Ayman: Trump’s ‘bloodthirsty threats’ hold world hostage amid delayed deadline

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The ultimatum that he gave, quote, a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. And we are now about 45 seconds past his arbitrary deadline. But just over an hour ago, Trump changed that deadline. Again, after threatening to destroy an entire country's power plants and bridges and civilian infrastructure, after basically promising genocide, Trump got an extension. He now claims a peace settlement with Iran is within reach. And after agreeing to a proposal brokered by Pakistan to stop bombing Iran for two weeks, it appears that Iran has agreed to a ceasefire that will open the Strait of Hormuz as long as the US stops bombing it. And as long as Iran keeps collecting $2 million per ship to pass through that Strait of Hormuz, that is at least according to Iranian officials speaking to the New York Times. But what happens in two weeks? And that all depends on the whims of the most powerful and arguably the most unstable leader in the world today. Just earlier, Iranian media showed people forming human chains around power plants and on bridges to defy and deter Donald Trump from bombing them. In response, Donald Trump told NBC News that the human chains were, quote, totally illegal, adding they're not allowed to do that. On Capitol Hill, a growing chorus of Democrats this evening, 70 in the House so far, are now demanding that Donald Trump be removed from office for threatening to kill a whole civilization. A few Republicans spoke out against the president's threats as well today, but that was before Trump delayed his threats for another two weeks. The president is both belligerent and erratic, and tonight was just the scariest of Trump's increasingly unhinged threats and the walk backs that he has done time and time again over the past few weeks. Take for example, March 21st, Donald Trump posted that if Iran doesn't fully open without threat, the strait of Hormuz within 48 hours from this exact point in time, the United States of America will hit and obliterate their various power plants, starting with the biggest one first. He publicly threatened to commit a war crime. He gave Iran until the evening of March 23rd, but 12 hours before that deadline, Donald Trump announced that talks were actually going great and that he would extend the deadline to March 26th. But Iranian officials denied that there had been any talks at all. But as that deadline loomed, just hours after Trump threatened that there is no turning back and it won't be pretty, guess what he did? He extended the deadline to April 6th. Again, saying that negotiations were going very well. That deadline was supposed to be yesterday, but over the weekend on Easter, you know what he did? He changed the deadline again in a profanity-laced post. Quote, Tuesday will be Power Plant Day and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one in Iran. There will be nothing like it. Open the effing straight, you crazy bastards, or you will be living in hell. Just watch. Praise be to Allah. Then today, as that deadline loomed, he did it again. He threatened to kill a whole civilization. Would you trust any negotiation with this man? You wouldn't. No one would. You'd actually call the authorities on him. But the problem in this case is that Donald Trump is the authorities, which is why the world is now basically living tweet-to-tweet social media posts to social media posts. All of this as Trump's threats grow increasingly dangerous. We have crossed the line here, no matter what happens. The man with sole authority to launch the largest nuclear arsenal that the world has probably ever known, he is either going to make good on that threat in another two weeks from now, which is the genocidal behavior of a madman, or he won't. In which case, he is holding the entire world hostage, making increasingly bloodthirsty, apocalyptic threats every few days. That is the world that we now have to take seriously, because he is the president of the United States. He's threatening to end civilizations because he can, because he's never really faced any serious consequences for any of his heinous actions that he has taken as president in this country. And the one thing that's painfully clear at this hour is that whether or not he actually commits more atrocities against the Iranian people, Donald Trump is destroying everything that made America better than him. David Rhodes is a national security reporter for MSNOW. Robert Malley was the lead negotiator on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal that Donald Trump tore up, and Trita Parsi is the co-founder and executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. They all join me now. David, I think you and I had very similar reactions to the news when we heard that a deal or a ceasefire agreement had been made possible, which is what in the hell happened? I think we were both kind of working our sources throughout the day. I don't want to speak on your behalf, but I certainly didn't get the impression that there was some kind of deal that was being brokered down to the final minutes. And then an hour before we get this message from the Pakistani prime minister, followed