Who have served this country and lost their lives fighting in the nations wars. It is his first day home since his nineday trip oversea, a viszity that did not sit well with Angela Merkel making waves saying this. Translator the times when we could completely count on others, they are over to a certain extent. Ive experienced this in the last few days, and that is why i can only say that we europeans must really take our fate into our own hands. Merkels spokesman added context to the remarks. Fred pleitgen is live in london with more. How do you read this . That was a startling statement from one of our biggest allies and her spokesperson seemed to walk it back a little bit. Im not sure hes walking back but stephen ze ibert the spokesman for Angela Merkel. Those who have accompanied chancellor merkel journalistically for a long time know how important the german american relations. Theyre a pillar of our Foreign Policy and germany will continue to work on and strengthen those relationships. So on the one hand hes clarifying her remarks but i do still think Angela Merkel does feel very or quite alienated by President Trump and some of the things she heard at the g7 summit in europe, some of the things he said about germany where he felt germany was bad for exporting so many cars to america but also some of the things that he said about nato allies leads Angela Merkel to believe maybe the u. S. Cannot be trusted at this point or with the administration the way it could in the past or doesnt have germanys back the way it did in the past. Poppy . Right, and you heard those stark remarks that were opposite of one another when we saw them speak at the nato headquarters prompting what merkel said. Heres the thing. She is sort of the polar opposite of President Trump when it comes to temperament and the Washington Post put it this way highly cautious, the speech is not an impulse move. This is something that was calculated. Ive been covering Angela Merkel since 2000. Ive known her since she was an Opposition Leader in germany. She was reserved and calculated, a doctor of physics and not someone who comes out with off the cuff remarks she hasnt thought through. Shes currently in an Election Campaign but so far ahead of the polls that no one really believes shes actually in line to lose this election. She will have not done this in sense of being in the Election Campaign she would have calculated this, we need deeper ties with europe and give a warning to the u. S. As well that germany is feeling alienated at this point. Fred pleitgen thank you very much. President trump returned to washington over the weekend. He left behind bruised alliances overseas and landed home in a pretty deep crisis. During those nine days he was gone much of the focus especially at the latter end of the trip was on his soninlaw Jared Kushner and reports he tried to set up the secret backchannel to communicate with the russians, with the kremlin. The white house is scrambling to defend those actions and contain the fallout. Athena jones is live at the white house with more. Last night finally after the trump team said were not going to comment, not going to acknowledge that, the president did give a statement to the new york times. Hi poppy. Thats right he did and part of what the statement says is jared is doing a great job for the country. I have total confidence in him. The president went on to say that kushner is respected by virtually everyone, and hes a good person, working on projects to save the u. S. A lot of money, but this is clearly a story line just the latest in a series of bombshell reports that is raising eyebrows and raising concerns among people certainly outside the white house. You have a former intelligence officials like Michael Hayden, who was the former director of a National Security agency who said this move, this reported move by kushner was off the map, not something hes ever, no other experience hes seen in our history or certainly in his lifetime. Meanwhile you have democrats on capitol hill, folks like adam schiff, the top democrat on the House Intelligence Committee who are also raising concerns and folks like Homeland Security secretary john kelly trying to defend kushners move saying its not a big deal. Take a listen to what schiff and then kelly had to say exactly. If these allegations are true and he had discussions with the russians about establishing a back channel and didnt reveal that, thats a real problem in terms of whether he should maintain that security clearance. I dont see any big issue here. My line of communication to a country like russia is a good thing. Reporter its not surprising to hear Homeland Security secretary defending Jared Kushner but this is going to raise a lot more questions on capitol hill to add to the long list of questions investigators already have about this entire russia issue. Poppy . Thank you very much. Ath athena jones at the white house. Is this off the map or what kelly just described. Julian zelezer, analyst and historian and professor at princetop university, david rhode, and salina zita cnn contributor. How normal is aa backchannel. It has worked before. How normal is it . The line seems to be this is much ado about nothing. Whats totally abnormal he was talking about