families tonight. and on that note, i wish you all a very good and a very safe night. from all of our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thanks for staying up late. see you at the end of tomorrow. tonight on all in. >> what are your strengths and weaknesses and do you believe the 2020 election was stolen?

>> a new litmus test for the rnc as an election losing election denier full-timely gives up the game. >> the people already know who the legitimate governor is and you aring looing at her. >> why keri lake admit today defamation with the republican state official who brought the lawsuit. >> i will do two terms and be your worst freaking nightmare for eight years. >> then the incredible upset victory for democrats in alabama. >> i think it is a victory tonight for women. for families. for alabama in general. >> and just when you thought you were spending too much on food. >> i want to make great deals for the people. i want to make good deals for you. >> a special report on what donald trump's plan for tariffs would mean for you. >> you don't think it would result in higher prices for american families? it could be $2,000 per family according to economists. >> when all in starts right

now. >> good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes, the republican national committee now firmly in the hands of donald trump and his family. the party is under the stewardship of the ex- president's daughter-in-law laura trump whose latest single anything is possible drops this friday. laura trump is hard at work shaping the republican party into an organization based first and foremost around her father-in-law and his ongoing lies about the 2020 election which he lost. as the washington post reports those seeking employment of the republican national committee have en asked in job interviews if they believe the 2020 election was stolen. making the false claim a litmus test of sorts of hiring. laura trump confirmed to garrett haake the rnc is all in on pushing election fraud

nonsense headed into this next election. >> is it going to be the position of the rnc in 2024 that the 2020 election was stolen somehow? >> i think we are past that. we learned a lot. we took a lot of notes. we have 23 states with 78 lawsuits in these states. to ensure that it is harder to cheat and easier to vote. >> we had sort of the inverse of this debate this week. our litmus test is the opposite of the rnc. we will be part of what we used to be a reality based community where we reacknowledge the basic fact that he lost by 27 votes. the republican national committee does not live in reality choosing to recede into a fantasy world where the election was stolen from donald trump. here's the thing. the weirdest part of this whole thing. donald trump is like a 50/50 coin flip.

he has a real shot of winning the election but it revealing. the maga movement is not actually interested in winning in a democratic sense. it looks to all the world based on the way they have undertaken things, they would rather steal the election or finish the project of up ending american democracy entirely. as an achievable aim is their intended goal. this devotion to the lie, the persistent enduring lie about widespread election fraud is one of their ways of accomplishing that. logistically speaking, every single rational good faith actor can see the election was not stolen and every time the big lie is marched into an institution where facts and reality matter, it gets laughed out of the room. we saw that happen at least three different times today. so first, just moments ago, a california judge remitted that

man should lose his license to practice law. eastman was one of the master minds. according to the judge overseeing eastman's disbarment, demonstrating an apparent inability to accept responsibility. this lack of remorse and accountability presents a significant risk that eastman may engage in further unethical conduct compounding a threat to the public. so that is eastman. meanwhile, jeffrey clark, he had a disciplinary hearing before the dc bar association. clark was a huge proponent of the big lie. trump wanted to put him in charge. so could weaponnize the authority of the department of justice. to say the election is rigged and no one needs to certify so they could overturn the results of the 2020 election. he has been criminally charged

in the state of georgia for his role in the plot. during the hearing this morning, acting trump attorney general jeffrey rosen again, this is a trump guy. the guy clark wanted to replace, how he and anotheto justice official, respond to clark's ridiculous claims of fraud. >> we had a discsion where mr. donahue was emphatic that the department has not found any indicaters of widespre or systemic fraud. and mr. clark said that he was questioning whether e department had done enough and he had read things on

internet. and . nahue i think had a higher degree, said, you haven't been involved in this. this is not our area of responsibility. >> i have read things on the internet. maybe let's overturn 200 yards of american democracy. his lawyer tried to strike a deal with the board where he would receive questions ahead of time so that his client could avoid repeatedly invoking his fifth amendable rights and he said he wanted to do so in order to avoid a very specific outcome. >> there might be an elegant solution that takes into account mr. fox's ballot concerns. to avoid us all being on msnbc

