i predict they will find both of the them. >> they do leave a trail. >> like a discover card or something. danny see vau -- danny cevallos, thank you. my colleague wolf blitzer starts my colleague wolf blitzer starts right now. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com hello, i'm wolf blitzer it is 1:00 p.m. in washington and 8:00 p.m. in damascus, and wherever you are watching around the world, thank you for watching us. terrorists are going to be some of the issues that president obama is going to be addressing when he addressing the nation in a news conference. we will bring it to you live. we are also waiting for a news conference from bernie sanders' campaign. the national democratic campaign

is going to suspend his access, and we will have that address. and also, following the anxiety following the terrorism in san bernardino and the president's plan to destroy isis, according to a washington street journal poll, only 34% of americans approve of the way that the president is handling is isis, and 60% disapprove. we go to gloria borger and jim acosta at the white house. what do you believe that the president is going to try to get across? >> well, it is another way of him assuring the american people that he is on top of it in securing the homeland and taking the fight to isis, and you have heard it in several settings, the oval office, the pentagon, and at the national counter

terrorism center yesterday. and this is a unique opportunity for the president to talk about what he feel s ths that the accomplishments were over the last year, and they want to talk about the climate deal inked in pari paris, and they want to talk about the iran nuclear deal, and the diplomatic relations opened up with cuba and tim -- the improving economy, but it is against that backdrop that the president has to address the climate of fear and concern out there in the american public about what is happening with the fight against isis, and there not a lot of confidence of the president's strategy for taking out the terror army, and growing concern whether or not the government can protect the homeland against the lone wolf terrorist attacks, and you mentioned the nbc news and "wall street journal" poll, and there are a number of americans who are confident that they can prevent a lone wolf attack. i suspect, wolf, that he will be looking at the executive order

of tightening the gun ownership, and the gun purchases in the country, and that is is something that is coming up shortly after the new year, and the president's aides are forecasting that he is likely to deliver the executive orders on guns after the new year, and we will hear about that as well. and the campaign, and we were talking about bernie sanders and also what is happening on the republican side, donald trump and his comments about vladimir putin and i suspect that is too tempting to have a reporter let that pass in a news conference coming up within the hour. >> and that news conference is going to last at least an hour, and maybe longer. it is that end of the year news conference for the president before he heads to california. later tonight, he is going to be meeting with some of the fami families of the san bernardino terror attack, and then off to hawaii for the family vacation. gloria bornger, we are learning now details about the off of the record detail that he had with some columnists this week, and according to the president, he acknowledges that he was slow to react to the concern of the american public that terrorism

could strike the u.s. homeland. >> when you speak to the people of the white house as i have done, tissue to them is that it is very hard for the president to calm the public when you have a republican campaign that is going on that is actually, i think that believe stirring up the public's fears. they also will admit as the president apparently admitted through the reports that we have read this morning in the off of the record meeting with journalists that he underestimated the public fear in the wake of paris and san bernardino. that he did not take to the bully pulpit quickly enough or public enough. so what they are trying to do now is to make up for that quite frankly. i mean, we saw the president visiting the counter terrorism center, and they will keep doing updates about how they are dealing with the terror in the country, and just to let the public know that the president is on top of it.

it also didn't help obviously, wolf when the president said that isis was contained, when it clearly wasn't before san bernardino. so they have a lot of ground to make up, and i think that the president over the years, we have seen that he has erred on the side of being more sort of low key than heading right out and talking to the american public directly when there have been problems. we saw it with the oil spill for example, and i think that it is his nature, and even at the late stage in the term, they have kind of realized that you do need to speak to the american public directly when there are big events like this. >> and he is still underwater in the job approval numbers according to the new nbc news/"wall street journal" poll, because his approval rating is 43% of americans who approve of his job performance right now. and th and that is in part because the

public doesn't have confidence as far as fighting isis? >> that is right. down in approval since september, and if you are looking further into the poll, wolf, on the handling of the foreign policy, he gets 37% approv approval. and on the handling of isis only 34% approval. so that is clearly is reflected in the polling numbers. >> all right. gloria, standby, because we are awaiting the coverage of the president of the united states, and we will have coverage of that news conference when it begins. right now, i want to begin with senator ron johnson who is president of the homeland committee. and let me get your reaction to the comments that the president made to columnists about what it would mean a ground war against isis. according to reports he said 100 dead americans a month, and 500 would come back a month wounded, and it would cost us $10 million a month to develop this ground

