good evening and welcome to special live holiday coverage. we are tracking many developments. i am ari melber with you live for another hour. but a lot of new material, including growing concerns about whether july 4th celebrations will exacerbate the spread of the pandemic. thousands standing crowded together at president trump's

maga-style celebration at mt. rushmore, south dakota, right now. social distancing not enforced. very few masks. they are optional. and the backdrop is the virus cases are soaring. 52,000 today. 38 states with increasing case loads. and we are learning eight to ten secret service agents on the pence detail have contracted coronavirus just this week. that's altered the vice president's travel schedule. secret service agents also contracting covid during donald trump's maga rally in tulsa last month. something of a theme. this is a big holiday weekend. this is the middle of summer. people celebrating, obviously. people want to honor the holiday in many different ways. but, we are being told by experts, be careful about how you congregate. the last big holiday weekend was, of course, memorial day. many states saw cases and another metric, hospitalizations rise over that period. younger people also engaging in very risky behavior. >> while people are dying, others are partying.

>> young adults in louisiana have more coronavirus cases than any other age group. >> parties have turned into breeding grounds for covid-19. >> it started with a house party june 17th. a gathering of young adults in their 20s. the host, already showing symptoms. >> the party is called pongfest. 300 teens attended the party. >> students are having parties and putting money into a pot. then the first person who gets covid after the party gets all the money in the pot. >> i need something to unwind. i like going and seeing other people. >> get over it. it's like any other sickness, any other flu. >> they don't have the right to tell people that you can or cannot go. >> that's just a sampling of what's going on out there. i want to bring in our expert guests, mark thompson, the host of make it plain podcast, dr. esther cho, an emergency

physician, and regena maxwell, the author of "the end of white politics." we don't generallyize around here, zerlina. there's all kinds of habits being followed by people of all ages. but what do you think of some of what has been reported out there by some young people heading into this big weekend? >> well, i don't want to shame them too much, because i do think that this is the result of poor messaging from the federal government from the beginning. they were very unclear about the impact on young people. they told us that largely, the vulnerable and the elderly were the most at risk, and so i think that gave young people a false sense of security. what we're seeing now, though, is that the virus doesn't self-incriminate against anybody, depending on their political affiliation or their age. so i think everyone needs to take appropriate precautions. when i watch that video, i think about the fact that i've lost five family members. so this virus is very real and

it is impacting people's lives and their health. and it has long-term consequences. it's not just, you get sick and may recover and you move on. they're still studying the long-term health consequences. and that's important to keep in mind, as well. >> doctor? >> i'm so sorry to hear that, zerlina, i didn't know that. yeah, i agree with everything you said. we talk a lot about how young people are not hit as hard, but the thing is, as cases rise and this disease becomes more commonplace, we will see less frequent things more often. so we will more and more hear that young people have gotten gr gravely ill and have died. we didn't hear that when the numbers were small. and it will start to feel very real for young, healthy people. and yes, then the disease will go to the vulnerable people that we all care about, our grandparents and our family members with chronic illnesses.

so it's really as we see, diseases shifting from nursing homes to recreational activities. we don't want to replicate what happened after memorial day. again, after july -- after july 4th. so i hope that we, at least a little bit, can learn from those lessons. >> yeah. appreciate both of those points, zerlina. and condolences. and the doctor, on the larger context. and i've got to tell you, according to some, mark thompson, you may have drawn the short stick now, with the topic i'm about to give you. are you ready? >> uh-oh. >> uh-oh is right. >> you get the topic, for anywhere you want to go with it, for people joining these public service announcements about masks and a new sbentry into th space is sean hannity. take a look. >> masks, ppe, it kept them safe and i was right here in the

