Rose welcome to the program. We begin this evening with politics and our continuing coverage of the firing of former f. B. I. Director james comey by President Trump. We talk to Jonathan Karl, gillian tett and ed rollins. Its is prerogative to fire comey. Could have fired him on january 20th and no one would have batted an eyelash. You cant beat him up. You say thank you for your 30 years of service. He had impeccable credentials. He had a difficult time and you may question his judgment on some of the things he did in the case but you cant batter him around. Rose we continue with a conversation with the c. E. O. O Susan Wojcicki. Cheers people who have a global brand, a lot of times they have millions of subscribers, theyre making a good living on youtube. They are extremely well known. They are extremely famous among their demographic and users, and, so, now, we have youtube is a collection of a huge amount of video content, many professional youtubeers and, of course, tv also uses youtube as way of putting their content on it, promoting it and having it be a part of a site where there are a billion people coming every month to watch video. Rose we conclude with tin carr, the director of the roy peck trust, an organization that supports freelance journalists around the world. Freelance journalists, many are threatened, they live under this kind of constant atmosphere of harassment, and some of them have to go into hiding, some of them have to escape very quickly. Some of them have to go into permanent exile, and thats a figure thats increased enormously over the last few years, and its because people dont want them to tell the stories that theyre telling. Rose more on the president and the firing of f. B. I director, Susan Wojcicki and tina carr when we continue. Rose funding for charlie rose has been provided by the following and by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Fallout surrounding President Trumps firing of f. B. I. Director james comey earlier this week. Trump began his morning with a series of tweets warning comey against leaking anything negative about him. President trump said to have he also threatened to cancel a future white house briefing. President trump said to have broadened his search for a new f. B. I. Director given controversy over comeys dismissal and said to be considering an interim director tell you his nominee is confirmed. Joining me from the white house is Jonathan Karl of abc news, ed rollins a republicans strategist and gillian tett, editor for the Financial Times jonathan has to leave in about ten minutes so we take advantage of his time when hes here. I begin with you, ed. What do you mange of all this . Youve seen president s, worked with president reagan. This particular president doesnt understand the impact he has every time he tweets something. We thought hell get better when he gets in the white house. The two failures of the white house is a lack of a communication strategy and equally the personnel is way behind. Saying all that, its his prerogative to fire james comey. Could have fired comey on january 20th and no one would have batted an eyelash. But you cant beat him up. You need to say thank you very much for your 30 years of service. He has impeccable credentials. He had a difficult time. You may question some of his judgments but you cant batter him around. You basically demoralize an agency that has been demoralized in the past. You cant make the accusations, theres no evidence hes ever leaked anything, start raising taping and what have you. People say what tapes are we talking about . Those are all bad words for you and i who have been around the game. People are starting to compare it to nixonian and carter. He has an important Foreign Policy trip next week. He has to set this will thing down and make republicans feel confident because they have a big task in front of them. Theyre concerned about their own numbers. He doesnt worry about polls but they do and theyre starting to worry about themselves. Rose jonathan, how does he do that . The republicans felt like they had gotten things back on track. They passed the healthcare bill, felt the president had a foreign trip coming up. Tax reform was beginning to move through. This is a massive distraction. I think ed is exactly right. The president could have fired james comey, could have done it without much trauma. It certainly was going to be a controversy and a big story no matter what, but to do it and then to have your white house senior officials from the Vice President on down give an explanation for why it happened, for nearly two full days, it turned out to be completely wrong, creates, you know, great uncertainty, and i think puts that agenda very much at jeopardy. Rose does it worry europe . It worries europe and asia as well. I was in asia last weekend and apart from the fact the japanese are talking about the risk of north korea missile strikes and actively preparing for that, theyre also eventually making very black jokes who looks crazier whether the president t the president of the United States or the president of north korea in terms of unpredictable and unfathomable behavior. Thats an extreme parody. This kind of reality tv president ial performance is leaving people around the world increasingly alarmed given the severity of some of the geopolitical challenges now. Rose why do you think he does it . I think he does it because its instinct. I think he does it because he disengages the media. He wants to reach directly to voters, in much the same way kennedy used television or obama used email. Rose reagan used television. Reagan used television as d hes also seeking to try and show hes actually in power, hes got the platform, hes trying to destabilize opponents as well. Rose Ronald Reagan would have said