others pressed him multiple times to say, wait, there's no evidence of those kinds of contacts? on that he did not give a clearan clearance. ity that's very important. one final point, kate, and this caught me. i think it's extremely interesting on flynn's contacts. as you know, national security advisor lost his job over this. russians during a transition. the suspicion about sanctions. nunez said if it was about big sanctions on ukraine, that would have been bad. if it was about obama sanctions, maybe that would be acceptable. that's an interesting distinction. >> he even called what the sanction from obama petty. >> he said you guys are calling them sanctions. i said actually it's the white house counsel that called them sanctions. interesting press conference. >> thank you so much for joining us at this hour. "inside politics" with john king starts right now. thanks, kate. welcome to "inside politics."

i'm john king. thanks for sharing your day with us. a big week for president trump. the outline of the first trump budget is being rolled out today. it keeps campaign promises to spike up military spending while keeping hands off social security and medicare. >> this budget will be a public safety and national security budget very much based on those two with plenty of other things, but very strong, and it will include a historic increase in defense spending to rebuild the depleated military of the united states of america at a time we most need it. >> it's about the previous administration, president obama and the congress to really identify that these were at least seven nations where this federal government under the

previous administration didn't feel confident they could get accurate information about the people coming in from those countries. >> and the supporting role of sorts for the president at last night's oscars. >> as a mexican, as a latin american, as a mieg rabbgrant w as a human being, i'm against any form of wall that wants to separate us. [ applause ] >> with us to share their reporting and their insights, laura mechanicer of the "wall street journal", manu raju, matt of the boston globe, and nia malika henderson. a brand new first trump budget outline that boosts military and homeland security spending and slashes funding from any domestic programs. >> this defense spending increase will be offset and paid for by finding greater saiflings and efficiencies across the federal government. we're going to do more with less. we're going to do more with less

and make the government lean and accountable to the people. we can do so much more with the money we spend. with a $20 trillion in debt, can you imagine that, the government must learn to tighten its belt. something families all across the country have had to learn to do, unfortunately, but they've had to learn to do it. >> a new president's first budget tells us a lot about what he wants to do. the direction of the country, the direction of the country, the philosophical kbrurnd pinning. what's the big headline about what we're learning from this one? >> i think we've heard the headlines. increasing military spending, cutting everywhere else. i think that the secondary point that we really need to keep in mind is that the budget does not -- at least the outline of this budget seems highly unrealistic. the idea that you can increase spending by such a dramatic factor at the pentagon, at the department of homeland security, and find all those savings just through the domestic discretionary spending without even touching social security or medicare.

i don't even think there are many republicans, not to mention democrats, on capitol hill who are going to be willing to come out there and say, yeah, this is doable, no problem. i'm not really sure that president trump is really tethering these to the math that he faces, and a lot of frustration among republicans that he isn't willing to take on entitlements, which is where the real drivers of the budget are. >> but he boxed them in during the campaign on this. he said unconservative republican, if you will, or very different kind of republican. speaker ryan has made his name. he wanted to bend the budget and bend the long-term debt ark back down. you have to deal with entitlements. president trump says don't touch. >> he is clearly with his budget trying to win over those defense hawks in congress, people like john mccain, lindsey graham who have been frequent war with this president over this president increasing spending. he will win over on this argument. when you start giving into serious significant tens of billions of dollars worth of cuts, those domestic discretionary programs, you're going to have pushback from republicans as well. there are a number of republicans that want to say cut

spending, but there are key programs that are important for individual states, individual districts. it's going to start a big war with congress. the one thing also is that this is just a first budget. there is going to be a supplemental appropriations bill that they send to congress afterwards that increase spending for things like the wall, others like that. it's also going to cause concerns because at the end of the day that will increase the deficit. >> the thing that he sort of wore with sort of showy pride, and he could do that as a businessman and over leverage things. he can't do that as a government executive. i think this is the first time like laura was saying, how does the math add up? what sorts of things is he going to cut? also, getting pushback from democrats. you know, pretty fiercely on some of the things that he is going to be targeting i think in his budget to try and make this work.

