Trump pick for FBI, Kash Patel, took $25k for role in Russia-linked anti-FBI documentary

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Good evening, Rachel. Good evening, Michael.
Working triple time, I see. No rest for the wicked.
Everybody's all in all the time. I'm learning from the best.

Well, get some sleep.

You've got about five minutes to sleep before you're due back here, Michael. Thank you, my friend.
Thank you, Ray. Well done.
And thanks to at home for joining us tonight. Really happy to have you here on a Friday night.
Just after the election, three days after the election, A right-wing streaming network started airing a six-part Russian propaganda special attacking the FBI. Now, I say it was a Russian propaganda special because, specifically, it was made by a producer who has made a living making propaganda for the Kremlin.
One of the producers, the guy who financed and produced this film, this docuseries, this attack on the FBI, he has been paid by the Kremlin to produce videos that are designed to lure Westerners, including Americans, to leave the West and move to Mother Russia. That project was funded by the Presidential Foundation for Cultural Initiatives, which is a state entity created in the Kremlin by Vladimir Putin in 2021.
This guy served on the board of a Russian propaganda outlet that was designed to look like an American news site. It was launched in the months leading up to our 2024 election.
It was full of pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine content. This guy has produced hagiographic biographies of pro-Kremlin dictators, including, I kid you not, an eight-part series singing the praises of the dictator of Kazakhstan.
And that was paid for by a charity controlled by the dictator of Kazakhstan. He also created a pro-Kremlin anti-Ukraine film that was paid for by a pro-Kremlin anti-Ukraine oligarch who has been under U.S.
sanctions for more than a decade. He and his company produced another anti-Ukraine film last year that featured claims smearing President Biden that were delivered by a guy who is under indictment in this country and sanctioned by the U.S.
government as a Russian agent. So this is kind of their oeuvre.
This is what these folks do. But their newest, this multi-part anti-FBI documentary that came out three days after our election in November, it was directed by a former host from Russian state TV, which is sanctioned in this country as a vehicle for Kremlin-sponsored disinformation and disruption efforts targeting the American people in our elections.
Now, at this point, you're thinking, okay, dog bites man, right? Some streaming outlet is running a pro-Russia, anti-U.S. government thing.
Okay, right? I know you're thinking, this sounds very familiar. There's a lot of things like this.
We know Russia runs all sorts of psychological and disinformation campaigns against us. A big, slick, Kremlin-affiliated propaganda operation against the FBI, something designed to smear the FBI.
Yeah, that tracks. We know the kind of stuff that they do to try to mess with us as a country.
The FBI probably knows to expect it. They probably know how to handle these kinds of operations and threats from Russia, as long as they're from Russia.
Senate financial disclosure forms show that President Donald Trump's nominee to lead the FBI was paid $25,000 by the company with the producer who has made the Russian propaganda for the Kremlin who made this new film, Attacking the FBI. Kash Patel was paid $25,000 by that production company, apparently for his participation in the anti-FBI film.
Mr. Patel appears in the film.
He's in episode four. He also got an executive producer credit on the film as well.
This was first reported today by the excellent investigative reporter David Korn at Mother Jones. But we can show you this is from Kash Patel's required financial disclosure form to the Office of Government Ethics as part of his nomination to be the director of the FBI.
Global Tree Productions. That's this production company run by this Russian-American propagandist who was part of the Kremlin-funded influence campaign to get Westerners to move to Russia, who sat on the board of the Russian propaganda site, apparently designed to sway our election.
Here's the record of their $25,000 payment to the man Donald Trump wants to put in charge of the FBI. That payment apparently pursuant to his participation in their anti-FBI documentary.

We have reached out to Mr. Patel and to the White House and to the film producer for comment tonight.

We have not heard back.

I should tell you the Washington Post has also picked up this story tonight.

A spokesperson for Mr. Patel did tell the Post tonight, quote,

The Senate has evaluated all potential conflicts and concerns. Have they, though? Have they? Are you sure? Was everybody totally aware of this one? Democrats on the Judiciary Committee did manage to push back Kash Patel's confirmation vote in that committee by a week.

