about north korea's nuclear programme. but two key players — china and russia — aren't involved in the meeting. it comes just days after inter—korean talks about north korean involvement in next month's winter olympics. us media is reporting that donald trump's former chief strategist steve bannon has been ordered to testify before a grand jury as part of an investigation into alleged russian interference in the presidential election. and this video is trending on bbc.com: the philippine province of albay has declared a state of calamity as mount mayon spews lava beyond the limits of a no—go zone. people have been fleeing their homes as tourists have been descending on the area to watch the spectacular lava display. that's all from me now. stay with bbc world news. now on bbc news it's time for hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk from washington, dc.

i'm stephen sackur. new year, same old donald trump. not a day goes by without a new media storm over a presidential comment, tweet or announcement that had democrats decrying him as unfit for office and republicans, well... what — what do republicans feel and do about their de facto party leader? my guest is michael steele, a former chairman of the republican national committee. should the party stand with or dump trump? michael steele, welcome to hardtalk. it's good to be here, yeah.

great to have you here. i want to take you back to that day in november 2016 when it became clear donald trump was going to be the next president of the united states. for you, as a long and loyal republican, how did you feel? i guess the emotion would be, "here we go. let's strap in, get ready." because i knew — i'd worked with donald trump in the past, i know what kind of campaign, obviously, he had run over the past 1.5 years, and had predicted his eventual win earlier on. but if i may say so, not in neutralfashion. this is a quote from you after you observed one of the later presidential debates. you said of trump's performance, "i was damn near puking during the debate." yeah, yeah, exactly. that's how i reacted, how a lot of people reacted, but it had nothing to do with his ability to connect

with voters in a way that they would then, several months, later go into the ballot box and pull the leverfor him. that's the one thing that i think a lot of the political elites and the establishments and the media and elsewhere did not understand fully at the time, was that as much as we were hair on fire about a lot of things that donald trump was saying, and the tweets and all this other stuff, beneath the surface, he was connecting with people in a way in which they found themselves drawn to him. i stepped back and observed that, and what i realised was donald trump's voters were once his audience. so these were people that he had been able to cultivate and develop a relationship with over a long period of time before he ran for president. and it should be said that you ran the republican party national committee at a time when mitt romney was becoming a front runner... mitt romney, john mccain... you had these years, the 2008 election, 2012 election where the republicans simply couldn't find a viable winner, and donald trump... i disagree with the concept that they weren't viable winners. they were certainly viable in the sense that they ran competitive campaigns, but the problem was that the last

little bit, as you know in politics, is about connection. you can have the best papers in the world. hillary clinton's a great example of it — policy up the wazoo, but at the end of the day, it's that connection with the voters that has to be genuine enough to pull you through, and that was something that was missing at the end of both of those campaigns. which brings us to the present day. if you are saying to me that despite your reservations, which you had from the very beginning of the trump phenomenon, despite your reservations, you could see that this guy had a special ability to connect. let us bring it to the present and ask — what on earth do you think donald trump thinks he is doing with the messages he is putting out, day by day right now? let us start with the first and central quote of this period, and that is his remark to a bipartisan group of congress people that he couldn't understand why — and it's an offensive word — but he couldn't understand why so many people from "shithole" countries were allowed to come into the united states. where's the connection there? who's he connecting with? he's connecting to that 36—37%

of his base that have stayed with him throughout, period. that's it, full stop. that's exactly — that's his cornerstone for anything he's going to do. look, he could calculate and go, "i'm going into 2018 with 38%. democrats have put no—one up against me so far who can keep me there." and he believes, and i do believe this, and it's probably a sad commentary in the main, is if an election is held today, given the options that voters have, he would be in a better position to win than not. and that, again, speaks to the fact that donald trump, for everything else that people don't like about him, with that core constituency that has stayed with him, that's a good, solid base to start from. and so he appeals to them. those comments appeal to those voters. he appeals to that basic instinct.

