Sold and ran during the campaign. And the New York Times is reporting today in a front page article that, quote there is evidence that twitter may have been used even more extensively than facebook in the russian influence campaign. All this while the president seemingly unaware of the now Public Information about russias use of social media in this country to influence the Political Landscape largely in his favor tweeted this. Facebook was always antitrump. The networks were always antitrump, hence, fake news. The New York Times apologized and the Washington Post were antitrump. Collusion . Question mark, end tweet. To decode it all, we have a truly allstar panel. Nbc news Foreign Correspondent keir simmons, former rnc chairman michael steele, Washington Post political reporter philip bump and former chief of staff at both the department of defense and the cia jeremy bash. Now an Msnbc National Security analyst. Philip bump, let me start with you because youve gone deep into Donald Trumps sort of supply chain of information, if you will. And i think its safe to say that he is part of he is on the receiving end and the supplying end of the kind of information that was likely circulated and in some instances originated in russia. Donald trump is sort of if you think of the prototypical concern who is a consumer of fake news, thats donald trump. Donald trump was born of this media environment of falsehoods and insinuations that fed off the polarized moment were experiencing. Donald trump read breitbart. He sat down for an interview with infowars. Thats donald trump. What the russians did here essentially if they had dropped 1,000 russian people into america to try and stir things up, we would have noticed. They basically did this virtually. But all they were doing essentially was taking advantage of the fact that americans were ripe for this sort of disinformation because, from a polarized lens, thats what they wanted to see. And jeremy bash, i positted this lowtech example to try to understand the position that the social Media Companies have largely taken. If someone were mugged on my property, i wouldnt call the police and say, well, i just bought the lot on which the house was bought, not my problem. And their posture, theyve hired lots of consultants and are doing lots of work to try to tell their story. Their posture has been, we just own the pipes. Its not our fault everything that happens on the platform. That seems unsustainable in the climate where you have congressional committees investigating russian meddling and bob mueller honing in on the extent and depth of russian interference. I dont think these social Media Companies were looking for nefarious russian content. Neerths was i, but it could have happened on my property. In your hypothetical, its visible. You can see it in plain sight. Unless youre looking for it, you wont see it. I think the point is that twitter is a very alluring platform, though, because it is in essence people standing on the Street Corner with a megaphone saying listen to me. Hear me out. And its easy. You can create a twitter handle in about two moments. It is really a ripe platform for individuals to come in and participate under fake pretenses in our political system. But i think one thing is important is that it wasnt all just go trump. It was very subtle. This is going to require a lot of sophistication by our government and by our candidates to realize some of this stuff was meant to divide, meant to provoke divisive, racially divisive themes to weaken us. That is right out of the russian playbook. Its ongoing. Some of these accounts are he helping to sow discord. They got involved in the debate that gripped this country starting last weekend with the president taking sides in the debate that has challenged the nfl about whether or not players had the right or within their rights to kneel during the national anthem. So why cant we stop it . Its not just looking back. Its how are the russians still better than, frankly, democrats or republicans, at using social media to mobilize their goals . Its such a good question. One thing i would say, when you say the russians it makes it sound like its a monolithic organization. Its not necessarily like that. The lines are blurred in russia between the government and individuals and individuals you think they are helping the russian government, not necessarily with the sayso of the russian government. Has putin called some of them patriots . Olook, he really has. Hes not trying to stop them. Lets be clear. President putin believes that Hillary Clinton intervened in his election so hell take the view, at least privately and pretty openly that intervening in the u. S. Elections is legitimate. Lets be honest. This isnt the first time one country has intervened in another countrys elections. This has been happening for a long time. But social media has nuclearized the whole thing. Its extraordinary. Somebody, a teenager with a laptop can sit, you know, hours and hours away from here and can intervene in the u. S. Elections. A group together and be very, very damaging. What you do about it, thats the milliondollar question. And we are focused on russia, but we ought really to be much more broadly thinking about the fact that any country could do this and that we havent even begun to think about how you deal with the issue of freedom of speech for these social media platforms versus the problem that the internet creates in terms of having a fair and democrat democratic election. Why are leaders like Angela Merkel better at rooting out the russian interactions. We dont know they are. She turned over tens of thousands of fake accounts. Weve got 3,000. Well, we know that the u. S. Fell asleep at the wheel on this. Thats the truth of it and we can get into why that is. But in terms of whether it affected her election, for example, you know, she was in a very solid position. Okay. You know, she hasnt been elected with quite the mandate she has in the past, and thats where it gets really