For the love. Valentines day is for the love. Forget the hallmark holiday haters, we need it. It should serve as a hallmark of the effort we need to make with one another. Every year if not every day. St. Valentine, beneficiary of many legends but a few things are clear. He believed in the need for love in practice. One of the things he did was sign letters to friends expressing appreciation to them signed your valentine. Thats why we say it. We make it about romance. Its fine. But it can be about more and should be especially today. Our connection to one another and our passion to demonstrate the same needs reinforcement. We all know that. The political divisiveness, the energy towards driving fear and anger towards others, distracting. Its draining from the love of a collective. A feeling about one another. Chocolates and candy, great. But what about compassion and collective action for the betterment of all especially today . You remember what happened a year ago today, right . A year ago we witnessed 17 being shot down in parkland, florida, school kids. Pain and shock, frustration, all familiar. But this massacre would be different. The kids who survived became advocates. They stood for the fallen and they forced us to recognize our lack of resolve. They were valentine. They were love in action. A year later nothing has changed in terms of love. The opposite of love, not hate is the difference. Thats the opposite. And thats what weve surrendered to. Too political, too hard. Everyone cares but no one did, not really. We actually had a member of congress say the wall is part of the solution to gun crime. So thats where we are. Today of all days remember the need to be better for the love. For the love of the fallen, for the love of progress, for the love of less violence, the love of cooperation and compassion. We may not be a law away from stopping School Shootings but we are one way from taking action. You really think we cant do better . Cant identify kids, adults who are at risk . Do more to control access to weapons . Google the columbia protocol. Google that, columbia protocol. It works. Brought down suicide rates in the air force, the only branch of service that saw reduction because of that protocol. The only failure is doing nothing. Indifference is the opposite of love. Remember that today. When we say we do things for the love, remember what it is we do and do not do. Happy valentines day. May it be good to you and may you be good to others. Thank you for watching. Cnn tonight with d. Lemon starts right now. Happy valentine, my friend. You as well. Youre so optimistic that i think people have been asking me what are you going to give chris for valentines day. And so here it is, chris. I have a card for you. Aw. And there you go. Its beautiful. I knew you would think its beautiful because youre surrounded. You didnt want to put your face in here, why, wouldnt fit . Because it would be like me loving myself. Thats what youre about. First of all, can we for the sake of valentines day can we stop this projection where i am the one whos so into my myself and you are this monk, like a selfless guy and a cynic . I am a selfloather. Im just better than you. Thats all. Doesnt make me anything special. Well, that part is certainly true. Maybe thats why youre in the gym so much. Youre complicating. Yes, im compensating huge. Ill about to buy a big truck, i got big dogs. Its pathetic. Are you driving a ferrari, a sports car . Every croesus, every trapping of every type of problem involved, i check the box. Ive got to say i feel sometimes we have youre a good sport, by the way. But ive got to say i feel youre right. Weve lost our optimism in many ways and im talking in general as a whole. And theres some good reason for that, but it would be great to get that back. Thats what america is about, really about being optimistic and making things that we thought were impossible become the possible. Its all about collective will. Look, we had a glimpse today before it was stolen by this next chapter in the wall brawl. They came together. Left and right did something reasonable. They didnt like it, they werent happy with the deal but it was better than a shutdown. They did their damn jobs, but now here we go again. Tomorrow is going to strt a whole new chapter. Ive got to go, but can we just put that back up, so chris can see how much love he has for his favorite person . I would gladly let anything bad happen to me in a moment just to save my kids and now youre getting all get out of here. See you later. Happy valentines day. You as well. This is cnn tonight. Im don lemon. Thank you so much for joining us. Weve got a lot more on our breaking news to tell you about now. The house finally passing a compromised security bill tonight. A bill the president is expected to sign tomorrow, but hes really not happy about it at all. Hes getting only 1. 375 billion for his wall, far short of the 5. 