by a statement from the American president and the Iranian foreign minister effectively saying that there is now a two-week ceasefire. I think we owe a big thank you to the Pakistani government. They sort of forced this to happen. I didn't have any reporting of any kind of direct negotiation or even indirect detailed negotiation between the U.S. and Iran. It was really this sort of moment of brinksmanship. And the bottom line of what happened is that Donald Trump backed down. He had painted himself into a corner. He was, he had described, you know, ending a civilization. He was being hammered domestically. And then let's be honest, this war has not gone well for the United States. The key issue here was the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. He's got a promise that that will end, but that sent, and they should have anticipated that and they didn't. And then he, you know, they lost this pilot. He was, he was recovered. But I think that was a demonstration of how dangerous this was becoming for the Trump administration. From the beginning, this war has not gone as they expected. Iran didn't back down as they expected. And this escalation cycle where Iran kept escalating and escalating and never backing down and Trump really didn't have an answer to it. So I think he backed off. And he was a little bit, I mean, it's safe to say he was erratic even in the demands that he was making on one, in one hand, he was saying, open the Strait of Hormuz the next time he would go on and say, we don't need the Strait of Hormuz. Let the Europeans figure it out, only then to follow it up with even more threats that he would wipe the entire civilization out if they didn't open the Strait of Hormuz. And this strange military strategy that we're going to destroy every bridge and power plant in the country, and which wouldn't have achieved anything other than horrible civilian suffering. Robert, you know, some Republicans will say that this is what they'd like to think of as the madman theory in negotiation, that Trump's threats work here because they can make the Iranians feel a tremendous amount of threat or pressure, and then only for them to realize that he's willing to back down if they agree to his demands. You have been in the room negotiating with the Iranians, or at least indirectly. Give me your sense as to how you read Donald Trump's threats here and whether they have worked. So first of all, I really want to pause on the point you made earlier. I mean, the threats that he proffered. We really have now the marriage of infinite immorality with infinite power, and that should give everyone a shudder down their spine. So we can't forget what happened, even if this ends, even if there is a ceasefire that holds. It's going to be very hard for the president to paint this as a triumph. The one achievement may be the opening of the Strait of Hormuz, which was not closed before he launched this war. So I don't know how that could be depicted as a great victory. You know, I think as David just said, he probably didn't want to go far. He wants to end this war because of the price of all, because of inflation, because of everything it's doing to the market. The third point really is a question, is this going to last? And there's so many uncertainties, there's so many ambiguities. The Iranians say that the Strait is open, but only under their control. Is that something that the president will accept? And the Iranians say that the deal will be based on their 10 points. I can't imagine the U.S. agreeing to half of those points, even a third of them. So we're not out of Hormuz way yet, but it's obviously, as David said, good thing that the Pakistanis did this, good thing that the president seems to have backed down. But I don't know where we'll be two weeks from now. So Trita, how do you navigate a ceasefire with somebody like Donald Trump, who seems to be bellicose, seems to be erratic, he threatens to kill everyone, he lies regularly, he constantly changes his mind as to what his priorities are and what his objectives are. What is it that the Iranians are negotiating, who are they negotiating with, and what are they negotiating on behalf of? We always said that there's almost no trust in the relationship between the United States and Iran, but never before has the trust been as low as it is now. So these talks are going to be extremely difficult. But the president did say that it's going to be based on Iran's 10 points, and Rob may be very well be right, that it's going to be very difficult for them to accept, but there is a significant change that has now happened. The potency of American military threats in any future negotiations have really been taken away. Trump can continue to issue them in these negotiations, but they will carry very little weight because essentially, war with Iran has been tried and it has failed. And as a result, going forward, these negotiations are going to have to be based on real compromises, rather than the United States under Trump trying to coerce or dictate the terms for the outcome. That's no longer in the cards. Yes, so to that point, Rob, I mean, when you go through the list of things that the Americans have taken off of their, you know, things they've taken out of their