Report. Plus, americans living like this. Look at this. Mold, mice, bugs, rats. Apartments literally falling apart and you are paying for those landlords to make bank. Think thats outrageous . Wait till you see the rest of our exclusive investigation of the state of hud under ben carson. A lot to get through on this thursday. Lets start with my colleague, peter alexander, over at the white house. We know whats on the president s mind this morning. Its russia, russia, russia. Hallie, youre right. Excuse me for looking down at my phone. Even as youre introducing this segment, we are hearing from the president. You see the snow, the freezing rain. A storm perhaps brewing inside the white house, certainly one in his head as he escalate this is war with Robert Mueller. Most recent tweets in the last couple of minutes. Universities will some day study what highly conflicted and not Senate Approved bob mueller and his gang of democrat thugs have done to destroy people. Robert mueller was, in fact, Senate Confirmed to be fbi director in 2001 by a 980 margin. He was not Senate Confirmed to be special counsel because that is not required for that post. Describing the investigation as a total mess. He says its gone absolutely nuts. He writes the following, the inner workings are a total mess, have found no collusion, gone absolutely nuts. He writes they are screaming and shouting at people, horribly threatening them to come up with answers. They are a disgrace to our nation and dont care how many lives they ruin. A week after he forced his attorney general Jeff Sessions out, he named Matt Whitaker as acting ag. And it comes after mike pence had a different take on the Mueller Investigation when he spoke exclusively to nbc news at the summit taking place in singapore. Should the American Public not be concerned about the special counsel investigation . The American People can be very confident that the right steps will be taken. Look, this administration has fully cooperated with the special counsel. We literally provided over a million documents to the special counsel. I think the American People can be confident that well continue to cooperate. But they can also be confident were going to continue to focus on the issues that matter most to them. The president in the last couple of moments tweeting again, the only collusion is that of the democrats with russia and many others. Here your takeaway, hallie. Its obvious theres something on the president s mind as it relates to this investigation. He hasnt said much about it the last couple of months. Certainly the two key months before the midterms. Why hes saying anything about it now, at least for the moment, is still unclear. Peter, thank you, on the white house north lawn. See you in a bit, pal. Couple of things that may be on the president s mind related to this and why it may be sparking tweets, new twist, new threat from republican lawmakers, at least one, to try to protect Robert Mueller. Kasie hunt is on capitol hill with the latest. Discussion about what members of Congress Might do to set up a shield basically around the special counsel. Hallie, there is bipartisan support for these efforts. Senator jeff flake threatening to stand in the way of moving any additional judicial nominees through the end of the year if, in fact, they dont do something to protect mueller. Theres not a lot that flake can do by himself. Theres some tools at his disoppodi disposal. Youre looking at flake standing next to senator coons, who has been a voice on this. The decision rests with Mitch Mcconnell as to whether legislation would move forward on the floor. So far he has said he doesnt think its necessary. My question is what harm would it do . He says sorry, we just dont need this right now. Being backed up by our republicans in this conference. See what john kennedy had to say about this. I dont thiching its necessary. Ive seen no overacts by anyone to try to either fire mr. Mueller or interfere with his investigation. I dont think he should be fire fired. You have kennedy, backing up what Mitch Mcconnell said. There has been some conversations among democrats about trying to attach this to a must pass spending bill. My question to the democrats would you shut down parts of the government over this issue, hallie . Thank you, kasie. Theres a new development in the special counsel investigation itself. Listen carefully here. Nbc news has obtained exclusive Text Messages that show trump associate roger stone and his pal, radio host talking about wikileaks plans during the 2016 election. On august 27th, 2016, credico wrote to stone, has kryptonite on hillary. Then another text to stone, big news wednesday. Now pretend you dont know me. Going on to say hillarys campaign will die this week. Nothing happened on that wednesday. On that tuesday, Julian Assange announced that his publication would publish emails related to the 2016 campaign. Three days later on october 7th, the now infamous grab them by the p word convo between donald trump and tv host billy bush. And first dump of email released by john podesta. You know what happened after that. Justice and security analyst and glenn kurshner joining me now. Yore reaction to our reporting here, matt . I think these are a number of people often have legal jeopardy. Roger stone is a target of this investigation. His attorney, again, in