for no good reason. >> that ploy did not work. >> i will take the fifth on that. i will invoke the fifth as to, i will invoke executive privilege. law enforcement privilege. and, attorney client privilege. the fifth amendment privilege of this time. the fifth amendment privilege at this time. the fifth amendment privilege of this time. the fifth amendment at this time. >> so that is how jeff clark ran up against the real world today. again. all the stuff you read on the internet has to actually come into a proceeding where this stuff is adijudicated. so that's the second one. the third brings us to arizona senate candidate keri lake. she previously ran go governor in 2022 where she emerged as one of the fiercest defenders of trump's coup. and antagonistic to the press.

>> we had a fraudulent election and corrupt election. fake news wants us to think that guy got 81 million votes. okay. all right. i am going to not only be the governor of arizona for four years. i will do two terms and be your worst freaking nightmare for eight years and we will reform the media as well. we will make you guys into journalists again. get ready. it will be a fun eight years. i can't wait. >> it will be fun. she lost. but i guess to her perverse credit, she really fully committed to the bit. going around to any fringe maga outlet. claiming the 2022 midterm election she lost were stolen as well. >> we know we won and showed up in droves and know that they

intentionally sabotaged election day so we will fight to get the rifle duly elected governor myself into office. >> we won the election. i know my opponent who is sitting in the governor's office is a fraud. and we are fighting that in the courts so i understand what president trump is up against. they did the same thing to him in 2020. >> we cannot have the election stand. the judge should declare me the rightful winner and we should move on and reclaim our government. our state government has been hijacked and stolen by a bunch of people who know this election was fraudulent. people know who the legitimate governor is and you are look at her, steve. >> she lost the election. she did win the best web cam in all of politics competition years running. it is the best: donald trump backed an entire slate of election denier ins 2022 and they all lost. but the thing about like that makes her stand out, she appears to be the only one who pulled a big lie of her own and

insisted she was the real winner actually. she did this so often in fact that she got herself sued by an elections official in arizona. republican steven richer, the maricopa county recorder, a republican, took her to court over her repeated false claims that richer rigged the election against her. he sued her for defamation in june and lake has been stalling on the case ever since until now. she just filed a motion for default judgment. she is not contesting her liability. because as we have seen time and time and time and time again, you can't defend the indefensible. let me start with you. tell me about what prompted you to take the somewhat extraordinary step of filing this lawsuit in the aftermath

of that election. >> yeah. it wouldn't stop. simply put, that's why we felt like we had to do this. we waited until she filed the claims with the court. she lost at the court of appeals and the arizona supreme court. then she filed another lawsuit. i was hoping she would get a new job, but she kept talk about it and made it the centerpiece of all of her fund raising appeals and her political prominence and even a book deal so i figured she is not getting a new job. i am the job and defaming my good name to her millions of followers was her profession at that point. this is the first time and last time i sued anybody in my individual capacity. but i talked to the team at protect democracy and we have a strong case. >> let me ask you legally the significance of today. the filing that she is basically not going to contest

the defamation. she wants to fight on the grounds of damages. but that means you caught me. >> that is exactly right. this is an unequivocal admission by ms. lake she has no evidence whatsoever so support her claims that mr. richer engaged in misconduct in the 2022 election. of course, we all knew that she had no evidence all along. but ms. lake has been saying she looks forward to showing receipts and yesterday, she told her supporters that instead, she has no evidence. she is waving the white flag. so now we are moving forward. not on liability. but rather we are going to be moving ahead to determine not whether ms. lake has to pay damages for the harm she has done to steven. but how much she will have to

pay for the harm. >> i want to talk to you about that aspect of it. i want to stress this. you are a republican official in mar pa county. right? >> yes. >> and, you were targeted by ms. lake. for my perspective, this is someone who lied about the 2020 election. it seemed obvious she was lying about the 2022 election. when she said she hadn't won. but i also know that people in the wrong side of these sorts of lies can really have their lives up ended. their careers. what is it meant to be the target of these lies? >> well, it doesn't take much imagination to foresee the possibility that of your millions of followers, when you tell them that this man steven richer has committed the most heinous crimes against our democracy, it doesn't take much imagination that one of your followers, two of your followers might do something very extreme based off of that.

