Transcripts For MSNBCW MSNBC Live With Alex Witt 20180616

Msnbc World Headquarters in new york. Heres whats happening right now. Pardon me . President trumps lawyer Rudy Giuliani clarifying remarks about who might get a pardon after the Mueller Probe is finished. It comes on the day the president s former Campaign Manager is jailed. Fact check looking at the president s many claims during his impromptu talk with reporters. What stands up to scrutiny and what does not. Outside income, a new report this week on how much money Jared Kushner and ivanka trump made this year and the number is staggering. Heartache at the border, the separation of children from their mothers. Theres a new report on exactly how many times it has happened in recent weeks. Weve got those details now on msnbc live. New this morning, the president s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, responding to questions about president ial partens on the same day a judge revoked former Campaign Manager Paul Manaforts bail and sent him to jail. Nbc White House Correspondent Kelly Odonnell has the details from her perch at the white house. With a good morning, what can you tell us . Good morning alex. The top former Campaign Official for the president s 2016 campaign, Paul Manafort, lost the relative comfort and privilege of house arrest, he is accused of witness tampering and so late friday night, he was moved about a twohour drive outside washington, d. C. , to a Regional Jail in war saw, virginia. In a section called the vip 1 section of that jail. And Paul Manafort will have to wait there at least as he is pending trial, and thats expected later this summer. Waking up behind bars. A first day without freedom for former Trump Campaign chairman Paul Manafort. A federal judge said she had no appetite to lock him up while he amates trial. But judge Amy Berman Jackson said she could not turn a blind eye. After prosecutors allege manafort tried to influence what potential witnesses might testify about, his lobbying work with ukraine. Late friday President Trumps personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, both floated and pulled back talk about president ial pardons. Hes not going to pardon anybody. In this investigation. But he is not obviously going to give up his right to pardon, if a miscarriage of justice is presented to him. Earlier, President Trump responded to the jailing of manafort with tweeted sarcasm. Didnt know manafort was the head of the mob. And tried to distance himself with false information. He worked for me what, for 49 days or something . A very short period of time. The president is wrong about that. Manafort was in charge of the Trump Campaign far longer. 144 days. Manafort, who claims innocence, is accused of a financial conspiracy can Money Laundering and foreign lobbying. Manaforts lawyer suggested he had contacted former colleagues, not knowing they would be witnesses. But friday, his wife of 40 years and lawyers left the courthouse without him. So Paul Manafort lost that privilege, based on the judge finding that she couldnt trust that he wouldnt attempt to do it again. And she quipped in the courtroom, its not middle school, she cant simply take away his cell phone. Hes facing criminal trials in two different jurisdictions this is involving the washington, d. C. Case. But he is also charged in alexandria, virginia. So it is possible that he could be behind bars in a jail setting for months, before his trial gets going. Alex . All right, Kelly Odonnell at the white house, see you again kelly, today. Thank you so much. Also new today in an interview airing sunday, republican congressman mark sanford issued a new warning about accepting falsehoods made by the president. And so maybe the reason im so outspoken on this now, is theres no seeming consequence to the president and lies. And if we accept that as a society, either its going to have incredibly harmful consequences in the way that we operate going forward, based on the construct of the founding fathers. Earlier this week, sanford lost the South Carolina gop primary to a candidate President Trump endorsed. Joining me now, aaron del mar, and john harwood, cnbc editor at large. With a good saturday morning to you. John, ill start with you, you have a republican congressman in sanford. Whats the reaction, saying that the president is getting away with telling falsehoods . Well Everybody Knows that hes getting away with telling falsehoods. The American People know that the president doesnt tell the truth. A large percentage of the time. Polls have shown that since the beginning of his presidency. But you have a Republican Party that is now dominated by trump and members, republican members of congress who are still serving and want to keep serving. Theyre scared and so they dont speak up the way somebody like mark sanford did. Mark sanford spoke up. Lost his seat. Youve got other people, bob corker, jeff flake, who are leaving, who sometimes go after him and call him out for things he says that arent true. But theyre scared, too. Because their entire peer group is people whose careers and livelihoods depend on standing behind donald trump. So its, its thats why theres no consequence. Any evidence, erin, that members of the party are going to acknowledge exactly what john is speaking and that would likely join mark sanford in speaking out . Or is everyone too afraid of losing their job . John made an excellent point. The people we do see speaking out against the president are ones that arent seeking reelection. That matters, it does dilute their message and it dilutes the