The Rachel Maddow Show
Fresh from scandal over group chat attack plans, Hegseth's conduct opens him to ridicule
Tue, 1 Apr 2025
Rachel Maddow looks at a string of bizarre headlines about Donald Trump's secretary of defense, Fox News personality Pete Hegseth, whose insistence on surrounding himself with close family while acting in his official capacity speaks poorly of his professionalism.
What unexpected event is unfolding in the Senate with Cory Booker?
Really happy to have you here. Happy Monday. Something is happening right now, right this second in Washington, in the Senate. And this is a bit of a surprise. At 7 p.m. Eastern tonight, Democratic Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey started talking on the floor of the Senate. And I think to the surprise of all his colleagues, he soon made clear that he is not intending to stop talking tonight.
Tonight, I rise with the intention of getting in some good trouble. I rise with the intention of disrupting the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able. I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our country is in crisis.
Republicans as well as Democrats are talking to me about what they feel is a sense of dread about a growing crisis or what they point to about what is going wrong, that bedrock commitments in our country that both sides rely on, that people from all backgrounds rely on, those bedrock commitments are being broken. Unnecessary hardships are being borne by Americans of all backgrounds.
and institutions which are special in America, which are precious, which are unique in our country, are being recklessly, and I would say even unconstitutionally affected, attacked, and even shattered. In just 71 days, a president of the United States has inflicted so much harm on Americans' safety, financial stability, the core foundations of our democracy,
and even our aspirations as a people from our highest offices, a sense of common decency. These are not normal times in America, and they should not be treated as such.
Again, this does not appear to be a normal speech in the United States Senate ongoing right now in Washington. Senator Cory Booker has taken over the Senate floor tonight and is saying that he does not intend to relinquish the floor. He intends to, as he said, it disrupt the normal business of the United States Senate. He says, quote, For as long as I am physically able.
and he is a fit and able man, so I don't know how long that means he's going to be there. The last thing that Senator Booker was involved in that was anything like this was nearly a decade ago, when Senator Chris Murphy, you may remember this, held the floor for 15 hours. This was in protest of gun violence. It was right after the Pulse nightclub massacre in 2016. Senator Cory Booker actually...
supported him for those 15 hours and participated in part of that filibuster. That 15-hour-plus filibuster succeeded nine years ago in forcing the Senate to allow some votes on some gun safety laws.
The following year, 2017, Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley held the floor for more than 15 hours protesting Republicans effectively stealing a seat on the United States Supreme Court when they would not allow
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