you are that relative rarity in the republican party, a senior voice from the black american community. in your view, is donald trump a racist? yeah, i think he has racist tendency. i think he uses race as a weapon to divide and conquer his opponents, to shift the narrative to something else. personally, how do you feel about that? oh, well, bothersome. bothersome? you're a black american! what am i gonna do about it? it doesn't matter. i didn't vote for the man, so what does it mean? hang on — you didn't vote for trump? no, ididn‘t, no. the former chief of the rnc who refused to vote for the republican candidate... that's been on the record since the election, no. since before the election. because i could not... i mean, look, i have a certain value

set, i have certain principles and i have a certain way i look at the kind of leaders that i want to represent me — and the key thing to understand here, and i think this is a critical moment on the heels of this recent controversy with the president — that this is no longer about donald trump. we need to get over this shock and awe with donald trump. "0h, guess what he said today? oh, my god, what does this mean?" it doesn't mean anything. he is who he is. he's a 71—year—old man that was born out of a certain period of time, he reflects that period of time. but you're suggesting we normalise the fact that in your view, a racist is sitting in the white house. we had an election. there's no impeachment proceedings, there's no 25th amendment proceedings, this will resolve itself at the ballot box in 2020. the american people have a decision to make at that time. so whether michael steele feels a certain way or someone else feels a certain way, the only thing you can do at this point is talk about it.

and here's the key thing — this is less about donald trump and more about the american people, a reflection of us, and the question becomes — is this the reflection that we want to continue to project? we'll get to the american people and what it says about the nation after we talk more about the republican party. because, again, let us constantly remind ourselves, you speak to me as a former chief of the republican national committee. what do you make of the responses to this particular outrage, the use of the word — again, it's offensive, but i'll use it — "shitholes". but other things we could talk about with donald trump and race — but what i want to know is what you make of the reaction of the leadership of the republican party on capitol hill? it's disappointing. the reaction of republican leaders is disappointing beyond any measure. you won't see any real movement against donald trump inside the gop until his numbers change inside the gop, because you have to keep in mind that members of congress, in a particular way, they look at their congressional districts. donald trump is at 60—plus per cent in their congressional districts. they're not going to go against that number, alright. they don't want to be primaried in a primary election.

they don't want to be in a situation where the president is using the hammer of his office, as we've seen him do... forgive me if i sound as though as though my mind is being boggled here, but you're saying that top echelon of the republican party is happy to yoke itself to a racist as long as they believe that that is in their political self—interest. why are you sitting here, shocked by this? didn't you watch the 2016 election? you saw 15 other people stand on the stage and couldn't put a glove on the man. you watched party leaders admit, "yes, what he just said was racist, but we can still work with him." so you have to get over your shock and step back and understand the politics that's beneath the surface. it's no stranger here. we've seen this in your own country, in great britain, when you look at the shock and awe the next day after brexit — but let me finish the point — you have to understand where people are coming from, and you have

to understand what motivates and moves the political leadership that represents those people. at the end of the day, politics is at the core of it. even on that cynical premise, i still... it's not cynical, it's fact! well, it may be factual, but you can also argue in the world of values and morality, it's cynical too. yeah. oh, sure. 0k. so the basis you've presented the argument, i still don't understand why the republican party is in lockstep still with donald trump, because if one looks at basic facts about demography in the united states... but what are they going to do at this point? what do you think is going to happen at this point? what would you recommend happen at this point? they could create meaningful distance between themselves and donald trump. how can they do that? you can't do... they could start by saying, "mr president, the way you are dealing with these issues, like immigration, is utterly unacceptable to us. " and then what? and when he goes..."so?" what do you do then? because he's the one who's got to sign whatever legislation you pass. and so if he doesn't sign

the legislation that you want to get passed, what have you accomplished? just going back to your notion of what's in their electoral self—interest, you have the fastest—growing demographic in the united states today, being the latino hispanic community. correct. they, by and large, look at a president who on issues like building the wall... they voted 30% for him in 2016. and you think right now the hispanic community is still 30% with trump? i don't know, i haven't seen the polling, but i'm just saying given everything that had gone before, alright, and certainly with respect to hispanics and the daca issue, that's an important issue on the back end, on the policy side, but i'm just saying, again, this doesn't follow any particular logical pattern. that's the thing that's so frustrating about this, because the voters themselves — that's why i go back to this being a... i give speeches around the country all the time. everyone‘s upset about donald trump. he's a reflection of us, he's a reflection of where we are in our politics right now. you say, "what could we do" as politicians or political commentators such as

