Hour gets under way on a thursday night. And good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. Day 875 of the trump administration. The president is in something of a mess of his own making, starting with his comments yesterday that he, indeed, would be open to dirt on a political opponent if offered by a foreign power. As he put it to abc news, i think id take it. He went on to add this. When somebody comes up with oppo research, right, they come up with oppo research, oh, lets call the fbi. The fbi doesnt have enough agents to take care of it. But you go and talk honestly to congressmen, they all do it, they always have, and thats the way it is. Its called oppo research. Two months ago Robert Mueller detailed multiple russian offers of assistance to the Trump Campaign in his report. The investigation found 140 contacts between Trump Officials and russians. This morning as the controversy over trumps comments was building, he defended himself on social media, and we quote, i meet and talk to Foreign Governments every day. I just met with the queen of england, uk, the prince of wales, and were pretty sure here he meant wales without the h, not the seagoing animals, the pm of the united kingdom, the pm of ireland, the president of france and the president of poland. We talked about everything with a capital e. How ridiculous. I would never be trusted again. The white house communication swap swung into action with its own explanation of trumps comments, including his assertion that the fbi should not be alerted about attempted election interference. I was standing just feet away from the president in his exchange with george stephanopoulos. It was very clear the president said if there was wrongdoing, of course hed turn it over to the fbi. The interviewer, stephanopoulos, did point out the fbi director Christopher Wray has said campaigns should reach out to the bureau if they are contacted by a foreign entity. The president responded the fbi director is wrong. Right. But, first of all, i think we were talking about james comey at the time and we all know james comey is wrong after being a convicted liar and leaker, so thats what the president was talking about. Not clear there. Members of trumps own party also weighed in. Heres how two of his strongest supporters in congress reacted. It is not okay for any public official to receive assistance from a Foreign Government. Whether it be anything of value, money or Opposition Research. I hope well do two things. Well make that clear to everybody so that we dont go down this road and then well look at what happened in 2016 with Christopher Steele because he was a Foreign Agent paid for by the Democratic Party to do Opposition Research on trump. Is it right for the president to say he would listen if foreigners offered dirt on his political opponents . Is that the kind of help you would take. Youre talking about a hypothetical. What would you have done . Ask a question. Doesnt the president have to set a tone about what is right and what is wrong . I think the president s been very clear. The president does not want Foreign Governments to interfere in our elections. Hes been very strong about that. About assistance. He did not say he would have a Foreign Government he said he would look at the information, listen to it, and if there were a problem, hed go to the fbi. Ive watched the president. I believe the president would always do the right action. So while a lot of republicans today deflected to hillary, to steele, to comey, Nancy Pelosis reaction could be called unsparing and yet careful. What the president said last night shows clearly, once again, over and over again, that he does not know the difference between right and wrong, and thats probably the nicest thing i can say about him. Would you consider that grounds to launch impeachment proceedings . It has nothing to do with any campaign. Make sure i want you all to understand that. As we go down this path to seek the truth for the American People, and to hold the president accountable, it has nothing to do with politics. Or any campaigns. Earlier tonight the chairwoman of the federal Election Commission offered a very rare and very blunt public warning. We cant remember anything quite like this before. And we quote. I would not have thought that i needed to stay this. Let me make something 100 clear to the American Public and Anyone Running for public office. It is illegal for any person to solicit, accept or receive anything of value from a foreign nation in connection with the u. S. Election. This is not a novel concept. Any Political Campaign that receives an offer of a prohibited donations from a foreign source should report that offer to the federal bureau of investigation. This is where we are, and it all comes as the president is just a couple of weeks away from a planned meeting with Vladimir Putin when they attend that g20 summit in japan. In an interview yesterday, putin [ speaking Foreign Language ] meanwhile, there are also new developments tonight involving two of the president s closest aides, White House Press secretary Sarah Sanders is leaving after almost two years on the job. In fairness, we havent seen her a lot. She talks to reporters in the driveway sometimes but its been 94 days since she held a press briefing. And an independent federal watchdog appointed by the president is urging the white house to remove Kellyanne Conway for violating the hatch act, which even interns at the white house learn prohibits white house politicking by public employees, because ideally youre working for the American People. Conway has