toolbox that they can use to compel the Iranians into some specific action. They've taken off sanctions, they've taken off decapitation strikes against the supreme leader, they've taken out military strikes, they've taken out now close to five weeks of unrelenting war alongside the Israelis. The toolbox is left in the U.S. arsenal besides what Donald Trump threatened today, and I think Iran civilizatially off the map, there's not much left for the U.S. to use to compel the Iranians to negotiate. No, absolutely. And this is really typical of what I've called sort of a global guerrilla warfare, which Iran has waged, where it doesn't really matter. You could hit Iran as hard as you can, and obviously this is going to have, what happened already, is going to have devastating consequences for average Iranians, for their economy, for their future, for their rebuilding. I don't want to minimize that, but just in terms of the warfare, Iran has learned that it can continue, it can sustain everything that the U.S. wants to throw at it, and it could still, it will survive as it has survived, and it will make the United States and the world economy pay a price. So when you're leading that kind of asymmetric warfare, when you're globalizing a guerrilla form of resistance, very hard to win because Iran or the regime's prevails simply by being able to fight, to live to fight another day. So I think, in that sense, Trita is absolutely right. I don't know what more Trump can do to threaten them. It doesn't mean there'll be a deal, but it does mean that Iran is not going to surrender. Yeah, so David, you know, the Geneva Conventions are very clear about this. And so is the U.S. law of war. Measures of intimidation or terrorism against the civilian population are prohibited, including acts of threats or violence, the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the civilian population. Donald Trump has already done that, right? Even without bombing, even without bombing Iran today, he has spread terror among the civilian population with the threats that he has made. Are you hearing any concerns from U.S. officials that Trump is breaking the law? Are we getting any indication within either the national security apparatus in this country or others in this country, or other agencies, that they are concerned about what they're being asked to do in violating international U.S. law? I was about to run a story that military lawyers in the armed services were going to resist. They were telling, these are former military lawyers talking to current ones, and that they were hearing how troubled they were by these statements by Trump, and that they felt there would be pushback from U.S. military lawyers to carry out the attacks on the power plants. And let's not forget, 1600 Iranians are dead. Roughly the same number are in Lebanon, so there has been a huge cost here. And it's how will this play out here? And I think it's hard to say, but I think politically, the feeling I got is that Americans don't want this country, they don't want our country to be intentionally committing war crimes. And what I was hearing from former military officials was that the ethos of the American military is not to intentionally carry out war crimes either. They were deeply troubled by this. There was going to be pushback from inside the military. We don't know what was said. A lot of people have faith in General Kain, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that he might have pushed back on this crazy plan to take out all these power plants and bridges. So maybe the system worked a bit, but it's crazy that this kind of threat was ever even made. Yes, so, Trita, I mean, I don't know if you've been hearing from your sources or contacts that you've been speaking to throughout Iran. I know communication is extremely difficult inside Iran. I'm not even sure whether or not Iran was getting the full picture of the threats that Donald Trump was making. But how did the threats and specifically today, the civilizational threats that were made against Iran, the regime, the people of that country play out? I had conversations earlier this morning with folks on the Iranian side, and I was really taken aback by the strong confidence they showed. And it's largely because of what happened over the weekend. Their narrative and their belief is that there actually was an invasion effort by the United States that went wrong. Most of the attention is on the pilot that was rescued, but that was a success within a larger failed operation. And there's really left them in a very strong position of confidence, perhaps overconfidence. They are susceptible to overplaying their hands like anyone else. And they saw these threats, particularly these increasingly unhinged threats, such as the civilizational threat, as a sign of Trump's desperation. But they were worried about it at the same time because they recognized that that desperation could cause Trump to commit significant mistakes. It's always very difficult to negotiate with a counterpart that is not necessarily fully rational. I'm not saying that Trump is irrational by definition, but he was showing behavior that I think was not kind of the deliberate man-man theory, but actually he was in a desperate state and