That was before this new reporting came out.

As of now, the vote on his nomination is scheduled for next Thursday.

I think we can expect all Democrats to pretty easily vote against Kash Patel for FBI director.

But until next Thursday, that's how long Republicans on that committee have to decide whether they're okay with this, too. So, listen, it's Friday night.
We are at the end of the third work week of Donald Trump's second term in office. Every day feels like, you know, trying to put 10 pounds of news into a five pound bag.
At the end of the week, it feels like there's split bags everywhere and lots of loose stuff. It's a lot going on.
And there's a lot to keep track of. I mean, just today, they chiseled the name off the USAID building in Washington and then announced with a sneer that Customs and Border Patrol would be taking over that building instead.
They think this is a huge political win for them, destroying foreign aid, destroying USAID. Republican senators, including John Boozman of Arkansas and Mike Rounds of South Dakota, they are among those, again, Republicans, who say their offices have been swamped with calls and complaints and concerns from their constituents back home.
Senator Boozman particularly singling out the freak out in his home state of Arkansas about what the cutoff of all foreign aid, right, which is supposed to be so popular, what that's doing to his state and to his constituents. Quote, Senator Boozman's office has been fielding concerns from constituents affected by the freeze on overseas aid.
Boozman said, quote,

what we'd like is exceptions to the freeze. There's areas where you've got food that's

halfway shipped. Senator Boozman said he hopes to get a report, quote,

as to what exactly they are doing. And maybe these Republican senators will get such a report.
They'll get an explanation. What do you think? Tonight, President Trump canceled intelligence briefings and also the security clearance for President Biden.
Tonight, as the new administration cancels immigration programs for people from Venezuela and Haiti and Nicaragua and Cuba, Trump tonight has unilaterally extended brand new immigration protections to white people from South Africa. Just the white ones, though.
Just white people. Tonight, we've also just had news of what appears to be the third serious fatal plane crash just since Trump's inauguration less than three weeks ago.
This is the third plane crash in 10 days. The day Donald Trump was inaugurated, the head of the FAA, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, resigned.
The FAA had grounded the Starship rocket program run by Trump's top campaign donor, Elon Musk, after a catastrophic failure of Starship, rained down debris, and caused emergency diversions for dozens of passenger flights over huge swaths of the globe. Elon Musk had demanded that the FAA chief must resign.
And on Trump's inauguration day, in fact, the FAA chief resigned. Since that day, we have had the Potomac River midair plane and helicopter crash over Washington, D.C., which killed 67 people.
We've had the Northeast Philadelphia plane crash, which killed seven people and injured dozens more on the ground. We've had a plane catch fire on the runway in Houston, forcing all the passengers to evacuate onto the tarmac via slides and stairs.
We had another plane crash into an airplane tug and critically injure an airport worker at Chicago O'Hare. On Wednesday this week, we had this happen at SeaTac in Washington State.

The wing of a Japan Air, look at that.

The wing of a Japan Airline 787 just sliced right into the tail of a Delta plane.

Look at that.

That was Wednesday.

And then yesterday, we lost track of another passenger plane in Alaska, operated by a regional airline called Bering Air. There were nine passengers and one pilot on board when the plane was lost about 3.20 p.m.
local time yesterday. The fate of the plane remained a mystery all night last night and all day today as rescuers searched for it.
It was about 12 miles offshore when it was lost from radar, but now tonight, just before we got on the air, it has been found on land about 34 miles southeast of Nome, Alaska. And there were no survivors.
Again, 10 people killed in this crash. This is the third major fatal plane crash in this country in 10 days.
Amid this cascade of aviation scares and disasters, President Trump has appointed a former cast member of MTV's The Real World to be America's Transportation Secretary. He, in turn, in his wisdom, has announced plans to turn over American aviation core systems to the hacker kids who work for Donald Trump's top campaign donor.
Headline, Musk's cost cutters target U.S. aviation systems.
Oh, good. The cost cutter kids, they'll take care of it, make it cheaper.
Today in Washington, these posters started going up everywhere. They show Trump's top campaign donor, Elon Musk.
They show his little head, see there, Elon Musk, and the phrase, I am stealing from you. These posters went up outside the treasury building where in fact, Musk's band of interns have been given access to the most highly sensitive payment system in the U.S.
government,

the one that controls your social security checks, your disability payments, everything.