repeatedly weighed in on political candidates over the past year. Here she is talking about the 2020 democrats. If he were a republican running against him, they would immediately call him a sexist. Id also ask him, what exactly have you accomplished that qualifies you to be the president. Ive yet to see president ial timber, i just see president ial wood ships. Amy klobuchar seems to be very nice unless youre on her staff. Elizabeth warren is running for president. She tried to appropriate somebody elses ethnicity. So much to talk about. So little time. Here for our leadoff discussion, peter baker, correspondent for the new york times, frank figliuzzi, mimi rocah and jeremy bash, former chief of staff at cia and pentagon, former chief counsel for the house intel committee. Jeremy, id like to begin with you. Your reaction to the president s words now over 24 hours later. They do linger. What innocent person says what the president of the United States said in this interview . What innocent person says this was not illegal, in fact, i would do it again . I think it is clear consciousness of guilt that he called for russian assistance. He received russian assistance. He welcomed russian assistance and he has rewarded russian assistance. And whats most astonishing, brian, is that he has said in the 2020 campaign not only would he welcome it again but that he urges everybody else to accept it as well. It is the complete undermining and breakdown of our election system if the person at the top of the political food chain, the president , says the rules dont apply. Frank figliuzzi, id like to play a clip from a former colleague of yours, Andrew Mccabe appearing today with nicolle wallace. The comments i heard yesterday only reaffirm for me the concerns that we had in may of 2017. If i am a foreign Intelligence Officer today, the message i got from the president s own words yesterday was it is open season on u. S. Political figures in 2020. So, frank, play it the way you usually do. Hyperbole aside, what are the real world consequences of what the president said yesterday . How will they stay with us . Well, were going to see an increase, perhaps more than ever before in recent history, in attempts at Foreign Governments to meddle and interfere with our upcoming election and were going to see it at all levels. And heres why. They now see more than ever a permissive respective environment. Today around the world in world capitals, Intelligence Service directors were having translators translate the president s words. They were scratching their heads saying, did he just say he would be receptive and not report to the fbi if we gave him research on his opponents . Answer, yes, thats what he said. And so any Intelligence Service worth their salt is saying, how can we get this done, get him vulnerable and compromised by having him listen to our stuff and yet not come across the radar screen of the fbi, the cia, et cetera . So theyre going to get more sophisticated at doing it. Theyre going to try to do it. Theyre going to do it in a way that doesnt make them look like foreign Intelligence Services and its going to get very, very complicated. Usually the attorney general would be the one to step in, call timeout and say, look, mr. President , youre wrong, i have the back of the fbi, they are our premier Law Enforcement agency. He hasnt done it. Weve heard nothing from him. And the Intelligence Services around the world are saying lets make this happen. Mimi rocah, i never thought a document from the federal Election Commission could be sobering. Ive never seen a document like that from the federal Election Commission. Question for you, did the president increase his legal peril at all yesterday . I think he did. I mean, and, you know, its striking to me that one of the things nancy pelosi said today is that this is, you know, the president doesnt know right from wrong. I really respectfully beg to differ with that. I think if anything what this statement in the interview shows is that he knows he just doesnt care. And it puts in a new light all of the conduct, i think, that mueller documented because, you know, he spent trump spent so long telling us it didnt happen. I didnt meet with the russians. Yes, i met with the russians, but it wasnt about the election. Okay, we met with them, but, now, you know, were at the point where its okay to do this. Thats where hes been all along. Its just now that hes admitting it, but i think it puts that conduct in a new light of, yeah, i knew i wasnt supposed to be doing this. Thats why i wouldnt admit doing it. But now im admitting it. I just dont care that its wrong. You know, to the extent that willfulness, intent is an element of any of these crimes, he has blown through the water on that. I mean, you barely would need anything other than that interview to show the president s intent to not only commit a crime in the future, which hes announced and admitted, but i think puts light on his conduct in the past as well. Peter baker, any Senior Republicans who are in the president s orbit and by default in your orbit expressing real regret . All we have to go on so far is the president tweeting about wales. Yeah, actually, there was a pretty universal reaction against this by republicans on capitol hill today. You saw any number of republican senators say pretty flatly, no, thats not what youre supposed to do, the answer is supposed to be no. You just heard Lindsey Graham, marsha black burn, lisa murkowski, one republican after another saying, no, this isnt the kind of thing i would do. What about Christopher Steele . Thats