>> right. one of the things he can't do at the stroke of a pen and he can't do with his speech, this is going to have to be a negotiation. first and foremost with republicans who have significant difference with their president, and then one would assume at least try to get some democrats. >> i mean, who, on the one hand, must be pleased that he is not going to touch medicare and social security. there are ads running from progressive groups about holding him to that promise, so in that sense i think this budget on the one hand you have hawks that are going to be pleased with this explosion in terms of spending on pentagon and the military, but then you're going to have progressives who are wondering what's going to happen with the e.p.a. as well as the state department. i mean, some of the reports are saying that the state department could face something, like, 30% cuts across the board. i don't know if tillerson is aware of that, but it sort of -- >> he is meeting with the president today. >> it underscores where he has been all along in terms of this administration and being sidelined in terms of his responsibilities. i think a lot of the cuts are going to be to foreign aid, but foreign aid is, like, 1% of the

budget. it's nothing. it's kind of a favorite hobby horse of people who say we should cut spending, but really it's not much of the budget at all. >> if you are serious about spending, you can't do it there. hold your thought on the budget. that's one of the big challenges. a, where does the president want to cut, where does he want to add, how does he negotiate with the congress? he will play out a huge debate. lamenting the fact he says this is what happens. he said at the end of the obama presidency, president obama's approval rating went up. he says now that people think they're about to take obama care away. guess what. the polling backs this up. people like it more. >> people hate it, but now they see that the end is coming, and they are saying, oh, maybe we love it. there's nothing to love. it's a disaster, folks, okay? >> he sees -- he is a great communicator, and he speaks in his way, but, you know, as he talks about this, again, this is not something he is going to be able to solve with his words and

with -- he can frame a debate, and he is very good at that, and that will be important going forward, but he is meeting with the governors today. they have some issues. republicans and democrats alike have some questions about how to do this. he is going to have the speaker of the house and the senate majority leader down in about an hour or two to talk to him about that big speech tomorrow night because they want some health care help from the president there. then again, you have a lot of conservatives saying, hey, says why didn't we do this out of the box? we have a republican congressman, republican president, we promise to repeal obama care. do it already. >> we talk about entitlements, and this is going to be a central question on, say, medicaid, for instance. it's a big sticking point of these negotiations with these governors that are there. a number of 31 states have expanded medicaid under obama care. do they go? do they touch the medicaid program and turn it into a block grant program like a lot of conservatives want? a lot of those states with republican governors, like, say, ohio, for instance,ing they are concerned about going that route. how did donald trump come down on key central issues that are

essential for this -- for republicans to cut a deal? we don't know that yet. we'll see how specific he gets tomorrow. >> also how much can he be swayed? >> he with saw was john kasich, and trump was going along with whatever kasich is proposing. i don't think that he is articulating. he keeps talking about the plan would be beautiful. you'll love it. he hasn't articulated what that is, and so i think there's room for debate over how to influence trump for what he does. >> he has set up a huge risk because in the campaign, and republicans don't like this, he has boxed them in. he says, you know, up to age 26 you should be able to stay on your parent' thing. again, we'll dive deeper in a few minutes. i want to get to one other thing. the return of george w. bush. mostly silent for the eight years of democratic president barack obama, but in the interview with nbc today the former president of the united states, the 43rd president of the united states asked what he thinks about president trump's attacks on the news media.

>> power can be very addictive, and it can be corrosive, and it's important for the media to call to account people who abuse their power. whether it be here or elsewhere. one of the things i spend a lot of time doing was trying to convince a person like vladimir putin, for example, to accept the notion of an independent press, and it's kind of hard to, you know, tell others to have an independent free press when we're not willing to have one ourselves. >> beyond very interesting. >> it's so key. that point that he is making about american presidents go traveling overseas, says and essentially lecturing other countries about the importance of a free press. this president can't really do that because he has already declared the media as an enemy of the people and this idea. he said power can be addictive and corrosive. >> especially because he has tried religiously.

he is a member of that exclusive club, and he thinks former presidents shouldn't get in the grill of current presidents. >> and using putin probably no accident there either. but, you're right. when the american press travels to other countries, there's always fights for access with foreign governments, and you can't -- trump has not yet gone on a foreign trip, but imagine those discussions taking place and will this administration fight for access? >> got carried out of the room once or twice at the kremlin. >> there was another interesting moment in that interview with george w. bush where he was -- they talked about the ban on people from the seven muslim majority countries coming here, and the "today" show played the clip of george w. bush after 9/11 where he said we are not at war with the muslim religion. it's the people who did the terrible act on 9/11 were not religious people, and he spoke very generously about that and said there are allies -- many of our muslim allies, and as the clip was playing, you could see george w. bush's face sort of smiling where i got the sense where he was proud of that. you know, he is proud of that

moment that he took that position, and obviously it's a very different point of view that we have coming out of the white house today. >> more on the former president we're turning up to. the deeper dig on the president's budget ideas and his challenge in selling them to congress and to you. no bitter aftertaste and she's calorie-free. so that's it? we made you a cake. with sugar? oh, no. (laughing) so that's it? we made you a cake. we asked people to write down the things they love to do most on these balloons. travel with my daughter. roller derby. ♪ now give up half of 'em. do i have to? this is a tough financial choice we could face when we retire. but, if we start saving even just 1% more of our annual income... we could keep doing all the things we love. prudential. bring your challenges.

