Proposal. And in the midst of that, there is another crisis and the historic protest of the secretary of defense, jim mattis is resigning in an extraordinary letter outlining the d disagreements with the president on National Security. Joining me is Kristen Welker at the white house, and Garrett Haake on the hill, and National Security and military reporter courtney cubii. And kristen to you, at the white house, they have not come out of the meeting. They were supposed to be in the Senate Session starting at noon today and still in with the president. Thet president was supposed to sign the criminal reform bill at 11 00 this morning, and that has not happened. What do you think is going on inside of this meeting with the Republican Leaders opposing their own president , and we saw that extraordinary letter, and the statement from Mitch Mcconnell yesterday after mattis resigned, and he is standing up to his president now. He is, and there is so much uncertainty here, andrea, and that is the word of the day today, and frankly yesterday. You can see that there are reporters gathered here behind me, and they are just getting called back right now to an event with the president. And so presumably, they will try to get some questions to mr. Trump about all of this, about his discussions with the republican senators, and any closer to finding a a way out of what seems like this the imminent partial Government Shutdown. Now, i spoke with hogan gidley, a moment ago, the Deputy Press Secretary here, and i asked him what is going on there, and what is the president s message to lawmakers today, and he said, look, he didnt know. So andrea, we cant underscore that you have is a president who is trying to figure out his next steps in real time. We are seeing it play out on twiter with the the threats. One of the president s tweets today, shutdown today if the democrats do not vote for the Border Security, and i asked hogan gidley about it, and how can say that when he is on tape saying that he was proud to own the shutdown. And gidley pushed back and said that the house is going to have to pass something. So there are a number of plans on the table, and the president has opposed all of the of them, and putting the hopes on this border wall which democrats will not be voting for, and this is on the backdrop of general mattis stunning resignation. While we are keeping an eyep on the door of the west wing when the marine guard is posted, and when that door opens, maybe they will be coming out or going to the bill signing, and that is a bipartisan achievement, and the fact that they did get the criminal justice sentencing are reform through, and looking at the right side of the screen, that is the senate floor, and the chaplain has gavelled down as they said they would at noon, but they are not going to do anything until the Senate Leadership returns from capitol hill. And Garrett Haake, at the capital right now, what is happening . Andrea, we are operating in what is an information black hole this morning. This morning, there is no plan or strategy or anything set to actually keep the government open, only tactic, and answers, and small steps to small questions with the house passing their version of the continuing resolution which included money for the border wall, and disastrous sentiment where they acknowledge that the votes are not there. The democrats will never vote for this, and it needed to get to 60 votes and that would not happen, and the president was tweeting about the nuclear option, and the idea to change the rules in the senate to move legislation with just a 50vote majority. I want to dispense with that as quickly as possible. It is both illegal and politically impossible, and there is a law, and if you want to read john cornyns twitter account, but he talks about how you cannot change this on a budgetrelated bill. So politically, it is untenable, and the republicans dont want to do it, and the democrats dont want to do it, and three prominent republican senators i am aware of coming out on statements this morning bob corker, and orrin hatch, and many of them are retiring some sooner, la mar alexander in 2020 opposing it and not doing it and it is not happening. The big question is that we are right back where we started last week. What can pass the two houses, and what is the president going to sign . Is there an offramp for the president . I suspect that is a big portion of this, and what is enough of a victory to get through both house, because right now, it is apparent that there is nothing that can that the president will sign. And garrett, thank you so much for that, because the reality check, and even though it is proposed by steve dane, and one republican senator, and picked up on fox news, and then the president tweeted it out. He was taking the cues from fox news, and one from the senator on nuclear option, and starting a whole firestorm based on no legal guidance from the legislative aide or the chief of staff or anybody else advising him. And courtney cubii, and mattis is leave us with no doubt of why he is leaving and detailed in an eloquent letter. I believe we must be resolute and unambiguous in our approach to those countries whose Strategic Interests are increasing in tension with ours. It is clear that for example we want to the shape a world consistent with russias authoritarian model. My views on treating allies with respect and also being cleareyed about both malign actors and strategic competitors are strongly opposed to this. And he laid it out saying that the two threats are china and russia. And when he is talking about the allies, he does not lay out what allies he is talking about, but looking at the decision