using a russian Government Communication system to secretly go into the russian diplomatic facility and use that, thats extraordinary, very strange and i think alarming. Its the way its reported by us, by the Washington Post. So you feel more safe and secure with the russian government and their Communication System than the rest of the American Government . What are you trying to hide in. The the Washington Post and the team point out perhaps this is false and not true and the russians were planting this to see if the u. S. Was listening in on that line. Thats a possibility. It could be disinformation but we have the pattern of kushner not disclosing his meetings with the russians. Reuters reported friday two calls between kushner and kislyak he has not disclosed so its a pattern. And reuters cites seven different former and current u. S. Officials. Julian, you wrote an oped, is this the nixon card . There was a back channel in the Nixon Administration to russia before the august nation and it was successful. You ended up with the Nuclear Arms Agreement or this can be more akin to an affair. So the positive story is that under Richard NixonHenry Kissinger would conduct negotiations in a backchannel with the soviet ambassador. Even before he took over as president nixionnixon, and it culminates in this Historic Arms agreement in 1972. The other backchannel though was in the middle of the campaign, people connected to the nixon campaign, told the south vietnamese dont enter into a deal to end the vietnam war. Youll get a better deal with Richard Nixon as president. Lyndon johnson heard about this, he said it was treason but he never said that publicly. So we dont know which comparison is more apt. Selena to you, switching gears here the president comes back from the trip overseas and calls it a gate success with big results. He doesnt hold one press conference so we can ask questions so we have to follow his tweets as his thoughts on this one, and then chancellor Angela Merkel comes out and says the times when we could completely rely on others to an extent are over. She didnt need to say President Trumps name or the United States to make very clear who and what she was talking about. This is a president who ran on an America First platform. Is this what they want . Yes, it is. I just came back from seven different states in the past two weeks, and this, for chancellor merkel to say this, the voters that put him into office would be like whats the big deal . No, they shouldnt have to rely on us all the time, because weve got to focus on our own domestic problems that are affecting our lives and affecting our communities, and thats what he ran on and thats what hes important to us. Lot of his voters i talked to, even ones who did not support him and sat out the election viewed this trip as successful in that he went there, he spoke strongly, a lot of people are not going to agree with what he said, but he did what he said he was going to do in terms of talking about nato, and talking in his decision or indecision on the paris accord, and a lot of sort of voters that supported him look at this as a successful trip. You have to remember, though, david rhode, whose hand this plays into. Growing discord between the United States and our biggest allies in western europe plays into Vladimir Putins hand. He has a meeting with french president macron today. If youre sitting in the kremlin looking at this, are you happy about it . This is what putin has been trying to achieve since he took over. For years and years there is discord but again people, his voters vote trumps voters wanted this, this is no surprise, two years of him talking about a distance from nato, and then a closeness i think to authoritarians, to putin and others. But at the same time julian could you flip the card and look on the other side. If trumps rhetoric and lecturing of our nato allies gets them to pay more finally if hes a president who succeeds at doing that, then that will be a stronger nato against russia. But its not clear thats how it will play out. Many members of nato unhappy with his rhetoric w his demeanor, with these kind of moments and the irony is obviously if this alliance weakens, america wont be stronger as President Trump promised, it will actually be weaker against adversaries such as russia. So im not sure voters thought out all the consequences of how this could play out. So since hes returned home, selena, he has tweeted the president , five times, i was counting them this morning, about what he deems to be the fake media. He has used that word five times in all of these different tweets, okay . He didnt hold a press conference as i said so we have to read this as what is top of mind for him because we cant ask him any questions right now. Right. What is the strategy here . You come back from this Huge International trip and you talk most about your typical line about the fake media. I dont understand the strategy. Well, i think it would be in his best interests as difficult and tough and as questions that have nothing to do with the event would have hit him, it would have been in his best interests to go out and face the press. You know, there are questions that he hes his best advocate and theres a school of thought, im