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welcome back. the numbers don't lie, and most of the numbers aren't good as president trump prepares for a big moment tomorrow night. a primetime speech to a joint session of congress. this early job performance ratings are historically bad. doubts about his leadership skills are on the rise. just six weeks on the job. this speech now a rare second chance to make a first impression. the president will outline a new budget he says will shift power back to the states and keep his big campaign promises. >> we're also going to do whatever we can to restore the authority of the states when that is the appropriate thing to do. we're going to give you back a lot of the powers that have been taken away from states and great

people and great governors, and you can control it better than the federal government because you are right on top of it. >> conservatives, especially republican governors, will love that line. they believe too much power, too much authority, too much regulatory enforce the semi-colons should be given back to them. some republicans worry if you pass a budget that gives them more power and shifts the money and the decisions to them, what happens next year? if the economy takes a bad turn or if the president decides i want to give that program less money? how important is this moment tomorrow night? >> well, it's important on so many different levels. it's important on the policy level, what you just outlined and what the future of health care is going to be, what the budget is going to look like, all of those things. i think it's something else that's really important about this, which is that, you know, he has not done what traditionally presidents do, which is sort of pivot from campaign mode into leadership mode, into sort of presidential mode, if you would, where you sort of try to bring people together. you're in longer nursing wounds from the campaign, but, you know, reaching out olive branchs to your former rivals and trying

to bring them aboard, and we haven't seen that, and then we've also seen him talking repeatedly, i think, he said over the week, this has been -- this job has been fun. i have accomplished everything that i want to accomplish. he has basically made it sound like it's been easy, as opposed to none of this is easy. i don't care who you are. none of this is easy. these are all hard decisions, and i think what we need to look for is you have to grapple with that and say, you know, yes, we have trade-offs for these things, and this is how i'm going to try to walk through that mine field. i this i that both of those are signs of a little more maturity in the job and we'll see if we see any of that tomorrow night. >> you know traditionally presidents reach out it those that didn't vote for them, reach out to the other party, but this white house has made a calculation, and there are plenty of numbers and smarts people to support the calculation, that he is not going to get those people. at least not in the short-term. he needs to keep his 40%. he needs to keep his campaign promises. he needs to stay laser focused on his group and to his credit, like him or not, he has at least -- he has out of the box shown great fidelity to his campaign promises. you make an important point. signing executive actions or

talking about them doesn't change the law. doesn't change the policy. doesn't move the federal government. how important is this? >> i mean, it will be interesting to see what his tone is tomorrow night. is it more conciliatory in any way? does he show some signs of humility? does he reach out? we know that's a difficult thing for the president. does he reach out to democrats in any way? does he recognize how difficult it will be to get something done without significant bipartisan support? he has done things on the executive level, but a lot of these are task forces to study issues or pullback some regulations, but that takes a while to go through the whole regulatory process or give flexibility on obama care. also, things that will take a while. he knows congress is a place where he can get significant things done or he can brush them back and be stymied. how much has he tried to recognize the challenges ahead? >> you have republican skeptics under that dome, who disagree with him on issues, or they don't like some of the spending.

they want to touch entitlements and be a more traditional republican. you have democrats who since the election frankly and now after this past week when they've been home, no, donald trump says, you know, eggs for breakfast, they say no, the democratic base says no so everything, and then you have the american people watching at home. never mind the global audience. people watching at home are still trying to get to know this president. his approval ratings are in the tank, but the nbc wall street journal poll do you approve or disapprove of president trump's policies? he has an even split. a much more traditional split than when you asked about donald trump. >> other numbers, the stock market is almost at 21 thougs. gas prices are great. we're almost at full employment in terms of the unemployment rate. i think he has some firm ground here. i think the people he needs to reach out to are those republicans, right? he has been signing executives orders and hasn't really reached out to the republicans in congress who are skeptical of him, of those trump state democrats as well. people like heidi hidecamp and