power they have going into the next congress. An important line here is how the party is going to cope with this trump effect. As it heads into the mid terms. You have lot of people who are running, especially running in the top states, swing states or swing districts who werent sure whether to run close to trump or whether to take themselves out of that picture and talk more about state and local policies that directly affect their constituents. But this example is going to push people toward cozying up to trump. Lets go to Rudy Giuliani, who tried to clarify comments that he made after he initially suggested the special counsels investigation could be cleaned up with president ial pardons. Take a listen to what he said last night. Why did you suggest it . I didnt suggest it. I said he shouldnt pardon anybody. What i said was after the investigation is over, then it has to be considered as a governmental matter, not by me. And what the history has been is, these people, these things get cleaned up. So youre saying after the probe is over, it may be cleaned up with any pardons. If people are unfairly prosecuted. If they were fairly prosecuted, no. So john, are his comments confusing there . Is he splitting hairs . How do you interpret what hes saying . I interpret what hes saying is trying to serve the interests of his client, President Trump. By suggesting to witnesses and people who might testify against him, that hes going to take care of it. That is a fancy way of saying he is suggesting not that its ing to be a governmental matter after the trials, that its going to be a way of evading accountability and responsibility legally. Rudy giuliani is talking about things that you dont normally hear any competent attorney talking about on behalf of their client. And usually because the clients dont have president ial pardon power. But its highly improper, and Everybody Knows that the reason were talking about this is that donald trump has been surrounded by a lot of either acknowledged criminal activity or suspected criminal activity. He is trying to avoid accountability for himself. And he plainly is entertaining the use of his authority as president to protect himself. That is sometimes called obstruction of justice, dont know if it could be prosecuted. But thats whats going on. And so erin, youve got manaforts bail being revoked. Is the prosecution now sending a message to the president , or to other witnesses, and is that why were hearing this fluid conversation about pardons all the time . Alex this has the effect of the Mueller Investigation, and the mueller team turning up the heat on Paul Manafort. But thats not exactly whats being done here. This is not a sentence as the president said. Paul manafort went to jail because he violated the terms of his release as set by the judge. But the effect this has, when i speak to former federal prosecutors, is that it does make people closely examine whether or not they want to participate and cooperate with federal investigators, ive had people tell me its easy to hold that line until you spend your first night in jail. And then that calculation shifts when you see Rudy Giuliani out on national air waves talking about president ial pardon power and floating this idea, yes, thats a signal that can be taken by manaforts team to hang in there. Okay. We are going to go to immigration now. In fact just moments ago, guys, the president tweeted, heres what he said, democrats can fix their forced family breakup at the border by working with republicans on new legislation for a change. And then heres the president yesterday pinning the blame on the democrats. Thats a democrat bill. Thats democrats wanting to do that. I hate the children being taken away. The democrats have to change their law, thats their law. The democrats forced that law upon our nation. I hate it. But theres no law that says the families have to be separated at the border, theres another way to go about it. So what is this, john . Is it some sort of a calculated attempt by the president to try to put pressure on the democrats, lets get to a compromise, fund my wall . Why is he repeatedly laying this at the democrats feet . Kristen welker made the point. This is not a law. No, its not. Look, alex, we have a president who is not honest, who lacks a moral sense, who lacks empathy. And what he is trying to do is deflect blame for a policy that he has caused to happen. And to do it while leading a party whose core appeal right now is to white people about resisten cultural and economic changes in the country, that have made the country more diverse. The immigration issue has been hot in our politics for more than ten years now. But President Trump has taken it to a level that george w. Bush would find unrecognizable. Because the cruelty that is being inflicted by this policy is something that the administration has chosen to do deliberately. And its not stopping it, because the core impulse in this party right now is to prevent the United States from becoming more diverse and having more nonwhite people in the country. So hes speaking for those people. Hes trying to rouse those voters, those white voters in the mid term election to protect the republican majorities, and he is crashing against the moral sense of others in the country, and were going to see how voters sort this out this year. There isnt going to be a new immigration bill passed on the terms the president is talking about. It just isnt going to happen. Who bears responsibility for this, erin . Was it all exacerbated by Jeff Sessions coming out weeks ago with the zero