Apologizes for a broken promise. I am very sorry theyre finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me. The question of confidence in the president. Bestselling authors all with new books. Joe scarborough, historian doris kearns goodwin. Times magazines Mark Halperin, plus representative Donna Edwards. Plus harry smith and his essay on the meaning of gettysburg on lincolns celebrated speech. Im David Gregory with all that ahead on sunday, november 10. Good sunday morning. No deal despite hopes of a breakthrough. Three days of negotiations in geneva failed to produce an agreement to freeze Irans Nuclear program in exchange for relief from crippling international sanctions. And although all sides pointed to progress, iranian president rouhani this morning insisted his country will not give up the right to enrich uranium. That is the critical step in the production of Nuclear Weapons. Prior to rouhanis comments, i spoke exclusively to secretary of state john kerry just moments after the talks had ended. Secretary kerry, welcome back to meet the press. Thank you. Good to be with you, david. The bottom line goal here is to prevent iran from producing or acquiring a nuclear bomb. You said in the interim you want to complete halt on a weapons program. Clearly there is not a deal yet. They are not in a position to give in to that demand. Is that a fair statement . No. I think its a question, david, of working out the modalities by which it will be done, by which it can be verified, the ways in which you have a set of guarantees that make absolutely certain that the goal of the president , to make certain that iran never has a Nuclear Weapon can be achieved. The first effort is to try to achieve it, obviously, peacefully. And you try to use an exhaust diplomacy in order to do that, but the president has taken no option off the table no matter. But it sounds like something broke down here, because there was such anticipation that you were very close to a deal. The reporting is that the french thought it wasnt tough enough on the iranians. And you know the history. As the israeli Prime Minister callled rouhani is a wolf in sheeps clothing, that this is what they do, they bide for time while they keep producing and they can play games. Is there fear around the table thats what theyre doing now . No, that is not the fear around the table, and i would say a number of nations, not just the french, but ourselves and others, wanted to make sure that we had the tough language necessary, the clarity in the language necessary to be absolutely certain that we were doing the job and not granting more or doing something sloppily that could wind up with a mistake. This is serious business. And i think every country came there. This is the first time that the p5 had come together with this kind of a serious set of possible options in front of it, with a new iranian government. Remember that this has changed since the election. This is a new overture, and it has to be put to the test very, very carefully. So i think there was unity there, david, with respect to getting it right. And we always said, president obama has been Crystal Clear. Dont rush, were not in a rush, we need to get the right deal, no deal is better than a bad deal. And were certainly adhering to that concept. Let me play you a comment that i think gets to the ultimate question of what does it mean to get it right . What is the bottom line demand of the United States . The israeli Prime MinisterBenjamin Netanyahu has been outspoken about this this week. He wasn this program late last month, and this is what he said about the prospect of a deal with iran. I want you to listen and ill get your reaction on the other side. I think the pressure has to be maintained on iran, even increased on iran until it actually stops the Nuclear Program, that is, dismantles it. I think any partial deal could end up dissolving the sanctions. A lot of countries are just waiting for a signal to get rid of their sanctions regime. So a couple of points there. You want them to stop their weapons program. Others, like the israeli Prime Minister saying, no, theyve got to dismantle their infrastructure before they get the kind of Economic Relief that is part of this deal. Well, im not sure that the Prime Minister, who i have Great Respect for, knows exactly what the amount or the terms are going to be, because we havent arrived at them all yet. Thats what were negotiating. And it is not a partial deal. Let me make that Crystal Clear as i have to the Prime Minister directly. It is a first step in an effort that will lock the program in where it is today, in fact, set it back while one negotiates the full deal. And there will not be a relaxation of the pressure. You know, nobody has talked about getting rid of the current architecture of sanctions. The pressure will remain. There will be, hopefully, if this is arrived at, a means of absolutely guaranteeing that while the negotiation on the real end game takes place, irans program is not going to continue, is not going to grow. It seems to me that israel is far safer if you make certain that iran cannot continue the program. Now, every day that we dont have it, theyre continuing it. So i think the American People, and most people in the world, want the president of the United States with the awesome power that we have to exhaust all the diplomatic remedies before we resort to the use of military force if we have to. That option is not off the table. Nothing is off the table, david. But heres the question. If the only reason theyre coming to the table now is because they