manchin and in the tough states. and the american people. this promise says i don't think we're going to see a president who all of a sudden is different from the man we've seen over these last many months. >> inside those numbers was an interesting flit split where 17% of people said that they don't like him personally, but they do like his policies. as a greater number than has ever been polled in this survey. that's an interesting point for tomorrow night. i mean, reaching people don't like him personally but do support the things that he wants to do. it's a big challenge for this president, and i think that the other thing going into tomorrow night, it is a very scripted event. perhaps the most scripted in politics. he doesn't often do well with scripted events. you know, he likes that free-wheeling style. you can imagine those moments with democrats not standing up or sort of that interplay that i

think he feasts off of will be interesting in that. >> that's a great point about what's the mood in the room going to be like? we don't get a sense of boycotts here. some of the guests try to get -- forgive the language here. his great trump card is that voters want to change in washington. my question is how much will he say they're part of the problem. she is trying to make the point that, yes, he seems very busy, but what's he done for you? >> he has no -- he has to talk about the press. he has no jobs bill, so he has to talk about kids -- transgender kids in school. he has no jobs bill, so he has to talk about immigrants and have a ban on muslims coming to the country. all of this is a deflection from the fact he has done nothing. >> safe to say, he is not going to have a lot of democrats where. >> i don't think there will be many standing ovations from the

democratic side. getting back to your point before, will he -- what happened to the whole drain the swamp agenda? this was one of the first things that he was going to do. term limits. things to really reign in members of congress. will he talk about that there? will he go after the people in that room or will he realize that he needs the people in that room to get his agenda through? >> i think one more important point to thing about this in regard to that polling finding about people who like his policies is that most of these policies are not yet policies. they're more like proposals in the form of executive orders. we'll have to see what does this really look like? when you actually go out and try to repeal the affordable care act, republicans are finding and will continue to find that it is very difficult to do, very difficult to do, and same thing with immigration policies. you know, he talked about this border wall. well, you know, it's a $20 billion project that even texas republicans don't support. i mean, it's not something that is going to be easy to do. none of this is easy to do. i think it's going to be at some point he is going to run into some barriers.

>> that's the governing challenge. whether you like him or not, to his credit, he has changed -- he is setting the tone of the conversation in washington. >> for sure. >> he is deciding what washington talks about, what issues washington talks about. a big moment tomorrow night. the president calls in insurers and promises governors they'll be happy with this obama care replacement plan. what's in it? did you know, 90% of the world's largest supercomputers run on intel? that means you can take a universe of data - in your case literally - and turn it into medical discoveries, diagnostic breakthroughs... ...proof that black holes collapse into one singularity. i don't know what that is. but yes. innovation runs on supercomputers... ...and supercomputers run on intel. you are super smart. and super busy. ♪ ooh! ufo! false alarm, eyelash! their leadership is instinctive. they're experts in things you haven't heard of -

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a little flashback here. remember this line? if you like your plan, you can keep it. well, it turned out not to be true. now that president trump has inherited president obama's health care law, the new administration wants to make sure americans don't forget how we got here. >> since obama care went into effect nearly half of the insurers are stopped and have stopped from participating in the obama care exchanges.

nearly 20 million americans have chosen to pay the penalty or received an exemption rather than buy insurance. that's something that nobody has ever heard of or thought could happen, and they're actually doing that rather than being forced to buy insurance. we must work together to save americans from obama care, and people know that, and everyone knows that at this point. >> everyone knows that. everyone knows that, and everyone -- if you have any memory of the last debate when they implemented or passed obama care, it's pretty complicated. from a policy perspective and from a politics perspective. we're at that moment. that was the president's meeting of insurance. he is right. along with companies that limited their involvement with the affordable care act. he had governors earlier today, and he is going to be sitting down. there are stake holders in the debate. the senate majority leader and the speaker of the house. there are a lot of plans out there. there's a lot of stuff being tossed around. what do we know about, a, what the white house wants to do and, b, what the congressional leaders would prefer that it do?

>> they need donald trump to give political cover to whatever plan they come out with. you know, trump says they're going to put out a plan, but really it's the congressional republicans who are drafting this plan privately. they're consulting with the white house. they're consulting with tom price at hhs. they're consulting with the governors who are actually trying to cut a deal on this medicaid piece of it, but what they need the white house to do is create the echo chamber, to create pressure on their own party to not buckle. the hope that trump can at least embrace the broad principles because he is not going to get down to the nitty gritty. >> they have to move to the president too because at least the early house republican plans is they kick around drafts and don't do everything the said. most of these republican plans, at least to a degree, would drive up the percentage of americans who don't have automatic access to insurance.