this story, says they still havent been contacted by the special counsel. Randy credico also has legal jeopardy and another associate of roger stones, Jerome Corsey, who has been told he has been indicted he has been told by special counsel he will be indicted. An indicted could drop any minute. I dont think its a coincidence that thats why the president is showing his anxiety on twitter, as he often does. The president appeared to have some inside knowledge about the inner workings of the mueller team. That could be because of reports that Matt Whitaker has given him, if he has been briefed on the Mueller Investigation. We dont know that he has, or because subjects of the investigation have a joint Defense Agreement with the president and telling him, Jerome Corsey expects to be indicted, roger stone expects to be indicted or other associates of the president. All the news reports out there this week related to a possible inindictment dropping. Always possible. Media matters take on the tough task of watching fox friends this morning, which often gives us the answer as to why the president was tweeting this morning. They havent talked about it. So who knows . These Text Messages prove beyond dispute that Randy Credico was the source who told me the significance of the material that Julian Assange told cnn he had and if he said anything different to the grand jury he perjured himself under oath. Does that take him off the hook or put him in hot water . Any time roger stone says he can prove something beyond dispute, i would bet it will never be proved. Stone, credico, corsey, here is what i can tease out of these emails reported out by Adam Schecter yesterday. Stone is too cute for his own good. He releases these emails and he wants us to believe these select emails and texts show that credico is really the one who is a closer associate to assange. What stone ends up doing is shooting himself in the foot. If i could just read one of the emails that stone offers in his own defense, he says that credico texted him saying, quote, why cant you get trump to come out and say that he would give Julian Assange asylum, close quote . What does that show us . At least in credicos mind, stone is the one connected with trump and engaging with trump on the assange matter. Based on all our reporting theres obviously a focus on mr. Roger stone, right . That is being reported out publicly. Democrats on the hill and some republicans are saying we have to protect this guy with this new acting attorney general, including one democrat, richard blumenthal, who spoke with our cameras on the hill in the last 30 seconds or so. Roll it. The American People want this investigation to be completed fully, accurately and we have to play hard ball. The greater danger is stifling and starving the investigation. Even if this bill doesnt pass its important to send a political message to the new acting attorney general and to the president that they wont stand for any interference in the probe. Weve seen challenges to Matt Whitaker, questions about whether he should recuse or whether his appointment is constitution. All of those are imperfect. Theres a political check on the president in normal circumstances. No president would dream of skipping over the usual line of succession to put in an acting general who is clearly biased against the investigation. Thats why its critical to see this bill move to send a signal to doj that no one on the hill will stand for it. Unfortunately, republicans dont seem to be there. Well be talking about it with our next guest in a second. Matt, glenn, thank you for coming on with this intricate, detailed and important story. Thank you very much. Democrats are back on capitol hill with a pep in their step. Blue wave getting bigger than initially thought. Why is there rumblings against the woman who led those big gains . Senator joe manchin fresh off his election win is joining us live after the break. I so many interesting details. N ancestrydna was able to tell me where my fathers family came from in colombia. 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Open an account today. Open an account today. I am a techie dad. N. I believe the best technology should feel effortless. Like magic. At comcast, its my job to develop, apps and tools that simplify your experience. My name is mike, im in Product Development at comcast. Were working to make things simple, easy and awesome. President trump this morning has given lawmakers new fuel as they try to light a fire to protect the special counsel. You know, because we talked about it earlier. The president fired off a new missile at mueller today, one day after Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell suffocated a move to force a bill that would help shield the investigation. Joe manchin, newly elected to his second full term in the senate. Thanks for being with us. Thanks for having me, hallie. Let me start with that bill. You support a bill to protect Robert Mueller. Senator Kamala Harris said mad respect hes coming out and joining democrats but senator kennedy, as you heard, thinks its unconstitutional. Why is he wrong . Hallie, the only thing that bill does, it basically says there has to be cause. You have to show cause to get rid of mueller. You cant just do it for political reasons. And then he has ten days to basically