yourself these days. one thing you could do, if i'm going to make it personal, is you could quit the republican party until donald trump... why would i do that? because your party is backing a man who you believe to be a racist. have no — become like everybody else who leaves, or i could stay inside to fight for my party. i believe in the founding principles that drew me to the party in the first place. according to you, there's no fight, that you've given up. you save there is nothing we can do. i did not say... i'm talking about what can — you're talking about what are legislators going to do? they're not going to impeach the man, that's not going to happen, so get that out of your head, it's not happening. they're not going to invoke the 25th amendment where the cabinet and the vice—president write a letter saying the president's incompetent to serve. that's not going to happen. the question becomes now — how do you get through and get subsidive policy done, alright, if you can,

and how do you, to your point, and, look, i don't want to give the impression that i don't appreciate what you're saying, i do. the question is — there's only so much of this that's going to get itself worked out now. that's what elections do. this november will be the first time the american people will be able to send a signal, as we saw in 2006 that they did with george bush, where they had enough with the war, they had enough with the economy, they took the house away from republicans, they unelected a lot of folks, and i think that's the trend line i see happening going into this fall. well, look at the local races we saw recently in the state of virginia, look at what happened to roy moore in the state of virginia and alabama. it looks to me as though in a whole host of significant races in 2018, if the republican party continues to tie itself to donald trump, they may well be facing a disaster. they very well may be. and you know what? you've gotta learn from the school of hard knocks ‘cause that's what politics is all about. if you want to go down this road, you want to continue down this road, you do not want to —

and i agree with the advice you just gave — i've given this advice, i've given it to folks inside the white house. so again, it's personal. at what point, when the party will not listen to people like you, and it's relevant here that you're african american, the republican party is not noted right now for its sensitivity... it has nothing to do with that, it's not about, "oh, ! bgcgmg'g'figpubliign who inspired in me not just a sense of service, but a sense of responsibility to my community, and what we can do to help the least. is it time for more and more republicans, who are minded like you and which are, frankly, disgusted by what they're seeing

from donald trump in the white house, to actually say they want no part of electoral politics right now? i'm thinking of senatorjeff flake, for example, who is outspoken in his criticism of donald trump, said recently, "there are times when we must risk our careers in favour of our principles and now is such a time," and he, realising that because of his criticism, he was not going to get the republican nomination to refight in his seat in arizona, he's walked away, he's quit. and i think that's unfortunate and i've said so, i've told him that. even though, look, if what you're saying, he wrote a great book on this, and if you really believe these founding principles hold true, then you stay in the fight. what good is it to walk away and to lessen the authority of your voice, even though you may lose your primary... that's called making a principled stand. no, it's not, in my view, it's not. here's another thing he said — "when the next generation," says senator flake, "asks us, why didn't you do something, why didn't you speak up, what are we going to say?" speaking up is one thing,

walking away is something different. my attitude is you are a current sitting united states senator who's drawn a very bright line with this president, as has senator corker, tennessee, drawn a very, very bright line with this president, so you're looking at your re—election prospects and they don't look good. what do you do? what i do is i stay in the fight, i stay in the fight to make the point because i've got the authority of my office, i've got the fire of my positions to stand in that and go, "you know what? i'm going to use my re—election, i'm going to use my primary as the battleground for what i believe, in and i may go down in flames, but i'm going to make the principle point that this should not stand." and who knows, who knows? you just may win! but if one looks at recent internal republican battles in the state of alabama, for example, and what we now see unfolding in arizona, where the latest news is thatjoe arpaio, of all people, the former sheriff, the man who was convicted in a federal court of involvement

in racial profiling... we will see if he makes it to the primary. ..these are the kinds of people that grassroots republicans want to fight the party cause in national elections. we don't know that because they haven't named a nominee for the party. joe arpaio‘s announced that he's running, but that doesn't mean that he's going to win the primary. there are other people who are in that race, some supported by trump people, some supported by establishment types. we'll see how this plays out. are we not seeing — and i'm going to create a phrase here — the steve bannonisation of the republican party. this is a man, and of course, he's been in the news recently because of the fire and fury book by michael wolff, and what we've learned about bannon and of course, he's now fallen out big time with donald trump, but bannon‘s point is that he is an insurgent, he is a nationalistic populist and he believes his movement is bigger than donald trump, and that whatever happens to his relationship with trump, it is the bannon politics of insurgency that will ultimately drive the republican party.