this worried them a little bit, but not in the sense that they thought that they could not repel an invasion. Alright, David Rode, Robert Malley, and Trita Parsi. Thank you to the three of you for starting us off this evening. Really appreciate it. Coming up, Congressman Ro Khanna joins me right here in New York on Trump, the 25th Amendment, and a lot more. That's coming up next. There is an increasingly pressing question here in the United States, two hours after we averted ratcheting up U.S. attacks on Iran. The question is, how do you stop an unhinged president who is making genocidal threats against another country? A president who says the Strait of Hormuz does not matter, only to then make this threat a few days later. Quote, open the effing Strait of Hormuz, you crazy bastards, or you'll be living in hell. Just watch. A growing number of people, including some on the far right, are calling to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove Donald Trump from office. Even some Republicans in Congress are now breaking with Trump over his threats to take Iran back to the quote, Stone Age. Watch. We have to finish the job. We have to open up the Strait of Hormuz. But I will be honest, John, I am hoping and praying that President Trump, this really is bluster. I do not want to see us start blowing up civilian infrastructure. I do not want to see that. We are not at war with the Iranian people. We are trying to liberate them. Congressman Ro Khanna is a Democrat of California. He serves on the House Armed Services Committee, and he joins me now. Congressman, it's great to have you here on set. You were one of the members of Congress that was out there today calling to invoke the 25th Amendment of the United States. Walk me through how you would see that working. This cabinet, this Trump cabinet, which would be required, including the vice president, which would be required to invoke the 25th Amendment, they are not exactly profiles encouraged and shown a willingness to stand up to Donald Trump yet. We need to remove this president. We need to use all options, whether it's impeachment, whether it's the 25th Amendment. The reality is he's threatened war crimes. He has undermined everything this country stands for. He's threatening to wipe out another civilization. And just because he did not, because not because of the whimpers of Congress. By the way, Congress was not exactly a profile encouraged. I mean, it was like, were they asleep till noon? Finally, we got some people speaking out, and then, oh, let's have a vote. How about let's remove the president before he blows up a civilization? But finally, we got some activism from progressives and conservatives to say, stop this. What are you doing? You can't just make these threats. And so we need to use every tool at our toolbox. And the 25th Amendment, yeah, we should ask JD Vance. Is this what you signed up for? A president who's threatening to blow up other civilizations? Yeah, he's too busy over campaigning in Hungary at the moment. So I'm not sure if he's been fielded that question yet or not. But what do you say to people who say the 25th Amendment or impeachment, as we have seen twice before with this specific president when it's controlled by Republicans? That's just not a realistic scenario. I think you're using things too tactically. You've been so immune. How about moral principle? How about that when a president threatens to blow up other nations, that we have to see some response to saying that we have a higher moral dimension, that there's something called conviction in politics, that the lives of the Iranian people matter, that the lives of people in Gaza matter, that the lives of people in Cuba matter, that when Donald Trump is echoing galaat and calling people animals who live in Iran, that we will be a Democratic Party who says that is morally wrong. And when we don't say that, and when we hide behind proceduralism, and when we hide behind tactics, and when we hide behind the fact that we don't have votes, then what we say to most Americans is we're not willing to fight for our vision for America, for our moral vision. You know who is willing to fight for his vision of America? Donald Trump. And you know why the Democrats keep losing? Because we don't have conviction in our politics. We don't have inspiration and passion in our politics. We've got people there 50 years who read the same scripts, put out the same bland statements. Get out! Let a new generation lead. You've been ineffective. The base doesn't like you. The base wants fighters. The base wants people with moral vision. And the only people the base are more upset with than Donald Trump is the ineffective leadership of the Democratic Party to stand up when a president of the United States is threatening genocide. So when you go back a few hours from where we were on the brink of this potential genocidal act by the president, you sit on the House Armed Services Committee. What are you hearing about how disturbed people were within the military, or within the chain of command, or within the administration who are being asked to potentially carry out this war crime? And not just this specific threat. Over the course of the last five weeks, the growing concerns that this war had