tricky. How do you determine the power of influence . Its not a science. And thats why we have a real challenge going forward. Michael steele, i hear in Donald Trumps weird and ive asked facebook about this. I said do you feel weird that hes defending you in the same sort of inexplicable way that he defends russia. Has he lumped in his mind together russia and what russia does on facebook in his mind . That tweet was weird but it wasnt squarely it wasnt weird. Why did he condemn why does he think that he cant condemn anything russia does on social media . I cant get into that because whats your theory . Youre a mind reader. Yeah, right. Theres clearly a personal link and we can put in parentheses, political, economic, whatever that interest may be, that link may be to putin personally. The russians generally that keeps him from actually going there like the rest of the country and the rest of the world looking at the behavior of the russians. But i think when youre looking at facebook and the russians, he sees this as one big kabal against him. The whole fake news concept is something thats about him. Its not fake news if theres something out there about you or something out there about keir. Its fake news because its about him. Thats his universe, his orbit. And so, yeah, facebook right now is going to be another piece of that chess board he can move around rhetorically and maybe politically to make the point and to reinforce at least with his base who largely i went out and interviewed more than three dozen trump voters and, without being asked, you over and over again said they got all their news from facebook. His base turns to facebook for news about politics. This is the universe that donald trump knows about because donald trump helped create it. Just to philips original point. Donald trump started with the burther narrative. Thats the original fake news story. To just answer your question to michael y did trump defend this . Because it benefited him . Let me ask you about something that may not benefit him. Twitter is on capitol hill in front of the house and Senate Intel Committee staff. You used to be a part of that. How does twitter fit into the investigation into russian meddling and weve turned these conversations into two categories. This i would guess is squarely the whether or not there were contacts or coordination or collusion between russians and the trump organization. The two companies we havent heard a lot from are twitter and google. Youtube is also a major social media site where people can post original content. I bet if you peel back google and youtube, youll see a lot of russian activity. Youtube videos are very popular. Some of the most shareable content out there. Twitter is a very vulnerable platform. Vulnerable to russians, to many other nefarious actors. Obviously, terrorists and isis have been using twitter. Fake twitter handles can be created very quickly. This is a very easy way to get information into the american bloodstream. Terrorism is an interesting one. After a terrorist attack, social Media Companies take down the suspected terrorists account afterward. There is never any real obvious effort on the front end. And i wonder if they are going through a culture change or the scrutiny of journalists like yourself, this intersection of politics and media, if you think that will change anything for them. Weve seen just if you look at what Mark Zucker Berg has done since election day. He sort of poopooed the idea that facebook could have had an influence. To use your analogy, the mugging, though, its not as if they have a backyard. They have 3 billion backyards. And some of the backyards if you look at them and play close attention you can see theres going to be muggings there but thats a lot of backyards. Its not me in my backyard in my slippers. There are technologies that will screen these. I want to ask you one more thing about the investigation. One of the overlaps between the Trump Campaign and the potential investigation is the work of is it cambridge analytics . Can you talk about the questions that have been raised about whether or not the work that was, i believe, largely overseen and something that Jared Kushner was proud of in coordination with came bribridge analytics. Theres a question about whether cambridge analytics was coordinating or targeting some of the facebook ads. Its hard to do this so ill take my time. The russians apparently did, to some extent, target places where they could influence the vote most effectively. For example, swing states. Communities within swing states. Thats something political campaigns do as well. We know, too, bloomberg reported shortly before election day the Trump Campaign was specifically doing whats called suppressive work on facebook. Essential lie, they were trying to show anticlinton ads to black voters in particular to get them to not come out and vote. So by doing that targeting on the campaign side and seeing these signs that maybe the russians were also doing targeting, the question is, was there information being shared . Was the campaign saying, for example, these are the places we really need help in trying to suppress the vote or turn out the vote . Did the russians take that information and act on it . I have not seen evidence this has happened. Im not privy to and i didnt suggest that, but this is a question. And i think vanity fair reported on it. Would this be a typical tactic of the russians . Absolutely. Yeah, of course. Russians want to to use anything they can find. Were talking about a country economically and militarily far, far lower, less than the u. S. But what cyber does for russia, and its not just on facebook and twitter and those places. Its also cyberhacking. What it does, it enables them to change their power position in relation to the u. S. Levels the playing field. So i think, you know, are they prepared to do it . Yes. Are they going to keep doing it . Yes. And other countries will be looking and saying, well be doing that, too. This is