well, clearly, there's not a whole lot of life in that. why do you say that? did he elect roy moore? is roy moore going to the united states senate? no, he's not. now, but let's see how many bannon acolytes are in the race... the bannon acolytes are dropping out of the race, they're second—guessing their runs because they've watched this thing collapse around them. you have to understand the truth of the matter is bannon has no base, his base is donald trump's base and donald trump's base is with donald trump, not with steve bannon. so these candidates that they're putting up and promoting out there looked at what happened in alabama and they went, "ah...| don't think so." so they're already beginning to back out of the idea of running, this is not going to go... you're not going to see a situation where steve bannon is going to be promoting candidates on one side and donald trump's going to be promoting candidates on the other.

that's a mismatch that won't even stand the test at all because bannon has no base. what bannon has, though, is a populist idea that has taken hold that trump has used to some degree, but even there, donald trump has sort of created this own space for himself. let me ask you a broader question about race in america today, and it's something i've seen discussed in recent hours in the united states quite a lot — the idea is that if the democratic party, for the next presidential election, comes out with an out and out left—wing candidate, maybe a bernie sanders or elizabeth warren, and they are running against donald trump, there are people in this country who believe that whatever misgivings people have about the perception donald trump is racist, they would rather vote for a racist than for somebody who they believe, with their left—wing policies, might affect their economic position and their pocketbook. is that something that you believe? i think that's something that's a fair... i think that's a fair assessment.

america is not a progressive left country at its core. we're very puritanical in many respects. but is white america instinctively, in your view, dangerously racist? no, that's a silly comment to make, that's crazy. 55 't,§a;1§£afl§4§§§f you do not seem to be depressed that roughly a third of the american people are still die—hard supporters of a man who you describe as a racist. i don't get depressed because i've got my bottle of gin, i get through the day, you know! so, no... i'm having fun with it! i think that where you're going with that is just part of a stereotyped view

of america that is... you just need to get over it. before we end, just a couple of quickfire questions about news events of recent days, one we've discussed already, alluded to the publication of fire and fury by michael wolff. now, fact checkers have had a field day because not everything in that book is accurate, but nonetheless, the picture it paints of the trump white house and the views of people around trump that this man is not a suitable president of the united states, not competent to do the job — does that worry you? oh, it does, it worries a lot of people, and that's why it was so important coming in, and i did a little bit of work on the transition before the president's team blew it up, it was so important to get the right people in the white house, to get the right people in place to help support... look, we understood, if nothing else, that you had an individual coming into the oval office who had no political established order. he had no political team, he had no real political base

in washington with which to work, no relationships on capitol hill, no relationships on k street, which is sort of the financial fundraising part of politics, and so the idea was to give him a team of people and put in place a team of people, which is why the positions of secretary of state and department of defence and cia was so important in these critical areas, to have good, competent people there who the president would listen to. the problem, as we've discovered, is that the president does not listen well, and the president in his own way is his own man, and i get that, but when you don't have the strength of a political structure to help you navigate washington and the responsibilities of the office, this is what you get. and we have to end in a moment. i'm amazed by your cheerful demeanour throughout this interview. as a seniorfigure in the republican party, the party of abraham lincoln and ronald reagan, do you not feel

that right now, your party is on a one—way path to self—destruction? look, i think my party has not had to deal with a lot of things that we need to deal with since reagan left office, to be honest. this is a just donald trump. the issues that are roiling inside the gop have been there since, really, the late ‘80s, early ‘90s. this idea of who we are as republicans, republican versus conservative. are they the same, are they different? this idea of what we believe, what we stand for, we've watched this party, to my great frustration, again prompted by this administration, move closer towards a blind loyalty to putin and russia.