war in iraq and syria. is that acceptable risk to you? >> first of all, hello, wolf. first of all, it is not that president obama has not done enough photo-ops or said enough things, but what the american people are looking for is action. they want to ak kccomplish the l that president obama himself laid out 15 months ago, which is to degrade and ultimately defeat with the emphasis on the word defeat isis. 15 months later, we have not contain ed them, and found out they are not the j.v. team, and that is the bottom line, we have to defeat isis, and that the finest among us, and they are involved to be with the military and defeat the enemies, but president obama has not agreed to take the action required to take. i don't know what the sacrifice is going to be, but that is what the finest among us have signed up to do which is to keep the nation staf, and defend our freedoms. >> he says that right now, apparently, we might hear it directly from the president in the news conference, the threat from isis, and yes, it is

significant, but it is not enough to justify what would be the cost of human lives and the cost in money if the u.s. were to go forward with this kind of deployment, and does he make a good case from your perspective? >> is he backing a wway from th stated goal of defeating isis, because if he wants to defeet isis, it is going to be taking ground troops, but we need american leadership to assemble the coalition of the willing like george h.w. bush did in the first gulf war. they provided one-third of the troop strength, and paid 75% of the effort. that is a true committed coalition, but because president obama has not led sufficiently, people are holding back, and you cannot defeat isis and deny them that territory and it away without the troops on the ground, and you simply cant no do it. so president obama has to be level with the american people, is he committed to the goal of defeating the isis or sit here in the holding pattern for next 11 or 12 months to the end of

the administration, and that is why so many americans are frustrated and disappointed in the leadership. >> mr. chairman, if you can hold on for a moment, because senator bernie sanders is about to make a statement, and the campaign is about to make a statement on the dnc allegations that they inappropriately accessed hillary clinton's database. i want to listen in. >> i want to ensure you that at the time the firewall between the campaign's data will be restored. we are confident that at that time some of our data is lost to one of the other campaigns, an instead, we found out two days ago once again, the sensitive and important data was compromised because the dnc and the vendor failed to protect it. we have invested enormous campaign resources for the right s of using this proprietary data, but the dnc in inappropriate action has denied us access to our own data, and this is data collected to

hundreds of thousands of volunteers across america, and this data is funded by the over 2 million contributions that the campaign has received from people all across the country. let me briefly discuss three issues involved in the matter. first of all, this is not the first time that the vendor hired by the dnc, and the dnc to run the voter profile program has failed to protect the data. it is incompetence, and it is our campaign that alerted them that the campaign data was made available to other campaigns. we were not running to the media, and relying on assurances from the vendor that the problem would be are resolved. unfortunately the other day, the vendor once again dropped the firewall between the campaigns for some data. secondly after discussion with

the dnc, it was clear that some of the staffers irresponsibly accessed some of the data from another campaign, and that behavior is unacceptable to the sanders' campaign, and we fired the staffer immediately, and made certain that any information obtained was not utilized. we are now speaking to other staffers who might be involved an further the disciplinary action may follow, and clearly while the information was made available to the campaign, because of the incompetence of the ven do, it should not been looked at period. third, rather incredibly, the leadership of the dnc has used this incident to shut down our ability to access our own information. information which is the lifeblood of this campaign. this is the information about our supporters, our volunteers, the lists of people that we intend to contact in iowa, new hampshire, and elsewhere. this is information that we have worked hard to obtain. as i mentioned before, this is

information gathered by our vol untears across the country, and funded by the over $2 million contributions we received online. it is our information, and the information of all of the volunteers and the people who support our campaign and not the dnc's. in other words, by their action, the leadership of the democratic nastional committee is now actively attempting to undermine our campaign. this is unacceptable. individual leaders of the dnc can support hillary clinton in any way they want, but they are not going to sabotage our campaign. with one of the strongest grass root campaigns in modern history. we are announcing today if the dnc continues to hold our data hostage and continues to attack the heart and soul of our grass roots campaign, we will be in federal court this afternoon seeking immediate relief. what is required here is a full and independent audit of the dnc's mishandling of this data,