These Musk posters have gone up near USAID.

They've gone up all over Capitol Hill.

This poster is by a D.C. street artist who goes by the name Absurdly Well.

But these are apparently getting wheat pasted all over the place in D.C. now.

Elon Musk's face, I am stealing from you.

So, you know, I recognize there's a lot going on.

We have a huge show tonight.

We're going to be talking to two people, two powerhouse U.S. government officials,

each of them really impressive and really important in their own right, each of whom has apparently illegally been fired by Donald Trump, each of whom is standing up against that apparently illegal firing in their own way. We're going to be interviewing the two of them in succession tonight.
You are going to want to see both of these interviews. I kind of can't believe that we got either of them.
The fact that we got both of them is a very big deal. Really looking forward to bringing you those interviews.
There is a lot

to cover. But you know what? I just want to say this again.
The nominee for FBI director

taking $25,000 for a pro-Kremlin anti-FBI smear campaign, a film made by a guy who

has made propaganda for the Kremlin that's kind of been his whole job in life, it seems like the kind of story that should maybe break through. And I know it's been kind of, you know, Kremlin Christmas this week, right? I mean, the news from the New York Times this week that the new Trump administration, in its infinite wisdom, sent a huge list of personal identifying information of CIA personnel in an unclassified, unencrypted email.
The news that CIA personnel and people who work at the Office of Director of National Intelligence are now among the government employees who have been invited to resign or else. an effort that has been temporarily halted by a federal judge, but it may be back in effect as soon as next week.
Can you imagine how excited our foreign adversaries are at the idea of a wholesale purge of all the experienced people in U.S. intelligence and counterintelligence? That said, I'm not sure how they narrow down what to be happiest about.
Trump's new CIA chief, John Ratcliffe, distinguished himself when he had his last big job, when he was director of national intelligence in Trump's first term. In 2020, he released a batch of what he initially conceded might be Russian disinformation that he apparently nevertheless hoped might help Trump in the 2020 election.

That's how he distinguished himself in 2020, leading to calls for his resignation at the time,

but now he's CIA director.

Trump's nominee for intelligence director this term has also been a phenomenal customer for notorious Russian disinformation.

She, for example, put a megaphone on Russian false claims that the U.S. had secret bioweapons

sites in Ukraine, and that's the only reason we didn't want Mother Russia to invade. Vladimir Putin ordered USAID out of his country more than a decade ago and has since spent years spreading lies and conspiracy theories about USAID to try to discredit it, to try to kill it, including weird and totally made up claims that aired on Russian state TV recently that said USAID funds had been spent to send American celebrities on international junkets.
These are totally false claims that came from Russian state TV that this past week were promoted online by Donald Trump Jr. and Trump campaign donor Elon Musk, who did apparently this week dismantle USAID.
You may remember that Elon Musk himself was reportedly unable to get a higher security clearance that he was seeking just this past year, in part because of his ongoing and frequent communications with Vladimir Putin and other Kremlin officials and his refusal to explain his international contacts and travel to the people who at least used to make decisions about security clearances in this country. Among the government databases and computer systems that Musk and his team have now accessed, that Office of Personnel Management system, the first one they got into, that's considered such a rich target for our foreign adversaries that it has repeatedly been targeted by foreign intelligence services trying to hack into it.
Well, now Elon Musk and his band of interns is in there. That should make it easier.
The treasury payment system that Musk has taken over, among other things, that includes details of secret payments made to foreign assets who are being run abroad by U.S. intelligence.
It includes details on payments made to U.S. businesses abroad that have secret contracts with our intelligence services.
In other words, that payment system at the U.S. Treasury, among all the other things it contains, it contains information that the Kremlin and our other intelligence adversaries would absolutely saw off their arm for.
But now Elon Musk is in there, fresh off of not being able to get a security clearance because he wouldn't come clean about how much contact he has with the Kremlin and what he talks to them about. It has been Kremlin Christmas for going on three weeks now thus far in the new Trump term.
But senators next week, Thursday next week, will have the chance to decide if they want to put someone in charge of the FBI who literally took $25,000 to participate in a propaganda film attacking the FBI made by somebody who makes propaganda for the Kremlin. This one, I don't know, seems like kind of a different kind of red line.

