President Trump is ramping up tensions with Venezuela, ordering a blockade on sanctioned oil tankers going to and from the South American country. Trump Trump wrote on social media last night, quote, "The illegitimate Maduro regime is using oil from these stolen oil fields to finance themselves." He added, "For the theft of our assets and many other reasons, including terrorism, drug smuggling, and human trafficking, the Venezuelan regime has been designated a foreign terrorist organization." It's unclear w ...

Tonight, President Trump announced on social media that Venezuela is completely surrounded by what he called the largest Armada ever assembled in the history of South America. He said that Armada was enforcing a quote total and complete blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers going into and out of Venezuela. Now, that announcement comes just a week after the Trump administration seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela.And all of that has been done without any congressional approval. And this comes ju ...

The last word with Lawrence O'Donnell starts right now. Hey, Lawrence. >> Hey, Jen.And Jonathan Capart is going to join us uh tonight at the end of the hour with a preview of Thursday night. >> Great. I'll be looking forward to that.>> Thanks. Thanks, Jen. >> Thanks, Lawrence.>> I was not here last night because I couldn't bring myself to talk on TV about the murders of my friends Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle, and I couldn't talk about anything else on TV. And so Ali Veli stepped in and allowed me to tu ...

Money, power, politics. Tonight, the November jobs report may include a warning sign about the state of the economy. More jobs were added in November than expected.That was largely driven by the healthc care sector, but unemployment rose to 4.6%. Now, that is the highest level since September 2021 when the economy was still coming out of the COVID pandemic. Joining me now to discuss is Justin Wolfers, a professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan and Jean Sperling, former director ...

We are now 321 days away from the midterms and we are tracking the fallout for the White House tonight after an explosive report in Vanity Fair. In a shocking interview with journalist Chris Whipple, White House chief of staff Susie Wilds unleashed a blunt assessment of President Trump and his cabinet, describing Vice President Vance as a quote conspiracy theorist, OM head Russell Vote as quote a right-wing absolute zealot and the president himself as having quote an alcoholic's personality. You heard that ...

I was not here last night because I couldn't bring myself to talk on TV about the murders of my friends Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle and I couldn't talk about anything else on TV. And so Ali Veli stepped in and allowed me to turn off the news of the world for a day. I might have something to say at some point about the wonderful experiences I had at Robin Michelle's home, which is now a crime scene, but right now I still don't have the mental or emotional clarity to form even a single sentence about tha ...

Nick, you have been uh to Africa since Elon Musk uh crushed USID. You have seen what he has done. Uh in Chris Whipple's reporting, Marco Rubio tells him something that Rubio has been saying publicly that no, no people have suffered because of these quotes. That's the official Rubio because of these cuts. Uh that's the Rubio position.>> And it's completely false. Of course, you know, as I was reading the Susie Wilds article, I kept thinking of the Shakespeare quote in King Lear where he says, um, you know, a ...

There is a little known tradition in Washington. Whenever a new administration takes office, the new president's incoming chief of staff has dinner with all the previous chiefs of staff. Usually, one of them hosts it at their house or at a restaurant or whatever, whatever it may be, and chiefs of staff from both parties attend. And they all do this so that they can offer advice to the new incoming chief of staff on how to prepare for the role. It's kind of a nice tradition through through multiple different ...

The late Donald Rumsfeld, who served as chief of staff to President Gerald Ford, once told Chris Whipple, quote, "The White House chief of staff, is the one person besides his wife who can look him right in the eye and say, "This is not right. You simply can't go down that road." But Donald Trump has made it clear that he will cast aside anyone who tries to assume that role. Rather than be a gatekeeper, Susie Wilds has given up on constraining any of Trump's worst impulses, which might explain why Trump and ...

You write this um when you're a woman in the public eye, you're often reduced first and foremost to your physical appearance. You also write, "If someone wants to take something away from a woman, they will try to rob her of her femin femininity, her beauty." We have current examples of this right now, particularly aimed at surprise, surprise. I had written the books before that, >> before all that.>> Right. Wh why does it persist. What will it take to shame folks into stopping what you described there.>> Y ...