epicenter. every store i went to, everybody was wearing their masks and thankfully, my grocery store, nobody got covid-19. so what did i learn? i don't have a problem wearing a mask, especially if it means we can go to a ball game or defend grandma, grandpa, mom and dad. >> take it away. >> that's a fastball right down the middle for me, ari. for people who have gotten sick, remain sick, and who have died, we really have to lay all of their circumstances at the feet of donald trump. he ignored all the warnings about this. in fact, at one of his last speeches -- in tulsa, he said, what does 19 mean? i don't know what 19 means. this was discovered in 2019 and he's still in denial about it. everyone in his administration

and all of his republican sycophants said that this would just wash over, it was an't a b deal. they were more concerned about the economy, allegedly. they minimized mask wearing. and so now it's kind of johnny come lately. it's good. people should be talking about masks now. but it's johnny come lately. right down the street for you, ari, in times square, is a trump death clock. because it shows how many people have died from this virus, because of the negligence of his administration. so i pray that all of the young people, everyone this weekend realizes how important this is to wear masks this weekend, to be safe, not to be running around outdoors with him at any fireworks display. and let me just say this. he's running around saying, oh, 4.8 million jobs. but as soon as people went back

to those jobs, because of premature reopenings, many of them are losing those jobs again now because of those reopenings, and it's just not safe. so we can't rest on these laurels. this thing is still out here. it's very, very serious. their cases have gone up more than they've gone up ever, over 50,000 in the past 48 hours. so we hope and pray that people will show some responsibility for everyone. and just one thing i'll -- >> well, mark -- mark, hold up. hold up. i was going to say, and then i'll let you continue, that maybe it's the holiday spirit, but so far, you've been quite diplomatic, because i know that you and sean hannity clash on a variety of items. but so far, you've been diplomatic. go ahead and finish. well, i'm going there. it was on -- and of course, a member of the kitchen cabinet, he's de facto chief of staff in the white house. but it was on fox news that they had the lieutenant governor of texas saying, grandma and

grandpa might just have to sacrifice their lives for the good of the economy. but they do that. it's the putin tact. the fog of ignobility. they say one thing and then come back and say something else, like they always were for masks in the first place. so, yeah, for the sake of their audience, god bless them. their audience who are victims of their false propaganda, good! listen to sean. sean's right to say put the masks on, but we must remember the hypocrisy. it is as hypocritical as frederick douglas called the fourth of july for black people itself. >> an apt reference. i appreciate the nuance you bring to that. and i want to let zerlina weigh in, as well. zerlina has worked for hillary clinton, among others, who obviously got the brunt of the fox news treatment. and yet, it's bigger than one's

personal views of any given person, because, "a," better late than never for hannity, and people can debate his motives. "b," most importantly, there are people, zerlina, who will take his word for it. so finally getting into the cdc landscape of the right thing to do is good, and yet mark draws our attention -- i would like your views on the fact that that doesn't mean that you get a full shout-out when you burned up this many months endangering your own viewers who take your word for things. and i should note, not challenging the president and many officials who have been on fox news about these issues. so more than one way to feel about it, zerlina. how do you feel? >> i mean, i feel like you don't really need to give sean hannity any credit here. he said he agreed with the cdc. we all should agree with the cdc. they're the ones who follow the science and know what they're talking about. so sean hannity agreeing with them, that's easy. the bottom line here, though, is that president trump is having a rally tomorrow, on the fourth of july, with a multitude of

issues. one is that 7,500 people, not social distancing, in a state that as yet does not have an outbreak as bad as some of the other hot spots. now you're creating an event where it could be a community spread event, because you're putting so many people together and not requiring them to do what the cdc is requiring them to do. additionally, in terms of the fireworks, the reason why you shouldn't be doing fireworks in this location is because of the threat of forest fires, so until we have a president who believes in science, we are not going to be safe. not in a pandemic or not when a climate crisis inevitably comes up. >> well, zerlina, you know that we quote -- from time to time, we quote wisdom on the program. you know that. >> i do know that. >> was it not smoky the bear who said, only you can prevent forest fires. >> he was right about that. and so can donald trump.

