Serious upset in trump country. New polling just out today shows why pennsylvania could be just the beginning. But we start with a restive weekend in the white house. That is an understatement. Andrew mccabe fired hours short of his retirement, and he kept his receipts. Reportedly handing over notes on the president to the special counsel. The special counsel subpoenaed the Trump Organization as the president s lawyer wondered aloud whether isnt it time for the special counsel to be ended . And now the president is fuming on twitter. Why does the mueller team have 13 hardened democrats, crooked hillary supporters and zero republicans . Worth noting that mueller, james comey and Rod Rosenstein are all republicans. So, with that out of the way, the president went on to golf at one of his properties, and across the globe the russian elections went off without a hitch. Vladimir putin running for another term as president , winning another term as president. If he completes it, he will have held power in one way or another for nearly a quarter century. We have quite the set of by lines with us tonight. White house bureau chief for the Washington Post nbc political analyst phil rucker. Pete williams. Reporter for the New York Times, michael schmidt. Jonathan swan and staff writer for the atlantic natasha bertrand. Thank you all for being here tonight. I hardly know where to begin from the events that have unfolded over this past week. But, pete williams, can you layout for us what exactly is going on behind the scenes at the fbi . Theres so much noise, so many accusations flying. But cut through it. What are the most important things that we should be focused on here . Well, i think the most important things are the work that chris wray is trying to do to sort of reshape the fbi. Now, the whole thing with Andrew Mccabe, remember, was sort of set in motion before chris wray became director. And what we saw as the maturation of that in late friday. It all began with in october of 2016 when Andrew Mccabe did an interview with a reporter for the wall street journal who was asking about, he was trying to check out what he had heard which was that the fbi was slow rolling an investigation of the clinton foundation. So, he called the fbi and said, is this true . Mccabe authorized talking to him to say, no, its not, that the fbi was pushing ahead, but they were getting resistance from the Justice Department. The meantime, after the election, the Inspector General, the Justice Department decided to do an investigation of how the fbi did the whole Hillary Clinton case and found out about this, and what were told now and the trouble we have here is none of us have seen the Inspector General report that triggered the mccabe firing. But what weve been told is when mccabe was asked about this, he didnt tell the truth and thats why they fired him. There have been some republicans out today saying its possible that there is and even adam schiff who is a democrat saying, we havent seen the report youve put out and there could have been cause. Thats the trouble. We just dont know. I will say this, though. A lot of the things that weve heard out of the white house the past few days about mccabe and about the whole russia investigation have nothing to do with what we are told is the reason that mccabe was fired. The whole question about the russian meddling and everything else, other things that theyve raised have nothing to do with his very singular surgical reason they got rid of him. The statement from mccabe i thought was stunning where he essentially said, look, this has become political. I told the House Intelligence Committee that i could back up james comey and therefore ive been fired for political reasons. He has really latched into comey in sort of to make the argument that hes done nothing wrong here, so sort of say i am a victim of trump. And its sort of an interesting political play. Mccabe is much more skilled than your average fbi agent. Its sort of knowing how to be a politician. Hes a good speaker in public. And hes sort of taking a comeyesque way. He kept memos just the way comey did. And hes sort of banking on that as a way of trying to flex from what could be some damaging things here in an Inspector Generals report. He was pointing out to me before we came on set, the most senior career person at the Justice Department signed off on this and thats not a political person. Right. Phil rucker, takes us behind the scenes at the white house over the past couple of days. The president s lawyer, john dowd, comes with a stunning statement taking on the special counsel in a way that is really a marked departure from the strategy they had applied so far. Thats right. The strategy all along had been not to antagonize mueller. You notice President Trump never mentioned mueller by name in his tweets about the russia matter. That seems to have shifted. It started with john dowd, the president s personal attorney issuing a statement saying the Mueller Investigation should come to a close. He initially told the daily beast he was speaking for the president. He quickly backtracked, no, no, im speaking for myself, not for the president. Donald trump has done this before where hell have surrogates, his spokespeople, his advisors to float bold ideas to test them in the market place. I have no doubt that trump had something to do with that statement. I cant imagine he would put the statement out trump wasnt okay with it. Its what trump believes. Ive talked to a number of senior white house officials over the weekend who said the president for a while now has wanted this investigation to be over. He thinks its becoming a giant fishing expedition. And then again today and late last night we saw tweets where he invoked muellers name and really ratcheted up the