I don't know.

Watch this space.

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What issue matters to you the most? Join her as she travels the country to talk to the people at the center of the president's policies and promises. Do you think now that he's pardoned everybody, he can count on this group of people again? Search for Trumpland with Alex Wagner wherever you're listening and follow.
Subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts to listen ad-free. It's hard to believe, but it was still January when Donald Trump fired the inspector generals, 18 different government agencies.
He fired the inspectors general illegally because, among other things, you're not allowed to fire an IG without giving Congress 30 days notice before you do it. One of those inspectors general was this woman.
Her name is Phyllis Fung. She's the inspector general for the U.S.
Department of Agriculture. Phyllis Fung is a nonpartisan technocratic official.
She was appointed by President George W. Bush more than 22 years ago.
She has served under Democratic and Republican presidents ever since. But when Phyllis Fong learned that she had been fired along with all the other inspectors general, she, like everyone, I think recognized that the announcement of her firing was illegal on its face.
And if an announcement is illegal, you might reasonably conclude that it's therefore non-binding. Therefore, the day after Donald Trump announced that she and 17 other inspectors general were fired, Phyllis Fong nevertheless showed up for work.
She showed up for work the next day, just like she had done for the past two decades. According to Reuters, Ms.
Fong said her firing was not legal, and so she was going back to work. Initial reporting said they then bodily escorted her out of the office.
USDA then disputed that and said, no, no, she left of her own accord. Either way, she didn't make it easy for them.
Her firing really does appear to have been blatantly illegal. So she did not accept it and she still showed up.
We're seeing other stories along these lines. Individual acts of showing up or speaking up throughout the federal government.
When Trump ordered federal agencies to get rid of any references to gender ideology, whatever that means, and demanded that federal workers must resign en masse or else. One administrative judge at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sent an email to the new Trump-appointed acting boss of that agency, and she CC'd pretty much everybody else in the building on that email.
The email included a reference to the president's top campaign donor, Elon Musk, the wannabe occupant of Mars. The email said, quote, these tactics you are employing and the actions you have taken are illegal and unconstitutional.
Quote, if upon reflection, you feel like now would be a good time to take a vacation and resign from your position, please reply all to this email and put in the subject line, quote, I'd like to occupy Mars. The acting head of the EEOC apparently did not do that.
Nevertheless, credit for the question. Humor, determination, showing up, speaking out.
Tonight we have with us two of the high-ranking, big-deal government officials who have thus far stood up to Trump and what he's done. First, we are going to speak with Ellen Weintraub.
She has been a member of the Federal Elections Commission since 2002. She has chaired the commission four times.
This week, President Trump attempted to fire her. Ms.
Weintraub responded in a post on Twitter, quote, received a letter from POTUS today purporting to remove me as commissioner and chair of the FEC. She said, quote, there's a legal way to replace FEC commissioners.
This isn't it. I've been lucky to serve the American people and stir up some good trouble along the way.
That's not changing anytime soon. Joining us now is Ellen Weintraub, chair of the Federal Elections Commission, who Trump claims to have fired.
She begs to differ. Commissioner Weintraub, I really appreciate you being here.
Thanks for joining us. Pleasure to be here, Rachel.
Why do you say this firing was not legal? Well, if you look at the Federal Election Campaign Act, there is nothing in there about removing FEC commissioners other than in the normal course, which is you can replace them when their terms have expired by appointing a new commissioner who gets confirmed by the Senate. That's the way you replace FEC commissioners.
There's nothing in there that says, or if the president doesn't like that particular person, they can just be fired. So now that the president has sent you this letter purporting to remove you, but under terms in which he's not legally allowed to remove you, I imagine that you consider yourself to still be a commissioner.
But how does this get settled? How do you plan to move forward here? Well, I'm still considering all of my options at the moment, but I will tell you that my email has been turned off, my computers have been taken, My pass, I believe, no longer gets me into the building.