and its security from the beginning of this campaign to the present. including the incident in october that we alerted them to when we are fairly confident that large amounts of our data were sent to another campaign. thank you very much. this is brad deutsche who represents the campaign and our legal team, and i'm happy to answer any questions that people may have. >> can you assure the dnc and the clinton campaign that you no longer possess any of their data? >> i can tell you that in an official capacity that we do not have any of their data, and we not want their data and in fact, when it was dumped into our computer, we isolated it and locked it up, and we are running a clean campaign, and we are g going to be beating secretary clinton and the campaign on the issues and we don't need to run a dirty campaign. >> and what do you think is

behind this. >>. >> well, after independent au t audit, we will find out. and look, we are investigating it, because one of the ironies is that the dnc has cut usz off to the v.a.n., the voter network, and it makes it impossible for us to look at who looked at what in the time period, so what we did is immediately froze the e-mail accounts of all employees we suspected were involved and reviewed all of the e-mails and the google documents, and restored any documents or the e-mails that i had deleted in the relevant time periods and we have reviewed them all, and investigation internally is ongoing, and in the heat of the campaigns, sometimes the young people make misjudgments. >> how do you nknow this. >> because i manage this campaign and data is being used. >> what was downloaded? >> no data that i am aware of was exported in a way that could be used by anybody. >> do you have documents to show

that up to ten early states may have been accessed and efforts were made to restore the data and that it is four campaign staffers. >> ngp issued an after action report said that none of the reports were printed, and none of them exportexported. i am relying on ngp because the dnc's sole data operator, that is not verified by us, because we have been cut off, and that why we want a full independent audit of the dnc's handling of the data going forward. >> how does this inhibit your campaign to getting out the vote? new hampshire and iowa? >> well, we are hostage the. because when we have people calling people to talk about bernie sanders' campaign to

mobilize america, we cannot organize without that data, and because of the nature of our campaign, we are are directly affe affected by this hostage taking of the data. >> does it make it impossible to win? >> no, because people are across the country starting to see this, and they are outraged by this conduct of the dnc which is a heavy-handed attempt to understood mine this campaign. >> do you know how long they plan to freeze your access to your data? >> to our own data? no, they have not, and that why we will have to go to federal court if this is not resolved shortly not only the vindicate this campaign, but to the millions of people across the country who want change. >> with the person who has been fi fired, and as i mentioned we are doing a internal investigation,

and the internal investigation may be inhibited by what we find, and we are possibly inhibited by the v.a.n., and the dnc is by their own action is hindering our ability to do the kind of investigation that they say that they want. >> your former staffer said that he was not trying to hack into their information, but that they were checking your v vulnerabilities? >> we are working a campaign that is very, very high standards. and so the appearance of anything that is not right is too much. we let that staffer go, and it is a clear signal we take it very, very seriously with respect to our data and other people's data and we will not retain anybody else's data and the dnc is clearly acting in a heavy handed way, and unprecedented way, and i would

like to see another presidential campaign having their own data withheld under similar circumstances. >> you said that two months ago, this happened? >> we found out two months ago, that when we were downloading our data, it was dumping other company's data, and that clearly said that the he firewall was ineffective. so we segregated that, and put it in a password protected file so we could document a breech, and we we were concerned that large amounts of our own data was download and we contacted the dnc to remedy the situation, and we assured them, and we were assured that this would be taken care of, but apparently, they are not come petent in maintaing the security of data between the campaign campaigns. >> is the clinton -- is the dnc taking sides with the clinton campaign? >> look, sure, all i know is

that i don't know the motivation of every person in the dnc, but there is a pattern of conduct and we have had concern for the saturday night campaign structure, and they are trying to help the clinton campaign, and there are others who are not happy with the overwhelming success of senator sanders, but we are going to win this campaign, and win this campaign and we want to have this data reinstated. >> very strong words by jeff weaver, the campaign manager of the bernie sanders' campaign, and making severe accusations for them stopping what he says is bernie sanders' information, and powerful indictment of the

dnc and the chair of the dnc debbie wassermann schultz is standing by live. we will get her reaction. there she is. we will get her reactions to the comments of jeff weaver when we come back. let's get these dayquil liquid but these liquid gels are new. mucinex fast max. it's the same difference. this one is max strength and fights mucus. mucinex fast max. the only cold and flu liquid gel that's max-strength and fights mucus. let's end this. the possibility of a flare swas almost always on my mind. thinking about what to avoid, where to go... and how to deal with my uc. to me, that was normal. until i talked to my doctor.