crossed a lot of lines. There was deep concern because no one knew what Donald Trump would do. They didn't know that would he unleash the full fury of the American military, or is he going to strike certain bridges and commit certain war crimes and escalate it, where they're putting our troops at risk? The reality is, even Richard Nixon, who came up with this whole madman theory of unpredictability, even he never would have thought to threaten to wipe out all of Vietnam, or wipe out civilizations. Donald Trump, across a line, which undermines America's fundamental belief in the dignity and equality of every human being, endowed by their creator with rights. I mean, he basically made a mockery of that. You talked about possibly impeaching the president. I know you're making the moral argument for it, but that would also require a legal argument. What is the legal argument that you think the president committed a crime in the way he has conducted this war so far? Well, I believe threatening to genocide is a crime. I believe conducting a war without coming to Congress is a crime. I believe that having no regard for the Geneva Conventions is a crime. And that's not even to mention all the corruption that the president is engaged in. But the reality is that the Democratic Party has to stand up for a new moral direction. And we have one side, Donald Trump, which is strong for his view of American militarism, American corruption. We need to be equally side in our view in standing up against genocide. And by the way, it's related because when we don't stand up against the fuel blockade in Cuba, when we don't stand up against the genocide that took place in Gaza, then we have delegitimized human beings in other parts of the world. And this, we need to articulate a moral vision in this country that says lives in other parts of the world matter, human rights matter. So what is your understanding of why Donald Trump backed down tonight from this threat? I mean, ultimately, is Seth Moulton, fellow Congressman of yours, I spoke to him last week and he was telling me that Iran basically has won this war so far with the way the president has conducted it. And I'm wondering how you read how Donald Trump has walked back his threat today and entered into this other cycle of two weeks of negotiations. Do you see that strengthening Iran going forward? Well, look, I want the peace to hold. So I don't want to litigate and say, look, we lost the war and then have Donald Trump go make threats again. I think we've got to figure out how do we have a ceasefire? How do we make sure now that we negotiate some sanctions relief for getting the enriched uranium? But the reality is we're in a worse situation today than we were before the war. Gas is up from $2.30 to $4. The enriched uranium is still there. We've replaced Khamenei with Khamenei Jr. Khamenei Jr. now wants to build nuclear weapons. We strengthened the IRGC and the Iranian people, we were going to free. We're now threatening to blow them up. So this has been a colossal moral blunder and a strategic blunder. I want to play for you. Donald Trump, as I mentioned, the vice president was in Hungary today campaigning with Victor Orban. Basically, on behalf of Victor Orban ahead of their election, let me play for you with Donald Trump who called into that rally. Had to say, take a listen. Well, I just want to tell you, I'm a big fan of Victor. I'm with him all the way. The United States is with him all the way. And it's a real honor to talk to you. You're really incredible people with great enthusiasm and brilliance because you're brilliant people. And I really love it. You have a man that kept your country strong and he kept your country good. And you don't have problems with all of the problems that so many other countries have because they let their countries be invaded. So just to be clear, Victor Orban is an authoritarian who has rolled back democracy by every measure in that country. He's solidified his grip on power and made it less democratic than when he took office. And you hear the president of the United States praising him and praising what he has done to that country. He's jailed journalists. He's jailed opposition leaders. But this is who Donald Trump admires. I mean, he is using that same playbook here. He's going after his political opponents. He's going after people with the ICE raids. He's going after his enemies. And we need to be clear right. And that is why the Democrats need to stand up with every tool we have against this president, whether that's the 25th Amendment, whether that's the impeachment. The American people are desperate for leadership. They're desperate for a new moral direction. They're desperate to stand up against this president. And what they don't want is equivocation. What they don't want is proceduralism. What they don't want is the sluggishness of liberalism that lost out twice to Donald Trump because he presented an energetic bold vision. It's time for a bold liberalism. A time for a bold vision on our side, a bold progressiveism, like Zoran is offering, like others are offering, like Bernie is offering. I believe that's what this country needs and what we will have. Do you think some of your colleagues who are running for reelection are facing