feel the economic pain of sanctions, its not just the israelis, its the saudis, its republicans in congress who have said if thats the only reason theyre coming to the table, whats the rush . Why not increase that economic pressure so you get not just a halt but actually get a dismantlement of the architecture which is the goal the president seeks . Because the president believes, as i do, that the pressure exists today, which is why theyre willing to negotiate. I mean, look, i was there and i voted for these sanctions. We voted for these sanctions in order to bring around to the negotiating table. Now that theyre there, you have to act in some good faith in an effort to be able to move towards the goal you want to achieve. If as their act of good faith they freeze their program and allow us absolutely unprecedented access to inspection and do other things im not going to go into the list. But if they do the things we believe is necessary so that we can guarantee we know what is happening and we can move it back while we negotiate the end game, it seems to me youve got to do something that indicates your good faith. Now, the president has made it clear, he will not reduce or change the overall core architecture of the oil sanctions, banking sanctions. Iran will still be under enormous pressure precisely to complete the task. I think there is a lot of hype and an awful lot of speculation about what is going on here when all that is happening is an effort through the sanctions congress put in place to get negotiations when those negotiations hopefully produce an actual result. Thats what we want to have happen. As americas chief diplomat, are you being skeptical enough about a man who has been called a wolf in sheeps clothing, who wrote a book in which he talked about how they can continue work on their Nuclear Program while they gain confidence of the west, basically played games with the west . Are you being skeptical enough . David, some of the most serious and capable expert people in our government who spent a lifetime dealing both with iran as well as with Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Armament and proliferation are engaged in our negotiation. We are not blind, and i dont think were stupid. I think we have a pretty strong sense of how to measure whether or not we are acting in the interests of our country and of the globe, and particularly of our allies, like israel and gulf states and others in the region. We are absolutely determined that this would be a good deal or there will be no deal. Now, thats why its hard. Thats why we didnt close the deal here in the last couple of days. Because we are together, unified, pushing for things that we believe provide the guarantees that israel and the rest of the world demand here. But one thing is clear, is that, you know, were not going into a full deal and giving away something. Were talking about stopping their program where it is with enough guarantees to know that it is, in fact, stopped where it is while we then negotiate the full measure of the deal with our allies, with our friends, with all of the interested parties, advising at the table, consulting, and their interests well represented. There is a broader criticism that goes beyond this that no doubt youve confronted in your extensive travels throughout that region. Let me sum it up this way. It amounts to this criticism that the president appears reluctant to exercise power on the world stage. Its not just israel, its egypt, its saudi arabia. There is a feeling that the u. S. Has abandoned Critical Friends in that region, in part because youre moving toward a deal with iran which could provide them tremendous Economic Relief when at the same time critics would say their major client, syria, has gotten a pass to murder their own people as long as they dont use chemical weapons. So that all of this is amounting to this reluctance to really exercise u. S. Power. That is my description of that criticism, and please respond to it. Well, let me respond very directly to it, david. I couldnt disagree with it more. The president of the United States made his decision. He decided to use military force in syria. He also made a decision to respect the requests of many members of congress to come to them. And guess what . When he did, it was the members of congress, as you know better than anybody, who bought very significantly with the exception of the Foreign Relations committee of the United States senate which took the lead, but the house clearly indicated a very, very strong reluctance to be engaged. The president , before he had to make a decision of whether or not he would use force, anyway, succeeded in getting an arrangement with russia to remove the chemical weapons altogether. That would never have happened, that deal would never have come about if the president had not made his decision to use force. The president used force in libya. The president has been willing and made it clear that he is prepared to use force with respect to irans weapon, and he has deployed the forces and the weapons necessary to achieve that goal if it has to be achieved. Let me just finish. The president has continued in afghanistan. He has sought a Security Agreement in afghanistan that is in the throes of being agreed on. It will continue american presence to complete the task in afghanistan. We cant let mythology and politics start to cloud reality here. This president has made it clear. Hes also the president who has prosecuted al qaeda with an intensity and terrorists generally with an intensity unprecedented and way beyond the last