and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. be there for you, and them. ask your gastroenterologist about humira. with humira, remission is possible. /s welcome to "kasie d.c." i'm kasie hunt. we are live every sunday from washington from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. eastern. tonight, executive disorder. the president puts his pen to paper, but this nation's immigration policy mess isn't going to be fixed overnight. plus, i traveled to the border to talk exclusively with senator kamala harris. i asked her whether it's time to abolish i.c.e. and she said, we might need to start from scratch. and just in tonight, the washington post reports stormy
daniels will meet with federal prosecutors tomorrow. but first, when we came on the air last week, the country was at an impasse. the president calling on congress to act on sweeping immigration legislation to end the separation of immigrant families at the border with mexico. the president insisting he couldn't fix it alone. republicans in congress were by and large horrified and for the first time since the president's election, they said president trump, you've gone too far. and with every senate democrat also taking a stand against the policy, the president signed an executive order ending the policy he started the week saying he was helpless to stop. and now we are back at the start of the cruel circle. families are still in flux. federal officials are struggling to keep up to reunite those families and congress has no clear plan to reform an immigration system that has needed repair for decades. with all this, i'd like to
welcome in my panelment here with me on set, politics reporter for the daily beast and msnbc contributor betsy woodruff. washington bureau chief for vice news, shawna thomas and principal at koej entitle strategies kevin mclaughlin. president historian msnbc contributor and author of the soul of america, the battle for our better angels, john meacham. john, i want to come to you in a second to -- for a little bit of conversation about exactly which angels are in charge right at the moment. i want to start with you, shawna thomas, because this week i remember sitting here a week ago sunday and wondering if this was going to be the kind of story that was actually going to breakthrough, that wasn't just going to be another handful of minutes of news cycle and those pictures galvanized the country. they galvanized both parties. and the president was forced to back down. >> yeah, and i think some of that is you still have people going down to the sites outside of el paso and down in mcallen.
you had members of congress there yesterday. you were there apparently. >> briefly. >> briefly. >> yes. >> and also there was another event today that had basically activists, lawyers, immigration lawyers, that kind of thing. there are still people going down there. we had a correspondent there, santoro, one of the people there with someone running for congress in that district. as long as people keep drawing attention to this, i think it is going to last for a while as an issue. the thing is we're about to be on the 4th of july. we are going to be in the middle of summer, people are going to be taking vacations with their family, people are not going to be paying as much attention. i don't know if this issue goes all the way to the election and that's some of why it's still bubbling up because both democrats and republicans think this is an issue that either needs to be taken care of so it doesn't affect the election or democrats think they can possibly use it, which sounds callous and i understand that. but it is kind of the situation we're in in 2018. >> of course, we want to be sensitive and the reality,
though, is that there still are thousands of kids who are, we think hundreds, at least 1800 plus kids who are still separated from their families at this point. john meacham, can you kind of put the week that was in perspective here for us? i mean, this has been an issue that we as a nation is have grappled with time and time again and we've had, you know, episodes where, you know, america has shown as the shining city on the hill and times when we have not quite frankly lived up to what the statue of liberty promises. >> absolutely. one of the first debates we had in the country in the 1790s, and you know it's a good sunday when you start with the 1790s. was a battle over the alien sedition acts, where we were an infant nation, and yet we gave the president of the united states the power to deport immigrants by fiat. illegal aliens, aliens he believed to be dangerous. into the 19th century where you had the chinese exclusion act, we had viciously racist rhetoric
from mainstream political figures in the 19th century who worried that, to quote a senator from maine i think it was, worried there was going to be a yellow empire from california to the rockies if we didn't limit immigration from asia. there was the fears of the white working class that led to the rise of the second ku klux klan from 1915 to about 1927 that was explicit anxiety that immigrants were going to work harder and possibly for less money. now, conservatives who believe in a free market had some problems with intellectual consistency. that's never stopped them. into where we are now. and i think what's -- to me what's really interesting about the last 12 or 13 days or so is i believe it's the first time in the trump administration where the president has explicitly reversed course or at least begun to reverse course. i understand before people start tweeting, i understand that this is like an arsonist, you were
congratulating an arsonist for putting out a fire. at least the fire was put out to some extent. and i think that the lesson for all of us and the country is that sustained public pressure, sustained resistance is absolutely essential at any moment in the life of the republic, but particularly one when we have a president who seems so determined to knock down the ordinary guardrails and the ordinary conventions of generosity that have marked our best eras. >> kevin mclaughlin, can you weigh in on what john meacham is putting out there? you are -- i don't know if you are a never trumper. i don't know if i want to label you that in public. >> i'm not. >> you are somebody who has been a member of the republican party sometime and seen it change under president trump. and quite frankly, this seems -- it felt to me like the first time that republicans said no way, we're not doing this. >> let me go back to 1790 polling data and i'll take you back like john did. i think there was a visceral
reaction. republicans have worked hard to get themselves in a good place in the midterm election a first time in a long time. they all see it going up in smoke right now. you know, midterms are base elections so i think in the senate actually, i don't think this is having a huge impact. i think it might kind of sort of help, if you will, on the republican side, as long as it gets solved immediately. but on the house side with so many swing districts and so many retirements in those districts, it's a real problem on the house side. >> for sure. so, speaking of polling, the reports over the last week said that president trump wanted the showdown over immigration. my people love it, he said, according to "the new york times." we now have new polling from cbs news and it shows the vast divide in how americans are reacting and perceiving this issue. while 53% of americans strongly oppose separating children from their parents who enter the country illegally, americans are divided over whether reuniting them is a high priority. and the difference, surprise, surprise, is political party.
75% of democrats said reunification should be a top priority, while just a quarter of republicans said the same thing. and nearly 75% of republicans said those who entered the u.s. illegally should be punished as an example of toughness while 80% of democrats said they should be treated well as an example of kindness. here is the president this weekend in las vegas. >> we have the toughest border you can have considering the laws are the worst of the whole country. our immigration laws are a laughing stock all over the world. we're the only people -- people walk in, they put a foot in. please, would you like to register? other countries, they say get the hell out of here. >> and the president tweeting today in part, quote, we cannot allow all of these people to invade our country. when somebody comes in, we must immediately with no judges or court cases bring them back from where they came. kevin, i want go back to you on this, and betsy, i'd like you to weigh in as well. but clearly the president views
this as a base issue, immigration. and the polling to a certain extent bears that out. i think my question is, is the number of those republicans shrinking as this presidency wears on? >> that may be true. i don't know. the problem i have with it is i think the base is pretty well locked down at this point. to be honest with you, the stuff the republicans would want to run on, economy, ending regulation, judges, that's really good for the base as it is on the republican side. and you don't have to lose people, per se, in droves when you do the hot button issue like immigration. i think that's the big reason that republicans just want to -- and congress want to move on and get on to the next thing. >> speaking of political -- the base of a party, this is the other side. this week i traveled to the otai mesa detention center in san diego to talk with senator kamala harris. during our conversation i asked her about the growing calls from progressive activists to abolish i.c.e. take a look.
>> a lot of the signs that the rally you just held were people standli standing there saying abolish i.c.e. is that a position you agree with? >> listen, i think there is no question we have to critically reexamine i.c.e. and its role and the way it is being administered and the work it is doing and we need to probably think about starting from scratch because there's a lot that is wrong with the way that it's conducting itself. and we need to deal with that. >> what do you think should be the alternative to i.c.e.? >> well, first of all, i don't think that the government should be in the position of separating families and that is clearly what is part of what's happening at i.c.e. and dhs. you look at what's happening, again, in terms of how they're conducting their perspective on asylum seekers, that is a real problem and is contrary to all of the spirit and the reason that we even have the asylum rules and laws in the first place. so, their mission, i think, is very much in question and has to be reexamined.
>> what do you make of that? is i.c.e. the bigger problem here? >> well, i don't know how you abolish an agency without abolishing the function. and i think the function is necessary. as far as what senator harris said about examining what they're doing, how they're doing it, i think that's absolutely something we should do. that's our responsibility to provide oversight. but ultimately there is going to have to be an agency before i.c.e. it was ins. there has to be some agency to administer the immigration laws in the country. there are a lot of questions to be answered. i don't know if i say abolish. i don't think that makes a lot of sense, but i do think looking at it makes a hell of a lot of sense. >> betsy woodruff, abolish i.c.e. is becoming a litmus test for democrats. >> that's right. i think particularly progressive activists are trying to make this a central -- trying to expand the overton window, if you will. in terms of the conversation that can be had about policy. that said, of course, these
calls make people's heads blow up at dhs. and what you'll hear from dhs officials, rank and file, it's their job to enforce the law. they are a law enforcement agency and what they will say, pushing back against kamala harris, the senator from california, and senator king, is very much that the problem is the laws themselves. not the law enforcement agency. that's the argument you're going to hear back. that's something you'll hear from republicans as well. the challenge for progressives is to differentiate the way laws are enforced and the laws themselves. the one thing we know is congress is really bad at changing immigration laws. it's been a nonstarter for literally almost decades now, i think. and that's part of the reason there is such a push back against the agency enforcing the laws. >> i also think that how the agency does their job is also governed by who is at the top. so, the difference between the obama administration and the trump administration in the case of how i.c.e. performs their function, whether it be within the country or on the border is that this zero tolerance policy on the border was something that was from on high, right?
so i.c.e. has to send their -- send the people that they catch on the other side of the border into the judicial system. that's not -- that's not the i.c.e. agent's fault. that is a higher -- that is a higher calling. >> absolutely. >> as well as like the raid everyone wants to point to, this is if you can have a sign that says abolish i.c.e. you can point towards those raids that are also doing things to families. but they are carrying out the policy of a president that has been hard on immigration since he ran for office. >> and let's remember how much of this comes back to doj rather than immigration enforcement. the zero-tolerance policy was a decision of the attorney general, jeff sessions, it was his idea. >> it's at the end of the day about the people who are in charge. let's refocus a second i do want to make sure we keep the focus where it needs to be, which is on these people who are still separated from their families. these mothers, fathers and of course the children. i was down on the border because senator harris went to visit that detention center to meet with mothers who had been separated from their children. here's a little bit more of our conversation.
>> senator, you've had a long career in law enforcement i mean, can you compare what you saw in this facility to some of the other things you've seen? >> i mean, it's a prison, kasie, it's a prison. i visited some of the worst prisons in the united states and it is a prison. you walk in. there are two layers of barbed wire and fence. there are people in pods and there's kind of a more maximum security area and then the lower security area. the time i'm spending is to talk with mothers who have been ripped from their children and just -- and the pain, right? i mean, you know, they're sitting with the united states senators so they kind of hold it together and then we start to talk about it and the tears just start flowing. it's awful. it's the pain of having to leave the only country they've known, because it was so dangerous. it's the pain of traveling
through an unknown land, right, through the country of mexico, relying on strangers in these caravans. the pain of all that they will be exposed to during that trek, right, not being in control of much. and the abuse they may endure. and then they arrive. and without even having the ability to yet give their story about the circumstances of their arrival, their children are taken from them and taken to unknown places. it's outrageous and it's inhumane. and it's unnecessary. and i think, kasie, that's one of the most important aspects of this whole issue. it's not necessary. it's actually not necessary. but you know why they did it? and this can't be lost in this conversation. they told us why they did it. the administration told us why they did it. they did this to deter others from coming to the country. so you have decided to exact what could be a lifetime of trauma over 2000 children for deterrence of other people?
it's unconscionable. >> we're going to have my complete interview with senator harris up in the next hour. john meacham, with some of those descriptions, vivid descriptions -- i sat -- i rode with senator harris to the detention sen consider. there's rolls and rolls of barbed wire, double prison doors. it feels like -- it really feels like a prison. i'm curious, i mean, we have a couple dark moments in our nation's history that we all kind of remember. is this one that you think is going to get added to that list? >> it's certainly the most vivid manifestation of what so many people have feared about the trump administration. and i think you go from the travel ban early on to this separation policy and i do think also there is a difference between -- it gets kind of fuzzed up in the conversation. there is a difference between zero-tolerance illegal border policy and a separate children from parents.
and i think that one can be for a strong border and find what's happening with these children to be abhorrent. i think that's an important distinction. and one that i believe, frankly a more morally sound and a more intellectually consistent administration might actually make. why wouldn't zero tolerance by itself be sufficient deterrent? that's a conversation that can be had. the trump administration isn't interested in having a conversation. they are reaping what they've sown. everything is a zero-sum game. everything is the war of all against all. and so i do think this moment partly because of visual imagery, partly because the president was forced to at least partially reverse himself. i think this will be something that at least extinction in the mind longer than most of the trump era, which is
unfortunately there is so much of it, it's almost impossible psychologically to hold onto it. but we are called upon to hold onto it and hold fast to it because we don't want to be the era that intern the japanese. you want to be on the right side of history, and history is forever. these news cycles and breitbart and fox moments, even midterm elections, they come and go. but history is going to judge all of us as lincoln once said, down to the last generation, for where we stood in this era where we had a president who really turned an us versus them rhetoric into reality. >> and i think that notion of history finally got to at least some of the people at least that i talk to every day on capitol hill. we are just getting started here on "kasie d.c." when we continue, we'll get into the culture war, breaking out from a fashion statement that the first lady made to the press
secretary being denied service at a restaurant. and in our next hour we'll dig into the book "born trump." author emily jane sfoks stops by. plus ken vogel has his offering on the white house featuring mar-a-lago. we're back after this. the blade quality you'd expect from gillette... at a price you wouldn't. the new gillette3 & gillette5. available now for $7.99 gillette. the best a man can get.
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are essentially summer camps. >> look, i read today about a 10-year-old girl with down syndrome who was taken from her mother and put in a cage. i >> woman p-womp. >> did you say womp-womp to a 10-year-old? how dare you, sir. >> these are not like it or not, these aren't our kids. show them compassion, but it's not like he's doing this to the people of idaho or, or, or texas. these are people from another country and now people are saying that they're more important than people in our country who are paying taxes who have needs as well. >> michael hayden posted a picture of auschwitz. >> that liberal michael hayden, that screaming liberal michael hayden. >> you're out of your cotton picking mind. >> cotton picking mind? let me tell you something. let me tell you something. i've got some, i've got some, i've got some relatives who picked cotton. >> welcome back. the debate over immigration
policy has gone far past policy and left the basic decency behind on its way. mike huckabee is facing backlash after tweeting out this picture with the caption, nancy pelosi introduces her campaign committee for the take-back of the house. sarah huckabee sanders, the white house press secretary and mike huckabee's daughter was asked to leave a restaurant friday night in virginia because of where she works. sanders tweeted, quote, last night i was told by the owner of red hen in lexington, have, to leave because i work for the president and i politely left. that restaurant has since been inundated with positive and negative yelp reviews. meanwhile white house policy advisor stephen miller was reportedly called a fascist earlier this week while dining at a mexican restaurant here in washington. also, homeland security secretary kirstjen nielsen also engineer jeered while she ate out at a mexican restaurant.
who wants to take this to start? shawna thomas, how about we start with you. >> there is a real conversation here about civility, right, and our ability to be in the same spaces at the same time with people who we do not agree with. and the sarah sanders example is one of those where was that the right way for the owner of that restaurant to handle the situation of sarah sanders eating in that restaurant? well, it's definitely not going to further the conversation between republicans and democrats for her to do that. however, the counter is was sarah sanders using her white house account, her at press secretary twitter account to basically rally the anger against this restaurant in virginia? was that a proper use of her function and her title and her job as well? neither of those things gets us any closer to being people who can actually talk about issues in the same room together, but it does really point to kind of where we are, which is it's an example of how divided we actually are. and it's scary that we're that divided. >> kevin? >> i do think that one of the
things that's frustrating is, you know, if we want to stop and we want to raise the civility is people need to stop celebrating like on the left, they need to stop celebrating people like robert deniro what he said at the tonys. stop cheering what people are doing in restaurants. it's outrageous. it needs to be treated the same way people treat what president trump says people see as inciteful. we need to have a balance. we need to find it, i don't know how. somebody has to put a pin in the balloon. the balloon is about to burst. it's terrifying. feels like a powder keg. >> if we're going to demand do unto others what you have done unto you, we disagree we could at the very least in our personal treatment of each other axe that out. john meacham, is this situation, are we destined to keep going farther and farther down the sewer as this goes on? or is it recoverable? is civility gone forever?
>> no, nothing is ever gone forever. it's redeemable. the founders wanted us to seek a more perfect union, not a perfect one. i agree that it's hard to see exactly how this rights itself, but it can, it should, and i think it will. you know, everybody is in this hobbsian moment. everything is weaponized. the little red hen, whatever it is, is weaponized, the mexican restaurants are. if you're on the left, you're thinking why isn't this appropriate? if i really believe that these people are -- that these people within the administration are ruining america, why can't i take a stand in the best way i know how? so i understand the reaction to it. and i think, you know, the trump people, there is a reason they are where they are. they are very good at playing suddenly, why can't we all get along, after they have
relentlessly and really created a culture of bullying at the very highest levels. if anything, this is a reminder that the president, the presidency, has an out size effect on our manners and morals. some say we are too sentimental on the presidency. even before when he was attacking obama and his birth which is not an issue, if trump had not helped exacerbate the tribal tendencies, he wouldn't be -- his staff wouldn't be facing this kind of backlash. so you reap what you sow. >> far be it from me to disagree with john meacham, i don't think they're saying let's get along. i think they're using this to drive the wedge further and further. it's all tongue in cheek. i don't think there is anything about this that they're saying, oh, my gosh, can't we all be nice to each other in restaurants? >> the other piece of this is
that it doesn't frighten the white house or republicans to have these protesters show up. in fact, there is some evidence that part of the reason donald trump was able to turn the primary significantly against ted cruz when he was was because some of these protests against trump happened and republican voters said, we want to support whoever is getting protested. so, especially on the right, especially among the president's base, these kind of protests result in sort of a conservative backlash that the white house likely believes can be politically useful to them. >> when we return, republicans in congress are split over how to fix immigration policy. i'll speak to congressman rodney davis who has been critical of the white house's approach. and as we go to break, a study from fox reveals male political reporters retweet their male colleagues three times as much as their female colleagues. according to that study, out of the top 25 political reporters who those men retweet the most, just three are women. the washington post sun min kim, great reporter is at number 11.
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welcome back to "kasie d.c." i want to give you all a quick note on what might have been a life-saving moment. spokesman for senator joe manchin told me that manchin aided his colleague care mccaskill thursday at the democratic policy lunch when she began choking on a piece of food. mccaskill started waiving her hand signaling she needed help. another senator nearby attempted to help her before manchin stepped in, lifted mccaskill out of her seat and performed the heim lick maneuver. a local journalist said she suffered cracked ribs. we have reached out to her office. haven't heard back yet. and no word on exactly what they were having for lunch, but we are glad senator mccaskill is okay. now, though, something completely different. joining me on set is you believe
are cann congressman rodney davis. appreciate you being here. i think you share our gratitude senator mccaskill is okay. >> absolutely i do. claire, i'm glad you're sessiokd senator manchin, great job. >> i want to talk about immigration and what exactly the house is going to do. it seems as though and i want to know what your assessment is of where things stand. but the compromised negotiations seem to have fallen apart late last week. now, there does seem to be some discussion of doing a separate stand alone bill to address family separation. is that the case and would you support that? >> absolutely. i hope to co-sponsor it. but i hope we can actually get some movement on immigration reform. we've had a lot of people -- our leadership team has sat down with all facets of our republican conference because we're not getting assistance from the democratic side to address the issues all of us have said are bipartisan issue. let's secure our border. there are areas of our border
that has to have a physical structure. not just with illegal immigration, but drugs that are coming in the country and ravaging the midwest and areas that i serve. we also need to address separation of families and we have to address how we deal with our immigration system at hand right now. eight what do you think is the likelyest outcome? do you think the house will vote on a separate stand alone to end family separation? >> i'm optimistic, kasie. you know me. i'm always the eternal optimist. i certainly hope so. i know those individuals, leadership and folks have been talking about a good compromise are sitting down again this weekend. and they're working hard to try and come up with that solution. the president, when he came in to see us last week and talk to our conference, he was clear that he supported both of the bills that we were supposed to put on the floor. >> sure, but then he tweeted, though, why bother, don't bother doing any of this because we have to win more seats to actually get something done. did that effectively kill any chance for that compromise legislation that was supposed
tonight on the floor last week? >> if it killed think chance or compromise, nobody would have been talking this weekend to try and find that compromise. that's why you've got folks like jeff denim. david, carlos, mario. these are republicans that represent districts where immigration reform is much higher on the priority list for their constituents than many other districts that republicans serve in our conference. >> sure. >> these are the ones that are sitting down with leadership. i have to give our team a lot of credit for being able to sit down without any democrat assistance and try and put together a good compromise. and i'm hopeful that we can see that this week. >> do you think the freedom caucus, mark meadows, jim jordan, other conservatives, are they negotiating in good faith? i've talked to a number of your colleagues who feel like they keep moving the goal post, say one thing and change their minds again and again. >> it's certainly frustrating we couldn't come up with a plan that really was the president's four pillars, border security that actually funded a physical structure. it wasn't just authorization like most bills that we pass in
congress. then we have to go back and vote again on the approps. we loved it all together. we addressed the daca population. 1.8 million daca and dreamer kids would have been taken care of and been granted legal status. >> in exchange for the wall. >> in exchange for the wall, exactly what many of my democratic colleagues who have been working with republicans on immigration reform have asked for. but it's getting too close to the election. the democrats aren't going to come together and help us govern on this issue because they know this issue divides republicans. so, i'm hopeful that our leadership team who has done a great job in making this happen -- and frankly i think there are some that are negotiating this that are a little more worried about where they may fall in the next leadership election rather than work and making our current leadership team look bad rather than actually coming up with -- >> you're talking about steve scalise and kevin mccarthy? >> no, i'm talking about people who don't want anyone in the current leadership team to remaybe r remain in leadership after this election. >> i see. >> i think there is a lot of
ambition when it comes to negotiating legislation right now. >> very interesting undercurrent. okay. i want to also ask you, as you know, utah's primary alexis is set for tuesday. mitt romney has an op-ed in the salt lake tribune. i appreciate the argument made by those who believe we should stay silent, but i cannot subscribe to it. i know that any criticism may lessen the president's flexibility to enact policy with which i agree, but that end does not justify my silence in the face of things that matter. do you think that republicans need to show more courage in standing up to this president? >> well, there is the far-right and the far left, no matter what we do, i'm never going to stand up enough for the president for the far-right. and immediately when i agree to work with the president on issues like tax reform, immigration reform, the far left is going to say, why don't you just impeach him? we have to get to the common sense voters that are
independents and those that really makeup middle america. we've got to stop this politicizing everything like dinner. the fact that sarah sanders couldn't go to a restaurant because of who she works for and her political beliefs, that's not the majority of voters in this country. donald trump was elected, in my opinion, because of this move toward making everything politically correct in this country. and frankly, his campaign was the antithesis of political correctness and he won. there are a lot of people that i serve in my district that voted because of what they see happening on the far-right and the far left. >> do you think -- i mean, this issue that we saw play out over the course of the last week, do you think it's a place where republicans who couldn't stomach it actually stood up to the president? and do you think the president is right that his people love what they saw this week? >> well, i'm not going to be able to answer the second part. i didn't hear or read what he said on that issue.
but i can tell you there are a lot of people in our republican conference that have varying views on immigration reform. >> but on the family separation. >> family separation, that is a policy that is not unique just to this administration as we saw today with jeh johnson's comments. but this is an issue where democrats and republicans should come together and i would hope that we can to pass a bill to ensure that we fix policies so that the flores decision isn't going to be a permanent precedence. >> congressman davis, stay put. we're going to have you join our panel when we come back and we're going to talk about your party's evolving relationship with the president and his relationship with your party. >> you have an outstanding man in dean heller and i know, and i've been on both sides of him. and i want to tell you, he's a tough cookie. he's a tough cookie. and we want him on our side. woman: i stay active
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long-time conservative columnist for the washington post george will surprised everyone this week with this headline. vote against the gop this november. in it he calls for republican caucuses to be, quote, substantially reduced. says speaker ryan traded his soul for a tax cut. calls congressional republicans, quote, the president's poodles and criticizes republican lawmakers for, quote, having no higher ambition than to placate the president. this after a long-time republican strategist steve schmidt tweeted this on wednesday. quote, 29 years and nine months ago i registered to vote and became a member of the republican party which was founded in 1854 to oppose slavery and stand for the dignity of human life. today i renounce my membership in the republican party. it is fully the party of trump. in another tweet he called the gop a, quote, danger to our democracy and our values.
john meacham, put this in perspective for us. i mean, i have been reading george will for, you know, my entire working life and he has always been kind of viewed as a conservative touch stone, intellectual, a place where you could go to hear kind of the arguments that under pinned everything that then was played out across our governing system. he is now not simply saying i'm leaving the gop, he is saying vote for democrats. >> yeah. george is essentially a torrey. he's a birkyian conservative. >> i love it that way. on point. >> one of his best books was a book -- besides his baseball book which is one of the great booked ever, state craft, soul craft. he believes government is not always the right answer, that in
fact there are organic reasons to have checks and balances on the state. i haven't talked to him about this, but i think basically he would have the view -- i don't want to pull him into this. my view is that the trump take over of the republican party is the first recorded case of a high jacker boarding a plane and the passengers sided with the high jacker. the question he is, has the republican party of eisenhower, reagan, both bushes, mccain, romney, is that a recoverable entity? and i think that's a very live question. not sure what the answer is. we have a fascinating senate race down here in tennessee that's going to test this to some extent. and whether a deep red state will go with a republican no matter what, when there is a conservative democrat on the ballot. but i think what george is saying is that the republican party that he knew as a young man at the "wall street journal" and becoming a syndicated columnist is no more. >> congressman davis, can you
get you to weigh in on that? is this republican party the party of trump? do you recognize that as the same party you started out in? >> absolutely it's the same party. george will, i like his baseball book, too. i would hope he would go to middle america and talk to some of the trump voters. talk to the former democrat blue collar voters who gave him the victories in wisconsin, iowa, michigan, pennsylvania, ohio and other states. but george -- and mr. schmidt, too. remember, they live out here in the d.c. bubble. go talk to those voters who put president trump in place. and his goal to make a republican party and a republican house more of a governing house would actually be the antithesis of what he's asking for if he says, go vote against republicans, because most republicans who could lose are the ones who want to govern. >> if anything, it could make it -- i do take your point on that. kevin mclaughlin, final words. >> i'm with the congressman. between washington, d.c., new york conservatives and everyone
else out there, fly over country. it's a huge disconnect, problem for folks in d.c. >> congressman rodney davis, thank you so much for your time. john meacham, thanks so you as well. let you get back to your cigar. coming up, a look at president trump's habit of praising strong men around the world, including one who is claiming victory in an election today. "kasie d.c." back after this. let's do it. ♪ come on. this summer, add a new member to the family. at the mercedes-benz summer event. lease the glc300 for $429 a month at your local mercedes-benz dealer. mercedes-benz. the best or nothing.
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i took control of egypt. >> it's great to be with the president of egypt. we are very much behind the president. >> we've had a great relationship. this has been very successful. >> i have a very good relationship with the president of china. he's an incredible guy. >> i respect putin. he's a strong leader. i can tell you. >> do you like vladimir putin's comments about you? >> sure. when a person speaks about you it's always good. >> putin's a killer. we have a lot of killers. >> really, he's got a great personality. he's a funny guy. he's a very smart guy. he's a great negotiator. he loves his people, not that i'm surprised by that. >> he's the head of a country and i mean he's a strong head. don't let anyone think anything different. he speaks and his people sit up at attention.
i want my people to do the same. >> we have a good chemistry together, kim jong-un. we have a great chemistry. >> it's a great honor and privilege because he's become a friend of mine to introduce the president of turkey. he's getting very high marks. >> those were just some of president trump's more overt displays of affection for strong men. among the leaders you heard him praise, the president of turkey, who claimed victory today in a vote. he called for an election in april at a time when his public support was more favorable than it is now, but it appears the gamble paid off. according to state run media, he claimed 53% of the vote putting him on track to claim a narrow victory and avoid a second round of voting. betsy, that was kind of a
remarkable display. this is not how the president talks, of course, about his allies, america's traditional allies. he was throwing barbs . it really makes me think that's the kind of job he wants. >> it suggests that. one thing we can say about president trump is that there's no evidence he cares about human rights. it's not something he's worried about. it's not on his priority list. he's yet to go after any of these leaders. turkey is an oppressive country. the president isn't interested in human rights questions. perhaps what's more significant is in some ways he seems to take leads from these leaders. he thinks the united states' drug enforcement needs to look more to the way the drug enforcement works in the philippines where they kill
people for using drugs. trump sees some of these leaders as people to model after and that's unprecedented for an american president. >> the president did act in syria when he saw evidence of human rights abuses. thank you for being on tonight. in our next hour, we have a show and tell presentation about the latest coins from the white house, but first our staff of producers has been watching the world cup all day, but managed to find time to watch the sunday shows so you don't have to. don't go anywhere.
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would the media like to hear mick mulvaney's report or would you find it extraordinarily boring and therefore not fit for camera? >> yes, please. >> would you like to hear it? >> yes, please. >> why don't we do this. we'll say grace afterwards. >> we are actually going t use that as an opportunity to take a bit of a break here. president trump there, weekly cabinet meeting, calling on his budget director mick mulvaney for a presentation. we will go back when the president starts to take some questions there from reporters who have assembled in the room. craig melvin here once again from mcallen, texas. you heard president trump there going on a bit about the economy, going on a bit about the bad hand he has been dealt with regards to iran, with regards to north korea as well, and, of course, with regards to mexico. all of this coming just less than a day really after president trump did an about-face on his policy of separating children from their parents as they illegally try to
cross the border here in southern texas. peter alexander has been standing by, he's been listening to all of this go down. what else to talk to you about what we heard from president trump, but we should know the president did hit one of his familiar themes as well, the size of his crowd in minnesota at that ruckus rally. >> yeah. what struck me is we heard the president, again, doubling down on this idea of illegal immigration, barely 24 hours after backing down as it related to this family separation policy as we just played for those watching at home right now. the president speaking for more than 30 minutes, fiercely laying in to some of his familiar opponents, trying to frame this as the fault of the democrats as it relates to the arrival of undocumented immigrants in the united states being fiercely critical of mexico saying they do nothing for us, which ignores, among other things, the fact that mexico is the second largest recipient of exported
trip here. she touched down i would say maybe 30, 45 minutes ago. she is here to meet with folks who are in the center. she is here to meet the migrant children who are being held, to thank law enforcement and the social services workers who have been working with them. mrs. trump, she spoke out early about the separation of kids from their parents and today she is going to be seeing the conditions we're told, seeing the conditions of the detention centers firsthand. she's asking officials here on the ground what more she and the administration can do to help. >> thank you so much for having me here today. i'm glad i'm here and i'm looking forward to seeing and meeting children. but first of all, let me begin to recnize each of you and thank you for all what you do. for your heroic work that you do every day. what you do for those children.
we all know they're having -- they're here without their families and i want to thank you for your hard work, your compassion, and your kindness. in this difficult time. i'm here to learn about your facility and which i know you house children on a long-term basis. and i also like ask you how i can help, to these children, to reunite with their families as quickly as possible. so thank you again, for all that you do, and thank you as well, thank you all for what you do. thank you very much. >> melania trump there. she is actually at the lutheran social services center. i was actually at that same services center yesterday interviewing one of the advocates who have been working
with migrant children here for a number of years, five, ten minutes from here, we're told the first lady is going to be making several stops in and around mcallen, texas. gabe gutierrez is also here in mcallen, over at the federal courthouse. gabe, what can the first lady expect to see while she's here? >> well, craig, as you mentioned she's touring the children's center and also planning to tour a processing center with cbp. that trip was delayed a little bit because of the heavy rain that we've been seeing in this area. i can also tell you she is arriving to an area that has some skepticism about how the president's executive order is playing out. i'll tell you where i am, in front of the federal courthouse here in mcallen, where an immigration hearing is under way right now as it is every day and 60 defendants are here being charged with illegal entry. what is significant about today, craig, is that according to an immigration attorney present
earlier this morning, 17 deftsz who had been charged with illegal entry had the charges dismissed. now that immigration attorney says these defendants had one thing in common, that those 17 defendants were all parents of children that they had been separated from those children earlier this week. they had been arrested as they crossed into the border into the u.s. illegally, either on monday or tuesday before the president had signed that executive order. now craig, why is that significant? it appears that we're seeing the ramifications of the president's executive order play out in real time. there's a lot of questions about how the judicial system w handle this. whether there will continue to be prosecutions of these adults who have children. just a short time ago "the washington post" citing a senior u.s. official, reported that the doj was suspending prosecutions of these adults until i.c.e. could have more resource capacity to have -- to be able
to handle these family units. however, doj spokesperson now says that that report is inaccurate, there has been no change to the president's zero tolerance policy. bottom line, right now there are a lot of questions about how this executive order will play out. overnight we had the conflicting statements from hhs at first saying there was no plan to reunify the families and a few hours later another official saying that the reunification of families was the ultimate goal and they were waiting further guidance on how to proceed. so craig, certainly a lot of questions playing out right now here on the ground in south texas and the federal building behind me, craig. >> all right. gabe gutierrez, about ten minutes from where i am here. inn mcallen, texas. we can tell you this is the video you saw there of the first lady, melania trump at the lutheran social service facility, video taken moments ago. mrs. trump is on the move right now. she is in route to a location --
we don't know precisely where she's headed but told when we get more images and pictures we'll bring those to you. she is expected to be spending the course of the day with social services workers, with law enforcement officials as well getting a firsthand look of the effort being made on the ground. it should be noted here, it was first lady melania trump a few days ago who surprised a lot of folks by saying through a spokesman, a very short statement, quote, mrs. trump hates to see children separated from their family and hopes both sides of the aisle can finally come together to achieve successful immigration reform. she believes we need to be a country that follows all laws, but also a country that governs with heart. president trump saying just a few moments ago there in the cabinet room announcing that his wife was making this surprise trip here to south texas. once again indicating that she had been quite moved by the
images that had been coming out of south texas over the past few days. peter, what more do we know about melania trump's influence on the president's change of heart if you will? >> well, i think we know that the president is driven by images, perhaps before anything else. he spends a lot of time speaking to friends and allies outside the white house, but he is certainly someone who consumes a ton of media. reading newspapers, but most often watching cable tv and based on conversations i've had the belief system is, that this president was in many ways motivated to make this decision based on what he was seeing on television. but it's certain that part of what swayed his decision, was the guidance, privately of the first daughter, ivanka trump, and the first lady melania trump, according to sources familiar with the matter. the first lady you'll remember, only a matter of weeks ago, announced her formal platform, be best, supposed to focus
specifically on children, which is why on this day, i think it's notable that she is sort of the ambassador on behalf of this administration who is going down to visit with some of the children today. >> all right. peter stand by. let's go back to the cabinet room here. president trump taking questions. nancy pelosi, they can come over, they can bring whoever they want. but the lawmakers have to sit down and have to do something because our country cannot continue to run like this. we can't have open borders. you have to have borders. you don't have a country without borders. they have to be enforced. it has to be a strict enforcement. at the same time we want people to come into our country, we need them. we have many companies right now moving back into the united states, they need workers. we have 3.8% unemployment. they need workers. we have to have them come in. i'm saying i want people to come in. they have to come in inn through a merit system. we can have a lot of people come into our system through the
merit system so they can help these companies that are looking so hard for people to make the company work. but the -- in a very simple way congress has to get together, get their act together. democrats and republicans. they have to come up with a solution. i have ideas, they have ideas, we can put them together very easily. there's so much hatred, there's so much -- i mean honestly i'm not saying this -- there's a lot of false reporting, misreporting, there's also a lot of great reporting. but congress has to come together and this is the best time to do it. right now, i think is the best time i've seen for people that really are well meaning now, unfortunately we have an election coming up in a few months and, you know, i guess they're looking at it and we're looking at it and maybe we have to just sort of put on the blinders when it comes to doing that, but congress has to get together and we have to d something on immigration. it's very important.
we have to change almost everything that's been done in the past. we are being laughed at as a country because of our bad immin policies. we're a young administration. this has been going on for 50 years, 60 years, 70 years. but it's gotten worse over the last 20 because laws have been so complex and so ridiculous, we really don't have a law. we have laws that don't allow you to do what you're supposed to be doing. and we also to keep it in a very humane way. we want to take care of people. if we don't take them in we have to help. we need help from mexico. mexico has not helped us, and we need help from mexico. that's a long answer but i also appreciate the great job you've done. [ talking at the same time ] >> i can't hear you. >> kids already separated from their parents? >> we want to put them together.
we don't want to have children separated from their parents. you have to understand, you gave an example of 12,000 children. of the 12,000 10,000 came up either alone, they weren't necessarily young children, but either alone or came up with traffickers. and coyotes. these coyotes are bad dudes. but they came up with other people, brought them up, and they used them, they are using the children. 10,000 out of the 12,000. of the 2,000 a lot of the people where they came in with their children, this is their third, fourth, fifth time trying to come into our country. so this is not a perfect situation. this is a very bad. port of entry, if you go to a port of entry, it works out very nicely. they've been doing a very good job. they don't want to come in through the port of entry. thatd doi it the legal way. many of the people in the 2,000 category, you're talking about 2,000 children, those are people that have tried to come into our
country many times the same way. they don't want to go into the port of entry. usually that's for a very bad reason. why don't they want to go in legally? you have to ask yourself that question. so you have a situation that is right for congress get together and examine up with a solution. and i am ready willing and able to help, ready, willing and able to take this pen right here and sign very quickly. >> [ inaudible ] tolerance to the system ? >> if we took zertolerance away, you would be overrun as a country. you would have millions of people pouring through our border. if you took zero tolerance away, everybody would come right now. there would be -- they would be getting their little belongings, unfortunately, and they would be heading up. you would be -- you would have a run on this country the likes of which nobody has ever seen. so we have to have strong
borders. frankly, the wall in terms of drugs, in terms of keeping certain people out that we don't want in this country, the wall is imperative. we have to have the wall. we've started the wall. we have $1.6 billion. we're fixing tremendous amounts of wall where it's been overrun. but we have to come up with a solution. i would consider it, whether it's north korea, whether it's so many other things, we have a lot of things. look, i've been given a very tough hand because i came up here, we had an economy that was going down, we had an iran problem, we had a middle east problem, take a look at what was going on in the middle east. it's a lot better now. a lot smoother right now than anything you heard over the last eight years. but we were given a lot of bad cards. one of the bad cards, we were given this immigration mess. and it was made worse by all of
the different contradting laws that have been passed. so we're going to work very hard with mike pence and with everybody else in this room, we're going to work hard to see if we can solve the immigration problem. but we need democrats to be able to do it. if they're going to obstruct it can't be done because the republicans don't have the votes. now, i think we're going to win additional senate seats. that will help us a lot. but unless we get additional senate seats, and unless we keep the house more or less like it is right now, you're not going to be able. unless the democrats are serious and they want to come along and ey want to get immigration work done. we can do something that's going to be historic. we can do something that will be historic. and we can get it done. i am ready. i'm here. all of these people, these are very talented people, we're all ready, we're all here. we need votes from the democrats or nothing can pass. thank you all very mh.
>> all right. president trump in, weekly cabinet meeting. taking a few questions from a handful of the assembled reporters. let me go back to peter alexander for a moment here, peter, the question that i did not hear asked and i haven't heard -- i haven't heard an explanation yet, correct me if i'm wrong, but the administration has yet to explain how it is that the president was able to sign an executive order reversing essentialla policy decision that was announced by his attorney general just a few months ago, how is he able to sign that order when for the better part of the past week, he's said several times that he couldn't do it by executive order, his homeland security secretary said essentially the
same thing. has anyone in the administration explained how they were able to do something that for days, they were insistent upon they couldn't do it? >> i don't think they have. certainly not very well, craig. let's be clear, this administration, this president, his advisors and aides, including the secretary of homeland security, kirstjen nielsen, for days, repeatedly and wrongly insisted that their hands were tied. effectively saying only congress could do something about this, the president could not resolve this by executive order. what is evidenced by what he did yesterday the president was able to at least suspend the separation of these young, undocumented immigrants fm their families by signing that order. now none of this resolves what is the current problem which is trying to reunite those young immigrants with their families more than 2,000 of them now spread in many cases around the united states. the process of trying to reunite
them with families is going to be a challenging one, one for which there has been limited, if any, clarity from the administration. kirstjen nielsen earlier today telling reporters they have a plan, but a spokesperson for her department earlier said that they basically haven't received any further guidance on that matter to this point. at the end of the day what the president has been trying to do here as evidenced by his remarks yesterday where he used the word strong seven times, is to try to cast himself as the strong guy, the tough guy, when it comes to illegal immigration, even while at the same time backing away from a policy that simply could not stand. as evidenced by the outspoken remarks from republicans and democrats alike on this issue. the president again today speaking firmly about illegal immigration, even his wife is down at the border visiting with those doctors, those social workers and those young individuals who in many ways were victimized by this.
they committed an illegal act by crossing the border, but they did it with adults so they were not in a position to do it of their own fruition so to speak and it's those individuals well being at the center of the firestorm across this country. >> peter alexander for us there from the white house as we, again, look at these images from here in mcallen, texas, where first lady melania trump, touched down last hour. i want to bring in our panel now and spend a little more time talking about the firstady's trip to talk about what we heard from president trump there as well. susan page, washington bureau chief for "usa today" with me. so is presidential historian and journalist jon meacham, an msnbc contributor and immigrations rights advocate ann chandler. a big thanks to all of you. let me just start, we're starting to get a little more color from inside this lutheran services center where melania trump was a few moments ago. again, we're told that right now
the first lady is on the move. she is likely being hampered a bit by the weather here in south texas. it has been raining torrentially for the better part of two days. flash flood warning in effect for most of the area. so she is having to reroute just a bit we're told. susan, we're told that the first lady has a translator with us to talk to the children who do not speak english. although many of these kids appear to have a grasp on the english language. she visited a series of classrooms, colorful drawings, beautiful landscapes, large sculptures of letters made out of crayons hung from the ceiling here. we're told the first lady shook hands and she told them at one-point, quote, be kind and nice to each other, okay. the girls giggled at that. she asked them, are you trying to learn to speak english. most of them nodded. melania trump asked the boys how
old they were, what their favorite subject in school is. these are some live pictures now. this is the first lady signing this oversized american flag e. this is a flag that we're told was made just for her. as you can see there, welcome first lady on it in big black letters. she asked the children where they are from and asked them to demonstrate their writing skills for her as well. first lady melania trump moving about. susan, let's talk about this trip and talk a little bit about melania's role, the role that she appears to be carving for herself. peter alexander, referring to her as the secretary of compassion a few moments ago. >> it is so interesting that the first lady chose to make this surprise trip to texas, and, you know, she's not someone who has weighed in on a lot of public policy matters so that means you really pay attention when she chooses to do so. it seems to me she is sending
such a different picture than her husband, just by going down there. she doesn't have to confront him on any policy questions. just the fact that she is there and focusing on the welfare of these kids who have come across the border since sends such a different message. i wonder to what degree she has an audience of one, she has her husband and his policies in mind when she goes down there and makes these appearances today. >> we have seen her sort of play this role a few times. the aftermath of hurricane maria, we saw the first lady. in las vegas after the deadly shooting at the hotel there. there's a look at some of the other trips that the first lady has made. jon meacham, i want to go back to something we were just talking about a few moments ago.
the idea that president trump -- we can dance around it, i suppose. the reality is the president capitulated. here's a president who appeared to really be digging in his heels just 24 hours prior, and then all of a sudden he announces that he is, in fact, going to reverse his own policy. let's not lose sight of that. >> yeah. >> but the president had a change of heart to a certain extent it would seem. what are we to make of that, jon meacham? is this the first time in his presidency that we've seen something like that? >> well, i think so. and i guess, craig, i would argue a little bit or suggest that the phrase is not a change of heart because, though, i can't see into his heart, obviously, i suspect that wasn't it, but it was a change of mind because of the politics and the -- i hate this word but the optics of the moment. and to some extent you to ask yourself, you know, the country
has spent the last ten days or more entirely focused on this issue, and if it's really about shees children, then -- these children, then we should be thinking this kind of protest, this kind of attention, has truly moved us in the right direction, not completely, but today is better than yesterday for these children who have been separated from their families. so i think we have to say that, not to give the president undue credit, i don't mean that, it was a crisis of his own making, but if we're going to have anything remotely resembling a rationale, political conversation in the country, which is a very elusive thing in the best of times, and this is not the best of times, i think we do have to be able to say, all right, this is a good day, we can keep pushing, keep working. on the first lady being down there in that very interesting,
interesting list you just showed about her other trips, one of the things that i don't know how widely understood it is, there are some people in the white house, particularly in mrs. trump's part of it, who have been part of previous administrations and understand what normal white houses do. if you look at that list you see that that's a role where a first lady is making a stand, playing out the symbolic role of the office, in a way that makes more sense to those of us who are accustomed to the rhythms of a white house. >> there really is, jon meacham, no downside to the first lady making trips like this. >> no. and, you know, if you're a particularly hard core anti-trump person, right now, at home, you probably have your lighter about to set your hair
on fire because what you think is happening is here we are, as m mark gurrin, the clinton communications director once said, the white house press corp is like an 8-year-old soccer team, they kick a ball and we chase it. the cynical view is one of the great points of modern washington life, the cynical view, we fell for it, right. we just fell forhe fact that now we're looking at this and thinking that the trumps are engaged in compassion. i understand all that. you understand it. at the same time here's the first lady of the united states and this is a better thing to be doing than staying out of sight and letting her husband, the most radically unconventional president in history, run over american values. so good for her for going down there. >> ann, let's talk about the
policy here. for a moment as we continue to watch these pictures of melania trump inside this facility here in south texas. i spent some time at a vigil and walk last night here in mcallen, and everyone in the crowd, a few hundred folks, they were all acutely aware that the president had signed this executive order reversing his own policy, ending the separation of children from their parents here. but there was still a great deal of, shall we say, skepticism and suspicion that this was going to be a practice that actually ended and that there was going to be, in fact, this sort of radical change. ann, in terms of the president's actions, what do they mean for the 2300 children who have been separated from their parents over the last month, what do the president's actions mean and perhaps just as important, what don't they mean? so i think skepticism and
suspicion are good terms to use. i mean what we read that executive order to mean was a few things. number one, that family separation, the policy that he put in place and then removed, is going to be replaced with something we believe that will look like family detention. number two, we still saw the zero tolerance and the sense that kind of ignoring that our nation does have protective laws and policies and procedures in place, not have an open border but procedures in place where asylum seekers arrive on borders and ask for asylum, kind of zero tolerance unfortunately is still in place. and third, what was most scary about the memo was, a sense that there is nothing wrong with detaining children in places of mass incarceration for prolonged
periods while they try to tell our government officials about the rapes they might have suffered, the human trafficking in their home country, about what the gangs might have done to their sibling or to themselves. and so i'm very -- i am de, deeply concerned that family detention under this administration may be and may capture the horror of the world in the same way that the world was horrified as we stripped children from their mothers and their fathers. >> and stand by for me in a moment because we have a bit of an update as it relates to the first lady's schedule. these are pictures from inside the lutheran social services of the south facility here in mcallen, texas. i can tell you i was there yesterday, this is a facility that has been open for three or
four years and we do not know, by the way, if any of the so-called tender age migrants, the toddlers, babies, we don't know if any of them are being kept here. t i can tell you that this is a facility for boys that was once anlyare facility. but an update here on the first lady's travel. she is apparently headed back to the airport, back to mcallen international airport. we were told that she was going to be heading to a processing center. the largest immigration processing center is here in mcallen texas. her plan had been to heado that processing center. we're told now she's headed back to the airport because of the widespread flooding that we have right now in mcallen, texas, and the surrounding areas. it has been raining torrentially for the better part of two days. that flooding we're told is affecting the first lady's caravan.
her ability to move around south texas. melania trump headed back to the airport now, presumably to head back to washington, d.c. that second stop likely going away because of the flooding. i can, again, i can tell you firsthand that the processing center, i was in front of the processing center this morning for the "today show," it was sufficiently flooded at around 10:00 a.m. and it has rained pretty much nonstop for the past three hours. so first lady melania trump heading back now to washington, d.c., what was going to be a bit of a tour here in south texas, is not going to happen. this one stop is going to be all the first lady is able to do because of the weather. and let me come back to you here for just a moment, because as you know, according to msnbc's exclusive reporting, as many as 21 military attorneys are being sent here and to other border states as well to help prosecute
immigration cases. congressman ted lewis is a former jag attorney, jags are not trained in immigration law. jag' mission is to help commanders fight our wars, not prosecute misdemeanors. is it in your opinion, is it a wise move to send attorneys here with limited immigration law experience into this situation? are they going to be able to help at all or do you foresee that being more of a hindrance? >> well, you know, i'm not familiar with the jag attorneys' background or professionalism. they handle that duty. what i am aware of is, that it is completely absurd that the u.s. attorney's office and now potentially jag attorneys, will be prosecuting asylum seekers for the misdemeanor of arriving on our country at a place that
is not designated by our government. you know, i think one thing that was left out by president trump's remarks, washe ability to -- individuals to actually access our asylum on the port of entries. i think it's really important for us to listen to the accounts of asylum seekers as they describe arriving on our bridges and our government officials telling asylum seekers i'm sorry, we can't process you. our -- we're closed for the day, please come back later. the border zone, one thing i think president trump got right, right now is a very dangerous place. we see many asylum seekers that have suffered rapend harm along this very perilous journey and it is incumbent upon our country as we look at zero tolerance, to demand for our government to allow a safe, orderly process for these children and these parents to be able to access protections and
individual evaluationings of their cases. so i'm concerned less about the professional background of the prosecutors than the fact that we're prosecuting asylum seekers for an illegal act where our law says one can seek asylum in our country, regardless of how they enter our country. >> jon meacham, president trump last night, at one of these rallies, one o these campaign-style rallies, doing what the president tends to do, going off script. one of the things that i found especially interesting if you will, after the rally was over, and was reading on-line, as well, and some other folks that seemed to share this sentiment, this is a president who seems to be exploiting the culture wars in this country more so than any predecessor, any of his predecessors, at least during my
lifetime. we've always had culture wars, abortion, gay rights. here's a president that seems to every month or two, manage to find another battle in the culture wars to exploit. am i overstating that or is this a president who has managed to -- why -- and i always hate putting guests in this position but i'll do it because you're jon meacham, why? why manage to exploit -- why exploit the culture wars to the extent he's doing it? >> i'm happy to be put on that spot. that's how he rose to power. he makes thomas hobbs look like a peacemaker. it turns out that the trump era is nasty, brutish and longer than we would like. i don't think there's any great mystery here. how did donald trump enter the heart of the hard core right wing coming out of a very new york background? he did it by lying about barack
obama and his birth certificate. he has trafficked in conspiracy theories. he's trafficked in caricatures, reaping the whirlwind of that right now. there is a rationale conversation to be had about what's going on at the border. there are two different issues here at least in the popular mind. the family separation and the zero tolerance policy. those are -- i know they are related but in the popular mind as the issue was presented to the country over the last couple, ten days or so, they are different. the issue, the focus was on these children who were being victimized by a separation policy. many. and everyone, you know, i don't know what the numbers were exactly, but we can agree that that was a terrible thing. and a situation of the trump administration's creation. now the question about the
border and asylum granting is separate or is different, anyway. and a different conversation. a president who did not traffic in care ka tours and as you say rightly fight constant cultural battles, could ask for a moment of having a rationale debate about that, but trump has to deal with the world he created. he's not a -- just -- i can't believe i have to say this sentence out loud, to say that donald trump doesn't really engage new wa engage nuance is perhaps the greatest understatement one can imagine. i think that we're in a particularly difficult political time, obviously, made exacerbated by the way trump has weaponized almost everything in our national life. and so there's -- i think the reason he does it, if you ask for the reason -- because that's
what got him to this point. it's what got him to that chair. all of us are doing exactly what he wants. we're sitting here talking about him and looking at him. you know, this is perhaps the longest abusive relationship in american history. there you go. >> that's a good spot -- >> susan, i'm sure you'll have a keen point. >> we're going to -- you know what -- susan, go ahead, as we look at the first lady here at mcallen international airport. live pictures here of the first lady posing with some of the law enforcement folks who have gathered there on the tarmac as she gets ready to head back to washington. what were you about to say? >> i was going to say to add to jon's point. it's five months before midterm elections that could dramatically change president trump's tenure and i think that one of the things that we know is that one of the issues,
perhaps the issue that most energizes his base voters, that supporters who have been with him from the start, is this issue of immigration. by talking about the threat from the border, talking as he did as we saw in this hour, talking about open borders and a flood of people who would come over the board fer he didn't maintain his zero tolerance policy, that is a message that will energize, i think, his supporters to get out and vote in midterm elections. and that may be hard. you know we know that first term midterm elections can be brutal for presidents. that was certainly true for president obama. it was true for president clinton. and this is i think a way politically to get his troops as energized as democrats are at the moment about the elections we're going to see in november. >> first lady melania trump making her way up the stairs of that 787. maybe a 737. i'm not sure actually. making her way on board getting ready to take that flight back
tohington, d.c. it was a whirlwind trip for the first lady, melania trump a few moments ago inside the lutheran social services of the south facility in mcallen, texas. that is one of the handful of facilities here in the area that uses migrant children. this particular facility houses boys. i was there yesterday, boys between the ages we're told of 8 or 9 and 16 or 17. these are boys who are not allowed to leave the facility. they are allowed to go outside and engage in recreation for close to two hours a day. they receive some instruction. they're also allowed to spe some time with members of the clergy as well. but melania trump on the ground here for about an hour. again, the plan was, we're told, for the first lady to make at least one additional stop. she was going to stop by a
processing center, one of the immigration processing centers, the largest center is here in mcallen, texas, but the first lady, because of the weather here on the ground, flooding in mcallen, texas, around mcallen, texas, was only able to spend 75 minutes. ose who are watching and listening and might think that is some sort of line from the white house, i can tell you firsthand, that there are a number of major thoroughfares that are flooded here. a flash flood warning in effect for a while. thank you susan, jon meacham, who managed to work in the thomas hobbs reference on cable news in the afternoon, thanks to you aswell. the plight of these children, separated by from their families that plight has struck at the hearts of many americans. some came here last night to south texas to take part in a vigil to offer their prayers and
hopes for these young victims of this crisis. i spent time with a few of them. >> i'm very concerned about both reuniting the families who have been separated from their children now there's been thousands of children, just like my little guy right here, as young as him. >> we need to unify them. find them and get them back together with their parents. >> you think that should be the next order of business? >> absolutely. >> are you optimistic that's something that's going to happen? >> i remain faithful and optimistic. >> you came here from new york. >> i did. i came down to protest, to -- yeah, to say people coming, people are in need and we're meeting them at the border saying, go to jail instead of come on in and we'll help. >> the president says that we've got ms-13 gang members coming in. >> i've seen the pictures of those gang members.
they're 4 years old. among the immigrants who come here across the border, crime is lower than it is for the likes of me and you. lower rates of crime. maybe we should go. >> josh ruben, by the way, there the character in the hat, hopped on a plane yesterday, left brooklyn, and came last night just for the vigil and just to protest. we're also keeping a very close eye on capitol hill where two te on those two different republican immigration bills are scheduled for later this afternoon, but that could change. we are going to check in with our garrett headacaike on the o side of this break. (vo) new purely fancy feast filets.