that from their constituents, that pressure for this bold vision? Absolutely. And I think that there's first, a view that we need a new generation. Second, a view that we need more boldness in our party. Third, a view that we need to actually tackle the massive wealth inequality and talk consistently with principle about human rights. And by the way, I'm for competitive primary elections. I have a primary challenger myself. Thomas Massey is a primary challenger. Who said that you can't run in this country? We've had a governing elite that has managed the decline of America and people are tired of it. They're tired of the status quo. They want new voices. They want an anti-establishment politics. And that's what we're going to see. Congressman Roe Conn, it's great to have you on the show. I really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Still to come, Donald Trump's new acting attorney general has a frightening vision for the DOJ. Lisa Rubin joins me on set on what we can hear from Todd Blanche soon. So in the midst of Trump's Iran threats, it's easy to forget that Donald Trump's new acting attorney general introduced himself to the press today. And so, Blanche held his first press conference where he insisted that the Department of Justice would not be focused on going after Trump's enemies. Here's what he told MSNOW's Candelaini. If you were a prosecutor and you were trying to prosecute your boss, you have ethical duties as a lawyer that I think prevent you from continuing to work in that environment. And so, in this case, what we saw and what President Trump went through, every single prosecutor in this department, whether you're in AUSA or working here, you have a duty to do the right thing. And so, in cases where, and this is beyond this press conference, but I'm happy to talk about another time, where you had prosecutors that were absolutely not doing the right thing. Okay. And so, none of those prosecutors. I hope everybody agrees they shouldn't work here if you're not doing the right thing. And that's what I meant by that. And listen, it's been talked about a lot, but what happened the last four years is something that will never happen again. Lisa Rubin is MSNOW's senior legal reporter, and she joins me to help us make sense of that press conference. So, Lisa, what struck out to you to this, let me introduce myself to the press quarter press conference by Todd Blanche. There is one word in his answer to Ken that I think is imperative that we all focus on, and it's his invocation of the word boss. Let's go back to what he said to Ken. Ken was asking him about the fact that he recently has said the department has been cleared of all the prosecutors who worked on the Trump cases, that Cache Patel has made a similar statement about the FBI agents who worked on those investigations. And Ken's question was, isn't that tacitly an admission that you did fire these people for political reasons? They have lawsuits now against the department. Haven't you conceded their point? And his response was, politically, it's not that it's much more simple than that, and that's when he made that statement that you just played. Look, if you were a prosecutor, you were trying to prosecute your boss, you have ethical duties as a lawyer that I think prevent you from continuing to work in that environment. Let me dismantle that. What Todd Blanche is effectively saying, Aiman, is that the client of any lawyer who works in the Department of Justice is not the Department of Justice, it's not the United States or the federal government. Are they like people? Yeah. It is the President of the United States, and that is a dramatic departure not only from Department of Justice norms, it is a dramatic departure from ethical rules governing attorney conduct that say, when you work for an organization as a lawyer, your duties are to the organization. If I were a lawyer, I would say that if I were a private lawyer for a corporation, my duties would be to the company, not to its CEO. And if I, for example, cooperated with the federal government in prosecuting a CEO who had committed some violation of the law, no one would say I had a conflict of interest. They would say I was doing what was right and what was my job. The federal government is no different. It's so interesting that you bring up the word boss, because there was this moment in the press conference that I want to play for reviewers that is beyond bizarre for an attorney general to say, take a listen to this. I did not ask for this job. I love working for President Trump. It's the greatest honor of a lifetime. And if President Trump chooses to keep me as acting, that's an honor. If he chooses to nominate me, that's an honor. If he chooses to nominate somebody else, and I go back to being the DAG, that's an honor. If he chooses to nominate somebody else and asks me to go do something else, I will say thank you very much. I love you, sir. So for an administration that is kind of against the politicization of the Department of Justice, an administration that doesn't want you to believe that it is a cult, how hypocritical, how strange is it to have somebody who will say to the president, I love you, sir? Well, let me first start by saying I witnessed Todd Blanche interact