Declines the job, and sources tell cnn other Top Administration officials arent interested. And pushing back on putin. American forces get more aggressive in response to provocative Russian Military moves. How will Vladimir Putin respond . Im wolf blitzer. Youre in the situation room. This is cnn breaking news. Breaking news as President Trump is looking for a new chief of staff tonight, cnn has learned one strong option, and thats a quote, for the job is the former new jersey governor, Chris Christie. That comes as the president who has stayed behind closed doors all day, is lashing out on twitter about the russia investigation, denying any inclusion between his 2016 campaign and moscow. But cnn has counted at least 16 Trump Associates who had contacts with russians during the campaign or during the transition, and sources say that list may grow larger. Ill talk about that and more with congressman Adam Kinzinger and our correspondents, analysts and associates are also standing by. First, lets go to our chief white house correspondent, jim acosta. Jim, as the russia investigation reaches a critical new stage, the president is also apparently struggling to fill a critical position in the west wing. But some new names, i take it, are clearly emerging. Reporter oh, thats right, wolf. The former new jersey governor, Chris Christie, is one of those names emerging at this hour. Its not clear whether Chris Christie would take that job, but his name is under consideration at the moment. One of many names now that this is a wide open Selection Process for the job of chief of staff over here at the white house. And President Trump, as you have been saying, wolf, has been staying behind closed doors, venting frustrations about the russia investigation and scrambling to find a new chief of staff after announcing john kelly will be leaving the post before he settled on a replacement. A source close to the white house says he is, quote, and this is a quote here about the president , super pissed that one contender for the job, nick ayers, suddenly pulled himself out of the running. President trump is trying to convince the world where there is smoke there is no fire. The president is downplaying the latest revelations in the russia investigation, mocking any notion of collusion with moscow, while declaring his innocence in the payments made by his former attorney, Michael Cohen, to women alleging affairs with mr. Trump. The president misspelled the word smoking and tweeted, democrats cant find a smocking gun. No smocking gun. No collusion. Thats because there was no collusion, so now the dems go to a simple, private transaction, wrongly call it a campaign contribution. Which it was not. Cohen just trying to get his sentence reduced. Democrats insist those payments may well be Campaign Finance crimes and potential grounds for impeachment. Well, they would be Impeachable Offenses, whether they are important enough to justify an impeachment is a different question. But certainly they would be Impeachable Offenses. Reporter if not impeachment, other democrats say perhaps possible prosecution. I think there is a very real prospect that on the day donald trump leaves office, the Justice Dpartment may indict him. That he may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time. Reporter the president is sticking to his talking points. On the mueller situation, were very happy with what we are reading, because there was no collusion whatsoever. There never has been. The last thing i want is help from russia on a campaign. Reporter as he denies collusion, the president is trying to clear up the confusion inside the west wing. After announcing the departure of his chief of staff, john kelly, while teasing he was on the verge oftapping a replacement. Well be announcing who will be taking johns place. It might be on an interim basis. Ill be announcing that over the next day or two, but john will be leaving at the end of the year. Reporter the problem, the young, ambitious staffer initially id f initially eyed, nick ayers, said no thanks and revealed hes leaving the white house, forcing the president to start scrambling. But sources tell cnn other Top Administration officials arent interested in the post, as in budget director Mick Mulvaney and steve mnuchin. Mark meadows has indicated he might take the job and robert light hows lig lighthizer is under discussion. Now as for the other wild card in the mix, a source close to the white house saying that the former new jersey governor, Chris Christie, is under consideration for the chief of staff job. That source said christie could potentially clean house over here at the white house, although the former governor, we should point out, does not get along well with the president s soninlaw, jared kushner. As we know, wolf, christie once put kushners father in prison. The president might like the idea of having a former prosecutor in the west wing to go toetotoe with the special counsels office, and with democrats who are itching to investigate up on capitol hill. And wolf, getting back to what we were reporting at the top of this broadcast, the president heading into this evening is very upset that he has to begin this chief of staff process all over again. He thought he was going to have a new chief of staff over the weekend, and nick ayers, and a source close to the president , close to the white house, is saying the president is, quote, super pissed that he has to start that all over again. Wolf . Yeah, you would have thought they would have had all of this in the works, given the fact that thats right. Kelly was about to go. Thanks very much, jim acosta reporting