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take a look at the live pictures coming in from the white house. president obama ready to hold a year-end news conference and we expect he is going to be asked questions for about an hour on the war on isis, terrorism, the presidential race, and whole lot more. our special coverage are will come up, and that is going to be coming up shortly, and i will anchor that coverage. standby for that. but you just heard moments ago the bernie sanders' campaign manager e jeff weaver respopd

ing to the the campaign's suspension to a key dnc national security database, and he called it irresponsible, and irresponsible reaction after the dnc's vendor failed to keep the information of the rival camps confidence shall. the sanders' camp has fired one staffer, and this is what he has said. >> we are announcing today that if the dnc continues to hold our data hostage and continues to attack the heart and soul of our grassroots campaign, we will be in federal court this afternoon seeking immediate relief. what is required here is a full and independent audit of the dnc's mishandling of this day the ta, and its security from the beginning of the campaign to the present, and including the incident in october that we alerted them to that we are fairly confident that large amounts of our data were sent to another campaign. >> and joining us from florida, the former congresswoman debbie

wassermann schultz, and she is the chair of the dnc, and thank you for being with us. >> thank you, wolf. >> are you ready to go the court to defend your decision to suspend the bernie sanders' campaign manager jeff weaver says is their own information. >> well, wolf, taking a look at the facts not in dispute. the sanders' campaign has acknowledged that they have inappropriately accessed data to which they were not entitled, proprietary information that was the property of the clinton campaign. that is not in dispute. that they, we have been trying over the last two days to get, you know, a analysis and information from the sanders' campaign that at this point they have refused to provide. we have also agreed, and we are initiating an independent audit, because it is the only way that we can make sure that we can protect our significant asset

that is the voter file in its integrity. and let me give you the analogy here, wolf, i mean, i guess that the sanders' campaign, unfortunately doesn't have anything other than bluster at the moment that they can put out there, because what they are doing is, what they have done is like if you had, and you found the front door of the house unlocked, and someone decided to go into the house, and take things that didn't belong to them, and then when they were caught, they the still insisted on having access to the house. i mean, the only way for us to at the moment make shure that w analyze what amount of information was taken, and that we can prevent and make sure that the sanders' campaign no long er has access to it is to suspend their ability to manipulate it. a and the only way we know how to do that which by the way is part of the agreement that they signed, and that we signed when they purchased access to the

voter file. so we are following the agreement that both parties entered into. this is certainly not unreasonable, and it is in fact, the only way that we can ensure that we are protect the sb integrity of the voter file. i can be quite certain that if the shoe were on the other foot, and the clinton campaign had inappropriately accessed sanders' pro pry tear -- propri information, that is the same decision they would want us to make if the shoe were on the other foot. >> jeff weir, the campaign manager says it is the dnc's fault, and the vendor's fault, and that they hired a vendor to protect all of the campaign information, and so incompetent and as a result some young staffers working with the bernie sanders' campaign has gotten

carried away and has been filed, and that it is your fault for not having an appropriate vendor. >> first of all, no question, and i want to make sure that we are dealing with facts that are not in dispute. there is no question, that ngp van who manages the voter file when they were applying a software patch, there was a window that opened up to allow each campaign to see one another's proprietary information, and the difference here is that just like when you leave that front door unlocked, if you are going to be ethical and responsible, you don't go into the house, and take things that don't belong to you. the sanders' campaign chose not to make that decision, and they went into the house, and accessed the information for which they were not entitled, and our reports from the vendor in the analysis they have done

