American scientists take to the streets to protest Trump's cuts

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Really happy to have you here this Friday night. I love days like this.
I love news days like this. There's so much to show you.
Here's Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania today. People turned out to stand up for science.
That was the name of the protest. To protest against the Trump administration's indiscriminate cuts to science in all ways.
You can see some of the signs here. Fight for science.
Defend the NIH. Defunding research is a recession plan.
That's actually quite true. Here's a good one.
Quote, budget cuts create all kinds of trouble. I had to look that up.
Alkynes, A-L-K-Y-N-E-S. Alkynes are organic molecules made of the functional group carbon-carbon triple bonds.
They are unsaturated hydrocarbons. And budget cuts create all kinds of trouble.
Here's another good one in Pittsburgh. Got polio? No? Thanks, science.
And you see where it says it's a Berg thing and the Salk vaccine there. The University of Pittsburgh is where Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine.
Across the state of Pennsylvania, outside City Hall in Philadelphia, look at this. This was the, I mean, this is impressive.
This was the stand up for science crowd outside Philly City Hall today. That's a big, look at that.
That's a really big protest. Some good signs at the Philly protest as well.
Your policy, defund the NIH, has been rejected by peer review. This is a good one.
I feel like this one is special for Susan's birthday today. She loves Beaker from the Muppets.
Susan, this happened in Philly today. This is the only orange Muppet I trust to tell me about science.
Meep. A version of this sign we saw a few different places today.
I love trans mice. All right.
I know you didn't listen to Trump's speech to Congress this week. I saw the numbers.
It was the least watched Trump State of the Union or joint speech to Congress of all the ones he's given. So I know you didn't watch.
But one of the things he said in his speech was that one of the terrible liberal things that his top campaign donor had discovered was happening in government was research to make mice transgender. And he said that in his speech and all the Republicans gasped and laughed and jeered because that was so terrible.

Actually, it's transgenic mice.

And transgenic mice are used in all kinds of laboratory research because mice are transgenic when they have been genetically altered so you can study human illnesses and conditions in them even though they're mice. It is transgenic mice, you numbskulls.
But sure, go ahead and shut down all the labs studying all the diseases, because what are you, five? This was Boston. There were big crowds today in Boston as well.
Stand up for science. Some signs in Boston.
No science means

no medicine, no tech, no progress, no future. Also this one, cut DNA, not the NIH.
Genetics

research and experimentation. Of course, because it's Boston, there's a Dunkin' Donuts sign.

America runs on science. In Madison, Wisconsin, local public radio there put the turnout at

Thank you. because it's Boston, there's a Dunkin' Donuts sign.
America runs on science. In Madison, Wisconsin, local public radio there put the turnout at what they described as more than a thousand at the Stand Up for Science protest at the Wisconsin state capitol.
Wisconsin Democratic Party chairman Ben Wickler said he was there and he thought the crowd was even larger than that. He also singled out his favorite sign in Madison, which was, quote, no science, no cheese.
It's Wisconsin. Really, really big crowd turned out in New York City at Washington Square Park to protest against Trump's cuts to science.
Look at that. Cold day, cold, windy day today in New York City.
Nine out of 10 preventable diseases prefer the GOP. Every disaster movie begins with a politician ignoring science.
See the one on the left there? It was a cold, miserable Chicago winter day today in the Windy City, but people turned out in big numbers in Chicago as well to protest. In addition to all the scientists and supporters and regular people who showed up, they also got some high-level representation from their members of Congress, including Senator Dick Durbin and Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky.
In Atlanta, there were big crowds in Atlanta at Liberty Plaza. Atlanta, of course, is home to the CDC, which Trump has whacked with big cuts and huge numbers of firings.
People turned out in the South, in Little Rock, Arkansas, on the state capitol steps. Stand up for science.
People turned out in Lansing, Michigan, with science supporting the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. We love NOAA, so stop firing the darn meteorologists and the people who run the freaking weather radar.
People turned out in St. Louis, Missouri, which is a good science sign.
Time to react with the steaming beaker. Raleigh, North Carolina, part of what they love to call the research triangle, but here are researchers and scientists and their supporters and regular folks having to come out in Raleigh, North Carolina today, protesting against Donald Trump's massive