aggression. Jonathan swan, what do you know from your reporting about the president s mood kind of behind the scenes in all of this . People his mood is variable. Thats like a vast understatement. People say, you know, hes fuming and often hes just watching tv, like often its him in realtime tweeting from tv. Last week, he was positively giddy. He had been on the rampage with the North Koreans where he told john kelly to shove it with his organizational principles, it was trumps white house. And was careening around the building doing what he wanted. This stuff gets under his skin, particularly when you see reports that talk about the Trump Organization or anything that starts to encroach upon his personal business dealings. Right. Thats when steam really starts to go out of his ears. And also whenever he sees people that he does care about, like hope hicks in the news, thats another thing that kind of triggers him. Well, and john dowd had been described in reporting that several of you around this table had done, as somebody who was calming the president down by saying, this is all going to be over, first by thanksgiving or christmas, then the new year, obviously now still going. And we have trey gowdy was on Fox News Sunday this morning with an interesting comment from about john dowd, mr. Trumps lawyer in which he called for an end to the mueller probe. I think the president s attorney frankly does him a disservice when he says that and when he frames the investigation that way. So, to suggest that mueller should shut down and all he is looking at is collusion, if you have an innocent client, mr. Dowd, act like it. Natasha bertrand, if your client is innocent, act like it . Its a really fair point, and that is something that, you know, the president should take to heart as well with all of his tweets over the past two days, slamming the Mueller Investigation. It really raises questions about, you know, whether or not he is laying the groundwork to kind of fire the special counsel. I think that with regard to john dowds statement yesterday, it doesnt seem like it was entirely premed traited. Premeditated. These are lawyers that came on to represent him as part of the special counsel investigation. These are lawyers known for kind of playing fast and loose. We saw john dowd and ty cobb have a loud conversation at a restaurant one day last summer about the investigation. Ty cobb of course has been known to go off in emails on reporters, myself included. Now we have john dowd who kind of issued this statement to the daily beast, at first saying he was speaking on behalf of the president and then saying that he was only speaking for himself. And ty cobb, of course, would not comment on the record to me, i think it is safe to say this is not something he anticipated and something he had actually consulted with the other lawyers about. So, whether or not i think that jonathan was right when he said that perhaps all of this is kind of just trump watching tv. And perhaps john dowd filling his mind a little bit with, you know, negative thoughts about the special counsel. But it doesnt seem like anything entirely kind of planned at this point. John . Its also worth pointing out, john dowd, to give viewers a sense, this is a guy who writes his emails in purple comic sense. He quoted cat on the hot tin roof from tennessee williams. Which you pointed out was on Turner Classic Movies last night. Reference this part of the scene equals the bureau, this part is comey. This is not your usual sort of lawyering that were seeing, to say the least. Pete, what do you know about these lawyers . Youve obviously theyve been in this orbit, your orbit for many years. Its Wishful Thinking the Mueller Investigation was going to be over by thanksgiving or christmas. Im not sure its going to be over by this thanksgiving or christmas. We certainly hope so. Its going to go until he figures he doesnt have anything more to go for. The idea they would try to calm down the president with that hopeful eventuality was unfortunate. A pipe dream. Michael schmidt, you reported this week special counsel bob mueller has subpoenaed the Trump Organization in whats the first known instance of the special counsel demanding records directly from the president s businesses. President also told you over the summer that prying into his business, his finances, could be a red line. Mueller is looking at your finances and your familys finances unrelated to russia, is that a red line . Would that be a breach of what his actual charge is . I would say yes. By the way, i would say its possible i sell a lot of condo units and somebody from russia buys a condo, who knows. I dont take money from russia. What would you do . I cant answer that question because i dont think its going to happen. And you and maggie haberman, michael, are reporting trumps lawyers got a list of questions from the mueller team. Whats the rationale there . They are still working on this negotiation, right . Thats the thing about dowd. For the past few months dowds most important job on the daytoday basis has been negotiating with muellers office about the interview. What are the terms going to be . How long is it going to go for . They dont even want the president to sit down. Theyve been having to deal with the president who really wants to go and explain himself. Now dowd has to come back to the table with mueller, who he just said over the weekend should be shutdown, and come to terms on this interview. And i think the white house i mean, i think the president would really like to sit down because he sees that as sort of the end to this and he thinks hes his own best spokesman and he can really explain t. The lawyers see it as a huge problem. I was lucky enough to sit with him in july. He starts talking and he doesnt