initially is not ont that they viewed it, and exported it, but downloaded it. so in order to make sure that we can preserve the integrity of the voter file, and to date which we don't know the depth of what they actually viewed and have downloaded, we have to make sure that they can't manipulate that information until we know exact exactly what happened, what they have, and that we can verify to each campaign that we have handled this in a way that is compliant with the agreement that they each signed. that is the process that we are going to follow. >> will you let them at least have information access to what they put in there, and not hillary clinton or dnc, but b bernie sanders' campaign information. >> what we have suspended is the access to the voter file software. that is what they do not have access to. i'm not familiar enough technologically to, you nknow,

describe what they do and don't have access to. one thing that i do want to address wolf, though, jeff, i guess in trying to make sure that you are throwing enough stuff up here on the wall said something about a previous time in which they made us aware that there was an opening of that same window. when the analysis was done at that time, and that is also not in dispute, there was a period of time that this occurred one o other time for a different reason, no -- unlike this time, no one's information was accessed and the window was closed and there was no breach of the integrity of the voter file, and no campaign accessed -- the ngp van has the ability to analyze each individual users' account and see specifically what they access and what actions they have taken and at that time, no actions were taken. in this case, as the sanders' campaign has admitted, multiple stuffers have on their campaign

not only viewed proprietary information of another campaign, but exported it, and downloaded it. >> and i want to give you information to respond to accusation accusations of the dnc by supporters of bernie sanders' campaign that the dnc is not so subtly trying to help hillary clinton's campaign and trying to hurt his campaign by doing these kinds of things that you have heard earlier accusations by hosting democratic presidential debates on saturday night when most people are not home, and rying to help hillary clinton's campaign, and that, you can respond and this is another example of what the dnc is trying to do to promote hillary clinton. >> what this is an example of the dnc trying to make sure that we can credibly manage our voter file. we have an incident in which a campaign inappropriately accessed another campaign's pro pry tear information. that is just like if you walked into someone's home when the

door was unlocked and took things that don't belong to you in order to use them for your own benefit. that is inappropriate, and unaccessible to and to get to the bottom of it, what we are going to do is to ask and we have asked the sanders' campaign to participate in the independent audit. i am hopeful they will agree to and that it is good that they stated that they want that to happen as well, and we want to have access to the data file, and so as soon as we can get access to the audit file, the quicker we will have access. i don't have another remedy that i am aware of to prevent the campaign from using or continuing to or being able to manipulate information that they should haven't had access to in the first place other than to suspend, the agreement that we have with them the access to the vo voter file. >> they say they are going to federal court this afternoon if

they don't do what they want, and we will see what happens on that front. i assume that the dnc has very good lawyers as well. thank you, debbie wassermann schultz for join g ing us. >> thank you, wolf. and by the way, the staffer who was fired said no malicious intent, and telling cnn by phone, that we knew that there was a security breach in the data and trying to understand it, and what was happening to the best of my knowledge, nobody took anything that would have given the campaign any benefit. let's bring in the senior political reporter nia-malika henderson. and gloria borger, it is a huge fight between the sanders campaign, and the dnc from watching from the sidelines. >> yes, the sanders' campaign is accusing the dnc of route -- of routing for them, and keeping the data which is the lifeblood of the campaign and the donor

base is the life blood of the campaign or the people who are your potential voters and supporters are the lifeblood of your campaign. and what they are saying is, look, we admit that we screwed up, and our guys accessed the information that was there because the vendors screwed up. but regoingwe are going to take court, because we need it to mount an effective campaign, and it is dicey, wolf sglfrmt and it comes the day before a democratic presidential debate saturday night, and a democratic presidential debate, and i assume that this is going to be further sparking some excitement between hillary clinton and bernie sanders. >> who knows if it is going to be coming up on the debate stage, because it is sparking what had been a simmering fight for as long as this campaign has been going on, and this is the