>> doctor? >> yeah, i'm not going to argue with smoky the bear. i'm worried -- we now just have a handful of states that are maintaining plateau or even going in the right direction. to go to one of those shrinking number of states with a large group event, literally exactly the type of event we're asking people to refrain from. i mean, understand that health care people are really happy to see people offdoorut of doors. we want people to stay healthy and start doing activities that are -- that feel good in their daily lives. there's a few things we're really discouraging. those are large-group events for prolonged periods of time without face masks or any social distancing measures. so this event -- check, check, check. it's checking off all the dangerous boxes. >> doctor, that brings us to the next question we wanted to get you on before we lose you, take a listen to the surgeon general

on the point you're raising. >> we know that large gatherings presents the biggest risk right now. would you advise someone to go to a large gathering? >> well, craig, it's not a yes or no. every single person has to make up their own minds. there are going to be people going to beaches, to barbecues, to different environments and they have to look at their individual risk. >> doctor, can you give us your expertise on that? >> yeah, well, dr. adams is a good friend and i think we sometimes fall on different sides of how the messaging should go. i think there's a pragmatic thing he's addressing there, is that people are making decisions to go to events and i think there's some mitigation strategies. i think what people need to understand is that it's not put on a face mask and then do whatever the heck you want. that's not the messaging we're going for at all. face mask wearing is one of many

layers of keeping yourself safe. you know, there's still the hand washing. there's still the social distancing. there's still avoiding the highest risk activities, like large groups. like going together into restaurants, and you know, in restaurant dining. things where you're just at close quarters with lots of people. and you can't have a lot of control over sort of hand-to-hand and face-to-face transmission. so i just want to put the reminder out there that it's not face masks and go to town, you know? please try to -- everyone, keep yourself as safe as possible. >> appreciate that. the doctor gets the last word in this segment. i want to thank the doctor and zerlina for all of your insights, really important stuff. mark, we'll come back later this hour. we have a lot to get to. also coming up, folks, retired general barry mccaffrey. someone you want to hear about how to deal with vladimir putin. and our experts looking at a

time period that may be one of the worst ever for donald trump donald trump, which is saying something. and new actions by local prosecutors against paul manafort. i'll explain mia. i'm ari melber and we will be right back. i'm ari melber and we will be right back 're always here to hep with fast response and great service and it doesn't stop there we're also here to help look ahead that's why we're helping members catch up by spreading any missed usaa insurance payments over the next twelve months so you can keep more cash in your pockets for when it matters most and that's just one of the many ways we're here to help the military community find out more at usaa.com

turning to new reporting tonight on that russia bounty scandal. the daily beast says white house officials urging trump to snub putin, withholding an invitation to the very big g-7 summit.

trump has not agreed to even that small response, according to the report. meanwhile, "the washington post" says trump does not actually believe the russia bounty reports are true or actionable. we turn now to a very special expert, retired general barry mccaffrey. good evening. >> yeah, hi, ari. >> when you look at this story, what jumps out to you and what should the united states do? >> you know, it's hard to know how to even approach this. it seems clear -- i've worked for two administrations, republican and democrat, in and out of the white house, as part of the uniformed military. i've dealt with two more republican and democratic administrations in the national security council arena. i've never seen anything like this. clearly, the intelligence community was largely believing that the russians were putting out a bounty to kill u.s. troops. i think that's probably the case.