cuts to scientific research. The biggest protest today was in Washington, D.C.
Literally thousands

of people turned out to stand up for science and protest against Trump today. Really big turnout

in Washington. Signs there include these.
Science is not a liberal conspiracy. Fund science, save lives.
Doge doesn't pass peer review. Also this one, very simply, cancer is not a partisan issue.
This is a nice subtle one. Hello, Health and Human Services Secretary.
Quote, science prevents brain worms. Stand up for science protests happened all over the country today.
And this was a big national organizing effort that was led by a small cadre of people just directly affected by these cuts. Graduate students and doctoral candidates and young scientists called this march today in Washington, and then soon dozens of satellite marches sprung up all around the country, and you saw the evidence of that there.
In addition to sort of nationally organized protests like that, we're also increasingly seeing just essentially local and independent protests pop up. Protests coming together in individual cities.
Like this big protest yesterday in Trenton, New Jersey. People with disabilities and their families and just angry, worried members of the public turning out in Trenton yesterday protesting against the cuts that Trump is planning to Medicaid.
Medicaid, among other things, is the primary health insurer for people with disabilities of all ages and all income levels. Medicaid covers tens of millions of people in this country.
It covers more than 40 percent of all births in this country. People turned out in Trenton, New Jersey yesterday to say don't cut Medicaid.
Along the same lines, just an independent single city protest. There was this protest of worried, angry local folks in Nashville, Tennessee, came out yesterday to protest to defend Social Security just right outside their local Social Security office in Nashville.
Protesters are pushing back tonight against possible staffing cuts at the National Social Security office. Thanks for joining us tonight at 10.
I'm Lauren Lowry. Dozens of people rallied outside the office today.
Our Sharon Danqua has a look at why they say cuts could directly affect them here in the mid-state. No closures.
No cuts. Protect SSA.
Today, we're gathered here not just as individuals, but as a community of people who understand the vital role that Social Security plays in so many lives. Resources provided in this building, Jennifer Brinkman says, so many could be taken for granted.
I know firsthand how essential these offices are, especially this office right here. When my significant other, Greg, was diagnosed with cancer and could no longer work, we turned to this office for help.
So when she heard the Department of Government Efficiency could cut Social Security staffing nationwide by 50 percent, she organized this rally. Our money we paid.
Hands off of SSA. I was in Nashville, Tennessee yesterday.
Some local coverage of that local protest standing up for Social Security.

We've also been looking today at local news reports about brand new little grassroots groups springing up in places like Central Minnesota.

They're going to be protesting tomorrow in St. Cloud.

