to do good. and on that now, i wish you a very, very good night. from all of our colleagues across the network of nbc news, thank you for staying up late with me, i see you at the end of tomorrow. >> tonight on all in. >> if you are coming after the rights of parents and florida i am standing in your way. >> can a candidate running for president on the freedom platform will authorizing the state to seize children from their parents? >> they decided they need to interfere in our personal lives and to use our child as a political pawn. >> the dystopian nightmare in florida and beyond and then -- >> the reason we are here today is because chairman jordan wants to make america trump

again. >> democrats crash another circus in the house. >> did you receive any money from cash patel? >> he gave me a donation last november. >> meanwhile, outside the maga run house -- >> his physical mannerisms are aggressive and i feel threatened by him. >> marjorie taylor greene's concern that he is a threat and a very important community for the ceo of twitter. >> -- if it is false. >> the reporter who debunked elon musk joins me live. >> we do know that he had a ideation and he had patches and tattoos. >> when all in starts right now.

good evening from new york, i am chris hayes. it is official, florida governor, ron desantis, is running for the republican nomination for president. nbc news confirms he will fire the paperwork and make a formal announcement next week. this is not a surprise, it has been widely anticipated because for months, desantis has been hitting the donor circuit and the early camping trail mikey up here insist in iowa and new hampshire. in fact he has turned his entire governing agenda in florida into a kind of set piece for his presidential campaign. he has been waging a kosher wore on his own constituents for the purpose of elevating himself. it is very clear and coherent. rhonda scent is towards around the country promoting himself and his new memoir titled the courage to be free, at home he runs a government based on the opposite of freedom. his agenda is about state authority and its punitive use and decrease from -- in florida he is running a kind of little my got kingdom in which rhonda santas, and the republican party in the state legislator with their big majorities tell you how to live your life and you do not get to choose.

now we are hearing the word authoritarian a lot more these days. in the wake of the first ever attempt to overturn american democracy particularly we use it on the show. donald trump encouraged those authoritarian impulses and ron desantis has stoked them. he put them into practice. i think the discussion about the threat of authoritarianism can feel sometimes a little academic. that word has a historical timber with it. we associated with stalin or mussolini and it can make it hard to look at mr. putting fingers yoking it up on the campaign trail in iowa and seeing authoritarian. but rhonda scent is really is running on authoritarian agenda. the policies he's enacted in florida are the opposite of freedom. to me the opposite of core american values because in ron desantis is florida, the state will decide what books your child can or cannot read in your school library, by threatening teachers and librarians with time in prison, but they do not comply with vague laws about instruction on race, gender, and sexuality. the state will decide what women can do with their own bodies by banning abortion at six weeks. of course that is for all intensive purposes they complete abortion ban, which

means that ron desantis and the republican party of florida control the bodies of every floridian who can get pregnant. it is their body, not yours, the state will also decide how you can dress in public. which costume as you could, whereby enacting what is essentially a full ban on drag performances which would also likely restrict pride events. the state would decide what kind of speech corporations can engage in, including which criticism they can make of the government by going after disney punitively for speaking out against anti lgbtq laws. that fight has become quite notoriously, blew up to the point where disney announced that it is abandoning a one billion dollar plan development in florida. we will see what sort of reprisals the state wages against that company. but ron desantis's dystopian

authoritarian vision is most apparent in the legislation that he just signed yesterday. it bans all gender affirming care for all minors in florida. everyone 18 and under. it also empowers state courts to change custody agreements of a child, if a child is receiving or at risk of receiving gender affirming care. meaning taking a kid away from the parent. telling parents how they can or cannot raise their own children is among the most authoritarian things that government can do. now that is exactly what ron desantis and the republican party in florida and generally the conservative movement that endorses this is doing, purely for ideological in punitive purposes. now the sick irony here, the one that i just cannot get over and really kind of sticks with me is that the right wing movement that gave us this new law yesterday is the very same group of people that screamed about parental rights for years. amidst the pandemic. i get to say whether my kid wears a mask, i get to say whether mike had gets vaccinated, i get to say whether my kid goes to school. and ron desantis was the public face of that movement. >> he wants to have the government force caden or gardeners to wear masks in schools. he doesn't believe the parent