When you say your computers have been taken, meaning removed from your office?

Well, I think they're still in my office, actually, but I can't get into my office anymore.

I see.

Do you think it is Trump's intention to dismantle the FEC in a fundamental sense, to rebuild it in his own image?

I mean, we've seen him wholesale fire all different kinds of officials that he's not allowed to fire.

Some people are suing. Some people are trying to show up to work anyway.

You say that you're considering your options. Do you have an understanding or even an informed theory as to what you think the end goal is here? I really don't know.
At the moment, there are still four sitting commissioners. So there is a bare quorum.
There is supposed to be six, no more than three from any one political party. It's supposed to be an independent bipartisan commission.
And the chairmanship rotates from one party to the next every year. The Republicans always get the election year, and that means the year after the election year, there's usually a Democrat who is in the chair.
And it just happened to be my turn, and I was duly elected by my colleagues. And that's why I should be still sitting in the chair.
But right now, there are still four remaining commissioners, so he has not disabled entirely the commission yet. But this is not the way an independent agency is supposed to work.
This is not the kind of agency where, unlike many other agencies in government, he doesn't get to come in and immediately put in his own chair of the agency. That just isn't the way the place was set up.
It was designed by Congress to ensure against political machinations that would interfere with the running of the agency. And that is why Congress set it up so that if a commissioner's term has expired, they can stay until they get replaced by another commissioner so the seat doesn't go vacant.
And that gives the Senate an opportunity for advice and consent. In this case, since mine is a Democratic seat, it should give the Democratic leaders in Congress an opportunity to weigh in on who they think ought to be sitting in the seat.
And it has never in the 50-year history of this commission, we're celebrating our 50th anniversary this year. This has never happened before.
It's never happened before. And there's been so much partisan fighting over the FEC.
And there's been so much like bad faith fighting over the FEC by various political factions over the years and other circumstances in which I have interviewed you on television about those shenanigans. But this is something that's never happened before.
You know, if he does remove more commissioners, if he is trying to disable the FEC, can you explain to our viewers in plain language what that would mean if the FEC effectively went away, if he was able to shut down the functioning of the commission? The FEC is the agency that was designed to follow the money and give the American people transparency about who is funding political campaigns at the federal level and what they do with that money. And if the FEC can't do its job, then the public is left in the dark.
There is already too much dark money in our system. And without an FEC, there would be even more.
Basically, all of it would be dark. And there would be no one out there to enforce the law.
If they leave the staff in place, they can keep the database up and running. But the staff is not capable under the law without the commissioners there of

enforcing the law in any meaningful way, in any way at all, if somebody violates the law. It's a law enforcement agency, and the law ought to be followed.
The agency needs to be there to enforce the law, and the laws ought to be followed in the ways that the commission is constituted. Ellen Weintraub, chair of the Federal Elections Commissioner,

longtime commissioner on the FEC. in the ways that the commission is constituted.
Ellen Weintraub, chair of the Federal Elections Commissioner,

longtime commissioner on the FEC.

Ellen, I don't know.

As you say, you're keeping your options open

in terms of how you plan to move forward here

now that the president purports to have fired you

by means he's not allowed to fire you by.

But please keep us surprised

and come back to let us know what you decide. Ellen Weintraub, chair of the Federal Elections Commission.
Thank you for joining us. Thank you, Rachel.
All right. We'll be right back.
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Download the app now at msnbc.com slash app. In just his first few weeks in office, President Trump has already fired dozens of senior officials across the federal government, including some he's not allowed to fire.