what about this . Ronald reagan would have said thank you to comey and found an appropriate replacement and move on. You covered Ronald Reagan. He never bad mouthed anybody. Not his style. Rose anybody in the white house can say no to President Trump . I dont think there is anybody that can do that. Jared kushner is in the family, so Jared Kushner has an ability to be a little more direct with the president. His daughter ivanka. But its not their style to go into the oval office and say, dad or fatherinlaw, youre wrong, but they do try to steer him in a certain direction. But, you know, this is a president that is completely in charge of this west wing and likes the fact that there are different factions and play them off and set them competing against one another. You know, the president gave a videotaped message today to the rnc meeting out in san diego and he said he predicted they could pick up many seats in the midterm elections because things were going so well. I mean, its hard to find any republicans that think that thats the case, but, charlie, can you imagine what the white house looks like if the republicans lose significant seats even lose control of the house of representatives, what this white house looks like . First of all, that conversation is going on. Members are concerned. We have a 20plus seat margin, and most to have the seats are and most of the seats are safe, but theyre very concerned. He doesnt care about his poll numbers which are bad but theyre dragging down republicans everywhere. The quinnipiac poll has republicans losing badly to democrats and creates chaos when there are two tough unpopular issues to move forward, the healthcare and tax bill. So my sense is he should be Building Support for his fellow members and i think to a certain extent theyre shaking their heads saying is this ship going to get straight and move forward . They want him to do well but theres real panic. Rose i want to make sure no one at this table is saying this is the beginning of the end, but thowdz this president change his behavior if hes 70 years old and been acting this way out of government all his life . Well, hes also somebody who has accomplished hes very successful. He became president of the United States. Hes not going to change his behavior. The question is whether or not it can be channeled. I think this trip, he heads out on friday, this is an extended foreign trip about ten days. Hes got not just a visit to saudi arabia that we talked about. Hes going to israel. Hes going to the vatican. Hes got a n. A. T. O. Meeting in brussels. Hes got a g7 meeting in sicily. This is President Trump on the world stage. He actually performs quite well on the world stage. Going back to the campaign, one of the highlights for trump during the general Election Campaign is when he made that secret trip to mexico and people looked at him and said, wow, donald trump actually can be president ial. So thats a chance for him to change the dynamic, but this is also something that is set up to dramatically distract from that trip. I mean, this was an unnecessary distraction. Rose what do they expect from Rod Rosenstein . Rod rosenstein came close to resigning. They denied he threatened to resign because he didnt come in and actually say, look, straighten this up or im going to resign, but i know from people who spoke directly to the Deputy Attorney general, that he was on the verge of resigning because the comey firing was being blamed on him, was being pinned on him. He never actually recommended that comey be fired. He did that threepage memo. It brought indictment of comeys behavior as f. B. I. Director, his handling of the clinton email case, but he never said to fire him. So i think that what they first and foremost what they expect and hope from him is he doesnt quit. I think that thats why you saw the president so dramatically and actually quite honestly change the story and tell truth which is what he had already decided to fire comey and he simply wanted some additional reasons to be put forward for why it should be done. Rose does anybody not in the f. B. I. Know what they have and where that investigation is and why the f. B. I. Director was asking for more money and more personnel to pursue the investigation and why someone else there called it a significant a significant investigation . Well, the person who said it was a significant investigation is now the acting f. B. I. Director mccabe, and he also said and this is important, charlie, because the story was out there the front pages of the New York Times and the Washington Post that comey in his final days asked for more resources and more money. Mccabe told the committee yesterday that was not true, that the f. B. I. Did not actually ask for additional resources, but he did say its a significant investigation, a highly important investigation, but its also not the only one. I thought it was significant, right after we heard about the comey firing, we see the Senate IntelligenceCommittee Issue to issue subpoenas to Michael Flynn to have him turn over documents related to their russia investigation. So i think there are multiple investigations that, if anything, may be stepped up as a result of the comey firing, not stopped. Rose jonathan, thank you for joining us. I know you have other duties there at the white house. But thank you so much for being here. Thank you, charlie. Rose back to your opinion. Is it possible that this president can achieve what he hopes in terms of saudi arabia and putting together a grand alliance between the saudis and other arab states who are all a sunni persuasion and get them to rally against iran and in hopes that in combination with israel they can come out with some kind of palestinianisraeli deal . Well, if you want to be optimistic after this