with Donald Trump in court every day for many weeks when Donald Trump was tried here in Manhattan by the Manhattan DA's office. I believe his admiration for the president is real and that they do have a bond that goes beyond that of an ordinary attorney and client. That having been said, that statement is about a fraction of a second away from being Kevin Bacon in Animal House when he says, thank you, sir, may I have another. The obsequiousness of that statement is something I would hope that we'll never see from an attorney general again. And you're right. There is some real disjuncture between there, oh, you're the weaponizer, we're not the weaponizer, and that sort of cult-like fidelity to a dear leader that Todd Blanche was showing at today's press conference. Do you think, I mean, Attorney General, former Attorney General Pam Bondi was fiercely loyal to the president. She had all these awkward moments where she would, you know, whether it was the 50,000 stock market or, you know, sit in the cabinet meeting and basically shower the president with praise for saving millions of American lives with the fentanyl and awkwardly just kind of showering him with love. Do you think it will create pressure on Todd Blanche to do more of the same of that? Does he now think that is the way you have to operate? Or does he go a separate way? Because on one hand, it didn't save Pam Bondi, but on the same hand, Donald Trump expects that kind of loyalty from his attorney general. I think anybody who doesn't understand that Todd Blanche has effectively been running the Department of Justice for many months is basically deluding themselves, right? Todd Blanche is a career prosecutor who came in and was one of the only people in the senior leadership of the department who had that experience. Pam Bondi had been a state prosecutor. She had no experience in the Department of Justice whatsoever. As the Deputy Attorney General, you run the criminal division, you are in charge of the U.S. Attorney's offices. Todd Blanche, I don't expect, will act any differently, even than he has already behaved. He knows that he is sort of on that tightrope between trying to do things the right way and accommodating the president. He has been on that line ever since. People who are loyal to Todd Blanche will tell you that he has tried to sort of move to the fringes, people that he didn't think were particularly effective or committed to doing it in the right way. You see that profile in New York Magazine earlier this week that talks about, for example, how Todd Blanche dispatched Ed Martin because he thought Ed Martin was not good for the department, was not going about certain of these investigations in a proper way. That having been said, does Todd Blanche want to accomplish what the president wants him to accomplish? Absolutely. How do I know that? He said it to our faces today that his job is to execute on the president's agenda. Let's go really quickly before we go. Cassidy Hutchinson, the DOJ now assigning civil rights to investigate her, remind us why she was so significant and how this falls into the weaponization of the DOJ to go after the president's formal enemies. Cassidy Hutchinson is one of the only Trump White House insiders whose account of January 6th helped people understand that Donald Trump was absolutely hell bent on interfering with the election, that he wanted his supporters not only to march to the capital, but to create some havoc there. And she is being accused of perjury and of lying to Congress why the Civil Rights Division is doing this and not, for example, Jeanine Perot, the US Attorney for the District of D.C., is a mystery. But hopefully our friends at the New York Times will get to the bottom of it. Hopefully so. Lisa, it's been great to see you as always. Thank you so much for helping us make sense of it all. Thank you for having me. It is Tuesday, 1926, so that means we've got voting going on and we have been watching one race today in particular, and that is in the state of Georgia, a special election to fill that seat left open by Marjorie Taylor Greene when she resigned earlier this year. And in that very, very red district, the AP is projecting a winner in that race. Clayton Fuller, the Republican, has defeated Democrat Sean Harris, according to the current totals, which sounds like a lot until you hear that Donald Trump actually won that district. The reddest in Georgia by 37 points back in 2024. It's not a bad showing there in the district of Marjorie Taylor Greene. We'll be right back. So about 12 hours ahead of the arbitrary deadline that Donald Trump set for the opening of the Strait of Hormuz, he made this threat on social media. Quote, a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. Who knows? We'll find out tonight. And if you can set aside the general insanity of that statement that a whole civilization will die tonight, you have to ask yourself, what exactly does Donald Trump mean by civilization? Was he talking about bombing mosques, libraries, historic buildings, palaces? Was he trying to equate the Islamic regime in Iran, which Trump has called evil and terroristic, to Iranian civilization, to the Persian Empire, to the 90 million people who live there? The