just going to use twitter as a way to get past the press and thats okay maybe here and there, but its important for the president to take the hard questions, to face the information that the American Public wants and you know, hes able to tell his own story, and the press is also able to pull out how he feels about things, not only on the trip, but also the problems that hes facing at home. Thats true, because we and everyone else would have ka areried that press conference life in its entirety. Its not like it would be edited down and he could tell his story. Selena thank you very much. Julian and david we appreciate it. Overnight north korea firing off yet another missile test, this is the third in as many weeks. How the u. S. Is responding. The president just tweeted about it. Also get ready for tighter security at the airport, the Homeland Security secretary says u. S. Planes are still a top target for terrorists. And a live look right now this morning on this memorial day at Arlington National cemetery, where we are honoring those who have died, given the ultimate price, paid the ultimate price serving for this country. The president is set to speak there a little later this morning. Well take you there live. Stay with us. Bp engineered a fleet of 32 brand new ships with advanced technology, so we can make sure oil and gas get where they need to go safely. Because safety is never being satisfied. And always working to be better. Okay, i picked out my dream car. Nows the really fun part. Choosing the color, the wheels, the interior, everything exactly how i want it. Heres the thing just because i configured this car online doesnt mean it really exists at a dealership, but with truecar, i get real pricing on actual cars in my area. 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This is the third test in as many weeks but what is significant about it . Is it different from the others . Does it show an advancement . Not really. This is a scud missile that north korea launched, it flew less than 300 miles, it landed in japans exclusive economic zone, those are waters close to the west coast of japan, which of course is infuriating for the Prime Minister here in tokyo, who promised concrete action against the north korean regime led by kim jongun. What does concrete action mean . What can the United States, japan and south korea do that they havent done over the last decade or longer to stop north korea from launching these missiles . The answer is poppy, not a whole lot. The pressure is on china, why you saw that tweet from President Trump once again talking about china doing its best to rein in north korea but we dont know what that is. China stopped buying coal from north korea but trade with north korea and china was up 40 at the beginning of this year. I saw a lot of evidence of chinese products on store shelves, chinese cars on the roads in north korea when i was there last month. This is an economic relationship that continues, and beijing really cant dispute the fact, poppy, that chinese money billions of chinese dollars are going into this economy and helping north korea continue to develop the weapons and test them time and time again, week after week. No question. That relationship, the economic ties are strong and the banking relationship between north korea and china is a big, big part of this. Will ripley thank you for the reporting. Joining me on set is democratic congressman Gregory Meeks of new york, he sits on the Foreign Affairs committee. Lets start with the north korea and the Bigger Picture to get your response to Angela Merkels comments. You were in south korea not that long ago and the last time you were on the show with me and john, you said that north korea had, china has not done enough, we have not seen enough from china. What is it that you want to see that you this i this administration isnt doing to stop the economic support that were seeing for north korea from china. I think the report just earlier speaks to that. And you look at some of the parts that are being utilized for these weapons, et cetera, they come from china. And china has historically used north korea as a buffer. So that it does not want the United States involvement for example with the north china seas, et cetera. Weve got to have some tough economic conversations with china ourselves. Wouldnt you say this president is being tougher on china at least in terms of rhetoric, than his predecessor, than president owe ba marx when it comes to dealing with the north korea situation or is there something you saw in the Obama Administration you think the Trump Administration isnt doing . I think that what you see with this administration, theyre trying to, theyre talking to china, theyre not talking about further sanctions or even isolating china in a degree that we may have to, working with our other partners. This is why i think it is important for us to be engaged in multilateral relationships as opposed to bilateral relationships, and i think with the Obama Administration did, it worked in multilateral relationships so that it would be america and our allies pushing together. China does not like the fact that we have thaad, theyre in south korea. What should the Trump Administration be doing differently right now