Another one expected from a coalition of small local groups in Muskegon, Michigan this weekend. Republicans are now trying to solve a line that it is only paid protesters, professional full-time protesters funded by shadowy globalists who are the people who are criticizing what Trump is doing.
They are trying to say that none of these protests are real Americans and any criticism of Trump is somehow inauthentic. That is just, I mean, I understand why they might want to say that for political effect.
It is absolutely belied by what we are seeing every single day all over the country. It's honestly hard to keep track of the numbers of different ways and different places and different groups that are standing up and saying no.
Protests are happening all over the country all the time. People are also pushing hard to get their Republican members of Congress to meet with them, to answer their constituents' questions about whether they agree with what Trump is doing.
Constituents are sometimes going to comedic lengths to try to get their members of Congress to agree to speak to them. It might seem like the packed room at the UP First Congressional District Town Hall had front row access to District Representative Republican Jack Bergman.
But at a closer glance, you will see they were talking to an empty chair. That's because Bergman did not attend.
They were invited. The receipts are here.
What they said is they did not get a formal invitation. Escanaba resident Teresa Ross organized the town hall.
Basically, I got mad and decided that phone calls to Representative Bergman's office was not cutting it, that I needed to do something more. Bergman hasn't held a town hall in the UP since 2017.
In an interview with TV6 last week, Bergman said town halls had become too disruptive, but he shows up for constituents in other ways. He shows up for his constituents in other ways, just not when they're there in Escanaba in his district and they want to talk to him.
Congressman Jack Bergman has apparently been too afraid to hold a town hall with his own constituents for the past eight years. But they want to talk to him.
He represents a district in northern Michigan next door in Wisconsin. Tomorrow at 11 a.m., Democratic Congressman Mark Pocan is going to hold a town hall in his Wisconsin district.
And he is a Democrat. So he represents a Democratic district.
But he is holding this town hall tomorrow way over in the corner of his district, as close as he can get to the neighboring congressional district that's represented by a Republican, by Republican Derek Van Orden. Mark Pocan, the Democrat, put out a press release today saying, quote, the town hall will be held less than 10 miles from the border of Wisconsin's third congressional district, represented by Republican Derek Van Orden.
Congressman Pocan has invited constituents from both his district and the neighboring 3rd District to hear from a member of Congress. With the implication being that they're certainly not going to hear from their own.
Mark Pocan later said online, quote, we've officially invited Derek Van Orden to join us this Saturday at our town hall in Belmont. We are hearing he hasn't had an open public town hall, so we thought he could observe ours so that he could replicate in his district.
Looking forward to him sharing his views. So there's a lot to keep track of, obviously.
There's so much that seems just indefensible or inexplicable from the Trump administration. It can be hard to keep up with it just on a day-to-day basis.
Late tonight, for example, there's news from local offices of the National Weather Service that in Albany, New York, and in the state of Maine, the Weather Service is no longer able to launch its weather balloons, which is a standard part of how they do weather forecasting. You put weather balloons up there to get sensitive atmospheric readings on temperature and wind data and dew point and relative humidity and barometric pressure, all the stuff that you need to be able to make accurate weather forecasts.
A couple of weeks ago, we had heard out of Alaska that they didn't have enough staff at their weather service offices to put up their weather balloons in Alaska. Now tonight, we're learning that that is also true in Albany, New York, and in Maine.
Cuts to the Weather Service, cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are going to hit Americans right at home, right away, as already we can't do some of the forecasting things we would normally be doing on an average Friday night in March. Tonight, this hour, we're going to be talking about some of the really big ticket items that we're seeing going on, stuff that you have probably seen at least headlines about elsewhere.
our military and intelligence cutoff of Ukraine, basically making the overt and knowing decision to hand feed the Ukrainian people into the Russian army. We've got new news on that tonight, particularly on the boomerang effect that is coming back at us on the intelligence side.
I think you're really going to want to hear about that. It's an interesting story.
We've also got news tonight on more mass firings at the U.S. Department of Justice, where they really do appear to just be grabbing the building by the ankles, turning it upside down and shaking out all the nonpartisan career people who work at the U.S.
Justice Department so they can replace them all with Trump operatives. We'll have more tonight on both those stories, including an unsettling story that we are really trying to chase down about which apparently armed agents are playing a physical role in some of the things they are trying to do by force in Washington when it seems like they can't do them by law.
That story, again, disturbing, something that we are still chasing, and that story is coming up. But I will also tell you, it is Friday night and at the end of this sixth week of the Trump administration, it's clear you can't cover everything every day.
And I get that and I'm at peace with that. but I do feel like there's value in just trying to

cover the field as much as possible, right? Trying to cover the pushback and the protests,

especially when they're coming from places you wouldn't expect or from places the national

media isn't always looking. So really trying to do that.
I'm also just going to keep trying to

tell you some of the crazier or dumber things that are happening, even if they aren't getting a ton of attention elsewhere. And again, you can't cover everything.
You got to make decisions. But some of the stuff that I feel like I need to prioritize on the show is just stuff you might not be hearing from other news outlets.
For example, I think it's worth all of us knowing that the Donald Trump Jr. hunting buddy who they put in charge of food safety at the FDA once they started firing all the regular science people who work at food safety at the FDA.
The Donald Trump Jr. hunting buddy who they put in charge of human food safety for our country is a man who apparently has no scientific background at all, but he does

hunt with Don Jr. and he did serve as a defense lawyer for an infant formula manufacturer whose product was associated with an, quote, elevated risk of a deadly bowel condition in premature infants.
He was the defense counsel for that infant formula manufacturer. For what it's worth, the FDA tells us that Don Jr.'s hunting buddy will comply with an ethics agreement that includes specific recusals related to the baby food formula company.
But, you know, representing the baby formula company associated with a deadly bowel condition in premature infants is apparently what recommended him for Donald Trump to pick him among all other available choices. As the person who should be in charge of human food safety for the United States of America.
And so now tonight, there he is. You should also know that among the people who Donald Trump has fired from the Department of Homeland Security now was the person who managed the, quote, Cyber Sentry program.

