Maddow: U.S. profoundly changed by authoritarian leader; 'We're beyond waiting and seeing now'

The Rachel Maddow Show

Rachel Maddow, MS NOW

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4.5 • 34K Ratings

🗓️ 5 August 2025

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Rachel Maddow points out that the thing most Americans were dreading has come to pass, and the United States has changed profoundly in only six months of authoritarian rule. "We have a consolidating dictatorship in our country." With freedoms likely to continue to be curtailed in deference to Donald Trump's power, that means Americans have the most tools for democratic resistance right now.

Transcript

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0:00.0	really, really happy to have you here. Four years ago, 2021, the Episcopal Church in New York
0:06.1	scored a bit of a coup. New York is already a really important diocese in that church. They have
0:13.0	the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, which is just a magnificent, massive thing you can't believe
0:19.1	is in America. It's up in Morningside Heights in Manhattan.
0:23.7	It is supposedly the sixth largest church of any kind in the whole world.
0:29.2	The interior space is 600 feet long, which is like two football fields minus the end zones.
0:36.6	It's massive.
0:40.0	They've also got this beautiful historic church, Trinity Church, down at Wall Street. And it really is beautiful. It is also
0:46.7	just completely incongruous with its surroundings. You almost can't believe it's there,
0:50.9	even when you're standing right there looking at it in the midst of all these Wall Street skyscrapers.
0:58.0	There's about 50,000 parishioners in New York's Episcopal Diocese, and it's a really diverse group of people.
1:05.1	There are Episcopal and Anglican churches all over the world.
1:09.3	And since people from all over the world end up in New York,
1:12.6	which is the cosmopolitan hub of the universe, the result for a church entity like this
1:19.0	is that the Anglican and Episcopal Church in New York is just tremendously diverse.
1:27.1	And in 2021, four years ago, the Episcopal Church in New York, they scored a coup when they brought in a new priest, a big deal, an international pioneer to serve New York parishioners, to serve in their Asian communities ministry.
1:44.1	South Korea is one of the countries
1:45.5	that has a big influential, important Episcopal Church. The first woman ever named to be an
1:50.4	Episcopal priest in the capital of South Korea in Seoul, she was recruited by New York in 2021.
1:57.0	She was recruited in 2021 to leave South Korea and come to New York to serve Korean parishioners
2:04.2	in New York and other Asian parishioners here in New York City.
2:10.2	The Episcopal Diocese in New York has about 500 priests, women and men.
	...

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