from the white house. Lets get some more on the Trump Associates who had contact [ no audio ] evan, cnn has now identified at least 16 People Associated with the president who had contact with russian officials while in the white house. But how big is muellers picture right now . Do you expect the list to stop there or to grow . It is quite possible that it is going to grow, wolf. There is a number of references in these Court Documents weve seen. There is unnamed people that are associated with the campaign who have not yet been identified. And so by the time this is all said and done, i fully expect we might see a longer list than that list weve been showing on the screen there, which has 16 people, which ranges, by the way, from Paul Manafort, the chairman of the campaign and his deputy, rick gates, who were in business with russians for many, many years to, his members of his family. Don junior who set up the now infamous june 2016 meeting in trump tower where he was supposed to be getting dirt on Hillary Clinton. And keep in mind, some of these meetings happened, some of them, facetoface, some of them over Text Messages, phone, email, and Robert Mueller has every single thing, every one of those communications. You have to imagine that by now mueller and the investigators already have their hands on. According to the federal prosecutors, manafort lied about his contacts with at least one russian and also lied about his contacts with the trump administration. How significant is that . I think both of those are very significant. One of those, we believe, is constantine kliminik, a russian spy, in business with Paul Manafort, and well into the time when he was already facing charges here in the United States. The second aspect of this is his contacts with people inside the administration, even, again, while we knew he was in trouble, wolf. Some of those contacts happened into february of 2018, which is around the time when everybody was worried that rick gates was about to flip. Rick gates was Paul Manaforts deputy. So what the content of those conversations, which by now we know, mueller has, is going to tell us everything about what you know, the importance of this of these lies. Because you have to wonder, why was he lying about these contacts . You know, shimon, President Trumps personal lawyer for a decadeplus, Michael Cohen, was also in touch with russian officials on a deal to build that trump tower in moscow, which never got off the ground. Now mueller is zeroing in on that deal, though, as part of his russia investigation. Tell us why. Yeah, so first of all, i think its whats important to note here is that many people have been lying all around this investigation. And one of the things that Michael Cohen lied about was this project to congressional investigators. Mueller had known that and when cohen came before mueller, he admitted that he essentially lied about it. And it was to protect the president. This was going to be a pretty lucrative deal, a lot of people were going to make a lot of money off of this. This was going to be a big project. They were going to probably make, you know, millions if not billions of dollars, had this project went through. And so one of the other things that was going on was that the president and people attached to the campaign at the time were denying that they were having any contacts with russians, certainly about any kind of business dealings. So, of course, that raised the suspicion from investigators, why were people lying about this . And then the other thing the concern with the moscow project was, was the russians using this as a way to perhaps manipulate the campaign . Manipulate donald trump and have something, hold something over his head . So that when he became president , they could use it as an advantage against him. And that has always concerned people, certainly, within the fbi and intelligent cans counterintelligence bureau. The idea also here, wolf, remember, is Michael Cohen was in communication with people in the kremlin. They had initially denied they were talking to people in russia about this project. He denied that the president was briefed on any of this. And then later on admitted that, yes, i lied about that. I was briefing the president about this project. So all of that really concerned investigators at the time. Now we know the truth. And we know why that is. Shimon and evan, guys, thanks very much. Good reporting. As usual, lets get some more on all of this. Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger of Illinois Joining us, a member of the Foreign Affairs committee. Thanks for joining us. And as you know, these filings show that federal prosecutors are accusing President Trump directly of directing his lawyer, Michael Cohen, to commit felonies in order to influence the 2016 president ial election. Do you believe, if proven, that would be an Impeachable Offense . No. I mean, thats political decision that will have to be made evidently by the incoming majority. Do i think that an fec violation rises to the level of impeachment . Probably not. We have to see all the details of that. All im getting is what you guys are getting, and youre reporting, which is some of the scraps of whats been filed in court. I think theres going to be a massive, more down load at some point so we know the details. When you look at issues of impeachment and whats taken for impeachment, i think its got to be something massive, and, again, its a political decision made by the house of representatives at that point. But im not sure if saying, you know, an fec violation, for instance, rises to that level. Its a decision that