tolerance policy . So the zero tolerance policy is a Trump Administration policy. This is a policy to refer more people for criminal prosecution than the traditional route which is would be giving them an opportunity to seek refugee or asylum status and remain with their families. Thats why we see an increased number of family separations, theres a massive washington blame game going on. You have President Trump blaming the democrats, you have paul ryan blaming a 1990s court order and you have nancy pelosi and the democrats blaming President Trump. The republicans are in charge of the senate and the house. They can work with the administration to craft an immigration policy. That could perhaps be conservative enough to pass the house, liberal enough to pass the senate and also be able to get to the president s signature but that is impossibly thin needle to thread right now. Its very hard to see us getting actual Immigration Reform by the end of this legislative season. But alex, just to add to erins point, you dont need to Work Together to stop this cruelty that were talking about. One person can do that, and thats donald trump. And the reason he doesnt do it is because he doesnt want to do it. Ill also point out, alex, that donald trump knows there is outrage over this policy. His own administration has framed this as a deterrent to people who are thinking about coming across the border. There could be a calculation here on the administrations side that while this tough policy that is receiving outrage from both sides is in effect, he may have more leverage to steal this debate. He might be thinking that that could get him money for the border wall. This may be a tactic. Erin del mar, john harwood, thank you, guys, appreciate the conversation. Questions about cash what the Trump Foundation did with it, and just how much Jared Kushner and ivanka trump have made since starting their white house jobs, we break it down for you, next. 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If you look at the fbi and you wouldnter in a new poll, the new fbi, the real fbi, those guys love me and i love them. The problem with the Mueller Investigation is everybody has got massive conflicts. You have a tremendous animosity, now heres the good news, i did nothing wrong. There was no collusion. There was no obstruction, the ig report yesterday went a long way to show that. And i think that the Mueller Investigation has been totally discredited. President trump at that impromptu news event giving his conclusions on the Justice Department review before the 2016 president ial election. Joining me now are natasha bertrand, staff writer with the atlantic and as msnbc contributor and katie phang. Katie, having looked at the ig report what do you make of what the president said . Im wondering whether or not President Trump read a different ig report than i did. Its a 500plus page report. I doubt donald trump spent the time to read it. But the bottom line is this it didnt deal with the Mueller Investigation. It dealt with the Hillary Clinton email investigation. And i also want to be clear about this, we all have biases and prejudices because were humans. But when youre Law Enforcement, and prosecutors, you have to put that aside. Thats a requirement of your job. So to the extent that the system failed in that regard, i do think that it was appropriate for the ig report to call that out. But comey, may have been insubordinate and thats exactly the adjective used in the ig report. But he was never called a liar. When it comes to credibility issues youre going to want to make sure when you have a key witness ultimately perhaps donald trump, the person has credibility and the ig report in 500plus pages never said that james comey is a liar. So i dont think trump really has any legal, factual grounds to be standing on to say that that the ig report excull pated him, shows what hes been saying that the whole thing is a witch hunt. Because it wasnt there. You write and im going to quote your headline here, natasha. How trumpworld is spinning the fbi report. How are they spinning versus what is the actual truth . Well there is a pretty damaging revelation in there. Which is that fbi agent peter strzok did text his, you know the woman he was having an affair with, lisa page, that he would stop trump from becoming president. There was a text Message Exchange in which he said well he wont really become president , will he . And he said no, no, well stop it. So that is something that trumps allies have really seized on in this entire report. To kind of fuel this deep state Conspiracy Theory they have that there are Law Enforcement and intelligence officials essentially out to get him. Of course that makes no ses. Because trump won the election and the russia investigation was never leaked by anyone in the fbi. Whereas the clinton investigation was effectively reopened days before the election. Additionally fbi agents i speak to current and former say theres no way that peter struck, one agent on this entire investigation, could have influenced the outcome of the investigation in any significant way. The ig report did say there was no evidence that his bias against trump affected his handling of the clinton email investigation in any significant way. It did not go into whether or not the Mueller Investigation was influenced. As one person on a team of dozens of agents, theres no way that he, not even as a senior official on that investigation, could skr influenced it, could have stopped trump from becoming president , even if he had wanted to. This is something that trumps