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♪ do you still think i'm crazy standing here today ♪ ♪ i couldn't make you love me applebee's 2 for $20, now with steak. now that's eatin' good in the neighborhood. right now on capitol hill, we are waiting for two highly anticipated votes on two immigration bills. but now the timing may be in question. zbart headac garrett haake is standing by with an update. >> house republicans are once again all twisted up about their immigration plan and everything is in flux. we expect we'll see one vote
today, for certain. that's the vote on this more conservative goodlatt e-bigoodl that's supposed to happen in the next hour. there is a meeting going on right nowspeaker's office. people have been coming out and going in. bottom line is, members don't entirely know what's in this compromised bill despite all the work that's been put into it. remember this morning you had the president of the united states on twitter saying, why bother with this bill if it is just going to die in the senate? so the sense that we are getting from members coming out is that they may give one more day on this vote, see if they can push it until tomorrow, see if they can have a bit more time for members to get comfortable with it but right now this compromise bill is on very, very thin ice. >> this is one of those movies
that we've seen a few hundred times. >> it is looking a little bit familiar. >> garrett, thanks. back here in texas, crossing the border. it can be dangerous, to say the least. pose a serious threat to the safety of my gragra migrants, fy to smugglers and others. mariana atencio is with customs and border agents. >> reporter: we're trying to understand the perilous journey that these families and kids even take to get to the u.s. border, a journey the president on twitter is calling a walk in central park. it is ed deadly. we've embedded with the border fa tro patrol here. tell us quickly why we have
stopped here? >> this is the background of the terrain that these human smuggling organizations, these criminals put theirictims through to come and bypass our checkpoints to get close to a state highway to get into the u.s. this here is an indicator of how or what the train looks like for these smugglers to get their people across. >> craig, they put these kids, families, through barbed wire, through fences like this one. it is the smugglers that are profiting from these families and these children. what is the going rate, on average, for essential american to bring them over? what do they pay these smugglers? >> the smugglers are charging from $10,000 to $15,000 a person to get smuggled into the u.s. and further into the united states of america. >> is that person from central america? >> the vast majority does come from central mark. that is the charge. >> $10,000, per person. >> yes, ma'am. >> it seems as if they are treated as a product. these families. >> they are treated like a
product. they care about making that money and these criminals treat their products without any care. so it is the only product that gets sent back to their country. them being illegal aliens, these alien smuggler organizations. >> craig, people bei treated as commodities. lining the supervisor said, it is the only product that is sent back so that way the smugglers ep making money off them, trying to get them back here. >> mariana, thank you. we'll be right back.
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right about that. earlier this morning the president of the united states publicly hounded nato's secretary-general, repeatedly disparaged germany and wondered aloud why america should be responsible for protecting europe against russia. vladimir putin wants donald trump to break from american allies. a few hours ago, that is exactly what he got. wow. welcome to "morning joe." it is wednesday, july 11th. with us, msnbc contributor mike ba ba ba barniccal. >> and david ignatius, nbc news capitol hill correspondent and host of kasie d.c. on msnbc, kasie hunt and former u.s. ambassador to nato and former state department spokesman nicholas burns, professor of diplomacy and international relations at the harvard kennedy school of government.
great group to start with this morning, and, wow, what a start to the trip. >> what a start to the trip. and -- let's just play the clip. here's donald trump actually doing exactly what vladimir putin would want him to do. good morning. >> in many countries, they owe us a tremendous amount of money from many years back where they're delinquent, as far as i'm concerned, because the united states has had to pay for them. if you go back 10 or 20 years add it all up. it's massive amounts of money that the united states has paid, and stepped up like nobody. this is gone on for decades, by the way. for many presidents. but no other president brought it up like i bring it up. >> the good news is that allies have started to give more to defense. after years, they've started to
add billions to this and defense spending, more in a generation. >> why was that, last year? >> also because of your leadership. because of your carried message. >> they won't write that. >> i think it's very -- sad when germany make as massive oil and gas deal with russia. where you're supposed to be guarding against russia and germany goes out and pays billions and billions of dollars a year to russia. so we're protecting germany. we're protecting france. we're protecting all of these countries, and then numerous of the countries go out and make a pipeline deal with russia, where they're paying billions of dollars in to the coffers of russia. so we're supposed to protect you against russia, but they're paying billions of dollars to russia, and i think that's very inappropriate, and the former chancellor of germany is the head of the pipeline company that's supplying the gas.
ultimately, germany will have almost 70% of their country controlled by russia with natural gas. so you tell me. is that i mean, i've been compl about this from the time i got in. it should have never been allowed to have happened, but germany is totally controlled by russia. >> i think it's something that nato has to look at. i think it's very inappropriate. you and i agreed that it's inappropriate. >> and the 29 nations, there are sometimes differences, and different views and also some disagreements, and the gas and pipeline from russia to germany is the issue where allies disagree, but the strength is that despite the differences we have always been able to unite around to protect and defend each other, because we understand we are stronger together than apart. the two world wars under cold war and we are stronger together than apart. >> how can you be together when
you know that. >> so this was supposed to be, just a photo op. the president wanted to make sure that he sent the message to vladimir putin while appearing to question energy shipments to russia, that he was actually doing everything he could to disrupt the nato summit from the start. and to also undermine america's alliance with nato. you could see, and mika pointed it out, mike pompeo looking down. as the president continued to badger and attack his hosts there. and in is so -- there is so many -- so many places to start. ronald reagan, during -- ronald reagan during a decade where he did more to bring down the soviet union than anybody would have ever expected continued to trade with the soviet union. donald trump is just, once
again, ignorant of history. ignorant of diplomacy and of the very things that have gotten us to a position where we have a $19 trillion economy and by far the most powerful military and economic engine in the world. on the planet. david ignatius, if you listen to donald trump ramble on and on about what a bad partner nato was, and what a bad partner the eu was, you would, might be fooled in middle america, if you had pictures of donald trump on your wall. you might be fooled into believing that europe does absolutely nothing when it comes to defense. and, of course, after us not wanting germany to re-arm for quite some time, we now have a situation where the european union spends more money on military defense than does
russia. they are an extraordinarily important, strategic ally of the united states of america against vladimir putin and his ambitions after he's invaded two countries in one decade. >> you would have no idea watching the president harang the nato secretary-general that today at this very minute there are nato forces fighting with the united states in afghanistan in a fight that we requested their help in, that they remain part of the coalition that's seeking to defeat isis. our terrorist ally. you would have no idea that that harang was directed at the people on whom we most depend for military support. that footage that you showed at the beginning of the show out to be nut a time capsule, because if people ask some day, how is it that the nato alliance, which
was the centerpiece of american defense strategy for 70 years, began to unravel. you just look at an american president who arrives and the first thing he does a pick a fight with the very secretary-general, which, as you said, joe, the american support team, secretary of state pompeo and our ambassador to nato, kay bailey hutchinson looking on with what seemed to me a kind of silent horror. >> yep. >> at what was happening. what an extraordinary way to begin a summit with your friends and allies. >> well -- hard to imagine. >> it's hard to imagine. it would be if churchill and fdr got together, jon meacham, during world war ii, and fdr was badgering churchill for not spending the exact amount of money on outlays in 1944 and
1945 as the united states. the fact is, that along with russia, great britain was our closest ally, and here, again, we -- europe, again, for those in my family and my friends who support donald trump, for those who have ears to hear, hear. europe spends more money on national defense, on the defense of the eu than does russia. europe spends as much money on the defense of that continent as does china. they are a strong bulwark against russian aggression, and with donald trump going in and hypocritically attacking them, germany, for trading with russia, when all he has done for the past two years is talk about the need to build closer relationships with russia is --
is just so, such a transparent -- i'm sure he thinks he's being clever, but it's a transparent way to carry out vladimir putin's deepest wish. which is, to undermine our alliance with nato. undercut a military strategic alliance that is like a dagger in the heart of putin's expansionist dreams. >> it's -- it's diabolical in that it almost manages to create as much chaos as possible. not really creative chaos, but create chaos, because, if you listen to that, you know, basically we have a president who sounds like the guy at the end of the bar who has a bee in his bonnet and on about his third or fourth beer. >> norm. >> yeah, norm is president. that's kind to norm. >> yeah. >> he's laying this out in a way that his base, many people in his base, will repeat, because he's saying it.
a., like the idea he was sitting there talking to this guy with a funny accent. they're going to love that. he was telling him what all, and yet when you pull back and think about what he was talking about, the entire point of the modern era, as david was saying, as opposed to, really, the 20s, which led to the '30s, was, we engage. >> right. >> and you engage by, with a free flow of people and ideas and goods as much as possible, and what this administration has done is pretty much, it's against the free flow of people and ideas, unless they have them, and it's against the free flow of -- >> so, not norm. more like newman. mike barnicle, go ahead. >> and sitting there watching this extraordinary clip we witnessed, the public
humiliation of the nato secretary-general by the president of the united states, it occurs to me and all of us on the set, how does it occur to you, this was the president of the united states speaking on a global stage intent only on talking about himself and what he felt rather than the common goals that nato has held for 70 years. >> well, mike, that's right, and frankly, it's just infuriating to watch this happen. you cannot imagine any american president all the way back 75 years deciding to become the critic and chief of nato. i mean, it's orwellian. he's making our friends out to be our enemies and treating our enemies like putin as our friends. and he's misrepresenting the facts. there have been four straight years of budget increases by every nato ally. the great majority of them will be at this magical 2% of gross domestic product level by 2024. all of our ability to project
power in the world, in the middle east and afghanistan comes out of the air bases, ramstein, insulak, aviano, the naval bases in italy and spain that the europeans pay us for. $2.5 billion a year to keep our forces there. it would cost us more money to bring the troops home than to keep them in europe. so what is the point of this? it's all about politics, and the president's base. the not about the power of the united states. this incredible alliance that we've built, every president from truman, it's infuriating to see this happen. it's diplomatic malpractice. >> exactly what it is. bring in nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker. live in brussels, belgium. kristen what can you tell us? >> reporter: well, mika, we're already starting to get reaction to that extraordinary exchange that you all are talking about. germans defense minister essentially dismissing president trump's claim that it is a captainistic to russia saying, i
think we can cope with it, meaning the criticism. also defending that deal that president trump was lashing out against saying, if we look at the gas pipeline, germany is an independent where energy supply is concerned we diversify, but the main over-arching topic is the summit. we want the summit that sends out the message of unity. of course, president trump sending out the exact opposite message. now, the secretary-general of nato also asked about the president's comments this morning, that extraordinary breakfast that he had with the president, and he said, look, there are going to be disagreements. that's a part of the deal at these international summits. mika, the extraordinary nature of what happened at that breakfast cannot be overstated. these summits are all about tone, all about the optics and on both of those fronts president trump was confrontational, really adding to the tensions here and the concerns that the united states won't be counted on as a part of this alliance, mika. >> and you've been covering these for a long time. how does this compare?
>> reporter: well, you think about the last summit, mika and president trump does not adhere to protocols. the moment he pushed the prime minister of montenegro, a group photo and he wanted to get a better position for the photo. so it's not unusual for him to break with the norms. this is something we deal with every day at the white house. but in the broader context of these summits. again, it's almost unprecedented you would have a public dispute spill out into the public view, and the timing of it is critical. it comes days before he's set to meet with russia's president vladimir putin. you already have nato allies very concerned that he's not going to be tough enough in that meeting with putin nap he. that he's not going to raise the issue of election meddling or invading crimea. a break with international law.
concerns the international community has here. >> kristen welker, hard to believe he wasn't performing for vladimir putin given how kind of overt that was. meanwhile the senate overwhelmingly pass add non-binding motion reaffirms the commitment to the nato alliance. 97-2 vote came hours after the president landed in belgium. the measure was authored by ranking member of the senate armed services committee jack reed. >> the united states participates in nato, because we believe the transatlantic partnership is in the u.s. national security interest and not because other countries are paying us for protection. >> the motion reaffirms the u.s. commitment to nato as a community of shares values including liberty, human rights, democracy and the rule of law. in addition, it calls for the u.s. to pursue and integrated approach to strengthen european defense as part of a long-term strategy that uses all elements of u.s. national power to deter and if necessary defeat russian
aggression. it also reiterates u.s. support for the rules-based international order and expending and enhancing alliances and partnerships. senators rand paul and mike lee were the only two to vote against the motion. >> ah, yeah. wow. okay. kasie hunt, that is the united states senate sending a strong message, as strong a message as possible to our nato allies as well as to vladimir putin. talking about russian aggression in that language, and also, you know, some of the republican senators that went over and were criticized for going over to russia actually, if you look at what was said in those meetings, there was confrontation about the russians interfering, meddling in our 2016 election. it seems the senate, at least, and some republicans in the senate, at least, is except for mike lee and rand paul, think it's a good idea to stand
shoulder-to-shoulder with our european allies and speak out against russian aggression. >> reporter: joe, this reads to me like an attempt by the u.s. senate, republicans and democrats alike, to send a message to our nato allies that says, please, try not to worry so much. we promise we're going to keep the lights on for you. and that when we are, we have moved past this era, this is still something important to us. i think -- there were so many republican whose didn't want trump to get elected in the first place. they thought there would be a lot of problems and issues. i don't think any of them ever dreamed that it would be a serious question to ask, mitch mcconnell got the question yesterday. do you think this president will pull us out of nato? the house that we built. this is the western world that the united states of america built after the cold war, and it's been the bedrock for, you know, all of our foreign policy, but particularly on the republican side. reagan and the end of the cord war.
the fact the vote happened at all, jack reed, a democrat. gave it to him, his counterpart obviously on the armed services committee, john mccain not here in washington, still battling brain cancer, but that is just an incredible signal and it comes from the top down. >> jon meacham, yes, it was the house that we built, nato. here's theresa may arriving. she has several things on her mind. one, of course, is the frail nature of her coalition in parliament with her shaggy haired foreign minister resigning a few days ago. also, of course, though, more importantly in our mind than meeting with donald trump is what every man, woman and child in england is thinking about today, and that is the 2:00 clash against croatia to get to the finals of the world cup, and if you think that i am being glib, you do not understand just what today's match means.
and also, of course, belgium in a state of warning today after their loss to france yesterday. but kasie hunt talked about nato being the house that we built. and, again, the ignorance of donald trump and the ignorance of those who believe that he's somehow showing those europeans. >> hmm. >> uh-huh. >> showing them what real leadership is about, again only reveals an ignorance that the house that america built in europe, we built for our own selfish interest. we built to protect our military troops, to stop a third european world war from occurring in 30 years. we did it to build strong trade partners, and what happened? we built strong trade partners.
we kept germany. we kept italy. we kept france. we kept a lot of countries out of stalin's grasp after world war ii. this along with the truman doctrine -- the marshall plan, one of america's greatest investments ever. forget about the niceties of democracy and freedom. >> yeah. >> we stand for that. just cold, hard cash. so when donald trump's playing businessman over there, he's being a fool and tearing down the foundation of america's $19 trillion economy. >> yeah. when fdr was dictating the for freedom speech, 1941. freedom from want, from fear -- he was listing, he said, we must fight to guarantee those freedoms everywhere in the world. everywhere in the world. everywhere in the world. he was dictating this, and harry
hopkins, his great adviser said, you know, mr. president i wouldn't say everywhere in the world, americans don't give a damn about java. he came back at him, the world is getting so small we're going to have to care about java. we're going to have to care about berlin. churchill said in harvard, 1943, the price of greats in is responsibility. america cannot rise to be the most significant force in global events and not have the long arm of history reach out across the oceans. and so it's entirely in our self-interest. the creation of nato, in part, was, has led to an era where we fought a terrible cold war and we have fought elective hot cwas as part of the cold war but not a global struggle. finally, it's been 30 years, george herbert walker bush thinks the most important he
did, bring stability to europe, to stand as a defense of the west, and created a remarkable trading partner. >> well, we, everyone stay with us. we have much more ahead this morning with this esteemed panel on the nato summit as we build up to the class photo next hour, which should be interesting, and david ignatius -- >> i wonder if these going to -- >> push anyone? >> be a buffoon and bush anyone this year? >> apparently that would be the least offensive thing that would happen there. david ignatius explains his take on why donald trump is so hostile to american allies. he resents them, and their success. interesting. we'll read from that new column just ahead. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.
we've seen over the past 18, 19 months, to not look at donald trump as doing either subconsciously or maybe he's just bumbling around, like mr. magoo, but he is doing the very thing that vladimir putin would want a western leader to do more than anything else, and that is to undermine nato. he could not be doing putin's bidding more effectively if he were an active agent of vladimir putin and the kgb. >> joe, for now i'm going to leave that issue to robert mueller, the special counsel. >> so, well, let me ask you this -- what does vladimir putin fear? what has vladimir putin feared over the past 18, 19 years more
than anything else? >> so putin fears and resents a strong american-led alliance in nato that he feels has gone right up to russia's border, has tried to draw in these newly merging countries that were part of a society empire. countries that bitterly resented russia's tutelage and now have moved towards nato for security. he resents it to some extent he fears it. he fears that that same desire for something different will affect his own population. it is a dream come true for vladimir putin, to have an american president arrive on the ground in brussels and the first thing, go a breakfast and harang the nato secretary-general and talk about germany, our most important ally in europe, as a captive of russia. i mean, it's just insulting language. it's -- it seeks to humiliate the people that he's dealing
with. i can only think that putin sits back in moscow, well, i'll tell what you people said to me in russia last summer when i was there. they said, we watch the american led liberal international order collapsing and we think that's good, but we don't really understand what you're doing to yourselves. we don't understand why this is being taken apart, but we're happy. i think they are happy, but, you know, people will look back, historianless look back and wonder how on earth was this instrument of american power and wealth undermined so systematically by a president who really had so little knowledge about foreign policy. >> and, mike, historians will look back at this moment and also wonder why more people were not asking aggressively and not with guarded words, but aggressively asking what does
vladimir putin have on donald trump? >> yeah. >> because there is -- we were talking about it before. there is no other explanation. >> that was a performance for putin. >> -- for an american commander in chief. >> yeah. >> -- to actively work to undermine america's most important, most strategic, most vital alliance that it has in the entire face of the earth. the only country this helps is vladimir putin's russia. >> well, history will have a long list of questions that will have to be answered. that's going to be among them, and another question that's going to be among them is, why was there such silence from members of the united states senate? or the united states congress about what is occurring right now? and nick burns, you're a man of the world. form 0er ambassador to nato. state department employee. tell us your view, your
concerns, perhaps, about what has happened when you look at what has happened, a withdrawal from tpp by this president. virtually seedi ingcreeding the to the chinese, latin america, africa, the middle east, intent on becoming a bigger world power than they already are, virtually one foot out the door on nato, the collapse of nato after 70 years, perhaps could happen. give us your view, your concerns about what is happening right now to our position in the world, and the relative silence as we just spoke of from members of the united states senate about this. >> mike, i think it's clear now, 18 months in to this presidency, that the president is abdicating american leadership. in the following way -- he's dismantling our alliances and downgrading them. that's been the power base for the united states for 75 years.
he's dismantled the trading system that brought us this unprecedented prosperity, and is replacing it with nothing. he's just tearing down. and i just -- third, i've been in europe. four countries in the last couple of weeks. the existential battle right now in europe is between the small d. democratic governments and the right wing democratic populists that have taken over the governments of hungary and poland and are inside the government of italy and the europeans are convinced that trump's siding with the authoritarian figures because trump has been praising them privately and publicly, the authoritarian leaders. he's gone after angela merkel. there they is on the screen, big time a vicious twitter attack designed to bring her down. he's been extremely critical of the western european democracies. you can't imagine why an american president would act this way. i think it's a radical revolution, if you add in leaving the iran deal, leaving the paris climate change deal. we had a power base as the most
influential country in the world. he only sees trade imbalance and does credit our allies with anything else. we're at a critical moment. we do need political leaders to speak out about this, because i can't believe that members of the senate and house think this is all a good idea. >> david, do you have any sense that -- nick burns just mentioned, angela merkel and the president going after her constantly, continually, do you have any sense of the root of this, clearly, anger he has towards angela merkel? >> it's one of the biggest mysteries, mike. angela merkel is really the leader of europe today. does he resent her strength? does he resent her, because she had a close relationship with barack obama? his predecessor? >> ah. >> except i see him as anything obama touched trump wants to get rid of. does he -- i wrote this morning, we'll talk about this maybe, but trump has this odd scarred,
wounded attitude of somebody who went through terrible financial trouble, towards people who were successful and prosperous. the germans of one of the world's greatest economic success stories. does he resent that? but he has been going very directly at her with political attacks, saying that the german people are turning against her. he's doing a little bit of that this week with theresa may, the british prime minister, in effect siding with boris johnson who just walked out of her cabinet in an -- american presidents don't do this. i mean, does donald trump, he makes us forget how unusual this sort of thing is, but as to the resentment of germany, that's the thing that's really undoing nato, because germany's at the center of nato, and it seems very deliberate, because he does it over and over again. to call germany a captive of russia. >> yeah. >> it's the most inflammatory language i can imagine.
>> david, read from your latest op-ed from the "washington post," trump's neediness is at the core of his diplomacy. you write, trump is the neediest person that the tycoon that vaulted to the top of the world. sees himself as chief executive not of a thriving enterprise but of one that has nearly been run into the ground by his predecessors. rather than warmly embracing longtime partners in europe he resents them and their success. he picks needless fights and tries to humiliate people that he feels have slighted him. this scarred, prickly trump is looking for new friends and investors. it's almost as if he's ready to fold what he sees as a losing hand and draw a fresh set of cards, ones bearing the faces of north korea's kim jong-un, china's xi, jinping and russia's vladimir putin, and that is --
wow n wow. that just matching exactly everything we have seen in trump's personality since we first met him, actually. >> well, you two know him and the world he comes from. i just have been struck recently that this is not the abul yaian donald trump, the part of a comeback donald trump, went through bankruptcy. got the scars, he's prickly. as i said in the column, it's almost as if he doesn't like the hand of cards he's got so he's laying them down and going to draw these new ones. one has a big vladimir putin face on it, and it's just -- it's mighty weird to see him put the angela merkel card down and reach towards the stack for putin. i don't get that. >> it's pretty incredible stuff. jon meacham? >> says a lot of practiced psychiatry without a license, a
theory for you to treect it. what's the role of misogyny? does merkel remind him of hillary? does that help explain the theresa may issue? he does not have a particularly healthy relationship, it seems, with a lot of strong women. what do you think? >> you know, i -- i'm going to be careful about -- about venturing towards the couch, but i do think that we see in donald trump an affinity for the big guy. you know? the guy who's like donald trump. there's something about him and kim jong-un as they're walking past the furled north korea and american flags and you think -- there's something similar in these two. you see that when he's with xi jinping. i'm sure we'll see it with vladimir putin. he keeps saying over and over gn i respect vladimir putin. he said about boris johnson a rough, tough unpredictable
british politician. he's a friend of mine. sort of like, he's one of the guys. so, you know, theresa may, angela merkel are not one of the guys. they're not in this circle he regards as friendly. beyond that, i'm not -- i wouldn't be, dare to guess. >> all right. ambassador burns, thank you very much for being on the show this morning. we'll be very, very hopeful to talk to you again as this plays out. coming up, when it comes to the president's trade war, what's another $200 billion? turns out a lot. at least for the american workers bearing the brunt of it. we'll talk about the new tariffs the white house is eyeing against china. we'll be right back. metastatic breast cancer is relentless,
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necessary countermeasures. the latest round of proposed tariffs would deepen the trade war between the u.s. and china and include everything from fish to luggage. senate finance chairman orrin hatch called the new tariffs reckless and not a targeted approach in a statement, and senator jeff flake told reporters he has reached an agreement with gop leadership to get a non-binding vote to instruct negotiators on a spending bill to give congress more authority over the president's ability to implement tariffs for national security reasons. the arizona senator says he expects a vote today. kasie what do we expect on capitol hill? given everything. >> reporter: the -- the fundamentals of the republican party as many of these senators have known it for decades are being day in and day out challenged. it seems as though we are finally starting to see some concrete action on the floor of the senate, but you have to remember that this is basically
the least intense version of what they could do. a non-binding vote to instruct people to put an amendment in a spending bill, yes, it does send a symbolic signal and we shouldn't underestimate the previous lack of willingness to do even that, but this is not something that is actually going to make a material difference. it doesn't seem at this point to the president's power to do this, and free trade and tariffs on the one hand and nato and our global alliances on the other have been two bedrock principles of the republican party until president trump, and the restructuring that is going to have to go on here, i'm just not sure where these politicians go. do they have a home anymore? they feel the party is the party of trump, they have to go along with that because he's so popular with his voters, but such disagreement on what are such fundamental and important issues. >> the thing is, though, jon meacham, again, i've always been
shocked by politicians in washington who act like the reality they're living in today will forever be the reality. donald trump will leave office at some point, and when he does leave office, these republicans are going to have a hell of a lot to answer for. i remember during george bush's second term criticizing his foreign policy and criticizing his deficit spending, and the massive debts he was racking up, and conservatives were attacking me. suggesting i wasn't sufficiently conservative, two, three years later. suddenly bush leaves town, and they have to defend all the things -- so that's why barack obama got elected president and there were 59 democrats elected to the united states senate. history moves on. donald trump will move on. all of this will be mud on their face they will have to deal with for a very long time. >> yeah. and they're all looking at --
not all of them, particularly in the south, most, red states are looking at numbers that are boggling their minds. which is an extraordinarily high level of approval rating for the president in the republican party itself. and so they're trapped between this momentary fever that i think the country -- many parts of the country and certainly many parts of the -- i hate to say the republican party. because it's especially been captured by trump and has become, a wholly owned subsidiary at this point, but it take as certain amount of imagination. it takes a lot of courage, to do what you're talking about. which is to transcend the reality of that number and to think, how am i going to be judged in five years, ten years, 20 years? as opposed to this week? you have to do that, because the people we talk about are the one whose do that. >> but here's the thing. the thing that's frustrated me
with republicans for the past several years. it's not that hard. i've told this story before of -- of being attacked for cutting medicare. the rate of growth in medicare, and i was getting attacked by the democratic opponent, and it was a lose-lose issue in 1996. but i got so angry at the demagoguery, because the medicare trustee said we had do it. what it did? did made the entire campaign a referendum on why we had to cut the rate of increase on medicare to save medicare. >> uh-huh. >> guess what happened? glen bolger with public opinion strategies called me before the election and told me i had the highest approval rating among senior voters than he had ever seen across america. because i was great now. because i told them the truth.
1995, at the height of the gingrich revolution. >> yeah. >> i was in a town hall meeting where people were screaming and yelling about common law marriage between gay men in vermont. this is something where i could have thrown red meat out and we -- we would have been devoured. i said, wait a second. why do we care about what gay men are doing in vermont? we don't want to tell them what to do in vermont any more than we want them to tell us what to do in northwest florida. >> right. >> people started clapping. you can move voters. you don't have to run scared, but you've got to take it on. right? >> harry troop han the best line about this. which is -- demagogues kel -- >> an easy one.demagogues -- yo thinking about truman, weren't you? >> i was. >> truman said demagogues tell lies again and again and people
leave them, were ut if you tell the truth again and again people will go along with you. i've said this before. to go to your point. people need to think about the oil portrait test. what are we going to think when we look at their all like that because they can't imagine an idea where we're not gazing at their portrait. you don't want to be joe mccarthy. still ahead, we know the president's stance on nato. former secretary of homeland security michael chertoff disagrees with his take, among other people. plus, nbc's andrea mitchell. "morning joe" is coming right back. ♪
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with nato. and again jon meacham, an alliance that which begun in the rubble of the second world war in 20 years and an alliance that has held russia in check and kept them out of western europe since 1947. >> the great wise man able harryman said after the war all americans wanted to do was come home and drink coke, but harry truman and enough people around him realized that the road to global war had come through isolationism. and so there was a determined attempt to re-engage the world, to remain engaged in it so that we would not retreat behind fortress america, we would not, to coin a phrase, put america first, which had been the great phrase of the isolation
organization of the 1930s. we would remain engaged, and therefore isolationism would not return. this is -- and it was politically difficult, the marshall plan because truman knew it couldn't be called the truman plan because he wasn't popular. imagine the incumbent doing that. >> there's a lot of symbolism going on here, even the way the president entered this nato headquarters. he took a separate entrance. all the other world leaders taking the red carpet. really actually physically separating himself from our allies but also in the room at the meeting that we saw with the head of nato, secretary general, you could see really awkward body language with mike pompeo and john kelly at the end of the table. >> mike pompeo looking down. >> looking like they're enduring a horror show. anybody who has a sense of how difficult, important and valuable these strategic
alliances are, it is a pretty staggering, astonishing set of developments in the course of just a few minutes with this president in front of the cameras lord knows what happens when the cameraings were off, join the conversation, former undersecretary of state, host of andrea mitchell reports, andrea mitchell and new york times washington bureau chief elizabeth newmiller. good to have you all on board. david ignatius is still with us as well. >> rick, there are people who don't want us to draw historical parallels, but history does rhyme. the costs -- you have jon meacham talking about our need to be engaged after world war ii, the costs for an american first policy and by the way the raising of tariffs across the globe, in the 1920s, had such destructive effects in the 1930s that led to the greatest
depression in american history as well as the deadliest war other than our own civil war. >> yes. john said it well. it's a scary prospect. there was another wise man who once said the chief deliverable of the nato summit is cohesion. and what donald trump has in one fell swoop violated that this morning. it's a very, very scary prospect. to go back to what david was saying, vladimir putin's great goal is not only to disrupt nato but particularly to disrupt the relationship between germany and the united states. this is a dream come true for him. i mean, vladimir putin could have scripted donald trump's -- your father would be livid. >> this is exactly, mike barnacle, this is exactly what vladimir putin has sought since he's been in power over the past two decades. >> yeah. >> this is his dream. >> he has it. >> he has it. >> dream fulfilled.
he has it at many levels. one of the things that occurs to i think all of us here watching the initial tirade earlier today with the president and secretary general nato is the spew of facts coming from the president. we haven't obviously had time to ascertain whether they're valid or not, but one of the things we can do is nail down his constant tirade about nato nations not paying up. >> right. >> and they do. and the 2% goal, that's a goal, it's not supposed to be today. it's a goal set for 2026, but the facts coming from the president of the united states are seemingly always screwed. >> it is certainly true that american presidents and particularly american defense secretaries have gone to nato and complained that nato does not -- nato countries in europe do not contribute up to 2%. i can remember robert gates doing this and setting off
alarms in europe. he was the defense secretary, not the president. but for the president to do this in front of the nato secretary general who had gone around asking countries for more money and had been fairly successful is germany is now going to contribute up to 1.5% is just bewildering why he chose now to do it. i think perhaps he felt it was playing to a domestic audience in the united states. he sounded very egrieved talking about how the taxpayers, american taxpayers, have to do this and nato countries aren't paying their fair share. and i also think -- i do think there's a certain amount of politics in grievance here. trump knows certainly how unpopular he is in europe and how unpopular he is with the other world leaders and certainly does not have a good relationship with angela merkel. do not discount just this sort of impulsive nature of this and the anger he brings to this meeting. >> lots to play for you,
president trump, fulfilling putin's dream. take a look. >> i think it's very sad when germany makes a massive oil and gas deal with russia where you're supposed to be guarding against russia and germany and goes out and pays billions and billions of dollars a year to russia. so we're protecting germany. we're protecting france. we're protecting all of these countries and then numerous of the countries go out and make a pipeline deal with russia where they're paying billions of dollars into the coughers of russia. so we're supposed to protect you against russia but they're paying billions of dollars to russia. i think that's very inappropriate and the former chancellor of germany is the head of the pipeline company that's supplying the gas. it's ultimately germany will have almost 70% of their country controlled by russia with natural gas. so you tell me, is that
appropriate? i mean, i've been complaining about this from the time i got in there. should have never been allowed to happen, but germany is totally controlled by russia. >> i think it's something that nato has to look at. i think it's very inappropriate. you and i agreed that it's inappropriate. >> 29 nations and there are sometimes differences and different views and also some disagreements and gas pipeline from russia to germany is only issue allies disagree. but the strength despite these differences we have always been able to unit around our -- protect and defend each other. we are stronger together than apart. three world wars and cold war show we're stronger together than apart. >> how can you be together when you're getting your energy from the person you want protection against? >> because we understand when we stand together also dealing with
russia, we are stronger. i think what we have seen -- >> no, you're just making russia richer. you're not dealing with russia. you're making russia richer. >> during the cold war, nato allies were trading with russia and there had been disagreements about what kind of trade arrangements -- >> i think trade is wonderful. i think energy is a whole different story. i think energy is a much different story than normal trade. and you have a country like poland that won't accept the gas. you take a look at some of the countries, they won't accept it because they don't want to be captive to russia. germany, as far as i'm concerned is captive to russia because it's getting so much of its energy from russia. we're supposed to protect germany, but getting their energy from russia. explain that. you know that. >> oh. andrea mitchell, i'm going to let you choose where you want to begin with your analysis if you can put it into words.
>> it is so shocking. my first nato summit was to bond then the capital of germany with ronald reagan in 1982 and europe was aflame with attacks from the left wing against the deployment, the collective deployment of intermediate range missiles and they all stood together, reagan leading the way, and to see an american president there with his secretary of state speechless, the u.s. ambassador to nato, very strong and smart woman, former texas senator who is just speechless, obviously her commander in chief, her leader is sitting there and deriding germany. and john kelly, a retired general, watching this. it's just absolutely stoopfying that he would say germany is controlled as captive to russia and that would be his opening gam butt.
he is playing to this politic of grievance as he anticipates protests against him in london. he has to stay out of london because it's risky politically and perhaps for other reasons so he'll be going to windsor pal los a las and other places. his facts are wrong. as you all have been pointing out. and his politics are wrong. and it is just a disgrace for the united states to open the nato meeting like this. >> yeah. and david ignatius, again, it's important for those that are just joining, it's important for donald trump supporters, it's important for all americans to understand, it's important for people working in the trump white house to understand, actually ignorant of the facts that europe has a bigger defense budget than russia. europe as as big defense budget as china. europe has been a bastien against soviet aggression since
1947 and against putin's aggression since the turn of the century. and west germans always reminded us when ever we had problems from 1947 to 1989, they say we are your most loyal and faithful children. and of course we do what you tell us to do. we are standing at the gates of your berlin wall and we are your allies ready and waiting. donald trump, of course, doesn't remember that because he doesn't follow history. but that is the case. germany has been our most steadfast ally against russia since 1947. >> germany is the bedrock of this alliance that has been the centerpiece of american strategy for dealing with russia. we have to remember that germany
and other european countries have supported the sanctions that the u.s. proposed after russia invaded crimea, even though those sanctions cost the europeans, especially the germans a lot in terms of things they could sell, deals they could make, they stood by that policy partly because we asked them to and partly because they knew that russia potentially threatened them. when i watched these pictures of donald trump, the record arrive at that breakfast, i think back two weeks ago to all of the nato officials including the young stoltenberg and their prop rations, is there some way we can make it work out so we can have a good nato summit, so we can talk about all the good things we're doing? in fact, they are doing a lot of good things. they're put more troops east as trip wires to potentially challenge the russians if they were ever to move. they're continuing to support u.s. operations in afghanistan.
there's discussion of training troops in iraq to stabilize iraq. all these things that they had lined up as potential achievements president arrives, boom, it's like he knocked over a whole set of blocks. you can only imagine what stoltenberg, what our nato ambassador were thinking as they sat next to the president as he went through this. just one final point, we used this phrase before, but the world we grew up in was well described by one of the creators of nato and these great institutions. he said he was present at the creation. and watching this morning's footage, i think we all wondered whether we were present at the destruction, at the moment at which this began to come apart. >> you know, that's a critical question that david just raised. jon meacham, also two weeks ago, david was talking about two week ago, two weeks ago june 24th, it was the anniversary of the start of the berlin air lift.
and you look at what's happening today and you wonder, how much of your history has been lost because of our inadequacy here in teaching our own history to our children, how much of history is lost clearly among members of the united states senate who have no seemingly no frame of reference to what this country stands for, has stood for through generations and now here we are today and as david pointed out, perhaps with the president of the united states who has one foot out the door on leaving nato. >> yeah. if you don't know how we got here, it's very hard to understand what you value and what you don't value. we have a president of the united states who is entirely intuitive. he is like an open synaps. you could sort of hear in that
soliloquy this morning he at least opened a briefing book. so he had sort -- >> he didn't know who gar hard stroder was until he got into the briefing book. i promise. >> might be one of the world cup people. >> yeah. >> but so -- >> he thought -- >> he plays piano. >> he thought he was a little kid who played the piano. >> that's right. but i think that because he is a populist, open synaps, i'm sure against what he said will play extremely well for a lot of people. and because it kind of makes sense, right? yeah, they're getting gas from there. and that's the danger of this. so exactly to mike's point, if you don't put the frame on it, if you don't explain that this is how we prosper, we're in
trouble. >> but rick, we've talked about -- mr. undersecretary, we've talked about the trump side of this equation. we haven't talked about the democratic side of this equation. i'm so glad that we're a democracy and we're not a parliamentary system, but we need a leader of the opposition, be that leader a conservative or a moderate or a liberal to stand up and not defend europe's interests but defend america's interest and to say, it subpoena against america's interest, it is against your interest, it is against your family's interest, it is against your pocketbook's best interests to continue having a president that tears apart our most valuable military allies, our most important trading partners, the bull works against russian aggression.
this is an argument that would be so easy to make. and yet where are the democrats? i guarantee you this, if george w. bush had run against donald trump in 2016, he would have cut him to pieces in the first debate. but he is just laughing at him and mocking him. barack obama would have done the same. bill clinton would have wiped the floor with him. where is the democratic leader that can do that? where is the republican leader that can do that? >> it's a shame. there's a democratic leader who did it. he said he would pay any price, bear any burden to defend liberty around the world. that was john f. kennedy in his inaugural address. this is a core, core value that these leaders cannot embrace. it's very sad. i want to go back to one moment of history here. one of my last trips with the state department was to berlin. and it was during that time that mrs. merkel gave the speech
where she said the reason i've opened my arms to refugees, to these syrian refugees is because when i was a little girl during the berlin air lift in east berlin, i watched american planes come over and they had these tiny little parachutes of candy and food that came down to me. that taught me how nations can be generous. america does bear any burden historically. what trump doesn't understand is that we're not being taken. we're the generous nation that will actually give more to assure security, to assure peace. that's what a democrat has to say. that's what the republicans have to say. i just can't imagine there aren't people who are speaking out like we're speaking out now about trump disrupting what has been the greatest military alliance in the history of the world, that has kept the peace and keep prosperity for 75 years? >> and elizabeth, this post war world that so many brilliant people helped cobble together in 1945, '46, '47, it's not only
kept america safe and free and prosperous so we have the largest economy on the planet and it has been growing steadily since 1945, it's also put us in a position where we could have fed and freed more people across this planet than any other country. again, we have been a beacon to people like angela merkel, as a child, behind the berlin wall. we have been a beacon, we were beacon to dissidence in soviet russia. we have been a beacon to people across the world. and now it seems that we're about building walls and blowing up bridges. >> i just wanted to remind people that after 9/11, the nato countries invoked article 5, which was very big deal. article 5, as you know, attack against one nato countries is an attack against all. it's a very emotional moment at the white house when that
happened. that was not envisioned. article 5 was never envisioned to be invoked in that way. as we saw in afghanistan, nato countries joined in that defense with the united states. now, that was a long war. there was a lot of argument with nato countries about how much they were contributing over time, but that was an important moment for the nato alliance we shouldn't forget. and i think the worst case scenario for nato now is to see what happens with the meeting between trump and vladimir putin and helsinki. and if that goes well after what has happened in brussels, that will be something. >> wow. >> it is really -- i'm trying to think of what my father would say at this point. i think he would -- >> andrea, you covered dr. ber zin ski -- >> you know my parents and you know my father's strategic thinking. i'm scared to even try and put
into words what his analysis of this would be. there was -- you know what, a potential in this meeting and a lot of opportunity. my brother ian wrote a piece for the atlantic council on what positive could have come out of this. how do we describe the negatives here? >> it's really hard to describe. i was just thinking while you were talking before you mentioned it about what your father would be saying at this point and especially looking forward to the meeting with vladimir putin. i'm going to be covering that for you all in helsinki on monday morning. we'll all be together again. and it's all going to be happening right during these hours where he's going to be having a one-on-one meeting without note takers, without advisers. but actually given the role that john bolton and other advisers have played, i'm not sure there being there would make any difference. that role of national security
adviser which your father occupied in the white house is so critical. now we understand whi h.r. mcmaster was fired because he could not have remained silent while this was going on. there is no one around this president who is willing to speak up to him. and that is what's so shocking. i really worry about defense secretary mattis who is in brussels. >> i do, too. >> he must just be gagging on his breath. >> looking at angela merkel's transcription here, the translation to the comments that she made just moments ago, i've experienced myself a part of germany controlled by the soviet union and very happy today that we are united in freedom as the federal republic of germany and can thus say we can determine our own policies and make our own decisions and that's very good. >> you know, joe, let me ask you something, i am constantly and
continually bewildered by the president of the united states. we just saw a group of children being rescued from a cave in thailand. the world was thrilled to see it. and here in america, we are taking children from their parents. >> yep. let's not forget the separation policy. >> should we no longer recognize their mothers when put together with them. we have a country where the president of the united states is separating himself from the rest of the world seemingly. where are the people in public life who stand up and ask the question, whose country is this? is it donald trump's or is it our's? >> well, we talked about history and now historians will remember this moment. it's hard, mike, every time something like this happens, it's hard to not turn to members of donald trump's own party,
again, trump a lifelong democrat, became a republican when he figured out racerism, birtherism in 2011 would help him win the nomination. where are they? i know they had a vote in the senate. fantastic. but i'll tell you if i were there, i would be rounding up a group of people, we would go down to the white house or we would give a press conference as republicans in front of the capital defending nato and calling out the president for his comments. do you know how hard that is? it's not hard at all. and do you know what happens in your district, i found it helps you in your district. this is what i don't understand about these cowards. every time i spoke out against my own leadership or against democratic leadership, my poll
numbers went up because people want somebody who speaks their mind. they want somebody who is independent. they want somebody who is not scared. these people are cowards. >> so now we're at the point where they would rather lose the country than lose their own election. >> they are more concerned about what happens this fall than they are with what's happening with what's happening with an alliance, again, that has made america the strongest, the most powerful, the most free country on the planet. forget the fact that we have fed and freed more people than any country in the history of the world. let's just be selfish about this. we have a $19 trillion economy. the post war period has been defined as one. the american century.
not the luxembourg century or the french century. because of what we have done in setting up this system, this post war system, historians called this the american century. and you know what, despite our political problems, still is, we still are the most powerful country in the world militarily by tenfold, 20 fold. we're still the most powerful economy in the world. and by the way, we were the day barack obama left office. we were the day george w. bush left office. we were the day bill clinton left office. so why blow this apart unless you are trying to help vladimir putin? >> to go to something mike just said, donald trump is the most vivid manifestation of the least
attractive characteristics in the national character. we haven't been captured by donald trump. we have had our worst instincts affirmed, exacerbated and put in front of the world. i think to suggest that somehow or another he has hijacked the country, lets the rest of us off the hook because right now the kind of courage you're talking about is required not simply of people who are in elective office but all of us. it's why conversations like this matter. jefferson said men should be participatories in congress not only in congress or elections but everyday. the only way to get through this hour of crisis, it is a crisis in the classic sense we know at the end of it whether the patient lives or dice, crisis is supposed to be that important, life or death matter, health crisis, health moment, the
country has fully the capacity to do the wrong thing. the wondrous thing about the country is that at least 51% of the time when we have actually let those better angels win, we have opened the arms, we have dropped berlin, we used the berlin air lift, we have colin powell saying we have gone around the world protecting our power, the only thing we asked for is the ground to bury our dead. >> and elizabeth, donald trump is succeeding in undermining the international american order because there is nobody in his own party pushing back at him. there's nobody in his cabinet pushing back at him. i saw a video a couple days ago of a woman who put on a puerto rico shirt and was abused, followed around by a racist while a cop just sat there and did nothing.
that's what the republican party has done. it would be very easy to intercede and step in and stop this. the republicans just choose to do so. >> i saw bob corker said some things yesterday about nato and they did pass a resolutions yesterday, i believe, firming support for nato. i also want to address jon meacham when he talked about our better angels and talk about this is not the separation of families. but i would like to note that because of the courts who says that the judge out in west coast says that the trump administration can't hold families for more than 20 days and because of the pressure from the public and the president's executive order, what we have now with our immigration crisis is that families are being -- we're back to catch and release under the obama administration. so i think if the things work in the country, that there is a system of checks and balances, however imperfect, families are
not being separated, they're being kept together for 20 days and being given court dates and being released into the country. whether you want that or not, we're back to what the obama administration considered a somewhat more humane policy. the bottom line is some ways the things are working in the country the way their supposed to. >> we'll see. some families are dysfunctional. we'll see what happens with donald trump. >> that's very true. >> andrea mitchell, two of my favorite columns in the age of trump, he was no fan of donald trump, one ended with the words the system lives. and in that column, he talked about all the things that donald trump did, all the breaches of constitutional norms that he practiced daily. and then talked about the four or five institutions, the press
or congress or the bureaucracy that pushed back hard, and that has happened for the most part. donald trump has been held in check. but as you know better than anybody in your year's covering presidents and foreign policy, a commander in chief is given such wide latitude that the damage that he can cause on the international stage is obviously far greater. >> indeed. and we don't have those checks and ambulanbalances in a real s. over time in elections you do. that's why helsinki and putin will be so fraught with high risk, especially because of the way the president launched his opening salvo at nato. we could have predicted it because of the way he left when he was heading to air force base yesterday. his departure remarks were so
aggressive against nato. one thought perhaps on the plane he might have read the briefing and been briefed. perhaps somebody could have talked to him. but instead, i think he got ramped up. this opening was tactical. there's no question. that he was beating up on stoelten berg in a deliberate way. he was playing to the camera and he knew what he was doing. i can only think that he was setting on a trajectory that we're going to see throughout this meeting in brussels. and it's only going to further soil his like. he is determined to blow up an alliance as america created as you pointed out there at the creation. we are now witnessing what could be the destruction. i have to think that the alliance and that history is
stronger and more durable as our friend charles wrote. >> david, i don't say this dispairagingly. you've been around a long time. >> boy, a long time. by the way, mike, david has been around long enough to remember -- >> come on -- >> when washington had a baseball team that was a contender. >> yeah, that was a long time ago, too. >> boy, we love the senators. >> seriously, david, have you ever seen anything like this? >> i never have seen a moment like this in which president of the united states deliberately sets out to undermine the alliance the united states needs. i never have seen it. i never could have imagined it. donald trump is a human wrecking ball. and he likes doing this. he thinks this is success. and we have to say that he is now as president in 18 months
succeeded in many of his foreign policy goals of undoing the foreign policy achievements that were built up over so many years and decades. and he will move into the next phase now as he meets with russian leader vladimir putin and tries to come up with a new structure for the u.s./russia relationship. it's a dangerous time. i was reading yesterday trump's inaugural speech. and you go back to that speech. it's not as if this has been sneaking up on us. it's been coming right at us. he said in that speech, you know, american carnage, we're a mess, everything is going wrong in this country. and people have been taking advantage of us and stealing our money and making us pay for the defense. i'm going to change all that. he couldn't have been clearer when he came into office and he
is now accomplishing those things one by one. and as joe said earlier, we're a democracy. people get a chance to speak up and say, no, that's not the way i want our country to go. i don't want us to trade in alliance with germany for an alliance with authoritarian russia. people get to make that choice. and we need to keep talking about the way the choices appear. but it's not as if this is a surprise or something that snuck up from behind. he's been saying he's going to do this and now he's done it. >> you're watching the official handshakes at the nato summit in brussels, belgium. and these official moments precede the family photo that will happen in a short time. of course we saw the last one at the last summit and it was absolutely fascinating with i believe the president shoving the leader of montenegro to the side. today has already proved to be
incredibly packed with drama and astonishing developments. we're told president trump will be coming out to shake the hand of the u.n. secretary general any moment now. >> nato. >> nato secretary general, excuse me. and that is, of course, if he chooses to stay with the program. he did not stay with the program in terms of his entrance. he chose not to walk the red carpet and came in a different entrance, perhaps symbolically separating himself from the allies. >> so, rick, we saw angela merkel walk across the stage. we've seen theresa may. we saw her when she entered. and there is, of course, as a backdrop of donald trump's populism and his approach to sort of the recking of the international order that this country helped build since 1945.
there are other countries that when you talk about poland, whether you talk about bulgaria, whether you talk about austria, other countries in central europe and eastern europe, who are also going through some fairly turbulent times while angela merkel and theresa may right now are struggling to keep their coalitions in power. >> and by the way, trump is single handedly trying to unravel theresa may's government. the insane thing he said about boris johnson, he really, really likes me. i'm a good friend of his. i want to go back to what you were saying before, joe, about are we returning to this period of isolationism in the '20s and '30s that americans didn't realize we were tied to tres of the world. we were much more isolated in the '20s and 30s than we are
now. our entire economy is bound to the rest of the world. unfortunately donald trump voters don't quite understand that. the fact that donald trump was attacking -- speaking of germany, speaking of bmw. >> in south carolina. >> largest plant in the world is in spartanburg, south carolina. those american workers were not happy there. >> that shows a profound ignorance of what you know what's on the ground because any southerner knows that bmw has led to the renaissance of south carolina since carol campable. >> i drove by on sunday the volkswagen plant in chattanooga, tennessee, 5, 6,000 jobs brought there by a young mayor named bob corker, sort of a successor to lamar and he brought in nissan.