should have a say in that. he believes it should be a decision for the government. i can tell you in florida the parents are going to be the ones in charge of that decision. joe biden suggests if you do not do lockdown policies, then you should quote, get out of the way. let me tell you this, if you are coming after the rights of parents in florida i am standing in your way. i'm not going to let you get away with it. >> what a tough guy. you see all of that swagger? he will stand in your way if you are coming after parental rights. if you try to tell apparent what they can do with their kids. that very same wing of the republican party embodied by ron desantis and the government of the state of florida has no demanded to produce a situation in which the government, that guy you saw there with the tough guy swagger, is going to decide if your child who lives in your home that you gave birth to or raised, that you love, your kid, what kind of care they can get. he decides.

care that, to be clear, the american academy of pediatrics supports and recommends. think about what this means right now. their parents and families in florida who have decided as parents along with their doctors that this health care, gender affirming care is the best care for their kids. you may not like it -- but you

know what? it is none of your, excuse me, got them business. to me that is what the courage to be free means. freedom means that in my household, our family decides what kind of health care are child does or does not get. not ron desantis. not the republican party. but that is no longer the case in florida. >> i think this is something that we just made the decision of a state, and me as governor to just say that we are protecting kids. we will protect kids when it is popular, we will protect kids even when you take some incoming as a result of maybe offending some ideologies or some agendas out there. but that is fine. we are happy to do that because this is important. >> they are happy to tell you whether you can get an abortion, whether you can give birth or not. the governor of florida, they made that decision for you, they made the decision about your child's health care. they decided to kind of care that your child can receive. desantis probably knows pretty well what is best for your 13 year old? the one who lives in your house? their courts could decide to take that child away from you.

if you violate their rules, their ideology, as a parent, i cannot think of anything more horrifying or un-american than that. yet it is going to be the centerpiece of ronda sentences presidential campaign. jennifer solomon is a parent of a gender nonconforming child living in florida. she is a registered pediatric nurse. and she joins me now. jennifer, first of all i want to say thank you so much for joining us tonight. >> thank you for having me, everything you just said i echo. >> that is good, you have a much clearer view of this than i do. i am speaking on this as a journalist and as a parent. you are a parent in florida, you have a child who is gender

nonconforming, what is the law yesterday mean for you and your family? >> first of all, it means i have a governor who was elected to address issues that he did not. that he has decided to come into my home, and make decisions that are supposed to be between myself, my child's doctor, and i do not remember ron desantis getting a medical degree or any other republican politicians that think this way. it is critical that these

decisions being made between families. i want the right to be able to raise my child in a way that he can grow and be safe and affirmed. despite what ron desantis is doing, affirming parents in this state will continue to raise our children so that they are in a healthy, happy plays. >> you have a 12-year-old named cooper and -- i just want to reassert an obvious point that i think gets lost in this. people talk about kids and critiques of certain models of gender affirming care. no care that your child cooper is getting has happened without your say-so. cooper is not running around clinics buying himself things at 12 years old. this is a decision you are making us apparent with your child and your medical care providers, right? >> yeah. i want to be really clear what this care looks like. for most children, until they reach adolescence, this kind of care is allowing a child to get a haircut. allowing your child to wear clothes that make them feel well. this is not medical care,

anything that could be reversed. so they make it out to be some scary medical thing. i wish i was able to get my child to eat his vegetables, you know? they are making it seem like we are parents forcing our children to do anything, but live happy, healthy lives. medical care is affirming our children and letting them be exactly who they were born to be. >> some of that care, puberty blockers as one example, there are trans kids and teenagers, particularly kids and adolescents, some go on puberty blockers. of course, they were not created for trans kids, they were created for other purposes. there are gymnast two could take them and could probably

still take them in the state of florida because it is not about the actual medication. but i am just wondering if you are talking to other folks like -- if you are on some kind of regimen, if you are receiving continuous care and it is interrupted that is not a small thing i imagine. >> i think that it goes back to parental rights and the truth is that this is not about parental rights. this is about parental rights for some parents. coming into our homes and making laws on something that you have no idea about, when we look at the medical associations, they all agree that this is safe, medical care for our children. yes, it is complete discrimination against trans children because puberty blockers have been used for decades. and then children who are not using it for gender dysphoria can still safely used it in the state of florida. it is clearly a discrimination against trans kids. >> i just want to ask how cooper is doing.