a different situation, obviously. There is plenty to argue about with regard to the steele dossier. Christopher steele wasnt working for a hostile government, the russians, and he did turn his dossier over to the fbi. The question is what the fbi then did with it to justify, you know, its investigation. So i think the republicans are very uncomfortable with this today. They did not want to see the president revive this. Remember, just a couple of weeks ago with the Mueller Report, it seemed like he had put the russia part of this thing behind him the issue was about obstruction of justice and these subpoenas, but not about russia. Now hes put that question, his relationship with moscow, right back in the center of the american debate. Jeremy bash, what have we done in the meantime to strengthen our elections to fortify them, what have our fine patriotic members of Congress Done in that interest . Well, unfortunately not enough, brian. If you look at the efforts that are across the states, we have so many different election systems, and i think it could have really benefitted from some strong leadership from the federal government, but, of course, states and localities want to do things their own way and i think theres been some reluctance by this administration to acknowledge the deep vulnerabilities we have in our election system. We heard reports about the foreign interference in two places in florida. Places where the vote tabulation systems have been infected potentially with malicious code. So i think this is a very unresolved issue and our defenses are down going into 2020. Frank figliuzzi, the president of the United States just declared publicly his fbi director is wrong, and i hate to disagree with the white house, he wasnt talking about comey, he was talking about director wray. How must it be inside that institution right now . Oh, the worlds getting very, very small at the hoover building and it must feel very isolating because as i said earlier, its the attorney general that you rely on to have your back. And so on the topic of what were doing about our elections, even if the fbi said to the attorney general we need x number of agents, x number of dollars, department of Homeland Security comes in and says we want to bolster Cyber Security in the following states and voting precincts. If the administration isnt tuned into that, isnt supportive of that, that money, those resources, that manpower is not going to happen. So what we need to hear from, really, is ask the secretary of Homeland Security, the acting secretary of Homeland Security. Ask the fbi director, do you have what you need . Have you gotten everything youve asked for to secure the 2020 election . And ill bet you the answer is no. Mimi rocah, lets just take a brief sidebar to mr. Flynn, who is awaiting sentencing. Dumped his last lawyer and has taken on a new one. We know this thanks to the president s tweet this morning. General michael flynn, the 33year war hero who has served with distinction, has not retained a good lawyer, he has retained a great lawyer, sidney powell. Best wishes and good luck to them both. Sidney powell is a frequent contributor on fox news. Well known in the republican legal world. What does this mean to you . Does anything get your attention there . I mean, the whole thing really gets your attention, and i cant tell you exactly where this is going, but, look, first of all, flynn is about to be sentenced. This judge has signalled very pretty clearly that he was planning on sending flynn to jail, and we have no reason to think yet that that would have changed. I think flynn is, you know, going down a different path. He thinks, well, if im going to go to jail with this judge then i might as well roll the dice on a pardon, and trump is certainly signaling that he is amenable to that by that tweet. I thought that tweet was astonishing because, first of all, he supposedly fired flynn because hi was not an honest man who lied to the Vice President. For him to now go back hes doing the dance that he did with manafort and with cohen, oh, hes a good man, hes a good man. Hes holding out something for him now, the possibility of the pardon, and this at a time when flynn is being subpoenaed to congress. There is still very much flynn could do in his cooperation, in his testimony now with congress. And trump knows that. And i think this is his way of holding out this pardon, holding out the possibility. It hasnt worked out for manafort so i dont know why flynn would trust him. Manafort is sitting in jail. But that seems to be where this is going. And peter baker, the other news of this day, the recommendation that the white house fire Kellyanne Conway for violating the hatch act, which used to matter and the departure of the press secretary where they used to hold daily briefings. Yeah, thats, you know, another day in trump world. Were busy, you know, reexamining his relationship with russia. The staff is turning over. Illegalities are being alleged. The office of special counsel that made this complaint against Kellyanne Conway is not related to Robert Mueller. Its a part of the government that existed long before this presidency, will presumably exist long after it goes. In order to enforce workplace rules on politics in the federal government and what they said was that Kellyanne Conway was using her official position as a white House Counselor, and from the setting of the white house, no less, to engage in partisan politics. Shes basically dismissed their relevance. She said a couple of weeks ago blah, blah, blah, youre not going to stop me by waving around