north american headquarters of nissan is about 10 miles from my house in nashville. it's a global economy. the fact that we have to say this is embarrassing. fdr said that every word that comes to the air, every ship that sails at sea does shape the american future. and it was true in 1940, '41. it's even more true now because of the pace of it and the integrated nature of our economic lives. but here we are watching this sound of music production. >> here we go with president trump now. >> walking across the blue carpet to shake the hand of the nato secretary general. >> president of the republic of lithuania, excellentsy. >> i certainly appreciated the
diplomacy that the head of nato tried to show president trump this morning after facing string of insults. he actually credited the president with having nato members increase their military spending when, in fact, the reality is that that's been happening for four years now. that began under barack obama. that began soon after bob gates began pressuring nato to do just that. and still, diplomats will be diplomats and they are doing their best to try to deal with american president who appears to be doing his best to do the bidding of vladimir putin. >> and stoltenberg has come here, met with the president in the oval office, has tried so hard to warm trump up and persuade him of nato's inherent advantage for the united states and of what they are doing. the irony is that the president
trump could have come here and took a victory lap and take credit for what started under bob gates and barack obama and some of their predecessors getting the nato members to stand up and meet these goals for 2024 as germany and others have. he could have come in and said that they are doing this because of my pressure. and instead, he came in his ha ranging form and tried to blow the whole thing up. and you have to admire stoltenberg for trying to put the best face on it, but he has the most difficult job right now. you can only imagine what angela merkel is thinking. you think back to the history of nato and how these summits used to be held in bahn. reagan standing at the gate and saying tear down this wall, mr. gorbachev. i was there. it was one of the most incredible impressions, moments i ever experienced as a
correspondent. and now to see this wreckage taking place with our commander in chief supposedly, it really is shocking. >> andrea mitchell, thank you. we'll be watching andrea mitchell reports at 12:00 p.m. right here on msnbc, wouldn't miss it, especially today. elizabeth, thank you for being on the show. >> elizabeth, can i ask you, do people come up to you on the streets because of this fast pace, this moving documentary, do kids come up screaming asking for autographs of you? >> actually it happened over the weekend in brooklyn. i will tell you one person came up to me. i was shocked. that was it. >> by the way -- >> you should not be surprised it was in brooklyn. >> you were very kind to give us a tour of the news room. >> thanks. >> and i must say, the pace was a little bit slower that day than it is editing of this documentary. >> as they say, they make it
very exciting. one of our news clerks says that he called and said i'm having a salad at union station. do you think the documentary crew could come and film it and make it very exciting. so, yeah, we take your point. >> got it. still ahead -- thanks so much. a group of -- still ahead on "morning joe" a group of former foreign ministers is urging the president to in an open letter to reverse what it calls the dangerous trend of america's deteriorating relationship with its western allies. that trend, of course, includes the president's increasingly blatant overtures to vladimir putin. we'll talk about the implications with the former secretary of homeland security, michael chertoff. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. - i love my grandma. - anncr: as you grow older, your brain naturally
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then do something with putin that further destabilizes the relationship. hopefully what will happen is, you know, that we'll have a good nato meeting and that the putin meeting will almost be a non-event as far as any commitment is made. >> that was the chairman of the foreign relations committee, senator bob corker speaking yesterday, not exactly sure how the senator would describe a negative nato meeting, but humiliating american allies right out of the gate might qualify. joining us now someone who might be able to add to this conversation, we're all a little stunned and speechless, former department of homeland security michael chertoff. he is out with a book. we will get to that in a moment because it's all related ultimately. >> it is. >> how do you put into words the damage that is unfolding at the
nato summit? and is there any other way to explain the president's i call it sort of carrying out putin's dream and his performance. any other way to read that an as directly as a favor to putn? >> well, first of all, for a number of administrations people have urged nato to step up more and do more spending. and actually they're moving in that direction. and of course as i think someone mention eed earlier in the show they stood should to shoulder with us after 9/11 in afghanistan. i think things are progresses what the alliance is doing in the right way. why the president is choosing to come in with guns blazing, i don't know whether that's a negotiating tactic to try to drive more behavior than he wants or whether it's simply expresses some kind of emotional reaction. i think what was very helpful was to have a virtually unanimous senate vote endorsing
nato. i do think the europeans understand that that relationship we have with them is an enduring relationship. it's not something that's going to come and go with a single president. >> mike? >> but you worked for a president of the united states who had his ups and downs, like all do. but this is the first time i think in at least my memory, maybe the country's history, where we have had a president of the united states who appears on the world stage next to other global leaders with a grievance, a public grievance on his shoulder. what's your reaction to that? >> well, you know, first of all, i agree with you. there were ups and downs with president bush, but he certainly never took a position that was antagonistic, although he stood his ground on certain issues. again, this is a stylish shoe. i can't explain why donald trump chooses to come out with a certain kind of persona. what i can say, though, again is that the organs of government themselves and the relationships between the europeans and the americans at the intelligence level and the defense level are
very, very strong. even in the worst periods of the relationship under president bush when there was some real hostility about iraq, we still worked very well together at the operational level, and i'm sure that's going to continue. >> jon meacham. >> i want to ask, as you served on the front line of collective security, particularly in the new asymmetrical era, do you think moments like this impact our intelligence services capacity to share information, our capacity to work together to keep us protected? >> actually the good news is i don't think it does. there was a lot of antagonism president bush after the iraq war started and yet operationally we had very close relationships with our counterparts all over europe. i don't expect that to change. so i'm not saying it's a good thing to have this level of public friction, but at the day to day working level, i think we continue to have a good relationship. >> i want to get to the book,
but i'm curious your thoughts on the president's separation policy, separating children from families. there are several thousands children, some say up to 3,000 that were separated and we've got certain numbers coming in from different news organizations about some very small children who they may not be able to reunite with their parents. it's all very complicated. but do you think the policy had a plan to track these children in a way that was effective? or do we have some questions here that this policy wasn't thought out and might have been purely political? >> the planning is there and i think that's why they're having difficulty reuniting people. i don't know what the genesis of this was but it looks like it was put in place very quickly and as a consequence, the issues about how do you track people, how do you verify what the family relationships are, those things do not appear to have been in place when they started this problem. i can tell you that in general
when you have any kind of initiative, it always takes people think it does. obviously what they're doing now is paying the price for the lack of a front end policy. and i hope they can figure out a way to get this reunification done as quickly as possible. >> well, it's to me so unbelievably not who we are that it's hard to fathom this is happening. >> so can i pivot to the book? i know you want to talk about it. >> please do. >> i'm going to ask in the weeds question and you can ask it in a quick way. one of the things that i encountered in governments part of the post snowden era, countries like russia passing data localization laws where they say any data you take from someone in our country has to pass through a server in our country so those people have access to that data. i know you're writing about privacy and people are thinking about privacy here, but what is the global implication of that kind of thing both for everyone on the planet and for u.s.
citizens? >> you put your finger on what is a real challenge because data is global. it does not respect physical boundaries. our laws are based on physical boundaries. that tension exists in a lot of areas now as we try to reconcile the idea if with an open and free internet with increasing intent by some countries to control information within their borders, particularly as it relates to their own citizens. we have to decide, do we want a real global internet or do we want a series of little national nets which would really undercut the economic and social value of what the internet is. >> david ignatius has a question. david? >> i want to ask secretary chertoff about one issue that may be on the agenda in helsinki when president trump and president putin meet, and that is the idea of global cyber regime, of global set of rules and standards administered
through the united nations or some international organization. the russians, as you know, secretary chertoff have been pushing this idea for the last few years. last few years. a lot of americans resist the idea that russians and chinese would write the rules for everybody. what do you think? >> first of of all, i do think we need to have some global rules, a kind of -- what microsoft has described as a geneva convention in cyberspace. we need to reinforce the idea that the fact we're operating in cyberspace does not mean you can attack civilians or undermine civil institutions. on the other hand, the question is who administers this? the russians and the chinese often want to have it be the u.n. because they believe they can dominate that process. i'm afraid that would take us down a road where there would be a lot of censorship. i know they view it as ideas they don't like to hear.
i think most western states want a multi-stake model where you get not just governments but civil society and even technical people involved in governing in kind of an incremental way. >> interesting waets going on there. you look at prime minister erdogan and trump walking together. just thought i would point that out because he seems to have done some things in the early hours of all of this happening in front of the cameras that appear to be for putin. and coming in from a separate entrance, possibly symbolic to separate himself. and now seemingly clustering a little bit with turkey's prime minister. it's fascinating. >> he's drawn to tough guys. mr. secretary, i realize you've been stepped away from an official capacity for quite a while, but i have a feeling that most americans would be stunned at the amount of money, billions, that american companies pay to prevent cyber
attacks against them. but we live in a world, we're in a threat of constant cyber attacks. i understand the removal in time from your office, but who are the top three, four, five practitioners, really good practitioners of cyber warfare in the world that we have to cope with? >> first of all, i think we certainly are as good as anybody. but we're dealing with the russians and the chinese. the chinese have been prolific in stealing sintellectual property over the years, though they've dialed it back a bit. the russians are responsible for a tax on the ukraine, a tax on us. there is disclosure that malicious tools have been found on our critical infrastructure. then you have north korea and iran who are not as capable, but they're more malicious and more unrestrained. the truth is you can buy a lot of bad stuff now on what they call the dark web. so these countries, although they're not at the level of a
russia or china, do have the ability to acquire some serious cyber weapons, and i think that's another concern. >> can we keep up with this? it's a constant daily battle, i would imagine. >> i think we are technically as good or better than anybody. but the problem is we're playing defense. it's an asymmetric game where the attacker just has to attack once. also not every enterprise sin vested as they should be in cyber security. it's a little like being a hockey goalie and you're getting a lot of free shots on goal, and that makes it very difficult to defend. >> we're watching, i believe, the setup for the family photo as they call it, and i see president trump having some pleasant conversation -- sort of pleasant -- she's kind of like, uh-huh, uh-huh. yep. yep, i'm really trying not to look at him and talk to him, but
he keeps coming back at me. i'm just going to look straight ahead here and hope the conversation stops. fascinating dynamics leading up to this photo being taken. president trump, of course, has certainly made waves in the first few hours of the nato summit, culminating in this picture, preceded by him entering and hanging out and walking with turkey's prime minister erdogan. and before that deciding to enter the nato headquarters from a different entrance than all the other world leaders were using. and before that, his performance before the cameras addressing nato's secretary general about germany. and it really -- by all estimates, everybody here on the set and andrea mitchell and all those who have been covering these summit for decades, astonished is a word to use to
describe the reaction that we are seeing among top foreign policy analysts. and also really no other explanation for what could have been behind what he was saying except that he was doing everything, seemingly, to please vladimir putin. which, really, i'm stretching my brain here, david ignatius, to think of what other intention would be other than what he said before the cameras about germany. >> i think this president likes to cause instability, who likes to create an uproar. he thinks that's advantageous before going to a key meeting with vladimir putin in helsinki. he thinks, strangely, that this will give him the appearance of strength that he's willing to diss his key allies and he'll come to the meeting with putin
in stronger shape. i have a feeling that the script for the putin meeting will be to write some new rules for places like syria, begin to write them for ukraine independent of our nato allies. it's going to be putin and trump who are getting the job done. he loves that role. up there with another big guy, whether it's xi jinping or kim jong-un and now putin writing the rules. i must say writing these pictures, you see him with clenched teeth, sort of scowling with everybody. he talks stiffly with other leaders, but there is a sense that this isn't a club he wants to be part of. i bet you anything we'll see a lot more presidential smiles when he's in helsinki with vladimir putin. fancy that. >> he doesn't like to share a stage, clearly. it's all about him.
mr. secretary, when you were there, ms-13 is quite a thing the president likes to talk about. it was on your screen, ms-13, as clearly as huge as it is on president trump's screen? >> it was on our screen and we were concerned about what was going on in the u.s., but a bigger problem was this. as we deported people back to their home countries after they served prison terms, they were received by places that didn't have the ability to manage the influx. or you had el salvador receiving ms-13 members, and all of a sudden they have the responsibility to police them and they don't have the capability. one of the things you have to look at when you see our refugee and our immigration policy is the solution begins not in the u.s. but in central america. you know, we need to have the ability of these countries to build a policing capability and deal with the gangs where
they're actually gestating because that's what's driving the refugees and creating our problem. this is a system problem, not a u.s. problem. >> can you look at this picture and all the dynamics we're covering between the key leaders we're looking at on this stage. >> once upon a time, and always until now, america was the anchor of nato, right? and now he's the outlyer. he's standing outside everybody and everybody is thinking he's this -- to use the phrase from this morning -- the kind of wrecking ball for nato. can i ask the secretary a question? go back to your book since they're standing still. one of the things we worried about were domestic attacks on the u.s.
the rise of isis messaging which is what i dealt with. what happens when people around the world who doesn't like muslims, wants to decrease muslims in america. does that increase the likelihood of an attack by an extremist islamic group? >> it does, because somehow it says the narrative is oppressed and they end up striking back. we're going to see rise extreme right wing and left wing violence. when you dial up the rhetoric and you use language that's aggressive and hateful, that empowers a certain segment of society to act out. just the way we did in the '60s where we show extreme right and left violence, i'm afraid we'll start to see an uptick of things we've seen, for example, in charlottesville. >> well, we're watching the
family picture, and some families, as joe pointed out, are quite dysfunctional. what a time it is. we're watching president trump now at the nato summit. we have an interesting dynamic where the president is insulting in a bold-faced way our allies, but 97 members of the u.s. senate passing a resolution to support nato with only two "no" votes, and of course senator mccain not able to vote. it is the top of the hour. with us we have msnbc contributor mike barnacle, columnist and associate editor of the "washington post," david ignatius, foreign public of state michael chertoff. david, the resolution patssed b
the senate, how symbolic is that to the world, or does it not have a lot of weight given the gravity of the situation? >> i think it is a reminder that donald trump is not the only voice in america, but he's certainly the strongest. it's symbolic. looking at the class picture of all those leaders standing together, i kept thinking if we were going to put a caption underneath donald trump, it would say, does not play well with others. that's really a problem. this is a president who, in a collective alliance that's all about interdependence, shared security doesn't play well with others. he gets angry at them. he's jealous. if one is making too much money in trade, he wants to beat them down. if they're not contributing enough to this or that, he insists on haranguing them. the spirit of nato collected action is still very much alive in our congress. so many senators and congressmen
have attended nato meetings in europe. the people who sign that resolution, i think, have a personal, intimate sense of what this alliance means. senator reid was one of the principal authors of senator mccain is a perfect example. john mccain goes to europe many times every year, and if there is a symbol for europeans of what the durable american commitment to their security is, it is senator john mccain, ailing now with his very serious brain cancer. but, boy, there is a person who kept this alliance going and symbolized personally what it meant for several generations of europeans. >> another word about john mccain, i was lucky enough to know him not only when i was in office to work with him, but also to travel with him to the munich security conference a few times, and he was really a beacon to the europeans and to
the world about what the u.s. meant. and he also tut ored and educatd a lot of members of congress and got them involved and engaged and that's a very strong part of the enduring relationship between our allies in europe and the united states. >> and when he was in munich or any other place in the world, i think other world leaders knew that what he said, his word was good. >> yep. >> what's confounding about this, i've been to nato meetings. what's great about a nato meeting, boy, people embrace you. you're the star of the party. it's a great feeling to be behind the flag at a nato meeting and think, yes, we've been the ballast of this, we've been the foundation of this. and people are grateful. the fact that the president is so ungrateful and so animated is a terrible thing for the united states. >> the picture is interesting. if you look at most members of
the nato countries, especially the european nato countries, each of the heads of those governments know that in their countries, there are american cemetaries with young men dead since 1945. and it's american territory, it's maintained by the government services administration, our government. there are beautiful plots of land in each and every country in europe. and guess what we did after world war ii, after we left our dead, after we buried our dead? we came home. we did not put a claim on their country, on their land. we came home. that's america. >> what's the colin powell quote, john? >> protected power around the world, sacrifice blood of our young men and all we've ever asked in return is the ground in which to bury our dead. >> and that's what this country has been about.
again, since 1945 we have stood side by side with britain. as i said before, rick, germany coming under withering attack today by the president, but the west germans from 1945 through 1989 with the collapse of the berlin wall, the west germans stood on the front line of that twilight struggle. they have been our closest allies militarily and strategically for years. >> and the unification of germany was one of the great post-war achievements that was led by american diplomacy. that changed the world for better in so many ways that it was just kind of incalculable. by the way, people didn't necessarily think it was going to happen. >> by the way, a lot of people didn't want it to happen. george h.w. bush had to use all
diplomatic skills that he had to unite germany. >> and the main person or entity that didn't want it was russia. russia always wanted a divided, split-up germany on its border, and the fact that this was their nightmare come true and the dream come true, as mika was saying, was to have an american president in germany criticizing germany is just -- i mean, david ignatius is too good a novelist to even put that in one of his columns. >> it would be crazy if he wrote it. it would be too crazy. >> nobody would believe it, would they? >> they would think it was pre p preposterous. come on. >> we have a great clip of president ronald reagan on the right way to talk about germany.
but first, our president, keep your eye wpinpointed on his chif of staff john kelly and secretary of state mike pompeo, because their body language is fascinating. >> also, kay bailey hutchinson also looks more than a bit uncomfortable. >> here is the president of the united states. >> i think it's very sad when germany makes a massive oil and gas deal with russia where you're supposed to be guarding against russia, and germany goes out to pay billions and billions of dollars a year to russia. we're protecting germany, we're protecting france, we're protecting all of these countries, then numerous of the countries go out and make a pipeline deal with russia where they're paying billions of dollars into the coffers of russia. we're supposed to protect you against russia, but they're paying billions of dollars to russia, and i think that's very inappropriate. and the former chancellor of
germany is the head of the pipeline company that's supplying the gas. ultimately germany will have almost 70% of their country controlled by russia with natural gas. you tell me, is that appropriate? i mean, i've been complaining about this from the time i got here. it never should have been allowed to have happened. but germany is totally controlled by russia. i think it's something that nato has to look at. i think it's very inappropriate. you and i agreed that it's inappropriate. >> there are sometimes differences and different views and also some disagreements on the gas pipeline from russia to germany. it's a small issue in which allies disagree. but we've always been able to unite to protect and defend each other because we stand stronger together than apart. we have two world wars and a
cold war and we are stronger together than apart. >> how can you be together when a country is getting its energy from the person you want protection against or from the group that you want protection? >> because we understand that when we stand together also in dealing with russia, we are stronger. i think what we have seen -- >> you're just making russia richer. you're not dealing with russia, you're making russia richer. >> even during the cold war, nato allies were trading with russia and there have been disagreements on what kind of trade arrangements we should have. >> i think trade is wonderful. i think energy is a whole different story. ic i think energy is a much different story than trade. you have a country that won't accept the gas. you take a look at some of the countries, they won't accept it because they don't want to be captive to russia. but germany, as far as i'm concerned, is captive to russia because it's getting so much of its energy from russia. so we're supposed to protect
germany, but they're getting their energy from russia. explain that. and it can't be explained, you know that. >> so, mr. secretary, there has been controversy behind this pipeline. and as a head of nato told donald trump, we have disagreements all the time. that's why we come here to talk through the disagreements. >> putting aside how this was expressed, there has been a concern about the fact that the russians use their gas, natural gas, as a lever to kind of drive behavior that they want to drive. and one of the solutions would be for us to export more of our liquid natural gas to europe which would create a counterbalance to the russians. so if one could strip out some of the hostility, there is actually a point to be made here about the geopolitics of energy that would be helpful both to us and to the europeans. >> so how does the united states export more? >> well, i think what we do is
we allow the regulations to permit us to do more exporting. for a long time we've been very constrained in our ability to export. we work with the europeans, if they're willing to sign contracts with us. that would then create a counterbalance to the russian use of their pipeline as a way of kind of exerting pressure. >> how do we do that in the middle of a trade war where we've racked europe with tariffs? >> that's where you have to get strategic. the big picture is to move power away from putin and back to europe and ourselves, and that way we're not dealing with steel which doesn't have an impact on the trade balance. we should be talking about energy and technology which is really our value position globally. >> let's compare trump's posture on germany to this, ronald
reagan and his nato allies in 1982 as he departed western germany. >> in berlin this morning, i looked across that tragic wall and saw the grim consequences of freedom denied. but i was deeply inspired by the courage and dedication to liberty which i saw in so many faces on the western side of that city. the purpose of my trip to bonn was to consult both with leaders of the german government and our colleagues from other nations. both aspects of the visit have been a great success. we didn't seek to avoid the problems facing the west in the coming years, we met them head on and discovered that, as always, what unites us is much deeper and more meaningful than any differences which might exist. >> john meacham. >> a different era, i think is
safe to say. and interesting -- ronald reagan came into office in 1981, as he himself put it, with a lot of people believing he was a combination of the mad bomber and ebenezer scrooge. there is a kind of center left acceptance of reagan and reaganism now that is, a, historical in the sense that it was not true in realtime. in 1982, '83, there were extraordinary demonstrations both in the united states and around europe by the deployment of the hrhing 2. so the idea there was this colleague before trump is not true. what is true is reagan was someone who came out of cultural populism, and as president reached beyond his base. he governed for the whole
country. he came in as a cold warrior who said -- the first week he was at the white house and said the soviet union lies and cheats to seek world domination. and in 1998, he's literally standing in red square playing with babies. he was a union negotiator. he understood that hope was a better bet than fear. president trump comes from a populist tradition here. he has shown no interest, and in fact, quite the opposite, in ever reaching out beyond his base. >> and, you know, mr. secretary, one thing that mark anbinder talked about in his book about ronald reagan was reagan was obsessed with understanding the soviets. he didn't quite understand why the soviets feared us as much as they did. so he read every book on the soviet union he could. he was constantly asking
experts, why do they fear us? what do we need to do? after he got shot, of course, we all know he felt like it was -- god had given him this time on earth to rid the world of the nuclear menace. and that's what he got to work on by trying to understand those with whom he disagreed. >> that would seem to be a good model for the 45th president as well. >> reagan had a positive vision. it wasn't just negative, it was how to reach something positive. and he had a strategic vision. and i think maybe to a greater degree than was appreciated at the time, he was somebody who listened and learned and was a thinker. i think that was a real strength that he had. i will say that if you look at the russians now, they still harbor that sense of fear and paranoia that goes back to the '80s. and what's been striking to me in the little bit of interaction i've had with them is how
generally convinced they are that we're out to undermine them, and in many ways they haven't lost that chip on their shoulder that you see back in the reagan era. >> mr. secretary, thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you, michael chertoff. >> and talk about a timely book, an important book. the book is "exploding data: reclaiming our cyber security in the digital age." a must read. thank you. president trump may think nato is a waste of time, but as we mentioned, 97% of the u.s. senate disagrees with the president of the united states. how lawmakers sent their own message to american allies just hours after the president touched down in europe. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. we do whatever it takes to fight cancer.
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belgium. the measure was authored by ranking member of the senate armed services committee, jack reed. >> the united states participates in nato because we believe the trans-atlantic partnership is in the u.s. national interest and not because other countries are paying us for protection. >> the motion reaffirms the u.s. commitment to nato as a community of shared values including liberty, human rights, democracy and the rule of law. in addition it calls for the u.s. to pursue an integrated approach to strengthen u.s. defense as part of a long-term strategy that uses all elements of u.s. national power to deter, and if necessary, defeat russian aggression. it also reiterates u.s. support for the rules-based international order and for expanding and enhancing our alliances and partnerships. senators rand paul and mike lee were the only two to vote against the motion. >> yeah.
wow. okay. caskasie hunt, that is the unit states senate sending as strong a message as possible to our nato allies, as well as to vladimir putin, talking about russian aggression in that language and also, you know, some of the republican senators that went over and were criticized for going over to russia actually, if you look at what was said in those meetings, there was confrontation about the russians interfering, meddling in our 2016 election. it seems the senate, at least, and some republicans in the senate, at least, except for mark lee and rand paul, thicnk it's a good idea to stand shoulder to shoulder with our european allies and stand out against regression. >> this reads to me like an attempt by the u.s. senate, republicans ask dnd democrats a, to send a message to our nato
allies, please try not to worry too much, we promise to keep the light on for you. as we move past this era, this is still something important to us. there were so many republicans who didn't want trump to get elected in the first place. they thought there would be a lot of problems and issues. i don't think any of them ever dreamed that it would be a serious question to ask -- mitch mcconnell got the question yesterday, do you think this president is going to pull us out of nato, the house we built. this is the western world the united states of america has been built after the cold war and it's been bedrock for all of our foreign policy, but particularly on the republican side. you look at ronald reagan at the end of the cold war. so the fact this vote was so overwhelming, the fact that it happened at all, jack reed, a democrat, they gave it to him and his counterpart, obviously, not here in washington, still battling brain cancer. but that is just an incredible signal and it comes from the top down. >> john meacham.
yes, it was the house we built, nato. the ignorance of donald trump and the ignorance of those who believe he somehow is showing those europeans, showing them what real leadership is about, again, only reveals an ignorance that the house that america built in europe we built for our own selfish interest. we built to protect our military troops, to stop a third european world war from occurring in 30 years. we did it to build strong trade partners. and what happened? we built strong trade partners. we kept germany, we kept italy, we kept france, we kept a lot of countries out of stalin's grasp after world war ii.
this, along with the truman doctrine, the morso plan. one of america's greatest investments ever. forget about the niceties of democracy and freedom, just cold, hard cash. so when donald trump is playing businessman over there, he's being a fool and tearing down the foundation of america's $19 trillion economy. >> yeah. when fdr was dictating the for-freedom speech in 1941 which was freedom for one, freedom from fear, he said we must fight to guarantee these freedoms everywhere in the world, everywhere in the world, everywhere in the world. he was dictating this. and harry hopkins, his great adviser, said, mr. president, i wouldn't say everywhere in the world because america doesn't give a damn about java. and hear truman came back and
said, the world is getting so small we have to care about java. we have to care about berlin. churchill said at harvard in 1943 that the price of greatn s greatness, america cannot have the long arm of history reach out across the oceans. so it's entirely in our self-interest. coming up on "morning joe," two of the top democrats on capitol hill, the ranking member on oversight and government reform, congressman elijah cummings. and the party's leading voice on the senate committee, senator bob menendez. "morning joe" is back in a moment. - i love my grandma. - anncr: as you grow older, your brain naturally begins to change which may cause trouble with recall.
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aimed at undermining germany, and again, right now it's looking like other summits that our president has attended. and continues a trend of being most abusive diplomatically to liberal democracies who have been our closest allies since the end of world war ii. and being, of course, most obseqious towards dictators and autocrats. which really, rick stengel, makes the next summit donald trump will be having with vladimir putin all the more important with the world all the more focused on whether an american president is really
going to undermine the nato alliance before going and embracing vladimir putin, a man who we said a few days ago would cause him his least worries. >> yes. if you bought a new spy novel and it opened with an american president going to a nato summit and attacking germany, you would probably put it down because it was too i am applaumplausible, never happen. but if it was the same novel, he would go to see putin who seeks to unravel nato and has a summit where they're hugging and kissing. it's just inconceivable. we were looking at ronald reagan in berlin in 1982 who talked about americans that died to protect our european allies, and ronald reagan would be so appalled at what donald trump is doing. it's absolutely inconceivable, and as mika said earlier can,
it's p -- it's putin's dream to see an american president attacking nato. >> we've seen them as an imminent threat to russia for some time just as the soviet union did as well. mike, making that bad spy novel all the more unbelievable about an american president doing the bidding, whether consciously or subconsciously for vladimir putin by undermining nato, would be the fact that that bad spy novel would begin with the president being investigated for possible collusion with vladimir putin and russia because, well, of the 13 russians that have been indicted, his national security adviser who was close to russia who has been indicted and is now cooperating, his campaign chairman who has been indicted and is now in jail with close ties to russia and russian
oligarchs, his deputy campaign manager also caught lying to the fbi. i mean, you could go down the list. and so that's all the backdrop for what we're seeing here. a president accused of being too close to vladimir putin and with suspicions raised about vladimir putin having something on him going to putin's bidding. this isn't a spy novel's work. you don't do it in the light of day, but donald trump does. >> as we were spelling out the gist of this preposterous spy novel which is all playing out in reality in our newspapers and newspapers around the world as we speak, one of the principal characters in the back story of this preposterous spy novel is seated three rows directly behind the president of the united states, and it is general james mattis, the secretary of defense, who has to, i imagine,
carry on a separate dialogue with other ministers from the nato countries, basically telling them, listen, i understand what happened this morning. i understand where our president is coming from, i understand your fears, but we are here. we will be there if article 5 is invoked. america stands behind its word. that's general mattis' task. >> and secretary mattis famously said nato was so important that if it didn't exist, we would have to invent it. >> absolutely. general ismay said something and lady thatcher used it later, that the purpose of nato was to keep the russians out, the germans down and the americans in. and right now, i suspect the germans are up. they want to keep russia out, still. i'm not sure they want us around so much. >> it's part of the infrastructure of the most remarkable era of prosperity and
relative stability, certainly, what, since the 1400s, i would say. certainly in the last six or seven hundred years. what's the great achievement? irony upon irony here. the great achievement of the post-war era in many ways is the american middle class. the level of material prosperity, the ultimate, though, painstaking and it took too long, the ultimate expansion of the jeffersonian promise of equality. i don't think it's a coincidence that 1964 and '65 saw us actually undo jim crow. it was partly because people were prosperous and they were able to finally, on the white side of the color line, were able to listen to those better angels. >> that's what's puzzling here.
like 1964 and 1965, we have been living in prosperity for the better part of 40, 50 years, and certainly over the past seven years, starting in barack obama's second year, we started a recovery in this country that has continued in a straight line. we're almost at full employment. our wages are creeping upward. we don't have the excuse, well, you know, the white middle class or the white working class is frustrated and afraid that people of color are going to take their jobs. we're at full employment. that makes this time all the more vexing. why are we moving in this direction of a populist when the united states of america is enjoying unequaled, economic and military prosperity? >> that's what makes this all the all pernicious.
because what president trump has done over the last three years -- it's been almost exactly three years, right, wasn't it june 15? >> right. >> he has created an emotional crisis in the country that is not substantiated -- >> it's not attached to reality. make america great again? $19 trillion economy. make america great again? our military ten times as strong as the next. i mean, stop all the border crossings from mexico? there was a net negative rate of immigration as we sat through the entire campaign. these campaign promises that he has made to stir up the crowd and suggest that america is facing one crisis after another have been made up out of whole cloth. >> and sometimes -- social science shows that when people should be most content, they're on most dissatisfied. he is tapping into a
dissatisfaction that isn't earned. the economy is almost a full employment economy. it's disturbing. coming up next, the top democrat on the house oversight and government reform committee, elijah cummings will be with us. keep it right here on "morning joe." we're going to ask him, where are the children?
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it's the internet in your hand. that's why xfinity mobile can be included with xfinity internet. which could save you hundreds of dollars a year. it's a new kind of network designed to save you money. click, call or visit a store today. >> mr. president, will the deadline not be met for reuni reunifying the children? >> i have a solution. do not come to our country illegally. do like others do, come legally. i'm saying this very simply. we have laws, we have borders. don't come to our country illegally. it's not a good thing. >> and i think a lot of americans agree with you. i know i certainly do. don't come to america illegally.
get in line like everybody else. that said, i also think most americans agree with me that it should not be u.s. policy to rip babies, infants, toddlers from their mothers' arms and then scatter them across america in a way that actually has them lost and has our government trying to figure out how to unite parents and toddlers, infants, children. but that's what's happening. and with us now, we bring in the ranking member of the house oversight and government reform committee, democratic congressman elijah cummings of maryland. elijah, it is always great to see you. thanks for being here. >> it's good to be here, joe. >> elijah, mika has been asking for several weeks, where are the children? it's a simple, basic, straightforward question. there are some that suggest the government knows exactly where the children and the parents are and they know how to unite them. that doesn't seem to actually be
the case on the ground. what can you tell us? >> i can tell you that i think nobody really knows where all these children are and where their parents are. and i don't think -- and the reason for that, joe, is because it was never an intention from the very beginning to reunite these children with their parents. you know, something as simple as an arm band like they give you when you go in a hospital. put one on a parent, put one on a child and be able to match them up. this is not rocket science. but now we're in a situation where because they did not properly plan, because they executed the zero tolerance policy in a way that had no forethought, and as a matter of fact, it looks to me like a very mean thing that the trump administration has done, we've got children who may never,
sadly, be reunited with their parents. but one thing i am glad about, and that is the judge is taking a real hard line with the government and saying, you've got to get this done, and continuing to pressure them very, very hard. >> congressman, clearly you're speaking about a crisis that is of the moment today, but if you think about this, we've been talking about immigration reform legislation to figure out exactly how to do this since alan simpson and ted kennedy began talking about it in the mid-1980s. my question to you is, given the nature of politics today, given the polarization in both the house and the senate, do you think it's possible that in our lifetime, your lifetime and my lifetime, that there will be some legislation passed to deal with this constant issue in a common sense way? sdp >> i really hope so, and that's
why i was very pleased that congressman meadows, the head of the freedom party and certainly a republican and one of our most conservative republicans, joined with me in asking for chairman gowdy of the oversight committee to do a hearing where we began to explore, first of all, what's happening with these children, trying to make sure it doesn't happen again. but also looking at how do we put ourselves into a position we're not constantly revisiting this situation? but to go back to your question, the parties are so divided, and with president trump saying the kind of things he's been saying, it doesn't help. >> rick? >> congressman, good morning. >> good morning. >> following up on that question, putting together an immigration policy. that mighten even happen in our lifetime. is there something congress can
do right now that prevents immigration from separating young people, infants, toddlers from their family? that this zero tolerance policy needs to be amended. >> there are several pieces of legislation that i know of that will address that issue. the question is whether the speaker will allow that kind of legislation to come to the floor of the house. he has been very reluctant to allow various types of legislation to come where he thinks it might not -- you know, where he thinks that he may be embarrassed in any way. but that's going to be the key. i think we can get some of the legislation that's already out there that says you cannot do this, then we can get there. but at this point, i think it's very difficult. >> congressman, do you have any sense of when we might be looking for director mueller's report? and if your party were to take the house back in november, to
what extent do you think the likelihood of impeachment proceedings is? >> first of all, i do not have a clue as to when mueller will be issuing his report. and i think that everybody needs to just chill for a minute and allow him to do his work. i've never seen anything like this where a defense team goes so publicly attacking a prosecutor. i've never seen that and i practiced for over 20 years before i came to congress. they've done everything they can to take away his credibility. but i think we need to let him do his job. and as far as impeachment is concerned, i think we have to face that when we get to it. a lot of it is going to depend on what mueller comes back with.
>> all right. congressman elijah cummings, as always, it's great to have you on the show. it's great to see you. i'll see in you washington sometime soon. >> all right, sir. thank you. sir. thank you. the ranking member of the foreign senate relations committee, democrat bob menendez of new jersey. we've been talking about what our secretary of defense had said about nato a year or so ago. it was so important if nato didn't exist, we would have to create it. i take it from the vote in the united states senate that is the unanimous agreement of all the democrats and at least every republican except for two. >> it's the near unanimous agreement except two republicans. and today they will mark up legislation that speaks to nato alliance that's brought us peace and prosperity in 73 years.
it was there in the aftermath of world war ii. it was there to win the cold war and on september 11th when the only time nato has invoked mutual self-defense provision was on behalf of the united states when it was struck on that tragic day september 11th and for 17 years they've fought with us across the globe. at the same time it's created prosperity that we have been part of enjoying in a significant market for the united states products and services. this is critical. it's so upsetting to see that putin, whose number one goal is to divide the west, particularly in nato, has an american president doing his work for him in a way that all of his cyber attacks and twitter disinformation and trolls have been unable to achieve. putin made a great investment in the 2016 presidential election
and it's paying off for him in brussels today. >> so what does the united states senate do? what can it do in a bipartisan way to send a message to our nato allies as well as to russia, that despite the fact that we have a president who said vladimir putin would be the easiest part of his trip and that our democratic allies, who have stood by our side since 1945, were going to be the most difficult, what do we do to right side this relationship again that our commander in chief is turning upside down? >> yesterday from the beginning, as you pointed out, joe, the senate spoke in a strong bipartisan vote, national defense authorization act. today the senate will speak through the senate foreign relations committee in a near unanimous effort. one colleague, rand paul, may not be there, in solidifying the
nato relationship from a national security interest. thirdly, i have said on the senate floor and i will continue, as my colleagues will continue to echo, that sanctions against russia is not a question of discretion for the president. when we wrote casa it was the first time in all the sanctions i've helped author, whether it be gns iran or in this case against russia, that the congress did not provide the discretion to an american president and insisted on mandatory sanctions if certain actions by russia were taking. those actions can only -- those sanctions can only be undone by the senate. i think that those are three critical elements of sending a very clear message to our nato allies that congress, an expression of the will of the american people, believes in nato and the importance of it.
>> senator, we're listening to you and respect your views and they're very strong views in opposition to what the president is doing. what the president is actually doing, it seems, is undermining 75 years of peace, stability and progress in disrupting nato. it seems as if he is intent on basically detablizing nato to the point that the european union is weakened. why then do we not hear more voices come out more strongly, like yours, on the fluoro of the united states senate and elsewhere in unison about what this president is doing to our history and our country? >> i think the vote yesterday speaks loudly. i would hope that my republican colleagues -- nato has been the
bu bu bull bullwort in support of nato. they're muted voices today, other than through their vote, is a concern to me because we need to send a robust message to all of europe, particularly our nato allies and to russia, an adversary. it worries me that the president is going to a meeting with putin where he describes him as a competitor. he is not a competitor. he is an adversary, in my opinion, a foe. when you go into a meeting thinking someone is a competitor, that's a strategically different train of thought when someone is an adversary. i hope our colleagues will raise their voices as they have in the past. they just need to go back and look at those speeches and they're as relevant today as they were when they made them
before. >> appreciate it. rick stingel, there are quite a few diplomatic dumpster fires, i think kinnen called it, that we are seeing at the same time. one, of course, is what's happening in nato. and people are offering their warnings. the president ignores those warnings and another where the president ignored warnings was north korea, which cnn international reported earlier that a source with knowledge of discussions between pompeo and north korea said the trip went, quote, as badly as it could have gone. north koreans were just messing around. not serious about moving forward. pompeo was promised a meeting with kim jong-un and not getting one. and kim jong-un in his summer
whites, as willie said, picking potatoes instead of meeting with america's secretary of state sends a message. >> i harken back to what david ignatius said earlier, the forming of this great post war order that the u.s. was the foundation of. maybe we are witnessing and maybe we are present at the destruction of that order. and that is just very disturbing. >> final thoughts, john meachum, in 15 seconds? >> i think president trump thinks that dean masterson was the head of the elementary school he went to. and i think this, too, shall pass. >> long past time for bob menendez and other members of the senate on both sides of the aisle to remind donald trump that this country does not belong to him. it belongs to us. that does it for us on this very busy wednesday morning.
stephanie ruhle will pick up the coverage in two minutes. i got it. and sometimes those experts need experts. on it. [ crash ] and sometimes the expert the expert needed needs insurance expertise. it's all good. steve, you're covered for general liability. and, paul, we got your back with workers' comp. wow, it's like a party in here. where are the hors d'oeuvres, right? [ clanking ] tartlets? we cover commercial vehicles, too. i think there's something wrong with your sink.
♪ add-on advantage. discounted hotel rates when you add on to your trip. only when you book with expedia. ♪ ♪ welcome to "kasie d.c." i'm kasie hunt. we are live every sunday from washington from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. eastern. tonight, critical mass. thought our politics were explosive before? try replacing the swing vote on the supreme court. we'll talk about the wild conjecture and what's actually about to happen. at the same time, democrats take stock after a top member of leadership is upset in new york. rising stars ben jealous and jason candor join me live to talk about what their party should do next. and later i travel to utah
to talk with mitt romney on the campaign trail. he's set to become the republican senator in the age of trump. plus, do not congratulate. russia stuns spain at the world cup. but first the interviews, the lobbying effort and even the ads are underway to replace justice anthony kennedy on the supreme court. the president is back home after spending the weekend at bedminster conferring with white house counsel don mcgahn. a handful of names are floating around from the president's list of 25. democrats are pushing to postpone the confirmation until after the midterms. >> my colleagues on both sides of the aisle know that this vote could be one of the key votes of their entire career. if they vote for somebody who is going to change precedent, it could be a career-ending move. >> you don't need a degree in applied physics to understand the forces that democrats are up against. so for the white house, it's striking the right balance. convince republicans to hang
together and change the court for decades to come. >> i think it's going to go very quickly. i think we're going to have a lot of support. i think we're going to have support from democrats. frankly, i think -- if it's the right person. i'm going to pick the right person. i'm going to pick somebody that's outstanding and everybody on that list is outstanding. a lot of people think it's going to be a very -- it's probably going to be vicious because the other side, all they can do is obstruct and resist, you know the whole thing is resist. >> i'd like to welcome in my outstanding panel, two of the best reporters in the country on the supreme court legal affairs from npr, anyone a totenberg and justice correspondent pete williams. in new york former federal prosecutor georgetown university prosecutor and msnbc legal analyst paul butler. pete and anyonnina, i'd like tot the conversation off with you. as we were going on the air, i thought i should step back and let the two of you tell our viewers what is about to unfold. pete, just to start out, the context of this, everybody has
cast this retirement as one that is unlike any other, at least in the last generation. do you think that is a fair characterization? >> the last 50 years or so, ever since the nixon administration and earl warren stepped off the court and warren berger took his place. i'd say every time i hear a reporter say the trump nominee could change the supreme court, i think what's this could stuff? of course it's going to change the supreme court because anthony kennedy really, after sandra day o'connor stepped down in 2006, he has been the key vote. really, for most of the cases we pay attention to, you can't win without anthony kennedy. if he votes with the liberals, you get a liberal outcome. if he votes with the conservatives, you get a conservative outcome. that vote is about to be replace bid a conservative. the conservatives will have a solid majority and that's going to make a huge difference. >> nina, let's step back a minute.
for those of us who have not watched the court as long as you've had the privilege to, there is some sense of question as to how somebody like anthony kennedy got on the court in the first place. these debates are so polarized now. >> he got on the court actually because president reagan nominated robert bork who was a hard core conservative to the core, and bank of new york was soundly defeated. he then put up another nominee who had to withdraw because it turned out that he had been smoking marijuana. >> you can do that nowadays. >> you can do that nowadays. at the time, though, the reagan administration wouldn't hire anybody in the justice department who had admitted to smoking marijuana and they never asked him that question apparently when he went to work at the reagan justice department. so, he went by the wayside, but stayed a distinguished federal judge. that left -- they really -- they needed to pick somebody and it
was, you know, it was time. and justice kennedy got the nod and he was a pretty conservative guy. and they looked at all of his writings and they were concerned about his -- some footnote that he wrote about respect for privacy, but they decided to overlook it and there were people in the administration later who didn't like the fact that they had overlooked it. i mean, they thought that was a bad thing. >> and just -- i would add two things to that. number one, remember that justice kennedy we talk about today is not the one that came onto the court back in 1988. secondly, you had this sort of more moderate push. once bank of new york gork got next nominee was conservative. >> the democrats controlled the senate. >> it's not like you go from
conservative to more moderate. they're all pretty mainstream conservative. even if something happened to this nominee, whoever it's going to be, it's not like the next one up would be very different. >> to rain on the parade a little -- >> i'm sorry, paul, go ahead. >> i want to rain on the parade regarding justice kennedy swing. he did swing, but mainly to the right, and so he wrote the majority opinion in citizens united, that case that said corporations are like people. he also voted for bush in bush versus gore. so on certain issues like lgbt issues, he got it in the way most conservatives don't. but in other kinds of civil rights issues not so much. >> and the voting rights act, of course. >> voting rights act, exactly. pete, quickly, you have a short list of -- based on your reporting of that kind of list, the 25 that the president had compiled. and to this point about conservative to conservative, one thing that's been raised in my reporting is the idea if they were to select a woman -- the
woman on this list, amy conan barrett of indiana -- is that something where you have a sense that on questions of precedent, questions of roe v. wade she could have an easier time getting through the senate or be somebody who could make them feel better about the issues? >> not necessarily. she had said roe was erroneously decided is the term she used. to be fair, ruth bader ginsburg said the same thing. it came to the court too fast and the court shouldn't have decided it. but nonetheless, remember she just got on the court of appeals by president trump, so she's been there for about a year. she's already survived the senate confirmation. she was a law professor at notre dame. now she's a federal judge. i heard the president say or someone say the president was going to talk to perhaps two women, and for the life of me i'm not sure who the second woman is. >> i'm not either. let me say something about the list of the president's. the list as much as a political
document, the people who compiled it didn't think it was a political document, the folks at the society and heritage foundation. they don't think they're mainstream conservatives. they think they're movement conservatives. those 25 folks are movement conservatives. they're people who have been waiting a long time to look at vast quantities of the law, very, very differently. and the president -- the first list was 12, i think. president was so thrilled that it reassured the evangelicals, got such great press in the conservative press about it, he said let's do it again. and that -- then they added a couple more people. but that's the list. and the list is not what we used to call a mainstream conservative. it may be some day mainstream, but today, even on this court i would say the people on this list would be on the far-right of the court. >> paul, can i get you to weigh in? it's a good point. this is something that was compiled as president trump was trying to demonstrate his bona
fides in the primary. >> it doesn't matter that the president won't ask how they feel about roe v. wade or lgbt rights. he already knows. president trump said something unusually sage and learned on friday. he said, apart from war, this is the most important decision a president makes, and maybe that's why he's outsourced this process to this far-right federalist society. again, i think he thinks that the gorsuch nomination was one of the highlights of his presidency, so he wants to do it all over again. again, you can't overstate how conservative gorsuch is. he's more conservative than scalia who he replaced. he's about level with justice clarence thomas, one of the most conservative people ever to sit on the supreme court. >> yeah, i actually want to -- forgive me for my control room loop here. i want to read part of this piece -- part of your piece. you say that after 30 years on the court, he believes that once rights are recognized they will
not be taken away. that includes the right to abortion that he helped to preserve and rights for gay people he helped to establish, the right to marry and be treated equally. time will tell, but every indication is president trump in a little over a week is someone who does not think those rights are fully protected by the constitution. i think we have the sound. >> one of the concepts that really means a lot in america is you don't overturn precedent unless there is a good reason. and i would tell my pro-life friends, you can be pro life and conservative, but you can also believe in story decisis. roe v. wade has been affirmed many years. i hope the justice that sits on the court, all of them, would listen to the arguments on both sides before they decide it. the story decisis is a well known concept in our law. >> nina, for people who are watching this unfold and who are worried, for whatever reason, but let's take people who are
worried because they believe that they want roe v. wade upheld, what's the real likelihood that this is going to be a major confrontation down the line? are there cases wanting their way through the system now? >> what i always said was it's not going to be overturned as long as kennedy is there. kennedy is gone. i think the odds are not bad that it might be overturned. and what if there is yet another -- i mean, we have two other members of the court, steve briar, 77, ruth ginsburg is 85. i think there are two ways to go here. you can expect that it will be whittled away so that you can have a lot -- make abortion pretty -- just about inaccessible in the 20 or so states that have tried to do that. >> sometimes it already is. >> or it will be overturned outright. i don't foresee another one of
these coalitions coming together that says, look, this has been the law for 50, 40 some odd years and we're going to respect it. that's what story decisis is, respecting precedent. to us, the people who want to overturn it, is like racial segregation. they want to overturn it because it was wrong in their view. >> pete williams, what's your reporting on this and how realistic is it that there are cases that will wind their way through that would ultimately lead to an overturning of roe v. wade? >> there is no shortage of cases in the states that have tried repeat lid to overturn roe. the more recent trend with ken dip on the court has been to say, well, that's a lost cause. so the action has been in the states to, as nina say, restrict access. instructive example. texas passed a law that said a clinic that provides abortion services has to be built to the same standards as an ambulatory care center and the doctors who
perform the abortions have to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. no hospital would give them admitting privileges. it was a sort of, in essence, a ban on abortion. the supreme court shot that down with justice kennedy voting with the liberals. so, without him there it's more likely, as nina said, these restrictions on abortion, age, consent, time of pregnancy when it's available, types of services, restrictions on medication abortions, they're much more likely to be upheld even if roe survives. >> very interesting. much more to come when "kasie d.c." continues. rod rosenstein faces down congress as the mueller probe quietly presses on. plus, demonstrations break out across the country as the immigration debate stalls yet again. and later i'm joined by former communications director anthony scaramucci amid rumors of new white house shake ups. as we go to break, we dug deep into our vaults for a news reel on how we got to this moment for the supreme court. when republicans blocked even a hearing for merit garland.
>> the sproupreme court, the highest court in all the land, where are the justices now? in their black robes and the -- yes, their appointments last for life. and when one dies or retires, we go helter-skelter, crazier than a soup sandwich. and today our seat sits open on the high court's bench. here's president barack obama pleading to accept his nominee. >> i ask that they confirm merritt garland to the supreme court. >> merritt garland, mr. moderate. democrats say he's an ideal choice, but not so fast. the grand old party has their game faces on and are ready to play hardball. >> it is clear president obama has made his nomination to politicize it for purposes of the election. >> that's right, leadership marks precedent vowing not to
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>> media reports are mistaken. >> sometimes, but this is what they said. having the nation's number one law enforcement officer threaten to subpoena your cause in e-mails is down right chilling. did you threaten to subpoena their cause in e-mail s? >> no, sir, and there is no way to subpoena phone calls. >> i'm just saying. who are we supposed to believe, staff members who we've worked with, who never misled us, or you guys who we've caught hiding information from us who tell a witness not to answer our questions? who are we supposed to believe? >> thank you for making it clear it's not personal, mr. jordan. >> i'm saying the department of justice -- >> i'm telling the truth and i'm under oath. >> those are just some of the heated exchanges we saw on thursday as fbi director christopher wray and deputy attorney general rod rosenstein faced off with members of the house judiciary committee. the house also passed a resolution in the middle of that hearing seeking to compel documents from the justice department regarding the russia investigation. joining our conversation former u.s. attorney and msnbc
contributor joyce vance. joyce, i'll start with you on what we just saw. and i know you were paying attention to it over the course of the week. it was really, i thought, a remarkable display for them to so publicly attack rosenstein. >> it was incredible. this was the deputy attorney general, the number two guy in the justice department, testifying under oath and being accused of lying by a member of congress. while that deputy attorney general is in the middle of supervising the turnover to congress of an unprecedented level of documentation in an ongoing investigation. >> and the president has -- he did an interview with maria bartiromo of facts and talked about why he -- or how his involvement is coming to be. we'll take a look the about it, and paul butler i'll ask you about t. >> are you going to ask them to get those documents over to congress? >> i may get involved. i've been told by so many people don't get involved.
it's not good. and they'll get the documents and it's getting and they're getting them, and they're great people. i didn't like the scene the other day where everybody was screaming at each other. i don't like that because it's bad for the country. if russia is, in fact, looking to sow discord or chaos, they have to be saying this is the greatest thing we've ever done. >> paul butler, what is your take on the president's words? that was in many ways -- i'm not sure i heard him acknowledge the russian's goal was to sow discord. >> i know rod rosenstein, we started at the justice department as prosecutors. he's normally the textbook example of non-emotive. i've never seen him as angry at the congressional hearing. add to the mix of the reporting that he feels exploited or used by president trump when he wrote that memo, when trump got him to write that memo justifying the firing of james comey, i'm sure
trump would love to fire rosenstein right now, but republicans on the hill said that's a line that he shouldn't cross. and so it's rosenstein who gets to make the decisions about what documents are shared with the congress. and again, i think he's going to toe the line and the president has to basically, you know, follow the will of the career public servant which is exactly what he should do. >> pete williams, you have covered the fbi for many years and i feel like i watch you on television all the time and you say, we have no comment because this is an ongoing criminal investigation. it seems unprecedented to me the number of documents of an ongoing criminal investigation that the fbi is turning over to congress. >> well, it is. and i think to some extent, the former fbi director shares some of the reasons that this is happening. but let's step back and see what's happening. we do have two separate branches of government. when a criminal investigation is going on, it's traditionally been the view of the justice department, no matter whether
republican or democrat in the white house, that you don't turn over to congress your investigative materials. you just don't do that. and these members know that. and i think they're trying to get it for two reasons. one is to undercut the credibility of mueller's investigation. but secondly, to try to sort of set-up rod rosenstein for failure. to get him to say no so that they can cite him for contempt or something. but i do think that james comey bears some of the responsibility for why this is happening because after the clinton e-mail investigation, he gave huge amounts of information to congress. now, granted, the investigation was over, at least they thought it was at that point. but he gave them the fbi interviews, the so-called 302s that joyce and nina know all about, the raw interview -- >> what time frame was this? >> this was shortly after his testimony. >> okay. >> after his july news conference. i think he thought that it would -- members of congress would read this and say, oh, i get it, i see why james comey did what he did. what he did was create 535 g-men
that thought they can now get access to these documents. >> as somebody who covers congress every day, that image i find mildly terrifying. >> it should be grossly terrifying. >> g-men, oh, boy. so, trey gowdy has been somebody who has gone back and forth on this, he drew a lot of attention when he defended mueller's investigation. but he had some pretty tough words in this hearing. take a look. >> russia attacked this country. they should be the target, but russia isn't being hurt by this investigation right now. we are. this country is being hurt by it. we are being divided. we've seen the bias. we've seen the bias. we need to see the evidence. if you have evidence of wrongdoing by any member of the trump campaign, present it to the dam grand jury. if you have evidence that this president acted inappropriately, present it to the american people. whatever you got, finish it the
hell up. because this country is being torn apart. >> so, nina, he raises this point in here we need to see the evidence, if you have any evidence of wrongdoing by the trump campaign. it raises the question whether there ultimately will be a potential supreme court case around what comes out of the mueller investigation. and there's also been part of the conversation around the justice if they select somebody, should they have to recuse themselves. >> there very well could be just on the question of whether or not the president agrees to testify. if he says, no, i'm not going -- to have his deposition taken. if he says no, i'm not going to be interviewed by mueller and then they subpoena him, then -- and then trump lawyers challenge the subpoena, it will go to the supreme court and it will matter what that justice who is sitting where justice kennedy was, what he thinks. at least one of the potential nominees has written that he thinks that the president should be excused from civil suits and
from this kind of -- from special prosecutors entirely. >> that's brett kavanagh. >> that's brett kavanagh. i don't know whether he thought that was something that congress should do or that the court should do frankly, but to be fair, this is a -- you know, the position that the president has taken from time to time is -- and this is only a slight exaggeration because he said, i could go out and shoot somebody in the middle of 5th avenue and nobody -- my base wouldn't care. and he apparently thinks, from everything he said, that he ought to control the justice department and he would not be subject to prosecution. now, that's -- that's a stretch for me and mr. gowdy, with all deference to mr. gowdy, the reason they haven't finished their investigation is this involves a foreign nation and intelligence and not just was somebody taking money from the
cookie jar. >> joyce vance -- >> it's pretty complicate and had it takes a little bit of time. it does take time. >> a little bit or a long time. joyce vance, the last word on gowdy and i what we saw here. >> gowdy's questioning of rosenstein is interesting because we know the mueller investigation has already produ produced indictments. the one of the campaign managers is sitting in prison awaiting trial. as representative gowdy well knows, it is entirely possible mueller has taken more to the grand jury. there are sealed indictments that haven't yet been made public and mueller has, in fact, already taken the evidence that gowdy is complaining doesn't exist, to a grand jury. one suspects that this russian troll farm indictment that's already public will have an american component, perhaps involving stone or other close advisors of the president in the coming weeks. >> it's going to be a long hot summer in washington starting this weekend. we're all in 90 degree heat.
nina, paul, joyce, paul butler, thank you to you. the ink is dry on the executive order and protests break out across the country as the country's immigration policy remains unresolved. we're back after this. still a chance here. it's willingham, edge of the box, willingham shoots... goooooooaaaaaaaallllllll! that...was...magic. willingham tucks it in and puts the championship to bed. sweet dreams, nighty night. as long as soccer players celebrate with a slide, you can count on geico saving folks money. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. pressure, what pressure? the players on the...