allies have seized upon in order to bolster their war on the fbi that trump started even before he became president. If you dig into it and think about it its nonsensical. So in essence, trumps allies are jumping on a personal communique between two people who were having a relationship. But there is no evidence that thatnion crossed over the line into a professional sphere. Thats kind of simply put. Improper, yes. But it didnt affect things professionally. People i speak to who know peter strzok say it was a really dumb thing for him to write. Theres no reason he should have been texting that to lisa page on an fbiissued device. Theres no expectation of privacy here. That being said, theres no evidence that his bias or anything he actually said translated into anything actionable. I got to take it as a guy who is trying to inflate his own selfimportance in some way saying to someone, hey, were going to stop it. He was trying to comfort her. She was very upset with trumps fight with a gold star family. I remember that, youre right. Katie, Paul Manafort. Candidate trumps former Campaign Manager spent his first night behind bars in a virginia jail after the judge revoked his bail on charges of witness tampering. Why did the mueller team push for this step . Is there a broader prosecutorial message being sent here . Why . Because there was a violation of the law. We have a superseding indictment that included two new charges for basically exactly what hes in jail for. Tampering with witnesses. Obstruction of justice. And if you think about it, alex, he woke up yesterday morning, in his fancy house, and last night he went to bed in a prison. And i know theyre calling it you know a vip section of the prison i dont care how country club you want to call it hes in prison. He has Restricted Movement and he is certainly not dipping snickers in cheetos dust this morning. Not making light of this. This is guy is going to be in jail pending trial. He will not be able to have immediate access to his family, to his lawyers, he wont be able to prepare in the luxury of his own home. So what is the broader prosecutorial message thats being sent . Number one, mueller doesnt play and number two, hey Paul Manafort, remember how youve been grandstanding and not wanting to cooperate . Perhaps now you will. When you consider manafort versus somebody like Michael Cohen, any both have valuable information to import to the mueller team it depends upon whether or not one of them is going to want to sing earlier. But manafort is definitely not in an enviable position now. Lets see how long he can hold out now that hes in custody. Which no one wants to be. The fact that Rudy Giuliani is dangling these potential pardons at some point, does that potentially open up an entire different obstruction investigation . It depends on how much creedance and credibility you want to give Rudy Giuliani. His destruction of credibility includes himself and this obstruction of justice allegation that Rudy Giuliani is saying thalt president can offer pardons like candy. He can. He can only do it on federal charges, cant do it on state. And the optic of him pardoning somebody like Paul Manafort or Michael Cohen is not going to be well received by anybody. But giuliani likes to talk about faux pass being committed by joe biden. He liked to talk about character problem. Well giuliani is the king of takebacks, we heard he wanted to walk back his statement about president ial pardons, but giuliani is the personal counsel for the president. Hes representing the president and hes making statements that are imputed to him. Can i quickly get to one point with the president and three of his Adult Children have been slapped with the new lawsuit. Accusing them of using the Trump Foundation charity to violate Campaign Finance laws. The president says hes not going to settle this case. Should he be concerned about this . Absolutely. I mean this is a really stunning rebuke of a sitting president , this was the result of a twoyear investigation. And honestly, david farrenholds buyline should have been on this indictment. Because he on the Washington Post first reported a lot of the stealth dealing that was going on by the Trump Foundation. And in black and white it was really astonishing to see ivanka trump, eric trump, you know listed on this document. Essentially theyre trying to take away their ability to run this foundation, trying to dissolve the entire thing. And going to fine them heavily. And there are, theres evidence, you have corey lewandoski, the trump Campaign Manager emailing the head of the Trump Foundation saying can you distribute funds . And they were essentially used by top Campaign Officials, as their own piggy bank. So this is really something that the president is going to have a hard time convincing anyone that his foundation was not used for his own personal selfdealing. Natasha bertrand and katie phang good to see you. The outrage of children detained at the border. It turns out theyre not just being separated from their parents, Gadi Schwartz tells us what he saw inside the detention center. If a family has both boys and girls as children, the siblings are separated. The girls fiscal cliff a different facility, the boys get here and they only get to see each other about once a week. Yeah, you . [ roaring ] [ screaming ] nope. Rated pg13. Im still giving it my best even though i live with a higher risk of stroke due to afib not caused by a heart valve problem. So if theres a better treatment than warfarin, im up for that. Eliquis. Eliquis is proven to reduce stroke risk better