what the hell is that? i mean, where'd that come from? we were the party that labelled them ‘the evil empire‘. doesn't it come back to cynicism? it comes back to the fact that donald trump has delivered massive tax cuts for the wealthy and for corporate america. he has delivered... but all that was in place before those things happened. what you're talking about is post—administration. he's already been elected and they move those balls that was transformative before, that was something that took place. they changed the party platform under trump's team to sort of embrace a little bit more of this idea of putin and russia. so what i'm saying is it's not something... it's notjust tax cuts for the rich. this is an ideological shift for the party that has nothing to do with tax cuts. but you didn't actually address my question — if this continues, is the party facing self—destruction? no, i don't think so. i think the party, like any other organisation, is going to go — yes, there's going to be rips and tears and we'll wait to see what emerges out of it.

that's why i stay in, this is why the fight is important to me. i'm not giving up my space, i'm not walking away from the station i have. i think these ideals and these values still matter, and i think they're worth fighting for. and we have to end there. but michael steele, thank you for being on hardtalk. yeah, no, my pleasure. thanks a lot. well, there's been some significant accumulations of snow across parts of northern ireland and scotland, the far north of england, and we continue to see wintry showers, snow showers, through the course of the night, early into wednesday so that's prompted the met office to issue an amber warning for parts of south—west scotland, northern ireland, for this combination of snow and ice. very windy too during the overnight period. gale force winds, particularly across irish sea coasts in towards the south—west for a time. plenty of snow showers continuing across scotland, northern ireland and into northern england that accumulate and continue

to tot up. across the south, some dry interludes in fact, particularly across the south—east, but wherever you are it's going to be a chilly start to wednesday. wednesday itself looks like to be another cold and a windy one, there will be wintry showers again but also some good spells of sunshine and increasing amounts of sunshine as we head on into the afternoon. but plenty of wintry showers, snow showers across scotland and northern ireland to begin the day. strong winds too so there'll be some drifting of snow, blizzard conditions, take extra care on the roads, watch out for icy stretches as well. the same too for parts of northern england but the further south that we head, fewer showers through the morning period. a few running through the cheshire gap there in towards the pennines and the odd wintry showers across the higher ground, the moors of south—west england. but elsewhere it should be dry, chilly and bright with some sunshine through the morning. those showers continue across many northern and western areas, but through the afternoon, like i mentioned, increasing amounts of sunshine for england and wales with most of the showers confined to scotland and northern ireland,

the far north of england with snow amounts continuing to tot up here. it will be cold if you factor in the wind, subzero feeling temperatures in the north. but to the south with the sunshine, it shouldn't be too bad. now, onto wednesday night, this is the area of low pressure will the next hazard to our shores. it's going to bring a spell of wet and very windy weather to all areas. across the north of this rain band, we're likely to see a spell of snow for northern ireland, northern england, central, southern scotland, which could be heavy for a time. severe gales sweeping through england and wales along with that rain but it clears out quite quickly through thursday morning, and in fact, into thursday afternoon, and improving picture, the winds falling lighter. likely to there'll be fewer showers, most in the north and west, against no on the hills, but some good spells of some joint further south and east. but that area of low pressure is cause some disruption, the severe gales, heavy rain and also the snow, which could fall across southern areas, so keep tuned

to your bbc local radio. and then into friday itself, it's looking quieter. not as strong, those winds. still blustery across the north and the west where there'll be most of the snow showers. good sunny spells further south and east. i'm rico hizon in singapore. this is newsday on the bbc. the headlines. 20 countries meet to step up pressure on north korea. but key players, china and russia, skip the talks. is steve bannon set to testify to a grand jury? the us—russia probe reportedly turns its sights towards trump's former chief strategist. i'm babita sharma in london. also in the programme: a californian couple is charged with torturing their 13 children. they were held captive, close to starvation, some chained to their beds. and hitting new heights. india's first skiing champion races into the record books.