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welcome back to "kasie d.c." in just eight days, president trump will announce his pick to replace retiring justice anthony kennedy on the supreme court. right now the president says he is considering about five people to fill that vacant slot, including two women. joining me now, former white house communications director anthony scaramucci. mr. scaramucci, it is good to see you. i have to ask you first about this tmz, i think, caught up with you and asked you about who the president is going to pick for the supreme court. can you again tell us who you think he's going to choose? and also how do you know? >> well, that's my guess. i mean, that would be my vaguest sports guess. it's only because of the closeness of the family, the fact that mary trump barry is on the third circuit with him.
he's a great judge, a very down to earth guy. but then when i said that, i didn't realize that there were going to be two women on the list of finalists. and so that probably alters my view a little bit. i mean, it could be possible that the president will pick one of those two women. so i'm a little less confident than i was when i did the tmz interview. >> you think there is anyway in the world he deviates from this list of 25? there was some speculation about senator mike lee, or do you think we're definitely going to get somebody on this list he publpu published? >> i can only go by what we discussed during the campaign and what led up to gorsuch. i think he's going to stick to the list. he likes that list. i also feel he made a campaign promise he was going to pick people off the list. he then said after justice gorsuch got on the court he was going to add people to the list, which he did. so i think it would be
uncharacteristic of him if he goes off the list. having said that, the people that they are talking about, should there be another retirement, i could see him adding other people to the list, like the ones that have been talked about. >> i want to talk to you, too, a little about trade and tariffs. this, of course, something your business background, you have weighed in and people have noticed. here's what the had to say about it in his fox interview, and we'll talk about it. >> would it be better to actually have our allies together to go against china instead of pushing back on our allies? >> excuse me. the european union is possibly as bad as china, just smaller, okay. it's terrible what they did to us. european union, take a look at the car situation. they send their mercedes in. we can't send our cars in. look what they do to our formers. they don't want our farm products. in all fairness, they have their farmers so they want to protect their farmers. but we don't protect ours and they protect theirs. >> you tweeted critically of the
president apartmen president's policy on that position saying he needs to, quote, change tactics now. what doesn't the president get about this, in your view? >> this is the thing. when people say i'm tweeting critically, i'm just really offering a bird's eye advice objectively. it's like the same thing with the child separation act. i said that that's a ridiculous policy. it has to be reversed. i think what sometimes happens is you're sitting in an echo chamber, kasie, and everybody wants to reaffirm each other's biases. >> you called on the president to change tactics now. >> i did. and the called on the president to reverse the child separation policy as well. but the reason i want to change tactics now is i spent a lot of time analyzing the situation and looking at flow of funds data, not only in europe, but here in the united states as well as china. and one of the things the president has done an amazing job of is he's boosted consumer confidence and the tax cut has
led to a stimulation of the economy. not just our economy, but the global economy. what you're watching is the rhetoric and the tension and the escalation of the trade rhetoric is causing a loss of confidence that is very, very bad for market psychology. and so i'm just sending up a warning flare to my friend and saying, listen, one way to change tactics here, the europeans and the united states, roughly a billion people, 46% of the world's gdp, both have issues with china. the president could say, listen why don't we address the imbalances that we both have with china first and then we can workout concession was each other. the only thing i disagree with the president on, i say this with great respect. i want him to win in the worst possible way and i'm loyal to him. >> you have said that. >> you have to understand the history of what happened with us and europe. go back to the marshall plan, go back to the '47-'48 gad
agreement. you'll see why these are imbalanced. we were -- i'm sorry? >> the canadians today, i understand the point you're making about europe. >> okay. >> to expand that broadly to canada, the canadians slapped counter tariffs on us, on america today. do you think that the president is damaging the country in creating a trade war with our closest ally across our border? >> i would say not yet, no. i don't think any real damage has happened yet -- >> -- reverse course? >> the market is telling you that. it doesn't matter what you think or i think, kasie. the market is telling you that. if you look at flow of funds data and you look at the last six months of market activity, the stock market was up roughly 2.5% for the first six months. that's the worst half of a year since 2010 when we've had a very -- great period of robust growth and low monetary policy.
so, the market is getting in a defensive position and girding itself. and what i don't like about what's going on is the president set the tempo for american ceos, business leaders large and small. america is open for business, let's invest in the country. let's repatriate capital back from overseas. the trade rhetoric is slowing people down and he's a very, very smart guy. he's an entrepreneur. he adapted on the child separation policy. i figure he can adapt here quickly where we can leave the economy growing and still address the trade issue. i think he's right on the trade issue, but i think he's wrong to go at both sides as aggressively as he's going. now, a lot of people will be criticizing me for saying that. that's fine. i think it is very, very important that we have smart people sitting in the room and offering different advice, which may or may not be inside the consensus. >> speaking of people sitting inside the room, there's been a lot of chatter. this comes up from time to time, but there seems to be some more
concrete details around chief of staff, john kelly potentially leaving. there's rumors, i would say, about sarah huckabee sanders and her tenure in the administration. we're running out of time, but quickly i want to know what you take first of all on the leaks out of the administration, what you make of those. second of all, has anybody been in touch with you about making a return run? >> no, thank god, no one has been in touch with me. but quickly, sarah's great. if general kelly is leaving, i wish him well. and the president will pick somebody hopefully that really likes him so he can start building a team around him, of people that really like the president as opposed to this establishment nonsense. the president has an agenda -- >> do you think the president has been effective? >> well, listen, you know, i have spoken about it before so i don't want to be the guy that's like beating the tommy-tom drum. do you think he's effective? >> that's a yes or no question. >> kasie, do you think he's been effective? i'll leave you this one last
thought. he wasn't capable of bringing one person into the white house. he didn't recruit one person. usually leadership, people want to work for you or work under you. they come running through the door to come work for you. so, listen, him and i don't like each other. it's totally fine. i don't want to make it personal, but just analyze it and be objective about it. and by the way, he only gave me 11 days as a communications director. three or four more days, i would have fired several of those people that are still leaking on the president right now. >> anthony scaramucci, thank you very much. happy holiday to you. >> happy 4th, kasie, happy 4th. >> coming up, a growing number of democrats call to abolishites as the immigration reaches a tipping point. you're watching "kasie d.c." oh, you brought butch. yeah! (butch growls at man) he's looking at me right now, isn't he? yup. (butch barks at man) butch is like an old soul that just hates my guts. (laughs)
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think about starting from scratch. >> i think it's too aggressive and over the top and i think it's lost its course. so we should replace it with something sensible, something practical. they still have to be a law enforcement agency but one that is a little more humane. >> we should froe text families that need our help and that is not what i.c.e. is doing today. start over, reimagine it, and build something that actually works. >> we can replace it with a humane agency that is directed toward safe passage rather than criminalization. >> we need to rebuild our immigration system from top to bottom, starting by replacing i.c.e. with something that reflects our morality and our -- >> joining me now on set, political reporter for axios, alexa mccanaan. chief correspondent for cnbc, john harwood. and contributor raul reyes.
raul, i want to start with you. these abolish i.c.e. cries really that are sweeping through the 2020 democratic establishment, what's your take on how that unrolls going forward? is it akin to republicans who have said abolish the irs, kind of knowing that ultimately taxes were never going to stop being collected? or is it something that speaks to a potential reality down the road? >> no, my take on this is that this growing movement which is increasingly as the clips show becoming mainstream, it reflects like such profound disenchantment with the role of this agency. some people see the calls to abolish i.c.e. as really a flat out call to end the agency. others see it -- other progressives see it as more of a starting point for a broader discussion about the role of the agency. here are the facts. it is a fact that i.c.e. has unleashed tremendous harm among latino and immigrant
communities. i.c.e. also sweeps up hundreds of u.s. citizens who cannot prove with papers on them that they are indeed citizens. so, this is an agency that has done a lot of damage and that, i think on the progressive side of the party, the swiftness of this movement going mainstream reflects that. so, to me it's more than just, you know, calls to abolish the irs. what i'm hearing a lot of is the push back on the right saying without i.c.e. we'll have open borders and there will be no immigration enforcement. whereas that is a misrepresentation of the issue because i.c.e. does not handle our borders. that's the role of the border patrol, customs and border protection, so we can have a strong border and we can have a new agency handling interior enforcement. interior enforcement is the job of i.c.e. >> john harwood, the kind of politics around this and the discrepancy between some of the younger alexandra or tcortez.
i'm taking to hillary clinton that you don't insist on a policy that isn't going to become law, and bernie sanders making it idealism saying we have to do all these things. it seems to me that the young -- the energy in the party is with, you know, the idealism. >> it is, but this is one area where i think the fact that you don't have a singular leader of the democratic party right now is an advantage. presidential nominees and presidents define their parties. and so when you have members of congress, there are a whole lot of them. i doubt that nancy pelosi and chuck schumer are going to make abolishing i.c.e. a core democratic issue in this campaign, and so the fact that a few people are calling for this and rallying progressives around that, i don't think it has the same kind of potential that the president's talking about, to cast the entire party as the
radical left. i just don't see that happening. >> alexis, let's not forget there is from what we can tell 2000 or so children who are separated from their families, and this really does seem to be -- abolish i.c.e. had been something activists had been using as a hashtag and focused on, but it really exploded into the mainstream after those child separation tz. >> right, because they think this is an issue that moves the democratic base in a way we haven't seen in a while. abolish i.c.e. is a perfect antithesis trump supporters chant to this day even though he's not running for reelection. among this revved uprising grassroots activist base in the democratic party. if they think they can use them, saying democrats are calling for open borders, i think it will be hard for them to make the argument that you can have strong borders and abolish i.c.e. a senior democratic source said
no one means this in a literal sense. the source said they mean it, to abolish i.c.e. is symbolic. the cultural argument of what is going on, whether it's children being separated or the president calling for deportations. it might not lead to the actual abolition of i.c.e. >> not necessarily practical. >> right. >> there was a memo that went out from the congressional hispanic caucus that essentially made the argument that hey, it might be better for everybody if he we cooled it down and instead focused on our actual immigration laws and not the enforcers, so to speak. what did you make of that memo? >> when i saw -- i did see the story about the memo. to me it sort of reflects that the caucus has maybe not wrapped their collective mind around how to deal with this issue, which has come up so quickly. but i would say that my sense is that this movement, it's real. it's not a sort of a theoretical call like abolish i.c.e. just in the sense of pushing back on trump. and when many people are calling
to abolish i.c.e., they're not saying to do away with any interior immigration enforcement. they are saying the agency as we know it should either be reformed, the duties should be given to gnaw entity, or there should be some type of radical restructuring of the agency. it doesn't seem that anyone is saying we shouldn't do immigration enforcement which is to a certain extent necessary in this country. >> raul reyes, thank you very much for your perspective on this. >> thank you. >> i really appreciate it. just ahead, the supreme court, mid terms and a shocking fall from leadership. it's an interesting time to be a democrat. in my next hour, i'm joined by two high profile candidates, ben jealous and jason kander, who is running for mayor of kansas city. we're back after this. starting with features designed to make it easy for your driver to find you. taking the stress out of pickups. and we're putting safety at the heart of everything we do. with a single tap, we're giving you new ways to let loved ones know you're on your way.
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going -- is this revelation going to prove destabilizing to this whole situation. the president went there, was operating, it appeared under the illusion that they were going to denuclearize. then when north korea said out loud, no, we're not. then he canceled the summit, then he rescheduled it. they took pictures. they put out a piece of paper that really didn't say anything at all. >> then we canceled our military exercises with south korea. >> we canceled our military exercises. he came home and said everybody, sleep safer because they're going to totally denuclearize, and they've already begun. that's not true. if in fact the president now connects to reality and sees that that's not happening, is he then going to blow up at chairman kim. >> no pun intended. >> and are we going to have a hostility? who knows. >> okay. john, alexi, stay with me because just ahead, michael steele and chef any ciroc are
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it took place. >> did you know at the time about that meet something. >> no, i didn't know anything about it. it must have been a very important meeting, because i never even heard that. >> no one told you a word, nothing? i know we talked about this on the plane a bit. >> no, nobody told me. sounded like a very unimportant meeting. >> deep cuts there from haberman and schmidt. that's not what michael cohen claims, alleging that he and several others were present when then-candidate donald trump gave his nod of approval for the meeting to move forward. that contradicts repeated denials from donald trump jr. and others in donald trump's orbit. >> did you tell your father anything about this? >> no. it was such a nothing, there was nothing to tell. i wouldn't have even remembered it until you start scouring through the stuff. >> the president said he became aware of it very recently, right before this came out, and that's when he was notified. >> joining me now is jeff
bennett, msnbc's white house correspondent, natasha bertrand, and kevin is with us, as well. help us sort through the confusion, kevin delaney is with us, as well, four in total. let us sort through the confusion, not only who's on with me, but this story, as well. part of a trio of tweets from president trump, in which he's trying to answer the question before it's even asked here about what he knew when, what he was told. give us the latest, if you would, jeff. >> hey there, david. well, president trump insists he did not have advanced knowledge of this infamous trump tower meeting in june 2016, and the reason why this is so important from the president's side is because as these investigations continue, the biggest problem it appears, the biggest present problem, is political. you have michael cohen, the president's long-time friend, attorney, so-called fixer, now saying, in effect, the president is a liar when he says there was
drafted on behalf of his son, which has come under heavy scrutiny by bob mueller, because he wants to know why were there so many cover-ups and changing stories if this was a nothing burger, if this was an innocuous meeting where nothing came out of it, just a meeting to potentially find out opposition research on hillary clinton, as they said that any candidate would have taken, then why all of the changing stories? and that, of course, is one of the biggest questions here. but i think that this is going to be a very important point in mueller's investigation if cohen does decide to tell him that trump knew in advance, and not only knew, but approved the meeting, but you have to put it in context. the trump campaign had already been told by june that the russians have dirt on hillary clinton in the form of thousands of e-mails, so if you're assuming george papp dop los that was the case, then it makes you wonder did the president accept this meeting and give it
the go ahead because he was looking for those e-mails and was everything else after that kind of a result of this conspiracy that the trump campaign and trump himself was involved in? so this is a very big deal if michael cohen does come forward. >> ken delaney, let's hone in on those two months then in the summer of 2016. we're looking at may, june, july, as well. so many pivotal things happened that summer. you've been following the investigations, bob mueller's doings, how much is this the focus now, this period of time, this meeting at trump tower? >> david, i'm a bit of an iconoclast on this. i'm not convinced this meeting in and of itself is a meaningful episode of collusion, as people like to use the term, because i've interviewed some of the participants and talked to people before the grand jury on this and have come to believe robert mueller sees this in a different way. he's more interested in this for the question of why the president was trying to cover it up apparently, why he issued that misleading statement, and
now, if in fact he knew about it, it puts that question into sharper focus and really puts the pressure on in terms of the obstruction of justice case. if he, in fact, knew about it, he's been lying all this time while he knew that robert mueller was investigating the circumstances of this meeting, where donald trump would have been putting out a false story to the public and i think that adds up to a piece of the obstruction case, david. >> kevin, i want you to comment on that. strikes me we've been dealing with a lot of potentially unreliable narrators here. of course, we can talk about the tapes in a second, but i want you to respond to what ken said about how pivotal you think the moment was. >> i agree with ken. consistently the subjects of the meeting and the folks who have been in the meeting and the issue of collusion are almost two entirely different points. i think that the notion that michael cohen, who at one time was a close personal confidante of then-candidate donald trump and now, obviously, that
>> kevin, the worst ever, but there is this amazing photograph politico obtained. bob mueller there on the left, hidden, right there to the right of the board, donald trump jr., then the statement here, nbc news got the statement for the spokesperson for the special counsel. that is him, bob mueller, waiting to board a flight. if that's accurate that's donald trump jr., they had no interaction there. what's this photo say to you about bob mueller's role or presence in washington today? he has sort of a sphinx-like feel. this is a rather astonishing photograph, natasha. >> yeah, it's absolutely incredible. bob mueller kind of reading the newspaper, oblivious to what's going on around him, or maybe not, but donald trump jr. doesn't seem fazed by it either. just an evidence of how small d.c. is, as well. >> yes, at that terrible gate, as kevin said. my thanks to all of you. kent, you're going to stay with me here. after nearly two years of
calling it a witch hunt and hoax, friday a meeting was held on election meddling. afterward the white house said this, "the president has made it clear that his administration will not tolerate foreign interference in our elections from any nation state or other malicious actors. you wrote a piece here highlighting the fact it's been 19 months in a meeting like this, give us your sense of what caused it to happen and what might have happened during the meeting, what sort of unified perspective on election interference might have come out of that meeting. >> i think what caused it to happen, david, was the fallout from helsinki, where donald trump stood next to vladimir putin and appeared to call into question the whole notion russia interviewed in the election, and for all accounts this meeting lasted between a half hour and hour and no significant policy announcements or orders came out of it. it was more of a look back at review of what various agencies
interfering in our politics on social media. look, the white house just simply has not made russia pay a price for this behavior and until that happens, they are going to continue to do it. >> what do they say about the fact there is no national security adviser for national security at the nsc? a lot hasn't been done here. how do they explain that? >> they don't explain it, david. they are not a talkative bunch, this white house, on substantiative policy issues. they've eliminated the cybersecurity coordinator, also fired tom bossert, the deputy national security adviser for homeland security and are not replacing him in that capacity, so it's not clear who is minding the store at the white house level. after 9/11 we reorganized the government, the united states did, to make sure that kind of terror attack could not happen again. we created the department of homeland security, laws were passed, funding was appropriated. nothing like that has happened in the wake of this 2016 russian election interference, which
some people, including john mccain, have called an act of war. not everyone agrees with that, but it was certainly a significant attack on our democracy that some would argue requires a significant response and we just haven't seen it. >> ken, lastly here, you were at the summit in colorado about a week ago with other national security journalists, sort of a who's who of national security personnel, as well, and from what i understand reading your piece, companies were there, as well, talking about this issue. what are they saying about the threats they are facing, about the threats the u.s. faces broadly here when it comes to cyberattacks from overseas? >> yeah, well private cybersecurity firms are watching on a daily basis nation state actors, you know, doing malicious things to our critical infrastructure, whether it's iran, north korea, russia, china, you know, i'm not suggesting this is anything out of the ordinary. this has been going on for years, but they reiterated at this conference, as did u.s. intelligence officials, that the united states is under daily cyberattack. some of it is cyber espionage,
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hell and not going to take it anymore." michael cohen allegedly ready to torch the man he vowed to take a bullet for, also is telling allies about a treasure-trove of material he could unleash to create headaches for trump. joining me now, katie fang, attorney and msnbc legal analyst and frank is a former fbi assistant director for counterintelligence and msnbc national security analyst. frank, i just want to start by getting your reaction to this tape. we've all heard it now. what's on it, how it ends, et cetera, et cetera. there's at least a dozen more of these things. your reaction to the tape itself and existence of more of them. >> well, i'm not part of the camp that says you can dismiss this tape, there's nothing significant on it. i fully agree that in and of itself there's no evidence of a crime inherent on the little clip that we have, but it clearly speaks to the issue of prior knowledge of the president, that there was a payment scheme going on, there
was a comfort level that we hear on this tape, and most importantly, we hear references to cash, finance, check, and creating a company. all of those concepts to an fbi agent, to someone like mueller or the southern district of new york, all smack of possible crime. money laundering. why are you creating a company? why would you need to create a company? have you done this before? the word cash, do you mean you're trying to avoid suspicious -- you are concerned about triggering suspicious activity reports of large sums of money transacting. when you say check, are you trying to avoid the cash transaction that would trigger a suspicious activity report? so those few seconds of audio actually have tremendous inherent meaning. >> katie, i want to get your perspective on this, as well, just about what the future use of this tape might be. how do you translate something that's been played, heard, processed in the court of public opinion into a courtroom
potentially? how's something like this cross that threshold into the court? >> from a legal perspective, we know trump and his team waived any type of claim of privilege, so that deals with any possible obstacle that mueller or anybody at the southern district of new york might have in terms of the use of this information. as we know, attorney-client privilege information, it's the client that holds the privilege, the client that waves the privilege, so in that regard, it can fully be used to be able to be evidence against trump for possible campaign finance violations, and it could be used by cohen as proof that he has other potentially damning evidence in terms of more tapes. we know at least 100 recordings were made during the time this was seized and maybe there's other evidence, documentary evidence, that's already been seized in the possession of the government that cohen can loop together or link together to provide some value to not only the mueller investigation, but also to the southern district of new york. >> frank, i think you'll agree,
it's been a crazy week, saturday is a good day to take stock of that. there was this report about michael cohen's willingness to testify, that donald trump knew about the meeting that took place in trump tower. i want to get your reaction to the reaction, what we saw from president trump after that was reported first by cnn and other outlets, including nbc news. he tweeted this, "i did not know of the meeting with my son, don jr. sounds like someone is trying to make up stories to get himself out of an unrelated jam. gee, i wonder if they helped him make the choice." i read that, i note lanny davis isn't mentioned by name, michael cohen isn't mentioned by name, as well. your reaction to the reaction from the president? >> so, this fact that the president can't help himself but protest and tweet any time he believes he's being offended and infringed upon or challenge is
eventually going to be his downfall, because there's tapes out there and he's not certain about exactly what he's saying on the tapes. i keyed in this week on one particular phrase where the president said why was the tape cut off? i presumably was saying positive things after that. presumably saying positive things. we don't know that. and, look, he's trying to have us believe he knew nothing about a meeting that was occurring in his own building while he was present in his own building, conducted by his chairman of his campaign who dismissed himself from a meeting in his office to attend the meeting. the meeting arranged by his son, attended by his business associate from russia. we're to believe that he knew nothing about it. it's strange. and every time he tries to challenge and push back on it, he puts himself into a box. >> kate, what do you make of the president saying this, we're familiar with his counsel, with rudy giuliani going on tv and doing the sort of twists and contortions along the lines of
what we saw from the president. what do you make of him taking up that mantle this week? >> giuliani is always going to be the surrogate, legally and otherwise, in the court of public opinion. i doubt giuliani would ever represent the president in a court of law, but what giuliani is trying to do is discorrect michael cohen by saying, hey, even trump says no way this was an appropriate thing for trump to have been, you know, taped. and by the way, he says there's no way i knew about this meeting going on, but remember, david, there was such a hasty scramble to be able to cover up the main reason why trump jr. met with the russians in june of 2016, and so i agree with frank, are you kidding me? you're going to say that that kind of important meeting where even roger stone had previously been approached on dirt on hillary clinton, trump didn't know about the fact this meeting was going on, and we all know that's not true, so why is that important? some of the best cases can be built on circumstantial evidence. you don't always have a smoking
gun and you can build it on the fact that if cohen knew and other people were present and cohen can say trump knew about the meeting, then that combined with other evidence can build a huge case in terms of obstruction of justice or even conspiracy. >> frank, before i let you go, i understand you have a story about david pecker, who's also at the center of this in some capacity. he, of course, was at the national enquirer. you've interacted with him before. >> well, under the heading of you can't make this stuff up, in the crazy week that we've had, i was reminding people that -- they were asking about ami, who is this company, well, they are owned by a guy named david pecker. the company now basically that's come out and said we do buy these stories, we do keep people quiet, and that's what the substance of the tape was. my brief interaction with mr. pecker was during october of 2001, when we had the tragedy, the first anthrax murder in u.s. history at ami headquarters in
boca raton, florida, and we had an opportunity to talk to mr. pecker and say, sir, we're going to go into the anthrax building, have an opportunity to pull out the most valuable possessions you want us to take from the building, what do you want us to grab? and he said, there's a framed photo of elvis in his coffin and a photo of back boy, you need to grab those. that's who we're dealing with. >> frank, thank you very much for that especially. katie phang, thanks to you, as well. not the right time to maintain control of congress this election year, to hold back that blue wave, and with the 2020 election right around the corner after that, one of the loudest voices on the left calling for president trump's impeachment. make a run for the white house himself. i'm going to ask tom steyer that when he returns after the break. 2018 ford f-150. with best in-class towing best in-class payload and best in-class torque the f-150 lineup has the capability to get big things to big places --bigtime.
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november. joining me now, tom steyer, founder of next gen america and the group need to impeach. i'm a grizzled veteran, talked to tom many times. i know how this goes, great conversation, then at the end close with the question of whether or not if he's running. we're going to wait, i'm going to ask you at the end of the interview. let's go back a few months. you made a pledge to spend $30 million on the midterms, 100 days from now. you had two dozen races you were looking at in particular. give us the update on the spend thus far, what you've spent, how you've targeted and what your indications are that that's working so far. >> well, david, what we do is we're a grassroots organization. we're trying to organize the biggest mobilization of voters under 35 in american history. we're focused on 33 congressional districts, which include eight gubernatorial races, seven senate races, so what we've done, it's pretty
much put in place, it's like running a business. we have people on the ground, we're on 412 college campuses. we have people going door to door, we're doing a lot on social media. i think the right way to think about this is, you know, have we seen impact so far in the primaries? have we seen impact in 2017 in the statewide elections where we were active and where this kind of program was in place? and the answer is, voter to voter contact, conversations between american citizens, are incredibly powerful and particularly for people under 35, which is the largest age cohort in america, the most diverse age cohort in american history, and an age cohort that votes about half the rate of other american citizens. that's why we believe in democracy, we believe in the broadest democracy, we want to make sure people show up at the polls. >> i'm going to begin to make the pivot towards 2020, we're talking about return on investment here, tom, and here i
want to ask about the metric for success. you're investing in these 33 races. is turnout the metric that you care most about? in other words, i'm sure you'd love to have democrats win the seats, but is the thing you're watching most closely with an eye towards 200 that youth turnout that you've been talking about? >> well, david, when we think about elections, there are things that we can control and impact and there are things that we can't control and impact, and what we are -- the things that we think we can do is encourage and enable people under 35 to understand how important their voice is and how much their vote counts. what we can't control is what happens in washington, d.c., what happens across the world, the sort of world itself and the events that are happening in the world. what we can do is make people aware of how important their participation is, so we can -- that's what we can mark, we can watch, we can manage, too. what we can't do, where you want to win for sure, but that isn't
something we can necessarily control. >> i want to have you react to what the president said yesterday in an interview with sean hannity, his friend and anchor at fox news. let's take a listen what he had to say on his radio show. >> so many things have taken place, but the economy is the strongest ever, and i think that's going to have a very positive impact, and i am going to work very hard. i'll kgo six or seven days a wek when we're 60 days out, and i will be campaigning for all of these great people that do have a difficult race, and we think we're going to bring them over the line, so i really believe that because we're doing so well as a country and so well with the economy, i think we're going to be surprising a lot of people. >> all right, tom, i want to get your sense of the competitive landscape there. i'm going to draw two things out of that, the fact he's going to be out there campaigning i think he said in a couple dozen congressional races across the country and he's focusing on the economy. give us your assessment here and the competitiveness of those races. >> well, david, there's no doubt
that nobody knows what's going to happen on election day, november 6th, 2018. the pollsters have been wrong every single time for the last few years. they've not understood who is going to show up and vote, so i think that this is very much a black box and the only thing you can do is put your head down and do your work and try as hard as you can. i think that the economy, the last quarter did have very good growth, and i think that anybody who's not rooting for that isn't rooting for the american people, but what we also saw in the last quarter and that we've seen for decades is that the buying power of people's wages isn't going up. so even though there was good growth in the economy, working peoples, any growth they got in their salaries, was more than chewed up by cost increases, particularly the cost of health care. so, in fact, if society overall is doing better, the benefits of that are not being shared with
the vast bulk of working americans and american families. so the president going out and talking about how great everything is, isn't really paying attention to what's happening to american citizens around the country, who if they have any wage growth, modest wage growth, it's getting chewed up by health care costs and the costs of living. >> here we are at the end of the interview, you continue to be a part of the political conversation in this country. you've traveled the country from small town to big city talking about your proposal for impeaching the president. you are spending, as i said, $30 million on these midterms. tom, are you going to be running in 2020? >> david, i don't know what i'm going to do after november 6th, 2018, but what i do see going around the country, having a petition drive that has more than 5.5 million signatures, knowing that we have a nixonian level of disgust with this president and a desire to have
him impeached and removed from office, i'm going to watch and see if any of those establishment politicians step up and tell the truth to the american people about the most important questions, because that's something that we are watching like a hawk. we need to have people who are willing to talk to the american people about the most important issues, tell the truth, not back away, and not sweep it under the carpet, because that's what's been happening and that's what we don't agree with. >> i'm going to follow up with nancy to get you back on the show november 7th. >> okay, david. >> tom steyer, always great to talk to you, i appreciate it. well, our focus on billionaires and the midterms continues. the koch brothers also spending heavily in advance of the midterm elections. which republicans are defending 42 open seats in november. that's something they have not had to do in nearly 100 years. my colleague leann caldwell is in colorado springs, colorado, where the koch brothers have convened their semiannual summit for conservative donors. let me ask you first of all
what's changed. we talk about the koch brothers in tandem. how's this conference different and what are folks saying apt t -- about the prospects for the midterms? >> a lot has changed for the koch brothers. one brother has stepped down, but let me tell you about this conference. they have it twice a year. you have to donate $100,000 per year to be able to come, and so these are the wealthy, sometimes libertarian-minded donors who come together and talk about politics and policy, and we've seen a bit of a shift among the koch brothers or about the koch network over the past few months, and that is that they started attacking republicans, as well. i mean, don't get me wrong, they are spending $300 to $400 million on politics and policy for the 2018 midterm elections. that's an enormous amount of money, and the majority of that is going to be spent to help
re-elect republicans, but there is a subtle shift happening between the koch network. they are not happy with what they see. they are trying to shed this partisan image that they have, they are not happy with the tariffs, something they are adamantly opposed to. they are really upset about the fact that congress couldn't come to an agreement on daca. they call it the family separation at the border abhorrent, and they are mad about runaway government spending, a $1.3 trillion spending bill. yeah, we passed tax cuts, but these other things are really detrimental, so what they say they are trying to do is also going to try to build bipartisan coalitions to try to advance the things they think are important, and that is getting government out of the way and adopting these more libertarian ideals. david? >> last question for you. you're on capitol hill usually, not out there in colorado
springs, and on the hill, of course, a big focus here is on the nomination of brett kavanaugh to be the next justice of the supreme court. this is something that the koch brothers and their organization are focused on, as well. what update can you bring us about their plans to spend on that to get his nomination through the senate? >> yeah, no doubt they support brett kavanaugh to get through the senate. they've already spent money and plan to spend more to help kavanaugh. they are going to spend a lot of money. they've spent millions of dollars attacking claire mccaskill, attacking joe donnelly, and all these vulnerable democrats who are up in the senate in 2018, and brett kavanaugh is definitely going to be a factor and issue they continue to hit until they see him confirmed. >> great to speak with you, thank you very much, out reporting on the koch brothers seminar in colorado springs. over the line, should homeland security secretary kirstjen nielsen lose her job over the trump administration's
separation of migrant families? i'll talk to liz holtzman, who just stepped down over the separation policy. at the alzheimer's association walk to end alzheimer's, we carry flowers that signify why we want to end the disease. and we walk so that one day, there will be a white flower for alzheimer's first survivor. join the fight at alz.org/walk.
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without talking to your rheumatologist about xeljanz xr. well, the president's former campaign manager, paul manafort, goes on trial tuesday, the first of two trials he faces. he's charged with 18 counts of bank and tax fraud. he's also part of the trump tower meeting that is back in the news. joining me now, elizabeth holtzman, who voted on the ni nick -- nixon impeachment. i want your perspective on this, the first of the two trials, what you're going to be watching for as paul manafort heads into the courtroom this week in virginia. starts on tuesday. >> well, i think the evidence is going to be overwhelming against him. i think the thing to watch for is to see when he begins to appreciate the level of evidence prosecutors got. 30 witnesses, enormous number of documents they are going to
present. a lot of this case is a paper case and the witnesses are going to be backing up those documents and there are other witnesses who are very close to him, his former business partner. >> rick gates. >> rick gates, and so, i mean, at some point it's going to have to don on him, this is not a winning strategy that he has. i think it's a very tough case for him to win. >> the reason i wanted to have you on is, you wrote a letter to secretary of homeland security, kirstjen nielsen, about the separation policy the administration put in place. you resigned from the homeland security advisory council. as i gather, this is a group of professionals mostly, who were meeting with the secretary, advising the secretary on things she could do. this is a rather new thing, as is the department itself. why did you decide to tender your resignation? >> well, the advisory council does some very important work with the homeland security department. for example, when i was there it did work on cybersecurity protection, it did work on home
grown terrorism issues, it studied the issue of private prisons, so a variety of issues. outside professionals, people with long careers in government giving advice on subjects and giving fine reports. i resigned because when i first was on the council, i had some disagreements with the obama administration policies, but, you know, there's always a give and take, and i was very upset when trump started his attacks on immigration policy, on immigrants, calling mexicans rapists, refusing to find some solution for the dreamers, whole policy of mass deportations, ripping families from the united states who have been living here for 20 years without any criminal record. i mean, this was really counterproductive and inhumane, but the final straw was when he decided with his homeland security secretary to separate children from their parents. actually, it wasn't separation.
in my view it was kidnapping children, taking them from their parents, and they were -- and as it stands right now, 700 of those children, at least, if not more, haven't even been reunited and it's not clear that our government has any intention of reuniting them. and it's horrific. it's inhuman. it's cruel. it's malign. i don't know that you have enough adjectives for it, but i couldn't associate myself anymore with this policy, and i actually said at the end of this letter to the secretary of homeland security, i said, you know, even though it's i who am tendering my resignation, you are the one who should be resigning. >> powerful words, i'll read them again. resigning in protest against these policies, it is you who should be tendering your resignation instead. we hear a lot and see reporting on this administration's disregard for expertise, and you've drawn this contrast a little bit here. when you saw these policy changes happening, was the door open for you to voice your opposition to suggest that they shouldn't be happening?
draw that contrast in as stark relief if you can on what it was like to be on this council before to offer your professional opinion then versus now. how open was the door to secretary nielsen's office? >> well, the joint letter signed by four of us -- >> others who signed with you. >> we all resigned at the same time, former secretary of the navy, former head of the office of counterterrorism, professor at university of virginia law school, people with long careers in government and highly respected individuals. we resigned because several things. we were not consulted, and because we all found the policy morally repugnant. i had several briefings under this new secretary, and i voiced my objection and my concern about how these policies were being effectuated and the answers i got were not truthful, not candid, and it was hopeless. we said that we weren't consulted about these policies,
but to the extent that we had any information, it was inaccurate. in my opinion. and how can you tolerate that? whereas i remember under the prior administration one of the things that i suggested to the people in homeland security dealing with immigration is i had been involved with the exodus from people from vietnam. at that time the u.s. government admitted 750,000 refugees from vietnam, so you can just imagine how ridiculous it looks when the government is afraid of 2,000 children and their parents. it's absurd, it's appalling, but in any case, i suggested that we have an orderly departure program from central america, because many of these people have to brave this terrible overland trip to the united states, and they literally qualify as refugees. we did this in vietnam. they could sign up as refugees in that country and they didn't have to flee in little boats. i said why don't we do something the same here?
i can't take credit for it, because they may have been thinking about it already, but i was able to share that information with them and have a receptive response. here the information we got back was untrue in some untrue in some circumstances and also the policy was greatly maligned. >> liz thanks for coming in. >> after more than a half century, north korea turned over the remains of 55 u.s. soldiers killed during the korean war. doubt lingers about the gesture. james mattis admits, we don't know who is in those boxes. joining me now is barry mccaffrey. let's start with the import of this, the president addressed this yesterday on the south lawn of the white house. talked about how there were families -- glad to see them come back to the united states. >> before we talk about the
broader gee yo little issues. >> i think for families in general, the most important thing is to have some finality to know what happened. being missing is one thing, but being unaccounted. were they killed, what were they killed. that's what the families need to know. there's more than 5,000 u.s. troops still missing, probably in north korean areas. the north koreans extort us for money over the thing, they use it for leverage. it's a very brutal process. >> i want to read a tweet here, some comments from my colleague andrea mitchell about this. she writes, north create ya reality check.
kim jong-un promised president trump 200 remains, he delivered 55. north korea is still producing nuclear weapons fuel. it took years to verify, some were animal bones as you just mentioned. i saw a piece that quoted danny russell. he talked about this being a strategy we've seen from north korea before. when you look at what came out of that summit in singapore. this is one issue where it seems like there has been some moderate progress. you have north korea doing this, and the goal is for us to forget about all the rest that's happening there. drawing from that tweet that i just read from andrea mitchell. give us your broader perspective. there's a lot that hasn't changed positively. since that summit in singapore. >> secretary pompeo is in trouble. you have to try to deliver some reality.
our sole objective is to stop the nuclear weapons process. that hasn't happened. what may happen is dialogue certainly will reduce tensions. there's a subordinate goal i feel characterizing it that way. there's 200,000 people in concentration camps in north korea, we can probably better that. what the north koreans are up to, they want the armed forces out of south korea, they want to continue and be recognized as a nuclear power, at the end of the day, i think their major goal is lift the economic constraints. i fear the trump administration is in trouble. they're using nonsense kind of proclamations of triumph when nothing in reality has changed. >> before this summit took
place, john bolton said, you shouldn't look at that summit in helsinki, you're dealing with two different people here, i want to draw a thread between them. there was so much focus on what was happening there. as i'm sure you're aware, you had this back and forth between the u.s. government and the russian government this week. you had vladimir putin saying, he would be happy to have president trump come to moscow to meet with him to continue the conversations that began in helsinki. we've been talking about promises that perhaps were made but not kept. what could the rationale be as you see it, be that in 2018 or 19 based on what we've seen since that helsinki summit. >> the russians have attacked western europe and the u.s. democratic election systems.
it's ongoing, they've not admitted to it, we have indicted several of their military intelligence organizations for carrying this out. it's simply appalling that we consider dealing with putin who's by the way, the biggest victim of mr. putin are the russian people. i think the background challenge right now is apparently having served with three white houses and watching the national security council in action. there is no national security process ongoing. secretary mattis, munchen, pompeo. mr. trump within his constitutional powers is winging it on his own. this is not a good way to protect u.s. national security. >> always good to talk to you, thank you very much. >> general mccaffrey joining me from washington today. a quick programming note tonight. msnbc presents a special look at the dramatic effort to rescue 12
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Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski interview newsmakers, politicians and pundits about the issues of the day.
job approval rating probably has seven or eight points, maybe even a little more of what i think of as 401(k) trumpers right now. i think there are people who are looking at their statements, people who are on the right side of the economic equation any way. they see their numbers going up for all sorts of reasons. and so they're willing to not really dive in to this russian novel story that no one can quite figure out. and they're willing to suspend their bizarrely in my view, but they are willing to suspend their ordinary moral judgments about how this president conducts himself and is now representing us on the world stage. but i would not, if i were in the white house, count on that lasting until 2020. >> we'll see. joe, your latest column in the washington post really speaks to this entitled trump finally
feels gravity's unforgiving poll and reads in part, quote, trump's stunning victory created such disorienting shock waves across washington that neither democrats nor republicans understood what the accidental president admitted to me a month after his win. the election could have been held 20 different times, but that was probably the one day i would have won. the president-elect said in december of 2016. everything came together at once. the resulting political horror show produced daily by trump has left journalists and politicians reeling but has failed to alter a few basic rules of politics. first, presidents with approval ratings in the low 40s lose their majorities in congress. second, kowtowing to ex-kgb agents erodes support with registered independents. third, lying about payoffs to a porn star and a playboy model rarely helps with swing-state voters. republicans hoping to save themselves from the political storm that will soon wipe away their congressional majorities
would be well served to speak out against trump's most destructive policies, which are anti-conservative, ill liberal and sure to bring doom to the once grand old party. party could be over. it could be. >> first of all, john, i'm very humbled to have my piece read on the "morning joe." >> well, it's a good piece. it's what we are talking about. >> this is your show. two of your's, but morning joe, that's you. >> well. >> so it's good that you get your pieces on your show. >> i also -- >> you have pull with the guys that run the place. >> that was somebody else. so, it does -- it seems that trump's victory was so shocking that i think a lot of pundits, a
lot of politicians, i think a lot of republicans have overstated his strength and his magical powers, his gravity-defying political powers. but at the end of the day, this man is still a 40% president. show me a 40% president, and i will show you a loser. no, no, no, i'm serious. show me a candidate that has -- by the way, his re-elect, his re-elect, according to the latest merit polls, his re-elect in michigan is 28%, in wisconsin it's 31%. show me a guy with a 30% re-elect. i will show you a loser. somebody that loses midterms and somebody that loses a re-election. i just think too often people
overstate his political strength because they were so shocked that he won last time. >> look, i think that's -- the shock is one thing. i think the degree to which his behavior and the ways in which he's departed from republican orthodoxy, various ways he's thrown washington into chaos, the fact that his base which is not 42%, his base is 35. the fact that those people are immovable even in the face of things that so many people object to strenuously causes us also to overfocus on the potency of the base. in the end, he's great to have a potent base. barack obama rested on his base. donald trump rested on his base and both of their bases are rock solid. again, 35, you're a loser. and even if you get those extra ones that meachum is talk about, push up to 40, 41, which is where he is right now. historically speaking that's a disaster for an inparty president, 40% approval rating, you're going to get wiped out in
the midterms if everything we know from history holds true again. >> jon meacham, my dad supported richard nixon and supported richard nixon until the final week. we were taught growing up that walter cronkite was a communist. my dad watched him and loved him. when he said that's the way it was, he believed that's the way it was but he still believed it was all a plot by "the washington post" and "the new york times" and walter cronkite and the mainstream media to take richard nixon down who they hated. and i remember the morning in 1974 where my dad was reading the newspaper and it's just like the scales fell off of his eyes all at once. and he may have said a couple of words that i can't repeat here, the second one was damn it. and then he said, if this man -- by the way, this is a guy my dad had worshipped since '52. if this man has done one third
of what they're saying he has done, he should be thrown in jail tomorrow. this is a disgrace. but he said that broken but after the tapes, there was no denying that richard nixon had acted abhorrently. >> well, this is the week. we're in the anniversary period between supreme court decision in which nixon had to turn over everything. he turns over the smoking gun tape where he's ordering the cia to block the fbi from investigating watergate, a conversation that took place i think on june 23rd. so within a week of the break-in. and we forget because in our movie-tone version of history, we naturally telescope everything. and so we think, break in. robert redford and nixon gets on the helicopter, right? that's kind of the popular
version of watergate. maybe howard baker pops in if you're from tennessee. what really happened was 27 months elapsed. congressional investigate, two special prosecutors, saturday night massacre, tapes dribble out, phrases like expletive deleted enter the conversation. and the fabled moment which is big among the npr left in the country which i love, there's a lot of liberals now who are saying, where is barry gold water when we need him, which is just -- we should all retire when people are saying that. what they mean is that goldwater and hugh scott and john rhodes went down to the white house and they told nixon he had to go. they did it on august 5th, after the tape came out and then nixon is gone by the 8th. so these things take time. i suspect your dad's expletive deleted remarks probably happened about this point in the
summer of '74. quickly to john's point, 34, 35%, that was joe mccarthy's national approval rating after the army hearings. if they take trump back to moscow in an orange jump suit, 35% of the country will be with him. that's just the way american politics works. >> one of the president's republican allies, congressman darrell isa says he doesn't think republicans will pay the price in the fall if the president has proven to have lied about the trump tower meeting. >> if he's proven to have not told the whole truth about the fact that campaigns look for dirt and if someone offers it, you listen to them. nobody is going to be surprised. there are some things in politics that you just take for granted. >> so you don't think this has anything long-term impact? he wouldn't be the first politician or president to misrepresent things? >> well, you know, businessmen
listen to almost everyone that might be helpful. by the way, they make pragmatic decisions about how to make bad stories go away. >> darrell issa, not my dad. in that case. first of all, so extraordinary. even in my little office as a member of congress, if somebody came to my chief of staff and said, hey, the russian government or the iranian government has some dirt on your opponent, my chief of staff would have said, hey, listen, we'll get back to you in a couple of days. what's your name again? what's your phone number? we'll call you back. would immediately call the fbi. would immediately call the fbi. this is not a close call. anybody out there thinking if you listen -- if that's what
darrell issa thinks, holy cow that is condemning. and here they keep moving the goal post for donald trump. they're lying about donald trump. donald trump didn't know. now if donald trump knew -- what's the big deal? no, nobody does this. nobody has ever done this. nobody has ever done this that i know of has gotten dirt on an opponent from a sworn enemy, russia, iran, you name it. >> never seen it in now almost unfortunately 30 years i've been doing this and covering republicans and democrats in the presidential races and other races. the thing i want to say about darrell issa just goes to the thing he's saying here which is that republicans aren't going to pay the price if it turns out that donald trump is lying. i just want to say that actions speak a lot louder than words. donald trump is retiring from congress, right? so he can spin a rosy scenario for how republicans won't pay any price for donald trump's behavior, but it seems like on the basis of his own political
calculations of what was going to happen in his own district, he may have had a different view of what the blood bath would look like this fall. >> donald trump has already lied about russian agents coming to his office. donald trump has already master mined the coverup on air force one where he lied and said that the meeting was about adoption, which by the way, over the weekend, a prosecutor said this is perfect to show the guilt, the conscious guilt at the time that something big happened in that room because you wouldn't lie about it if it was innocent. >> sure. but look, i think one of the problems we have here a little bit is that it's a bit of a he said/she said. giuliani was saying yesterday on a sunday show, there's five people who will say donald trump did not know about this russian meeting up against michael cohen. i was working in the washington bureau of the new york times in the summer of 1974, so i was sort of watching all this. meachum can contradict me, but
my recollection were the tapes were the defining moment because you heard him on tape saying this. so far i don't think we've quite seen these tapes from michael cohen. he can wiggle and twist his way out of every box people try to put him in. >> what's the end game for saying something like that? it's obviously clearly something you wouldn't want to support, the president lying about a meeting? >> lobbying money? their own personal self interest, constantly, that's all we see on display consistently. among republicans who are choosing to prop up these lies and to devalue truth and factual accuracy in the american public. and it's really disgusting. i can't believe that we're at the phase where, you know, the $12 billion bailout for agriculture because of a dumb policy decision and all of these so-called fiscal conservatives can just get behind it because they're going to go with trump
no matter what and we're just seeing where people really do not stand for much except the ideology of power. >> think about that really quickly. again, and ron johnson and i can't believe i'm quoting ron johnson because he backed down to donald trump over and over again. ron johnson correctly said this is soviet style economics. you adopt a stalin in five-year foreign policy. the five-year plan, right? and you have tariffs. you destroy the economy. and then you come in behind it and after destroying the economy for these farmers, you then prop them up with a $12 billion centralized state payoff after i just got to say a lot of farmers are already subsidized. like the big farm interests? so this is subsidy on top of subsidy on top of subsidy.
>> but we have to cut the deficit, joe. there's a lot of deficit in washington. >> absolutely none. still ahead, steve eluded to it a few moments ago, we have a full fact check of the president's economic claims that he made, and some of it starts with a simple google search. >> why don't people -- why don't my friends and family just turn on the google machine? just crank it up in the backyard -- >> as elise just said, the truth has been devalued. and people must not care. that's what this president has done. >> mika, i don't understand. so many of his lies, so many of his claims can be completely blown out of the water with 30 seconds and just, again, borrow your neighbor's google machine. >> they don't care. >> 30 seconds. and it is a proven lie. by the way, from a thousands different accurate sources. >> this president started off by saying, look at my crowd size, it's the biggest one, when it
was clearly the smallest and people didn't care. >> type in trump lie pops up. >> i give trump this, when he puts his mind to it, he's a master messenger and he has branded the media as the enemy of the people and took it up with the publisher of the new york times. >> that's right. >> when he is at the stage where he is comparing the u.s. press, the free press, to an enemy on the level of isis or al qaeda, that's a real problem for truth and accuracy. >> you are absolutely right. >> again, the truth is 30 seconds away. check out google. check out yahoo. check out whatever search site. >> got to care. >> msn, of course, yes. >> we'll get into "the new york times" aspect of this story in just a moment. first, let's go to bill karins on the check of the forecast. bill? >> joe f we can get people to do and this stop using your weather app on your phones to get the hourly forecast, we would be all set. >> he doesn't do that. he calls you. >> yeah, that would be smart. so the rain is already back in
the picture of a nice weekend for so many people from the ohio valley, great lakes to the east coast. the humidity is back, too. along with it, a rainy week. a lot of heavy rain this morning through eastern north carolina moving up through virginia, virginia beach, norfolk to richmond and it will arrive in d.c. and also towards baltimore this afternoon. philadelphia north wards the rain should hold off later this afternoon towards this evening. and this week is just like what we started with last week, it's going to get humid. we'll have on and off rain all week long for the east coast. how much rain? well, this is through friday. the next five days, two to four inches of rainfall the southeast all the way through the mid-atlantic. no reason to be watering the grass this week once again. here is the week ahead forecast. i will add, it stays hot in the west and stays dry and of course we have that car fire, six fatalities and the blaze still mostly unchecked. they're just trying to protect structures at this point. as we go throughout the week, the heat continues in the west too. summertime storms in the southeast. by the time we get to wednesday, here is all the heavy rain on
the eastern sea board. much of the western haft of the country remains dry and hot. finally as we end this week on friday, i think the flooding problems are going to be worse northern georgia, up state portions of south carolina and through much of the southern appalachians we have to watch a lot of the rivers and lakes and streams closely. areas like new york city, enjoy your monday. this is by far the best day of the week. low humidity, temperatures are comfortable. the august humidity will arrive as we go to the middle to the end of the week. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. the fact is, there are over ninety-six hundred roads named "park" in the u.s. it's america's most popular street name. but allstate agents know that's where the similarity stops. if you're on park street in reno, nevada, the high winds of the washoe zephyr could damage your siding. and that's very different than living on park ave in sheboygan, wisconsin, where ice dams could cause water damage. but no matter what park you live on, one of 10,000 local allstate agents knows yours.