7 billion he demanded before he shutdown the government for 35 days forcing 800,000 federal workers to go unpaid. So what is the president doing . Creating a huge mess with his plan to announce an executive action tomorrow that will include a National Emergency declaration. An effort to do an end run around congress to get more money for the wall. A white house official says that the president is expected to announce hell get some 8 billion for his wall. No word on exactly where all that money would come from. But members of the president s own party really, really dont want the president to declare an emergency. I continue to believe that this is not what the National Emergency was intended to be used for. It was contemplated as a means for responding to a catastrophic event like an attack on our country or a major natural disaster. What about if somebody else thinks that Climate Change is the National Emergency, and then what will they do and how far will they go . I want you to listen to the president s nemesis, House Speaker nancy pelosi. That the president can declare an emergency on something he has created as an emergency, an illusion that he wants to convey, just think of what a president with different values can present to the american people. A democratic president can do that. A democratic president can declare emergencies as well. So the precedent that the president is setting here is something that should be met with great unease and dismay by the republicans. What a mess. Really what a mess. Especially for Mitch Mcconnell, the man who said this about president Barack Obamas executive action on immigration 2014. Roll it. It seems to be about what a Political Party thinks would make for good politics. It seems to be about what a president thinks would be good for his legacy. Those are not the motivations that should be driving such sweeping action, and i think the president will come to regret the chapter history writes if he does move forward. Things that make you go hmm. Now mcconnell is back and President Trumps National Emergency move just listen to what donald trump himself said about as i always say there is video and tweet for everything. This is what donald trump himself said about president obama in 2014. By the way a hat tip to our friends at the k file who dug it up. Now we have executive action and this is very, very dangerous thing that should be overwritten easily by the supreme court. Were looking now at a situation that should absolutely not pass munster in terms of constitutionality. But depends on what these justices do. Oh, my gosh, my how things have changed. The man who once opposed unilateral action by a president now seems to think its fine. National Emergency Declaration is fine. As long as he gets what he wants. Speaking of National Emergencies, you might be wondering what kind have other president s declared. Over the years a lot of them had to do with International Hot spots and sanctions, okay . There were others like the two by president george w. Bush related to terrorism. That was in the days after 9 11. Clearly an emergency. There was one by president obama related to the swine flu outbreak in 2009, an emergency. But definitely nothing like this one. To build a border wall . 66 of americans in the latest cnn poll are against declaring an emergency to build a wall. And american president s both republicans and democrats have opposed a border wall. The president s from Ronald Reagan president Ronald Reagans final address to the nation. Watch this. Ive spoken to the shining city all my political life. In my mind it was a tall, proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, windswept, god blessed and teaming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace. A city with ports that hung with congress and creativity. And if there had to be city walls the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. Remember that was president reagan, the Gold Standard of republican president s. Now a democratic president , barack obama. Suggesting that we can build an endless wall along our borders and blame our challenges on immigrants, that doesnt just run counter to our history as the worlds melting pot. It contradicts the evidence that our growth and our innovation and our dynamism has always been spurred by our ability to attract strivers from every corner of the globe. Thats how we became america. Why would we want to stop it now . Heres a really disgraceful thing. Okay, are you listening . All of this, this whole mess is manufactured. Its a manufactured crisis. A non. Crisis at the border thats really not fooling anybody. People hear its crisis, crisis, they know its not a crisis. Thats all for political expediency, all for getting what they want. All for saving this president s rear end. After all, what kind of emergency is it when you do absolutely nothing about it for the first two years of your term . When you let 35 days of shutdown go by and not incidentally force 800,000 federal workers to go without their paychecks . When you give congress three weeks to make a deal for far less than you wanted and then and only then declare an emergency . What are we, stupid . A manufactured emergency. All to keep a Campaign Promise that the majority of americans dont want you to keep. What kind of emergency is that . A lot to talk about. John deans here, chris lizza, doug hine. Well dig into next. cos i know what it means to walk along the lonely street of dreams here i go again on my you realize your vows are a whitesnake song . I do. If you ride, you get it. Geico motorcycle. 15 minutes could save you 15 or more. When did you see the sign . When i needed to create a better visitor experience. Improve our workflow. Attract new customers. Thats when fastsigns recommended fleet graphics. Yeah now business is rolling in. Get started at fastsigns. Com. With cinemastream for less buffering, cinemasound for brilliant clarity, and cinemacolor for ultra vivid color. Shop the biggest president s day ever at dell. Com. At dell. Com. Now audible members get free fitness and Wellness Programs to transform your mind and body. Download the audible app and start listening today. Heres some breaking news. The white house says President Trump will sign the funding bill that congress has passed, but hes not happy about it at all. So hes also planning to announce hell get 8 billion for his wall through executive action including declaring a National Emergency. So lets talk about it now. John dean is here, chris lizza, doug. Hi, gentlemen, good evening to all of you. John, how does this play out legally . Its interesting. The National Emergency act, don, it was a