made just this week. Swun is to pull all u. S. Troops out of syria, and backlash from the republicans and the democrats on the hill, and the analysts saying it is going to leave the kurds, the ypg, and the Syrian Democratic forces who the u. S. Has been working with in a lurch by pulling out the leave them in that last little bit of area to clear of isis. The second thing that we learned this week is that the white house asked for new plans for withdrawal of u. S. Troops from afghanistan. Again, you know, a strong allied resolution which is a nato allied mission that we hear so much about from is secretary mattis about the importance of the alliance and how many countries are involved, and while he does not say that in the letter exactly what he is talking about, it is fair to infer that he is talking about specifically these two plus other issues to come up with these two alliances that are called into jeopardy just this weekend, andrea. And while we are speaking about this and setting this up, the senator tim kaine is joining us from capitol hill. And senator, you are an expert on Foreign Policy, and your son is on active duty, and you are deeply immersed in all of these issue, and in military affairs. What is your reak shction to th loss of what this means to the loss of secretary mattis Going Forward . Andrea, this is a tragedy. I have been in public life for about 25 year, and jim mattis is one of the finests Public Officials that i have ever worked with. He has been a source of stability in this country, and when the news broke yesterday that he would be leaving an ambassadors of the allies have been reaching out the senators to basically say what the hel slshgs going on . The allies are frightened and as you pointed out he laid out two blunt reasons. He believes that we need to strengthen alliances, and he believes that we have to stand up to authoritarian adversaries, and he does not believe that the president of the the United States shares those the values. So this is as loud an alarm bell as could be rung by a Public Servant of gravity and depth that secretary mattis has. Who else could stand up in the National Security ka cabinett . Would bolton or pompeo stand up . Because we have not seen any sign of that as something as important as the khashoggi issue . No, they dont have the gravitas except for general dunford, but his role is more operational role in many ways, though he is very blunt. General dunford if you ask him bt, and months ago we did if we should stay in the iran deal or exit, and he said my military judgment is to stay there, but we have lost general mcmaster who spoke truth to power, and now secretary mattis, because he is going to speak truth to power, but he is no longer willing to have his name associated with policy to appeasing the adversaries and kicking around the allies. In fact, President Trump ignored secretary mattiss recommendation to replace joint chiefs dunford when his term expires in october, and in fact, insulted joe dunford ten months e earlier to make him a lame duck, and doing it in a very inappropriate way. And a cascades set of these this week. The announcement of syria took everybody by surprise, and are reporters said that you are on Armed Services and Foreign Relations and were you aware of this and i said, no, the administration was telling me the opposite two days ago, but ask the Republican Committee chairs because maybe they were briefed and i wasnt, but the answer is that they were not briefed either. The afghanistan news, and we had two hearings in the last two weeks with the pentagon on where one was open and one closed and i asked is there any plan to change the troop strength in afghanistan, and the answer is no. So to some degree, they are ignoring advice of the pentagon, but to some degree, they are not seeking the advice of the pentagon, and as somebody who is on these committees in a state that is connected to the military with a child in the military, i find this very, very frightening. And in fact, i just want to update the viewers that the meeting of republican senators and the president is apparently over, because we have seen some people coming out. The pool that is of the photographers and the camera people, and we can see Mitch Mcconnell there leaving and presumably headed to the hill where you know well is to reconvene at noon, but waiting for their return from the white house, and we dont know if there is a agreement if any, and senator shelby there as well. And let me tell you what we want do. I have a long rule from about Elementary School that you do not back down to a bully. You never back down to a bully. We ahad a bipartisan deal that the white house signed off on and the Senate Passed unanimously less than 48 hours ago and now the white house is backing down, and the president said, ale though i said that i would take the deal, but i am not, and give me 5 billion. Normally, if you want to add something, offer something. And this is what he has offered. My a offer offer is to not puni government workers before christmas. And so he bows to bullies like russia, and turkey and now china, and i dont believe that you will see him saying you give me what i want or i will punish 800,000 federal employees. The Vice President of the United States told the Republican Leadership that they were on board with this just 24 hours ago, and all of this blew up without the Vice President knowing about it. The other piece of this is turkey and erdogan, and a lot of reporting out there about the phone call between the president and erdogan on friday. Theres reporting that is the key phone call that persuaded the president against all advice of his Security Officials and mattis to