U.S. and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire just a little over an hour ago, but what exactly was he planning to do that would have destroyed the civilization of the people of Iran? Congresswoman Yasmin Ansari of Arizona is the only Iranian-American Democrat in Congress. She joins me now. Congresswoman, it's great to have you on the show. I wanted to have this conversation with you. As someone who is the first Iranian-American Democrat elected to Congress, I just want to know what your reaction was to hearing the president say this civilization that you historically have been a part of, your family or ancestor has been a part of, that civilization will die tonight. My reaction was that Donald Trump has finally confirmed to the American people and to the world that he is unfit and mentally unstable and should be removed from office immediately. His statements to me were nothing short of threatening a genocide against the population of 90 million people in Iran. To me, it sounded like he was normalizing language for the use of nuclear weapons against the Iranian population. And I think it is far past time that the 25th Amendment is invoked and that the cabinet take their responsibility seriously to remove him from office. He is a threat not just to this country but to the rest of the world. And I think that the overwhelming reactions we've seen today, not just from over 80 Democrats who have called for the same, but from Republicans who I never thought I would have such strong agreement with. People like Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson, Alex Jones, Candace Owens and the list goes on. Who called for the same? This man is unhinged. He has already committed war crimes by bombing schools and bombing hospitals, bridges, desalination plans. And all of this is without congressional authorizations. It is grounds for impeachment. Congress needs to act and this is unacceptable. The American people and the rest of the world cannot go on like this. I was wondering if you can talk to me a little bit about the Iranian Persian civilization and culture that Trump is threatening here that maybe a lot of people don't know about. And the fact that he is conflating at best the Islamic regime of Iran with the people in the history and the civilization of Iran. Donald Trump pretends like he cares about Iranian people. I mean, as you and I well know, he doesn't care about American people. So of course, he does not care about Iranian people. But Iran is a country that stems from the Persian Empire. It's a civilization of thousands of years. I've been to Iran and from Persepolis to the palaces from the monarchy to the bazaar. It is a beautiful country with beautiful people, very vibrant culture, generally very pro-west. Very much want freedom from their regime and they want open lines of communication with the United States. They've been facing an internet blackout from their government for months now. And so it is really heart-wrenching and devastating to see that Donald Trump has sold a fantasy to Iranian people. And that is really important to note because at the outset of all of this, you know, we know Iranians inside the country felt hope mixed with anxiety. We've seen the images of diaspora Iranians here celebrating. But I think as the war has gone on and Donald Trump's true intentions or lack of a plan and lack of rationale and disregard for human life have made more and more clear that that's not what any of this is about. In fact, we don't know what any of this is about. This is the Trump cycle. He creates a crisis. He then tries to tell the American people that he's solved the crisis and then he reverses course. And that's exactly what's happened with the ceasefire and with the Strait of Hormuz and so many details of what is happening in Iran. And let me ask you really quickly before we're almost out of time, Congressman, you said that you would also be looking into launching articles of impeachment against the Defense Secretary Pete Hexeth. Tell me why you think he also should be removed from office and how you're going about doing that. So I will be introducing articles of impeachment against Pete Hexeth next week. We have a lot of support from organizations and we expect a lot of cosponsors in Congress to join us. Pete Hexeth is directly taking orders from Donald Trump and carrying them out. On day one of this war, the United States bombed a children's school and 160 children were massacred for no reason. It was a double tap strike. That is a war crime. There are hundreds of legal experts who have deep concerns about this. Pete Hexeth, you know, has not followed through with his oath of office and his duty to the Constitution. And I believe that he also has committed many impeachable offenses even before this war in Iran. And that includes strikes on boats off of the coast of the Caribbean and the list goes on. Congressman Maynard, yes, Maynard, I'm sorry. Thank you so much for joining us this evening. Greatly appreciate it. Thank you for having me. Next up, Jen Socky will be joined by Maryland Governor Wes Moore and Arizona Senator Mark Kelly. You don't want to miss that. We'll be right back after a quick break. That is all in on this Tuesday night. You are watching the new MS Now Premium on Apple Podcasts.