the intelligence community put it in the president's daily brief. they had an nsc policy meeting to discuss options. of course they told the president of the united states. he had five phone calls with putin. i've been in the room when the president meets a foreign head of state or calls him on the phone and you prep the guy for what's coming up. and an, oh, by the way, putin put out a hit on u.s. troops, you would think, would be part of that background briefing. so the question, why is he doing this? it's a slap in the face to the u.s. armed forces who are suffering casualties in afghanistan. and by the way, it doesn't make a lot of sense. russia -- which i spent a lot of time in and out of -- brilliant people, good people, they deserve more than putin, a cleptocrat, a dictator. it's no longer a great power. the government is no longer -- besides nuclear weapons and oil,

they have almost nothing that people are concerned about. what is he doing? the gdp of russia is less than that of california? something unusual is going on to have mr. putin have such an influence on the president of the united states. it's great evidence you've put forward that reminds everyone that while putin may seem like a villain and a bogeyman for all of these reasons, you're reminding us of the fundamentals and the geopolitical imbalance, which makes it all the more suspicious the way trump acts. when you look at a situation like this as a military strategist, there are always risks to acting or overreacting or escalation. do you believe this is a situation where there is also risks if donald trump settles on basically no action? >> of course. you know, the bottom line is, when we believe that we have credible intelligence that somebody is about to conduct lethal attacks on u.s. forces, we have the intelligence

community find out where they are and we go kill them. that would have been step one inside afghanistan, to find russian intelligence operatives, the hakani network, the taliban people involved in these purported strikes. we would have picked up the phone and called the u.s. ambassador in moscow and said, go on in and tell these people to knock it off. we would have told the cia, go snag some of their people in syria as a counterpunch. but the bottom line is nato, the european union, is threatened by russia and the armed forces. we briefed nato that this was a concern. the brits have their forces at risk, also. what were we thinking of? and even now, the president says, it's a hoax. a hoax from the cia, from his own intelligence community, from the special operations community in afghanistan. just an unbelievable situation.

>> and general, you have this headline here i want to read you. is it possible that no one told trump about the russian bounties? you just explained the policy process why you don't find that very credible. a quote here is i believe his staff was afraid to tell him about it for fear he would erupt and do something damaging, like calling putin and tipping him off. a former cia general counsel. what does it tell you that people who have a duty to do better, i mean, if they're inside a government, they've got to do their jobs, especially the career appointees, may be operating in this way, where they're, for whatever reasons, just not bringing this stuff to him? >> that's uncommon in washington. you find out the boss doesn't want to hear certain kinds of information or doesn't like certain figures in government or international figures, and people are reluctant to bring it up. they want to avoid trouble. however, at the end of the day, the ever president's a

politician. i can't imagine that jared or the white house chief of staff or the national security director wouldn't have gone in and said, look, this stuff might leak out, as it has finally. your buddy, putin, is trying to kill our troops to humiliate us as we leave afghanistan. i don't believe for a minute that he wasn't told, verbally, by senior people in the white house. and if he wasn't, as you suggest, what a comment on the public officials surrounding him at the apex of the american government. >> wow. general mccaffrey, as always, we appreciate your expertise, sir. >> good to be with you, ari? >> thank you. we are back in just 30 seconds. a trump insider talking about how overwhelmed, angry, and scared the president is. stay with us. scared the preside. stay with us ss allstate won't raise your rates just because of an accident. cut! is that good?

no you were talking about allstate and... i just... when i... accident forgiveness from allstate. click or call for a quote today. ibut nothing makes me feel like pnew always discreet boutique. outside, it's soft like underwear. inside, it turns liquid to gel. for incredible protection, that feels like nothing but my underwear. new always discreet boutique. trump is holding this big rally tonight, no real social distancing plan. masks are optional and a lot of other july controversies. that comes out of a tough month, from the tulsa embarrassment, which has trump's own aides talking about changing the campaign manager, to the very real public health crisis of the pandemic, to this issue of race, where many say his problems are self-inflicted wounds. >> reporter: outrage is growing of the forceful removal of