withdraw from syria because erdogans request calls the kurdish fighters that are our best allies, and he is calling them terrorists, and if that is what persuaded the president , and they could not talk him out of it. Andrea, that reporting is frightening, because there were bits of evidence on the table when the president made the announcement about the pullout of syria, and of course, an announcement that turkey would buy patriot missiles to the United States and i saw that close in time and when there even reporting of the phone call i wondered about the connection. The kurd in Northern Syria have been the best partners that the United States has had in defeating this caliphate idea of e isis. Isis is still alive and they still mean harm to americans and others, but at least the territory is shrunk, and it is because of the u. S. Working with the allies and nobody more important than the kurds f. We abandoned the kurds now, and if turkey goes in to do what they have suggested they will do to take on the kurds and u. S. Abandons these people who have stood side by side with the military to defeat isis, it is going to be a mark of shame on this country. I cant imagine that it was not one of the major factors that secretary mattis was grappling with if he is now contemplating the prospect of the syrian pullout, and close u. S. Allies who fought side be by side with american troops to defeat isis, and getting target ed by turkey and the u. S. Is going to be standing aside to let it happen. Who would ever stand with us aga again . Who would fight side by side with us again if we abandon them . Na is a very significant worry as i am talking to the democrats and the republicans here that they have right now that the president is being, positioning to abandon allies to a very, very challenging fate. Senator tim kaine, thank you very much for being with us today. Thank you, andrea. And now, on the senate floor and talking about the shutdown is senator schumer. Abandon the shutdown strategy. You not getting the wall today, next week or on january 3rd when t the democrats take control of the house. Just two days ago the senate came together to support a proposal by leader mcconnell unanimously, every democrat and republican to extend government funding through february without partisan demands. What it would accomplish is that the government would not shutdown, the fights that we are having would be postponed to a later day and millions of americans would not be hurt this crists mas week. So let me repeat that. The senate, every democrat and every republican has already unanimously supported a clean extension of government funding. Democrats supported the measure, because we do not want to see the Government Shutdown. We have no demands other than that. And we had every indication that the president would sign the legislation as did our friends, the republicans on the other side of the aisle in the senate, and yesterday, President Trump hounded by the radical voices of the hard right threw another temper tantrum, and here we are again once again on the brink of what if president said that he wanted a trump shutdown. The president will try to do his be best to blame the democrats, but it is flatly absurd. President trump called for a shutdown no less than 25 times. In our meeting in the oval office President Trump said, quote, if if we dont get what we want, i, President Trump, will shut down the government. I am proud to shut it down, said President Trump. I am not going to the blame you, meaning the democrats, and i will take the mantle of shutting it down. And those are President Trumps words and nothing that he does or says today can undo that. No democrat has called for shutting the government down, and we are all working to avoid it. The president seems to the relish it. He seems to feel that it is going the throw a bone to the base. The problem being that his base is less than one quarter of america. Mr. President , President Trump, you cannot erase months of video of you saying that you wanted a shutdown and that you wanted the responsibility and blame for a shutdown. President trump, you own the shutdown. You said so in your own words. And President Trump may get his wish unfortunately, but it does not have have to be this way. Democrats have offered two alternatives and republicans, leader mcconnell, has offered one. The democrat s has have offered pass the six bipartisan appropriation bills plus a oneyear continuing resolution for homeland security. We have also offered a oneyear continuing resolution for all of the remaining bills. Republicans have offer ed to pas a shortterm continuing resolution through early february. Each one of those proposals would pass the house and the senate. Each one of the proposals contains 1. 3 billion of real Border Security. Not a wall. There is no wall in those proposals. Democrats support real Border Security and not a wall. And by the way, that is in addition, in addition to the lo year, and a vast majority of which the Trump Administration has not spent. They are asking for loads of money, and they have not spent last years money, and it is clearly a political gambit to appease his base. While Chuck Schumer is laying out the posture, what are you hearing from inside of the pool of the president and what he is saying now that he has finished the meeting with the republican senators. Andrea, it is the first sense of what happened in the meeting between President Trump and republican senators and this is from the pooler, and so these are not exact quotes. They are a sort of the rough log of the reporter in the room writing in real time. He says that now the senate is looking at it, and presumably meani