump. because the more people want tre more they'll vote for who they think is best situated to get him out. and every tweet and every daily drama and trauma that he brings us through, he pushes people toward who they think is the likely person. i think the other people in the race have to convince the voters that i can win. most of us like one of the other candidates for one or two issues but there are flaws with all of them. we want probably to end up with the one that can win because we're going to have to accept some things we don't like from all of them. >> exactly. reverend al sharpton, thank you so much. we'll be watching, politics nations this weekend on msnbc.

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♪ it's lonely in the deep dark night i can see ♪ >> wow. that was from the new musical "bat out of hell " which is in the middle of its engagement at the new york city center. joining us naught man and voice behind the rock opera as well as some of music's best selling albums of all time. we are talking to meat loaf. >> how are you guys? >> so great to talk to you. we're great. i'm curious. when you started doing gigs in the '60s and into the '70s, did

you ever dream that a time might come when your songs would make up a broadway musical? >> yeah. i started my -- really my career on broadway doing "hair." i wouldn't do the nude scenes though because they wanted to sell tickets. and so, yeah. i was into the theater and jim steinman and myself. my agent at that time i went down and he said if you want to work in new york you got to work for joe. >> the "bat out of hell" album sold 60 million. what it is about these songs that have resonated for generations? >> people are saying, are you going to play the old songs? like saying play an old

beethoven piece. i don't make the songs part of me and i don't have my picture on the cover and i sing as if i'm -- when you listen to it i'm singing only to you. it's your story. and it's your life. i'm not involved with it. so anybody out there listening if you want to take a piece of tape and cover up my name on the album feel free. write yours because it's your record. >> what you were just saying, you were singing to him. >> i was also singing to you. >> that is the question actually. because when you listen to your songs and i've been listening for 30, 40 years -- >> let's not say that, okay? just calm down a bit on that. >> the songs when you listen to them repeatedly, i'll do anything for love but i won't do that. paradise by the dashboard light. they become more than songs. they become like plays. >> they are. that's what they're meant to be. >> really. >> because i take -- i've never

sang a song on a record that there's not a character involved with that. i take a character for every song. if you watch videos, you'll see. if you want to be an actor you have to take movement classes. so it's all about movement. it's all about -- and i try to make an audience when there is an audience i walk the stainige the beginning. i take an audience no matter how big they are. i try to make them one human being. and they disappear from me and i'm singing to that person the whole night. so you come to the show a lot of people say i felt like you were just singing to me. good. that's what it was meant to be. >> what is your favorite song to perform? >> my favorite song and it's not to perform but my favorite song and every time i perform before i perform i start crying so it is really hard. people can argue with me all you want but it's "for crying out

loud" the last song on "bat" and to me the greatest love song ever written. it truly is. last night at the show i you was crying. i'm about to cry now because i'm talking about it. i get very emotional with that song. >> "bat out of hell" the musical currently playing at the new york city center. meat loaf, thank you so much. really great to meet you. that does it for us this morning. chris jansing picks up the coverage right now. thank you so much. i am chris jansing in for stephanie ruhle. it is friday, august 23rd, and here's what's happening. tonight the president will depart for the g7 in france and already talk that a key agenda item is not about policy but how to keep any drama fueled by president trump to a minimum. as "the washington post" puts it, like an annual holiday gathering where the main goal is to get through the day without a family explosion one of france's main objectives as host of this weekend's group of seven summit is to minimize chances president

trump will blow it up. it's happened before. last year in canada trump left early in a huff after what he saw as disrespect by the host, justin trudeau. and then from 10,000 feet aboard airforce one withdrawing his signature from the official joint statement. and this year the formal agenda also includes topics where the president and other leaders have some deep, philosophical differences. global trade agreements, nato spending obligations, and iran. and then there's climate change. france's prime minister macron asking the leaders to address the fires blazing through the amazon rain forest. trump of course pulled the u.s. out of the paris climate accord. i want to start with nbc's kristen welker at the white house for us. of course macron's plan for the three-day summit is to have as little drama and get as much work done as possible. what is the president's plan? >> reporter: well, chris, good to see you. president trump already putting deep differences on display

calling for russia to be re-admitted to the g7.