>> by quite a large amount. millions of people -- this is not a small difference. the upshot is what the affordable care act tried to do was essentially spread the risk to over a large group of people by requiring everyone to buy it and then giving lower income people help to go buy them on these exchanges. it didn't work out so well because essentially not enough people came in to the system so, therefore, it kept getting more and more expensive. people who came were more likely to be sick. the question is what do you do if you want to remake it? you still have sick people who want insurance. if you are going to do what president trump has said on more than one occasion he wanted to do, which is maintain the guarantee of coverage for people who are already have preexisting conditions, someone has to pay for it. they talked about high risk pools, for instance, which would be a place to concentrate all of the sickest most expensive people all in one place, but you can imagine when you do that, it's very expensive. >> it hasn't really worked.

trump's mantra on health care seems to be what it is with his budget, this idea whether they can do more or the same with less. pretty unrealistic. already you can see that as you go to your tax person, you don't have to necessarily pay a fine if you don't have -- if you didn't have health insurance. the funding source for this is already drying up, and the things they're talking about, like tax credits for folks, that doesn't help you on the front end if you have to buy, you know, health insurance or need health care. it seems like older people might have to pay more. if young people are in the system any more. they keep talking about access and freedom. freedom to buy, access to buy, but if you don't have the money, you are not going to have that access or freedom to buy. >> with all these policy questions, and that's just some of them, we could sit here for a week actually going through them, and it's so important. how does the process work here? as you jump in on the process, some conservatives want to vote repeal yesterday, and then put in there we're working on the replacement parts of the repeal doesn't take affect.

as they do so, the political climate has changed. look at the nbc wall street journal poll program. do you feel that working well the way it is? only 4% say that. there is a demand for fixes here. needs minor improvements. obama care needs significant fixes. beyond that, when you start getting into the details, this is a huge political risk. >> for trump too. i mean, we know that he is not a guy that likes to get into the policy weeds. you know -- what types of things they want and what he doesn't want, but we also saw over the past two weeks really animated opposition at these town hall meetings to the point that a lot of republicans are cancelling them. they don't even want to interact with people at these town hall meetings, and so i think that the democrats are ready to fight

on health care and change those percentages and that may be a result of some of what they've done. >> one of those republicans, mo brooks, i believe, alabama, right, said that he is afraid some of his conservative friends are losing their spine, his words, over this town hall meeting. >> that means there will be votes in the house committees first before it goes on to the floor. they'll probably get out of the committees. the question is can they not -- limit defections in the house floor to 20 republicans and there are 24 republicans who came from those hillary clinton districts that she won. what will they do if they feel a lot of pressure from their constituents? >> a big meeting at the white house today, and we'll see what the president says in that speech to you, and not just for the american people overnight. they look for help on that one. up next, the chair of the house intelligence committee faces tough questions on ties between the russian government and the trump campaign. we'll tell you what he said next.

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welcome back. congress is back in town after an interesting week to say the least back home, and among those is devin nunez. that committee, along with the counterpart, charged with investigating russian meddling in last year's election, including the question of whether trump associates were in touch with russian officials or russian business people back during last year's campaign. listen to chairman nunez facing extended questioning saying best he knows right now, there's not a lot there. >> we have the scoping of our investigation finished, and then we're going to move into actually receiving the evidence, but as of right now the initial inquiries i've made to the appropriate agencies, i don't have any other evidence. as of right now i don't have any evidence that would -- of any

phone calls. it doesn't mean they don't exist, but i don't have that, and what i have been told is by many -- by many folks is that there's nothing there. we're still -- we're absolutely looking into it, and i want the informati information. >> that familiar voice you may have heard. manu who hustled from capitol hill to make it. translate that for us. he has faced some heat. there's no there there, and he is the chairman of an investigation, and he acknowledges it's just beginning. he acknowledges he doesn't know where it's going to end, and yet, he is stepping in to help the white house, you know, with media relations, and he said so what, no big deal. >> he is in a difficult position. he is trying to defend the white house. he is leading something that will be beyond reproach. anyway, the headline out of this was that he said that, yeah, he has not seen any evidence of any