assertion of a lot of the bernie sanders' supporter s ths that tc had the thumb on the scale for hillary clinton. i also understand that this vendor which is ngp van a lot of the complaints have come in about this vendor even in prior campaigns, and they are talking to the folks who are familiar with the dnc is thinking, and they are saying that they want to get it under wraps and taken care of so that the narrative doesn't sort of become the sanders and the dnc fight. >> and it is extraordinary development, because jeff zeleny is with us as well that a democratic presidential campaign bernie sanders and the dnc having a bitter public fight, and bernie sanders' campaign is threatening to go to federal court later this afternoon. >> that is where it is looking like it is going, because we just heard the chairwoman say she is not backing down. what is a civil affair at least by this year's standards of politic politics is suddenly exploding into something far more on the democratic side. this has consequences, because the supporters of bernie sanders

believe he is right. they won't be swayed by what the chairwoman of the committee says. we are seeing the online petitions out there from moveon.org and other liberal groups here, but we don't know the substance of the matter here, and how this works is important. i have been talking to the senate democratic campaigns who work on other organizations who use this information all of the time, and the campaign information is behind a firewall. what they believe is that the sanders' campaign was inappropriately looking at thing, and in copying things, and so this is isa serious matt, and the chairwoman is right if it were reverse, people would be going crazy here about the clinton campaign, and it is not watergate, but it is the electronic vegs of it, because there are electronic fingerprints in here, and this one of the reasons that the obama campaign operated outside of this whole system in 2012. >> and didn't the sanders' campaign claim that the clinton

campaign got a peek at their information? >> it is possible. >> but this is a 45-minute window, and the chairwoman said that for 45 minutes they acce accessed allegedly, this information there, and so it is a lot of time. stop and ask what this information is? it is specific as a specific voter in iowa who had been approached by a volunteer who likes hillary clinton but is open to bernie sanders and so these are real voters and all of this information is such the lifeblood of the campaign. >> it is people, and everything you need to particularly like in an early state like iowa getting people out to the caucuses. >> it is incredibly valuable. >> and the analysis is that it is a new version of a high-tech version of watergate in back 1972 when there was a break-in of the democratic national committee head quarters at the watergate complex here. we know what resulted then. this is obviously not watergate, but it is sensitive information

that apparently one campaign got maybe inadvertently or the result of young staffers or overly zealous, but it could explode into a big issue. >> that is why it is a big deal, because as knee nia said that t tensions are high, and many, many the sanders' campaign believe that the dnc has been pulling the levers for the clinton campaign, but it is important to see what happened here. the sanders' campaign did acknowledge firing someone. >> and to be fair -- >> and jeff weaver called them irresponsible, and that is why they were fired. >> in watergate, it was republican operative trying to steal democratic information, and in this case, it is democratic operative trying to steal another democratic operative information, and stay

tuned for more on that. the presidential candidates will debate tomorrow night. i will anchor the post debate coverage, and we will go from 10:00 p.m. to midnight. if -- and just in case you missed tuesday night's debate, it is going to be reair eed tomorrow at 10:30 p.m. and we will have more on the presidential news kconference start thing after this break. count on being slammed this hwith orders. we're getting slammed with orders. and my customers knowing right when their packages arrive. totally slammed! introducing real-time delivery notifications. one more reason this is our season. when i was sidelined with blood clots in my lung,h.

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i'm wolf blitzer in washington. i want to welcome the viewers here in the united states and around the world. this is cnn special live coverage of president obama's final news conference of the year. it comes in the volatile presidential race, and as the world is reacting to terror attacks around the globe, including in paris and san bernardino, california. let's go to our chief white house correspondent, jim acosta who is over there at the white house right now. you are in the briefing room, and the president is about to walk out. jim, tell us what is going on, and then answer a whole bunch of

questions. >> yes, that is right. and if you are wondering if it is a full house, i can say, definitely yes here more the president's end of the year news conference, and going into the final year in office, wolf, the president is typically in cruise control, but instead, president obama is in the hot seat right now. if you are looking at the polls, and it is resounding, the public is deeply worried about his handling of the war ob isis, and they are very worried about his capability of protecting the u.s. homeland right now. if you are looking at the latest polls, there are deep doubts if the u.s. government could stop a lone wolf attack after what happened in san bernardino, california, a few weeks ago. so i expect that the president is going to be reassuring the american people to enjoy the holiday season to despite the threat hanging in the air that americans feel all too deeply. and now, wolf, the president is going to be coming out here to talk about accomplishments or the ak come ple establishments that he has racked up, the