it seems like a happy and thriving 12 year old. and how your household is doing independent of whatever ron desantis says about how you should be raising your kids. >> you know it is really interesting because when we talk to cooper and his friends, i'm curious to see what their take is on this. they would like to know why a governor and why an elected official is allowed to behave like belize. because you know, i guarantee that if they acted the way these adults act they would be punished. it is mind-boggling to them why these leaders and the state are allowed to lie, allowed to push information that clearly is absolutely not in the best interest of children. so despite that, cooper has decided that he is going to show these leaders what it looks like to be a boy turning 23.

and he might wear a dress, he might wear makeup, lightweight nail polish, but he will continue to live his life like he says he is living his best life. i would love for our governor to talk to me and talk to families like ours and i'm just a mom who wants my child have a safe environment in school, i want my child to be able to meet with a pediatrician, and come up with the best care for my child. just like i am sure he does with his wife and his children. >> jennifer solomon who is a moment florida whose family has been targeted by the state of florida, thank you so much i cannot thank you enough for coming on the program tonight. it means a lot. thank you very much. >> i appreciated, thank you so much. >> coming up, quote, this is defund the police on steroids. republican congressman, jim jordan, redefines irony and delivers a master class and weaponizing the government for political purposes, next.

>> house republicans hold another one of their hearings on the so-called weaponization of government today. on this one day invited for witnesses who testified the fbi is persecuting conservatives among its ranks. a claim that if you ever read anything about the fbi and your entire life, democratic vice chair stacey plaskett blood berrettini motivations for the existence of the weaponization committee. >> the reason we are here today is because chairman jordan wants to make america trump again. my republican colleagues are here representing their constituents, not my constituents, they are representing donald trump. they are acting as his defense attorney, his campaign operative, and everything in

between. this select committee is a clearinghouse for testing conspiracy theories for donald trump to use in his 2024 presidential campaign. >> i mean -- democratic committee member then golden try to get jim jordan to share the private testimony from the so-called whistleblower's. testimony republicans have been hiding for some reason from their democratic colleagues. >> such record should be the property of the house and each member delegate and the resident commissioner should have access there as well. why doesn't that apply? where is the whistleblower exception and the rules of congress? >> it is the prerogative of the committee to decide. we have the rules of the house. we have the whistleblower testimony. they have to be made available at this time. >> they don't make committee rules. >> the whistle blowers are three suspended fbi agents who claim that they were unfairly retaliated against for their conservative beliefs.

again, at the fbi, they pointed out at least two of them were being funded by cash patel, a former trump official who let the ex presidents fight against the so-called deep state, trump believed was sabotaging his administration. >> do you know who cash patel's? >> i do. >> have you ever receive any money from him or his organization? >> i have. >> what about you? do you know him as well? >> yes. >> did you receive any money from him? >> he gave me a donation last november. >> a donation? >> yes. >> are you a charitable organization? >> i was a man trying to feed his family and he reached out to me and said that he wanted to give me it donation. -- on a january 6th defendant lot enforcement uses the stuff all the time. in this case the defendant had

been photographed outside of the capitol wearing body armor and wielding assault rifles. just this month, him and another one of the witnesses had their security clearances revoked by the fbi in part because they would not stop spreading conspiracy theories about january 6th. the over arching irony of today's hearing is that in the middle of the hearing to actually took a break. committee members could go vote on a republican messaging bill quote, expressing support for local law enforcement officers and condemning efforts to defund or dismantle local law enforcement agencies. the republican hypocrisy here was not lost. >> my colleagues on the far-right are on a mission to attack, discredit, and ultimately dismantle the fbi. this is defund the police on steroids. >> let's be clear, this is not about backing law enforcement in some principal logical sense. for republicans it is about backing the people republicans think are on their side, local law enforcement, and will go after enemies. but if a lot enforcement advertised to enforce the law

against conservatives, then that is weaponization. that is basically the definition of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. of weaponization. we planned well for retirement, but i wish we had more cash. you think those two have any idea? that they can sell their life insurance policy for cash? so they're basically sitting on a