challenge the cause, to show its valid or not valid. Thats all the bill does. People keep saying protecting, protecting. All were saying is show us cause why you want to get rid of him. Do you think the president s tweet storms, for lack of a better word this morning could help build momentum for this bill, in your view . I dont know. Before we never thought it was needed. There was no movement at all. Boom, as soon as the election is over, Jeff Sessions is gone, hallie. Now we do have concerns. I think on behalf of the administration, the president and everybody else involved, let this thing finish. Let the Mueller Investigation finish. Give us some ability to say, we know it was done. Maybe it took longer than what people wanted, but it has been thorough, and completed by the most respected person from both sides of the aisle. Let me ask you about the midterms. Obviously you won your reelection, despite the president campaigning pretty hardily against you. Very hard. My campaign go ahead. Go ahead. I was going to ask you this. I have a couple of questions on that. Number one, have you spoken with the president since your victory . What messages have you conveyed to him . Do you think you are somebody who, early on, the president thought he could work with, and then he went up against you in your reelect . Can you find Common Ground . I can always find Common Ground. Yes, we have spoken. Yes, we are going to get together. The bottom line i told the president i want to work with you. Youve done everything you can to defeat me. You came in many times to my state. You sent the Vice President many times to my state. You sent your family in many times and in my speech, my victory speech the night of the election shall i just said, hallie, mr. President the people of West Virginia spoke loud and clear. They want their senator, not yours. And thats it, in a nutshell. Me being the senator for the people of West Virginia, supporting them 100 of the time is finding some Common Ground that we can work with our president. So im still reaching out. You are still reaching out. The Vice President was sending signals in that new exclusive interview that nbc news obtained with him. You look more broadly at the democratic landscape in the house, for example, you have wins, new jersey, andy kim the apparent winner there, california, rudy, the apparent winner there. Two other California Races are looking good for the democrats. Positive news for the dems. Here is what mike pence had to say, to downplay some of those results. We made history by expanding our majority in the senate. We won some great elections in governors offices around the country. We didnt really see that blue wave in the house of representatives come our way. I think its because the American People see the results. So, he seems to be downplaying these gains the democrats made. Are you worried thats a signal that this administration will not play ball next year . The only thing i hope, sooner or later they come to the realization and Vice President pence should know it well because he was a member of congress. Republicans are no longer the majority in the house of representatives. They still have the senate. But theres going to have to be compromise working back and forth. Once they realize if they want to get something accomplished we can work with them. I can forge that partnership between and try to help broker deals i think is good for my state of West Virginia but good for america. And thats what happs to be don. They have to work with those of us who want to work in the middle. I am still there and will say that when i speak with the president. Lets work with the house. If the house is going overreach i hope they dont we can fix, basically, health care. Well call it trump repair care. He is the one person who can put his stamp of approval on whats been laying on Mitch Mcconnells desk for 15 months and we can start fixing, bringing the rates down, making sure people with preexisting conditions are protected and not by the threat of a court. Thats the things that he can do. Also, he can do is looking at this tax, we have to look at tatab taxes to the point of what were doing to the next generation. Immigration, he wants border security. I want border security. I voted for over 42 billion in the 2013 bill. He could make it his premier legacy. Youre identifying topics there. Let me ask you this. Would you be willing, going back to this mueller bill thats the other issue on the table. Would you be willing to vote to shut down the government if republicans dont come on board and vote for the bill to protect Robert Mueller . When i know i can stay here and work through my differences, why do we even talk about shutting it down . Keep us here seven days, 24 7 until we fix it. Okay. Senator joe manchin of West Virginia, love to have you back on the show. Any time, hallie. Good to be back. Thank you. The final countdown in florida, four hours to go right now until the deadline for counties to finish machine recounts. Will they mac it . What happens if they dont . News on the late court appeal from the Republican Senate candidate. Were talking to a lawyer for the florida gop after the break. The florida gop after the break. The new Capital One Savor card. Earn 4 cash back on dining and 4 on entertainment. Now when you go out, you cash in. Whats in your wa