the democrats are going to have to make and one they have to live with politically and also, you know, does this reach that level of twhat the constitution calls for. If the candidate personally directed his lawyer, knowing fully knowing it was a violation of Campaign Finance laws to offer that hush money to those two women and doing it fully aware that it was a Campaign Finance violation, would that be a serious crime . Well, i think it would be a serious issue. You know, youre trying to ask me to say crime or impeachment. Theres a lot of information i still dont know. Is paying somebody to be quiet in and of itself a violation of the law . I dont think so. The question is, is that done and can they make that connection to say that was a basically an illegal in kind contribution to benefit a president ial campaign . And thats going to be have to be something the prosecutors will litigate in court and will be presented at some point before the house of representatives, potentially, where they make that decision. But is, you know, a in essence illegal in kind contribution, does that rise to that level . I dont see it right now but there is still information to come out. The u. S. Attorney for the Southern District of new york on that lengthy document that they filed on friday, they did say it was a felony. And that the president of the United States and the candidate actually directed Michael Cohen to go ahead and commit that felony. So theyre accusing the president of committing a felony. Yeah, okay. Well, like i said, ive seen those. Ive heard the gist of them. I havent read all the documents. My guess is there is much more forthcoming. But the question of whether thats a crime is not necessarily in the payoff, if thats what it was. But its in whether that constitutes an illegal, inkind contribution. And ill tell you, there is campaigns fined all of the time by the fec, whether its inkind contributions, et cetera that dont necessarily leave to impeachment for somebody in office or jail time. These findings also find additional contacts between people and the president s orbit. At least 16. Trump associates. And you can see them up on the screen. Had at least some sort of contact with russians. How do you explain that . No, i cant explain it. I dont like it. You know, ive always had some kind of creepy feelings about Paul Manafort. Even before the president was sworn in. He was very clearly sympathetic to russian interests. To pro russian ukrainan interests. I was very upset when they changed the Republican National pl platform to take away support for ukraine against their fight against russia. And so there is a lot of information i looked at and, you know, two years ago was wondering what Paul Manaforts role in some of this is. We have to understand how russian spy craft works where they try to in essence climb a ladder to influence, to do things like that. And as a functioning democracy, we have to protect ourselves against that. I think its a leap right now to say that automatically goes up to the president , versus some of the people around him. We dont know that. What we do know is there are people that are being prosecuted by manafort, cutting deals or not cutting deals, that had russian associations. Is it illegal to talk to the russians . Probably not. But the question is, what were the russians trying to do and what were they doing on behalf of the russians . Thats information i think were fully going to get whenever the Mueller Report comes out, which i hope is sooner than later. Heres whats concerning. Ill get you a quick response. Several of those individuals of the 16, they lied about their contacts with the russians and not one of them actually reported to the fbi or federal authorities that russians were getting involved with them for the purpose of aiding in the campaign. Thats a serious problem. I know, it is a serious problem. Nobody, whether you affiliate with republicans or democrats or independents or anywhere else in between, should ever be working on behalf of a foreign government, much less the russians. Nobody should ever be, you know because of their political stripes, not subject to the law, whether democrat or republican. And so what were seeing is pieces of this puzzle, whatever the final puzzle looks like. And thats what Robert Mueller, whenever he completes his report, will put before us and we have to analyze. Congressmankinsinger, thank you so much for joining us. Well see you. Next, could the new revelations spell legal trouble for President Trumps children. And an accused russian spy reaches a plea deal with federal prosecutors. How valuable is the information she might provide . Theres an unexpected twist tonight in the case of an accused russian spy. Federal prosecutors say maria butina infiltrated conservative organizations like the nra to try to interfere in u. S. Politics. Our political correspondent, sara murray, is working this story for us. Update our viewers with the latest on this case. It appears that maria butina has reached a plea deal with the u. S. Government. We dont yet know what she is going to plead guilty to or whether she has information to offer investigators about other investigations. But were sure to learn more about all of that in court on wednesday. Prosecutors once accused maria butina of being a russian spy who cozied up to the National Rifle association. Now they appear ready to strike a plea deal. Today, butinas attorneys and prosecutors requested a change of plea hearing in d. C. Federal court. Noting that parties have resolved this matter. The filing indicates butina is likely to plead guilty to at least one of the charge