climate deal, and the deal done in paris, and we have a news dump that the president is commuting the sentences of nearly 100 non-violent drug offenders which is of course part of the president's push for a criminal justice reform, and a push that he going to be taking into the coming new year, and that is one of the president's top priorities in addition to the gun control, and we are expecting a executive order on that after the holidays, and the president is determined to tear down that terror detention facile the ti in guantanamo, and that is something that he has wanted to do, and he has not been able to do it, and he has been thwarted by every member of congress, and in fact, there were roadblocks passed by the recent omnibus bill passed by congress, but he is expected after the first of the year to ask for a road ahead to tear

down that detention facility. >> yes, it is a campaign commitment he promised to do so in 2008, and promised to do it in the first term, but it has not happened, and we will see if he can achieve that in the final year of office. we want to bring in the anchor of the lead our own jake tapper, and our own correspondent gloria borger, and also our national security correspondent jim sciut sciutto. once he finishes this news conference, he is headed tout san bernardino to meet with the families of the terror attack there, and then he is going on the vacation in hawaii, but he has spent the last week or so event after event after event to reassure the american public that he is on top of the isis threat. >> indeed, he spoke with a number of columnist m-- columnists in an off of the record conversation, and peter ba baker did put that very public,

and one of the things is that he h was not aware how anxious the american people were after the paris attacks and he attributed it because he does not watch cable news, and perhaps he should change the diet when it comes to the media, but moving beyond that, that is a reflection of when the president looks back at the year, it is a year in which he has had very little control over the major event events. a wall street news journal poll said that the horrific shooting in the south carolina church were the major news stories of the year, and what they said were not the big events were the big events that president obama hoped. the deal with iran. the deal with cuba. the climate change agreement. all of these issues that the president wishes were what the american people considered to be the big news of the year instead of these anxiety-inducing the terrorist attacks. >> he will open up, gloria, with a statement, and i assume it is

go ing the focus in on what jake is talking about, the focusing of the historic events he wants to promote, but get into the fear of the american public of a terrorist attack. >> and he going to be talking about the executive actions of immigration that are challenged in court, and short-term budget deal, and the other things that jake mentioned which are part of the legacy, i think that he sees the iranian nuclear deal as a large portion of the legacy, but when you talk to people at the white house, and i spoke with somebody the other day, i think that there is a frustration there that the republican campaign is playing out, and they believe that it is stirring the anxiety of the american public about isis, and at the same time the president made a mistake in coming out to say that the isis was contained and underestimated the level of public fear and anxiety about isis. if you are looking at the same "wall street journal" poll, only 37% of the people in the country believe that the president is

handling the foreign policy and even less 34% approve of his handling of isis. so they underestimated that the president needed to talk directly to the mile an hour people. that is why we have seen him come out lately, and we have seen him touring the counter terrorism center, and all of the rest, because they want the american public to have a sense that there is a robust response in this administration even though the president has not been out there detailing it. >> very interesting, and jake mentioned it, "the new york times" story detailing this off of the record two-hour conversation. >> so-called off of the record. >> that he had with the columnists in which he outlined the concern of sending the ground troops to the syria and iraq and according to the nos"t york times" there would be 100 military personnel would die every month, and 500 coming back wounded, and it would cost $10 billion to the launch this attack, and the threat while

significant, it does not justify this cause. >> and he revealed the thinking behind the policy, and really, the stubbornness on this point. that is really, what defined the campaign, right? end ending what he thought was a dumb war that cost money and blood in american lives ash and that has decisions about respon to the threat from isis. we know this has been his thing. e he revealed a deeper layer. if i were to send those troops, this is what would happen and he's reminding people of that. in addition to that as well, his steadfast feeling that actually war is what isis wants. putting those ground troops in not only would have great costs, but wouldn't accomplish what the american people want to accomplish here. that's his thinking. people disagree with that, but that's his thinking. the other point is him trying to strike this very difficult balance of saying to the american people don't lose sleep. enjoy your holidays. there is this threat, but we're on top of it. i met with my team. my team is good.