than warfarin. Plus has significantly less major bleeding than warfarin. Eliquis is fdaapproved and has both. So whats next . Seeing these guys. Dont stop taking eliquis unless your doctor tells you to, as stopping increases your risk of having a stroke. Eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases fatal bleeding. Dont take eliquis if you have an artificial heart valve or abnormal bleeding. While taking eliquis, you may bruise more easily and it may take longer than usual for any bleeding to stop. Seek immediate medical care for sudden signs of bleeding, like unusual bruising. Eliquis may increase your bleeding risk if you take certain medicines. Tell your doctor about all planned medical or dental procedures. Eliquis, the number one cardiologistprescribed blood thinner. Ask your doctor if eliquis is whats next for you. Welcome back. Im eye lex wit here at msnbc World Headquarters in new york. Heres what were monitoring. We have new information about the facilities where Migrant Children are being held after being separated from their parents at the border. New numbers from the white house that show nearly 2,000 families separated since april. Nbcs Gadi Schwartz got a rare look inside one facility near san diego that holds those kids in limbo. Gadi, to you, good morning. Yeah, alex, people in this neighborhood never imagined what was going on behind this fence. So we were allowed back in there. What we saw, you know, some of it was the staff trying really hard it seemed to make these kids comfortable. Other parts of it were pretty haunting. In fact when we go in, one of the first things they show you is this bell. And this bell is supposed to be rung every time a child is reunited with their family or a child is turned over to foster care. And is able to go free. And so the facilitators here ring the bell and then all of a sudden throughout the entire facility, you can hear the sounds of clapping. From some of these children, these Migrant Children that are held here. Just a little bit about what their day is like. They wake up at 6 30 in the morning. Every single day. Theyve got classes, theyre able to play soccer in the back. Theyre not able to talk to their family very often. In fact theyre only allowed two phone calls every week. Those phone calls are about ten minutes long. And we also learned that if a family unit consists of a brother and a sister and a parent, and theyre caught at the border, theyre all separated. So the brother goes to one place, the sister goes to another place and the family is referred for prosecution. So here at this facility this one is only for males, if theres a sister in a nearby facility. They only have one visit a week. And so they only able toe see their brother or sister one time. Thats what goes on behind this fence here. Very nondescript. In fact they dont have any signs alerting what this place is. Its in a residential neighborhood. Youve got this Shopping Center here. Its kind of a strip mall. Youve got a cafe, houses across the street and this what people see from the outside. Its basically just a fence line holding 63 young migrants here. And take a look over here. This is a of this has been on the news all day. Youve got people coming out. A sign that says families belong together. This is the community starting to react. To whats being going on behind this fence. Alex . Gadi schwartz, thank you for that report. Joining me now, msnbc contributor and professor at the lbj school of Public Affairs at the university of texas, victoria defrancesco, welcome to you. The numbers here, almost 2,000, 1995 specifically of these kids being separated from families at the border under the zerotolerance policy. Thats 46 kids a day over sixweek period. What do you think when you hear numbers like that . I think we need to break down that number a little bit. Further, alex, the bulk of those apprehensions of those children have happened in the past six weeks. So we have seen a spike in the apprehensions throughout the Trump Administration. But especially so now. So you know my first take is, that the issue of unaccompanied minors coming over of children and families seeking asylum in the United States from Central American countries, that have been ravaged by violence has been happening since 2014. And it really has gone unabated. So this zero tolerance policy, this get tough on the border, separating out of families is not really making a dent. Because the issues are so grave from the sending countries, if we wanted to do something substantive about this issue, lets talk about foreign policy. Foreign aids what can the United States do in terms of working with these countries to make the living conditions, the violence, ameliorate the violence from the sending countries. The president is putting the blame for all this squarely on the democrats. Listen to what he said. The democrats gave us the laws. Now, i want the laws to be beautiful, humane, but strong. I dont want bad people coming in. I dont want drugs coming in. And we can solve that problem in one meeting. Tell the democrats, your friends, to call me. What is that about . Because its not a law. This is Trump Administration zero tolerance policy. What, what does this mean here . I teach immigration policy. And i would know if there was a law saying we need to separate families out from their children. This is not the case. Its an issue of policy implementation. So the Trump Administration together with Jeff Sessions as attorney general has made this decision to separate out families. This does not have to happen. This is not something that