administration. Mr. Secretary, final question before you go. You gave some comments in light of the 50th anniversary of the assassination of president kennedy to nbc news that have now been widely broadcast and reported on. And in those comments, you said this. To this day, i have serious doubts that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. That certainly would be surprising to a lot of people that those were your views. Would you care to elaborate . No. I just have a point of view. And im not going to get into that. Its not something that i think needs to be commented on and certainly not at this time. Do you think the Conspiracy Theory is his involvement with russia a motivation from the soviet union or cuba are valid at some level . David, im not going to go into it. Its inappropriate and im not going to do more than say its a point of view that i have, but its not ripe or worthy or appropriate for me to comment further. All right, mr. Secretary. We thank you for your time very much. Thanks. Joining me now, the Ranking Member of the senate Foreign Relations committee, bob corker of tennessee. Senator, its good to have you here because the subject is iran, and the president of iran theres no volume. Saying this morning we might have some audio difficulties. Senator, can you hear me okay . Senator, are you able to hear me . Well work on that as i set up the premise here, which is the question of what the senate is ultimately going to do on sanctions. Senator, are you with me one last time . 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Like caramel chocolate drizzles. Happier holidays. Chex party mix. Joining me now is the Ranking Member of the senate Foreign Relations committee, senator bob corker of tennessee. Good morning. Good morning. Iran refuses to stop enriching uranium, a critical step to making Nuclear Weapons. Is this a negotiation or is this actually a dead end . Well see. The Security Council resolutions call for a complete stoppage, so well see. The concerns we have is on these partial kind of arrangements are exactly what we have in north korea. You begin this dance were seeing right now, so unless you do the whole deal on the front end, you, in essence, begin this series of steps that may well lead to iran getting to exactly the place they wish to get to while we relieve sanctions. So there are a lot of concerns. Some of the same people that were involved in the negotiations with north korea are involved in these, and so you can imagine that congress that put these sanctions in place with the administration kicking and screaming all the way, pushing back against these sanctions, are very concerned that were going to deal away the leverage that we have where we finally have iran willing to sit down and talk about these issues. So, senator, in the interim, there is going to be another meeting. These negotiations will continue on a freeze, just a temporary step before you get to a real negotiation. What are you and your colleagues going to do . Do you think its important to actually impose more sanctions, to impose more economic pain on iran before thinking about relieving those sanctions . Well, you know, there is going to be a banking markup this week where sanctions are going to be looked at. That meeting has been called off by the democratic leadership. And senator kerry is going to be coming up this week and briefing. But i do want to say, david, when you use semantics like freezing, iran is still going to be enriching uranium based on what we see. So when they say freeze, that means theyre not going to be gaining but theyre still going to be enriching, so there are a lot of concerns. Are they going to continue building the facility in iraq which contains plutonium . What are we going to do with the enriched uranium on the ground there . So there are a lot of details to look at sternly before we decide were moving ahead. I do know on both sides of the capital, on both sides of the aisle right now, people are really looking at what the next steps ought to be. All of us want to see diplomacy, we do. We thank the secretary for the efforts hes putting forth. That is the best way to resolve this issue. But were also concerned about an administration that seems really ready always to jump into the arms of folks and potentially deal away some of the leverage we have. So well be watching this. We want to see a good outcome. Do you predict more sanctions before there is any kind of deal with iran . I dont know. You know, new sanctions, david, would not kick in for several months, and i think youve already seen that the administration has dialed back the rheostat since rouhanis election on the existing sanctions we have. They have a lot of ways to dial down these sanctions in different ways. I think this week sitting down and talking with secretary kerry will be an important element of what we do. Especially, again, david, think about it. A partial agreement leads us down the same path we went down with north korea where just to get people to act right as you move through these things, you continue to reduce sanctions. So, again, a lot of concerns about the approach. A lot of us want to see it resolved diplomatically. We know the sanctions got us here and were worried were dealing away our leverage. Senator corker, we will be watching. Thank you very much. Thank you. Joining me now republican governor of new jersey, Chris Christie. Governor, welcome back to meet the press. Congratulations on your reelection. Thank you, david, very much. Happy to be back. A lot of speculation and a lot of excitement throughout the country w