peaceful protesters to clear the way for the president to hold a photo op. >> the president's methods make him vulnerable and losing ground to joe biden. >> disapproval rating, 57%. >> another military leader is speaking out against him. >> inside the arena, empty seats. outside, the overflow area torn down. >> we are seeing cases across the country spike and now many states are putting a pause on their reopening. >> joining me, professor brittany cooper, author of "eloquent rage: a black feminist discovers her superpower," and mike thompson back with us. brittney, your thoughts? >> yeah, look, trump is a total failure. and unfortunately, the country got to see that in stark relief in june. we could anticipate that this was going to happen when he decided to make this, as i've been calling it, necro political calculation in march and april that he was going to ignore the coronavirus. and then when it really hit the

country hard and 100,000 folks died and over 20,000 of those folks were black people, when we began to see that disproportionately black people were dying, the conversation about reopening ramped up from his administration, that frustration plus the killing of jornl floyd and the killing of breonna taylor by police drove people into the streets in the middle of a pandemic. so what we got to see was the way in which he's not prepared to lead. when terrible things happens, he sticks his head in the sand, engages in wishful thinking. and he also thought that the old playbook that got him elected in 2016 would actually work. that he could stoke racial fires and racial animus in the country. that he could antagonize these protesters. and that would actually make him look strong. the problem was that he did that in the middle of a pandemic when people had a front row seat to see george floyd be killed. and when folks are forced to see state power enacted in that way up close and have the time to digest it, as we all do, these days. then people had a sort of

consciousness shift that said, look, something is very wrong here and the president is not providing the leadership that we need. it was a terrible month. i think it will go down in infamy as the turning point of the trump presidency. at least, this is the thing i pray for. so i don't think there's any coming back for trump from this point forward. >> mark, you're nodding? >> yeah, first of all, i'm honored to be on with professor crunk. she always drops it. and we should learn that term, necropolitics. and ari, let me commend you on the segment you did in the last hour on the history of black artists and violence against them and police violence in particular against them. i really want to commend you for that. >> thank you. >> that's documentary work. i agree with everything that professor crump said. i would only add a couple of points to it. he clearly is exploiting race and as people like him,

demagogues like him have often done throughout history, race and racism becomes a distraction from reality. white people are dying in this pandemic. now, clearly, we're dying disproportionate disproportionately. but if he can convince them, as he's always saying, the economy is fine, everything's okay, fourth of july, tomorrow is really more so the fourth of his lie. the segment you just did on russia, i want people to think about this. this is -- and i think this is a direct example of how he exploits race. he knows about the russian bounties. he knows all about it. he's lying when he says he doesn't. so watch this. he strategically starts talking about the confederacy, so that he can trick people into thinking he cares something about u.s. military history or u.s. service members, and that's supposed to distract from the

fact that the very service members of today have bounties on their heads. how dare he accuse colin kaepernick of disrespecting the troops when he is disrespecting the troops, by not speaking out against putin, number one, and frankly every nfl player ought to get on their knees, because what putin is doing to our troops in afghanistan is the same thing that the police are doing to black people in america. it is appalling and a disgrace. and i pray with professor crump, people have got to wake up and make sure that once and for all, he is sent home for good come november. >> well, i believe the name of the show is make it plain. your series, mark. which is what you do. so i appreciate you being in two

segments with us tonight and all the food for thought you gave us. mark thompson, thank you very much. professor cooper stays with us. because i wanted to show one other item. "the new york times" here, professor, really going through what they call the terrible june. we'll put this up, why june was such a terrible month for donald trump. the white house has been paralyzed by trump's erratic behavior. trump remains stubbornly determined to feed the appetites of his hard right base. when you look at that, professor, there is the fact that we're going into the rally tonight, the weekend of july 4th, and white house was signaling, as they do, they sent out these notes. sometimes we report them, sometimes we don't find them to be anything worth reporting. but i will tell viewers, they are saying that donald trump wants to use this holiday weekend to rev up a fight about statues and monuments and

