With joe biden and cory booker. Ill talk to dnc chairman tom perez about that and about the democrats mustwin governors race in virginia on tuesday. This is ned brooks inviting you to meet the press. And celebrating the 70 years of meet the press sf. I have no doubt id beat mr. Nixon. Elections matter. I think votes matter. The elections, the president s, the candidates and the news makers who have made history right here on meet the press. Joining me no insight and analysis are nbc special correspondent tom brokaw, peggy noonan, Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson and nbc news capitol hill correspondent kasie hunt. Welcome to sunday for 70 years and counting, its meet the press. From nbc news in washington, the longestrunning show in Television History celebrates i ing its 70th year. Good sunday morning. Welcome to our anniversary broadcast. 70 years ago tomorrow at 8 00 p. M. That the first moderator of meet the press, mara roundtree brought viewers what we call Americas Press conference of the air. It was brought to you by Maxwell House coffee. Good to the last drop. A long time political aide to fdr and a former chairman of the Democratic National committee. We have the current dnc on the todays broadcast, by the way. Throughout the morning well bring you some of the familiar faces who have appeared on this the longest running broadcast in Television History. We have a job to do and we begin with the russia investigation and the walls closing in on people close to the Trump Campaign and the white house. The more weve learned about the trump teams ties to russia, the more people in the president s circle have changed their stories. Attorney general Jeff Sessions, former National Security adviser mike flynn, mr. Trumps soninlaw jared kushner, his oldest son donald trump jr. And Foreign Policy advisers carter page, j. D. Gordon and George Papadopoulos, whose pled guilty to lying to the fbi. In fact, it was papadopoulos guilty plea in particular, along with two other indictments this week by special counsel Robert Mueller, that seemed to unnerve the white house and to prompt President Trump to lash out at his own Justice Department. Im really not involved with the Justice Department. Id like to let it run itself, but honestly they should be looking at the democrats. As the special counsels russia probe begins to put pressure on mr. Trumps inner circle, the president is stepping up his attacks on law enforcement. The saddest thing is that because im the president of the United States i at not supposed to be involved with the Justice Department. Im not supposed to be involved with the fbi. Im not supposed to be doing the kind of things that i would love to be doing, and im very frustrated by it. After Robert Mueller unveiled his first criminal charges this week against mr. Trumps former Campaign Chairman and two other former aides, mr. Trump lashed out in a flurry of tweets. Everybody is asking why the Justice Department and fbi isnt looking into all of the dishonesty going on with crooked hillary and the dems. All i can tell you is this, there was no collusion, there was no nothing. Its a disgrace, frankly, that they continue. Meanwhile, the number of contacts between the Trump Campaign and the russians continues to grow. And stories keep shifting. Trump Campaign Volunteer adviser George Papadopoulos pled guilty to lying to the fbi by denying he was involved with the campaign in april 2016. When he was offered, quote, dirt on the Hillary Clinton. Including thousands of emails by russian contacts. Mr. Trump once praised papadopoulos. George papadopoulos, hes an oil and energy consultant. Excellent guy. But though the president frequently boasts about his memory, including last week one of the great memories of all time. The president now says he has trouble remembering a march 2016 meeting at which papadopoulos floated the idea of a campaign sitdown with Vladimir Putin which never occurred. I dont remember much about that meeting. It was a very unimportant meeting. It took place a long time. Youth Campaign Adviser j. D. Gordon who was also in the room tells nbc that mr. Trump listened with interest but then senator Jeff Sessions, who is now attorney general, opposed the idea. This new information contradicts statements by the president. Can you say whether you are aware that anyone who advised your campaign had contacts with russia during the course of the election . No, nobody that i know of. And it contradicts what sessions has told congress under oath. You dont believe that surrogates from the Trump Campaign had communications with the russians . Is that what youre saying . I did not and im not aware of anyone else that did. Joining me now is the democratic senator from virginia mark warner. Hes vice chair of the Senate Intelligence committee. Senator warner, welcome back to meet the press. Thank you, chuck. First of all, congratulations to you. You and your team for 70 great years of journalism. That i appreciate. Hopefully well be here for another 70. Let me start with what we learned this week or what you learned this week from the special counsels indictments. Do you believe that the fact that weve already seen some stories change this week or Additional Information about either contacts with russians or ideas of meeting with russians, do you feel like thats all coming from the indictments, that this is the impact of those first indictments from the special counsel . Well, the committee itself has been aware of some of this information and weve been continuing to work. I know youre