What is the Cyber Sentry program?

It was described by CBS News today as the, quote,

congressionally mandated program designed to continuously monitor and detect cyber breaches of the nation's power grid, pipelines, and water system,

installing sensors across critical infrastructure designed to detect insider threats and foreign adversaries like China, Russia, and Iran. Because, yeah, who wants us to be protecting our pipelines, our power grid, and our water systems from cyber attacks? Who wants that? Who wants to be protecting that stuff? Make America great again.
Am I right? Donald Trump just removed the leadership of that program. You should also know that Donald Trump has also just fired the government's foremost expert, the nation's, quote, national taxonomist, of the specific pest that almost completely destroyed the Florida citrus industry just a few years ago in 2019.
There is a guy in the U.S. government who is the scientist in charge of making sure that pest doesn't again get into the United States to decimate Florida citrus trees.
Just six years ago, that happened and it reduced Florida's citrus industry

to, quote, ghost groves. Some experts were writing off Florida citrus entirely.
That was a multi-billion dollar crisis in 2019. Donald Trump just fired the guy in charge of making sure it doesn't happen again.
One of the world's leading scientists on that particular agricultural problem and pest.

You should also know that amid all of this genius, very intelligent cutting of the United States government, the Department of Homeland Security has somehow, this past week, found $30,000 to air television ads, specifically in West Palm Beach, Florida, over last weekend while Donald Trump was at his house in West Palm Beach, Florida. These are ads that explicitly thank Donald Trump for being so great.
And the Department of Homeland Security is now spending your tax dollars to air those ads thanking Donald Trump.

The ads are running in West Palm Beach while Donald Trump is weekending in West Palm Beach. Ads just telling him he's great and reminding him who the Homeland Security Secretary is, who thinks he's so great.
They're doing that with $30,000 in tax funds. But sure, the guy who keeps the thrips and psyllids off the orange trees in Florida, no, Trump fired him because we can't afford him.
Can't afford that. So again, our attention spans are finite.
We all only have so much bandwidth. Time is finite.
But I will do everything I can to bring you all the news I can, especially if I think it's stuff that you might not be running into other places. People all over this country are pushing back against what Trump is doing.
People are pushing back in numbers, big and small, in some big national organizing efforts like we saw today, in little local uproars like we saw today, in town halls, whether or not they can shame that Republican congressman into actually turning up. I absolutely believe that information is power, but so is getting up and doing something about it.
Everybody's doing their part. So we've got lots to get to coverage as it unfolds.
Go beyond the what to understand the why. Download the app now at msnbc.com slash app.
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The first 100 days. Bills are passed, executive orders are signed, and presidencies are defined.
And for Donald Trump's first 100 days, Rachel Maddow is on MSNBC five nights a week. Now is the time, so we're going to do it.
Providing her unique insight and analysis during this critical time. How do we strategically align ourselves to this moment of information, this moment of transition in our country? The Rachel Maddow Show, weeknights at 9 p.m.
Eastern on MSNBC. Today, we learned that the acting attorney general of these United States, Matthew Whitaker, is steeped in time travel and Bigfoot.
He was on the paid advisory board of this company that was so all in on Bigfoot, they had a website selling Bigfoot paraphernalia and planned a celebrity event called You Have Been Squatched. I invite you now to join me in viewing the best product.
The new attorney general of the United States ever helped sell the world. The extra deep masculine toilet for the well endowed.
That is a thing that happened. We lived through it.
In Trump's first term, he briefly and inexplicably named this guy Matt Whitaker to be acting attorney general of the United States, the masculine toilet, you've been squatched guy. Trump eventually claimed he didn't know Matthew Whitaker, never heard of him.
That was after he had named him as attorney general. It was all a very weird, weird series of events.
But whatever happened to that guy? Trump has named him to something else this time around. He has named him to be the new United States ambassador to NATO? Matt Whitaker has no experience being an ambassador or being any kind of diplomat or having anything to do with diplomacy in any way or anything related to foreign policy.
He also has no military experience. So obviously he's the perfect choice to be our ambassador to the world's largest military alliance.
At his confirmation hearing this week, Whitaker was asked about the Trump administration's commitment to NATO.