american history. so there we go back to what "the times" also has reported on a larger basis than what you were saying, which is, leaning into those things, as if it would help him this time, professor? >> yeah! look, one of the things that happens every july 4th on my social media feed is black people reposting the famous frederick douglas speech, what to the slave is the fourth of july. so there has always been a counterdiscourse in this country from african-americans about the fact that july 4th did not signal our freedom, and that in many ways, it called the country to account for its utter hypocrisy, its commitment to guaranteeing the freedom of white folks, but sort of brazenly fighting against making every other group of people in the country free, particularly people of color and black people. so trump is trying to play from this playbook, where he wants to stoke racial fears. i think mark was right, that he wants to distract americans from his many different failures. the problem with that is that

when we saw these prfotests tha happened in may and june all over this country, there weren't just african-americans in the street. we saw people from all races and all ethnic backgrounds in the street saying, we are fed up with this president. we are not going to fall for this anymore. and so he could have -- he could take this opportunity to shift. but this is a man who is committed to snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. up until march, he was winning the fight and he had a good chance of being re-elected, simply because the economy was doing well. he chose to mismanage covid in a way that means that we're just going to continue to see delay after delay in terms of reopening the country. and therefore, reopening the economy. he has over 100,000 people dead under his watch. people who would be alive, but for covid. so his leadership has shown that people die, people of all races and colors and classes and creeds die because donald trump is the president and because he is not suited for the job. and then he stands by and

watches the police abuse african-americans and he takes no moral stance on that, that says, as a country, we won't stand for it. he's not using the fourth of july message to say, look, our founders believed that we were a country where all men were created equal. even that shift would give him the cover to perhaps make it to november. he's uninterested in that. this man is a brazen racist. he has deep disdain for african-americans, for latinos, for anybody who is non-white. and he is showing that. so i think that rather than trying to give him any credit, i think that we should see that the gloves are off, that he is fighting in the way that he knows, and that way is simply to say that the only lives that matter to him are the lives of white people and the lives of people that support him. that is the way that he has always governed. and i think what is hard for many americans is that in this moment, we have been exposed,

even when we think about what's happening with russia and with these bounties on the military's head, we had an opportunity to impeach this president because of his problematic relationships with president. we have impeached the president for other crimes. we as a country kept on failing to hold him accountable. and now we're in this position. and my appeal to the american people is to recognize, right, you know, it's an old black saying. first time, shame on you. second time, shame on me, right? which that famous quote that george bush could never get right. and that j. cole likes to make fun of george bush. he has this song about that. but the point is, we kept on missing telephone. and now the lesson is here again, and the question is, are we going to change, stand up and listen to these people in the streets and say, we want to be the america that our founders say we were. >> i appreciate you mixing themmic seriousness of your point, that we hope everyone

hears with the lighter quote, when george w. bush said, fool me once, don't fool me again. and it came out ridiculously. brittney cooper, i wish you a very good weekend if you get any time off. thanks for being with us. >> angst, thanks, ari. >> absolutely. fitting in a break and then we have big news on paul manafort, when we come back. hen we have big news on paul manafort, when we come back. now is the time to support the places you love. spend 10 dollars or more at a participating small business and get 5 dollars back, up to 10 times with american express. enroll now at shopsmall.com. guys! guys! safe drivers save 40%!!! safe drivers save 40%! safe drivers save 40%!!! that's safe drivers save 40%.

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new developments in legal problems for trump's former campaign chair, paul manafort. local new york prosecutors want to revive the criminal charges against him with a lot of talk about whether he could ever get a trump pardon. manafort srverved some time in prison but then got spared and got home confinement. he was convicted in federal court on a range of charges, but that state case that was separate was previously dismissed by a judge on double jeopardy grounds. a legal concept that no matter how bad the thing you did is,

you can't be tried twice for it. trump has been hinting for a pardon for a different person who was actually paul manafort's business partner, roger stone. he was convicted of obstruction, witness tampering, and lying to the feds during the mueller probe, but he has not yet reported to prison. that would be on july 14th, two weeks from today, unless something changes. we are joined by david corn, the author of the book, "russian roulette: the inside story of putin's war on america and the election of donald trump." and if you don't like a hard cover, because sometimes they're hard to use at the beach, you can socially isolate with this one on paperback because it's now out on paperback and many people feel it's a good read. congratulations. >> thank you, ari. >> people still write books in this country. go ahead? >> i would say the thing is, too, because we're talking about manafort and stone now, we still are going back to russia, russia, russia. we see the bounty program.