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>> so what you have to do is check them out and you get a sense of whether or not he's telling the truth. let's take a look at some of his claims. >> okay. >> i am thrilled to announce that in the second quarter of this year the united states economy grew at the amazing rate of 4.1%. >> that's very good. >> he is correct about 4.1% growth. >> 4.1. if you can do that for a year, brother. >> here is thing, most economists would not use the word amazing to describe it. in fact, president obama reached that mark four times, including three times higher than trump's 4.1%. trump's quarter would tie just the 13th best quarter under bill clinton and the 14th best under reagan. >> so you're saying that bill clinton had 13 better quarters than -- >> yes, but trump calls it amazing. >> it might be amazing. >> 13 quarters is like three years worth of quarters, right?
that's a lot of quarters. >> that is a lot of quarters. but i will say this, steve. i remember bush w. had, what a 5.6 or a -- it was like amazing when the number came across there. >> actually. >> and the economy seemed to be growing. well, here again, if he stays at 4.1 the rest of the year, i'm going to say great job, great for americans, great for everybody involved. but most economists were saying, just like they were predicting the deficit was going to rise because of reckless entitlement spending and defense spending and every other kind of spending you could think of, there were a lot of economists who two weeks ago were saying, hey, we're going to have a higher quarter this time and then it's going to go back down to 2%, 2.5%, correct? >> essentially. we can look at some numbers and you can see both historic and what looks like it's going to be
coming in the future on this chart here. so to your point -- >> oh, you have charts? >> that's nice. >> that's very nice. >> walked right into that. >> well to the point about higher quarters in the past, you can see first of all obama's four quarters of growth -- >> let me stop you right there. we'll get to all the charts. jon meacham, you look at all those numbers, it will fascinating that donald trump will say bill clinton beat 13 times, amazing, remarkable, the greatest thing ever. barack obama would have had gdp growth of over 5%. and he would get out there and give a speech of we understand that somewhere in america people are still eating rats for dinner, so we're not going to celebrate this yet. like barack obama could never embrace good news. he always had to parse it. he always had to apologize for those left behind. it's just the opposite of donald trump. somewhere in the middle is a leadership style that actually
works. >> i think that's right. and i think this is a great exhibit in one of the running themes in the books about this era is going to be that donald trump was as much a reality show impar sar owe as he was a real estate guy. he just pretends what he wants to be true is true. and has now inflicted that faux reality on all of us. >> yep. >> one of the great ironies of we always dislike in others what we fear is true in ourselves, it's no mistake that this is the guy, no coincidence that he coins the term fake news. he's the embodiment of it. >> here is another one of the president's claims on friday. >> the trade deficit, very dear to my heart because we've been ripped off by the world has
dropped by more than $50 billion. 52 billion to be exact. >> the trade deficit did drop. it was also the largest it's been since 2006. according to the bureau of economic analysis. >> all right. so, steve, first of all, there's so much we have to correct here. i'm just going to quickly say something about the trade deficit. donald trump will say the chinese stole $82 billion from -- another way to put that is, americans got $82 billion worth of cheaper products. so much of the trade deficit is fueled by us importing goods that are competitive that actually make working class americans lives much better. so when he goes around the chinese stealing. no, the americans have the freedom to decide for themselves. do i want to go to the grocery
store? do i want to go to walmart? do i want to go to target? do i want to get these items cheaper for myself and for my family? most of the times they say yes. >> and they say yes. the trade deficit did play a role in this. to re-enforce a point you made, 4.1% growth we got in the first quarter, these are goldman sachs estimate and show it trailing off as the quarters go on. the other point i would make on this, if you see this red line, this is the year over year change in the growth rate. so you can see, it's gone up, it's gone down. there's nothing extraordinary, at least yet, about donald trump's growth rate. now on the trade deficit which relates to these numbers if we can look at the next chart, you'll see that in fact, this 4.1% isn't all it's cracked up to be. of the 4.1, .8% is the stimulus that president trump enacted. the spending cuts and spending increases in the tax cuts that specially destroyed our fiscal
balance. ironically another .6 of the increase is the chinese importing a lot more soy beans in this past quarter to get ahead of the tariffs that are coming. so when you cut through it all, the actual adjusted, fairly adjusted base growth rate of the economy was actually 2.7%, not 4.1%. >> okay. >> so here is more from the president on friday. >> we've accomplished an economic turn around of historic proportions. >> hold on. can we play that again? i like that one. >> here we go. >> we've accomplished an economic turn around of historic proportions. >> this comes from the guy who has all of his club championships that he won in his office because he cheated. >> and his "time" magazine. >> and fake covers of the "time"
magazines, the greatest turn around in american history. anybody who goes on a google machine can see that you showed part that the economy '08 was here. went up and then it has been a steady, slow, gradual, economic increase. that's good news. but it's good news from bush to obama to trump. >> sure. we can show that in the context of jobs f you want. so trump talks about all the jobs he's created. 3.5 million. but let's put that in some context and compare the last 18 months of obama where he created 206,000 jobs a month to the first 18 months of trump where he created 193,000 jobs a month. >> let me stop you here. i don't understand that because it actually looks like barack obama created more jobs per month in his last 16 months than donald trump created in his
first 16 months, but that can't be true because donald trump and a lot of people on television that are news readers actually are talking about the exploisive trump economy. you're not actually saying -- hold on. help me out here, you're not saying, are you, that barack obama actually created more jobs his last 16 months -- >> 18 months. >> so it's more. >> close to 18 months. >> you're not saying that barack obama created more jobs in his last 18 months as president? god, that would be the last year and a half. that would be really hard to do, than donald trump has in the first 18 months, are you? >> you know, i am saying that. >> no. hold on. >> but the president says he's. >> statistics don't lie. >> wait, john, john, do you believe -- show this chart again. i just think because donald trump says this is the greatest economy we've ever had. happy days are here again. donald trump has not created as
many jobs his last 18 months as barack obama did his final 18 months? >> finally i do believe it, joe. >> do you really? >> because of the fact that i, on your advice, have become very familiar with the google machine and have been using it quite aggressively recently. i want to correct one thing you said about the steadiness of the economic growth. you want to not talk about the george w. bush part of it because that administration ended with the financial crisis that drove the country to a new depression. since october of 2010, steve, i think is correct is that is when the now 90 some months of consecutive job growth started. october 2010 with barack obama and we've been on a steady path ever since then. >> what happened on september 15, 2008, was not good for the economy? >> i am saying that. we don't want to put bush in that same continuum. >> this is staggering. elise, if you talk to any trump
supporte supporter, they will tell you, i support him because you know what, the economy, we have a record economy and record job growth and record this. we don't. we don't. we don't. we don't. go to the google machine and you'll see that barack obama wz more successful in creating jobs his last 18 months as president than donald trump has been his first 18 months. that simple. >> a lot of the role is cheerleader in chief, giving and projecting confidence in the economy and that's something that -- >> devaluing the truth. >> he has done that -- >> we don't need to say turn around. >> he takes it way too far. it's one thing to be pro business and to convince the business community that, yes, he's going to be anti-regulation, enacting policies that are more favorable to the business climate, but then just to all out lie. that does not help anything. >> steve, what you just said, very true. you talk to just about any business owner and they will tell you that he is more pro
business. that regulatory relief helps a lot. yes, they will take those tax cuts. they don't think it was done. as well as it could have been done, but any tax cuts are good tax cuts. there is no doubt the business community is more favorable towards his policies than barack obama's policies and actually think they have somebody in the white house that actually understands what they're going through. that said, ublgd have said the same thing for george w. bush when the economy collapsed at the end of 2008. so that alone -- even if that is the case, that alone is not making the economy better than it was under barack obama. it's just not. >> and it's not. look, there's no question the business community is happy with this and that he's given them a lot of stuff, but i think what we should also talk about is the average worker and where the average worker sits at the moment relative to what trump is proclaiming as a turn around of historic proportions. >> the average worker, elise, if
i'm a democrat, i'm talking about the average worker that got stiffed by these tariffs. they'll be paying more when they go shopping. they got stiffed by the tax cuts. they went to the richest americans. and they've gotten stiffed by health care, pre-existing conditions, forget about it. donald trump and his administration are trying to obliterate protections that congress laid down when it comes to pre-existing conditions and we'll talk about lower wage growth under trump in a second. >> there was a really disturbing stat that i read recently something like 70% of renters -- 70% cost the average income coming in goes to rent in a lot of major cities. that's completely unsustainable for workers to have to pay 70% of their income every month. i don't see how we don't -- we've had ten good years post the recession. how do we not have a dropping
off the cliff soon? >> and what about wages? are they going up? >> they have to be going up because donald trump says they are. >> ivanka visits a lot of workers, and i think that helps. >> she also visits, iowa, by the way, but more on that later. >> more on that later. isn't it the ultimate litmus test of the administration whether you make the average worker better off or not. >> they get to meet ivanka. >> under obama, the average worker got pay increases of about 0.8% a year. that's after adjusting for inflation. that's that line i just put up. >> right. >> under trump, it has actually dropped to 0.3% a year. so in fact, wage increases under trump have gone from 0 .8% under obama to 0.3% under trump. >> right. >> the last two quarters wage increases -- these are all after adjusting for wage. the last two months they have
been zero, no wage increases for the average american. >> just from 40,000 feet, the u.s. economy under barack obama and the first 18 months donald trump pretty good, right? again, it's a slower, gradual growth. trump will probably be annualized at maybe 2%, 2.5%. just like obama. but again, pretty good, steady growth over time. >> you know -- >> it's not 3%. >> yes. exactly. in a year of somewhat diminished expectations of what we can perform and produce, 2% is a reasonable number, 2.5% is a reasonable number. but the problem is as my last chart shows, it's not getting to the average worker. >> right. >> and the key thing about trump is that if you look through all of his policies, find me one that is actually helped the average worker. tax cuts for the rich, tariffs, deregulation. i don't think so. >> also tearing to shreds any hope for health care reform. >> health care.
>> that would help working class americans that would take care of their kids with pre-existing conditions that would take care of the elderly. they're talking about slashing funding for nursing homes when you look at what they want to do with medicaid. >> democrats are salivating about taking health care out on the campaign trail this fall. >> i just checked the google machine on your question -- no trump policies that help workers. still ahead in may he called michael cohen honest and honorable. >> this rudy, yeah. i remember when he called michael cohen -- >> he did. >> honest. >> 100%. >> and honorable. >> but yesterday he called him a pathological liar. >> what? >> uh-huh. >> apparently he was the president's lawyer, though. which is kind of interesting that the president employed a pathological liar as his lawyer. >> i don't understand, america's mayor said he was an honest man. >> rudy giuliani has done a 180 on the president's former fixer.
we'll talk about why next on "morning joe." >> very confused. ♪ ♪ ♪ let your perfect drive come together at the lincoln summer invitation sales event. get 0% apr on select 2018 lincoln models plus $1,000 bonus cash.
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of the june, 2016, trump tower meeting with russians. just over two months ago on may 6th, giuliani described cohen has a, quote, honest, honorable lawyer who, quote, doesn't have any incriminating evidence about the president. >> rudy giuliani -- >> yeah. >> honest? >> what do we do with this character? >> john heilemann, you're going to have somebody be your personal lawyer for 20 years or so, i guess it has been 20 years already. >> not quite that long but a while. >> you want a guy around you who is honest and honorable so it makes sense that rudy and trump would say that cohen is an honest lawyer. he's your fixer. >> he's your guys with you don't want a scum bag as your fixer. you want a guy who is honest. >> and loyal. >> fast forward to yesterday and here is what giuliani had to say. >> uh-oh. >> what? >> now i've listened unfortunately, fortunately for my client's point of view, to many, many hours of tapes and
the man is a pathological, manipulator, liar. i didn't know that. i didn't know him well, but i knew nothing bad about michael cohen until all of this started to happen in the last couple weeks. >> until he stopped covering up for donald trump. >> former chief of staff at the ci, a and department of defense now an nbc national security analyst, jeremy bash. also here with us on set, nbc news foreign correspondent keir simmo simmons. >> good to be here. >> rudy giuliani has transformed. >> he's so sad that michael cohen isn't a boy scott afterall. >> jeremy bash, it seems to be a tale of two cohens here. [ laughter ]. >> he was the best fixer. he was the worst fixer. >> that's right, joe. look, i do think that this claim by michael cohen, we don't know yet whether it was verified,
that donald trump knew in advance about the meeting in trump tower that he approved it and welcomed the support from the russian government delegation. that is potentially the most significant development in the whole russia investigation. and the reason is because up up donald trump has been able to say, you know, i don't know what my son, people in my campaign have been doing. i had nothing to do with it. michael cohen knows every single detail about the trump organization, about the business dealings in russia, he can say and testify or provide testimony to bob mueller's team that donald trump was briefed about this, he welcomed this, he knew that it was a russian government delegation and this under mines every other single claim that donald trump has made. >> donald trump knew enough about that meeting to get everybody on air force one and lie about it. but you've really done a deep dive into people that were at the meeting.
>> thanks for the dicken's reference. look, we got close to the kremlin. for example, i can tell you the billionaire was on vacation with the spokesman for president putin just last week. so they are pictured together with their wives. the whole russian heirarchy, if you like, the top of that establishment is like this. >> like london. >> i think one of the interesting insights into all of this is what we're talking about is the behavior of obscenely rich people. this is how they behave. they believe that everything that they say, if they say it is right. that's what obscenely rich people do. and their children.
their entitled children they empower them to make the same kind of success. in a sense if you step back, the real connection is about how very, very rich people behave and how they behave towards each other. >> i think you told me when you spent some time in london that was your takeaway at least about london is it was very closely held and, you know, everything happened in london and everybody seemed to know everybody. what we're learning not only from keir but others it's even tighter in russia because as you say -- >> it depends. you have nice parks. >> small country, couple universities. a lot of these russians are now in london. property owners. they have parts of football
clubs. i want to come back to what jeremy said about the michael cohen assertion. there's a question. will it be verified or not. are there tapes that demonstrate this. jeremy, one of the things that we know, at least from the reporting on this, is that michael cohen is saying to people that there were other people present in the meeting at which donald trump, he alleges, was told all about this meeting and what its purpose was and so on. one of those people -- i'll offer this not for somebody who has been named but a reasonable person to start asking about is hope hicks who was pretty much in every meeting that donald trump was in at that point in time in the campaign and who has already talked to robert mueller. talk about the various ways -- that's one example -- other ways in which the cohen assertion could be, in fact, verified. >> there are other opportunities to have corroborating evidence. there was a discussion in the
house intelligence committee report that came out about a month and a half ago about a blocked number that donald trump jr. called before and after that meeting. obviously, bob mueller can access who that blocked number was. there will be documents, there will be calendar, other people who were in the meeting with donald trump. there are other ways to corroborate this. i should think if donald trump was briefed on this we'll know about it and it will be in the bob mueller report. i just think it's also important, now that we have so much about the trump tower meeting to remind ourselves it was not just a meeting with don't jr., it was with paul manafort and others. it was with the russian delegation. not just about adoptions it was about sanctions and what they would trade in order to interfere in the elections. >> i would add one thing. not just that we can speculate bob mueller might find out. i think there's a chance bob mueller already knows this stuff. he's talked to people already
who would have been present at the meeting. he has this information. it's another example ways in which bob mueller is miles ahead of where we are and the things we think we might learn one day are things he might have already nailed down at this hour. >> i have some doubts about whether the others were led up to meet the president other than candidate. i wonder if that's true. i've spoken many times. the idea that president trump knew about the meeting, i signed up. did they actually meet, i'm not completely convinced. >> jeremy bash thank you very much. still ahead, president trump escalates the threat of a government shutdown before the 2018 mid-terms. and get as word of caution from some republicans. "the washington post" robert costa joining us us with his latest reporting. plus the president puts his fear on the mueller probe on full display launching his most
personal attack against the special counsel yet. >> did you believe now nervous he was. just petrified. >> a fraidy cat situation. >> he was in a fetal position tweeting under a desk. >> he was very, very scared and the tweets were full of ties and riddled with fear. you can almost imagine him. >> makes me sad. it's hard. . was he shaking that bad? >> it's not good. we'll talk to senator richard blumenthal about those tweets and congressman eric swalwell on the committee investigating russia. "morning joe" is coming right back.
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>> i'm a red sox because i hate the yankees. i hate the yankees. >> we need to go out and see a mets game. >> they have to win a few first. >> mookie is cute. >> she likes mookie. >> it's monday, july 30th, 2018. still with us, john hallman. >> he seems sweet. >> nbc news foreign correspondent keir simmons. he's adorable. former aid to the george h. w. bush white house and state department elise jordan. and author of "the soul of america," the soul of america himself john meacham. >> you earned so much money on that book, can you buy me a book. have all your relatives been calling and asking for things because you're so rich now because of that book? >> no. i don't actually answer the
phone. we have like a green acres phone, eddie albert, we get on top of mr. drucker's store and i stay off the roof. >> you have arnold the pig answer the phone for you. >> yes. >> it would be cool if you got the boat. the boat paid by the soul of america. >> joining the conversation -- >> i have a quick question. has you're comparing 1960s sitcom animals, all right, we got a showdown between arnold the pig on "green acres," the smartest animal in town too versus "mr. ed," who do you go with? >> the pig. 100%. i liked the talking thing is kind of cool. the notion that a horse could talk, i like that. but the pig is the smartest
creature. pigs are smart. >> my mom loves the pig. >> your pigs can do higher math. >> all right. also joining us political reporter for "the washington post" and moderator of washington week on pbs, robert costa. >> neither "green acres" or "mr. ed" is airing. >> and law prove for at george washington university, mr. turley. >> arnold or mr. ed? >> mr. ed. >> chicago cubs is the greatest baseball team on earth. >> wow. >> so he's going to start like that. >> cut his feed. ing? >> right to the news. president trump spend part of his weekend lashing out and questioning the credibility of robert mueller's ongoing investigation. in a series of tweets yesterday
trump claimed there was no collusion and since he says so he thinks everyone should believe him. he called mueller's probe a witch-hunt and an illegal scam. he went on to write nervously. is robert mueller ever going to release his conflict of interest with respect to president trump with respect to the fact we had a very nasty business relationship. i turned him down to head the fbi one day before appointment as special counsel and comey is his close friend. also why is mueller only appointing angry dems some of whom who have worked for crooked hillary. including others have worked for obama and why isn't mueller looking at all of the criminal activity and real russian collusion on the democrat side, podesta dossier? nbc news reached out to the special counsel's office and received no response.
>> so, jonathan, just curious where are you right now with a lot of things that happened over the past couple of weeks. and, obviously, donald trump lashing out furiously at the special counsel, independent counsel. it's as if he expects something to drop over the next week or two. where are you right now on the mueller investigation, what you know of it and where you think it's headed? >> i think the current development is very serious. he's one witness away from a potential catastrophe. if any of those five witnesses breaks and supports michael cohen this will get real bad real fast. it's not that the meeting will establish a crime of collusion even if what cohen is saying is true, but what it would mean is that donald trump jr. would be in serious jeopardy of a criminal charge. if mueller was to go after donald trump jr., i think we
would see a very rapid chain of events and it would not end well for anyone. i think that donald trump very well could match his past visceral language with similar language. company start to fire people. and that would have a cascading effect. it would probably take us right to the door step of impeachment. thus far, there isn't any corroboratation from michael cohen and the fact is he's not a very credible person. unlike rudy giuliani most of us have actually heard bad things about michael cohen. he must not have been around for the past year not to hear bad things about michael cohen. cohen is not really redeemable as a witness. he needs to have support from some of the people in that room. >> and robert costa, what can you tell us about the attitude
inside the white house, what's going on there, why donald trump went on this scream again yesterday morning. we see it in the past when the heat is turned up on him. what happened this weekend? >> my sources meeting with them over the weekend they are on high alert. look what's happening on capitol hill. don't ignore it with regard to the mueller investigation. you have top trump allies proposing these articles of impeachment now, a contempt of congress for deputy attorney general rod rosenstein and that option is sitting out there for president trump being proffered by his allies saying if you do want to move on mueller, if you do believe you have an excuse to go after the department of justice over this document fight you can go after rod rosenstein. it's sitting there as a political target and that has made some trump allies on edge if mueller does start to take some real action legally that the president could consider making some moves at doj. >> john, there a couple of back
benches that are going after rod rosenstein. at the same time you have republicans in the united states senate shoulder to shoulder in support of robert mueller, in support of the investigation moving forward. you have richard burr the chairman of the senate intel committee saying last week that all the fisa warrants made sense and were logical, no wrongdoing there whatsoever. you talk about open warfare among republicans, the saturday night massacre, what is playing out between the white house and justice department, it would be 80% of the senate and, you know, probably 50% of the house republicans going after each other and the president. it would be a bloodbath 99 days out. >> 100%. i think -- but that was true, but broad support for rod rosenstein among senate
republicans and even many house republicans who don't want to say so publicly, that was true before helsinki. after helsinki. the degree of strength that rod rosenstein has among everyone but the nunez caucus and mark meadows caucus who is engaging in this ridiculous impeach rod rosenstein. it's just pure kabuki. he won't be impeached. but the extent that there's a caucus that likes to make that kind of noise, the counter caucus, the broader support for rod rosenstein is off the charts after helsinki. >> post-helsinki you really, really have to be taking your political future into your own hands even as a reif you're going after robert mueller's indictment of what does he have, 23 russians now? and clear evidence -- just in black and white -- that they tried to rig the 2016 election.
>> they tried to intervene, yeah. i think you can under estimate how much the russians are watching. we talk about the, you know, american foreign policy you should always view through american domestic policy. russians know that. when i speak to people in the kremlin i get a clear impression that they understand the politics here and they are making moves. so just, for example, after helsinki, some in the kremlin told me we won't talk about this any more. we need to keep quiet about this. now we had president putin offer president trump -- >> i don't like washington in the fall. you're my patsy, you come to moscow. >> can you under estimate that again and again. remember when i was in north korea last year and a north korean official told me we watch "morning joe". >> huge.
>> this country is going through this incredible angst and clearly that has to happen but don't under estimate how around the world he's being watched. >> the world is watching. >> so john meacham, where is the soul of america in the age of devalued truth, starting at the top and the relationship with russia that we could never expect? >> you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. lies are good starter, but they are not good finishers, and again and again in american life we've had periods where we had distrusted institutions, we had people who thought they could put a fast one past us and sometimes they did for a time. but ultimately the great experiments in self-government that the founders put together created a document, created an ethos that because it takes into
account that we're flawed, we're driven by appetite and ambition, it gave us a chance for reason to take a stand against passion in the arena. this is what the constitution was made for. what would have stunned the founders, they would have taken until 2016 to get a demagogue like this as a president. the document was kraefted to try to check our worst impulse, and joe mccarthy took four years, watergate took 27 months. jim crow took a century. you know, we've been in dark places before. we just have to remember that what makes us best is when we're strong and when we open our arms. >> jonathan turley, elise here. the column about how michael cohen is panicked and that makes him dangerous. you're talking -- you were talking about some of the behavior that we might see if donald trump jr. is himself more
imperilled. is michael cohen at this point still hoping for a pardon or any acting out or has that ship sailed >> yeah, no. i think donald trump is probably more likely to give hillary clinton a pardon right now than michael cohen. any pardon strategy is gone. this over mutually shared destruction strategy by cohen. i don't really get it. usually you threaten that. you don't usually commit the act. he started out with that. the pardon, i think, is no longer an option. he's putting all of his money on mueller. i'm not too sure that strategy will play out for him. he's not that valuable of a witness in one sense than he is in another. his proximity makes him very draws dra dangerous to the president. but to have the lawyer say he'll
try something new he'll tell the truth. that's not a roaring endorsemen. it's basically saying i'm john dean without the guilt. not that great of a witness to put on the stand. >> jonathan turley, thank you very much. president trump used twitter to once again shut down the government for tougher immigration laws. he tweeted yesterday i would be willing to shut down government if the democrats do not give us the votes for border security which includes the wall. must get rid of lottery, catch and release, et cetera. and finally go to system of immigration based on merit. we need great people coming in to our country. trump's warning comes ahead of the september 30th deadline for congress to strike a deal to fund the government, raising the possibility of a showdown just 37 days before the mid-term elections. the potential funding battle would come amid efforts by
republicans to confirm the president's supreme court nominee brett kavanaugh by october 1st. following his meeting on wednesday with senate majority leader mitch mcconnell and paul ryan president trump signaled that he was on board with the leader's strategy to fund the government through smaller packages of spending bills. mcconnell said friday talks over funding the border wall would have to wait until after the mid-terms. bob costa, i think immigration is a great issue to go into the mid-terms with to remind e around the stench around this presidency with the separation of families going on with hundreds of children who may not ever be reunited with their families again because of president trump, jeff sessions, kirstjen nielsen and ivanka trump by default since she's counselor to the president in support of families. >> are republicans afraid of the shutdown >> mika makes an important point
on immigration. ivanka trump in 2016 went to the suburbs of philadelphia and vulnerable republicans right now are very unese i about the president focusing on immigration. but my sources say the president talk about this witch00, his words about the russia investigation, hammering a proposed border wall. all about juicing up that republican base because talking to pollsters inside the party and people conducting focus groups they are concerned a blue wave could be coming. the quarterly growth, the tax cut not enough to get the trump voter to come back out in the mid-term elections. it's back to the wall, back to immigration, back to going after robert mueller. that's the strategy. >> boy, that is, steve rattner, that's a rough strategy for donald trump and i'm sure probably speaks to why recognizes are afraid. i mean coming to the district.
and you've talked about it this morning already, the "times" has a story on the front page but poll after poll after poll shows the rank-and-file just aren't buying this tax cut. in fact, it's deeply unpopular, especially among working class americans that republicans need. >> it's got a 30% approval rating. americans got to give him a little bit of credit on figuring things out. what they figured out 85% of this tax cut going to businesses or people making over $75,000. the average american gets $600. not a lot of money. on the shutdown question there's 13 legislative days between now and the election. there's a lot at risk. history would tell you shutdowns hurt the party that perceived to create the shutdown. but democrats need 60 votes in the senate. they have to get some democrats
to get over the finish line. >> going to be awfully tough. keir, i want to talk about london again. it's on my mind. since i can't talk about chelsea. let's talk about theresa may and boris johnson, news this week, don't know if it's accurate or not, but boris johnson now is becoming good buddies with steve bannon. true? do you see those reports? >> steve bannon has been in the uk and has been making friends. and not just with the former foreign secretary but with others much further to the right. >> do we expect a challenge to theresa may from boris johnson? >> just to put simply what's happening in the uk is the government is hanging by a thread and what the conservative government is frightened of is if they break that thread and go for a general election spend up with a very far left labor party
in power. that, by the way, would turn things upside down. the leader of the labor part in the uk has some sympathy for russia. he has interesting views on europe. the potential for things to really unravel around brexit and echo around the world economically which where things here should worry b-i guess, is great. >> is there a possibility of another coalition government in britain where it gets to the point where it looks like you'll have boris johnson teaming up with other right-wing parties. >> you need another election to have it happen. you can predict the outcome of an election, particularly the way that the electorate are these days here and in the uk. what's happening is very detail internal politics within the ruling party in britain with the big picture of them desperately
trying to cling to power. >> keir simmons thank you very much. robert costa, thank you as well. >> robert, what are you working on today? >> keeping an eye on the mueller investigation. where is this report? when is a subpoena coming for president trump? is rudy giuliani going to don't dance around the idea of doing an interview. decisions have to be made on both sides. >> still ahead on "morning joe" from cruel to inhumane to careless and incompetent show you senator blumenthal describes the government initial child separation policy and subsequent efforts to deal with it. the connecticut democrat joins us next on "morning joe". ♪ feet. & with edge-to-edge intelligence you've got near real time inventory updates. & he'll find the same shoes in your store that he found online
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resolution on protecting the press. we'll get to that. curious as to what you know about where the separation policy stands? we know they ended the policy but still a lot of children's lives hanging in the balance. are they going to be able to resolve this completely? >> hundreds of children are still separated from their parents. >> do we have a good number on that? are we in the hundreds? >> there are no good numbers. >> no good numbers. why are there no good numbers. why can't we get the government, why can't we get the fraugs to give us good numbers on how many children they seized from tarms of their parents and have now lost? >> that is the question we're going to be asking tomorrow when we have i.c.e. come before the judiciary committee. we'll have a hearing. and the question of whether this policy is a result of incompetence and carelessness or deliberate cruelty. right now what we have is benign
neglect. children are separated because of the incompetence and carelessness and the policy itself and americans should be angry about it is the result of consciously and purposely inflicted cruelty. >> the focus on i.c.e. is misdirected. the focus is on the policy. this would be like americans being angry at tsa if donald trump decided to seize babies from mothers arms when they are going through the metal detectors. >> that's exactly right. that's why we've urged the chairman of the committee, chuck grassley not just have i.c.e. but the office of refugee resettlement, department of homeland security leadership in general and the department of health and human services. they all bear responsibility. >> why are they still separated. what's the crux of that? are the parents deported? are the parents out of country and now the kids are stuck in america? what's happened? >> some parents have been
deported on the promise that they would be reunited. that was a false promise. some of the parents are still in this country, but the department of homeland security doesn't have sufficient information to bring them together. we've received closed briefings and the basic conclusion here is that this policy is a result of a conscious effort to deter asylum seekers from coming to this country by convincing them that they will face more pain here than they would by facing the murder, violence and gang warfare in their own country. >> so i understand that's what sessions, that's what trump wanted to happen. what i don't understand is when they implemented the policy, how were they not able to trace -- how were they not able to put 2-year-olds, 3-year-olds, 4-year-olds back with their parents? whose ultimately -- who ultimately fumbled that responsibility?
>> and that's what the american people deserve to know. and we don't know the answer yet. we'll begin finding out tomorrow. but i think there has to be accountability. >> isn't it remarkable we don't know? isn't it remarkable >> there was a plan? >> there was no plan. you know when i visited the border, now almost six weeks ago, what i saw and i said it when i came back was no plan, no path, no system for reuniting these children with their parents. i looked into the eyes of a 2-year-old girl in her father's arm who faced possible separation from her father, and he was close to tears. but he had walked 30 days across mexico to escape the violence and persecution in his country simply so his daughter could live and have the opportunity to be in this country, but there was no plan to keep them together, there was no plan to reunite them if they were
separated. there never was. and that is the really untold story. >> i feel like we have to call a time-out right here for viewers who may not understand the laws of this land. it is legal for people to come to this country and seek refugee status and when they come here that's when we're supposed to have a review. and we're supposed to have judges, courts look at it. and, of course, donald trump's answer is separate the children, deport the parents, and fire all the judges. says he doesn't want any judges any more. doesn't want any more due process for refugee status which, again, is that's the basis of our country. donald trump's parents, donald trump's mother came to america from overseas, mika's mother and father escaped hitler, came to
america, mika's mother went across the atlantic, actually got -- the boat got hit by a german torpedo which was a thud, but escaped, escaped nazi oppression. >> so did my dad in 1935 came here at 17 years old. he had not much more than the shirt on his back. spoke no english. he was a penniless refugee who would have been sent back under trump's current policies. there is a legal protection but there's also a great american tradition. >> exactly. that's our story. >> exactly. we're a nation of immigrants. >> there's something that also is really troublesome, i mean everything about this policy is troublesome, but texas tribune had been reporting about 70 children under the age of 2 have been representing themselves at asylum proceedings. how does this happen in america? >> i know.
>> sir, i want to move on to a different topic and a different venue for you which is your role on the judiciary committee. bret kavanaugh coming before you guys. you have been raising some concerns about the scope of the committee's inquiry, ability to get all the records from the time he was in the white house an also about where he stands on the question of the nixon president. i want to talk about both those things. where we are. not so much about the political maneuvering, will he protect robert mueller, how serious is the scrutiny your committee will give to this nomination. >> first of all, we need the documents and right now we're being denied all documents we need to review this nomination. the reason we need the documents is that there's no telling what he may have written and what's relevant when he was staff secretary to president bush. we know that on some of the issues like the signing
statements related to illegal detention he took certain positions. but we need to confirm what he tells us by having all the documents. the question is what are they hiding? why are they concealing some of these documents sydney won't meet with this nominee and certainly would urge my colleagues to vote against him if we are denied those documents. second, on the issue of presidential power he has a very expansive view of what the president's powers can be. first of all, the president can refuse to enforce a law if he feels that it is unconstitutional. second, he should be able to fire the special counsel for any reason or no reason at all. and that makes him a possible deciding vote also on the subpoena power, he's questioned the validity of the tapes case. that was in the watergate area and decided unanimously by a
supreme court in an opinion written by the chief justice warren burger a nixon appointee. this questioning of the issue of when the president is above the law is extremely serious. if his position is the president is above the law, i don't see how any of my colleagues can vote for him. >> senator, without diminishing the importance of everything you said, in the real world of politics it seems like the republicans are absolutely locked in step here on whether maybe rand paul but mostly locked in step. three red state congressmen who voted for gorsuch. is there doubt he'll be confirmed. >> there is doubt. mainly in these documents, if we get them, there may be bomb shells and smoking guns and other very revealing evidence that goes to his views on these critical issues, not just presidential power but also roe v. wade and his committing
apparently passing the trump litmus trump to automatically overrule it, on health care issues. we need to take this case to the american people and i think the american people are going to want a check and balance on this president particularly. i think they are going to want someone who is in favor of a free press. especially with this president. >> so, let's talk about republicans and the mueller investigation. you, of course, have a couple of house republicans who are playing the role of vladimir putin's poodles, embarrassing themselves. on the republican side in the senate some strong words, again, from richard burr the chairman of the intel committee saying fisa warrants were actually in line and the judges, the republican judges did the right thing there. it seems that more and more republicans are speaking out strongly for, in support of
robert mueller's investigation going to its end. >> there's no question that trump's cronies in the house are threatening impeachment of rod rosenstein, which is very impactful. and also threatening special counsel. we have republicans in the senate beginning to show some signs of resistance to this consistent concerted campaign against the special counsel. remember this campaign has been ongoing for some time, not just the president calling it a witch-hunt, but also some of his -- i hesitate to say stooges but surrogates in the house saying that it is all made up. we know from the close to 30 indictments and five convictions there's a lot of evidence. >> russians, by the way, they are not just covering for donald trump any more, they are not trump's churmps any more, they
are vladimir putin's useful idiots. this is a russian story that these republican dupes in the house of representatives are covering for vladimir putin. they should get their contributions converted to r rubles now. >> the remarkable thing about this indictment, no way these russias were freelancing. they are military intelligence operatives under orders from vladimir putin. instead of inviting him to this country, he should be indicted in this country. and the people who are cozying up to him are simply aiding and abetting ongoing attack on this country. >> it continues. >> senator blumenthal you say stooges. >> we don't. richard blumenthal, thank you so much. >> i do like putin's poodles.
>> there's a few republicans in the house of representatives who are literally covering up an enemy's attempt to undermine american democracy. think about how remarkable that is. how do you go back to your constituents and say i'm trying to impeach the guy that is running an investigation against our enemies trying to infiltrate american democracy and undermine it. try to put that one on a bumper sticker. >> joe, i really think you're doing an injustice to the dogs of america. >> okay. >> senator, thank you. we'll be watching as you present a resolution today on the press as well. we'll get to that. coming up the trump-cohen drama goes public and getting ugly. we'll bring in a former judge and u.s. attorney from the office now investigating the president's former fixer. we'll be right back. ♪
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and rb. there must be something wrong, please recheck that poll and many did check, according to gallop, trump's approval rating among republicans is 88%. at the same point in their presidencies, dwight eisenhower's approval rating was 92% among republicans and george h. w. bush's approval was 93%. four and five points higher than trump's respectively. he needs to heck chcheck his nu. he really needs to search. up next more on the conversation we were just having with senator blumenthal, that the white house had absolutely no plan to reunify the families i want separated at the border. that's next on "morning joe". oh!
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information to locate hundreds of missing parents to reunite them with their children. a federal judge overseeing the court ordered reunification of more than 2,500 migrant children has ordered the administration turn over a list of all parents deemed ineligible for reunification by wednesday. let's bring in msnbc correspondent jacob for more on this. are they going to be able to track down all these families and reunite them >> that's the idea, mika. this thing is almost absurdly far from over. on friday the trump administration basically declared victory saying they had reunited by this court imposed deadline the eligible, what they call eligible 1880 something, 1882 children systematically separated from their parents by the trump administration. the overall number was 2,500 kids. what we learned in court from the trump administration on friday actually went down there and sat in this courtroom to listen to the judge talk to trump administration and watch
them battle it out with the aclu. there were 650 kids, senator blumenthal didn't know the number. 650 is the number of children that the government deemed ineligible to be reunited with their parents and didn't reunite them. the judge stepped in and basically said there are missing parents. he calls them missing parents. go find them. the government was refusing to provide the aclu information, specific detailed information that would help them track down these folks in their home countries including 431 parents who were deported and can't get back to this country to be reunited with their children. this information being handed over by wednesday and track them down. >> jacob, you said 650 the trump administration saying 650 young children are quote ineligible to be reunited with their parents, ineligible on what grounds? how did they define ineligible >> right. that's such a good question.
let me be clear. those children were separated in the exact same way at the exact same places that the kids that were deemed eligible were separated. the only issue with these children is they say some of these parents, 431 of them were already deported. that's it. they just got deported before they could get-together with their children. another small portion of that group has some form of criminal convictions but we don't know why or what kind. they are focused on 120 of these parents, who they say waived the right to reunification with their kids. but it's sort of a hard argument to buy because we know from affidavits filed in court many of those parents said i actually signed those forms in error to give up my children, i didn't understand them. they were different languages. >> jacob, are these judges raking these government bureaucrats over the coals? i can't imagine any judge with a thousand kids missing, 650,
however many it is right now, i can't imagine any judge rake, not raking these bureaucrats over the coals and demanding that they provide answers. are they doing that? >> of course. the bottom line a plan for reunification if it wasn't for this judge down in the southern district here in california. he said very clearly on friday, there never was a plan. these were like a bunch of different stove pipes, doj, hhs, the department of homeland security that never even talked to each other. he said, look, step one is getting the eligible children back together. step two is you guys basically finding the parents you said were ineligible and we're going to reunite, even if i, the judge, didn't tell you to do this and come up with an actual plan to do this. and, step three, that this never happens again. all of these agencies you would think would talk to each other, all federal government agencies involved in the care of migrant children at the border, would talk to each other and they're not talking to each other. he said this can never happen
again, was basically his parting thoughts in court on friday. >> jacob, thank you very much. pbs's "front line" is taking a closer look at the crisis with a new special entitled "separated children at the border." here is a clip featuring an interview with former acting director of i.c.e. >> when you heard the tape, the pro publica published of the children waling, what was your reaction? >> i didn't hear the tape. >> come on. >> i did not hear the tape. i've heard many children cry in my 34 years. i don't need to hear. >> can i play it for you? >> yes. >> it is a young girl who asked to call her aunt, she has the number memorized. how can you not condemn that? >> look, i've seen a lot of terrible things in my 34 years. what we have to address the border. >> do you not sympathize -- >> absolutely. i'm a parent. it is sad, but when a government chooses to enforce the law and
they separate the parents being prosecuted, just like every u.s. citizen, person in this country is separated when they're arrested, people want a different set of rules for an illegal alien. >> and "frontline" correspondent martin smith joins us now. martin, obviously quite an interview. what else did you find out from the former director of i.c.e.? >> well, look, he takes a very simple approach to this. it was abundantly clear after talking to him that he sees this as a simple case of there's a law about how you legally enter the country and he's going to enforce it. and the president has accepted that kind of approach to this. you know, if you want to have a humane process of deciding who can come and who deserves to come, who is fleeing violence and needs asylum, you have to have judges. you have to have a robust asylum
process. the president says he doesn't want judges. well, that's what judges are for. >> right. >> to judge whether or not somebody -- has a decent case to make. so holman says enforce the law. >> did you sense from him and do you sense from other i.c.e. officials and other people who tried to tackle this issue a frustration, a belief that you hear out of this administration that people in the past have brought children up with them to make their passage into the united states easier? >> you know, he didn't -- he didn't harp on that, and i have heard that from some. but, look, you know, i went down to salvador for the making of this documentary, and my producer was covering this for the last year, was in mexico, guatemala, el salvador. these people are fleeing violence and these children and their mothers or fathers need to get out of the situations
they're in. they're not just looking to make this easy to get in. >> what's the fate of these children, especially if they can't be reunited with their families, which it sounds like is a legitimate possibility for a good number of them, what will happen to them? what do we even know of their status right now, how they're doing? >> well, it is an excellent question, mika. we don't know. we don't know what's going to happen. we talked to one man who was put on a plane back to salvador. his daughter had been separated from him at the border. he was told that she -- if he agreed to be deported, she would be reunited. eventually she was reunited with him. but there are others who went back under the pretense that if they agreed to be deported they would get their child back, which is really a violation of their right to file a claim for asylum and have a court hearing, due process. but in any way, you know, some of -- like was mentioned by
jacob, there are people that speak a native language in guatemala who were asked to sign a form in english. they didn't know what they were getting into. there were some that were illiterate. but these are people that have legitimate claims from what i saw, not by and large criminals as is -- as they are described. >> martin smith, thank you so much. the new "frontline" documentary, "separated children at the border" premieres tomorrow night on pbs. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thanks so much. so let's talk about the politics of i.c.e. they will be talking to the director on the hill. right now it seems most democrats are trying to distance themselves from comments others have suggested that i.c.e. be abolished. >> yeah. i mean, look, that tape, that interview is -- many democrats, certainly the base of the party,
that kind of comment, the chilling tone of, well, you know, this is sad but, you know, these pembroke the law. >> right. >> that's going to fuel this debate for democrats, especially those thinking of running for president in 2020. you have kristin gillibrand now, elizabeth warren on the strong "we must abolish i.c.e." front. we have people like kamala harris who say we have to fix it. fixing i.c.e. is the easy position. in the democratic party where there's so much energy on the far left in the base -- >> but if you abolish i.c.e., what replaces it? >> for the moment all i want to say is that the political dynamic is going to pull democrats to the left. you have a couple of big voices saying "we must abolish it." it will become a litmus test. if you want to run for president, you have to say you will abolish it or radically reform it. >> still ahead on "morning joe", we will bring in a former
prosecutor who has sharp advice for the president's former fixer, michael cohen, and a retired judge who says some members of congress need to be investigated for trying to intimidate the deputy attorney general. plus, democratic congressman of eric swalwell. "morning joe" is coming right back. am i willing to pay the price for loving you? you'll make my morning, but ruin my day. complicated relationship with milk? pour on the lactaid. it's delicious 100% real milk, just without that annoying lactose. mmm, that's good. lactaid. the real milk that doesn't mess with you. and for chocolate lovers, try rich, creamy lactaid chocolate milk. happy anniversary dinner, darlin'. can this much love be cleaned by a little bit of dawn ultra? oh yeah one bottle has the grease cleaning power of three bottles of this other liquid. a drop of dawn and grease is gone.
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but every time i look at him he's campaigning. >> wow. president trump is -- >> i'll go six or seven days a week when we're -- i'll go six or seven days a week when we're 60 days out, and i will be campaigning for all of these great people that do have a difficult race, and we think we're going to bring them over the line. >> wow. president trump is known to contradict himself while on the campaign -- >> is he really? is he really? never happens. >> i wouldn't -- >> that's hateful you would say that. >> yes. this time he is contradicting himself being on the campaign trail. >> okay. >> the midterm vote is 99 days away. while the president is not on the ballot, his presidency certainly is. good morning, everyone. welcome to "morning joe." >> 99 days away. >> oh, that's so -- how did that happen? >> well, i mean -- >> this has gone so quickly.
>> i would think you would want it to be 99 days. >> closer to this being over. >> nine days away would be great. >> please end it. >> 99 bottles of beer on the wall. >> something like that. >> let me ask you, because obviously 100th day yesterday, people were talking about it. what is the state of play right now? there's always a back and forth and there will be more back and forth as we move forward, but where do the democrats, where do the republicans stand in terms of confidence on whether trump's going to be stopped or whether everything he's done the first two years are going to be validated? >> i think if you looked over the course of this year, people broadly think democrats are likely to retake control of the house. still kind of a coin toss in the senate. about a month ago you heard republicans getting sort of this surge about optimism that maybe they could hold on, that the economic news and some other things, and trump not having created, at least by his standards, too much chaos for them that things were swinging a little bit back in republican's
direction, and then helsinki happened. >> yep. >> the separation of families on the border happened, other things that blotted out all of the things that republicans want to talk about. they all came to the forefront, and now today democrats incredibly, incredibly confident and optimistic and republicans privately back to pessimism and thinking the house is probably gone and we maybe are going to hold on to the senate, but the blue wave feels stronger than 30 days ago. >> think of the three things that happened in the past 30 days. first of all, south korea has gone south. secretary of state pompeo admitting that the north korean's haven't slowed down and in fact may be creating more secret sites to build nuclear weapons. that north korea deal went down the drain. john already talked about helsinki. and lying over all of this, and i know it is something you will relate to very much, after katrina there were so many evangelicals who i went to
church with that we were, you know, we would do daily relieves after katrina over to mississippi and louisiana and they were shattered. their faith in george w. bush was shattered by what they saw on the ground in mississippi and louisiana, that nothing was being done. the question is where are the children that mika has repeated over and over again. i'm hearing from evangelicals that have supported him, this is not who we are. >> well, and you can hear about the russia investigation constantly, but in my opinion that's not going to move voters. but my mom, my sister-in-law, they voted for trump. they to not like these babies who are separated from their parents, and that's a story that is just an albatross, as it should be. >> right. >> i mean torturing children on the border of our great nation and it is something that donald trump can't run away from. >> but they can -- they can vote
according to their pocketbooks, steve ratner, and for that many are doing, you would say, pretty well. >> well, i mean in fact john jr. said -- >> not everybody. >> john jr. said, then i've heard other people say this too, that barack obama never even got above 2 percentage points for one quarter. isn't that amazing? and donald trump got 4.1. i mean never. >> we're going to do a little fact check on that, but the fact is that obama got about 4% i think in three-quarters. but, look, the tax cut is still incredibly unpopular. only a minority of americans support it, and there's a story on the front page of "the times" today about how republicans are not even campaigning on it. john will know more about this than i do, but i think there are 42 open republican seats right now, not running for election. you know how hard it is to flip an incumbent so these are open seats democrats can take on in the house. >> and you have dana rohrbacker
running, too, and if he would stop speaking russia maybe the republicans could hold down that seat, too. devin nunes putting a hammer and sickle in the o of the gop which is distracting. you know, it is interesting. we always say that people vote their pocketbooks, and been saying this for a very long time, that they don't in off-year elections. we'll see what the 4.1 is in the third quarter. most economists say it is going to go back down significantly. but we shall see. but, you know, in '94 becoill clinton had a great economy but he was seen as out of touch with the mainstream of america, and there was a massive republican title wave. 2006 the economy was going pretty darn well, but, again, it was post katrina. it was in the middle of iraq. nancy pelosi became speaker of the house. people don't always vote their pocketbook in mid-term elections. often they vote in reaction to what they've seen in the past
two years on cultural issues or even a leadership style. >> yeah. and the political science on this is always pretty clear, which is it is a base-motivated election. the economy i think is pretty safe to say is much more a driver in a presidential year. my own view with no evidence whatever -- so nothing new there -- is that the approval rating, the trump job approval rating probably has seven or eight points, maybe even a little bit more, of what i think of as 401(k) trump pers rigers . i think there are people looking at their statement, people on the right side of the economic equation anyway. they see their numbers going up for all sorts of reasons, and so they're willing to not really dive in to this russian novel story no one can quite figure out, and they're willing to
suspend their -- bizarrely in my view, but they are willing to suspend their ordinary moral judgments about how this president conducts himself and is now representing us on the world stage. but i would not, if i were in the white house, count on that lasting until 2020. >> we'll see. joe, your latest column in "the washington post" speaks to this. it is entitled "trump finally feels gravity's unforgiving pull." and reads in part. trump's stunning victory created such disorienting shock waves across washington that neither the democrats or the republicans understood what the accidental president at mighted. he said in december of 2016, everything came together at once. the resulting political horror show produced daily by trump has left journalists and politicians reeling, but failed to alter a
few basic rules of politics. first, presidents with approval ratings in the low 40s lose their majorities in the senate. third, lying about pay-offs to a porn star and a playboy model rarely helps with swing state voters. republicans hoping to save themselves from the political storm that will soon wipe away their congressional majorities would soon -- would be well-served to speak out against trump's most destructive policies which are anti-conservative, ill-liberal and sure to bring doom to the once grand old party. the party could be over. >> no. >> it could be. >> first of all, john, i'm very humbled to have my piece read on the "morning joe." >> well -- >> pride of place. >> it is a good piece. it is what we are talking about. >> your name is "morning joe." this is your show. but "morning joe", that's you. >> my music going as well. >> so it is good that you get
your pieces on your show. >> i also, mika -- >> you have pull with the guys that run the place. >> i have cleaning products to be selling at the half hour. no, that was somebody else. so it does -- it seems that trump's victory was so shocking that -- that i think a lot of pundits, a lot of politicians, i think a lot of republicans have overstated his strength and his magical powers, his gravity-defying political powers. but at the end of the day this man is still a 40% president. show me a 40% president and i will show you a loser. no, no, i'm serious. show me a candidate that has -- by the way, his reelect -- his reelect, according to the latest
nbc marris polls, his reelect in michigan i believe is 28%. in wisconsin, it is 31%. show me a guy with a 30% reelect, i will show you a loser, somebody that loses mid terms and somebody that loses real electio reelection. i think too often people overstate his political strength because they were so shock that he won last time. >> yeah. look, i mean i think the shock is one thing. i think the degree to which his behavior and the ways in which he has departed from republican orthodoxy, various ways in which he has thrown washington into chaos, his fact that his base -- which is not 40%, but 35 or something, the fact those people are immovable even in the face of things people object to so
strenuously causes us to over-focus on the base. barack obama rested on his base, donald trump rested on his base, agent both bases are rock solid. again, 35, you're a loser. even if you get the extra ones that meacham is talking about, you push up to 40%, 41% which is where he is right now, that's historically a disaster. you will be wiped out in the mid terms if everything we hold from history holds true again. >> still ahead on "morning joe", don jr. met with russians at trump tower in 2016. >> yes, he did. >> and the explanation why and who knew about it has changed multiple times. >> it was about adoptions, right? >> no, it wasn't. now a top republican in congress suggests that story may change yet again. we'll talk about that, but first here is bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> good monday morning. this will be an active weather week once again with flooding concerns and more fire risk and of course all atext is on the carr fire that is just on the border of redding.
already five fatalities including two firefighters. we have seen 500 structures, hundreds of homes have been burned. it was 110 degrees for four straight days last week, it will be about 100 to 105 for much of the upcoming week, no rain in site. the containment, again, less than 10%. it is extremely difficult for these firefighters. imagi imagine being on the front line, the heat from the fire and the heat from this time of year. we have strong thunderstorms out of oklahoma overnight. dallas catching is break, they're weakening just in time. eastern portions of oklahoma and abilene, texas with strong storms. the humidity and the rain is back in the mid atlantic region. these are tropical downpours moving from maryland and delaware. there's a possibility for three inches of rain today alone. potential flooding on the east coast. extreme heat and fire weather on the west, and unfortunately not a lot changes. even into wednesday, there's the heavy rain in the east, hot in
the west. 102, boise on wednesday. finally we end this week just like last week, with all of the wed weather and the flood risk in areas of the southern appalachians, carolinas through the mid add lan titlantic regio. this will be wettest weather in boston, which we have already done. new york city on the northern fringe of the heavy rain this week. maybe an inch or two this week. areas to the south, a lot more. enjoy today, nyc, the sunshine while you have it. you are watching "morning joe." we will be right back. thing sayr like a beach trip, so let's promote our summer travel deal on choicehotels.com like this. surfs up. earn a $50 gift card when you stay just twice this summer. or, badda book. badda boom. book now at choicehotels.com
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told the whole truth about the fact that campaigns look for dirt and if someone offers it you listen to them, nobody is going to be surprised. there are some things in politics that you just take for granted. >> so you don't think this has any long-term impact? he wouldn't be the first politician or president for that matter to maybe misrepresent things and he gets over it? >> well, you know, businessmen listen to almost everyone that might be helpful. >> yeah. >> by the way, they make pragmatic decisions about how to make bad stories go away. >> darrell issa. >> which is why -- >> darrell issa, not my dad, in that case -- first of all, we're going to run the table here because it is so extraordinary. even in my little office as a member of congress, if my -- if somebody came to my chief of staff and said, hey, the russian government or the iranian government has some dirt on your
opponent, my chief of staff would have said, hey, listen, we'll get back to you in a couple of days. what's your name again? what's your phone number, we'll call you back? would immediately call the fbi. would immediately call the fbi. this is not a close call. anybody out there thinking that if you listen -- if that's what darrell issa thinks, holy cow! that is condemning. here they keep moving the goalposts for donald trump. they're lying about donald trump, donald trump didn't know. okay, now if donald trump knew, what's the big deal? no, nobody does this. nobody has ever done this. nobody has ever done this that i know of, has gotten dirt on an opponent from a sworn enemy, russia, iran, you name it. >> never seen it in now almost unfortunately 30 years i've been doing this and covering republicans and democrats in the presidential races and other races. the thing i want to say about
darrell issa though that just goes to the real -- the thing he is saying here, which is that republicans aren't going to pay the price if it turns out donald trump is lying, i want to say it just like actions speak a lot louder than words. darrell issa is retiring from congress. >> uh-huh. >> right. so he can spin a rosie scenario for how republicans are not going to pay any price for donald trump's behavior, but it seems like on the basis of his own political calculations of what was going to happen in his district, he may have had a different view about what the blood bath is going to look like this fall. >> and donald trump has already lied, steve ratner, about russian agents coming to his office. donald trump has already masterminded the coverup on air force one where he lied and said that the meeting was about adoption, which, by the way, we saw over the weekend an attorney, a prosecutor say this is perfect to show the guilt, the conscious guilt at the time that something big happened in that room because you wouldn't lie about it if it was innocent.
>> sure. but, look, i think one of the problems we have here a little bit is it is a bit of a he said/she said. guilliani was on one of the shows basically saying there are five people that will say donald trump didn't know about the russia meeting up against michael cohen. you know, i was working in washington for "the new york times" in the summer of 1974 and i was watching all of this, and meachem can contradict me, but in my recollection the tapes were the defining moment because you heard him on tape saying this. now, maybe michael cohen has tapes that are equally condemning, but we haven't quite seen them. he has been able to wiggle and twist and worm his way out of every box people tried to put him insofar. >> but at least for darrell issa, what's the end game of saying something like that? it is obviously something you wouldn't want to support, the president lying about a meeting. >> lobbying money. >> with russian agents. >> their own personal self-interests constantly. that's all we see on display consistently among republicans who are choosing to prop up
these lies and to devalue truth and factual accuracy in the american public. it is really disgusting. i can't believe that we're at the phase where, you know, the $12 billion bailout for agriculture because of a dumb policy decision and all of these so-called fiscal conservatives can just get behind it because they're going with trump no matter what. we're just seeing where people do not stand for much except the ideology of power. >> think about that really quickly. again, ron johnson -- i can't believe i'm quoting ron johnson given the fact he has backed down to donald trump time and time again. but ron johnson correctly said it is soviet-era-style economics where you first of all adopt a stalin five-year foreign policy. the five-year plan, right? and you have tariffs. you destroy the economy, and then you come in behind it, and
after destroying the economy for these farmers you then prop them up with a $12 billion centralized state pay-off, after, i just got to say, a lot of farmers are already subsidized. like the big farm interests. so this is subsidy on top of subsidy on top of subsidy. >> but we've got to cut the deficit, joe. >> right, thank you. >> there's a lot of serious deficit hawks in washington. >> yeah, absolutely none. >> all right. coming up, rudy guilliani opinion of michael cohen has transformed over the past two months apparently. >> the shape shifter. he's like the next man. >> quite a metamorphosis. apparently so have cohen's opinions of the president. what it all means for the next significant stages in the russia probe straight ahead on "morning joe."