Inspectors general, general counsels, the chair of the Federal Elections Commission, who I just spoke to for the first time in the 50 year history of the FEC. Trump has just tried to fire an FEC commissioner.
She told us tonight she is reviewing her options as to how to respond since the president is not legally allowed to fire Ellen Weintraub the way he is now trying to do. But there is very little question about whether these firings are illegal.
And because of that, we appear to be headed toward some major legal battles with implications for these officials themselves, with implications for what a president can get away with by just brazenly and repeatedly breaking the law. But there's another equity at stake as well.
Because while those battles make their way through the courts, presenting definitional and life-changing consequences, again, for these individual officials and for the scale of the power grab that Trump is trying to get away with. There's also, in between there, there's the question of what's done to the country, what harm is done to the country if we don't have these agencies that Trump is messing with by firing all of their members, even though he legally isn't allowed to.
Here's an example of what I mean. Last Monday, last week, the people who work at a Whole Foods grocery store in Philly, they formally voted to join a union.
And that made them the first Whole Foods store in the whole country to unionize. And because Amazon owns Whole Foods, it actually made them the second ever group of Amazon employees to unionize.
So that's a big deal. But then something crazy happened.
Hours after they unionized, Trump fired a member of the National Labor Relations Board, a former chair of that board named Gwynne Wilcox. Ms.
Wilcox has now filed a lawsuit against President Trump to get back her job because her firing was plainly illegal. We're going to talk with her about that live here in just a moment.
But in the meantime, the way the National Labor Relations Board works, it needs to have three of its five members present to issue any decisions. The board only had three

members at the time Gwynn Wilcox was purportedly fired by Donald Trump. With Gwynn Wilcox removed,

the board is down now to just two members, which means it can't do anything. So now Whole Foods

is claiming that Trump firing Gwynn Wilcox makes that union vote, that union's win in

Thank you. it can't do anything.
So now Whole Foods is claiming that Trump firing Gwynne Wilcox makes that union vote, that union's win in Philadelphia, moot. It means that it doesn't count.
In a legal filing this week, Whole Foods is arguing that because the National Labor Review Board effectively no longer has enough members to function, quote, the board's regional director lacks authority to lawfully certify the result of the union's win. Yeah, yeah, they may have voted to unionize, but there's nobody here to certify that win, so it's like it didn't happen.
Sharon Block, a Harvard law professor and former Democratic member of the Labor Board, told the Washington Post, quote, the Whole Foods filing made clear the company is not going to abide by the outcome of that election. And now there's nothing that can compel them to.
Joining us now live, I'm honored to say, is Gwynne Wilcox, former, well, former, well, member and former chair of the National Labor Relations Board. Chairwoman Wilcox, I really appreciate you making time to be here tonight.
I know it's not an easy decision to come on TV and talk about these things, given what you're in the middle of, but I really appreciate you being here. My pleasure to be here.
It's important. It is important.
Let me ask, some of our viewers may not be familiar with the work of the NLRB, may not be familiar with some of the things that I just described.

Did I describe them accurately? Is there anything else that people should understand about the basic functioning of the board and what they do? The only thing I would just add is that the NLRB protects employees even if they're not part of a union. So if workers are complaining about working conditions or in particular, and they want to speak with their co-workers about it, they're protected under the law of the National Labor Relations Act.
In addition to circumstances where employees may be disciplined as a result of engaging in that type of activity or union activity, and if they're being retaliated against, then they would be protected by the National Labor Relations Board. And it's correct that we, you know, as a result of my removal, there are only two board members.
And so we cannot, the board cannot function in terms of issuing decisions. does that include what Whole Foods is alleging, which is, well, yeah, that union vote may have happened and it may look like it was a legal and binding election that we'd otherwise have to abide by.
But since the NLRB doesn't have the requisite number of members, then nobody can certify the election. And so therefore, it's like the election didn't happen.
Therefore, we can ignore it. What do you make of that case? I'm paraphrasing, of course.
What do you make of that case from them? Well, in reality, it's the regions that run the election. A union would file a petition with the regional office.
And the region, after either an agreement or direction of election, there could be—there would be an election, and whoever wins, if it's not—normally what will happen is that the regional director would certify the union unless there are objections that have been filed. And so, you know, not to get into the weeds too much, but, you know, I'm not certain from what you've presented exactly what's the status of this case with regard to the functioning of the regional director.
So it's something that, you know, I can't really speak on it because I don't know enough of the facts. But, you know, as I said, the regional director, well, the regents control the election unless there are appeals made to the board.