that was the heart of the impeachment case, because he was trying to get ukraine to absolve russian of intervention in 2016. that was one of the investigations he wanted. and we still have new information coming out of the mueller report that was recently unredacted. it was about both manafort and stone. the original sin of the trump presidency, the russian intervention, and i would say trump's complicity in it, not collusion, but complicity, is still with us today. and we still don't even understand everything that happened in 2016 and all the reasons that trump still won't criticize putin, even when he's putting a bounty on americans in afghanistan. >> so what can you prove the reason might be for trump's reticence? >> i think it's mind blowing in a way, because any other politician, just if you want to get elected, will at least pay lip service to protecting

american troops overseas. whether they cared or not. and he won't even do that. we see in john bolton's book that part of it that was not covered extensively when it came out a couple of weeks ago, that he tried to get trump to challenge putin on intervention in u.s. elections in 2016 and make sure they're not going to do it again in 2020, even though the fbi says they are up to it again, and trump refused to do this. bolton gave him a memo. just gave this memo to putin. you don't have to say anything. and still trump wouldn't do it. we're left with this puzzle that just won't go away about why he is so enthralled with and by putin and refuses to stand up to him, even when american lives, let alone an american election, is at risk >> where does bill barr fit into all of this? >> that's interesting, because one of his major priorities, it seems to be, since he took office, as attorney general, is

to basically undo the mueller investigation and anything related to the russian investigation. so he intervened in the roger stone case to get roger stone a lesser sentence that may lead to a pardon, we don't know yet. and he intervened in the michael flynn case, and he has taken u.s. attorneys and had them reinvestigate the russian investigation itself. so even though the fbi director, chris wray, and the director of national intelligence, who trump appointed, john ratcliffe, say that russia is yet again -- right now, as you and i speak, trying to intervene in the 2020 election, bill barr is assigning people to go back and look at the 2016 investigation to try to clear trump, rather than saying anything publicly about russia is doing right now to perhaps throw the next election into chaos. and maybe once again, as the intelligence community once concluded, try to help donald

trump win. >> and we're about out of time, david. but will you keep the beard post this pandemic period? >> you know, i was thinking that maybe i'll wait until election day. >> and will the results affect your grooming or just election day's a natural time? >> it seems to be a point of -- a natural point that we're working towards as a country that could be somewhat significant. >> yeah, well, and all i would add to that is you said election day, but depending on how close it is and counting mail ballots, it could be election days. david corn, we'll be coming back to you. i hope people check out your book, sir. >> thank you, ari. happy july 4th. >> happy july 4th. which is a time that generally kicks off the kickoff to the general election. the stakes couldn't be higher this year. and i want to tell you, our next guest argues that for liberals who want to stop not only donald trump but trumpism, you have to

look after that election and get active at every level. a very special political conversation, when we come back. a very special political conversation, when we come back. we're always here to help with fast response and great service and it doesn't stop there we're also here to help look ahead that's why we're helping members catch up by spreading any missed usaa insurance payments over the next twelve months so you can keep more cash in your pockets for when it matters most and that's just one of the many ways we're here to help the military community find out more at usaa.com

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xfinity. the future of awesome. it's certainly true that control of congress and state and local government is key. presidential campaigns spend the most money, they get the most attention, but it's the other offices that decide rules for key issues, like minimum wage, health care, housing, law enforcement. and voter interest and turnout typically drops for all of these other races.