you have been to the pentagon. my team is good. we're fighting them on the ground and protecting the homeland. while at the same time, getting across this thing he hasn't been able to get. across which is empathy with the american people saying i know you have fear. i can feel that, but that's a difficult balance to strike. the other balance is this. you can do everything in -- you can have your run, intercept phone calls, put law enforcement on the street, but the fact of this new kind of terrorism is even with all those resources, you may not be able to e predict these attacks because they are lone wolf attacks. that's the new normal we're living with today. it's a a tough balance to strike. >> i will be curious to see if the president mentions the numbers of the potential casualties if think were to deploy ground troops. let's take a quick break. we're awaiting the president of the united states. he will have a statement followed by questions.

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welcome back to our viewers in the united states and raroun the world. we're awaiting president obama. he's minutes away from walking into the briefing room. e he will make a statement and answer reporters' questions and he's heading out to san bernardino, california, to meet with the families of the victims of the terror attack that occurred there. we have full analysis. s.e. cupp, what's the most important thing you want to hear from the president? >> if there's a reason why the president has in recent week hs to go out multiple times at multiple venues to explain to the american people he's on top

of the terror threat. not that he hasn't been going out is he keeps saying the same thing. he's defending a strategy that americans and even some allies have acknowledged as not working. gloria borger mentioned that no one believes that. it's less attitude and more of an acknowledgment that the strategy isn't working. isis is not contained. i don't expect we'll hear that, but i think if he wants to move american sentiment on this, he has to act a little less cool about it and join us in our fear and anxiety just for a little bit at least. >> the president in that off the record conversation with columnists at the white house, if you read "the new york times" today the president thinks he wasn't sensitive enough to the deep concerns of the american public about terror, especially

the aftermath of paris and san bernardino and suggested he wasn't watching enough cable news to appreciate how concerned the american public is. that's a pretty strong indictment. what's your reaction? >> i take it all with a grain of salt. the president gets a daily briefing every day. i'm sure that the emotional -- the united states deals with this significant threat. but i don't really get caught up in what i believe is a conversation. what the president has to do today, and i'm sure this is going to be a wide ranging in r interview similar to the press conference he gave at the end of last year. he's going to continue to tell us what he's doing to keep the homeland safe, what the united states is doing in their ongoing

campaign to defeat and contain and destroy this very credible enemy that is not just on the ground but everywhere else. i think the president owes us an explanation about the national security issues. this has been a long year. we've dealt with gun violence at home. the interest rates just went up. so i hope to hear a comprehensive view of what's going on in addition to the threat that isil posed not just to the united states butt rest of the world. >> i don't know if the president is going to be asked about it, but it's becoming a controversy. donna, you're a leader in the democratic national committee. the extraordinary feud that has developed between the bernie sanders campaign and the dnc over a breach of sensitive hillary clinton campaign data information. what do you make of this? we just heard some angry words

from bernie sanders' campaign manager, a strong response from debbi wasserman shults. they say they are going to federal court this afternoon unless they get access to their own information. >> that tells you how serious this breach was. the fact they are willing to go to court. i was on a call earlier today. the other officers were briefed. we're well aware of the situation. e we believe as offices working with the dnc that we have to do a forensic analysis to ensure that our system is safe. safe from not just the other campaigns, but also safe so that our venders and our voters that are on these files are safe. so that's number one. at the end of the day, the sanders campaign want access because they have information on that file. we have o to find a way tone sure they continue to have access, but with the appropriate safeguards. no one should violate the

agreements that they make with the democratic party in order to use and access this data. no campaign. and i'm speaking as neutral as i possibly can. i don't have an allegiance to anyone but the democratic national committee, but. i hope we are able to get this done, that we're able to e review all of our safeguards to ensure that no data breach was done. nothing was removed. and campaigns can do back to reaching out to the american people, telling the country what we're going to do to keep the country safe. i do believe the next president of the united states will be a democrat. but this is a family fight and we're going to get through it. >> it could be a family fight, but remember tomorrow night is another democratic presidential debate. three democratic presidential candidates. i assume, and i'm anxious to get your thoughts, that we know bernie sanders. he's going to be very, very angry. he might