Whitaker told senators that commitment will be, quote, ironclad. Ironclad.
He said that on Tuesday.

On Thursday, Donald Trump himself characterized his commitment to NATO somewhat differently. Quote, Donald Trump has cast doubt on his willingness to defend Washington's NATO allies, saying he would not do so if they are not paying enough for their own defense.
Trump telling reporters in the Oval Office, quote, it's common sense, right? If they don't pay, I'm not going to defend them. No, I'm not going to defend them.
What's the opposite of ironclad? I mean, we all keep wondering if Donald Trump is going to pull the U.S. out of NATO, but he kind of just did by word, if not by deed, right? The NATO commitment is a commitment to defend each other.
It only works if your adversaries believe you're going to do it. If the American president is now just out there saying, I'm not going to defend those other countries, that's kind of the whole ballgame, whether or not we formally withdraw from NATO or not.
The latest Reuters-Ipsos polling shows that while Americans did approve of Trump on foreign policy by two points in January, 39 to 37, they now disapprove of Trump on foreign policy by 13 points, 50 to 37 percent. When Americans are asked whether they personally sympathize more with Ukraine or Russia, 56% of Americans say Ukraine, 3% say Russia.
3%. Trump is in lonely territory here.
And that stark public opinion on this issue raises the question as to whether or not there's going to be some democratic limit, some democratic friction in terms of how far Trump can

push U.S. foreign policy to essentially make the United States into a subsidiary of the Russian Federation, right? Trumpistan or Ameristan, if we're lucky.
Just this week, Trump cut off military aid to Ukraine. It was an order so sudden.
NBC News reports that planes carrying military equipment to Ukraine were literally turned around in midair.

Trump also cut off intelligence sharing with Ukraine, which is way more consequential than it might sound.

From the Associated Press, quote,

The suspension of intelligence disrupts Ukraine's ability to track and target Russian troops, tanks and ships.

Ukraine's other allies lack the same resources to fill the gap. In other words, we're forcing Ukraine now to fight blind.
Today, Simon Schuster at Time magazine cites five senior Western and Ukrainian officials and military officers in reporting this, quote, the U.S. decision to suspend the flow of military intelligence to Ukraine this week has aided the Russian advance along a critical part of the front, weakening the negotiating position of President Zelensky and killing many Ukrainian soldiers in recent days.
Now we've learned that Trump has even cut off Ukraine's access to commercial satellite imagery purchased by the U.S. So not just military aid, not just U.S.
intelligence, but also commercial satellite imagery. Quote, commanders and soldiers keep tabs on where enemy positions and depots are, making it easier to find vulnerabilities in troop movements.
They help logistic soldiers plan vehicle routes with alternative corridors laid out if pathways are mined or destroyed. Washington Post says tonight, quote, the suspension was immediately felt by soldiers in the Ukrainian military, some of whom described the decision as treachery, not politics.
This is serious stuff. And here in the U.S., we are starting to see it boomerang a little bit, starting to see the other side of that coin already.
And then NBC News reporting this headline, quote, as Trump pivots to Russia, allies weigh sharing less intel with the U.S. Quote, some U.S.
allies are considering scaling back the intelligence they share with Washington in response to the Trump administration's conciliatory approach to Russia. The allies are weighing the move because of concerns about safeguarding foreign assets whose identities could inadvertently be revealed.
NBC News citing five sources with direct knowledge of the discussions, including two foreign officials. Quote, the Allies, including Israel, Saudi Arabia, and members of the so-called Five Eyes Spy Alliance of us, the UK, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, are examining how to possibly revise current protocols for sharing intelligence to take the Trump administration's warming relations with Russia into account.
These are our closest intelligence partners and have been for decades. And it's not a one-way street.
We benefit from their intelligence too, right? But maybe not any longer. There are material consequences in Ukrainian lives and elsewise.
There are consequences to switching sides, to not just giving up the title of the leader of the free world, but to actively switching sides so your country is now actively working against it. Joining us now is Mark Polomiropoulos.
He's a 26-year veteran of the CIA. He's also an MSNBC national security and intelligence analyst.
Mr. Polymeropoulos, thank you so much for being here.
I appreciate your time. Good to be here.
So hearing me describe that reporting, let me just ask you if I'm getting any of that the wrong way around or putting too much or too little emphasis on any part of it, as you see it in terms of the impact here? Well, Rachel, let me tell you, the order to stop sharing intelligence with Ukraine, I think, hit the intelligence community like a seismic shockwave. And, you know, for 10 years, the IC, the intelligence community and members of my old outfit, the CIA, have been with the Ukrainians, not just since the invasion, but 10 years.