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i was really frustrated. all of that finger pricking and all that pain, my a1c was still stuck. before dexcom g7, i couldn't enjoy a single meal. i was always trying to outguess my glucose, and it was awful. before dexcom g7, my diabetes was out of control because i was tired, not having the energy to do the things that i wanted to do. (female announcer) dexcom g7 is a small, easy-to-use wearable that sends your glucose numbers to your phone or dexcom receiver without painful finger sticks. the arrow shows the direction your glucose is heading-- up, down, or steady-- and because dexcom g7 is the most accurate cgm, you can make better decisions about food, medication, and activity in the moment. it can even alert you before you go too low or when you're high. oh, the fun is absolutely back. after dexcom g7, i can on the spot figure out what i'm gonna eat and how it's going to affect my glucose! when a friend calls and says, "hey, let's go to breakfast," i can get excited again. (earl) after using the dexcom g7,

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scene unfolded between a sitting u. s. congressman undone activists who was heckling maga congresswoman, lauren boebert at a public event outside the u. s. capitol. >> you're out, you're out, you're out. you are out. >> someone get this on video. get this on video. this is a salt. this is a salt. >> you are a u. s. congressman -- you need to calm

down. >> the guy doing that, the man-handling, that was congressman shoving a person who was heckling speakers but appeared to pose no threat. the activists was apparently questioned by the police. the guy who is getting manhandled before he said he was let go but nothing happened to clay akins who bragged about it in a statement. the court activist was threatening. and case you are wondering, it is apparently police code for disturbance by a mental person which fits coming from him because he is a former local cop in louisiana who quit in 2007 just as he was about to be disciplined for a violent attack on a bystander. keep that in mind. that is a natural member of congress man-handling someone. keep that incident in mind as you watch his fellow maga caucus member, marjorie taylor greene, speak at a press conference about how threatened she feels. not by clay higgins but by another member of congress. >> on the capitol steps yesterday he was the one who approached me. even cnn reported that. yelling, shouting, raising his

voice, he is aggressive. his physical mannerisms are aggressive. he recently shelved thomas massie and just outside the house chamber. i think there's a lot of concern about jamal bowman. so i feel threatened by him. >> concern, threatened, shoved, i saw that tape. he did not shove him. i would know if he shoved him. the man she says she feels threatened by is this congressman. he represents parts of the bronx, and for the record, we've shown this video of his interaction with thomas massie. it was an argument about gun violence. but no shoving, obviously. the charges that bowman was being aggressive and as a result she felt threatened by him. so here is the exchange. >> save the party. the party is hanging by a thread. the party -- no more qanon. no more debt ceiling. come on. save the party. save the children. do something about guns.

come on. save the children. >> where are all the kids? where all the children? you've lost them. there are tens of thousands and we cannot find them. migrant children -- >> that is fox news. let me tell you something. save the party. >> okay? as you can see two members of congress arguing, which is what happens in a democracy. but really kind of an amazing illustration of how phrases like threatening, and aggressive are. jamaal bowman had a perfectly reasonable if lively exchange against marjorie taylor greene and she says i feel threatened by his aggressive physical

mannerisms. in just a moment i will ask jamaal bowman right after this short break. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere. don't go anywhere.

