coordination whatsoever between trump officials and russian officials during the election? we would be crazy to try to draw conclusions from where we are in the investigation. i think mark and i have committed to let this process go through before we form any opinions, and i would hope that that s what you would like us to do, as much as we d like to share minute by minute. even the snapshots we get as a team going through it are not always accurate when we find the next piece of intelligence, so let us get a little deeper into this before you ask us to write the conclusions. that s clearly something we intend to do down the road. reporter: and refusing to rule out if the there are any direct links between russia and the president. and we won t take a snapshot in time and make any observations on it, but we know that our challenge is to answer that question for the american people in our conclusions to this investigation. reporter: the committee plans to interview 20 witnesses,
he meant have meant them as morale booster in chief but our timing seems peculiar. our soldiers are fighting and like never before. in this particular case he was ignoring the fact that the really hard fighting occurred with the invasion of iraq in 2003 and 2004 and 2007. reporter: comments also come after word of a formal investigation into u.s.-led air strike in mosul after more than 100 civilian deaths. the trump administration is now dropping 500 precision-guided bombings on mosul every week a u.s. defense official tells cnn. the top commander acknowledges that keeping civilians out of the line of fire while attacking isis is growing harder. as we move into these urban environments, it is going to become more and more difficult. reporter: as the trump white house increases bombing and troop levels against isis in several countries, still no sign
back now with our world lead. president trump raising some eyebrows right now saying u.s. soldiers are fighting like they never have before in iraq. that s interesting in and of itself. also, with no reference to the military commander that is potentially responsible for an air strike that killed hundreds of innocent civilians last month. cnn pentagon correspondent barbara starr joins us now and white house press secretary sean spicer said the president is pleased with the progress in iraq and this is a different assessment than before he was president. reporter: this begins to raise an interesting question. is president trump s military strategy really any different than president obama? we re doing very good in iraq. reporter: rare comments on the war in iraq.
site created by a movie marketing team and another asked whether the travel ban was a trial balloon tore a coup and there was also a report that the president cut funds for a veteran suicide hotline. of course, none of these stories is true, but for some people these days facts are fickle. it is remarkable how people are condemning the conspiracy theories that trump promotes while at the same time promoting conspiracy theories of their own, and i think we need to take a sober second lock and think more carefully about what the evidence really supports. reporter: a political scientist at dartmouth college says conspiracies aimed at trump may be a coping mechanism for liberals. it s not like conspiracy theories have gone away on the conservative side, but the intensity is seemingly lessened. people tend to believe them when they are negative about their opponents, and in particular after they have lost power they may be more vulnerable. reporter: of course, washington conspiracie
would make headlines. melania trump leaves trump tower to honor some courageous women. welcome to the lead. i m john berman in for jake today. we will get to the bottom of this. that is the promise from senators investigating any links between associates of president donald trump and russia. that was the clear promise. the clear message, enough with the kids table. the grown-ups are stepping in. the senate intelligence committee has invited 20 people to testify and is pledging to work together in a bipartisan way. that comes as we learn more conflicting information about the apparently stalled house panel s investigation which is a partisan mess. an fbi official tells cnn the house intelligence committee has not officially requested the fbi director to come testify which is odd, very, considering that committee chairman devin nunes said this week s hearing had to be rescheduled because the fbi director could not come in. cnn senior congressional reporter manu raju live on