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meeting with russians. just over two months ago on may 6th, guilliani described cohen as an honest, honorable lawyer who, quote, doesn't have any incriminating evidence about the president. >> all right. so let's stop right there. can we keep it up for a second? so rudy guilliani, honest -- >> what to we do with this character? >> if you are going to have somebody be your personal lawyer for 20 years or so, i guess it had been 20 years already. i don't know how long it was. >> not quite that long, but yeah, a while. >> still, you want a guy around you who is honest and honorable, so it makes sense that rudy would -- and trump would say that cohen is an honest lawyer. >> of course. >> he's your fixer. you don't want a scum bag as your fixer, a guy who is honest enough you can relax. >> and loyal. >> and loyal. >> fast forward to yesterday and here is what guilliani had to say. >> what? >> now i listened unfortunately, fortunately for my client's point of view, to many, many hours of tapes, and the man is a
pathological manipulator, liar. i didn't know that. i didn't know him well, but i knew nothing bad about michael cohen until all of this started to happen in the last couple of weeks. >> until he stopped covering up for donald trump. >> joining us, former chief of staff at the cia and department of defense, now an nbc national security analyst, jeremy bash. also here with us onset, nbc foreign correspondent keir simmons. good to have you both with us today. >> good to be here. >> rudy guilliani has transformed in so many ways and some of it is heartbreaking to watch. >> yes. >> it is just so sad michael cohen isn't a boy scout after all. >> jeremy bash, it seems to be a tale of two cohens here. he was the best of fixers, he was the worst of fixers. >> that's right, joe. look, i do think that this claim by michael cohen, we don't know yet whether it is verified that donald trump knew in advance about the meeting in trump
tower, that he approved it and that he welcomed the support from the russian government delegation. that is potentially the most significant development in the whole russia investigation, and the reason is because up until now basically donald trump has been able to say, you know, i don't know what my son, i don't know what people on my campaign have been doing, i had nothing to do with it. but if michael cohen, the person who knows every single detail about the trump organization, about their business, about their business dealings in russia, if he can say or provide testimony to bob mueller's team that, in fact, donald trump was briefed about this, he welcomed this, he knew it was the russian government delegation, think it undermines almost every other claim donald trump has made about the russia investigation. >> donald trump knew enough about the meeting to get everybody on board air force one and concoct a lie about it, but you have done a deep dive into people who were at the meeting. >> yeah. >> you talked to some -- >> i know them. thanks for the dickens
reference, by the way. look, it is close to the kremlin. for example, i can tell you that the billionaire behind the meeting was on vacation with the spokesman for president putin just last week. so they're pictured together with his wife. so i mean the whole russian hierarchy if you like, the top of that establishment is like this. >> is like london, everybody knows everybody. >> yeah, us british guys, russian guys, same kind of deal. i think one of the interesting insights in all of this is that what we are talking about is the behavior of obscenely rich people. >> right. >> this is how they behave. so the russian oligarchs, they treat people like pawns. that's what many rich people do. they believe everything they say if they say it is right. that's what obscenely rich people do. and their children, their entitled children, they empower
them to go and try to make the same kind of success. so in a sense, if you step back the real connection is about how very, very rich people behave and how they behave towards each other and treat the world. >> coming up on "morning joe", our next guest is accustomed to judging things and he calls the push in congress against rod rosenstein a, quote, baseless, shameful campaign. a former u.s. district judge for the southern district of new york joins us straight ahead on "morning joe." [music playing] (vo) from the beginning,
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that's what it is all about. he had a right to say to comey, give flynn a break. there's no investigation at the time. not only that, he didn't tell him don't investigate him, don't prosecute him. he asked him to exercise his prosecutorial discretion because he was a good man with a great war record. i've been asked that many times, take the man's life into consideration, either go easy on him or this time you can pass on him. you do sometimes. >> how about trying to create a new crime. no collusion. now we have obstruction by tweet. whoa. i don't think the congress -- >> tweet. >> yeah, obstruction happens this way. hey -- or there's a gun. it doesn't happen by -- he has 80 million followers. >> a lot. >> sitting here looking at the federal code, trying to find collusion as a crime. >> it is not. >> collusion is not a crime. everything that's been released so far shows the president to be
absolutely innocent. he didn't to anything wrong. >> what is that? that's -- what is that, federal prosecution for fools? >> yeah. >> of course, rudy doesn't talk about how the president of the united states. >> debasing himself. >> -- kept out of the oval office and told the russian foreign minister and russia's ambassador to the united states, i fired the fbi to get pressure off of us, he's a nut case, wouldn't drop -- wouldn't drop the russian investigation. time and again, there's evidence that he was pressuring comey to drop the russia investigation, and when he didn't trump admitted he fired him because of it. >> it is really hard to know where to begin when you watch something like that. >> i wonder what's hard -- who believes that? >> well, it seems like -- didn't seem like anybody was questioning him. >> go to the google machine, and you see that everything he said is just foolish. >> yeah. >> and actually doesn't line up with what actually happened.
>> joining us, former assistant united states attorney in the criminal division of new york. and member of the house judiciary and intelligence committee democratic congressman eric swalwell of california. good to have you all. >> thank you, guys for being here. judge, let me start with you. how do you even begin to try to figure out what rudy guilliani is saying there, when he's a former u.s. prosecutor like you, understands -- >> my successor. >> yes. understands that investigations have to run their proper course, and you just can't shut down an investigation after actually the united states government's figured out that the russian government was actively trying to undermine our democracy. >> i think it would be a crime to shut down this investigation
early, and that people seriously try to make that argument makes absolutely no sense. there's an awful lot of material here that has to be coordinated, and the idea that you would cut it down early or the idea that you can dismiss the conversation that the president had with jim comey so cavalierly, it has all of the hallmarks of a criminal case. >> yeah. >> get the witnesses out of the room, and then the president doesn't say i was just trying to help a friend. he said, it didn't happen. >> judge martin, you have a column in "the washington post" entitled, the baseless, shameful campaign to discredit rod rosenstein. in it you write in part this. the claim that deputy attorney general rod rosenstein or anyone else involved in the fisa application the something inappropriate is wrong. while freedom caucus members call for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate rosenstein, it mayer more appropriate to appoint a special prosecutor to
investigate an attempt to corruptly obstruct justice by members of congress who so obviously use their office to intimidate the deputy attorney general and to undermine the credibility of special counsel robert mueller's investigation. >> judge, you have republicans in the united states senate who agree with you, that the fisa judges, the republican-appointed fisa judges, did the right thing. >> and anybody who looks at that warrant application, reliability is the key. what does it say? this man has provided reliable information in the past. you've got an informant like that and he's not somebody with a criminal motive or any obvious motive. another interesting thing is that in the second -- in the first renewal application, they put in there that steele became so upset when comey went -- put out the letter saying they're reinvestigating hillary clinton that he went public.
so it was very clear that steele was somebody who was very interested in hillary clinton succeeding. >> so, congressman, i will ask you what i asked senator blumenthal before. do you look at the republicans in the senate, people like richard bure, head of the intel committee, chuck grassley, it seems that most republican senators are saying do the right thing, let him continue his investigation until we know all of the facts about how the russians tried to disrupt american democracy in 2016? >> they're giving us hope they have the bipartisan legislation to protect bob mueller. they should bring it to a vote immediately. i think it is really unacceptable that mitch mcconnell won't, but also their investigation is our last chance to fully understand what the russians did. you know, bob mueller can only tell the world what he can prove beyond a reasonable toubt. there's a lot of other things we can learn to protect our ballot
box you may not be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that congressional should have been able to prove. we should put it in the hands of experts and elders to tell you how we are so vulnerable, who worked with the russians and what the government response was. we have 200 members of congress on board bipartisan, but we need to take it outside of the capital because we don't know what to do if it happens again. >> daniel goldman, you a former ex federal prosecutor, have free advice to offer to michael cohen, which is to shut up. but could he help himself by talking to an extent or why shut up? >> can i as a guy who only practiced law for a couple of years and just practiced insurance defense for the most part answer that question? no, it does no good. >> no good at all? >> why isn't this guy shutting up? >> when we say shut up, it means shut up in public. obviously he should run in and
talk to the southern district. >> that's what i was figuring. >> the only explanation i can glean from this is because he -- who he -- the primary target he would testify against is the president and his sort of surrogate rudy guilliani who are on the attack constantly, that michael cohen i think is trying to burnish his own image in the public. >> he's playing a pr game in the public which really doesn't matter to robert mueller or the prosecutors in the southern district of new york or all of the people who his life is in their hand. >> not only does it not matter, it hurts his cooperation. >> right. >> a prosecutor does not want the evidence in an investigation out there in public for a variety of reasons. first of all, it will make cross-examination easier against michael cohen. but more importantly, other wys necessaries will be able to change their testimony to fit the evidence that they would not have known. >> they can prepare. >> that's why it is not helpful for the prosecution for michael
cohen to be talking. >> judge, he is only undermining his ability to get a good deal from the southern district, right? >> i think they are unhappy with what he's doing certainly, an obviously it will depend on how much good information he can give them and how much corroboration there is for him. >> elise? >> so do you think that members of congress have been obstructing justice in the russia investigation? >> they're stopping justice in the russia investigation. we saw that when we would bring people in like don jr. or michael cohen and ask direct questions about the trump tower meeting and don jr. would refuse to answer. you know you have subpoena power and you don't have to take the rue fu refusal, but each time we would say, make donald trump jr. answer, but they would say, no, we're here under a voluntary scheme, which is what they set up. they protected them at every single stop.
since they ended their investigation we learned about cambridge analytic, about roger stone's extensive contacts and we're learning more and more about michael cohen. these guys are going to learn the hard way in november i'm afraid. >> daniel, we really need to look at this from 30,000 feet because in the past we talked about the house members protecting donald trump. but is it not fair to say that after mueller's last round of indictments a couple of friday go ago where the united states government actually identified russians that were trying to undermine american democracy, that at this point if you are trying to stop mueller's investigation you're not just a dupe for donald trump, you're a dupe for vladimir putin and you are getting in the way of an investigation that's trying to get to the bottom of how the russians tried to undermine american democracy? >> that indictment set forth how the russians went forward, at least in one way to infiltrate
our election. >> right. >> what bob mealer has not ton at any point and i think this is intentional, he has not included any evidence of american involvement in any of what we call collusion. collusion is shorthand for conspiracy to defraud. >> why has he done that? >> for a couple of reasons. one is what we talked about with michael cohen. he doesn't want to let the public or other witness he know what evidence he has. two, i think he wants to wait and make a very measured and complete decision as to whether and what extent americans were involved. so he's going to keep it all confidential because there may be people that aren't charged that should not go -- be named in public or there may be people who will be charged. but he's basically gathering all of the evidence and doing what a professional prosecutor would do. >> right. >> and then he is going to make a final decision as to who is going to be charged and with what, and he's not going to leak anything and he's not going to
let anything out there. but i do think he's going to indict people. i think when that indictment drops it is going to be a bombshell. >> judge, finally, what's next? what do you think is next? >> think dan is right. i think mueller is not going to do anything until he has the whole thing put together, because if you have to put out something devastating to the president, you don't want to put out little pieces one at a time. >> uh-huh. member of the intelligence committee, congressman eric swalwell. former assistant u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york, daniel goldman. former judge for the southern district of new york, john martin. thank you all. >> thank you all. up next, president trump suggests the media is putting american lives at risk. it is just one of several lines of attack from a weekend war of the tweets. we will run through it briefly next on "morning joe." preparing classic campfire trout. say what? trout. trout. all right. you don't think i need both? why does he have that axe? make summer go right with ford america's best selling brand.
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new laptop with 24/7 tech support. yep, thanks guys. i think he might need some support. yes start them off right. with the school supplies they need at low prices all summer long. save $200 on this dell laptop at office depot officemax. we are off to -- okay, out of the room. so john, really quickly, you sent me something from buzzfeed. all i got to say, it's about time. charles koch has done what i've wanted republican donors to do for a very long time. enough of this nonsense. this is an anti-free trade, anti-immigration, anti-nato, anti-american in many ways, policy, group of policies, that
aren't conservative. like, you know, like i said last week. they're not only anti-conservative, they're ill liberal policies. for libertarians like charles koch, enough's enough. they're actually running ads against republicans in pennsylvania. they're running ads for heidi hide heightcamp. they say they're more willing to strike out against trump's radical big spending policies. >> the koch brothers are at the center of a network of conservative money that's going to spend $4 million in the course of this midterms. they have been basically a partisan group for a long time. what charles koch said in these interviews around their big aspen-based yearly conclave this past weekend was "we made mistakes." >> right. >> it was a mistake for us to be purely partisan. we should be about our ideas and not about party because now our
party's been hijacked by this president who's not really conservative. we're now going to change the direction of our spending and we're going to spend money on people who uphold conservative and libertarian principles. and we're going to try to punish those republicans who have capitulated to the president, particularly on issues like trade, that are not conservative or in line with their philosophy. it's a big, if they follow through on it and make spending decisions consistent with this new line, it will have a big impact. >> for people like you and me who are -- have always been conservative/libertarians. you probably a little more libertarian, be a little more conservative. you sit there and go, wait a second, this is the biggest spending group of republicans since the last time republicans -- >> respective if their spending -- >> listen, biggest spending bills ever. tariffs. trump and republicans picking winners and losers.
and then they have a socialist bill to bail out farmers who are already being bailed out. some huge agricultural companies are already being bailed out. this is socialism. why should charles koch spend his money -- >> right, and go against everything that he always has stood against. you know who is upset though, joe, steve bannon says that yn they should just get in line and they need to get on board and the master political strategist of roy moore's -- >> yes, yeah. >> i think that probably means charles koch is doing something right. >> mike, why -- >> we're off delay -- >> i've always said -- >> careful, loopy. >> why is that only directed at me? >> i've spoken at groups before like club for growth and always told them if you give americans a chance to vote for a real democrat, a republican spending like a democrat, they'll vote for the real democrat every time.
and these are big government republicans. some of these policies are just downright socialist. >> no, you have to do what you do here day after day and keep calling them out on this. the thing for the farmers. even bernie sanders probably looked at that and said, wow, i don't know if i would go that far. >> trump enacts emergency policy to enact tariffs that hurt farmers and then he enacts an emergency policy to blow 12 building more dollars on the first emergency he enacted. that is socialism. you're picking winners and losers and you're picking them badly. >> joe, this is the gas lighting of the american people. he's like president gas light, okay. and this is the problem. you call him a day trader, okay. this is what happens when you govern from news cycle to news cycle. and you don't like the reaction
to the news cycle. so you overreact the other way. >> you know what this reminds me of, this is marie le pen who dumb conservatives in america said, oh, we love her. stupid republicans in america said, oh, we hope she wins. she's a socialist. she's a socialist who happens to be a racist at the same time. that's what they're getting here. they say, oh, well give us two supreme court justices and we will vote for a socialist who adopts vladimir putin -- >> go to loopy. >> you know who also likes her, steve bannon, a big fan of le pen. when you look at what we're talking about here, the spending decisions, is this the first sign of the donor class maybe being a force for positive change in the republican party? >> only if they scare him enough. because all he cares about is -- john, is his own political ambition. john, think about sorting through that tweet storm of
yesterday. but i always look for good news somewhere, okay. so when he was talking about angry dems yesterday, i think, okay, this is a new video game. forget about angry birds. we now go to angry dems. demonizing the other people. but guess what, what happens in 99 days? james carville said something to me the other day. you know who's going to change the narrative in this country, women are. >> i agree with that. fundamental realignment. women are fed up. >> it is -- >> right? >> you know, charles koch, other big republican donors, could literally change tomorrow not by scaring trump but by scaring republicans who have been kowtowing to a guy who has an anti-trade policy, socialist redistribution of income, plans to cover up his tariff policies. those congressmen, congress
Updates of the day's news.
directly intersects with the news of the day about there being potentially a second premeeting for the russia trump tower meeting. rick gates is one of the names that rudy guilliani slipped and revealed in the series of interviews yesterday. >> what is the significance of paul manafort dropping his case against robert mueller. he was trying to have this case dismissed in court, saying that robert mueller's jurisdiction did not extend to what he is actually charging paul manafort with? as i understand, he dropped those charges yesterday. >> it just seems he is increasingly finding himself to be more cornered and he doesn't have a lot of options to fight back at this point, and this is all getting back to that original goal of trying to squeeze manafort and get as. information as possible out of him as they move closer hopefully to doing an interview of the president himself. that is still very much on the table. >> also, heidi, why is it that paul manafort you think hasn't
literally, quote, consequences the likes of which few throughout history have ever suffered before. one week to the day of saying that he says he is now willing to meet with president rouhani, no conditions. i'm going to ask you the million dollar question, try to make sense of that for us. >> yeah, i don't know. >> thanks, cal perry, for joining us. moving on. >> see you guys later. part of it is trumpian, part is this showman, part of it we have seen before, part is that he loves the media, he loves the cameras, the flash of the cameras, he loves to sign things. the problem here is what was buried in what he said there, which is iran is in trouble. iran is in trouble. the real has lost -- its currency has lost half of its value since april. iran is facing these devastating sanctions that the u.s. is likely to reimpose in just over a week. so the question is, one, is donald trump doing the good cop/bad cop himself again? the second question then is did he catch pompeo off guard.
does the state department now advocate a policy of regime change in how do change? how does it make sense with what he said? none of it makes sense, i guess. >> the thing is iran has been in trouble before and they haven't come to the table. it worked with kim jong-un and the fire comments online and twitter. iran is a very different country. the leaders of iran are veritive than kim jong-un and north korea. >> right. so that's the headline here, two completely divinations. one is a rogue nation that has been sort of totally isolated from the world. it has a gdp of almost $13 billion -- that's north korea. iran has a gdp of almost $430 billion. this is a country that has recently sort of come into its own with the nuclear agreement. it will be interesting to see if they don't just try to go their own way with europe, but these are two very different countries, two very different situation goes. when you look again at the sanctions, we're talking about sanctioning iran's ability to
find u.s. dollars, to trade in gold, to find semi metals, to trade in coal. we are talking about a country normally would sort of make its living, make its economy on oil exports. they could fall as much as two-thirds by the end of the year because of u.s. sankss. so a very different situation and a country that's going to likely become quite desperate. >> i can only imagine what the israeli prime minister -- >> that's what i'm waiting for. >> -- his phone board must have blown up with people telling him what the president said. >> what does bolton think about this, right? this is a man that wanted to go to war with north korea and iran. i don't know. >> thanks, cal. >> we'll touch base with you in a little bit. stick around for us. there's new reporting north korea may be up to old tricks. the u.s. spy agency says there's new evidence including recent satellite photos showing that kim's regime is once again
constructing new missiles at the factories that produced the first icbms capable of reaching the continental united states. officials familiar with the intelligence tell "the washington post" the new evidence reportedly indicates work is under way on at least and possibly two liquid-fuelled icbms, according to an official able to describe the classified evidence. mike pompeo told a senate hearing last week that north korea continues to produce fis ill material used in making nuclear weapons. switching gears to the deadly fires in california where firefighters are continuing to work to try to control the carr fire in northern california, the fire which has charred more than 103,000 acres at and around the city of redding. it was reported last night to be 23% contained. however, the temperature in redding has reached 105 degrees yesterday in a heat wave that could threaten to make conditions on the ground worse for those firefighters. cal fire said the blaze has
destroyed more than 800 homes and more than 300 other structures. the carr fire has been blamed for the deaths of six people, including two firefighters, making it one of the worst in the state's history. still ahead, the fall-out over sexual misconduct allegations by les moonves and his fate as the company calls for new investigation. later, reporting that the trump administration is eyeing new tax cuts for the wealthy. what treasury secretary steve mnuchen has to say about that. those stories and a check on your weather when we come back. ♪ ♪
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nbc news correspondent morgan radford has more on this. >> reporter: cbs's board of directors taking no immediate action against ceo les moonves. the media company at a previously scheduled meeting now calling for an independent investigation, seeking outside counsel, following the bombshell "new yorker" report accusing moonves of sexual misconduct. the article details six women's account, four on the record, that include accusations ranging from forcible touching or kissing to physical intimidation between the 1980s and 2000s. moonves's wife long-time tv host julie chen reiterating her support for her husband on cbs's "the talk." >> i issued the one and only station i will make on this topic on twitter, and i will stand by that statement today, tomorrow, forever. >> reporter: moonves saying in part, i recognize that there were times decades ago when i may have made some women uncomfortable by making add advances.
those were mistakes and i regret them immensely and i have never misused my position to harm or hinder anyone's career. moonves's position now in question. >> it seems like they're afraid to name the ceo in any of the communications. >> why? >> because i think they want to leave lesley moonves to decide for himself whether he's going to step town. >> reporter: in a statement last friday cbs said, we to not believe however that the picture of our company created in "the new yorker" represents a larger organization that does its best to treat its tens of thousands of employees with dignity and respect. >> that was morgan radford reporting. the company announced it was investigating its corporate culture after long-time anchor charlie rose was fired. >> meanwhile, "the new yorker" report contains explosive allegations against the current executive producer of "60 minutes." several anonymous employees say he allowed harassment in the
news division, which he denies. let's get a check on the weather with bill karins. >> flood watches have been issued and the wet weather pattern is setting up. it doesn't look as bad as last week with flooding, but the heaviest rain day will be wednesday. here is the set up. we have the storm system with the dip in the jet stream over missouri and kansas. all of the winds from the south from florida north ward. that is increasing our flood risk. as of this morning there's not a lot of areas of heavy rain. cincinnati has been in it for a good portion of the overnight hours and southern portions of illinois, and some thorls rolling through central louisiana near alexandria. that's about it. hit and miss showers in other areas. timing out the mess going throughout the day, this is 10:00 a.m., still dealing with rain in areas of the southern ohio valley. as you would expect in stumper time, we get hit-and-miss dotted
showers. looks like areas north of raleigh could get into it. heavier rainfall areas, louisiana, central mississippi, scattered around d.c. and pittsburgh. from philadelphia north wards you remain dry today. that won't be the case on wednesday. the tropical connection feeds further to the north. wednesday afternoon, hit and miss showers and storms along the appalachians, near new york city possibly, even boston, and the heaviest rains will be south, especially near atlanta. it adds up to a four or five day period with two to four inches of rain. the greatest flood threat, north georgia, and that's where we could see upwards of five inches of rain. of course, the other issue is all of the fire problems out west. >> for sure. >> incredible heat. i will talk more about that next half hour. >> i'm sure they could use some of the rain happening on the east coast. >> it seems like it is always like this, feast or famine. >> yeah. still ahead, as baseball trade deadline approaches one of the
game's biggest stars could be on the move while the yanks and red sox continue to bolster their line-ups. all of the details next in sports. it naturally traps and removes the waste that weighs me down. so i feel... lighter. try metamucil and begin to feel what lighter feels like. and try new metamucil fiber thins, made with 100% natural psyllium fiber. a great-tasting and easy way to start your day.
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astros acquired suspended reliever roberto osuna from the blue james giving up ken giles and a top ten prospect in return. osuna is serving a sentence for a domestic conviction in may. lance lynne was acquired in exchange for tyler austin and pitcher rio. to the action on the field in minnesota where the indians' jose romero slugged a pair of solo homers in last night's game against the twins. the all star third baseman snapped an 0 for 16 slump with the first inning hit into right field. he repeats at the next at bat, and matching martinez for the league-leading 32nd home run of the season. as for the game, the twins beat the indians 5-4 in that one. some power there. to boston where a miscue in the
philadelphia outfield helps the red sox in last night's game in the fifth earning nunez an rbi triple after he lines one over the center fielder's head. the game would head into extras, tied at one. in the bottom of the 13th, red sox' backup catcher cranked a double into the team's bullpen, knocking in nunez for the winning run of the game. after the game the red sox announced they acquired second baseman ian kinsler to replace pedroia. >> hard to imagine harper being traded, but cal perry called it a few days ago. >> cal is an oracle out there in london. >> on twitter, to his credit. >> he can talk middle east affairs and sports. >> and baseball. let's not get ahead of ourselves, just sports. he said it would be a good thing for the nats to trade him, he was underperforming and had a bad attitude. >> should we go to cal now and talk about it?
>> go to cal. >> thanks for that, louis. president trump renews his threat to shut down the government over immigration, but not all senate republicans are on board. we will hear what some gop lawmakers have to say about it. plus barack obama and joe biden together again. we will have the details about their surprise reunion yesterday. stay with us. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens ♪ ♪ bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens ♪ ♪ brown paper packages tied up with strings ♪ ♪ these are a few of my favorite things ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ these are a few of my favorite things ♪ i've been making blades here at gillette for 20 years. there's a lot of innovation that goes into making america's #1 shave. precision machinery and high-quality materials from around the world.
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bergdorf. it is the bottom of the hour. let's start with the morning's top stories. one week after threatening the destruction of iran, president trump now says he is open to sitting down for a meeting. >> how about that? >> trump also says he has no precondition to meet, although secretary of state mike pompeo yesterday ran down a list of them during an interview on cnbc. >> not so fast. joining us once again from london, nbc news international correspondent -- >> and sports commentator. >> yeah. >> can we let the oracle thing breathe? just let it breathe. >> at least you get the baseball calls right. >> yeah, i appreciate it. >> listen, what are the chances of a trump/rouhani summit. >> wow, you're going there, calling it a summit at this point. >> let's see if cal can predict this. what's the over/under on this, cal? >> man. look, he would be the first president to ever do it, right? so i think that's part of his motivation here, is that he likes to be president-setting, he likes the flashes of the
cameras. here is what rouhani said since my last live shot. he says the american withdrawal from the nuclear deal was illegal. it is now in europe's court and he says the islaming republic has not sought tension in the region. code for iran's ability to move oil in and out of the strait of hor muz. the big fear among war amongers is they say if iranians shut down the strait, the american navy -- where specifically you have an aircraft carrier group basically stuck on a lake which is suddenly very scary. that's the question, right? when do you get to the tipping points with world leaders. >> so what i'm hearing really is that the u.s. needs to come back to jcpoa for them to entertain a meeting between the two leaders. >> so do you do it just to avoid the kind of crazy? like we know that donald trump, president trump, who is now sort of being accused by former rogue
nations of being rogue himself, you know that he loves the event. you know he loves the pageantry, he loves though cameras, saying the word summit. he loves going into rooms one-on-one with other world leaders without any advisers, just translators, because he is the man who gets the art of the deal. do you say, okay, we have at least two more years of this, possibly six? it is something we can't avoid, we have to sit down at that big oak table, we have to sign something, let him hold it up to the cameras and even if it means nothing we are buying ourselves time until the americans can have another election? that's one possible way for the iranians to do this. >> not sure though going in that direction. >> i think a lot of lawmakers and folks on the hill in general gave the president the benefit of the doubt on the north korea issue, they weren't critical of him when he went for the summit meeting. i think it would be different if he tried to push ahead with a one-on-one meeting with rouhani. >> just on the israeli front alone, right. >> exactly. >> that's right. >> it is a more complicated
issue there. cal perry, thank you. >> thanks, cal. the koch network of doanors said they would not back one of the republican biggest chances to pick up a senate seat this year. officials with the political network over seen by billionaire charles koch announced they will not support gop congressman kevin kramer against heidi heitkamp for north dakota's seat this november. the move comes as it says it could support those outside of the republican party. it deals a massive blow to kramer who is currently being out fund raised by heitkamp. kramer said he respected the koch decision to stay out of the north dakota senate race. staying in politics, president trump is renewing his threat to shut down the federal government over immigration and border funding.
he tweeted the threat sunday and repeated it yesterday while speaking in a conference along italy aprime minister. take a listen. >> if we don't get border security after many, many years of talk within the united states, i would have no problem doing a shutdown. it is time we had proper border security. we're the laughing stock of the world. we have the worst immigration laws anywhere in the world. i would be certainly willing to consider a shutdown if we don't get proper border security. >> okay. but a number of senate republicans, they are distancing themselves from the president's threat of a shutdown. for more on that i want to bring in nbc news national political reporter heidi press bizybyla. >> reporter: yes, sir. senator enthusiasm said they want to keep the government up
and functioning. senator hatch said, quote, he knows the game but we don't want to do that again. nobody wants that. here are how other members of the party responded. >> is the funding of the border wall going to wait until after the midterm elections? >> probably, and that's something we to have days agreement on. >> so you're not worried about a government shutdown before the midterms? >> no, that's not going to happen. >> i think it would be bad politics for the republican party to shut the government down. we would get blamed and it seems to me there's a way to get wall funding and deal with the population. i would prefer a deal that would be a win/win. >> none of us want to shut down the government. democrats or -- no one wins. i think the american people expect us to do our job. >> if the president wants to shut down the government, you know, that's his prerogative. i don't -- i think it would be a mistake and i don't think it is going to be necessary. >> reporter: so not a lot of takers on the shutdown. maybe they run the 2013 shutdown and how their approval ratings
plunged. >> yes, i was going to say, it is obviously they are the party in power. they control both the house and the senate. why would the president put his own political party in that predicament if he has the support to get wall funding. >> because he wants 25 billion. >> but j is why is he putting h party in that predicament? >> reporter: he loves the issue. let's go back to the hot-and-heated parties he had during the campaign, he got everybody to chant "build the wall." he thinks it is a core issue and we're going into an election year. he knows he's never going to get full funding but he can declare victory when he gets something. we have a billion in the senate, five billion in the house, they meet somewhere in the middle. the president again can say on this issue that he got some kind of a victory. >> but we are on the heels of an immigration debacle, 500-plus kids still separated from their parents who were deported from the country. we hear the president himself
saying we have the worst immigration laws in this country, in part due to what he put in place and the separation between the parents and the children. it is unbelievable to me that there would be this threat now two months ahead of -- possibly ahead of the midterm elections. >> shutdown's not popular. guess what? immigration may not be popular because of what is happening at the border. we may be seeing a paradigm shift here where this issue, which was jet fuel for the president's campaign and for some of the congressional candidates, is now turning around on them. what we're seeing in the polling numbers are, for instance, important demographics like suburban swing-voting moms are really upset about this issue. this only serves to, like you said, put this once again in front of them right before voting time at the election, just like meeting with putin wasn't a great idea, file this along in the category of not helpful. >> at one point we thought immigration would be a hot
button issue for midterm elections. we thought tax cuts would be a hot button. seems that's not a big topic for the midterm election. possibly the economy because we've seen growth there and the president wanting to tout his presidency for that. what else to we see as a hot button issue when it comes to mid terms that the gop will grab hold of? >> reporter: the gop were supposed to grab hold of the tax issue. that was supposed to be their saving grace. there was in absolute panic to try to get these tax cuts through, and now what are we seeing? for instance there's a special election coming up in ohio. some of the republican candidates are seizing back on the immigration issue. it is not good news for republicans given they spent so much energy into getting the tax cuts. but what we're seeing is what the companies did with these tax cuts is not what they promised the american people. >> yeah. >> reporter: they're investing them in stock buybacks, not in increasing worker wages, not in increasing necessarily new jobs. >> all right. it will be interesting to see how it plays out.
heidi przybyla, thank you very much. stick around for us. still ahead, president trump securing a critical vote from a fellow republican on his supreme court nominee. plus, politics greatest bromance. you know who it is, folks. they're back together again. details on the surprise visit by former president barack obama, former vice president joe biden to one d.c. bakery. plus, bill karins is back with another check on the forecast. stay with us. man: are unpredictable crohn's symptoms
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kavanaugh, jim van dye, let's not even put rand paul on this list. he toss it every time. i'm going to vote against this, i'm going to vote against that, and he always ends up lining up behind the president. he always ends up supporting donald trump blindly. he's going to vote for kavanaugh. it is a joke for him to even -- any reporter that thinks he's not seriously should look into another profession. he's going to vote for kavanaugh. >> and former president obama and former vice president biden reunited yesterday, surprising a washington, d.c. bakery when they stopped by for lunch. the pair took photos and shook hands with workers and other patrons at the dog tag bakery which trains and employees disabled veterans, military spouses and caregivers. it is an unbelievable organization. they spent about 45 minutes at the establishment, thanking them
for their work in the community. take a listen. >> cheese sandwich, grilled cheese. >> changing the world. >> we got a little yoga afterwards. so, you know, what you guys are doing, having already rendered service whether as an active member of the military or a spouse, family member, and then -- to then contribute again, to come back and do more for your communities, that's what makes us proud. >> yes, sir? so we so appreciate you guys. >> it was a pleasure. >> looked like a fun lunch there. let's get a check on the weather now with nbc meteorologist bill karins. bill, you're tracking some of the weather that is so critical to the fires burning in california. >> yeah, there's no rain in sight. it is the dry weather. wet weather doesn't start until maybe october. this is the carr fire, now at 25% containment. that's good. they went from about 10%
yesterday to 25%. still about 105 degrees yesterday. it will be similar to that today. it has now burned over 100,000 acres, just for some comparison the island of manhattan in new york city is about 14,000 acres. the state of rhode island is a little over 700,000. one-seventh of the state of rhode island is how big that fire is. the heat dome continues over the west. the only excessive heat will be interior sections of washington state, little slivers of oregon near pendleton. seattle and portland a little cooler today. here are some of the three bigger fires. there's 17 fires right now, large blazes that are unconfined. the carr fire is one of the biggest one. the ferguson fires, we've had problems with that one, the mendocino, and the temperatures will soar for the firefighters. 104 in redding today. as we go throughout this week, we get a little break in the northwest but it doesn't quite make it to california with the temperatures.
it goes from 102 and then it goes to 101 on thursday, 102 on friday in redding. there's really no end in sight to this, guys, for many areas of the west. we had a decent amount of wet weather over the winter, so everything started to grow, and now it has been so dry and so hot all of that is just -- you know, just like easy -- easy to burn. >> it just seems there's no relief in sight. how long could this thing go on, could the fires go on for in. >> typically the fire season is usually the worse going into the late summer, fall, so i want to say august. we don't start getting the humidity in tarnd whe air until october. november is the start of rainy season in the west. >> i believe the fire was only 23% contained according to cal fire officials there earlier. thanks, bill. still ahead, the potential price tag taxpayers may be on the hook for. >> plus, another round of tax cuts mulled for the country's
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billion to compensate the industries for the economic damage they may face. that figure included the $12 billion in emergency aid recently approved by the trump administration for farmers who produce certain goods like soybeans. any like soybeans. any potential impact to the soybean farmers could have major ramifications when it comes to the election. one-third of the nation's most contested house districts are home to major soybean farms, primarily in the midwest. while president trump had a strong performance in that region back in 2016, the area is bracing for a potential economic blow come harvest time due to the tariffs just before voters head to the polls in november. the trump administration is reportedly weighing a $100 billion tax cut that would largely go to help wealthy americans. according to the "new york
times," congress is considering bypassing the senate on that move. in an interview of g20 officials, steve mnuchin said his department was studying whether it could use regulatory americans to account for inflation in determining capital gains tax liabilities. capital gains taxes are overwhelmingly paid by high earners and were not touched in the $1.5 trillion tax law president trump signed last year. saying that independent analyses suggests more than 97% of the benefits of indexing capital gains for inflation would actually go to the top 10% in america. breaking a move by president trump, as a candidate said he would training the tax laws to force people who work at hedge funds to pay more in taxes's in an august interview president
trump said i may want to switch taxes around. i want to save the middle class and have hedge fund guys making a lot of money that aren't paying anything. trump reiterated that point in another interview just days later. >> the hedge fund guys didn't build this country. they shift paper around and get lucky. when the market collapses like it is now, they're losing a fortune. 45678 of energetic, very smart, but a lot of them, like they're paper pushers. they make a fortune. they pay no tax. it's ridiculous. okay? some of them are friends of mine and some i couldn't care less about. it's the wrong thing. the hedge fund guys are getting away with murder. coming up, axios's representative is coming up. and on "morning joe," president trump implementing spontaneous foreign policy. more on the president's off the cuffs comments or meeting with
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and talks about immigration and all the trump issues, instantly becomes the favorite. instantly wins. seeing this unfold in florida. congressman adam putnam, grooming himself to be governor. the president doesn't want him. blesses a conservative hard-liner, up by 12 points now. seeing it in almost every race. the economy is booming and republicans finally get the tax cut they want. but what are candidate talking about? about trump issues. talking about immigration. they're talking about all of the things that trump cares about. the wall. other things like that, instead of traditional republican issues which is, think about george w. bush. he was able to change the party in his image. he was changed by the party. donald trump is fundamentally changing the party top down. >> is it safe to say this is a new era trumpism? you had reagan onices but now
it's trumpism? >> he is fundamentally reordering the party. issues he cares about. took a party that stood for one thing, did some of that and now adding a new dimension he karca about, trade, russia, immigration. the part that could last. republicans say it will burn off. i don't think it will. hi think he really directed the party in a fundamentally different direction. >> we talked about how the gop can't necessarily run on immigration anymore, especially midterms, considering where we're at with immigration and what's happened in the last couple of months? >> you can at the primaries. think about issues that motivate republicans. immigration is at the top of the lists and gets people fired up. >> do they care about the separation policy? how do you spin that.
>> two parts. in a primary, care more about building a wall. general election, suburban district, trying to appeal to independent it become as complicating factor for the republican party and you isolate the party to the 40% to 45% of people enthusiastic about trump. another poll out that captures how powerful trump sway is over the party. asked -- a cbs poll. asked, if you're a true supporter of trump, who do you trust to get your information. 91% said trump. 60% said their family and 11% said the media. the fact they're looking to him at "the" divine source of fact and information. >> 91%? unbelievable. >> jim, great to have you in the flesh. >> good to be here. >> i want to bring my own music next time. >> a little intro for -- >> count bowne -- >> usually we have a dance. decided not to do it. stick around. "morning joe" in a few minutes.
and good day, everyone, i'm andrea mitchell in washington where president trump is reportedly pressuring his legal team to secure a sit-down with the special counsel. robert mueller has a new interview offer on the table for the president. what personal attorney rudy giuliani calls slight improvement by investigators in their offer. three sources briefed on the matter are telling "the new york times" that the mueller team wants to discuss possible coordination with trump associates and russians and whether president trump tried to obstruct adjustmenjustice. the special counsel is willing to accept some written answers from the president but wants the ability to ask followup questions of the president. peter alexander is at the white house. bob bauer is here with me. peter, what do we know so far about this possible interview offer? it appears from this that as of now mueller is not really
considering the possibility of pushing it all the way to a subpoena for an unwilling president, which could be months of litigation all the way to the supreme court. >> reporter: andrea, we're not hearing from the special counsel's side, obviously, most of the information coming from the president's legal team. rudy giuliani saying there was some slight movement, referring to a letter that the president's legal team received on tuesday. the reason that was notable is it was just the next morning, yesterday morning, that the president went off on the mueller investigation and called on jeff sessions in his most explicit, direct call to this point, effectively to shut down the mueller investigation. guiliani says, and you were talking about the idea there would be some written questions and some oral questions as part of this potential interview, according to our sources. giuliani says the focus, according to him, remains on collusion and obstruction, as he describes it, pre-presidency and post-presidency, andrea.
Interviews with political figures and news updates.
easier just because of the way he simply cannot control what he says. >> when we talk about mueller, according to the giuliani team, the president's team, somewhat narrowing their request to focus on the meetings with the russians, which is conspiracy to commit election fraud or whatever, to meddle, to hack, whatever you want to call it, and then also separately the obstruction, going back to comey and a lot of the other sort of nexus of comments, statements, pressure. most recently, this extraordinary tweet storm yesterday against both jeff sessions and mueller. what do you make of that, if those are the things that mueller is really zeroing in on? >> i think the negotiation is very much in mueller's interest. if this comes to a fight over a subpoena, mueller wants to present to the court his effort to accommodate the president any way he can. in the same way, trump saying i really want to do this but my
lawyers won't allow me, mueller wants to show that he's trying to avoid a confrontation. i don't think mueller will give in on the obstruction charge which the president's lawyers don't want included at all, either written or oral, although now they're saying them entertain a couple of questions, they probably won't agree to followup questions on that topic. >> is it your read that mueller knows at the end of the day, it may have been 8-0 in the nixon supreme court, but this is a different supreme court, a different era, and different facts of the case? >> i actually don't agree with that. i think mueller is prepared to battle that out. i think mueller would have a high confidence of winning. >> bob bauer, thank you so much for your expertise. peter alexander, before you go, a quick question about ivanka trump being asked by axios if she agrees with her father and her boss, because she is a white house staffer. the president of the united states repeatedly calling the
press the enemy of the people. let's watch. >> do you think the word, enemy of the people? >> sorry? >> is the enemy of the people? >> no, i do not. >> that's not a view that's shared by your family? >> are you looking for me to elaborate? >> sure. >> ivanka and the worthy mike allen, great question. she has carefully separated herself from some of her father's statements in the past. this one really noteworthy since the president has not backed off on that at all. >> andrea, i think you're right, it's noteworthy that she says that. i think the frustration of ivanka trump's critics here and outside this white house is that she doesn't wield more power inside this west wing to convince her father to sort of dial back some of that fierce rhetoric, notably there as it relates to the media, but
broadly on some of the other policies, more importantly, that he has been putting in place, including the family separation policy. she noted today that that was a low point of her time at the white house, and people who are upset with the way the white house has conducted things say there are still families separated, still children who are not with their parents, she should be fighting actively for family reunification. >> peter alexander, there's supposed to be a press briefing in an hour or so, we'll see how that goes. bob bauer, thank you so much. in the paul manafort trial, the defense won a small victory over their client's big ticket performance. rick gates is now expected to take the stand against him. joining me from outside the alexandria courthouse, ken dilanian and barbara mcquaid, a former u.s. attorney. barbara, from inside the courtroom, tell us what happened
has all it needs but he's not going to allow the government to, he used the phrase gild the lily, to show these photographs which he worried may be overly prejudicial to paul manafort. >> this could be very complicated for a jury, it's a long paper trail. does this materially weaken the case of the prosecution? >> it's hard to tell, andrea. just to be clear so our viewers understand, there are pictures of suit jackets that were admitted into evidence. but there are many more pictures that the judge has blocked, including pictures of manafort's entire closet filled with hundreds of suits and also pictures of lavish renovations at his home in the hamptons. we just heard testimony about nearly a million dollars he spent on landscaping including a flower bed in the shape of an "m." the prosecution would like to illustrate that but judge ellis
is arguing, manafort is not on trial for being rich or for spending lavishly. he thought this would unfairly besmirch manafort. it's absolutely true that while we in the audience may think the prosecution is being too meticulous and is hammering too much evidence home, the jury is not always paying attention. it's sometimes hard for juries to follow things. and what the prosecution does not want is the jury to fail to convict because they didn't understand the evidence, andrea. >> and as a former prosecutor, how important do you think is this decision that they're now signaling, barbara, that rick gates will in fact be on the witness stand, the former deputy chairman of the campaign? >> i think they did make it pretty clear, greg andres, the lead prosecutor said today they fully intend to call rick gates as a witness. today they said that they weren't sure whether they would or would not call him. today they made it pretty clear
it is their intent to do so. his value as a narrator, in many ways they could make their case without him, based on documents and transactions. but one defense theory that seems to have emerged is that it was rick gates who was the one manufacturing fake invoices in an effort to steal money from paul manafort. it may be necessary now to put rick gates on the stand to refute that theory and explain the government's theory of the case. >> barbara and ken, thank you both so much, a beautiful day out there in alexandria, virginia. thanks for being with us. coming up, slamming on the brakes. president trump moving to roll back president obama's auto emissions standards. this really matters, it's important. we'll have a report coming up in our inside scoop, right here on "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. come here, babe.
going to court to challenge that new health care plan, claiming it is unconstitutional. let's get the inside scoop on all of this from nbc chief environmental affairs correspondent anne thompson. heidi przybyla. >> in effect, the obama administration put these standards in place in order to increase fuel efficiency to reduce the impact of climate change. and so by stopping the increase in fuel efficiency standards at 2020 today, in effect the trump administration has set off an
environmental civil war in this country. california governor jerry brown says he will everything to fight what he called this stupidity on every level, because along with rolling back the fuel efficiency standards, the administration also wants to revoke california's waiver to regulate its own pollution standards, its own tailpipe standards. california has set the bar for the country for decades now on that issue. and 19 attorneys general and the attorney general of washington, d.c. have said they're going to file a lawsuit against the administration to stop the rollback of these standards, because they say the country needs to do more to protect the nation from the impact of climate change. >> just to put an exclamation point on this, we both remember when los angeles was always covered in smog. >> right. >> the change in the air quality in california over the last decade or so has been really
if i recall the data from when they first were proposing to undercut obamacare legislatively, 20 million people are affected by preexisting conditions. if you have a health care plan that is short term, doesn't cover preexisting conditions, and has a lot of other, you know, things that are eliminated from obamacare, you're really undercutting the whole premise of national health care. >> this is the latest iteration of what the president promised to do when he didn't get that vote through in congress which is to undercut the entire law. this is a number of bites that the president is taking at this to try and rip it apart. that's why you're seeing this separate lawsuit that i'm reporting on today by major cities, who say what you're doing here in effectively undercutting this law is leaving us holding the bag, because there's fewer insured people, more people who are uninsured visiting emergency rooms, we're having to pay for that, we can prove damages, and that you're
doing this intentionally, andrea. there's been a lot of dispute about this take care clause in the constitution that says the president must faithfully uphold the laws of the land. this is different, you've never before had a president who said this is the law of the land but i'm sabotaging it. he just said yesterday on rush limbaugh, "i think i'm almost done with tearing up obamacare." >> jeff, as we've been absorbed with the mueller probe, the presidential tweets, there's a lot happening at the regulatory level that we don't see as much of at evaluate pa, ryan zinke in interior. and only last week, i think, they first nominated a white house science adviser, the longest they've gone without having a science adviser in the white house. >> the one thing i was thinking today, looking at both these stories, it reflects again the impact of elections. we spend a lot of time talking
about the controversies, about the palace intrigue going on at the white house. but real policy things are happening as well, not just a rollback of obama-era issues but things that will affect this country for years and years to come. the environmental piece is interesting a interesting, that we were talking about earlier. yes, president trump and his administration have tried to be very industry-friendly. but one interesting aspect to changing these rules for car companies is it forces them as well to have to deal with different sets of standards in different parts of the country. that's not always easy for car companies or industry as well. environmentalists are also taking issue, not surprisingly, with the trump administration's suggestion that doing this will lead to fewer accidents and healthier people. >> that's a very strange claim as well. anne, you also cover the vatican, so brilliantly.
the pope spoke out against the death penalty today. i know it's been part of the vatican's position on this, a long time. is today's statement more definitive, if you will, about the death penalty? >> it is. in effect what pope francis did today was to change the teaching of the catholic church on the death penalty, to say that the death penalty is inadmissible because it's an attack on the dignity of the person. this builds on statements that were made by st. pope john paul ii and benedict xvi. pope francis has long been a foe of the death penalty. he's now made its inadmissibility a teaching of the catholic church. that's what's significant today. >> thank you all so much. coming up, call to action.
a democratic member of homeland security and house judiciary now pushing to protect the mueller probe, that's next. capital one and hotels.com are giving venture cardholders 10 miles on every dollar they spend at thousands of hotels. brrrr! i have the chills. because of all those miles? and because ice... is cold. what's in your wallet?
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it's not an order. it's the president's opinion. and it's ridiculous that all of the corruption and dishonesty that's gone on with the launching of the witch hunt, the president is not obstructing, he's fighting back. the president is restating his opinion. he's stating it clearly. there's a reason that the president is angry and frankly most of america is angry as well and there's no reason he shouldn't be able to voice that opinion. >> white house press secretary sarah huckabee sanders trying to explain the president's twitter tirade, threatening both his attorney general and the mueller probe. joining me now is democratic congresswoman sheila jackson lee who serves on the judiciary committee, also homeland security. thank you, congresswoman, thanks for being with us today. i know we're getting ready for another sarah sanders interaction with the press, as brief as it may be. i wanted to get your reaction first of all to the president's threats, basically. he really upped the ante yesterday against both jeff
sessions, who is recused and so cannot fire bob mueller, but also, most importantly, against the mueller investigation. do you think we're reaching some kind of really dangerous inflection point here? >> first of all, congratulations to a powerful woman with knowledge for 40 years. >> oh, thank you. >> thank you for your service very much. >> thank you very much. >> we're seeing a breach of the rule of law of historic proportions. anyone who is an historian, political scientist, average voter, knows as they watched the presidencies through the decades, last ten, 15 years, they've never seen a president of the united states, not their operatives or their staff or their press people, go so squarely against democracy and the rule of law, as evidenced by the shenanigans of this administration and particularly the president. as a senior member of judiciary and homeland security, i've
never seen it. many presidents were investigated, nixon had his midnight massacre, which looks like small potatoes now. clinton had his episode and people were attacked the special prosecutor at that time. but never directly by the president of the united states. george w. bush, president obama, everyone has had their share of reviews of their tactics and policies. in this instance, this president has gone directly and squarely against the rule of law. he is on the brink, he is on the precipice. he is clearly touching upon constitutional violations that no president should cross. >> i want to ask you about the fact that the republican leaders certainly in the house side on the various committees but now on the senate side as well, senator chuck grassley today about the mueller investigation, saying that he thinks that mueller ought to proceed and get it over with and that he in fact should have gotten it over with yesterday but if he can't get it over with yesterday, maybe friday, tomorrow, it can be over, because it's going on for
15 months. when you have the chairman of the senate judiciary committee coming out that strongly and telling mueller to hurry up and finish your investigation, what does that pressure tell you? >> well, let me say this. individual members certainly have their right to comment. i'm going to be as strong as i possibly can. the committee of senator grassley has passed out the special counsel protection act led by him, and democrats, a bipartisan legislation to protect the special counsel, director mueller. i would say that i hope that the majority leader, who has refused, put the bill on the floor. in the house we have over 150 members of congress who have signed on to protect director mueller so he cannot be removed while he is continuing his work, which has been stunning in its preciseness and its secrecy, unless it is a dereliction of duty and misconduct. so i go by your actions and not by your words.
the special counsel is a fixture of the democracy of this nation. he is legislately authorized, if you -- legitimately authorized, if you will. the deputy attorney general has not indicated any lack of confidence in the director's work. iran-contra went on for eight years. the special prosecutor in watergate went on for almost two years. and so the work that has to be done is work that has to be done fairly. and i would imagine at this point in time, none of the other special prosecutors had this number of indictments. we're now in a full trial of paul manafort. the first campaign manager of any president of the united states, presidential candidate, that is now on trial. i think special counsel mueller needs to continue his work. >> and finally, i want to ask you about the violence against women act. you and nancy pelosi, steny hoyer, other members of the house democratic leadership, have introduced a bill to extend it.
it's going to expire september 30th. it was first passed in 1994. now it's going to expire. the house is going off for the august recess. >> well, thank you very much. and you're absolutely right. and democrats who enconcernuragd invited republicans to join us, we're the get it done party. democrats work. what we decided to do is we couldn't allow on our watch for the violence against women act to expire without not only a reauthorization, andrea, but a freshen-up. we're excited about the fact that native american women, we have expanded their rights for protection. 84% of them suffer some kind of abuse. we're good because we have immigrant women protected. and we've done something that advocacy groups have begged us to do, and that is not to force victims through a bench warrant. i saw that tragedy happen in my own hometown of houston when
they put a victim in jail, not to force victims through bench warrant or court order to testify. it only results in horrible situations, and as well to strengthen law enforcement tools to help them find the perpetrator. there are victimization of women and men, of course, we expanded it to people across the nation. they can't wait. and republicans need to stop playing politics. we hope that they will join us. this happened in 2010. it took three years before we could finally get a bill. we hope when we get back, we'll move this legislation to protect not only women but children and the american people in this time. it is right for now, and it is a bill that has drawn bipartisan support of the decades-long relationship that the groups, the advocacy groups have had with members of congress to pass serious legislation. we hope it get done just like we hope director mueller continues his work without the intrusion of naysayers and fake news. >> thank you, again, thanks for
your advocacy. we appreciate your coming on today. thanks very much, congresswoman. coming up, the kremlin crackdown. republican and democratic senators wanting to push russia for continuing their election meddling, that's ahead. stay with us right here. rning, pins and needles of diabetic nerve pain, these feet... ...grew up the youngest of three kids... ...raised a good sport... ...and became a second-generation firefighter. but i couldn't bear my diabetic nerve pain any longer. so i talked to my doctor, and he prescribed lyrica. nerve damage from diabetes cause diabetic nerve pain. lyrica is fda approved to treat this pain from moderate to even severe diabetic nerve pain. lyrica may cause serious allergic reactions, suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worse depression, unusual changes in mood or behavior, swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling, or blurry vision. common side effects: dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs, and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery
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that the current measures have failed to deter russia from meddling in the upcoming 2018 elections. joining me is "washington post" columnist david ignatius, and john kelly, ceo and co-founder of graphica, a social media analysis company. thank you very much. the other john kelly, or you're the real john kelly. someone is the real john kelly. you were testifying yesterday and we were all watching as you were making clear that what we're seeing in the social media space is from russia, because there's been so much quickbblin and from the white house, from the first national security meeting last friday, less than an hour, that was devoted to this and the statement afterwards did not even acknowledge that russia was the main actor here. but dan coats has acknowledged that. >> yes. it's clearly russia. there's a lot of data from the internet research agency that's making its way into the public and a lot of folks are into it, including us, and it's pretty
incontrovertible. >> what are you seeing that shows this is fancy bear or whatever? >> fancy bear is a middle government part of the russian government. this is from a contract shop that was for years conditioning the russian public and most of their output was actually russian language output for the russian public. at some point they got the contract to boot up their american contacts. >> david ignatius, you've been following this in your work. as they contract out, spewing this propaganda, basically infecting our political dialogue to exacerbate preexisting tensions, to get on the side of black lives matter during 2016 or on the other side, and to get people to come to rallies and to bring helmets, to bring placards, making it much more
argumentive before the elections. >> if you look at the russian strategy as it was outlined in the mueller indictment that named the internet research agency, its personnel, and produced a lot of evidence of the specific facebook ads they placed, messages they were putting on social media, it's playing both sides of the polarized situation in america. you just can see transparently what the russian strategy is. they'll hit pro-kkk, right wing activity, support it. they'll support black lives matter activists. they just want to churn anger and division in the country. and there's every evidence, as your guest has said, that this effort by russia is continuing. >> and david, you were in aspen, among all of us listening to
homeland secretary kirstjen nielsen. she seemed to be going out of her way not to blame russia. >> she did seem to be going out of her way. that was in the immediate post-helsinki i want to say confusion, nobody quite knew which way things were going. your interview with director of national intelligence dan coats was a breath of fresh air in that. i've sensed, andrea, in the last week, an effort to kind of steady the ship, to reverse some of the positions the president seemed to have taken or at least discussed with vladimir putin in helsinki. i've noted a more assertive posture from secretary massive, more assertive posture from secretary pompeo in the state department. i think they're pushing back to try to get the policy within what we think of as normal, vigilant parameters.