>> what kids? we are accepting them. we love them. we love the migrant children. >> you can't find them. >> what are you talking about? what are you talking about? >> migrant children are missing. >> that's fox news. listen, i need you to -- >> yelling, shouting, raising his voice, he -- his physical mannerisms are aggressive and i am concerned about it. i feel threatened by him. >> jamaal bowman it is here with me now to respond to those accusations from congresswoman marjorie taylor greene. he's been menacing me this entire commercial break. what do you want to say that? >> my goodness. it is so nonsensical that it is comical. you can see clearly in the video that we were like, playfully jousting with each other. she was laughing, i was

laughing we were talking about each other's party and certain issues. so the demeanor and disposition on the steps was playful. we were going after each other. so for her, the next morning to say what she said, it is a complete one 80. it is no longer comical now because now you are using historical racist tropes towards blackmon, menacing, his mannerisms, i'm afraid, that is the stuff that got trayvon martin killed, to me erase killed, michael browned killed, i believe officer darren smith talked about his presence and his strength thousand excuse for killing him. this has happened to blackmon historically. so now we are in a dangerous space. that's why i wanted to be really, really clear to reporters today how reckless and dangerous her statements where, and she should know better, i believe she knows better. this is another reason why we need to teach the accurate history of america in our

schools. make sure african americans are a part of that. because her rhetoric and her behavior outside of me, pictures with the ar-15, with the squad behind her, chasing david hogg and stalking him as he engaged in activism around gun violence, her rhetoric, hurling which, her behavior has been aggressive, and now she is trying to displace it. >> i want to say also that if this gesture which you are doing is aggressive, all of this -- it is new york city right here. >> a serious point, what i thought was, if she had said this without the video, we had the video so you could literally look at this like this is ridiculous.

but when someone says this black man is intimidating, or physically aggressive, that is a serious thing to say in the society in which we live in and have been for a long time. it has real consequences. >> throughout american history and not just blackmon but women of color as well. when i first came to congress and i had my first conversation with the squad they were coming off of donald trump. they would talk about the number of death threats they would receive after trump would say something about them. send them back or something like that. a rise in death threats, had to increase security. this is dangerous territory. we have to be clear about that.

and we need her to say that she should apologize to me on record, and ask her directly, do you want physical violence to be inflicted upon congress? and let her answer that question. because at the end of her statement it was we need to watch him. that is almost like donald trump -- you know, stand by and stand back to the proud boys. that was a couple of years ago. we need to watch him? what are you saying? it is crazy. again, this is why we have to teach history accurately so we could all be more enlightened does we govern. >> i want to ask you, you had that exchange with thomas massie. so it would be news and -- what is the deal with these interactions? it's it just in the moment? it is this -- are you doing this as a practical thing or i can't help myself? >> you know what it is? it's literally organic. it just happens. so the massie thing, i wasn't yelling at him, i was yelling at journalists to ask republicans. then he walked up and that became a thing, with byron donalds, we usually talk about sports and i saw him approach to ask about desantis, and we started going at it like yeah, what do you have to say?

it is really who i am in terms of how i talk to people on a consistent basis. so it is not really a thing, it has become a thing. i get a lot of questions. this confrontational style and i don't need to be that way but however, i am extremely frustrated consistently by the backup action in congress and how everyone is all about decorum, and kids are dying every day from gun violence and one in five children go to bed hungry. we have all these issues and we don't have the urgency to do anything about it. so it is authentically me, but at the same time it's like okay, this place is up to's, it takes way too long to do anything, and i am not a lifelong politician or business person. i'm not rich, i'm an educator. i'm coming in with that energy

and hopefully we could get stuff done. >> let me ask about gun violence question. this is something i'm obsessed with at this point. if you talk about violent crime and the right will talk about violent crime all the time. they want to run ads and democrats like you -- the second that you call it gun violence archive, which is the most serious violent crime we have in the u. s. unquestionably, all of a sudden it's like it gets flipped. there is nothing that we can do about gun violence, and gun violence you know, what's going to happen? it's so strange to me -- it is the same thing. it is the same thing. america has too much violence. it has too many homicides. too many people die from this. we need to bring that number down. >> i mean -- >> it is bizarre. and it is why congress is often like upside down world.