requires a congressional fix. It is something that the attorney general and the president could decide to reverse. The political back story here is it seems that President Trump wants to use this as a bargaining chip for the wall. How horrendous can that be in keeping children from their families in order to get the big, beautiful wall, which as a side note. Isnt going to keep people from coming over, anyway. I want to get to some of the specific proposals that the white house is putting forth, saying that the president would sign this compromise immigration bill to your point. Here are the key provisions. Ending the separation of children from their parents of legal guardianships at the border there. Legal status for dreamers with a path to citizenship. And to your point, the 25 billion funding for the border wall. What are the chances Something Like this gets passed . It doesnt look good. This was a discharge petition that was in the works. And that seemed to have some support, because in order to get anything passed in the house, you do have to have some democratic buyin. What were seeing in the bills that paul ryan is going to be putting forward, it has republican support. It has support from the president. But not from the other side of the aisle. So were seeing this in theory. I dont think its going to happen, alex. And quite frankly, think that with this hard, hard line that the republicans are taking, nothing is going to happen. Because the democrats are not going to allow themselves to be held hostage. Do you have insight, victoria, as to what this is like for the Border Agents that are having to separate kids from their parents . Dow do they have any option to refuse doing this . Well, i mean theres the official line, you know what you have to go by in terms of your guidebook. But i, you know, i cant help but think that as a parent, especially those who are parents, that they try to figure out what can i do to make this situation, the least difficult possible. And yes, i think there are folks out there that may not have that, that connection, that feeling to the immigrants. But i do think at the end of the day, this is an issue about human emotion, about love, about feelings, about parents and children. And there has to be some element of pulling at the heartstrings. My hope is that that sensitivity would allow the treatment of these immigrants to at least be more humane. Victoria defrancesco, thank you for the conversation. See you again. The 82 million question about Jared Kushner and ivanka trump and how they are serving america in the white house. Oscar mayer deli fresh ham has no added nitrates, nitrites or artificial preservatives. Now deli fresh flavor is for everyone. Like those who like. Sweet. Those who prefer heat. And those who just love meat. Oscar mayer deli fresh. A fresh way to deli. And help you feel more Strength Energy in just 2 weeks. Ill take that. Ensure high protein, with 16 grams of protein and 4 grams sugar. Ensure® yes. Its a targeted medicine proven to help prevent severe asthma attacks, and lower oral steroid use. About 50 of people with severe asthma have too many cells called eosinophils in their lungs. Fasenra™ is designed to work with the body to target and remove eosinophils. Fasenra™ is an addon injection for people 12 and up with severe eosinophilic asthma. Dont use fasenra™ for sudden breathing problems or other problems caused by eosinophils. Fasenra™ may cause headache, sore throat, and allergic reactions. Get help right away if you have swelling of your face, mouth, and tongue, or trouble breathing. Dont stop your asthma treatments unless your doctor tells you to. Tell your doctor if your asthma worsens or if you have a parasitic infection. Fasenra™ is a targeted treatment for eosinophilic asthma. Thats important. Ask an asthma specialist about fasenra™. This week, the white house released Jared Kushner and ivanka trumps financial disclosures. It shows the couple raking in at least 82 million of income last year. All this while serving as unpaid advisers to the president. Well joining me chris whipple, author of the gatekeepers. Welcome to you. 82 million, thats alarmed some watchdogs, is this type of outside income. Is it ethical for white house advisers . Obviously transparency is critical following the law is crucial. I would defer to, to legal experts on the exact law here. But you know it seems to me that the disclosure is a reminder that jared and ivanka had plenty of money coming into the white house. Theyre going to have plenty of money when they leave the white house. And to me, the more interesting question is, what do they want to accomplish while theyre there . You know by all accounts they consider themselves pragmatists, they want to help the president govern effectively. But this white house is increasingly enthralled to the idealogues and the hard right and the incident at the border of children being ripped from their mothers is the latest example of that. Im going to be fascinated to see what extent they have a more moderating influence on the president going forward. Would you be expecting to see them somewhat distance themselves from their Financial Investments that way, just because of people questioning the ethics around it . I dont know about that. I, im not sure that theyre going to do anything differently, and i think they would probably argue that theyve complied with the letter of the law. But as i say, i think thats something that is no surprise to anybody that theyre, that they have plenty of money and they will have money when they leave. And the question is, what