watergate reform to deal with this very kind of problem. It was adopted in 1976. It didnt define National Emergencies, however, and left that power with the president. It did create checks in congress, the ability to have a joint resolution forcing the issue to have the Congress Vote on it. Whether congress will do it or not we dont know yet. I would assume the house would do it in this instance. Also if he does this, theyll likely end up in court. I think most likely an imminent domain or one of the state attorney generals might get jurisdiction. So doug, i found this interesting you tweeted this. Make no mistake the next president will declare National Emergencies on guns and cite the president when doing so. That caught the attention of the president tweeting, make no mistake anyone who think they wouldnt do this anyway you dont get a lot of Valentine Day greetings but a lot of Valentine Day messages. But, look, ultimately what weve seen over the past few years is an increase of president ial power at the expense of congressional power, which is isnt the sexiest issue in the world but something we Pay Attention to when barack obama does it with immigration or donald trump does it with the wall. When we were upset about Barack Obamas executive overreach and what we viewed as executive overreach we were pretty vocal about it, and a lot of times i would help draft the statement, and i would send them to chris and chris would write about how republicans are outraged. And fast forward a few years, not so much. Does it seem like small potatoes now considering whats happening . Welcome to politics, unfortunately. You played earlier Nancy Pelosis wording about what a democratic president could do as well. Im also reminded of what Mitch Mcconnell warned harry reid on the Nuclear Option where he said be careful what you wish for. Republicans, be careful what you wish for on this. Thats what i want to talk to chris about. Chris, listen, because your piece mentions earlier i was talk to chris and i said maybe the smartest thing for democrats would be to say go ahead and do, right, because the president wouldnt want to do it. Because if the democrats agrees, he would go i dont want to do that. He sets a bad precedent for a president to do this, so maybe the best strategy is to say hey, well let you go ahead and do it and hell say no, i dont want it. Doug made a great point you talked about in your piece. First of all, i think you make a great point which is if its such an emergency, why has it taken this long . Remember he walked up to doing this before and didnt do it. If you have to go to the emergency room, you dont spend a month deciding to go to the emergency room. You just go, right . I think thats point one. Point two is dougs point. Harry reid changes the rule on federal judge nominations earlier this decade. Essentially mcconnell says, well, you know, whats good for the goose is good for the gander. Hes right because under those same rules is why you have neil gorsuch and especially brett kavanaugh. Supreme Court Justices confirmed with a simple majority vote because the rules changed. Precedent matters. Its not the sexiest topic, but Mitch Mcconnell understands that. He understands this president. He also realizes politically speaking another Government Shutdown would be exponentially worse than the first one they had this year, so hes choosing the less of the two evils in his mind. What do you think would happen if theres a democratic president and all of a sudden theres restrictions on the kind of guns you can because of an emergency . How will republicans react then . Not well. But, look, i actually think it could be on climate, on education, lots of things. I think you have to realize that the constitution, article i, its right in there, Congress Appropriates the money the government spends. If you allow the executive branch to take money appropriated to other things and spend it how the executive branch sees fit, that is not how the constitution laid out how our government should work. Not for democrats, not for republicans. John, i think you do consider this ill just ask you. Do you consider this you sort of referenced it in your first answer. Do you consider this an abuse of power, of president ial power . And how has this fake crisis turned into a National Emergency compared to the other times that this has been used . Well, don, lets just set aside the fact this is very typical step for an autocrat in a democracy that wants to take it into a dictatorship. Weve seen this in other democracies. So lets just set that aside. Is he abusing our power . Absolutely. As i said the National Emergency act was adopted to deal with nixons abuses of power. And this is exactly what has from an inattention to the law by congress, theyve allowed to happen. Doug, weigh in here. Because two years of republican control, weeks of a shutdown and still no declared emergency. The spending bill gives 1. 375 billion for a barrier. Trump wanted 5. 7 billion. Its also getting less funding than was put on the table before the shutdown. Doesnt this show you hes only doing this now to fulfill a Campaign Promise . Well, i think he actually could have allowed all this to happen and fulfill the Campaign Promise. He could have said i got my wall and let the democrats say, no, you didnt. And also i think the thing really frustrating to a lot of republicans is we know the leeway the trump base gives hill. And its broader anything than Barack Obamas base had or bushs base had in their respective presidencies. He can cut the deal on immigration that say a president jeb bush wouldnt be have been allowed to by the Republican Party and say not only did i get this done, but i got the deal barack obama couldnt. Which shows us to be the great negotiator and claim big credit for b