and republicans will say these things, many support what they say, and what i want for our party to do is push back and take back the narrative and be very clear on what we are talking about. do not acquiesce or see ground to their talking points because we feel we need to be tougher on crime. talk about public safety. talk about public health. talk about poverty. i saw kids coming to school every day hungry, frustrated, living in public housing, of course those kids are more likely to get in trouble in school, because we are not meeting their basic needs. i want our party to talk about that and take back the narrative when it comes to that. and they have no moral ground to stand on that issue at all.

that's why we have to use it to win big in 2024. not just in the house but the senate. >> there is a bunch of new york reps that are going to be on the frontlines and maybe there will be a george santos vacancy as well. we will see where that ends up. congressman, good to have you here. still to come, trapping you in an endless craving loop. nicorette reduces cravings until they're gone for good. there is a better way to manage diabetes. the dexcom g7 continuous glucose monitoring system eliminates painful finger sticks, helps lower a1c, and it's covered by medicare. before using the dexcom g7, i was really frustrated. all of that finger pricking and all that pain,

my a1c was still stuck. before dexcom g7, i couldn't enjoy a single meal. i was always trying to outguess my glucose, and it was awful. before dexcom g7, my diabetes was out of control because i was tired, not having the energy to do the things that i wanted to do. (female announcer) dexcom g7 is a small, easy-to-use wearable that sends your glucose numbers to your phone or dexcom receiver without painful finger sticks. the arrow shows the direction your glucose is heading-- up, down, or steady-- and because dexcom g7 is the most accurate cgm, you can make better decisions about food, medication, and activity in the moment. it can even alert you before you go too low or when you're high. oh, the fun is absolutely back. after dexcom g7, i can on the spot figure out what i'm gonna eat and how it's going to affect my glucose! when a friend calls and says, "hey, let's go to breakfast," i can get excited again. (earl) after using the dexcom g7, my diabetes, it doesn't slow me down at all. i lead line dancing three times a week, i exercise,

and i'm just living a great life now. it's so easy to use. it has given me confidence and control, everything i need is right there on my phone. (earl) the dexcom g7 is so small, so easy to use, and it's very discreet. (dr. aaron king) if you have diabetes, getting on dexcom is the single most important thing you can do. (david) within months, my a1c went down, that's 6.9. (donna) at my last checkup, my a1c was 5.9. (female announcer) dexcom is the number one recommended cgm brand and offers 24/7 tech support, so call now to get started. you'll talk to a real person. don't wait, this one short call could change your life. (bright music)

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richest man, becoming more and more of a right wing crank by the day. and we get to see this play out because one of the world's richest man is now the biggest roland eastbound 44 billion dollars. so everyone can see his own case of brain worms unfold display. the core of his particular kind of familiar right-wing internet inspired radicalization is this kind of chasing the conspiracy theories and creation of an alternate elaborate set of facts one over the world produces them they are ideologically inconvenient. it is like trump's big lie, which is the biggest example of this, but it is about everything, take and small. take this for example, the ideological leanings of the shooter who murdered eight people, including little kids. in an outlet mall in texas nearly two weeks ago. shortly after the horrific massacre, the new york times identified the shooters apparent social media profile. reporting his profile praised hitler and reference neo-nazi

websites. and d. c. news even confirm some of those details later that day and uncovered more racist and antisemitic posts. then the award-winning investigator uncovered what appeared to be the shooter's social media posts, on a russian social media site. he had a jacket with a right-wing death squad insignia on it. he signed off one of his post saluting hitler, another big clue. if there was any lingering doubt about his politics, here are the photos of the guy! the apparent tattoos he had. yes, that is the s as emblem and the swastika. and he is not a fringe outlets, they're actually a remarkable outlet. a renowned organization. but according to elon musk, this whole thing was just an elaborate conspiracy theory. he accused baselessly bell and caught of specializing in psychological operations on twitter and then after showing to be wrong he basically doubled down and elaborated on

this conspiracy theory. >> when you link to somebody who is talking about the guy who killed children in a mall in allen, texas -- you say something like it might be a bad psyop, not sure what you meant. >> in that particular case, there was somehow -- not that the people were killed, but it was i think incorrectly described to be a white supremacist, actually. and the evidence for that was some obscure russian website that no one has ever heard of that had no followers. and the company, the founders, is bellingcat. i'm saying i thought that the