That's providing things such as resources, capacity building, certainly training. You know, it was it was we were in it in the fight and the struggle against Russia.
And so this is seen as an incredible betrayal. I mean, members of my old outfit, remember, you know, have fought with them or been in the trenches with them, have mourned when they lost soldiers,

celebrated in a. But to see, frankly, this not only kind of at one point a neutral stance by the United States, but now tilting towards Moscow, it's disorienting to members of the IC, the intelligence community, because again, we're now in essence on the side of an enemy.
Given the nature of the fight right now between Ukraine and Russia, flipping the switch like this, not just stopping those planefuls of weapons, but also turning off the sharing of intelligence, turning off their access to commercial satellite material, it does it does seem like it's not just refusing to help. It feels like it is trying to rush Ukraine toward a catastrophic loss.
I have read analysts say that with what we are now doing to them to effectively shove them toward defeat, that the question is existential for Ukraine, basically, based on whether or not Europe can try to recreate some of what we were supplying, the removal of it essentially guarantees failure. Well, Rachel, you know, the U.S.
has been an incredible ally of Ukraine in the past, providing so many different things, not only, as you said, you know, military ordinance equipment, but also key intelligence. And when we stop providing these targeting packages to the Ukrainians, that means that they can't hit either Russian forces inside Russian-occupied Ukraine or in Russia itself.
And the result is the Russians will be able to then attack civilians in Ukrainian cities or, of course, Ukrainian military targets. But let's be very clear, Ukrainians are going to die because of this.
And I think that's why this is absolutely so stunning. Again, an ally, you know, that we kind of we were with side by side for a decade, we have now abandoned.
And Ukrainians who we were supporting, we were with against, again, in the trenches are really going to suffer. So it's an incredible moral injury for the U.S.
intelligence community. But of course, it's incredibly damaging for the Ukrainians who are going to suffer.
And we saw that over the last several days with the results of, you know, these increased Russian drone and missile strikes. Yeah.
And if this Time Magazine reporting, Simon Schuster, is correct, you may be able to measure the cost of what Trump's done here in hundreds of lives already among Ukrainian soldiers. Mark Polymeropoulos, former senior CIA officer, I really appreciate you joining us on this tough story tonight.
Thank you. All right, we've got more news ahead tonight.
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Listen now. All right, let's start with the photo.

This appears in the New York Times.

It looks like it might be from a freight elevator, maybe, from the sort of atmospherics here. But you can see the caption there.
Workers from the Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, preparing to enter the offices of the U.S. African Development Foundation after U.S.
Marshals opened the doors on Thursday afternoon. The New York Times and other places reporting on the kids from Doge being let into this tiny federal agency that they had previously tried unsuccessfully to get into.
They tried on Wednesday to get in and the agency wouldn't let them in. They came back Thursday and they were let into the agency by U.S.
marshals who opened the doors for them.

Once inside, they reportedly changed the locks.