last week, there are really two reasons why you can be optimistic. Firstly that trump has shown himself willing to talk very tough and then make a big strategic retreat. Weve seen that with china in relation to trade. There is some hope that maybe in relation to russia and the middle east and syria there could be some grand bargaining in the offering. The second reason there is hope to be optimistic is because around President Trump you have a number of people who are widely respected on the International Stage. You have general mattis, mcmaster and Rex Tillerson as well. So thats the optimistic scenario that actually something good will come out of this completely chaotic week. The more pessimistic reading is he has seen his standing on the world stage significantly diminished by whats happened and its worth noting that if you look at the european vetting betting markets, they have been putting the chance for trump impeachment or removal significantly rising this week, 50 , 60 , much higher than any of the other u. S. Markets are looking at, and that kind of perception or psychology fits into the International Stage and look at trump. Somebody think he may not be a lame duck quite soon. Rose do you think that can happen with republicans in both houses . No, i dont. I worry about the midterm elections rose could change that. Could change that. We dont have enough republicans. We have a majority in both houses, dont have enough in the senate. If two or three go south on us we lose momentum. 20 is not a giant number in the house of representatives. Obama had way more in times of big legislation and we have tough stuff ahead. Weve got them all worried about we have to have them all not worried about getting rereflected and have to believe in him. There were times he was showing great strength and got hiring numbers on his leadership that got somewhat diminished about this. And the danger is who cares about Rosie Odonnell . Hes back tweeting on her. He cant let anything go. He doesnt act president ial and he needs to act president ial. When he goes on this world stage which is a big, big test, which is a first measurement. Reagan stumbled in the first economic summit, came back roaring in the second, this is a. Ders and say can this guy dok is he going to be okay with the significant leaders in the world. I hope he can but he cant if he gets distracted. Rose why do you think he can do it . Hes a performer. He has a confidence factor. Ive seen him head to head with world leaders. He doesnt flinch. The Strongest Team he has around him is the Foreign Policy team. Even though tillerson isnt experienced at state, hes experienced at world affairs. Mathis is first rate. His Treasury Team is best. He has his best opportunity if he sits and takes the counsel. The team is well respected and comand respect on the world stage and thats important now. But you cant lose out on the fact youre seeing a potentially distracted at best present and at best president and at worst a damaged president dealing with Foreign Policy issues which are fantastically serious. North korea is a significant threat right now. You have the middle east in chaos. You have the syrian problem, you know, running on and on and on, europe increasingly worrying about refugees and the russian problem. Its worth pointing out the f. B. I. Arent the only group looking into russia. You have the european Intelligence Groups as well. You have a lot of threat, a lot of juggling. One thing that worries me is the president doesnt seem to be good at multitasking. Hes a onetrack, one issue a day kind of president and the question about whether he can multitask on this width of agenda will be very important going forward. Rose go ahead. Equally as important, hes been around a long time, i was there in watergate, the press have been waiting a long time to find another Pulitzer Prize and another issue, and hes dumped all over the the press from the beginning. My sense is a very serious journalist will go out and make a days against him for all these make a case against him for all these things. If i were him, and im not advising him, i would say let it run its course. Dont let the senate or house create a special prosecutor. Let it run its course and talk about other things. I care about the next month he has to perform at a level to which he gets his own side to pass significant legislation which is not easy or at least get on the track to pass legislation, because if he doesnt get a tax bill or a healthcare bill, the rest is irrelevant. Rose thank you ed rollins, Jonathan Karl and gillian tett. Stay with us. Rose Susan Wojcicki with here, c. E. O. Of youtube. Googleowned video platform has more tan a billion users in 88 countries. History with google dates back to 1998 when she became employee 16. She made pivotal contributions to the company especially advertising. Fast Company Magazine called her a consummate google insider, observing not many people and very few women are chosen to be a part of larry pages inner circle. Pleased to have her here for the first time. Welcome. Thank you. Rose you smowived here earlier, so i take the blame or bestow it on you. Thank you so much for having me. Rose when they moved to alphabet, they thought a youtube might have lifted itself from under the google umbrella. I think the idea was it was to be able to give a scalable platform. Google and alphabet expanded into many areas, fiber, medical, cars. Youtube you would think might become an independent company because of our brand. We have over a billion users, the reach that we have. But, yeah, youtube is a really integral part of google and our mission about enabling everyone to have a voice and to be able to have a large collection of video is really somewhere to google, and were integrated in so many differen