do they want to accomplish in the white house while theyre there. I want to switch gears here, chris, as you know the white house had the job fair on friday. Top officials, including most recently White House Legislative Affairs director mark short announcing exits from the Trump Administration. What do such frequent turnovers say about the staffers . And how the white house is able to run . Well, you know, john kelly was quoted the other day in the New York Times saying its a miserable place to work. Im not sure about that. But it is troubling when you see you know, so many competent people headed for the exits. Dena powell was gone first and then hr mcmaster. Rob porter is gone for obvious reasons. But still, you have especially a lot of the more moderate voices in this white house. Heading for the exits or gone. And i think that frankly, the job fair, they should be shopping for the, the highest job there is. White house chief of staff. I think its time for trump to have a change. Ive been critical of kelly. And i think hes reinforced Donald Trumps most partisan instincts, i think hes failed to help trump to really govern as opposed to campaign. So the chief of staff position there, notwithstanding we had an Obama Administration official telling job fair that these jobs for executivelevel positions, absolutely unheard of for the white house. Do you think its something that could work for this administration . I dont think a jobs fair is the answer to this administrations problems. I think that what, the fundamental problem, ive said that john kelly reminds me a little bit of don regan under ronald reagan. Regan was imperious, he was arrogant and he was politically inept. The latest fiasco on the border is another example of john kelly being tonedeaf politically. I think donald trump if he wants to succeed, if he wants to govern as opposed to simply running a perpetual campaign, has to find his own version of a james a. Baker iii or a leon panetta, somebody with political instincts who can tell him what he does not want to hear. Chris whipple, author of the gatekeepers. Thank you, chris, so much. Coming up, separating fact from fiction, following the president s impromptu briefing with reporters on the white house lawn. South l. A. Is very medically underserved. When the old hospital closed people in the community lived with untreated Health Problems for years. So, with the countys help we built a new hospital from the ground up and having citi as an early investor worked as a signal to others to invest. With citis help we built a wonderful Maternity Ward and we were able to purchase an mri machine. Weve made it possible for the people who live here to lead healthier lives and thats invaluable. Its not theirs, its mine. The new rx 350l with three rows for seven passengers. Lease the 2018 rx 350l and rx 350l awd for these terms. Experience amazing at your lexus dealer. Thats confident. But its not kayak confident. Kayak searches hundreds of travel and Airline Sites to find the best flight for me. So im more than confident. Hows your family . Kayak. Search one and done. Falsehoods, lies, inaccuracies, misleading statements, alternative facts, some of the descriptions of the president s friday claims that didnt match up with the truth. He claim the ig report totally exonerated him. But the report did not make any then he also down played his former Campaign Manager Paul Manaforts role and contradicted his own past comments about michael flynn. He blamed democrats for his own administrations policy separating children from their parents at the border. He went on to say north koreas problem is largely solved. And then he pushed back against the suggestion Vladimir Putin is responsible for the annexation of crimea by saying president obama is the one who gave it all away. Lets bring in jonathan alter, columnist for the daily beast and msnbc political analyst and republican strategist reena shaw. Good morning to you both. Hi, alex. Reena, how do you explain all of this. Does the president know hes twisting the truth, or does he think hes stating facts . Theres really no good answer here except for that in his head what hes doing is correct. President trump thinks he is telling the truth. Theres no other explanation. But, the american public, see for what this is. This is a blame game and these are lies, lies and more lies. Never before have we seen such brazen lies come from the pulpit. Conservatives, democrats are stomping mad. But conservatives like me are scared more than anything else that the president is head down a road that we knew he would go down. You just identified yourself, youre the republican on this discussion here. Youre conservative. That is right. What is your take about all this, jonathan . First of all, i think its what you just did with that fact check on the president s comments. What weve seen so far is that you have fact check departments at newspapers that maybe later on go along and in a separate story try to explain when the president is lying. Washington post has a great one. Right. But what were getting now and this is very, very important is that the fact checking, the calling him out for his lies, is being integrated into the news stories which is something that didnt use to get done. It was seen as being not journalistically proper. And what happened was first when joe mccarthy in the early 1950s, he manipulated the press and the conventions of the press the way the press operates on his own behalf. And now trump is doing this same thing. What youre seeing now finally is the right kind of pushbacks. The New York Times this morning, in the news story, it would say not true. Not true. And then later on, false. These are words that we have not seen in the past in news stories, in news accounts on television. We are now seeing them because our job is truth, not just to give the president a megaphone to lie. And when he lies, he must be called out every time in realtime in order to hold him accountable. 