so in recent months, we have had two people arrested for threats to me. i get on a daily basis messages about why i should be in jail and mo. this means to stop. that is why we filed this lawsuit. it is rich this is coming from somebody who said she had all of the evidence and she was going to fight to the bitter end. she just put up the white flag. she doesn't have any evidence and while she is lying about me, she is lying to arizona. some people in arizona who have gone to jail. and given her campaign money. it is now a lie that has entered in court. >> yeah. lake's team on tuesday filed that default judgment motion that indicates she wouldn't challenge. they said richer should turn over medical and psychiatric records to show his health was defective.

it will not be on the basic facts here. completely wave the white flag. this will all be on the damages portions of this. >> ms. lake has conceded that she has no evidence whatsoever to defend herself. again. we have known it all along. that she has been telling her supporters she has the receipts. we have known that she doesn't. but now that she has surrendered. the case will move forward purely on the question of how much she is going to have to compensate steven. >> steven. just to zoom out for second, you are right on this fault line of american politics. and we have seen republican members of the officials in your party on both sides of it. i don't know what your views

are. it is really just on the line of this basic fidelity to the truth and the facts and how, what has that done to politics in your state? >> so tax rates should be as low as possible. i want to make sure we are clear on that. that is how i feel about tax rates. but two plus two equals four. that has always been a truth. it has become a litmus test in some quarters. it is not entirely that. i will buck that trend in my election. but, it unfortunately factored in significantly. and i will say to the ultimate detriment of republican candidates. many of those candidates who won their primary based off of the big lie, that didn't carry over to the median arizona voter. it is a losing strategy. lost in 23 and 22 and 21. but more than that, it is

immoral and people know better and leaders need to stop giving this any legitimacy. >> a great pleasure to have you both on. >> thank you. coming up, it is a truly shocking campaign promise that has somehow snuck under the radar. donald trump takes the rare step of campaigning on higher prices. that's next. her prices. that's next. it's lying dormant, waiting... and could reactivate. shingles strikes as a painful, blistering rash that can last for weeks. and it could wake at any time. think you're not at risk for shingles? it's time to wake up. because shingles could wake up in you. if you're over 50, talk to your doctor or pharmacist about shingles prevention.

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is that everyone hates paying more for stuff. people's view of the economy plummeted. so did their approval of the president. it really sucked, inflation. in 2020, your average family of four paid about $927 a month for groceries. the average was 1,307 dollars a month. that is $400 more a month. that has started to come down actually in real terms. the average at the end of last year was around $1,261. but still up from 2020. and the experience of paying

more and more, translates to disaffection. that is the single biggest advantage you can have as say the challenger to an incumbent president operating in a world of which prices have gone up. and yet. the republican challenger president biden isn't running on lowering prices. he is actually running on jacking up prices on a huge amount of the goods we use every day. and i know that sounds like i'm making this up. but genuinely, and i want to be clear here, his core economic policy proposal, a consumer sales tax for every single good imported into the united states. now he may call it a tariff but it will be passed along to consumers. you don't need to take my word for it. just listen to donald trump himself. >> i think we should have a ring around the collar as they say. when companies come in, and they dump their product ins the

united states, they should pay automatically. let's say a 10% tax. >> i'm a big believer in tariffs. number one. i fully believe in them economically. when you are being taken advantage of by other countries. i would say that china, if you are building a plant on our border to build cars in mexico and to sell them into the united states, i'm putting a 50% tariff on those cars. >> you use tariffs and sanctions against china? >> we took in hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes through the tariffs. taxes and tariffs. we have to do it. on every single good that is imported. and here's the thing.