stop. By the way, on that red line business, looking at the questions again refreshes my memory. If they look at your finances unrelated to russia. So, i dont know what we make of whether the subpoenas last week are, in fact, crossing the red line. Its sort of a faultily built red line. As we saw under obama, the whole red line thing is a bit a mirage. A bit contrived. So, i dont know, i wish we could go back and drill down a little bit more on the red line. Pete williams, there is some new polling out from nbc news wall street journal that shows the fbis Approval Rating with the public dropping, 5 since january, when it had seemed before as though they were becoming more popular. And it is still, you know, we should point out, positively viewed way more than most other institutions more than the press, for example. For example, and the congress and the president for that matter. What is your sense of what the danger is to the fbi here . And, you know, as somebody who has covered it for many decades, how extraordinary do people in the fbi feel this moment is . So, on the first question of whats going on with the polling, its interesting because i had been watching it over the past i went back and looked at our own nbc news polling. It steadily had gone up. I suppose we started polling around the time of the whole church Pipe Committee thing when the fbi was in serious trouble. It is interesting it is rising. Clearly the fbi is worried, that they need public confidence. They need people to come to them. They want people to have confidence, that they can tell the fbi about trouble. And, by the way, you know, there was this whole screw up about nicolas cage, this florida shooter. Im told by the fbi since that happen, since the fbi mea copa, the numbers to the tip line is up. Thats a positive sign. Phil rucker, what do you see as the next iteration here . Theres been a lot of reporting and speculation about who may be the next to go in the white house. The members of congress, there are renewed calls for potential legislation to protect mueller. How far do you think the president is going to take this and how quickly . I dont know. Its interesting. In congress we see some vocal calls to protect mueller, but there is actually legislation to try to protect him that has not come to the floor. It does not have the support of the Republican Leadership of either chamber, either the house or the senate. I dont know in that changes this weekend. But i think the president is sort of testing out how far he can go. He clearly wants this to end. Hes bothered by the russia investigation. He feels like its a cloud over his presidency that is really inhibiting his ability to get some things done and his ability to have credibility with the majority of the american people. So, hed like it to be over. I dont think hes actually getting to the point where he would pull the trigger and order the firing of mueller. That would be a huge, a huge move that as many Lawmakers Said today would spark a constitutional crisis. And there are many calls from democrats to say get out in front of that crisis. Pete williams, thank you for your time tonight. We appreciate you coming in. There is so much more to come, as you have gotten a taste here. Did a Company Owned by trump take advantage of facebook profiles . Well look at that. Trump has new fiergz and new hirings power the rumor mill. As we go to break, it was another break neck week of news, the flight of the bumble bee takes us through it. And some breaking news in the Stormy Daniels saga. Shes offered to give back the hush money, that 130 grand. That is breaking news from theresa may. The British Government has identified the likely source of the poison. Breaking news today. House republicans ending their russia probe. Good morning. Weve got breaking news. Rex tillerson is out as the nations top diplomat. Stormy and her lawyer set a deadline of noon today to respond to her offer. The white house has fired the john mcindee its Election Night in southwestern pennsylvania. Right now the race is too close to call. Just another tuesday. We have some breaking news here in washington. We are now declaring connor lamb the winner. Students threaten to walk out of their classes. Stormy daniels talking about a possible donald trump deposition. Larry kudlow is set to replace gary cohn. A Senior Advisor to hud secretary ben carson resigned today. In Treasury Department is finally sanctioning russia today. Breaking news now. Mr. Mueller is now subpoenaing subpoenaing the Trump Organization itself. The president is about to remove National Security advisor h. R. Mcmaster. Was she threatened in any way . Yes. Was she threatened physical harm . Yes. President trump is expected to call for the Death Penalty to punish some traffickers. Russian hackers are targeting the u. S. Power grid. Jeff sessions has just fired Andrew Mccabe. I understood early that facebook was how donald trump was going to win. Twitter is how he talked to the people. Facebook was going to be how he won. And facebook is how he won. I think so. I mean, i think donald trump won, but i think facebook was the method. It was the highway in which his car drove on. After mr. Trump won, Cambridge Analytica said it was key to the victory, but parscale said he never used psycho gravgs. He said it doesnt work. So, you didnt use it because you didnt think it really worked as opposed to you didnt use it because you thought it was wrong, that its manipulative or sinister or something . I dont believe its sinister. You just dont think it works . I just dont think it works. Want to dig into new reports that Cambridge Analytica, a firm backed by millions of dollars from the Mercer Family and contracted by the Trump Campaign harvested some 50 million profiles from facebook during the