>> john kelly, what needs to be done and would happen if the president doesn't show direct leadership? >> well, i'm a network analyst, and i work on the data side of these kinds of problems. so i think there are two key components to defending the country from this. the first is a technical component, which is how do you get access to the data and just run the math, the computation, the algorithms, to detect these things before they happen or when they just start to happen. and the second piece is more political, which means that if you can definitively attribute these actions to a foreign government, you have to have the normal kind of carrots and sticks of foreign policy environment to take up and deal with that. >> and the bottom line, is facebook in whatever they turned over to the senate committees before this hearing, are they being proactive enough? are these i.t. companies now finally stepping up? >> i think what facebook did the other day is actually essential,
the proactive transparency, when you discover something, go out there and tell the public. that is absolutely essential to people understanding that the problem is real and that the platforms are taking measures to deal with it. i would say they showed leadership in that. >> thank you so much. thanks for your expertise. and david ignatius, as always, thank you. coming up, warning signs. new testimony that top government officials warned the administration about the long term health effects of separating kids from their parents. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" right here on msnbc. tt geico... (harmonica interrupts) how they could save 15% or more by... (harmonica interrupts) ...by just calling or going online to geico.com. (harmonica interrupts) (sighs and chuckles) sorry, are you gonna... (harmonica interrupts) everytime. geico. 15 minutes could save you 15% or more on car insurance.
as well as unstructured. there's basketball courts. they're exercise classes. there's soccer fields that we put in there. >> but the ordeal has hardly been fun and games for hundreds of families that have yet to be reunited. as one senior hhs official revealed during the hearing, rerepeatedly warned the trump administration about the lasting effects of separating children from their parents before they initiated the policy. >> who thinks that family separation policy has been a success? raise your hand. did anyone -- any member of this panel say to anyone, maybe this isn't such a good idea? commander? >> during the deliberative process over the previous year, we raised a number of concerns in the program about any policy which would result in family separation. due to concerns we had about the best interest of the child. there's no question that separation of children from
parents entails significant potential for traumatic psychological injury to the child. >> joining me now is jean guerrero, author of "crux" a cross border memoir. thank you for being with us. all of your reporting, and we've had you on, following how closely you have followed this whole case. to hear from a health official that they argued against separation only validates suspicions that what the attorney general did in announcing this was to propose a deterrent policy. >> right. >> they just wanted to stop people from coming a cross and seeking refuge. >> even before the zero tolerance policy there was talk of separating families. former homeland security secretary said they were going to consider separating families as a deterrence strategy. this was initially envisioned as a strategy to scare families from coming to the united states in the first place. >> as we've seen, it evolved now
and you've been following a critical hearing in san diego where the judge is saying you've ignored the families in all of this. you're talking about everyone else but the families. and is demanding some action on reuniting families including those who have been sent back voluntarily, quote/unquote, signing their rights to their kids and to a sigh lum without even knowing the language they were reading. >> exactly. there are more than 400 parents who were removed from the united states their children, many of them assigned to these forms that they didn't understand and was prechecked, that i agree to be deported without my child. the difficulty is finding -- finding these parents that were deported without their children so they could be reunited because there are still hundreds of families that have not yet been reunited. and the judge in san diego has ordered the government to submit a plan today to explain how it plans to reunify these families,
and the challenge is first of all going to be locating them. pause most of them didn't go back to their hometowns. th they left their hometowns because they feared for their lives. some are on the way back to the united states because they want to recover their children so this could be anywhere in mexico. >> while we've been here, ivanka trump was being interviewed. a number of things. we've showed one of her responses earlier. this is what she had to say when asked about the separation policy. >> that was a low point for me as well. i feel very strongly about that. and i am very vehemently against family separation. and the separating of parents and children. >> it's very interesting that she would say that because the next follow-up question would be, what have you done to argue against it inside the white house.
>> right. exactly. then also what is being done now that these famililess being reunited. there's this idea that, okay, we did our job, that the trump administration, you know, met the goal of reuniting families. but in reality, there are still hundreds of people who haven't been reunited. and also once these families are reunited, they underwent such significance traumas. these children -- the children of families that i'm speaking with, you know, they're having fight mares. they're crying all the time. they're fraid that they're going to be separated from their parented again. not to mention the trauma inflicted on the parents. so these are lasting psychological injuries to these families that the government has acknowledged. the health and human services officer said he told the trump administration this was going to happen, and that they, you know, they did it anyway. and nothing -- nothing so far is being done to address the psychological impact that has been had on these families, you know, mental health services
being provided. that's something that the american civil liberties union is proposing in san diego but we don't have any kind of statement from the government that they plan on doing this. >> i know you're following this for pbs, for kpbs and i hope you'll contribute to our reporting. sarah huckabee sanders scheduled to hold a white house press briefing. we'll bring that to you live. stay with us. i found my tresiba® reason. now i'm doing more to lower my a1c. i take tresiba® once a day. tresiba® controls blood sugar for 24 hours for powerful a1c reduction. (woman) we'd been counting down to his retirement. it was our tresiba® reason. he needs insulin to control his high blood sugar and, at his age, he's at greater risk for low blood sugar. tresiba® releases slow and steady and works all day and night like the body's insulin.
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a voluntary interview suggests there's more to the interview. when you want that you want it written down so you can use it in the future maybe for perjury. >> in terms of that, if you are roger stone and you're watching how this is playing out, you and your attorneys as you're huddling, what's the thinking there. >> well trks ha, it's hard to k. he's under scrutiny. if you were going to make a list three years ago of the trump associates who were most likely to be in trouble, it would be paul manafort, roger stone beneath him. so i think that the major jeopardy we're seeing in this case, you have one shady lobbying case. paul manafort. russians indicted who will never see the inside of a u.s. courtroom and then you have perjury. you have people not telling the truth. so any lawyer working for any of these people under scrutiny has to be emphasize, do not think you are more clever than these professionals who will nail you to the wall if you make the slightest fib. >> roger stone released this statement about kristen davis,
quote, she knows nothing about russian collusion. wikileaks collaboration or any other impropriety related to 2016 elections which, thought was the subject of this probe. rich just laid out what we know so far. we've got manafort on trial. russians who have been indicted. questions of personal jury. how is this coming together? there are people who look at this and go wait a minute, everything that's going on, that's not collusion. >> hold on. never say that. mueller is methodical. the man doesn't make a move without a reason. so it's the methodical mueller meeting the manhattan madam. i worked with him for four and a half years. does not do fishing expeditions. i can think of two reasons. one is people and the second is money. if roger stone is in the middle of this investigation, one of the basic sort of questions or lines of questions you would have for her is what do you know about him, but what else do you know about people he introduced you to, people he talked about.
you know and if there is a relationship, either out of intimacy or friendship, there's still the idea of pillow talk. so what has he said to you, a trusted person that nobody else knows? i want that and i want it in front of my grand jury. >> there was a lot of focus on a potential interview, once again, talk iing about potential interview for for some time. so this report ng "the new york times" this week that the president realwanting the sit d because he believes he can convince. this is really a witch hunt. on the one hand, it's not surprising as we know that the president may want, may very well have said that. that he thinks he's the guy. >> at some point. but they'd also based the question, is that what's going on or is it being filtered out again by the legal team to see how it plays in the court of public opinion. >> that's that's what i think. i believe that donald trump is occasionally delusional enough to think i can convince robert mueller. but he has a broad team who have
to be sit doung with him saying no, you really can't do this. you cannot make things better for yourself. i felt like it was a pr strategy to say yeah, the president was always said so. he's got nothing to hide. he wants to. he won't. >> phil? you think he will? >> i think that's dead on. let me give you a simple explanation. people keep saying there's a lie between the legal team and president. that may be true. the president's pretending to play along. to be on a different side than his legal team and behind closed doors he's saying i'm going make it look like mueller made the conditions so difficult that i couldn't speak. i think this is a game and i think the game is to get the president off the hook because if he walks in that room, let me tell you who's going to win. not the president. drirector mueller is going to wn that game, i guarantee you. >> laura quickly, just weigh in. >> on the one hand, you could see why you'd prefer if you're the president of the united states to testify voluntary will and not wait until mueller's team gives you a subpoena. you get to have the lawyers
present when you're there. you get to have them sittinging next to you nudging you saying you didn't say that. remember, we talked about this in a different area. but i think it's will the of smoke and mirrors so ai'm willing, but they don't want to hear from me. not a farfetched conclusion given you heard him how he hid behind the curtains because he was -- >> i had forgotten about that. >> the other former fbi director would maybe suck come to his intamation. but maybe he's em boldened why what he's heard. >> so many maybes. to be a fly on the wall. the next time we're all back, stay was. after all the nation security chiefs warn that our democracy is in the cross hairs, president trump makes big joke of confronting putin. will the white house and the president be on the same page when it comes to rug but new information on a cnn exclusive. slashing security at the
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new jersey where the president is on a working vacation. >> it's become part of president trump's all too familiar sound track. zbli. >> i call it the russian hoax. they made up the whole russia hoax. >> but those same words in a pennsylvania rally last night. >> now we're being hindered by the russian hoax. it's a hoax. okay? >> striking a new and discordant tone coming hours after his team stepped forward to cull out russia for its role in attacking russia in its elections. >> russia attempted to interfere with the last election and continues to engage in maligned influence operations to this day. >> to the head of national intelligence. >> we can't continue to see a pervasive messages campaign by russia. to try to weaken and divide the united states. >> to the secretary of homeland security. >> free and fair elections are the corner stone of our
democracy and it has become clear they are the target of our adversaries. >> all saying what the president has refused to say in public. >> this is a threat, we need to take extremely seriously. to tackle and respond to with fierce determination. and focus. >> the president dwelling on his warm relationship with putin. >> in helsinki, i had a great meeting with putin. we discussed everything. i had a great meeting. we got along really well. by the way, that's a good thing. not a bad thing. >> three weeks after trump and putin's summit, a meeting that elevated the russian president on the world stage, a central question remains. what did the two men talk about during their two-hour private meeting? when asked in the white house briefing room, dan coates said he still didn't know to what degree election meddling was
discu discussed. >> not in a position to either understand fully or talk about what happened in helsinki. i'll turn it over to the national security director to address that question. >> the issue was discussed and in fact, president putin said the first issue president trump raised was election meddling. >> so as we end this week here, we do still have so many questions about that helsinki summit, but there has been a major change at least from the xwovt. there was the unified show of force about election meddling, but it was missing one critical voice. the president's voice who of course has the loudest megaphone of all. he will be here on a working vacation. he'll be going to ohio for a brief campaign tomorrow. erica, we'll see if he mentions it there. >> we will be watching thank you. >> we heard today from a russian foreign ministry spokesperson who said this two-year hysteria around the alleged russian interference which did not
happen not only undermines bilateral relations, but mocks the whole political system of the u.s. representing democracy there is the house of cards. so obviously, not surprising that would come from russia. it played right into though what we're hearing of the president sa playing right into the hands there and against his own officials. it's not the first time, but it is become iing more ab more obvs and getting louder. is it becoming more damaging? >> well, you had the split effect because on the survey stan substance, they're doing everything they should. he thinks for political purposes, it's important to be an 110% against the mueller investigation and say the whole thing is a hoax as possible for his political purposes to discredit that investigation. and the split goes deeper because he has this fixation about getting along with putin. tat the same time, his policy,
whether it's given lethal arms toukrainians, embrace iing the energy revolution here at home which is not good for the russians depending on high energy costs or opposing very vociferously the pipe liline, t single most important russian initiative in europe. president trump has consistently blasted the germans for embracing that project. this weird disconnect and it's not going away. >> is it em boldening the russians? is there a sense from people you're speaking with and this is giving them a little bit more power? >> yes. obviously. and you know, rich is right about all those policy points. but i guess i would quarrel as to whether we know that the government is doing all that it can it can do to prevent future russian meddling. and when the president goes up again and again, he's in his bizarre world with his
supporters and he rebukes or contradicts his top people. this is the kind of gaslighting and it's creating, continuing to fracture america. so you have this minority of, the trump supporters, who believe in a totally alternative universe. we've got the russians didn't meddle. nothing went on in the russia hoax. dangerous for the president to play it up that way. >> when we look at this, we don't know what's really happening. phil, number one, can this administration effectively combat this threat when it doesn't have the full public support of this president and number two, on the heels of that, can the american people trust that this system will in fact be secure? >> can i challenge this for a moment? we do know what's not happening. if not a question, number one, is there a white house spokesman for the american people in advance of the midterm elections who says to everybody voter in america when you're on facebook, this is what to look out for. the cia director doesn't do
that. the president should, he's not. number two, who's leading the congress to have a conversation about how do we tell the russians this is going to hurt. wee going to sanction you further. we're not doing that. number three. who's leading the europeans to say we're not the only country being attacked. can we talk the italians, the germa germans, the french and british about how we isolate putin? the president shows up for the g-7 and says why don't we make it the dwrks-8. we know what's happening here and it's the white house that says we don't want to bring it to putin. it's not very kocomplicated. put in quotes there. rich, tat end of the day, this all comes back to the president not wanting to acknowledge this. the president's own concerns that if in some way, he acknowledges it, his win is illegitimate? >> yeah, so look, i think he should just frankly acknowledge it. no reason he shouldn't. he should have been denouncing it during the campaign.
but let's be honest. the opposition has dug into the idea that russian somehow illegitimately gave him the presidency and is looking for the mueller investigation to leverage him out of the office. he knows that. he's resisted. he never wants to make a concession against interest and doesn't want to give any ground to that whatsoever and it's how he politics, i don't like it, it's the way he's done everything for 40 years and he was elected president of the united states. being this kind of guy. >> if he had nothing to fear from the mueller investigation, if there was no collusion there. you know there was interference, but if there was no collusion, i don't know why he's so hostile to mueller. if there's an investigation, they can get to the bottom of it. sometimes people, innocent people welcome that. >> a year long obsession in the press and every time he turns on the tv or lifts a newspaper, he sees this story. and there's been few president who is just accept the special counsel investigation and say,
oh, this is just fine. bill clinton didn't do it. >> we're going to have to leave it there. but it is important to point out, too, thises a president who brings it up at every opportunity. so he doesn't want it to be t k talkeded about, perhaps he should. maybe not bring it up every time. we are going to have to leave it there for now. there is new information coming out in court about what paul manafort might have been doing with his property in trump tower. so you have, your headphones, chair, new laptop with 24/7 tech support. yep, thanks guys. i think he might need some support. yes start them off right. with the school supplies they need at low prices all summer long. save $200 on this dell laptop at office depot officemax.
prosecutors in the trial of paul manafort making their case. the 69-year-old is a tax cheat who engineered an elaborate scheme the hide millions in income. the government's star witness, manafort's long time business partner, rick gates, could take the stand any moment. evan perez is in the courtroom for us today. we heard from manafort's accountants today. what more did they reveal b about his financials? >> two accountants that testified today both said that they did not know about these foreign bank accounts that paul manafort had in cyprus and other countries. they said they knew that they were these foreign entities, but they thought they were clients and that's where the money was flow iing in from. not that these were bank accounts the government says
paul manafort controlled. we also heard from the first witness, the first witness that's been given immunity in this case. cindy is one of the two that was testifying today and she was testifying about how her company and people who work with her fudged loan numbers essentially faked loan numbers in particular, one $900,000 loan in the tax year for 2015. and she says quote, i very much regret it. this was done she says at the request of rick gates who was working alongside paul manafort. and really, the reason why she said she did it in order to help paul manafort reduce his taxes in 2015 was because paul manafort was a very important customer. >> very important customer. meantime of course, the anticipation is building as e wait for rick gates to take the stand. questions about what he might say. of course how d testifies may grill him. what are we expeg p ekting?
>> right, absolutely. it is all of this is building towards rick gates. now cindy and we're going to hear from a couple more people who work nd the firm who were going to testify that they were part of this conspiracy and that's where rick gates comes in. we may hear from him at any point perhaps monday. but here's what we expect him to say. we expect him to say he was part of this conspiracy with paul manafort to deceive the irs, to hide these bank accounts he had overseas. and we very much of course expect that a paul manafort's attorneys are going to point out to the jury that rick gates has pleaded guilty. he pleaded guilty to lying to the government as part of this investigation. of course now rick gates is now testifying for the government so he's changed his tune. we expect that's going to be a very fiery day on the stand for rick gates. >> thank you. breaking news. a a judge blasting the federal government for trying to get the
aclu to reunite hundreds of children, children that the government separated from their parents. overall #1 rated, weathers it all. find our most advanced formula exclusively at the home depot. ♪ it is such a good time to dance ♪ ♪ it is such a good time to [ laughing ] ♪ scoobidoo doobidoo ♪ scoobidoo doobidoo [ goose honking ] ♪ [ laughing ] a bad day on the road still beats a good one off it. ♪ progressive helps keep you out there.
proof in a criminal court of law. we don't try to correct what you've done wrong through policy implementation. what they're basing it on here is not quite in the constitution, the idea of familial integrity, being able to have your family associations together. and that is the argument of the aclu and those who are supporting the reunification of migrant children who are separated from their families. the idea here is about due process. when you're talking about separating families and children from their parents it's about you cannot deprive them of life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, or even familial association. we wouldn't do it in an abuse case of an american citizen child. you'd have to have a termination of parental rights. it's a very lengthy process. you're denying due process and denying equal protection of the laws you would otherwise extend to a citizen of this country. and the constitution of the united states does not refer to citizenship at all really. if you're in the united states you get the protections. there is a strong argument that they must reunify legally.
>> what's remarkable too, and really on a couple of levels, sticking with the legal argument here is the fact that they're trying to pass off -- the government is trying to pass off its own mess that it created. there is no denying that on the aclu and say here, you clean up the mess that i made. also the aclu is saying listen, you should come up with a plan to put together a steering committee. that the right way to move it forward, even legally, laura? >> collectively, if you can have a solution to an urgent need, the courts want to facilitate that but if it's a game of hot potato, that child cannot become that hot potato. if there is a way to facilitate reunification, but the problem here they're talk about as you're saying is the legal hurdle of giving over private information because they do have privacy interests about giving the names of children, the names of family members, et cetera. but this seems to me like a very on a cost benefit analysis, you go for reunification.
>> they don't care about anything. they don't care about anything having to do with the rights of these parents orrer these children expect they're going to protect their privacy rights which is so outrageous. and aside the legality issue, the aclu says all of these groups at the border are working their tails off, sometimes with volunteer money to do these reunifications. it's not that they're not trying. they really do want to be part of a solution if laura says. that's the best way to do it. but they need information. they need funding. they're literally doing it. volunteer lawyers are going to the border to try to accomplish these reunifications. it's so heartbreaking and so despicable. >> i don't think the government is literally washing its hands and saying aclu, you do it. they're saying aclu, please help us. and one of the reasons the separation policy is such a fiasco is once you separated the parents and the children, the children are an entirely different legal and bureaucratic track because they're technically then unaccompanied. and you literally cannot under the law separate them one day
and the next day reunite them. you need to do like a 50-day waiting period to do fbi checks. so it's an insane system. everyone should be trying their hardest to put these families back together. and congress to actually have a national policy at the border should change the law under various rules that prevent us just from holding families together, adjudicating whatever legitimate asylum claims there are and deporting them together the claims don't pan out. >> it didn't have to happen in the first place. >> right. >> it's a plan that was not well thought out there. was no planning, period. there were people who didn't have any information. we didn't know who they were. this is all a big issue. and now we have -- so 572 children, because as we're talking about this becoming a hot potato, we're talking about 572 children and their families. they are still in custody. 410 of those children have parents who are outside of the
united states. what's remarkable is dhs secretary kirstjen nielsen has said repeatedly no parents were being deported without the option to take their children with them. >> this is not true. >> are we supposed to believe all 410 of these children, the adult, the parent that was with them all elected to say yes. some likely did. >> remember, these parents in the central american countries send their children unaccompanied in many case. i know. but if you give some of them a choice you're going to be deboard your kid or your kid can stay in the united states, some of them will stay, let the kids stay. >> no, we have so many -- we have so many examples of lawyers saying my client was told the way to get your kid back is to waive all your rights and say yes, i'll be deported, and then they don't get their child back. this is documents. dozen. i shouldn't say hundreds. dozens of these cases are documented by the attorneys for these families. these families, these parents
were lied. to and then their children are being abused. not all of them, but some of them are being abused in our custody. and they're throwing it back on the aclu like it's the aclu? it's just unconscionable. >> why wouldn't the aclu want to help? i they are helping. >> it's not the aclu saying we don't want the help. they've been there. we've all talked about it, covered it, whose all there trying to help out. it's the fact of the government coming forward by the way, which we heard for some time, we created this problem trying to pass it off. first it was congress needs to do something. there are things that can be done. >> not trying to reunite them. the state department is in touch with these embassies. it is trying to track down these people. >> right. >> but these are clients of the aclu. the aclu wants to reunite them, as we all do, so help out? what's wrong with that? >> they do want the help. i think the issue they're facing is the idea of if you create a situation where you make -- someone has to go through herculean efforts to get the job done, and then you refuse to extend information that would
accomplish that measure, how possibly could they help. i think the real issue is the court, as they set a deadline for reunification, they don't thumb their nose but you have in your power to reunify. therefore you cannot simply pass off the buck to somebody else without giving all the information there but i don't think it's a matter of complete and total indifference on behalf of the government in some capacity and the aclu not wanting to help. for the court, they're looking at it and saying we have a problem. i'd like to facilitate a solution. everyone has to play their part. and the government, you the greater onus because you created the problem. so hand over information. and i as a mother, i don't think b i don't believe there are 500 sets of parents or parents who say you know what? go ahead and take my child. >> do you believe that parents will send their children through a desert for five days unaccompanied to get to the united states? do you believe that happens or not? it does happen. >> you also know what happens?
in america we have an asylum process that was not adhered to for many people. >> but the point is these families are so desperate to get their kids, they'll sometimes send them without even coming themselves. they'll separate themselves from their kids. >> the only way they feel they can get their child to a safer future. >> usually they pay a lot of money there. >> is a lot going on here. this is tar from the last time we were talk about it. however, we're wrapping it up for this afternoon. they are the silent majority on many of your flights, the silent security, rather. could federal air marshall, however, soon be boarding fewer planes? and what does that mean for you the next time you fly? the surprising plan that could save some money. it's a cnn exclusive you'll see first on the lead. (man) managing my type 2 diabetes wasn't my top priority.
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back now with breaking news and a cnn exclusive. the tsa is discussing cuts to save money. documents reveal one option being explored, cutting the number of federal air marshals. it's part of the same story we first reported here on "the lead" that the tsa is also looking at eliminating security at small airports across the country. an idea widely panned by security experts, but again, an option being floated to save money. rene marsh joins me now. these cuts could save the agency some $300 million in the next few years? >> that's according to the document that is the goal. but tonight it raises the question, has the risk to aviation decreased or is this all indicative of an agency feeling the pressure to cut costs. a new internal tsa document cnn exclusively obtained shows the
proposal to eliminate screening at more than 150 small to medium-sized airports is just one of several cost-saving measures the agency is discussing. a senior tsa employee tells cnn the agency is looking at cuts that could save more than $300 million in 2020. one cut, reducing the number of air marshals, eliminating screening at small airports, staffing cuts at tsa headquarters, and changes to benefits are also being discussed. tsa did not comment. juliette kayyem, a former official with department of homeland security under obama is concerned. >> ending security at certain airports and ending or flat lining the air malls service are actually inconsistent, because if you're going to decrease security at certain airports, what you would want to do is increase the presence of air marshals or other security features just in case. >> cnn revealed the most controversial cut, eliminating
screening at small airports like this one in redding, california, where bryant garrett is the manager. >> since i as the airport don't want the take on that, either the liability nor the cost, and i'm quite certain the airlines don't want the take that on scott. if tsa backs out, there is a void and i don't know who would fill it. >> ladies and gentlemen we are the police. remain calm. >> air marshals are the last line of defense, armed agents aboard planes the prevent hijacks. critics have questioned its effectiveness, buzz the tsa a has defended the program as a deterrent. >> yeah, just as recently as made the tsa defended the air marshals program. it really raises the question why the agency is discussing cuts, potential cuts to that flume. we reached out to tsa multiple times, but they did not respond to a request for comment. >> sate lot to take in. phil mudd, do any of these scenarios make sense?
>> there is one broad scenario. let me break some news for you, this country, that is the united states, and a citizen here, overspends on security. if you look at our spending on the conventional military and intelligence side, we far outstrip people around the world in terms of spending. so tsa is doing what other countries routinely have to do around the world that is risk management. i'm not sure this is just about a proposal, and i'm not sure that we cnn really are the recipients of this message. i suspect somebody is leaking this as a message to congress to say if you keep cutting our budget, this is the kind of stuff you're going to get so you better give us this money. >> in that vein, renee, these are discussions being had. have you gotten a sense of how serious any of these measures are? >> no, because we just have not been able to get anything back from tsa, despite us reaching out. we do know that the ta's administrator was certainly briefed on this according to our source just last month.
so we know the discussions are happening. what will the end result look like? it's really unclear. but the issue is, you know, people will say, agency to agency, there are always having these conversations about how can we be more efficient? where can we trim? where is possible to be trimmed. the issue that some i'm have here is a lot of the tickets you and i buy, when we buy an airplane ticket, you will pay a tax. and a lot of that money is supposed to go to security that tsa provides. the question that a lot of these small airports have if i'm spending, i'm paying a tax every time i buy an airplane ticket, why is it that i perhaps may see the presence of tsa disappear at my airport. these are system of the questions that are being raised, sure, certainly, cutting and trimming at agencies is something that is a routine. but i think that many people who live in those smaller area, especially with the screening, you know that you buy a ticket,
you're paying a tax or tsa security. and you don't see the tsa security at your airport, you're kind of scratching your head. >> there is the obvious point too of does this make those vulnerable airports targets. phil, are there some cuts that could potentially be made? give us the 30,000 foot view. what do you see today that perhaps could be changed so people don't have to give up security at airports or on board a flight. >> let me give you the ten-second ants. americans have to undergo security a little more difficult for them. that is bring the purse size back on a plane. everything else goes out in the belly. americans wouldn't like it. that's an easy solution. >> all right. there is one. you got a second one? because you got another 15 seconds. >> the second one would be looking at i think some of the smaller airports and i would agree, looking at tiny airports do we need the kind of security we need today? i think that's okay. >> do you think we don't need that kind of security at smaller
Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski interview newsmakers, politicians and pundits about the issues of the day.
Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski interview newsmakers, politicians and pundits about the issues of the day.
disapprove. the numbers are shifting for the president? >> talked about it for a long time. a bit of narrow casting. but this is about as narrow casting as it gets. willie, all i can say for donald trump and republicans who are hoping, like a special election in ohio tonight, the republicans hoping that he's somehow going to get them over the finish line, even in strongly republican districts lie this ohio 12. they better hope that their small slice of the electorate comes out, because, i mean, donald trump is sacrificing just about every other group in america for this one group of white, non-college educated voters that, again, just -- there just aren't enough to get him over the top or to get his candidates over the top in a lot of elections. >> that gallup number is where
no doubt about that, but they're victims of a con. they node a leeed a leader, a p who will do something about their lives, to improve their lives. that's the tragedy. >> you know, gene, victims of a kind, a what i've never really understood for somebody in economic trouble. somebody struggling to get their kids through school. somebody who's struggling to keep a job, somebody who's struggling to get, you know, good, decent fair wages and the ability to take your kids to a doctor that's not an emergency room visit at 11:00 at night. not quite so -- i just don't understand why some of these people out in the crowds, they're conned by a guy who talks about himself all the time. lies about himself all the time, inflates what he's done all the time, and then, of course, on top of that, he has convinced a
lot of these people that their biggest problem -- their biggest problem -- is the media. >> yeah. right. yeah. we're the enemy of the people. >> that's their biggest -- if that's their biggest problem, that's -- that's -- that's interesting. >> yeah. and, look, he sunshi-- as mike . it's a con. it's been an effective con. the other thing he does, before these audiences, is make ridiculous promises that are just -- that will never be kept. you know, he's bringing back the steel industry. they're opening eight new clients -- that's simply not true. it's not happening. yet he says it, and people applaud, and this and that, and he's very skillful at making these, drawing these cultural and racial lines. and essentially putting people in a position of being with him
or with ms13 basically. it's a demagogue's toolkit that he uses and he uses it effectively. >> and elise jordan, to an extent he chips away at his own credibility when he has policies like the separation policy. he talks about the wall. he talks about immigration and the most, in the most, quite frankly, degrading way to people, but some of that is appreciated by the base for whatever reasons. having said that, isn't it fair to say the policy of taking children away from their families has definitely hurt the president? nobody likes that. i can't imagine that would poll well. >> well, and mika, especially women that i've spoken with who are trump supporters don't support of child separation policy, even if they support donald trump. john kasich himself pointed out
suburban women will be really key in this 12th district and in picking who the next congressman is going to be. so i really am curious what suburban -- the suburban women of columbus, ohio, are going to decide to do today, in light of donald trump focusing more on any distraction that he can throw at the wall to try to turn people away from the real issues that are affecting men and women in this country. namely, the families and children separated by his inhumane policy, but also health care, and looking at what has donald trump done to actually improve health care for men and women of the 12th district. >> jake sherman, interesting when lamb won his shock, surprise election several months ago, we were talking about the suburbs of pittsburgh. now we're talking an another midwestern town. the suburbs of columbus, ohio, and if you look at one area
where republicans have been hurt the most. where donald trump's lost the most support, the reason why he's sitting at 39, 40, 41% depending whether you believe gallup or -- isn't it, when it comes to suburban voters, used to be the absolute bedrock of any republican presidential campaign? >> yeah. it's a huge problem and the majority will be won and lost in the suburbs. no question about that. i think the important thing to point out here, and what we need to wrap our head around is if this district is competitive, and our plus seven district, the district john kasich and pat tiberi, the last two that won by a dozen points or ten points every single time, if this is competitive, then there are 80 seats in america that are competitive just like this. 80 republican seats in that kind
of range that could be on the table come november. so democrats are seeing extremely rapidly their political map expand to a point where they could -- we don't know. just talking based on available information -- we could see a massive amount of seats flip, if a district like this is competitive. there are suburbs obviously all over the country that are less republican than this that could go. so we're seeing -- it almost doesn't even matter who wins tonight, because it's competitive, and that shows a really huge change in the political fortunes of the democratic and republican party. >> yeah. and, jake, it just shouldn't -- sorry about that, willie. jake, it just shouldn't be competitive. right? i mean, this is a race that republicans expected to easily lock up all along, and any reports of republicans doing
better in congressional ballot tests that we were hearing several weeks back, it seems so much of that has changed, and is there that sinking realization on the hill among republicans that this actually is going to, despite what donald trump says about a red wave, that things are getting worse by the day for republicans? >> yes. if you talk to republicans in the leadership on capitol hill they recognize that this is the cleanest test of their political fortunes at the moment. the interesting thing, this hasn't gotten a ton of ink, but in private polling the president's actually right side up in this district, not under water in approval, but the republican brand and troy balderson, the candidate, are so damaged, that it is in play, and the republican policies that danny o'connor has tried to and has successfully latched on to have put this district in play, and, yeah, there is a realization this is getting bad. getting worse than expected, and the ballot test that democrats
are up, you know, anywhere between 7 and 10 points is actually up and headed for a massive wave in november. >> willie, again, donald trump, there seems to be an irrational fear of donald trump because he shocked everybody. nobody expected he was going to win and everybody saying, oh, my god. wait. he's going to pull a rabbit out of his hat, he'd going to -- but again, there are political realities we have to look at that for, you go back, you know, 50 years. if a president's in the low 40s in approval ratings, add on the ballot test, democrats ahead 7 to 10, 12 points, there's just no getting around the fact that if democrats get their voters out this is going to be a huge fall for them. >> and donald trump won that election by seven points and
they've shrunk 10.5 points against republicans, democrats have. donald trump was there last week. mike pence has been there campaigning for balderson. this is a test of donald trump's influence. joe, point you to something else we found, unearthed writings by mike pence in the late 1990s recently brought to light. pence argued, a president should be held to the highest moral standards and removed from office if not, citing then president bill clinton's affair with a white house intern and public lies about it as an example. in one piece pence rote, "if you and i fall into bad moral habits, we can harm our families, our employees and our friends. the president of the united states can incinerate the planet. seriously. the very idea we ought to have at or less than the same moral standards placed on the standards we place on the executive a ludicrous and dangerous. we've seen the president as the
repository of our highest hopes, ideals and values. to demand less is to do harm to the blood that bought us freedom." referring to clinton again "the president's repeated lies to the american people in this matter compound the case against him as they demonstrate his failure to protect the institution of the presidency as the inspiring supreme symbol of all that is highest in our american ideals. leaders affect the lines of families far beyond their own private life." >> preach on, brother. >> a radio host when he wrote that in indiana. wrote those, posted them to his website. if you superimpose those to 2018, they take on an entirely new meaning. >> he was a radio host then and now has fallen down to vice president of the united states? words to live by and restores your faith in the one endeer --
>> more's standard maybe don't creep on 15, 16, 17-year-old girls backstage at the miss usa pageant. that who mike pence thinks has great enough moral standards to be in the white house these days, i guess. >> or don't pay off porn stars, perhaps. >> don't pay off porn stars. >> also, elise, franklin graham. read what franklin graham wrote during the clinton impeachment time. u just an self-righteous and sickening given the current stand that he's in right now, but for mike pence, again, i keep wondering. when is mike pence going to speak out? you know, donald trump and mike pence and the republican party supported roy moore. >> yeah. >> when all of those accusations were coming forward in that campaign.
to go from where he went in 1999 to where he is right now, not that long later. not that much later. a shocking, shocking turnaround. that now he's defending this guy. others saying, well, it's just between him and his wife and god. it's not what he was saying, t what franklin graham was saying or a lot of republicans defending donald trump were saying in 1999. >> an attitude i've heard recently justifying the current sins because of the past sins. well, because he did it, it's okay for him to do it now. we just don't care because he got away with it. why not let our guy get away with it, too. that shows a very hollow core of your actual beliefs. >> yeah. you know, also, mika, i've had people write me before. people that i've known in
conservative movements and also evangelicals saying, you should know, joe, christians, they ask for forgiveness. they ask for redemption. i've always said, that the is the center, if you read the bible, understand the bible. the center of jesus' teaching is we've all fallen short of the glory of god, and what's required? what's required is that you ask forgiveness, that you beg forgiveness, you understand you are unworthy of god's grace. and that it is given to you only, only, as grace. >> and you've got donald trump who says, no. i've never actually had to ask for forgiveness. i've never had to pray for forgiveness. no. i can't really think of any reason why -- that's just not who i am, asking god for forgiveness. these evangelical not only --
claim they're evangelicals, they certainly aren't evangelical -- certainly aren't the evangelicals i grew up with at first baptist church in chamblee or meridian, mississippi, or in pensacola, florida. they're giving this guy a complete free pass, and they can do that, but, please, don't wrap jesus around it, because jesus' got nothing to do with this. >> mike pence totally lost who he is in this. i'm not sure what's worth it to him, to not hold back from what he believes in, but he is allowing this to swallow him up. also, from the way back machine, jake sherman, you post add clip on twitter jed yesterday of dan rather interviewing donald trump in 1999. featuring his trip to california trying to build support among members of a reform party for a possibly president's bid. here was their reaction to his
sales pitch, plus something trump said 19 years ago that he famously echoed during the 2016 campaign. take a look. >> i was disappointed. because i felt that he -- i thought he was very attacking of other members of the party, which i thought was very disrespectful. >> i think he came, you howard what he had to say and we're exciting. >> he's a con man and ought to go back to new york. >> why? >> he's coming out here trying to destroy our party. that's the way i look at it. >> reporter: the way trump looks at it, he's at least better than everybody else in the race beginning with john mccain. said he flew combat missions. >> does that make you a hero? i'm not sure. i don't know. >> it's not the first time he said it in the past few years. it's horrific to say and seems the public's relationship with
trump has really transformed as his presidency has become all the more serious on the world stage, but he said it so many years ago. >> i'm glad my youtube phishing is good for something. yeah. no. it is obviously fascinating and the president has, despite people urging him in his party, he has continued to throw shade at john mccain about his vote last year, about a year ago right now, against repealing the health care law. something obviously, a definite thread, his disdain for john mccain going back to 1999 when he first thought about running for president. >> willie, you know, this bears repeating. donald trump dodged the draft. he got what? four, five deferments for -- >> five. >> -- bone spurs. those little feet. hard to carry around all that weight. so i guess. he's got bone spurs but sitting there making fun of a man who
was flying very early in the war. got shot down on combat missions. i know a lot of great american heroes like bud day who did and a lot of other great, great men who did during the vietnam war, and you know, he carries those scars to this day, and, again, as everybody knows, but it's got to be repeated again, the north vietnamese were going to let john mccain leave and go home, because his father was an important man in the united states military and he refused. couldn't go until the rest of his band of brothers said, until they, he allowed all of them to go. and he didn't do it. he stayed there. he stayed behind. >> i hadn't seen that clip from 1999. i thought when we heard it on that stage three years ago during the president's campaign it was maybe something impulsive her came out in reaction to john
mccain, but apparently a deeply held belief he's had for 20 or so years from now. they are true and this is preposterous. remember, he said that during the campaign, by confessioned you radios of politics, this guy is in trouble. he'll be done. the front page of the "new york post" said he was finished, her survived that, then we knew his presidency would be different than all the others. >> if you use donald trump's own way of deducing these things, if getting captured doesn't make you a hero for some reason, then getting all of those deferments because of bone spurs makes you a little coward. jake sherman, thank very much. still ahead on "morning joe" from harley-davidson to amazon a new look how companies are handling public attacks by the president. axios has an interesting new take on that.
plus, web giants team up to take down a purveyor of lies, infowars loses key platforms. surely a welcome development for the families of sandy hook. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. nkle cream in no hurry to make anything happen. nkle cream neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair® works in just one week. with the fastest retinol formula available. it's clinically proven to work on fine lines and wrinkles. one week? that definitely works! rapid wrinkle repair®. and for dark spots, rapid tone repair. neutrogena®. see what's possible. so let's promote our summer travel deal on choicehotels.com like this. surfs up. earn a $50 gift card when you stay just twice this summer. or, badda book. badda boom. book now at choicehotels.com
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and don't like trump, don't want corporations weighing in on political issues. even if they personally feel strongly about it. this puts corporations, puts ceos in particular in a little jam, because you have a millennial workforce, shareholders who want you to take a stand, feel passion against trump as most people do and want them to stand against them. it's clear, the backlash, the risk, is much higher for corporations, which helps explain why so many corporations even when they feel pressure the ceos sit out the debate. >> you know, jim, fascinating. it really -- you really do pick it up now more than any time, and it seems to, whether you're talking about harley-davidson or banks or entertainment firms, you name it. donald trump and the schism that's been created by the last 18 months of his presidency
really has caused that. in a big way. and think about it. because i'm sure a lot of shareholders would like -- their ceos to be positive about it. if you look at all the billions of dollars they got in the tax cuts. all of the buybacks. very good for a lot of businesses, very good for a lot of corporations, large corporations. why wouldn't they talk about it. like you said, then you've got that millennial workforce. you've got a lot of people that are offended by some of the things that trump says, by some of the positions he's taken on race issues. it really could divide a workforce. >> in some ways, ceos have to see themselves as politicians. because the game has changed in the last couple offer y eyears. a lot of customers, shareholders, think you should stand for something other than just profit. you personally feel a desire to get more engaged in politics, but same time, you live in fear.
you understand that a tweet that gets sent by the president could send your stock prices tumbling. that it could lead to a regulatory fight with the white house you weren't anticipating's just like trump changeded media, trump changed politics, he's undoubtedly changed the mood inside board rooms and calculations ceos and their communicators have to make. >> willie, speaking of companies having to step up, it does seem some large tech companies have stepped up against infowars, and a host that not only has made the life of parents whose children were slaughtered at sandy hook back in december of 2012, made their lives a living hell, with many having to move from one place to another, and getting threats against their own lives because of lies that he's spreading about them, but also last week shockingly enough, maybe it was two weeks ago, accusing robert mueller of
running a child prostitution ring and then holding up his finger like it's a gun, and simulating the shooting of robert mueller and many people looking at that would suggest that he actually encouraged it. >> yeah. there's been a lot of pressure on these media companies. talked about it a lot last week, joe, on this show. now four media giants are banding together to take down controversial infowars content from the their sites. apple, facebook, spotify and youtube all removed infowars and its creator's content from platforms in various degrees. all in an effort to stop the spread of misinformation. alex jones has been behind several right wing conspiracy theories like claiming the sandy rook shooting was a hoax. a following garnering millions of subscribers. apple moved sunday to remove its podcast from its platform, spotify following suit. facebook announced unpublished
for repeatedly violating company standards, youtube followed suit. jones confirm and twitter he'd been banned by facebook, apple and spotify. twitter has not taken any action against infowars or jones himself. gene robinson, this is a guy that goes without saying, people are familiar with him. he's driven sandy hook families into hiding fans conspiracy theories and having his follo r followers go after these families. facebook doesn't have to abide by the first amendment. it's a private companies. >> these private companies had a decision to make and i wonder why it took so long, because to continue to put up this kind of content, just invites people, perhaps like me, to say, hold on. these are publishers and publishing material that is
false and defamatory, and they ought to be able to be sued just like the "washington post" could be sued, and others can be sued for libel and in their case billions of dollars worth of damages. so i think it was a, not just a morally correct move by these companies, but also a smart business move to sort of fend off what would be the next step, i think, which would be to, you know, look, guys. we're going to sue you. >> and you know, elise jordan, that somebody like ted cruz would come out defending alex jones, saying -- really repulsive, you know, quoting the first line of a poem, talking about the holocaust and first they came for alex jones, i don't know. ted cruz, is he familiar with the content in infowars?
i would think most of the people he sits in church with would be deeply offended. the content is extraordinarily vulgar. his language, beyond repulsive, and, again, the conspiracy theories. and the suggestion that former fbi directors be assassinated, i mean, every day he's -- it's a new shocking attack against some foundation of our culture, of our civilization, and ted cruz is going out there comparing that to people that were sent away in the holocaust? >> you got give it to ted cruz, just because he does take pandering to new lows. whether it's his own wife. his own father. he was so quick to, you know, cower back, grovel back to donald trump, and that's the same thing that he's doing with alex jones and it's so craven, so transparent, and he cares more about the millions of followers that alex jones has
and's it shows his desperation with his upcoming senate race and also his complete lack of any moral compass whatsoever. >> and, joe, you touch upon a really important point there. we all understand that there's only so much space in a newspaper. we all understand that there's only so much time on a tv program. but the media, in a sense, has dropped the ball in terms of doing our job, in terms of making more americans aware of exactly what alex jones and his followers believe. exactly what they push and believe. the conspiracy theories are beyond the realm. beyond being offensive, they're dangerous weekend ouous and we h telling people out there what these people are and what they
believe. >> it's not new. i mean, this guy actually had the repugnant view and promoted the repugnant view that -- he was, a truther. that george w. bush was -- it was an inside job. you know? i was reading a "new york times" article yesterday from back, you know, five, six, seven, eight years ago where alex jones and rosie o'donnell and all of these other people believed that building seven had imploded and that the united states government had killed americans on 9/11. that it was an inside job. i mean, that's just -- that's such deceased thinking. it's such offensive thinking, that you wonder how those people are given a platform at all. why anybody would listen to them at all, and alex jones, my god,
mika. in just -- >> yeah. >> -- again, calling -- it seemed that he was calling for the assassination of robert mueller. this should go well beyond him not being on apple or youtube anymore. this seems to be something that the secret service should be looking into when it seems that he is calling for the assassination of a former fbi director, and a man who's leading an investigation into vladimir putin undermining american democracy. i just don't get it. >> i think we can debate it more and we certainly have had that debated. especially now i think giving people like that a platform is dangerous. and we are watching things unravel before our eyes, even the value of the truth. jim vandehei, thank you. be sure to sign up for the newsletter at signup.axios.com.
still ahead, in the paul manafort trial, rick gates takes the stand and shows us what can happen when a witness flips on a former colleague. we go live to the courthouse coming up on "morning joe."
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hey, willie, want to talk quickly. you es ip caped little big horn yesterday. the red sox -- everybody loved to talk how the red sox were 8.5 games ahead 40 years ago. and bucky "blankin'" dent. and even more vexing year, 2011 up by nine games on september the 3rd. >> yeah. >> and still managed to blow it. so we still -- i always -- i always tell jack. we always say the same thing. joey and i look at each other, 162 games. 162 games. >> you still can't celebrate after a four-game sweep of boston. >> no. >> i want to point out the
yankees are red hot after blowing out the white sox in chicago 7-0. turned a corner. nine games out. not only 9.5. 9 games out and hot on your heels. playing really well. >> how about lamere and me, literally predicting a sweep in the other direction. you're right. i'll be comfortable, like, september the 28th, maybe. >> i mean, you totally, totally out-classed us, but we're going to hang on to the wild card, beat seattle and see you again in the playoffs. >> and you do that. >> anything, anything can happen in october. anything. >> still ahead, the trump administration gets set for the next phase of its immigration overhaul. this time making it harder for some legal immigrants to earn citizenship. we'll tell you which segment of the population is being targeted next on "morning joe." ♪
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aon. a new watchdog report shows major flaws in the trump administration's long promised border wall. >> this is actually a shock, because i thought for the first time he brought this up, i thought -- you know he's a builder. >> yes. >> he's got everything figured out. sherlock, the new sherlock -- no. it's unbelievable. >> yeah. >> you're telling me that's not completely locked down yet all the details. >> no, it's not. it's part of his immigration policy and concept on immigration which includes separating children from families. >> you've told us about that. >> i told you about that because every time we talk about it, every minute that goes by those children are sitting in detention fasts away from their families and their family will have no idea if they will ever see them again and the children have no idea if they will ever
see their parents again. it's worth repeating because it's going on right now. when you bring up the wall and the wall, president trump, you bring up your policies. >> the government accountability office claims the wall could cost more than projected, take longer than planned, and actually not be effective. >> just like his policy of separating families. >> they found dhs is not properly documents plans for building part of the wall in san diego. >> trump has been pushing -- >> that's german, actually for -- go ahead. >> trump has been pushing congress for more money even threatening a government shut down if his demands are not met. white house officials figure the entire wall could cost $8 to $12 billion while dhs estimates clock in at $21 million. >> really quickly willie, the most remarkable thing about that
wall, donald trump admitted during the campaign that any time there was sort of a lull, any time energy level came down, he would just use that as a throw away line, build that wall. nothing more than a throw away line. they are trying to waste $21 billion on this boon dogle that everybody including john kelly says won't work and now we have reports explaining why it won't work. >> the president continues to say at these rallies that we've already started to build this wall. they haven't. he went down once. he looked at pieces of wall like going into a wall paper store and yeah we'll do that. mexico throughout the campaign was going to pay for that wall and now donald trump is hammering democrats for not giving him funding for the wall. so there are inconsistencies every where you look about this
wall. let's bring in national security reporter for nbc news julia aimsly. she has new reporting on the trump administration legal move on legal immigrants in the u.s. tell us about your reporting. >> reporter: what we found is that steven miller's next move, this is while they are cleaning up after necessary of separating families like mika pointed out, the next move focus on legal immigrants. these are people already living in the united states with green cards, some wanting to get green cards, some wanting to get citizenship. what we're finding is that in the coming weeks, actually, this is coming very soon, the white house is finalizing a proposal that they don't need to go through congress to get this done. this would limit those immigrants from getting that citizenship or green cards if they have ever been on public benefits. that includes obamacare. includes child health insurance. includes food stamps. includes a lot of programs that immigrants, especially those working in low wage jobs would
need just to support their families. again, these aren't illegal immigrants. these are people lawfully in the united states trying to get status either as citizens or legal permanent citizens. >> what possible legal ground who steven miller or the president have if these are legal immigrants to not allow them to get their green cards. >> reporter: that's a great question. there's this public charge rule that goes back to the 1800s. it was designed so people who were coming in, say ellis island wouldn't be a burden to the federal government. they wouldn't want to take someone in who they thought couldn't support themselves. now they are redefining public charge in a very wide way to include those programs we named and to make it harder for people who might have been given waivers in the past to get citizenship, they are now re-examining that and trying to make that harder. they want to bring down the numbers of all imgrant, even legal ones. >> thank you so much for being with us. we greatly appreciate it.
mika, the biggest problem right now is, first of all, it's a boondoggle, it won't work. the trump administration is running a bigger deficit than ever before. national debt is at record high, over $21 trillion. we can't afford this wall. just, if you look at how much money we're borrowing, it's at record rates. we couldn't afford this in the best of times but with the national debt higher than it's ever been under donald trump we certainly can't afford it now. >> coming up president trump tweeted a minute ago about the neck and neck special election in ohio today. we'll have more on the latest national test of the president's popularity ahead of the mid-terms. plus "the washington post" robert costa joins us with new reporting on possibility of a sit down between the president and special counsel robert
mueller. what was hope hicks doing with the president on air force one this past saturday? there's new reporting on that. "morning joe" is coming right back.