led to higher consumer prices. take the first two tariffs on washing means and steel. almost immediately jumped back up. after trump's tariffs. in fa, the new york times found the washer specific tariffs raised costs for imports like lg and samsung. now trump wants to do it again but bigger. okay? you can argue this is in the long run to help manufacturing. but, in the short term, like, what's going to happen is the prices are going to be up.

you add 10% on the back of the napkin. here is the cost of living under the trump tax. start with groceries, the site of a lot of angst. that goes up to 3:30. with the u.s. up porting more than 4 million eggs a year, that can cost $1.2 million. oranges go $1.53 a pound. it will be $1.68 a pound with the trump tax costing consumers $71 million for the half a million dollars. we don't really grow bananas in the u.s. going up to 69% per pound with the trump tax. and thanks to the u.s. importing more than $10 billion pounds per year, that could

cost americans $609 million. it could cost $3.5 million. the point is if you are spending $12 million a month on groceries, add another 120 of the bill. that is more than even the peak of inflation in 2022 which topped off at 9%. this is 10%. okay? it is not just groceries. how about the refrigerator you need to keep the groceries fresh. the average cost is about $1,300. with the trump tax, that could go up to $1,430 costing americans $1.95 billion for the 15 million refrigerators we import. again, that is a $1.59 billion in new taxes. what about the car you need to drive to the grocery store? a new car costs about $48,808 today with the trump tax, it

could cost $53,684. with americans taking the $66.3 billion hit. that is not even with the 50% tariff he wants to slap on the imported cars. making it another $25,000. even the smartphone in your pocket costs about $940 right now. with the trump tax, that could go up to $1,034 with americans paying app extra $13.2 billion for the nearly 141 million smartphones we import per year. it is one of the biggest vulnerabilities for a sitting president, inflation. and here is donald trump in the year of our lord, 2024 running against president biden, promising to make things more expensive for every american. i new sensodyne clinical white provides 2 shades whiter teeth and 24/7 sensitivity protection.

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take a look. >> two decades ago, i faced the hardest decision of my life, too. my baby had, you know, an underdeveloped brain. heart, lungs, kidneys, you know. just complete organ devastation. and the baby would not survive.

this is the story of millions of women who live in places where maga extremists are devising cruel ways to erode our most basic freedoms. they don't care about your health, but i do. that's why i'm running for alabama state house. >> that was marilyn lands. she ran under the scrutiny of the right wing's desire to control bodily autonomy. evidence whatsoever couldn't have imagined any democratic political consultant telling a candidate to run for officer on abortion rights.

last night, when the votes were in, she not only won the special election, she absolutely romped to victory with a 25-point margin with a seat she lost by seven points two years ago in a district that joe biden lost. what happened in arizona. it shows no sign of waning and may be strengthened. bill, great to have you on. i want to talk about the context of the republican incumbent in this seat that hoped this occupy for a special election. >> our reporter here, ran for district 10. it took us about a year of reporting relentlessly on the subject. before we can get anyone to listen for the fact that this

guy cheated to win an election in alabama. a place that loves to talk about voter cheating for democrats. >> so, the republican incumbent had lied about his, he lied about his address. he was fraudulent where he lived. he was caught. pleading guilty and resigning is that correct? >> yeah. he pled guilty to voting fraud. and, he was down from office. >> so, she really won in a landslide. now obviously, it's a special election. it is in a district in alabama that is probably much more centrist than other parts of alabama. parts of huntsville. people with college and advanced degrees. but what is the contours of this issue particularly after alabama became the talk of the

nation after that decision? >> remember this is an area of the estate that gave us maga year after year. this is the candidate with the right message at the very right time for the right district. >> some of the print material in the state race. you are mostly doing mailers. you are mostly doing that kind of thing. people are not on the air a lot. she talked about abortion a lot. she wanted to center abortion and again, that feels counterintuitive but it seems to me to say something about where this portion of the state