As far as I understand it, and correct me if I'm wrong, but the National Labor Relations

Board was created in the 1930s.

It's been around for 90 years.

In the history of the agency, has any other president ever tried to remove a member of the board the way Donald Trump tried to remove you? No. This is the first time it's ever happened.
And, you know, that's why when I received an email on January 27th at close to 11 p.m., I was rather surprised that that was the route that was being taken.

And as you already mentioned, the reality is that the board cannot function without at least three board members. And so the board went down from three to two.
And there's really a lot of work to be done by the board. And it's, you know, I'm concerned about the fact that

cases cannot be decided and there'll be more delays. And, you know, the National Labor Relations Board is very critical to the, critical to labor relations because there's employees, This is where they come to seek protection under the Act.
And, you know, I'm very concerned that any delays will just delay things much longer. And, you know, and in addition, you know, besides this being unprecedented decisions, are'm also unlawful, because the National Labor Relations Board is to be independent of the age of the president.
And so if the president wants to remove someone, that means that they have the president would have to allege that there was either neglect of duty or some type of misconduct, malfeasance, and provide notice and hearing. And none of this was happening—none of that occurred or was stated in my removal letter.
So I take the position that this is an unlawful termination as well as unprecedented. And that will be the basis of the lawsuit that you have filed this week against President Trump to get that job back.
It does appear—I'm not a lawyer, but it does appear that his firing of you was plainly illegal. Your decision to challenge him puts you head to head with him on that, but also head to head in favor of the work that you've done at NLRB and what the country needs from that board.
Gwen Wilcox, thank you for talking to us about it tonight. Please keep us surprised as this challenge moves forward.
I'll be really interested in seeing you get that seat back, and I'd love to talk to you the night that it happens. Okay.
Thank you so much. Appreciate it.
Thank you. All right.
Okay. We'll be right back.
So because it's Friday, I saved this for Friday. I wanted to give you a little follow-up on a story that we brought you earlier this week.
You might remember a couple of days ago here on the show, we talked about a phenomenal, amazing, can-see-it-from-space-level conflict of interest related to a man who President Trump picked to be the interim U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C.
This guy is a Trump election denier. He was a stop-the-ste steal activist.
He was a defense lawyer for people who participated in the January 6th attack on the Capitol. Trump, of course, pardoned or commuted the sentences of everybody who was convicted or pled guilty in the January 6th attack, including people who were serving years in prison for assaulting police officers and all the rest.
But after Trump issued the pardons and commutations, this guy who Trump installed in the U.S. Attorney's Office, his name is Ed Martin, he still had some sort of cleanup work to do on a lot of January 6 related cases.
So he ended up filing petitions with various judges asking to, for example, drop charges that were still pending or to vacate some convictions. One of those motions was a guy who'd received a six and a half year sentence for his part in January 6th.
He was actively appealing his conviction. This application was made to vacate that conviction to essentiallycuit the appeals process.
This guy had a defense lawyer in his criminal case. His defense lawyer was Ed Martin, the same Ed Martin who's now the U.S.
attorney in Washington, D.C. And it was Ed Martin who filed the application in that guy's case saying the Justice Department, which had previously been prosecuting this case, they'd now like the court to vacate this matter.
So in other words, Trump's U.S. attorney, Ed Martin, switched sides in the courtroom.
He had been the defense lawyer for this guy. And then in the same case, he moved over to the prosecution side and said, yeah, I know I was his defense lawyer, but now I run the government side of things.
And as Ed, I think you should drop that case. Lawyers aren't allowed to be the lawyer on both sides of a case.
We have an adversarial system. You can't be the lawyer on both sides.
Switching sides in a case is a very obvious no-no for lawyers everywhere, but it's also specifically against the rules at DOJ. DOJ regulations, quote, require lawyers to step aside from cases involving their former clients for at least a year.
Not if you're Ed, though. Ed was this guy's defense lawyer, and he now wants to be the prosecutor in that case, too.
The prosecutor who thinks this case should no longer be prosecuted. You can't take both sides in a case, Ed.
No word on whether his boss, newly confirmed Attorney General Pam Bondi, is going to be taking care of that or addressing it at all. But that's sort of on her desk as she arrives at the Justice Department.
Meanwhile, another wrinkle has emerged in this matter over the last couple of days. Turns out that after Reuters reported on this, again, you can see it from space, conflict of interest in this one particular case, Ed Martin actually submitted a motion to the court to withdraw as the counsel of record for his client.
He did not mention his new job in the filing. He didn't say why he wanted to withdraw as counsel of record.
But then this was the response that he got from the judge. Quote, your attorney renewal slash government certification has not been received.
As a result, your membership with the U.S. District and bankruptcy courts for the District of Columbia is not in good standing.