the nature of espionage. The problem the question really is, its not just about whats happened but about how you deal with it going forward. It isnt an easy answer. Do you think that the russians see in donald trump someone who isnt interested in doing something about it moving forward . I think i believe in the kremlin. Im pretty confident in the kremlin. They still view President Trump as on their side. Whether right why wouldnt they . So do i . Well, they they uls believe that we only have his body of public statements and if thats we dont know what has been said in some closed door meetings between the president of the United States and the president of russia. Thats definitely what the russians think right now. You know, they believe that around President Trump are a large group of people who are opposed to russia. Thats probably true. Mike mattis and so the question is, at what point does president putin change his mind on that, or does he continue to have faith in that strategic view of the politics in washington . And its hard to change your mind when youve got trump with a foreign minister lavrov talking about jim comey being nuts and the firing of him. So again, judgments made just on his public comments. Keir, thank you for stopping by. When we come back, the crisis widens in puerto rico where critical supplies and provisions are stuck in shipping containers while citizens boil over with frustration about the inability to distribute that aid across the island. Also ahead Donald Trumps crony cabinet. The president who promised the very best people. Now its a cabinet full of rich guys who like to fly private on the taxpayers tab. Gop meet roy moore and his teeny pistol. Youll get asked about him over and over and over. Get used to it, michael steele. Youre laughing. Well be right back. The morning walk was so peaceful. Until. It. Wasnt. Dont let type 2 diabetes get between you and your heart. Even if you reach your a1c goal you are still at risk for heart attack or stroke. Talk to your Health Care Provider today about diabetic heart disease. And find out more at heartoftype2. Com. Your heart and type 2 diabetes. Make the connection. More than 9,000 shipping containers have arequired at the ports of puerto rico. Yet thats where they remain. Supply chain problems ranging from damaged roads to not enough fuel for trucks have prevented supplies from reaching those most in need. Nbc newss Gadi Schwartz visited the town a little less than an hour from the islands capital to see the conditions firsthand. Reporter this whole area has been cut off from the rest of the island. Theres a critical road down here that was washed away by mud slides and debris that came down the mountain during the hurricane. But this is what people are now trying to escape. This type of living situation with no power, no food. No water. No access to gasoline. Theres going to be a mass exodus from places like this down to san juan, puerto rico, or possibly to the United States. Lets go to msnbcs mariana atencia where many today are trying to leave the island. Exactly what were seeing here. Thousands of people trying to get on this Royal Caribbean ship behind me. These are the last folks in line. And i might add that im in a gated area with security guards. People lined up all day to get aboard this cruise ship with their families, with their pets, elderly parents. The last stop on this trip will be tuesday. Its going to ft. Lauderdale, florida. We were also at the airport in the morning. We also saw desperate people, hundreds of them trying to board any flight they can trying to get off the island and away from that nightmare scenario with the no fuel, no water, no cell service and very little food. So it is what were seeing. Youre seeing it here behind me. Its not easy to get off the island at the moment. This is san juan. The cities in the southernmost part of the island and those people havent even begun to flock here to san juan to try to leave the island. Mariana, do you have any explanation from federal officials or local officials about why they cant craft a solution for getting some of those provisions, im guessing in some instances, those are going to be lifesaving supplies of clean water and food and perhaps medicine. Why cant they get more resources, helicopters or whatever it is that they need to start to move those supplies around the island . So, nicolle, ive spoken to three different sort of departments if you will, to try to solve this puzzle. Number one, the folks from the company that controls 40 of the ports here. They tell us that the biggest bottleneck is the drivers. The drivers that arent reporting to work that arent getting these supplies off these ports and onto the most devastated areas. Ive spoken to the Communications Person for the ports. He told me it was access to fuel. That was their biggest sort of worry creating this bottleneck. On top of that, i spoke to the director of econo, one of the biggest supermarkets here who tells me the food isnt getting to his shelves because theres fear these fuel trucks will get looted so then there was an additional concern because of security and telecommunications. 91 of the island does not have any cell service. So going back to what i think is the crux of the issue, these drivers that need to get these supplies onto those devastated areas. They cant even reach them at many points and the islands infrastructure completely devastated. What it took our Gadi Schwartz to get to, which is more inwards and not on the coast, it will take you around six hours, if you can get there. So its almost the perfect storm after the storm that has created this growing desperation in puerto rico. And what is the most frustrating it is the fact the supplies are here but according to the folks at crowley, the folks at the port, they are not able to deliver those lifesaving supplies. Your body of reporting there in mexico city and hurricanes irma, probably too extraordinary for you to even catch your breath and look at but were very grat