going to have my friend James Lankford on later. Im very proud, our committee is the only Bipartisan Group still looking at this. What we did see this week, though, was one more example of at least where the russians had what appeared to be a fairly organized effort in terms of trying to reach out to folks affiliated with the Trump Campaign to share, quote, unquote, dirt on emails about Hillary Clinton. Weve seen it with the case of mr. Papadopoulos. We saw it in the case of the socalled june 9th meeting with donald trump jr. Weve got a lot more questions to get answered. Weve got a number of other individuals that were going to want to interview. Our effort is separate obviously from the special prosecutors, but i think were both proceeding ahead. But im curious, does the threat of more indictments to come, which im sure many folks believe is happening inside the Mueller Probe, probably you expect them as well. Is that going to make folks more cooperative with your investigation or do you fear now that because the Mueller Probe is intensifying that the fear of legal jeopardy will actually make them clam up with you . Well, weve actually interviewed literally a couple hundred individuals. Many times without actually even the knowledge of the press. Weve worked with a lot of these individuals cooperatively. Weve got more to do. Obviously muellers got a different lane and as people fall into the realm of legal jeopardy, they may be less willing to talk to us, but ive been very pleased so far in terms of the level of cooperation weve had from virtually everyone. Is there a point, though, where youre going to run into each other . Listen, just as we if you look back in the days of the watergate, there was a special congressional committee. There was also a special prosecutor. Yeah. Weve got different lanes. You know, theyre looking for criminal indictment. Were trying to make sure that we find out what happened in 2016. Was there collusion . Weve got a different factual basis that were trying to hit at and i think were going to have to find ways to deconflict and i think we will do that. Have you interviewed George Papadopoulos . Listen, im not going to talk about which witnesses that weve seen or not seen, but the chairman and i did indicate that mr. Papadopoulos had been on our screen for a long time. Okay. So youre not confirming or denying whether youve interviewed him . Again, what the chairman and i have said is we dont comment on specific witnesses, but we put out a joint statement that mr. Papadopoulos had been on our screen for a long time. Let me ask you about former National Security adviser Michael Flynn and his son michael g. Flynn. I know there were reports that your committee was meeting resistance from them when it comes to cooperating with your investigation. Are you still meeting that same resistance with the two of them . Chuck, again, the way we get the kind of cooperation with the witnesses is frankly to not share the kind of weekly box score of who weve seen and who weve not seen. Weve got a lot of folks that we have seen. Weve got more folks that we need to. At the end of the day, what we owe the American People is the truth, and most importantly how we make sure that we dont have a foreign power and a foreign power like russia intervene again in our elections. Thats really important, whether its the potential issue as round collusion or the kind of questions weve seen in terms of interference with 21 states electrical syste electoral systems. Let me quickly ask you about the steele dossier. Youre the chair, your partner there republican senator richard burr said youve hit a brick wall on the steele dossier. You confirmed or have been able to rebuild it i think it what he said going back to june. But youd hit a brick wall in part because you havent been able to speak to mr. Steele. Have you still hit that brick wall or have you broken through it . Listen, the steele dossier, there has been a lot of interest in who paid for it. Weve got information now there were republican payments, democrat payments. At the end of the day, what i want to know and the whats true in the steele dossier and whats not true. This is a fairly damning indictment and i wish mr. Steele would talk to our committee. Weve reached out. Hes refused to do so, so far. We hold out the option that the chairman and i have said well meet him any place, anywhere. I want to ask you something about the Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell said about social media companies. I know you want to try to come up with some legislation that makes advertising more transparent. Listen to an idea he brought up with hugh hewitt on saturday. What we ought to do with regard to the russians is retaliate. Seriously, retaliate against the russians. And the these tech firms could be helpful in giving us a way to do that. What do you think of that idea . Getting the Tech Companies to cooperate in a retaliatory strike of some sort against the russians . Well, chuck, i actually agree with the majority leader that we need a cyber doctrine for a long time i think we have had incoming whether it was russians, chinese, others where weve had cyber attacks, misinformation, disinformation attacks. We need to have both defense and offensive capabilities. But i also believe we need to make sure that we apply at least the lightest touch possible. I was in the tech business for 20 years. Im protech, im proinnovation, but i think at the basics we ought to make sure when were receiving political advertising these companies would work with us to