Therefore, you are not permitted to file.

In other words, Ed Martin, who Trump has named U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., is not currently licensed to practice law in court in D.C.

He somehow failed to renew his membership to practice law there, even though he's been doing

his new job there for a couple of weeks now since Trump has been president. He apparently has until next week to fix the problem.
A spokesperson for his office has declined to comment on this matter. But, I mean, how many strikes does Ed get? Because there's another way that interim U.S.
attorney for D.C. Ed Martin is distinguishing himself, which is his odd public statements of allegiance to Elon Musk.
He has posted, I guess, like an open letter on Justice Department letterhead to Elon Musk's social media platform in which he vows to investigate criminal referrals from Elon Musk and to prosecute anyone who has, quote, even acted simply unethically. Because, quote, no one is above the law.
Actually, you know what? Wait, look at that quote. It doesn't say no one is above the law.
It says noon is above the law. And I don't know who this noon guy is, but we better watch out because Ed Martin says he's above the law.
Noon is above the law. Ed Martin's coming after you right after he remembers to renew his law license and after he checks to see if he was your defense attorney before.
Only the best. Only the best people.
We'll be right back. Thanks for being with us this week.
I just want to say one last thing before we go. I want to congratulate my colleague, my friend, Andrea Mitchell, on an amazing milestone, an exciting new chapter in her life and her career.
Today, Andrea marked the end of her show on MSNBC, Andrea Mitchell Reports. After 17 years on the air, she shared the moment with some of the many people she has worked with and mentored in her 47 years at NBC News.
I am proud to count myself in their number. I'm delighted to say she's staying in the family.
She got a new gig as NBC News Chief Washington and Chief Foreign Policy Correspondent, which is great news for us all. But mostly, congratulations, Andrea.
I would not be who I am without help and guidance and inspiration from you. Congratulations.
Well done. And Godspeed, my friend.
All right. That's going to do it for me for now.
I'll see you again Monday night, 9 p.m. And p.m.
Now it's time for the last word. Good evening, Ali.
She was still hitting the road this week. She was in Panama last weekend with Marco Rubio.
And, you know, I've traveled around the world with her a lot. We've covered a lot of the same types of things.
And I sort of pride myself on not necessarily the smartest or best looking in the room, but I can work a lot. I can work for a long time.
And Andrea Mitchell can always work longer and harder than I can. She's up earlier.
She's on TV later. This woman has been unbelievable to work next to and be around the world and cover some of the biggest, most important breaking news stories where you don't get to set your own schedule.
This isn't the world of old where you show up and you have dinner with some famous people. You are working all the time.
And that is Andrea Mitchell. Yes.
It's going to take four people to fill her role. And Ali, I would say she would, that would be true.
Even if she weren't the time that she's been doing all of this globe trotting and all of this correspondent work also doing a daily show on MSNBC. And on top of that, she really has been an incredible mentor.
I can just speak from personal experience when things are tough, when things are rocky, you know, on a corporate side, when stuff is difficult behind the scenes, when people are going through stuff, Andrea has been there for me almost more than anybody. And I got to say, I just, I owe her a lot.
And I hope she gets from our viewers, the respect that she deserves and that I hope that you can all see among us who have worked with her. She really is something else.
The admiration that we all share for her. Thank you.