is on this issue. >> if you poll the people of alabama, the people of alabama do not approve the draconian laws we passed here to out law abortions even in the case of rape and incest. what it is, is that you have an extreme right wing portion of the republican party here, that has to count down to the base so that they can get reelected. i talk to these people. i know these people. many of them think that what they are doing is outrageous. but they want to stay in office. so they are complicit in the lie. >> the supreme court found in the civil wrongful death suit that a fertilized egg, an embryo, for the purposes of ivf was a life. was a child, essentially. and there is tremendous fall-

out from that. several ivf clinics immediately close. the republican legislature in both houses rushed through a bill signed by governor kate ivy. do you think that had an enduring effect? did that really change the way people are thinking about things in your state? >> i think it brought to light just how absurd this conversation is in alabama. alabama has good people, smart people. but our politicians do not represent alabama. they represent a small portion of the maga base who believes in this type of extremism. so yes. it brought it to the forefront so that it was right in people's face and they had to deal with it up close and personal like they had before. >> marilyn lands winning by 25 points in that district. she will be a guest i believe on the 10:00 p.m. show tonight on the last word. you can see her there. bill brett, thank you very much. >> thank you, chris.

as i said, representative- elect marilyn lands will be on the last word at 10:00 p.m. make sure to stay tuned for that. but first, why things might be looking up for the biden campaign and what you really need to know about polls ahead of this election. next. of this election. next.

let me point you to the bottom of the screen.

there. there. just to give you time to get your phone out to scan it. there has never been more national polling than there is right now. every day, there are new polls and we see people freak out about bad polling numbers. amid all the yo yoking, it is easy to lose sight of what polls are measuring and what's the best way to use them. given the constant polling discourse, i thought it would be a good idea to talk to entocone on my podcast why is this happening. he is the creator of the times poll and he is a sharp thinker with insights into why polling does or does not work. >> people want to know what is going to happen and can't know what is going to happen. and the gap between those, they grasp for things. >> if you take the notion we just put forward seriously, the polls that people want to be predictive may be the fuel that powers decisions that change the result in the end. right? so, there is anyone who takes

this stuff seriously cannot believe that they are predictive. but that's what people care about. >> that's right. so that point if they are not predictive, they are a snapshot of time. possible, again, possible blind spots. that we see or don't see. deeply imperfect. and that is why i think. >> in an era where elections are so close by the way. >> these minor fuzzy things that have always been around, they are almost every election, the candidate leading in the polls could lose in a way that was not true in 1984. >> the whole conversation was really illuminating and i feel like we cleared up a lot of misconceptions about polling. i'll bet i refer back to it throughout this election year. you could listen to the full episode by scanning that code i couldn't seem to find my way to pointing to or by searching chris hayes wherefore you get your podcast. president biden appear to

be edging up a bit right now. what that says about the current state of the trump campaign next. campaign next.

paid ads have gone up in the air. they have social media posts. they are producing a lot more content you have seen includeing the time machine capsules of donald trump four years ago. highlighting some of the more deranged and offensive things he said like this one posted yesterday. >> you were in great shape. i hope that's the case. >> been doing more than donald

trump has been doing. pomeroy served in the 2016 clinton campaign. cohost of msnbc's how to win 2024 podcast. jennifer, i'll start with you on a check in here. i think that sort of before and after the state of the union. the freak out after the report, now both of these individuals are clearly the nominees. it does have a much more aggressive general election vibe this last few weeks. >> it is so early. february was not a great month. but it was good to deal with the age issue then and move on. people see he is fine. state of the union was as strong as it was. and, it is march. so that is kind of an early