So presumably behind those locked doors, they could go about the business of trying to dismantle that agency and fire everyone in it.

Same basic story from The Washington Post reporting that the Doge kids showed up, quote, with five U.S. Marshals.
The Post reporting that the people who work at that agency, they were warned by colleagues who were having lunch nearby who saw the Doge kids coming, warned that the Doge guys were on the way with U.S. Marshals.
The staffers then used the stairs, not the elevator, to get out of the building. They slipped out that way.
They left their belongings behind, quote, to avoid a confrontation with Doge and the U.S. Marshals.
So this is a very dramatic story, right, about a tiny agency created by Congress. Legally, only Congress has the authority to shut them down.
Trump is trying to shut them down anyway, trying to use this doge entity that is under the control of his top campaign donor to do it. Maybe they don't explain themselves much, but it seems like that's what they're doing.
At this tiny agency, the staffers there tried to hold the line and keep operating as an agency by essentially keeping the doors closed while the

Doge guys tried to muscle their way in, pounded on the door and said, let us in. Here's what I want to know, though.
When those Doge kids came back the second day, they came back on Thursday, and according to all the press reports, U.S. Marshals let them in the building.
was it U.S. Marshals? I mean, who is that in the elevator with the Doge kids, really? We have reason to question whether the men reported as U.S.
Marshals, now in multiple press accounts, are actually U.S. Marshals in the usual sense.
We asked the Department of Justice about it, since the Marshals are part of DOJ. DOJ told us, quote, we are not making a statement at this time.
We do request that you please verify with your sources to ensure your reporting would be accurate. We absolutely are trying.
It would help a lot if you guys would answer the question, are those U.S. marshals? That said, while that sort of unsettling detail remains outstanding,

while we literally cannot tell who it is that's showing up, apparently armed, to let DOGE staffers into locked doors that legally they may not be allowed to be in, while that remains unsettled but this question of who is the armed escort for what Doge is trying to do. The Justice Department appears to be conducting another one of their Friday night purges of career officials, firings at Maine Justice in Washington, D.C.
tonight and at the U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan.
Two prosecutors from the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams were placed on administrative leave tonight. Reporting from NBC News indicates that in Manhattan, those prosecutors were walked out of the building by U.S.
Marshals. Joining us now is Ryan Riley, NBC News justice reporter.
Ryan, thanks very much for being here. I appreciate it.
No problem. Thanks for having me.
This is a question that ultimately will have a simple answer. While it remains outstanding, I will admit to being a little unnerved.
DOGE is involved in actions that a lot of people in government agencies say are not legal. This small agency that they tried very hard to get into and ultimately succeeded in getting into today said that they did not have the authority to come inside their offices, that Congress was the only entity that could dissolve this agency or fire its members.
Nevertheless, Doge was able to summon some sort of muscle, some sort of force to force them into that building physically, despite the fact that the agency told them, no, they couldn't come in. Do you have any sense of who that muscle was or how we could find out? Yeah, you know, normally that's something that we would be able to find out from the Department of Justice, but I think there's so much chaos, and I really just can't underscore the amount of chaos that's happening inside DOJ at this moment.
You know, you not only had those prosecutors who were pushed out, you not only had these leadership changes that are being instituted today at DOJ, but you also have people going after individual line attorneys who made critical comments of U.S. Attorney Ed Martin on social media.
There's people who now have been placed on administrative leave because of that. So this force, the U.S.
Marshals, is typically something that, you know, follows judicial orders or there's a process for or they're following, you know, that sort of procedure. They also have this critical role in protecting judges.
So the idea that, you know, actual U.S. Marshals were being sort of summoned by those to go behind the scenes would be a big deal, but we just don't have the evidence to suggest right now that they are indeed U.S.
Marshals. There's nothing from the government saying affirmatively that these were indeed Marshals.
We just don't really have that reporting. And I think because of all this just enormous level of chaos, it's really difficult to sort of get straight answers out of the Department of Justice at the moment.
And there's so many people behind the scenes, I think, who are really worried about speaking out and talking to reporters just about what's going on there because they're worried about the consequences that will have for them. Typically, being a federal government employee, you have some level of security.
And even though it was difficult to get sources to talk to you, that people weren't worried about just being instantly kicked out for any contact whatsoever or for sort of various reasons or because someone has a grudge against them. And that has sort of been thrown out the window in the last few weeks.
People are really afraid for their jobs. And there's certainly folks who are speaking out.
And I appreciate every single one of them who's contacting me over signal or what have you. But it's a really chaotic situation inside the Justice Department right now and not a lot of certainty about what's going to happen next.
Yeah, a chaotic situation in terms of the firings, a chaotic situation in terms of obviously some of the ethics and the ethical and legal issues happening, but also impossible to get straight answers as to the use of force inside the U.S. government, one part of the government against another.
This is very unsettling stuff. And I know you're on it, Ryan.
I know that if anybody's going to be able to figure it out, you will. Ryan Reilly, NBC News justice reporter, thanks for working so hard on these stories.
It's such a tough time, Ryan. I appreciate it.
Thanks so much. We'll be right back.
You know how sometimes people say, you can't make it up. This is one of those, you can't make it up.
In fact, I tried to make this up at one point. It wasn't this good.
This is incredible. All right.
This is Paul Tibbetts. He retired from the United States military as a brigadier general.
He was a pilot in the United States Air Force during World War II.