and that is part of the argument from a new music video that just went viral with a civics breakdown that is on point. that song is my vote don't count by ohio rapper yellow pain, whose style is to confess really than preach recounting his own political awakening as obama ran for president and fact checking that obama didn't get enough done. ♪ ♪ ♪

the video you are seeing a clip of went viral. it is headed for a million views after one month online. it is a rare piece of political culture that's drawing praise from everyone from which he wch clinton. recently huddling with georgia democrat stacey abrams who is rumored to be on joe biden's short list for vp. yellowpain is on the beat. thanks for being here. >> what's going on? >> yellow, there it is. >> you got to say it like that. >> you have gotten a lot of people's attention here. what did you set out to do with this video? >> the purpose really was to just take people like me who recently, you know, a person who recently didn't know nothing about the voting process, who is now educated on it, to just give

everybody else that same wake-up moment i had. >> and you break down, okay, this is the system of government. we all go to school, but a lot of people don't really pay attention to politics, especially when you are young and busy. so how did you kind of brush back up on giving this civics lesson? >> yeah, that's a fact. we certain so briefly younger, but the president is kind of the face of it, but there is so many more different parts in how us voting can change the community. i really woke up to it like, wow, this has got to be something we talk about. >> what issues do you think are most important then at that local level, not just the presidential level? >> yeah. it's a lot of different issues. the ones that are, you know, most important for me, things that affect me every day as far as, you know, like the piles in the street. i went from dayton, ohio and you ride up salem avenue and it's like the most important street

in the city. it's one of the most important streets. just things like that to minimum wage. some of my family being able to get more money every two weeks to help with stuff. so just stuff that affect our every day lives. a lot of people think it is the president, but it is like the local government. >> music so often is people's experiences. that's why we connect with it because it's like, wow, you can really understand a little bit more about where someone is coming from. but it can also of course be dreams. it can be vision. you have a very positive kind of hopeful vision here that i want to share with our viewers because may not always know about this. let's play one other part of this song where you talk about what a better life through politics might look like.

it wasn't really about it being cool, you know what i'm saying, when i made this song. it was about the purpose. and, you know, we rally for so much for change in our community, and we don't -- we personally feel like it's nothing we can do about it. we're waiting for somebody else to do it for us. so my purpose of making that song wasn't really to be cool. i got enough cool rap songs. there is enough cool rap songs out there. i just wanted to start a conversation about following up, staying on your candidates so that your children and children's children reap the benefits of us voting consistently. >> stay involved, keep people accountable in the community. >> exactly, not just this time. >> how do i say it? >> yellow! >> yellow! thank you very much and congratulations on your work. a lot of people clearly inspired by it. >> yello! go to youtube right now. you can search my vote don't

count. we appreciate him stopping by. the interview was obviously taped onset before the coronavirus. we had held it back for breaking news. ...you can do no wrong. where did you learn that? the internet... yeah? mmm! with no artificial preservatives or added nitrates or nitrites, it's all for the love of hot dogs. -always have been. -and always will be. never letting anything get in my way. not the doubts, distractions, or voice in my head. and certainly not arthritis. new voltaren provides powerful arthritis pain relief to help me keep moving. and it can help you too. feel the joy of movement with voltaren. i felt like i was justthis constantly cleaning up his hair. then, i got my paws on the swiffer sweeper.

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msnbc. tonight on "all in," it is a national emergency. new worries about the holiday weekend as covid cases surge across america. and the president holds a masks optional rally at mount rushmore. how we got here and what needs to happen to stop it from getting even worse. then new hope in the year's long battle to change the name of a washington, d.c. football team. and why trump just had a very, very bad month. when "all in" starts now. good evening in philadelphia. it's the 4th of july weekend, a weekend when americans usually travel to visit family and friends. but this year it is different because we're in the midst of a raging pandemic. experts have concluded that the last holiday, memorial day, coupled with states re-opening too soon led to the current spike in coronavirus cases