time to fully engage and keep the momentum going but the biden campaign has a number of things going for it. one, a lot of money. two, they have a really great story to tell. i'm in michigan. i follow secretary holmes and governor whitmer. phenomenal historic investment. and you can feel talking to voters it is starting to take hold. and the other thing is the contrast. every time trump does the campaign event, there is endless, there's endless footage for the biden campaign to use against him. it is not easy to stage this. this is a situation where the biden campaign has a lot to choose from where they can do that. >> robert, one of the big decisions about politics in the trump era has always been broadly the two categories of

way to go after trump. one is that he is personally so odious and says offensive things and he is bigoted and he is corrupt and he is all these things and all that. and then there is just the fact that policy wise, he just supports a lot of like bad normal republican policy like repealing the affordable care act which he says he wants to do. how do you think about those two categories for the story that the biden campaign is going to tell in this campaign? >> it is a great question, chris. you have to be careful in these races when there's a lot of targets to shoot individually at every target. but not think of what is the meta message that you are trying to leave with people? i think about this? a way of joe biden and his administration have worked the past four years to be more on

your side versus donald trump who has really never been on your side. and i do think you have to force this race through that larger lens. through a larger lens so that you don't become again, a series of tactics or that your message is a series of issues. it does have to be something that is larger and it attracts people and pulls people in and tells that story. i think the arc of what joe biden inherited, where he has brought people to this point, in terms of what he has been able to get done and how that has taken hold with voters. that is tremendously important. and the campaign will help that story and help him tell that and it will see donald trump as the central character a long time. and you will get a sense and be able to talk about the fact

that donald trump is in this for one person and it is not you. it's donald trump. >> i want to talk about the fund raising aspect of that. it plays into it as well. also, before we get to that, there is new polling out from fox news on all places about abortion. striking polling and they have a pretty good polling operation over there. and i will just read it here. but basically, should abortion be legal? it has gone from april, 2022. it is up to 59%. okay? so, you have just got this central thing. it is not low salience. you can't run away from it. they are going to come out. they are going to do a national abortion ban. they think they can message their way out of it. but the national abortion ban to me seems like an enormous gift, politically to the biden campaign. >> that is something breaking through in a couple of days i have been, in michigan, that you hear back from voters.

i think, gibbs is right about the donald trump, donald trump is in it for himself. one thing i hear from people is they say we gave him a chance and he didn't deliver. biden is delivering and trump is not on the side of women and i hear this coming back now that people hear even though the state ballot initiative protects abortion rights. in 2022, they understand that it is on the ballot when it comes to congressional candidates, candidates. >> on whose side is joe biden or donald trump on. one thing i think again hasn't quite sunk in. there is some ground for it. it is this bribe me sign that trump has put in mar-a-lago.

i'm desperate for cash personally and politically. and i don't have a lot of fixed commitment. so, you know. the tiktok reversal was sort of perfect little proof of concept. the big donor comes and visits mar-a-lago. the degree to which his advantage in 2016, i'm above all the fund raising, i'm not grubbing for money, there is some hay to make there. >> yeah. and look, the stories about how, they are not going to help the party. not just him in the party. but all the way down the ballot senate. house. state legislature. but instead going to pay lawyers. again, it gives you a sense. he is in it for himself. and we are now hawking bibles which you know, is really, you couldn't make it up if you wanted to. if you did, nobody would believe the script. and the structural advantage of

fund raising the really important. we have come to an era where you have so much soft and dark money into the system. really very few races were decided by money anymore. and this race has a structural financial advantage right now for one candidate. that is joe biden. >> all right. jennifer and robert. always good to talk to you too. that is all in on this wednesday night. alex wagner starts right now. >> i don't know, we will be talking about the bibles coming up. >> do you know it's the only one. the only one. >> if you thought it was a donald trump endorsed bible? big news. thank you my friend. d bible? big news. thank you my friend. thank you, my friend. and thanks to you at home for joining me thisfo hour. for years now donald trump has insisted hisw favorite book is the bible. but for years now he's also been seemingly enunable or at least unwilling to recall any of its