Here's another shot of him poking his head out of his plane window. And that plane, it had a name.
You see it painted there in black, Enola Gay. General Tibbetts actually named the plane himself.
He named it after his mom, whose name was Enola Gay. And that plane is probably the most famous plane in American military history because Paul Tibbetts piloted the Enola Gay when it, of course, dropped the world's first atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

These days, the Enola Gay is on permanent display at the Air and Space Museum in Chantilly, Virginia.

The Enola Gay, a piece of bold-faced American history.

Today, the Associated Press published a book. The Enola Gay, a piece of bold-faced American history.

Today, the Associated Press published this database. It's basically a list that was compiled by the Trump administration of more than 26,000 photographs and websites that are on file with the U.S.
Department of Defense. And the reason the AP published this database is because, according to their reporting, the Trump administration plans to wholesale delete all the 26,000 photos and websites that are listed in this Pentagon database.
All 26,000 things here, the Trump administration wants all of these things scrubbed from the internet entirely. And included in that database, marked for deletion by Donald Trump, is this photo of Paul Tibbetts and the Enola Gay.
This photo from the United States Air Force website. And that's curious, right? I mean, it is the most famous plane in modern history.
Why would the Defense Department want to scrub that photo from the Internet?

It's not like deleting this photo is going to make people forget that we dropped that nuclear bomb on Japan.

The tens of thousands of Department of Defense website images have been flagged for removal due to having content that highlighted diversity, equity, or inclusion. They searched the whole Defense Department website for the word gay and then ordered all the gay to be deleted.
I'm serious. That's what happened.
And I mean, substantively, it's confusing. This is like, this is like the straightest thing I've ever seen, right? It's a, it's a giant metal machine from the 1940s, but maybe because he named it after his mom, does that mean he's sensitive? Does that make it kind of gay? Also, you know, you delete the photo of the gay plane, but then what? Do you have to also destroy the actual plane? Set it on fire, drop a bomb on it, although uh-oh, using a bomb to destroy the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb, that might be seen as kind of poetic, and that is definitely gay.
I should mention it's not only the photo of the gay plane. This is Sergeant Major A.C.
Gay. His photo has also been flagged to be deleted by the Defense Department because his name is Gay.
This is it's like that time that right wing website in the mid 2000s, he's decided they were going to change all the mentions of gay and all their news stories to be homosexual instead. You might remember we talked about this a few weeks ago.
The American sprinter Tyson Gay was in the news. And on this right-wing website, they changed all their stories about Tyson Gay to be instead about Tyson homosexual.
Tyson homosexual easily won his semifinal for the 100 meters at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials.

Except now it's not some fringy conservative website. It is the U.S.
Defense Department.

We should send somebody to Chantilly to go check on poor Enola homosexual. See if she's doing okay.