identify if a foreign power is behind that advertising. Think americans have a right to know. All right. Senator warner, i have to leave it there for time. Thanks for coming on. Thank you chuck. Joining me now is republican senator James Lankford of oklahoma. He too is also a member of the intelligence committee. Senator lankford, welcome to meet the press, sir. Good morning. You dont look a day over 60 honestly. Im surprised youre there for 70 years. Well, were benjamin button here. Were growing older as we get younger. Let me ask you this, its a similar question to what i asked senator warner. At what point are you concerned that the special counsels investigation gets in the way of your investigation . Im actually not concerned about that at all. We have individual lanes. We have deconfliction that happens regular. Theyre focused on criminal investigations. Were focused on armchair quarterbacking, making sure every witness has been seen and were going through the policy aspects. Longterm we have policy issues how we handle elections, how we handle social media, how were handling classified information and that is getting out in the public sfeef. The special counsel has things that he will uniquely work on as well. About a month ago on mtp daily i ask you do to define collusion and you said its an issue of did any American Work with a foreign power to be able to influence our election . Thats the key question that still has to be resolved. The George Papadopoulos news and guilty plea on lying to the fbi and at least making contact with a russian, at that point do you look at that as attempted collusion . Well, what i look at that is actually no surprise in this. The russians were reaching out trying to find some way to influence it. The big challenge that i mentioned at tat time was an american reaching back and trying to engage with that. Thats something that George Papadopoulos told the fbi he had not participated in that obviously the russians reached out to them. He seemed to reach back out to them and say, okay, sure, id be very interested in that. Now the next challenge is did anyone else from the campaign do that . He was a volunteer. He seemed to advertise himself around the world for being more fluent in the campaign than he was and it looks line the russians took the bait on that. I know youve been trying to get information out of both the National Security adviser mike flynn and his son mike flynn jr. What role do you believe mike flynn jr. May play in this investigation . Thats actually what were going to try to ask and find out. We want to be engaged in all areas of that and ask them both every question we can possibly get out. As you and i have talked about before, a lot of americans are going to say did you ask this person that question . Were going to make sure that gets out. Are they being cooperative . Im going to leave that up to the chairman and the vice chairman to be able to determine how cooperative theyve been in coming in and out. There is a lot with any investigation where we build a lot of information before you meet with the final principal so you have the right questions to ask at the right time. I want to ask you about a group of House Republicans that is pushing for bob muellers resignation. Its only three strong today, but given the narrative being pushed more aggressively than ever about democrats needing to be investigated here. How concerned are you that mueller will be ousted before his work is done . Maybe the president is upset. Maybe it becomes some congressional resolution. Is that something that should be discussed . Thats thats not a threat at this point. Bob mueller needs to be able to finish his investigation. The challenge of any investigation like this is how long it could go on and how broad it could be. Again, you go back to the Reagan Administration, that special counsel was in place for six years. They extended even past the Reagan Administration being in office. We dont want to see that but i do think bob mueller needs to be able to do his investigation, do it independently, stay in mace, use the resources he has as he gets to all the facts. Do you think Congress Needs to sort of codify his role to protect him . No, i dont. There has been a lot of back and forth to say at some point the president said he needs to he doesnt need to be there. I dont think thats the white house position. The white house has said over and over again they have no desire to push him out. That shouldnt be an action of congress as well. Lets let him finish his job. I want to get your action to the frustration i guess that the president cant order the Justice Department to do an investigation or cant order the fbi to do it. These attacks on the Justice Department, are they proper and what is your reaction to it . I think its a natural reaction of a president who doesnt have a political background on it. I understand that fullwell. I dont either on that. Hes stepping in and saying, hey, thats not my role. Theyve got to do their job. We hat similar conversations when president obama dressed down the supreme court. When he made comments to the fcc and the fcc was an independent body. I think this is a natural reaction. President trump says it a little bit more blunt. President obama was a little more nuanced but he also spoke about independent agencies and spoke about the court. Well allow the president to be the president. I want to ask you about the attorney general, though. At least one time hes been caught misleading under oath. There are some questions whether he did it a second