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robinson. joining the conversation political reporter for "the washington post," moderator of washington week on pbs and msnbc political analyst robert costa. also with us senior reporter at "vanity fair" and an nbc news and msnbc contributor, scream lie jane fox. she has new reporting on hope hicks this morning which we'll get to in just a moment. >> so, mika, we got a few people from washington here. so, i feel guilty, we only talk about, you know, the red sox and the yankees. >> here we go. >> gee, the nationals they have like a three game winning streak last week. any chance nationals will come back? >> well, you know, hope springs eternal. you know that, joe. you're a red sox fan. so, yeah. there's a chance, the chance is -- i wouldn't say it's between slim and none but the window is shrinking, let us say.
bryce harper has finally got hot. his recent batting average is like .471. which is good. and so they will make a run. and got great, you know, great pitching when the pitchers are actually on, so let's hope they make a run. but it's going to be tough. >> bob costa, there always is a silver lining. i mean you can still be an orioles fan, right? >> i grew up loving cal rip kki. when you live in d.c. you have to appreciate the nationals. i wish scherzer can pitch every inning. >> he pitches one extraordinary game after another. let's go on to news because we got some news, mika, about
donald trump jr. he's talking and talk, talk. >> talk, talk, talk. >> these people need to stop talking. they need to listen to lawyers, not tv lawyers, their real lawyers and just stop talking because it makes it worse every day. >> it's beyond. donald trump jr. has said a lot about his 2016 meeting with russians beginning with his quickly discredited claim that it was about adoption. i guess a lie. now the president's son insists in a radio interview that any investigation into the matter is a big waste of time. again, after two years of, you know, nonstop investigation with everyone in the media, everyone at the fbi, the whole world is looking at this thing and have yet to produce anything that even remotely resembles what they have been talking about. yet every other day now we got
it now. i've been hearing this for two years. >> donny, did the adoption that's near and dear to my heart because i have two adopted russian sons. did that come up. >> when? >> like i said, that was the primary thing that we had spoken about in the meeting. that's not the premise that got them in the room. then essentially bait and switch to talk about that. everyone has basically said that in testimony already. so this is nothing new. but, like i said, i know it's an important issue to you. this was not a campaign issue to us. this wasn't relevant to us. it wasn't something we were going to do anything with. >> willie, where do i begin? again, when you have these people coming on and saying, oh, there's been this investigation and nothing has come out of it. well you've had actually the united states government indict
a couple of dozen russians. they have the proof from what our united states military discovered, what the intel community uncovered, what kirstjen nielsen, what dan coats, the fbi director, what everybody in donald trump's own administration, not junior, senior his administration came out and said the russians tried to undermine american democracy in 2016 and the russians are going to try to undermine american democracy in 2018 and we have all of that information because of this investigation on russia. i mean, that's about as important of an investigation as i can recall anybody in government undertaking. >> when donald trump jr. or rudy giuliani says what mural has or
doesn't have. he said mueller doesn't have a damn thing. nobody knows what he has. to listen to don jr. yesterday with laura ingrahm to say it was a bait and switch, presented to him as dirt on hillary clinton and then switched in the room to adoption, he's admitting he took the meeting to get research from a foreign entity. the emails are clear as day. his explanation after the fact at first was that it was only about adoption then as the evidence came out, obviously they shifted and changed their story. so they are twisted in knots. we were talking about this when we sat down. i have no idea what lawyer is letting these people go on tv, go on the radio and say these things over and over, contradicting themselves. >> they are just not helping themselves. they also showing certainly their state of mind. >> yeah. >> which is we're on
opportunity, we're on the prowl for russian dirt on hillary clinton. and, again, the timeline lines up in a pretty devastating way if you look at donald trump's statements in press conferences saying russia if you listen, well russia did start listening. they went after it. look at people close to donald trump, what they are saying on the radio and radio interviews. yeah, lawyers, the one or two serious lawyers around the trump family have to be pulling their hair out right now. bob, i want to -- we're going to keep talking about this in a bit, but i want to jump to what's happening tonight a big election in ohio. a race republicans should have put away a long time ago. donald trump won ohio by 11, 12 points. a strong republican district. yet a neck and neck tonight between democrats and republicans, a lot of democrats for good reason believe they've already won this, saying if they
end up losing by a point or two because the map has expanded now to 75, 80 places. you have the republican shooting himself in the foot yesterday talking about how franklin county they shouldn't elect anybody from franklin county which is one of the most important counties in that district but also the state of ohio. >> there are local issues that are a factor in this race, joe. but what's the biggest orange averaging theme of the race tonight. it could be more of a john kasich republican, move away from president trump's message. he embraced president trump, was with him at a rally over the weekend in the columbus area and stood right there as the president talked about building the wall and shaking his fist about the mueller investigation and the media. balderson is trying to see if he can make that message, standing
with trump play in the suburbs. that's a vexing challenge. it's a microcosm of what so many republicans will face in the next few months. can they get the trump voter out but run on standard republican issues. >> what i'm really watching tonight, to go back and just keep hammering down on this point, what are suburban women going to do? how are they going to vote? i think we're on the verge of a fundamental political realignment where the republican party has permanently just at least temporarily if not permanently repelled women from voting republican because of donald trump's consistent behavior. >> you're looking with suburban women across the country but including ohio they look at the issue like immigration, child separation from their families, and you wonder is that enough of a breaking point?
president trump was able to win over many women votes in 2016 as a change agent and so on who is representing a break from the washington establishment. do the scandals, the controversies, the immigration policies, does that push them away? republicans continue to believe, though, that even if you want to win over women voters you can't go too far away from president trump and that's why they are not running like ohio governor john kasich, almost independently minded republicans with the president win or lose. >> there's new reporting on former communications director hope hicks and her reappearance over the weekend at the president's side hours before he tweeted about trump tower meeting. hicks served as the go-between when the son dictated his misleading statement that it was about adoptions. hicks had planned to spend the weekend in new jersey to catch up with ivanka trump and jared
kushner. when the president learned she was in town he asked her to come along to the rally and she did. hicks was discussed by some as a dark horse to one day replace john kelly as chief of staff. while speaking to the press aboard air force one saturday hicks said she would consider it if the time was right. she came up after a couple of months away. has she ever really left the trump orbit? >> no one leaves the trump orbit in a major way and hope hicks has certainly remained connected to president trump and especially to i haven't okay and jared. she has not left this orbit. what happened on saturday was certainly the most public and overt expression of her being back in the fold since she left the white house in the spring. it seems from my reporting it wasn't necessarily a nefarious thing, she was out there. the president said for old time's sake come along.
under normal circumstances, lewandowski still travels with the president. that's something that's done. at this time when the issue of the don jr. trump tower meeting and the statement thereafter is so hot, so in the news, it's been talked about for the last couple of weeks in particular, you were talking earlier about lawyers not advising their clients to talk on tv about these things, i can imagine that hope hicks lawyer said to her it's a good idea for you to be on air force one this weekend, this is a smart legal strategy. they are people in the president's orbit like steve bannon who will not talk directly to the president because he's worried about being called back to robert mueller to interview with him. so it would not be surprising to me if robert mueller saw this coverage and we need to get her back her and ask what he talked about over the weekend. >> the president as the walls close around him a little bit want to surround him with people he's comfortable with.
he calls her hopy and yells her name. is there a chance she comes back to the white house in some way, in an official capacity? >> she has not landed a job. not decided what she wants to do next. as she spoke to reporters on saturday, she said look if the time is right, if there's a job -- that wasn't necessarily a serious offer but from people who know her they would not be shocked if at some point down the road in some capacity she came back into the fold. >> how is she finding life outside of the white house in terms of pursuing other job opportunities >> there's job opportunities she's finding. there are people who are supporters of the president who saw she did a relatively good job, as good of a job as she could. she 29 years old. head of the communications job in the white house which is an impressive thing. she hasn't found what she wants to do. she has this legal cloud looming over her head which is difficult for her and i'm sure difficult
for employers who are saying is this the right person to hire at this exact time as well. >> fascinating piece in "vanity fair". always good to see you. mika. >> chicago mayor rahm emanuel and police department officials are calling on residents to help stop the surge in violence there. following the deadliest weekend in that city in more than two years. at least 74 people were shot, 12 of them fatally between friday afternoon and monday morning. the victims ages ranged from 11 years old to 62. local media say 47 people were shot on sunday alone. the most shooting victims in a single day since september of 2011. speaking yesterday mayor rahm emanuel and superintendent of the city's police department visibly frustrated called for accountability of the people behind the violence. >> there are too many guns on the street.
too many people with criminal records on the street. and there's a shortage of ovals about what is right, what is wrong. what is acceptable, what is condoned and what is condemned. and we as a city in every corner have an accountability and a responsibility. >> you know what i never hear. i hear people holding us accountable all the time. i never hear people saying these individuals out here in the streets need to stop pulling the trigger. i never hear that. i never hear that. they get a pass from everybody. and they shouldn't. they shouldn't. >> despite the weekend's bloodshed officials say gun violence is down 70% from a year ago while homicides have fallen 20% in that same time period. really? >> gene robinson it's true the numbers are down in chicago but it's relative they are down from
astro astronomical rates. 74 people shot. 12 of them fatally. in any other context that's a mass shooting happening in america. >> yeah. it absolutely is. and chicago for years now has been this outliar as other big cities in this country have become as safe as they have been since the 1950s, new york city safest city, big city in america practically. think of where it was in the '80s. but chicago has not joined that trend. and there's lots of reasons. one is that there's kind of a gang war, a drug trans-shipment center. a lot of stuff going on. but there's no excuse for it. there's no excuse for not understanding what the situation is, and taking much more
aggressive action to stop it. 74 people shot is just unacceptable and should be unacceptable in any american city. >> it really should. gene, what's so vexing and so frustrating is the fact that, you know, in 1988, 1999, 1990, '91, new york city was an extremely dangerous place and yet you had a succession of mayor, rudy giuliani back when he was thinking in coherently, in a coherent manner. michael bloomberg for three terms. de blasio. republicans, independents, democrats figuring out how to work with the cops in new york and, again, "new york times" reported a couple of months ago that crime is solo that you have to go back to the 1950s before they were taking accurate
records and try to guess what year was the last year that was this safe in new york city and yet in chicago the nightmare continues, 74 shot, 12 killed just this weekend. what can chicago learn from new york? what can chicago learn from a lot of other cities that have turned things around? >> chicago can pick a lesson and then learn it. they can learn from new york where it was, you know a lot of policies you could argue about. there was stop-and-frisk which was ruled unconstitutional. there was sort of a very aggressive community policing. washington, d.c., which is also safer than it has been in decades. crime rates have plummeted. and did it in a different way. did it with a more of a community policing style that has produced a lot of results.
but pick one. pick some way to do something. the problem is that in chicago, which rolls on and on and on, and, obviously, not in anyway, shape or form attacking the root problems. >> it is such a tragedy for the people who live there. so bob costa, your reporting about the possible interview with robert mueller's possible interview with donald trump. that just keeps rolling on down the road. what's it looking like? are we getting any closer to the moment where the former fordham student sits across the table from princeton and st. paul's and the marine hero that two get-together and sit down and talk? >> at this point, based on my gfrgs wi conversation with giuliani last night we're not at that point.
we could be inching closer to the point when mueller makes decision about issuing a subpoena of the president of the united states. they've been negotiating for months. you wonder what is the point where mueller has had enough with giuliani and the president delaying a decision. giuliani said to me last night that he's now going to send a letter back to mueller who wrote giuliani a letter last week, a response back on tuesday or wednesday, today or tomorrow saying any questions about obstruction or in essence going to be off the table. about the president's conduct with regard to the firing of james comey or the handing of the national security adviser michael flynn. giuliani acknowledged in the conversation that this is just, again, pushing the decision away and we're now in the summer as mull certificate trying to wrap up his report and that subpoena threat made months ago back in the spring during a conversation with then trump attorney still hangs over these exchanges. >> is there a feeling, rocket, that they've just been stalling
for time, trying to push it as close to the elections as possible thinking you might not subpoena him before election >> that's exactly right. based on my conversations not just about giuliani but other trump advisors, mueller has a window before the election to issue his report on the president's conduct and they are ware if the president doesn't sit down with mueller, they wonder if mueller can finish a report on the president's intent. was it criminal intent or not when he made certain decisions or had certain actions as president of the united states and at this point giuliani is advising his client, the chief executive to not sit down. the president says to his advisors he wants to sit down but actions speak louder than words. at this point they are delaying. >> yeah. if the president wants something he gets it. if he wants to tweet something dumb that's counter to anything that might benefit him in this case he does it. so he knows better, i think. robert costa thank you. we'll be reading your latest
reporting in "the washington post". gene robinson, thank you as well. your newco aluminum on trump's rally rhetoric is a must read. still ahead, robert mueller got rick gates to talk and talk he did. what the former trump campaign aide testified to in paul manafort's criminal trial. we have a live report from outside the courthouse next on "morning joe". this is not a bed.
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through wire transfers using income and accounts that manafort asked him not disclose. the former trump deputy campaign chair also acknowledged crimes he committed on his own behalf like embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from manafort and failing to report income. gates reached a deal with robert mueller in february agreeing to cooperate for an exchange of a guilty plea. charges against gates carry a possible ten year sentence but prosecutors could recommend less time than that. joining us now, two experts who have been watching the manafort trial from inside the courtroom, former u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor, barbara mcquaid and nbc news intelligence and national security reporter ken delaney. barbara, let me start with you. the vibe, the atmosphere in the courtroom as you had these two men who worked closely together for so many years one turning on the other. >> there was daefl buzz in the
courtroom when the government called rick gates to come in. he seemed visibly nervous. he spoke very quickly. he did not make eye contact with paul manafort as you said. there were several side bars during his testimony and he was sort of just sit awkwardly and look straight ahead. paul manafort looked directly at rick gates. during the testimony it came out their dynamic was different than i had appreciated before. he described it as very much an employer-employee relationship. rick gates had met paul manafort when he was an intern and said they never socialized together the only time he went to paul manafort's house was when he reported there to do work for him. tension between. but he's getting his story out. >> did the prosecution get what they wanted out of rick gates. did he present stories, evidence that would incriminate paul manafort? >> absolutely, willie. they are only at the beginning. gates, while he was certainly near vow was a pretty compelling
witness even though he was sort of a disreputable character and got up there immediately started to admit to crimes. he's college educated. prosecution pointed out he served honorably in the virginia national guard and described, you know, working for paul manafort for ten years. he started as an intern in the '90s out of william and bhaer the former lobbying firm and came on board in 2006. the other witnesses in the case have given the jury a glimpse into the wave of criminality. gates is taking them all the way down the cave on a rope and showing them all the corners. key speak to manafort's state of mind, talk about what manafort said and why he did these things. he told the jury that manafort wanted to pad his income. that's why he was evading the tax. that's why they had the secret bank account. so far he's been a compelling witness. he admitted to some crimes that
prosecutors didn't know about including embezzling from manafort. while they were committing crimes together, gates was stealing from manafort by padding expense accounts, willie. >> barbara, one of the things ken brought up there wasn't an especially close relationship between gates and manafort. and i was talking to a reporter last night that followed the campaign extraordinarily closely, and what he just could never figure out in real-time was why after manafort was fired that his underling gates remain there and his conclusion had always been that he was the conduit to russia, even after manafort was gone, because no campaign would have kept an understandli underling of campaign manager that was fired. gates survives not through the end of the campaign but also into the transition as well. it's fascinating.
has anybody inquired about that? do you know if there's been any questions in the overall investigation? >> in this case, of course, they are focused on the income tack and bank fraud charges. i imagine his testimony will relate solely to that. he did admit with when he talked about the crimes to which he pled guilty one of the crimes was the foreign agent registration act conspiracy with paul manafort. i imagine his cooperation with robert mueller, far exceeds the scope of what we'll hear about in his testimony in this trial. there's the trial that will occur in september in washington, d.c. with manafort with some of those charges may come in to play. we may get more of a glimpse into that. but to get his deal and he said yesterday he could be facing potential ten years but if he does everything he's supposed to do he could get as low as probation. he's got to tell everything and put all the cards on the table. i'm sure he'll be confronted with every e-mail and surveillance cut obtained through the foreign intelligence
surveillance court that exists. if that's true he'll no doubt be confronted about it and may be the key to breaking that connection. >> isn't it strange that, again, you know, corey lewandowski is fired, manafort comes in, all of i had people are basically tossed out. this happens in every presidential campaign. manafort is fired. and yet his underling, his flunky, the guy that is carrying around his backpack, the guy who is his employee, strangely enough he stays around the campaign despite the fact that trump doesn't like him, makes him sit outside of offices where the actual critical meetings are taking place, but he remains there not only through the end of the campaign, he remains there through the transition and the inauguration. >> well, joe, that's something i'm intrigued by just because there's been so much reporting that various members of the trump campaign team like michael
flynn were so interested in padding their own wallets during the campaign and setting themselves up for business afterwards because they didn't necessarily believe that donald trump was going to win and so ken, something i'm curious about, how much could this trial potentially get into the financial activities of paul manafort during the fall of the trump campaign after he had officially left the campaign but not necessarily the orbit of donald trump? >> reporter: the bank fraud, tax fraud, schemes did extend into that period. there was a loan he obtained from a guy on the promise of a position within the trump organization or the trump administration. he ended up on an advisory board this guy did. that's alleged in the indictment. that may come up at trial. i want to point out, guys, in
terms of gates and manafort and their connections to the whole russia investigation, they were in the loop on george papadopoulos campaign aide who pleaded guilty trying to broker a meeting between putin and trump. there's a lot left to be told about what they knew between campaign and russia. they were the most russia connected of any of these advisors. manafort came to the campaign working for free, flat broke, right. scrambling for cash. in debt. and the question is how desperate was he what was he willing do if the russians put the finger on him and asked him to help in their interference campaign. >> thank you both for being on this morning. coming up, a massive wildfire in northern california has now burned an area the size of los angeles. it is the biggest blaze in state history and president trump is blaming bad environmental laws
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history and president trump is weighing in on the firefighting process. he tweeted last night california wildfires are being magnified and being made worse. it's being diverted into the fantastic ocean. must also tree clear to stop fire from spreading. as the "los angeles times" points out the current wildfire situation is unrelated to water supplies or environmental laws. fire agencies vent been complaining about lack of water. major reservoirs are near the worst fire zones, and all are at or near their historic levels. the president also tweeted yesterday governor jerry brown must allow the free flow of the vast amounts of water coming from the north and foolishly being diverted into the pacific ocean. can be used for fires, farming
and everything else. according to politico trump's comments may be referencing an unrelated dispute between brown's administration and california republicans over how much of the state's water can be diverted to southern california farms. one california gop strategist told politico that trump's recent tweets don't show an elementary understanding of water policy and also don't really show any recognition of the people fighting these fires or the land that is being destroyed, and well beyond that. >> it is the politicalization even of forest fires. willie, this is a guy, again, he sees a basketball game, he sees the opportunity to divide, sees a football game, the opportunity to divide, see as tragedy in california, a forest fire and what does he see? an opportunity to divide. >> on the one hand it's comical
he's expert on forest firefighting. it's sad he's not recognizing seven people that died, a greatgrandmother and her two children that died finer, the firefighters fight firing. he's also confusing as usual one policy with another. i think what he's referring to as far as i can tell is a dispute between farmers about getting more irrigation into their farms and having nothing to do with fighting a forest fire. i guess it goes without saying he's inaccurate in this and doesn't quite know what he's talking about but that didn't stop him from weighing in. >> up next we had john mccain on the show shortly after donald trump questioned the senator's status as a war hero during the 2016 campaign. but newly unearth footage shows it wasn't the first time trump hit mccain for his service to the country. we'll show that to you next on "morning joe". you're headed down the highway
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i'm jason. senator black has been attacking me on guns. in army i know how to use and respect my rifle. in afghanistan i volunteered to be an extra gun in a convoy of unarmored suvs. i also believe in background checks so terrorists can't get their hands on one of these. aappro i approve this message because i want to see senator black do this. >> i believe that's what we call in the business a mike drop. that was a viral campaign from jason cantor calling for tougher background checks. he lost that race narrowly the former missouri secretary of state jason cannis running for r of kansas city. his new book called "outside the wire." jason, great to have you with us. let's talk about your decision to run for mayor. the election is not until next
year, june of 2019. there were a lot of people, including president obama who said he's my guy in missouri. >> very nice of him. >> and somebody who ought to run for president. what was the decision for you like not wait and jump into the mayor race. >> it's do everything you possibly can for your fellow citizen right now. that's hat i'm doing. i'm a fifth generation kansasian. i love my home town. that's why i decided to run for mayor. also why i decided to write "outside the wire" and why in the interests much using that platform for as much good as possible, for every copy we sold we donate to moms for safety. it's do what you can do for others. i tell a story about a young man i watched on his very first day in afghanistan get clearly visibly physically sick as he looked at the unarmored suv he needed to get in with me to do
its job. he sat in the seat behind me and i was worried he would throw up on me. i think about him all the time when we talk about tough choice. don't seem that tough compared to getting in a vehicle and going outside the wire. >> you enlisted in the army national guard after 9/11 as a response to that incident. was it a difficult choice for you because as i said there were a lot of people at the national level who look at you, my gosh in the state of missouri he almost knocked off the incumbent when donald trump was winning the state by almost 20 points. you are viewed as a rising star in the party. was it a tough call not to wait to the presidential election? >> an opportune to mayor of kansas city, have you been there? it's a waterfall place. it's a place where we had a lot of progress. we've had a lot of success. but i want to see that extend to everybody in the city. i want no matter where you live for you to be able to see it and to see it and feel it and so no.
that made it not at all a difficult choice for me. it's about -- i write in "outside the wire" about how a lot of people have something in their some day category. some day i'll do x. really i want people to understand don't wait for some day, make it now. making change is about getting outside of your comfort zone, and nobody ever made change from within their comfort zone. >> joe has a question for you. >> jason, you talk about your expenses in afghanistan, what you learned there and talking about politics. one of your first bit of advice taken from your time in a war zone is, if you want to change the world, you have to get outside the wire. explain that. >> so outside the wire is a term that we used overseas. it means to go off the safety of the base. and look, i've spent a lot more time figuratively outside the wire in politics than i even did literally in afghanistan because, you know, it's been
several years now. i just never have seen anybody -- like when people say there's tough choices that have to be made in politics. i think about explaining that to people who have risked their lives it just doesn't wash with me. i mean i came back, one of the stories i tell in the book is i came back, i had a meeting once i was in the state legislature with the speaker of the house who really wanted to brace me and get me to do exactly what he wanted. the whole time i was thinking about a meeting i had had with a corrupt afghan general and the border police, and i wasn't really sure i was going to get out of that meeting alive. once you have had had experiences like that, it is pretty difficult to look at elected politics in america and say, you know, this is really tough stuff. the truth is it is really not. >> yeah, not even in the same category. let's talk about your first campaign, what you learned there. you talk about, you say you need to hustle but you need to stay humble. explain that. >> yeah. i mean you put in every bit of work you can because voters
appreciate it. one of the stories i tell in "outside the wire" is that one of the very first doors i ever knocked on in my campaign, my first campaign, which was for state legislature, this fellow came to his front door and we were talking. it was really clear immediately that he and i disagreed on this issue he wanted to talk about, and i had just been a candidate for a short time and i did what i had seen politicians on tv do, and i start trying to spin him and tell him how really we agreed, and next thing i knew we were in an argument and it wasn't going well. i felt frustrated and desperate. i said, thanks for your time, i know what you believe. i walked off and he said to me, that makes sense, you can put a sign in my yard, i will vote for you. that's how i learned that voters don't expect you to believe everything they believe. they want to know you believe what you're saying, and they will for gigive you for believi something different if they know you care about them. >> you are one of the most prominent and politically
successful afghanistan vets in america. where are you on the continued u.s. involvement in the war in afghanistan more than a de acad after you left? >> we were talking about how we had both been at the same place several years ago. look, we have to recognize the fact if you were to go back to the beginning of the american story and, you know, write it from the beginning, you wouldn't write afghanistan as the longest war in american history, it is just a fact. that's where i start from, is that i grew up comfortably. i grew up in a way where no politician could make a decision that would take food off my family's table. first time i was on the receiving end of bad decisions made by politicians that negatively affected me, i was in the back seat of an unarmored vehicle in afghanistan. now there are american kids there who likely don't remember 9/11. as you mentioned, 9/11 is what spurred me to go into the military. there are americans there who
don't remember that likely. that's something that has to be at the top of our mind as we make decisions about our commitments there. >> so should we draw down? should we get american troops out of afghanistan? >> our strategy clearly needs to be about unwinding and reaching that point. i think what's tragic, and one of the things i point out in the book that kind of shaped my view of politics, is that, you know, so much of this can be traced back to a very politically-driven decision by karl rove and others to invade iraq. i was in afghanistan in '06, you know, e-mailing with my friends from officer training who were in iraq at that time and saying they weren't sure exactly why they were there. it diverted an enormous amount of resources. >> mika? >> jason, i'm just curious as you seek to serve, your second attempt, and it is very much appreciated. >> thanks. >> politically. what are you hearing from people? we're in an age of sort of devalued truth, where there's now arguments about what is
real, what is fact, what is fiction, and what comes out of the president's mouth and rumors that are being passed around. what are you hearing from people about any of that? do they even care or what do they want? >> you know, and this is one of the things i talk about in the book because, you know, i got 220,000 votes from folks who voted for president trump and for me, even though the only thing we agree on is we're both afraid of sharks. and so i do hear from a lot of people who voted for him, and what they generally say to me is this. like back in 2016, what they were saying, the persuadable voters, they were saying, look, i don't like him, i don't like the way he treats people, but he made himself very personally successful. they weren't like, so that's great. they were like, i'll give it a try. what he this say is, i still don't like him, still don't like the way he treats people, and he never really switched from making -- from doing that for himself to doing it for the country. the way people express this is they say, i don't like all of
the tweeting. when you dig deeper, what they're saying is, he never really followed through on his promise, which is to put the country ahead of himself, which, you know, is a shame obviously. but it is why he's just burroing down into his own base and not getting outside of it. he refuses to get outside of his own echo chamber. >> for sure. the book is "outside the wire." democratic kansas city mayoral candidate jason cantor. thank you for being to this morning. >> thank you. still ahead, two decades ago mike pence made the case for impeaching a president with, quote, bad moral habits. that applied to bill clinton. so what about donald trump? plus, we'll go live to ohio as one of the candidates running in the special election there tries to clean up a last-minute gaffe in the dead-locked race. >> you can call it a gaffe. he actually insulted people in the county that's going to be casting the most votes tonight.
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bush white house, elise jordan. editor of "the washington post", eugene robinson. senior writer at "politico", jake sherman. we will start with new weekly tracking numbers from gallup. it finds 54% disapprove of the job president trump is doing compared to 41% who approve of his performance. cnbc's john horowood analyzed the support and found in the data whites with no college degree approved of the president's job 58% to 39%, while 29% of all other americans approv approved, and 66% disapprove. the numbers seem to be shifting a bit for the president. >> there's always been -- we talked about it for some time, that there's always been a bit of a narrow casting, but this is about as narrow casting as it gets. willie, all i can say for donald trump and republicans who are
hoping, like the special election in ohio tonight, the republicans who are hoping he will somehow get them over the finish line even in strongly republican district like the ohio 12, they just better hope that their small slice of the electorate comes out because, i mean, donald trump is sacrificing just about every other group in america for this one group of white, non-college-educated voters that, again, there just aren't enough to get him over the top or to get his candidates over the top in a lot of elections. >> yeah, and that gallup number of 41% approval is about where he has been over the course of his presidency, but it is the cross tab you are looking at that is so interesting. remember, he won white, non-college voters by almost 40%, so it certainly makes up the core of his base, gene robinson, and those are the people we see at the rallies,
that is his hard-core support. it remains to be seen when he intervenes in the elections like ohio 12 or endorses chris covac running in kansas, it remains to be seen how powerful he is in the races. >> yeah, what we have learned so far from the special elections and the primaries is he is very powerful inside the republican party. he has 89% support among republicans. so it is very difficult if you are going to run as a republican in a primary to buck trump. on the other hand he is very unpopular among your general -- among americans in general, and democrats have been doing a whole lot better than one would expect, than anyone imagined from in these elections. we shouldn't be talking about this ohio special election. this is a safe republican seat, and we're talking about it
because it is a trumpian-backed candidate up against a democrat who is a moderate who could win. >> you know, mike barnacle, also, again, when you talk about off-year elections, what is so extraordinarily important is the intensity, because most people don't go out and vote in midterm elections. you are lucky if you get a third in the primary and maybe 50% of the voters when you get to the general election. but there was an article this morning that i read talking about how -- i think it was "the washington post", talking about in ohio these are rock-ribbed republicans who voted for trump, and you had the reporter knocking on doors, and one lifelong, rock-ribbed republican said -- they sundasked who theye going to be voting for and she
said, well, i support trump, we voted for trump, but i hate him. something along those lines, i can't stand him, he's a jerk. we're hearing that more and more. i'm hearing that more and more from the people i talk to who voted for trump. they voted for him, they're embarrassed by him, they don't like him. that's not exactly the secret sauce to get people out to vote in midterm elections, and i just believe this ambivalence at some point -- and i believe just hating nancy pelosi at some point is not ongoing to going t to help the candidates because nancy pelosi is not running america. >> you know, joe, there's a tragic aspect of the numbers that we just indicated in the poll. the fact that he has overwhelming support among largely whites with a high school degree, these are people
who need a president standing up for them more than most people in america. and he goes to these rallies, and if you listen to the rallies -- i know it is discomforting to listen to his language in the rallies, but he doesn't propose anything to help them. instead, he relies on grievance. he relies on trying to cement the divisions that already exist in america. he relies on strengthening those divisions. he relies on talking about race. he relies on talking about really hate, and these people who show up are victims of a con. not all of them are racists. some perhaps are, there's no doubt about that, but they're victims of a con. she need a leader -- they need a leader, a president who will do something about their lives, to improve their lives. that's the tragedy. >> you know, gene, victims of a con, and what i have never
really understood for somebody who is in economic trouble, somebody who is struggling to get their kids through school, somebody who is struggle to keep a job, somebody who is struggling to get good, decent, fair wages and the ability to take your kids to a doctor that's not an emergency room visit at 11:00 at night, i'm not quite so -- i just don't understand why some of these people out in the crowds, they're conned by a guy who talks about ims hhimself all th time, lies about himself all the time, inflates what he has done all the time. then, of course, on top of that he has convinced a lot of these people that their biggest problem, their biggest problem is the media. >> yeah. >> right. yeah, we're the enemy of the people. >> if that's their biggest problem, that's interesting. >> yeah.
and, look, he is, as mike said, it is a con. it has been an effective con. the other thing he does before these audiences is make ridiculous promises that are just -- that will never be kept. you know, he's bringing back the steel industry. they're opening eight new plants. well, that's just simply not true. it is not happening, yet he says it and people applaud and this and that, and he's very skillful at making -- drawing these cultural and racial lines and essentially putting people in the position of being with him or with ms-13 basically. it is a demagogue's tool kit that he uses, and he uses it effectively. >> and, elise jordan, to an extent he chips away at his own
credibility when he has policies like the separation policy. he talks about the wall. he talks about immigration in the most, quite frankly, he degrading way to people, but some of that is appreciated by the base for whatever reasons. having said that, isn't it fair to say the policy of taking children away from their families has definitely hurt the president? nobody likes that. i can't imagine that would poll well. >> well, and, mika, especially women that i've spoken with who are trump supporters don't support the child separation policy, even if they support donald trump. so john kasich himself pointed out this weekend that suburban women are going to be really key in this 12th district and in picking who the next congressman is going to be, and so i really am curious what the suburban women of columbus, ohio are going to decide to do today in light of donald trump focusing
more on any distraction that he can throw at the wall to try to turn people away from the real issues that are affecting men and women in this country, namely the families and children who have been separated by his inhumane policy, but also health care. and looking at what has donald trump done to actually improve health care for men and women of the 12th district. >> yes. >> jake sherman, it is very interesting that when lam won his shock election several months ago we were talking about the suburbs of pittsburgh. now we're talking about another midwestern town, the suburbs of columbus, ohio. and if you look at one area where republicans have been hurt the most, where donald trump has lost the most support, the reason why he's sitting at 39%, 40%, 41%, depending on whether you believe gallup or quinnipiac, isn't so much of that the bleeding support that
he's seen when it comes to suburban voters, which used to be the absolute bedrock of any republican presidential campaign? >> yeah, it is a huge problem, and the majority will be won and lost in the suburbs, there's no question about that. i think the important thing to point out here and what we need to wrap our head around is if this district is competitive, r-plus seven die, a district that the last two congressmen from the district won by a dozen points every single time, if this is competitive then there are 80 seats in america that are competitive just like this. there are 80 republican seats in that kind of range that could be on the table come november. so democrats are seeing extremely rapidly their political map expand, to a point where they could -- and we don't know. we are just talking based on
available information. we could see a massive amount of seats flip if a district like this is competitive. there are suburbs obviously all over the country that are less republican than this that could go. so we're seeing just -- it almost doesn't even matter who wins tonight, because it is competitive and that shows a really huge change in the political fortunes of the democratic and republican parties. >> and we'll have a live report from the battleground district straight ahead. plus, two throwbacks from decades ago that have a special sort of resonance today. what mike pence was saying about presidential morality in the late 1990s. >> let me get, let me guess, let me guess. it is different than what he is saying now. >> yes. >> what a shock. >> very. >> situational morality. >> and what donald trump had to say about john mccain right around the same time. but first, bill karins with a check on the forecast. bill. >> well, once again we are talking about heat from the west coast to the southeast, to the
southwest to the northwest. the only people out of the equation are in the middle of the country. the fire news out of california continues to be eye-opening. the mendocino complex fire now the biggest fire in california history. if that sounds familiar, last year the thomas fire became the biggest fire in california history, and those records go back to about 1932. so pretty impressive stuff as there's a lot of tinder because of the drought over the last decade and the intense heat over the summer, firefighters have their work cut out. 31 million people in the northeast under heat advisories, similar to yesterday. now we are watching the expansion of the heat in the northwest, and there's plenty of smoke from northern california blowing into oregon, too. not only is it hot with excessive heat warning, the air quality is horrendous right now for anyone with respiratory problems. 25 million people in the desert southwest under advisories and warning for the heat. raleigh will be up there about
100. hot in areas like atlanta, too, where it will feel like 99 degrees. we continue with our sweltering summer. it gets to this point and you're kind of like, how long until fall? i don't want to bring on winter, but i would like it more comfortable for everyone. new york city under the heat add viedoradd -- advisory. you will probably feel like 98 to 100 degrees this afternoon. you're watching "morning joe." we will be right back. ninety-six hundred roads named "park" in the u.s. it's america's most popular street name. but allstate agents know that's where the similarity stops. if you're on park street in reno, nevada, the high winds of the washoe zephyr could damage your siding. and that's very different than living on park ave in sheboygan, wisconsin, where ice dams could cause water damage. but no matter what park you live on, one of 10,000 local allstate agents knows yours. now that you know the truth, are you in good hands? booking a flight doesn't have to be expensive.
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we can harm our families, employers and our friends. the president of the united states can incinerate the planet. >> wow. >> seriously, the very idea we ought to have at or less than the same moral standards placed on the chief executive than we place on our next-door neighbor is ludicrous and dangerous. throughout our history we have seen the presidency as repository of highest hopes, ideals and values. to demand less is to do an injustice to the blood that bought our freedoms. >> wow. >> geez. >> pence adds in another column referring to clinton again. >> preach, preach. >> the president's repeated lies to the american people in this matter compound the case against him as they demonstrate his failure to protect the institution of the presidents as the inspiring supreme symbol of all that is highest in our american i deals. leaders affect the lives of families far beyond their own private life. >> amen. preach on, brother. >> mike pence at the time when he wrote those was a radio host in indiana.
posted it to his website. if you superimpose it to 2018 they take on a new meaning. >> he was a radio host? >> he was. >> and now he has fallen to vice president with donald trump. those are words to live by. once again, restores your faith in the one enduring aspect of american politics, hypocrisy. >> yes. >> he is a living symbol of hypocrisy, mike pence, sadly. >> i guess we are holding our neighbors the moral standard of maybe don't creep on 15, 16, 17-year-old girls backstage at the miss teen usa pageant. that's who mike pence thinks has great enough moral standards to be in the white house these days i guess. >> don't pay-off porn stars perhaps. >> you have also, elise, if you read what franklin graham wrote during the clinton impeachment time, it was just as self-righteous and just as sickening given the current
stand that he's -- he's in right now. but for mike pence, again, i keep wondering, when is mike pence going to speak out. you know, donald trump and mike pence and the republican party supported roy moore when with all of those accusations were coming forward in that campaign. to go from where he went in 1999 to where he is right now, not that long later, not that much later, shocking turnaround, that now he is defending this guy. you have others saying, well, it is just between him and his wife and god. it is not what he was saying, it is not what franklin graham was saying, it is not what a lot of republicans who are defending donald trump were saying in 1999. >> but there's this attitude that i heard frequently justifying the current sins because of the past sins. well, because he did it, it is okay for him to do it now.
we just don't care because he got away with it, so why not let our guy get away with it, too, which i think that shows just a very hollow core of your actual beliefs. >> coming up on "morning joe", donald trump's attack on john mccain's status as a war hero wasn't a one-off from the 2016 campaign. he was peddling that message back in 1999. that moment from the archives is next on "morning joe." ♪ philadelphia freedom ♪ from the day that i was born dear foremothers, your society was led by a woman, who governed thousands... commanded armies...
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and when we have an emergency situation we are going to be much more skilled and prepared to mitigate that emergency for all concerned. the things we do every single day that puts ourselves in harm's way, and to have a partner that is so skilled at what they do is indispensable, and i couldn't ask for a better partner. does donald trump owe you an apology? >> no, i don't think so, but i think he mayo owe an apology t the families of those who have sacrificed in conflict and those who have undergone the prison experience in serving our country. i'm in the arena, as t.r. used to say, but in the case of many of our veterans, when mr. trump said that he prefers to be with people who are not captured,
well, the great honor of my life was to serve in the company of heroes. i'm not a hero, but those who were my senior ranking officers, people like colonel bedet, congressional medal of honor winner, those who inspired us to do things we otherwise wouldn't have been capable of doing, those are the people i think he owes an apology to. >> that was senator john mccain on "morning joe" back in 2015 with his first public response to trump mocking his years as a p.o.w. it turns out that wasn't the first time trump made those comments. jake sherman, you posted a clip on twitter yesterday of dan rather interviewing trump back in 1999, and it teeturedfeature at trump's trip to california where he tried to build support among members of the reform party for a possible presidential bid. here was the reaction to the sales pitch, plus something
trump said 19 years ago that he famously echoed during the 2016 campaign. take a look. >> i was disappointed because i felt that he -- i felt he was very attacking of other members of the party, which i thought was very disrespectful. >> i think he came. i think you heard what he had to say, and we're excited. >> i think he's a con man and ought to go back to new york. >> why? >> because he's coming out here, just trying to destroy our party. that's the way i look at it. >> the way trump looks at it, he is at least better than everyone else in the race beginning with john mccain. >> i mean he was captured. >> and you flew combat missions. >> does being captured make you a hero? i don't know, i'm not sure. >> wow. jake sherman, so we thought it was the first time he said it in the past few years. it is a horrific thing to say, and it seems like the public's relationship with trump has really transformed as his presence, obviously, has become all the more serious on the
world stage. but he said it so many years ago. >> yeah. i'm glad my youtube fishing is good for something. yeah, no, it is obviously fascinating, and the president has, despite people urging him in his party, he has continued to throw shade at john mccain about his vote last year, about a year ago right now, against repealing the health care law. so it has been something, obviously a consistent thread, his disdain for john mccain going back to 1999 when he first thought about running for president. >> you know, willie, this bears repeating. donald trump dodged the draft. he got, what, four, five deferments. >> for his little feet. >> for bone spurs. you know, those little feet, it is hard to carry around all of that weight i guess. he's got bone spurs. but he is sitting there, making fun of a man who was flying very early in the war, got shot down
on combat missions. i know a lot of great american heroes like bud day who did and a lot of other great men who did during the vietnam war, and, you know, he carries those scars to this day. again, as everybody knows but it has to be repeated again, the north vietnamese were going to let john mccain leave and go home because his father was an important man in the united states military, and he refused. he wouldn't go until the rest of his band of brothers said, until they allowed all of them to go, and he didn't do it. he stayed there. he stayed behind. >> i hadn't seen that clip from 1999. i thought when we heard it from on that stage three years ago during the presidential campaign it was maybe something impulsive that he came out with in reaction to john mccain, but apparently it is a deeply-held belief he has had for 20 years
or so now. yeah, of course, all of the things you have said are true, and a side-by-side comparison of the two men is preposterous. remember, at that moment when he said it during the campaign that was one where we all said by conventional rules of politics this guy is in trouble. the front page of the "new york post" said this guy was finished. when he survived that and his numbers went up after that, that was one of the first signs we had that his candidacy would be different from all of the others. >> coming up on "morning joe", a live report from ohio where the polls are open in a special election. will a perceived gaffe have an impact. steve kornacki will join us with his live analysis next on "morning joe."
ohio's 12th congressional district and polls show the race is now in a dead heat. with us from columbus, ohio, msnbc correspondent garett haack. what can we expect today? we expect a close race which is news worthy. it is a district donald trump won by 11 points. it used to be won in the mid 60s. we expect a single-digit race with the possibility that a democrat could represent this district here, basically suburbs and exurbs around columbus, ohio, for the first time in my lifetime and for the first time in his lifetime. the democratic candidate here is only 31 years old. what you have here is this relatively familiar formula we've seen in some of the special elections where you have the president has essentially opened the door here by firing up a democratic base who just doesn't like him and hasn't had
much to be excited about here in a very long time, and democrats hope by turning off some of the moderate republicans, this is typical john kasich, mitt romney, john mccain territory here. i have been talking to some of the voters who say they really can't get behind trump, and that lingers. that sort of has this overhang on troy balderson, the republican candidate here. danny o'connor had all of the momentum. he got help last night in the form of a good old-fashioned campaign gaffe by balderson who was on the stump, last event of the day. he said, we don't want somebody from franklin county representing us here. he was in one of the more rural parts of the state. frankl franklin county is the biggest county in the state. democrats seize on it. balderson tried to clean it up this morning. >> i'm excited about the day, excited to represent the 12 it congressional district. it is a big day and we worked hard to get here. at american pride last night did you say you didn't want someone from franklin county? >> i'm going to work for this
whole congressional district is what i'm going to work for. >> do you want to elaborate on that at all? >> i'm going to work for the whole district. >> all right. >> we will go anywhere and talk to issues that matter around the kitchen table, how you save for retirement and health costs. there's no community i won't address. >> this guy is going to win. >> reporter: yeah, that's danny o'connor at the end of this. he has to play error-free baseball to win in a district like this, but he has run a tight campaign. republicans got excited when he appeared to walk back the pledge not to vote for nancy pelosi for speaker should he get elected. he came back out and said, absolutely i'm not going to support her. he has kept his distance from everything washington, and it seems to be working for him, but, again, it will be very close tonight. >> thanks so much. greatly appreciate it. it looks like a fascinating race there. willie geist saying that, well,
basically disrespecting franklin county would be a lot like starting your presidential campaign saying, you know what? we're going to win this race for president and we sure as heck don't need any of those iowa people helping us or any of those new hampshire goons representing us. >> it turns out franklin county is where most of the people are. national political correspondent and msnbc, steve kornacki. you will be at the big board tonight for the special election. >> yes. >> as garett said, the president won this district by 11 points but lost franklin county. >> it is never smart for a politician to sound that way, but interesting when you get someone like balderson bashing the franklin county part, it speaks to a massive cultural in
2016 political divide in the district and mirrors the country. you seen the far eastern part of the district, that's where balderson is from, what he represents. culturally, it is light years from columbus and the immediate columbus suburbs. you see a third of the voters are in that geographically hard part that swung hard against donald trump. it was virtually a tie in 2012, franklin county right there, it was virtually a tie. it turned into a 20-point clinton win in 2016. that's the part of the country, the up scale, college-educated, suburban, white collar professional. they don't like trump. muskegon county where balderson is from, that's the other part of the country we talk about. in 2012 barack obama won that portion of the district over mitt romney. four years later, donald trump by nearly 30 points takes it. >> incredible. >> that huge swing we saw in that part of the country is embodied by that half of the district. it is almost the population, it is not quite 50/50, but it is
close to an even split in the district. you are getting a measure of the two erk inamerica, a measure of they reacted to trump after two years and a measure of the enthusiasm tonight. >> boy, steve, what a measurement, and it is a microcosm of the republican party's problems. i had relatives from columbus in arlington heights and been there time and time again. that is the center of america. it is the heartbeat of america, and that -- i mean growing up, all of my relatives there were the most republican of republicans. like as rock-ribbed, red republican as it gets. that's just not the case anymore. i mean they voted for mccain, they voted for romney, they loved reagan, they voted for w., and none of my relatives that i know there, all of these lifelong republicans voted for trump. >> and you're talking about the area close to columbus, you could add the name john kasich
for congress two districts. this was his district or a version of the 12th district. but what you are describing is the change demographically, the change culturally in the republican party based on the appeal of donald trump, based on the backlash to donald trump. it is really embodied in this district. we talked about donald trump doing worse really than any republican we had ever seen in 2016 with suburban, traditionally republican voters. folks that vote the pocketbook a lot, maybe more cultural centrist, they tend not to like taxes, that's columbus and the immediate suburbs around columbus. as we see in many ways they were repelled by donald trump. delaware county is a big suburban area that donald trump carried in 2016, but mitt romney was well over 20 point, trump got it by 16 points in 2016 and the flip side is the appeal donald trump has. it is that blue collar, non-college white we talked
about, ohio, pennsylvania, michigan, the eastern part of this district, like zansville, that's the heart of the trump surge in 2016. are we still seeing evidence of that trump surge or are we seeing evidence that the voters two years in are willing to go back towards the democrats? >> this could be fascinating. in a moment i'm going to read an interview that was done with paul ryan for the ""new york times"" magazine. let's stay in ohio. i'm looking at the president's tweets about the special election there. are people on twitter responding, you know, in kind to the president's outreach for this candidate? >> well, i think what we're seeing is that there are people who are still trump supporters, who excited about the fact that he uses twitter. they think it is his personal. they see him as brash. i have been in ohio and a lot of people that voted for him looked at him as a wild card, looked at him as someone who could be great for the country or sink us
all. i think now that they've had a year and a half, two years to look at the president to see how it operates as president, we'll figure out whether or not the people think that the economy the president keeps talking about is trickling down and helping their wages, while unemployment rates are historically low wages are still pretty low and people have a lot of bills they're trying to pay, that they hope the president can help them do that. i think it is going to come down to whether or not they like the president's personality because obviously he has been as brash as ever. >> you know, mika, she is so right. so much of donald trump's support or opposition is personal-driven. we're hearing more and more, i told you i talked to the three or four trump supporters this past weekend and just sat and lessened, a listened, and to a man they said, i don't like the guy, he is a jerk, i wouldn't want him at my house, but, hey, he is going to shake things up and i'm
supporting him because the economy is going well. this morning in the paper someone interviewed republicans in the district, knocked on a door and a woman came out who said, i supported trump but i hate him, i can't stand the guy. there's a lingering question on whether she will be voting republican tonight or voting democratic. again, in off-year elections so much is driven by intensity, getting people out to vote for a candidate. it is just -- you just wonder how compelling the case is to get out and vote for a republican when you have a president you support but you don't like. >> yeah. as i mentioned, joe, take a look at this. mark levovic posted a new profile of speaker paul ryan for "the new york times" magazine. it is entitled, this is the way paul ryan's speakership ends. in it, mark writes in part, quote, ryan made a determination after trump's election that to defy the president too forcefully would invite a
counter reaction. he tends to speak of the commander in chief as if he were sharing a coping strategy on dealing with a ritalin-deprived child. ryan prefers to tell trump how he feels in private. he joins a large group of trump's allies, many of whom who have worked in the administration, who insist they've shaped trump's thinking and behavior in private. the, trust-me-i've-stopped-this-from- being-worse approach. i can look myself in the mirror and say, i avoided that tragedy, i avoided this tragedy, i advanced this goal, i advanced this goal. i locked in on the world tragedy. it sets the mind reeling as to what thwarted tragedies ryan might be talking about. i asked for an example. no, i don't want to do that, ryan replied, that's more than i usually say. what's he talking about?
>> willie, if you are a conservative, you look and see a guy who made a fool of himself in north korea. claimed that he was going to hold the north koreans accountable. their nuclear program and their missile program is moving forward more quickly than it was even under barack obama. you look at outreach to vladimir putin. he has completely scrapped america's vision of europe and america's vision of the world and repelling vladimir putin. he has backed down time and again. the biggest deficits ever, the biggest spending sprees ever, the biggest national death ever, the things that paul ryan supposedly stood for. i'm not exactly sure what tragedies have been averted. >> well, he got his tax cut at the end of last year and he stood there and applauded with other republicans. that was the goal of at least going along with a lot of what president trump was doing that they didn't like so they could
achieve their legislative ends. but as joe says, these are core questions to a conservative like paul ryan, exploding deficits, these tariffs. he is on his way out of the door. you might think in an interview like this he might be more forthcoming in his thoughts over donald trump. what will paul ryan's legacy be in the next couple of years dealing with the president? >> paul ryan's legacy will be one of weakness. to joe's point, this is a man who espoused a strong belief in free trade, and you look at what donald trump is doing with the various trade wars he is engaging in. it falls hollow to say, oh, we averted this tragedy, we stopped this, we stopped that, you just have no idea what we're doing in private but we can't give you an example. it reminds me of ivanka trump's language. you could substitute her for her excuses for her father's
behavior, claiming she is influential in private but can't speak out in public. we see how donald trump respond to what is on television, respond to what is in the press. he cares about public critique. it is an incredibly weak tact for the so-called allies to fall back on that excuse. >> the argument we have heard from speaker ryan and ots is he had a job as speaker of the house to keep his delegation together, to keep republicans together, to achieve goals like the tax cut. we wondered time and again why he wouldn't occasionally step to the bank of the microphones and criticize the president or, when appropriate, to go after a policy or decision or comment that the president has made. our reporters follows these guys and women around the capital, they just look exhausted by the questions, responding to the daily tweet by the president. >> i think paul ryan as the leader reflect the psychology of what is made by every member of congress, and that is they look
back to their districts and look back in most cases to being more afraid of a republican primary challenge than of a general election opponent. >> except he didn't have one. he's on his way out. >> yeah, and, again, paul ryan talking about tragedies being averted, you have the biggest national debt ever, the biggest spending bill ever over the past year, the most protectionist president since hoover. you could go down the list, all of the racist statements, on and on, children at the border being seized from their mothers. what tragedies could have been averted? how could this have been worse? >> well, i think that's the key question, and paul ryan is really the only person and maybe other republicans in the room, are the only ones that can vouch for whether or not paul ryan was able to actually change this president's mind. from my reporting it seems as though there are people who come
in and try to influence the president, and time and time again if it is john kelly, reince priebus, sean spicer, all of these people come in thinking they will be the reminds everybody he's president and he's his own communications director. he's going to do what he wants to do. it's really hard for me to figure out what paul ryan is talking about without him being very clear. >> it makes no sense. i think when you are on the issues of racism and bigotry and abuse of children. if you can't have a voice, whether you're a democrat or a republican, you need to leave washington now. if you can't share your opinion on that, if you're too afraid, why are you there? steve kornacki and amesh, thank you. up next, one of the biggest concert events in the fall is weeks away. we'll explain.
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♪i believe, i really do believe that♪ ♪something's got a hold on me, yeah♪ ♪oh, it must be love ♪oh, something's got a hold on me right now, child♪ ♪oh, it must be love ♪let me tell you now, oh it must be love♪ the global citizen festival returning to central park on september 29. taking the stage this year, janet jackson, the weekend, cardy b and jamel monet.
hugh jackman will host. joining us now, the ceo of global citizen. this year's festival presented by citi which has within a long and proud partner. let's start with the ad budget first of all. the back page of "the new york times." another incredible lineup. the music is always great. it's sort of just to get a lot of eyeballs and people hearing the message. >> this is a hugely important year for us. obviously we lead into the midterms coming up in november so we're going to be encouraging young people to take action. we're going to be attacking some of the most important global issues of our time. we're going to be focusing on women's economic empowerment. making sure the 260 million
children out of school get adequate financing to get back into school. >> we focus on this almost every year. the white house proposing aid cuts which are so important around the world. >> we know that currently the united states gives about 1% of its budget in foreign aid. we want to resist any proposals to cut foreign aid. we've got great bipartisan support. have said, you know, across the board we don't want to see foreign aid cuts because we know the three legs of the school of international development are development, diplomacy and defense and we can't just invest in defense. we also need to invest in development and we need to make sure we have a safe world for the future. >> joe, i know you'll be screaming like a teenage girl for sean mendez, front row. >> always will. i'll be throwing my tie on stage. and anything else that may come
off during those heated moments. >> oh, please. >> you've focused for years on extreme poverty. there's obviously great challenges with budget cuts, 32% budget cuts here. also though, you're not just challenging the united states, you're challenging europe to step forward, to lean in, to continue the battle against extreme poverty. talk about how important that is. also talk about the games that have been made since five years ago, since you began this battle against extreme poverty worldwide. >> well, i should start by saying that global citizen is one part of a much broader movement that is embodied in the united states sustainable development goals. designed to end extreme poverty, tackle climate change and reduce inequality. so many great organizations around the world are at the forefront of combating the scourge of extreme poverty. since global citizen started seven years ago, millions of
actions have been taken, leading to over $37 billion announced on global citizen stages that will affect the lives of some 2 billion people by 2030 so we're really proud of the impact that's been had. in fact, in my lifetime, extreme poverty is halved from 62% of the world's population, down to less than 10%. but there are still 750 million people living in extreme poverty which is far too many in this world of plenty. >> jennifer, as i said, citi's been there from the beginning. what's the role of a large private company like yours in this fight against global poverty? >> we've been partnered are hugh and his team at global citizen for years since the inception. and for us, it's just -- it's critically important that as a brand and as a large company that we're standing for issues that matter, that have impact. and, again, with global citizen,
the partnership's been very powerful and long standing. given that we share some common goals and collective goals. enabling progress has been a mission that citi's stood for for almost two centuries. working with global citizen allows us to amplify that message. >> not a bad partner sitting next to you. >> no, not a bad partner. >> literally citi's been with us since the very beginning. thank you. >> we're happy to be along for this journey. >> msnbc exclusively will air the global citizen festival saturday september 29th at 3:00 p.m. eastern. you can go to nbcnews.com/global citizen to learn how you can take action yourself and earn points for free tickets to that big and excellent concert in new york city coming up next month. hugh, jennifer, thank you so much for what you're doing. mika. >> absolutely wonderful. and as we close the show, we