white supremacy was [bleep] and the information for that came from an obscure russian website and was somehow magically found by bellingcat which is a company that does psyop's. >> there is no proof that he's not. >> i would say that there's no proof that he is. >> there's no proof -- okay, this was fabricated apparently. this was the elon musk story. now bellingcat is not russian. it is a russian social media site. it's currently abandon russia. but it is not just bellingcat but aren't seeing the shooter had neo-nazi affiliations. it is also the new york times, nbc news, and get this -- it is the texas department of public safety that also said last week

that just like bellingcat reported, the guy with the swastika tattoo, and the hail hitler entries was a neo-nazi. >> we do know that he had neo-nazi ideation. he had patches, tattoos, even his signature verified that. that was one thing we do know. >> joining me now is aric toler, he reporter whose work elon musk attacked and smeared. he wrote the report on the island, texas shooter. it is great to have you here. i want to start with your methodology. how you do the work that you did. before we get to the case, could you talk a bit about what you were able to incur about the individual who leaked all that classified information onto discord channels? if i am not mistaken, you sort of sniffed him up before the government did, and my right? >> not really. the government actually knew where he was.

so the fbi has released documents. they knew that a couple days before, because they talk to his friends. they got his credit card information. being a very smart guy, he paid for it with his credit card, and his address, and everything. so we made it public, i guess, before the fbi did. >> and you are able to use the tools that you use of forensic internet analysis to basically track the guy down. all you knew as what had been leaked, you knew there was a discord channel, and you are able to figure out who it was. >> there were other people who -- yeah. this kind of went from a post that came around to fortin, some minecraft, and a few others, and it went eventually to the original source. and i found out yesterday that he was posting it to three

different discord members but we found two of them and then got the information and grabbed it and reconstructed it. >> this is sort of what bellingcat has been known for. using what you call open source intelligence which is basically using all the information that is on the internet attract people down. that is what you did with the shooter in allen, texas. tell us what you found and how you found his profile. >> so this is originally in a new york times report that came out a couple of weeks ago and it mentioned the second paragraph report that they found that he had a profile which was what musk called an obscure russian website that we've never heard of. it is a second biggest russian social media site. and it is said on the report but he had his address on there. so garcia, the name of the shooter, date of birth, i founded on google. we do a lot of work with human rights violations, and things like that. so a lot of time, unfortunately, on this russian social media site. i searched with these parameters, you can search by date of birth, nationality, all

that. and the result was some guy with a little cartoon smiley with eight hitler mustache. it was him. >> this is where you found the tattoos, where he had a cartoon where he talked about his own latino heritage in saying that he had to choose between basically being friendly with african americans or being a white supremacist? he talked about a story saying hail hitler to a teacher who kept getting upset. it seems like a pretty radicalized not see? >> i do this for a living. and i have a lot of digital footprints, and there's a lot of gray area. you can't really know what people are thinking but this is kind of by far the construction that we've seen. we've seen 100 pages that were scanned. he wrote these long posts, and he posted his thought process. there is a lot of chilling stuff in there as well. he posted maps of the shooting a couple weeks before the shooting. >> i want to respond to the world's richest man and the owner of twitter saying that this is a fabricated psyop that you invented.

>> yeah, i mean, obviously it is not. the texas police found it and it got leaked to the new york times. but i mean, musk's just entirely kind of flooded in his far-right info space. you know, all of these types who are kind of putting this kind of stuff out there, he's

just getting garbage in and garbage out. i don't think it actually understand. >> garbage and, garbage out i think is a good description of the current elon musk method. aric toler, great reporting, thank you for joining us. >> sure thing. >> that is all in on this thursday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now, good evening alex. i'm up as you can use the name elon musk in the word method. in a sentence. >> well, it is what it is. i think i said this and someone earlier today, it's a donald trump method. we're whatever vile nonsense appears in your replies, is the fact of the matter. earlier it's the donald trump method. whatever vile nonsense appears in your replies is a good fact of the matter. >> whatever phrase ebegins whatever vile method you know you're onto a