100 agree with you, jonathan. But do you think the president knows that hes lying, misstating facts . No. He doesnt know it, you dont think . So he cant tell the difference between truth and lies. An old boss i had once told me, every great con man believes his own con. Thats what makes them a great con man. If they had a conscientious, if they knew they were lying, they wouldnt be good con men. Of course he believes his lies are true. He has no ability to distinguish between truth and lies. Thats a really scary thing for this country. Okay. One look at what happened in primaries this week with you, rina. The Washington Post says that the Republican Party this week confirmed its rebranding as the party of trump with the results of the primaries. Do you share that conclusion . And if so, what does that mean for the future of the gop . I dont share that conclusion at all. Look, South Carolina, of course, somebody who is antitrump was going to get knocked off here. The representative Katie Arrington was a protrump candidate she won because she said somebody needs a backbone to stand with this president. Well, mark sanford, the sitting congressman who represents South Carolina won has a backbone to criticize this president. I think thats what members of Congress Need to realize that principled leadership in this moment means not agreeing with the president. And a great many of them are not willing to take that political risk. Their careers are too important to them. So i think what weve seen here is the party is fully embracing trumpism in this very moment, alex there are trumplicans and republicans like me. I think thats where were headed down now. We are going to see everything defined by that. We are going to see where those people are and where people like me are, where weve been critical of the president. We know hes a danger to democracy. The gop chairwoman is not willing to call out anybody. Whether that be in congress and in the executive branch. He wants everybody to fall in line. She tweeted as much, saying complacency is a problem. Anybody who doesnt embrace the agenda of trump essentially needs to get out of the way. These are terrible times for the party, alex. I think were at a very Pivotal Moment where we have to see the president for what he really is. And he is delusional. Lets get to what senator bob corker did, which is make some headlines, jonathan, this week. He was describing the gops deference to the president as a cultlike situation. Then donald trump jr. Reacted to that on fox news. Here is that. If its a cult, its because they like what my father is doing. You see real americans actually winning for a change. Conservatives actually getting things done. Last answer to you, jonathan. Okay. Is this a cult . Within his base within the blow hard at the end of the bar its a cult, but in washington they cant even get people to go work in the white house. Those used to be the most coveted jobs in the world. So anybody with a head on their shoulders is not part of the cult. They know that this is a dangerous guy. But out in the country, these republican candidates, many of them are finding that the base, if people who determine the primaries, are in a cultlike trance. The only way to break that cult is to wipe these guys out in the general election. And then when they get that message, then the next time theyre not going to be cultish if they want to hang on to their jobs. Lets see what happens in november. Well talk with you both many times before that john and this rina. Thank you. The Trump Administration use of the bible specifically romans 13 to justify splitting ups at their families. He eats a bowl s at every meal he holds your house in the palm of his hand hes your home and auto man big jim, hes got you covered great big jim, there aint no other so, this is covered, right . Yes, maam. Take care of it for you right now. Giddyup hi this is jamie. We need some help. And with twice the detail of other tests. It can show dad where hes from. And strengthen the bonds you share. Give dad ancestrydna for just 69 our lowest fathers day price ever. For just 69 if his denture can cope with. A steak. Luckily for him, he uses super poligrip. It helps give him 65 more chewing power. Leaving brad to dig in and enjoy. Super poligrip. We have a mission to help hand everyone a better world. Thats why we, at the Cocacola Company, make shore breaks with actual coconuts. Tea, organically. Treats for celebrations. Water with added minerals for taste. Dear future us, thats why were striving to do good. And help our communities get the education they deserve. Were doing this today. So you can do even more. The Cocacola Company thats a wrap of this hour with msnbc live. Ill see you at noon. Look at the time, its 10 00 a. M. Stay right where you are for a. M. Joy for my friend joy reed. I hate the children being taken away. The democrats have to change their law. Thats their law. The democrats forced that law upon our nation. I hate it. But theres no law that says that families have to be separated at the border. Theres another way to go about it, mr. President. Democrats laws. Good morning and welcome to am joy. Start with the fact that thats not true. But