contacts between russian officials and the trump campaign during the campaign. there are reports in the "new york times" and cnn. the sources were very familiar with that. he did not say that they're done investigating it. he also did not say that he was -- who told him that there were no contacts. in fact, he just said the intelligence community generally, when he was asked, specifically are you talking about the fbi? he would not say. he said, well, colleague jim schudo also asked him, are you talking about anyone connected with the russian government? are you saying that russian intelligence officials didn't talk with the fbi because we believe that they're trying to create some distinction there? he did not say that specifically either. he left himself a lot of wiggle room. he also said that they saw -- they were briefed on the transcript between michael flynn and the russian ambassador about around the time that obama was imposing new sanctions on

russia. he said that what he has learned from that, and there's really nothing there. he really downplayed that phone call, and i asked him, did anyone from the white house, the trump transition team, tell flynn to call the russian ambassador. he did not say explicitly, but he said, well, i would be surprised if they did. really trying to defend the white house, but also saying they're looking into this. >> the democrats see an effort by the white house to get republicans on capitol hill in line, you know, deciding at the beginning of the investigation there's nothing there before they know the facts. the interesting question is really republicans. you saw marco rubio did a sunday interview from the local station back in florida. susan kol -- saying that they were concerned some of this is implied, but about irthis chairman on the senate side did the same thing. the white house said can you help us call a couple of reporters say there's no there there. their concern was that, you know, even if that was menlt in an innocent way, it creates the perception that how can this be an impartial investigation when the chairman early on, before he knows the final facts, is calling reporters on behalf of

the white house. >> there's this weird atmosphere right now sort of going back to comey, the fbi director, briefing the public on information before you have all of the facts completed, and you know one way or the other what the answer is. i do think it is sort of triggering more calls for maybe a special prosecutor or doing something different or have something more independent that's members of congress and members of the president's own party doing this, and i think those calls will increase. >> darryl issa suggested this idea that jeff sessions isn't going to be an impartial arbiter of all this, and maybe there needs to be an independent investigation into this. i mean, they're facing pressure, and this is coming up at some of those town halls too. talking about are you guys doing your jobs in terms of looking into this, what about him releasing his taxes, all of these things i think are playing out in ways that the white house didn't expect. >> they were sad. i asked him about the independent prosecutor, special prosecutor.

he said, no, there are no -- there's no evidence of any crimes being committed. no reason to do that yet. he said the only crime is the leaks that have happened, and that's the only thing that he -- >> he has had a much harder view on that. there's a tension issue. some is legitimate concerns about leaks. democrats say republicans only want to talk about the leaks, though, and not some of the other conduct. in the middle of all this, we've seen a lot of stories about white house staff internal either internal fighting or leaks coming out about the president's agenda, and the white house press secretary, sean spicer, called his colleagues into his office and said phone is on the desk. personal phone and government phone. i want to see if you have encrypted texting apps. i want to see who you have been texting. how about that for a workplace environment? >> it is remarkable. it's in order to keep their message under control, and i think that it does underscore

what i think gets lost in the hostility between the white house and the press and all the terrible things that the president has said about the press is that from a reporters' point of view, there has been more information coming out of there either from the white house itself or from people near the white house, and, i mean, just the idea that we read draft executive orders that were floating around, but we -- can you remember that ever happening in previous presidencies? >> ant at this scale. >> early -- this is my fifth transition. i'm the old guy at the table. it's my fifth transition in washington, and early -- there's always hiccups and always turf balgss and always sharp elbows. there are always examples of this in the new administration. the size, scope, and volume of this. >> to me the problem is -- >> the problem is that the white house doesn't have its act together about what they want to say and what they want to roll out in if an organized way that's been vetted with the people they need to vet it with. all the problems that they've had have been self-inflicted in

the sense that they have not run their own ideas past their own allies, brought people in, got support before it becomes public. >> even this, can you imagine the feeling that spicer must have had when he read about the leak meeting? >> don't leak this, and then he reads about it on politico and on cnn.com. >> he had the white house counsel come in so that he has the lawyers backing him up when he tells his communication staff give me your phone. >> it's -- >> it all creates this sort of haze of who do you believe and who is telling the truth, and you have different power centers over there, and even among just the communication staff, you know, who are supposed to be communicating in a way that we can understand what they're trying to do, and -- >> undercuts the president's public argument that there are no sources. the president says can we make this up? we don't make this up. we get this information. sometimes we overuse anonymous sources. yes, i think our business could look in the mirror about that. when this information comes out,

i think sean spicer calling his own team in to check their phone is proof that he knows this is coming out of his building. >> he is having a lot of hiccups so far also, not just that first press conference where briefing where he did take questions, and talked about the crowd size, and even disputing reports that are accurate, like a nominee withdrawing from a key post and then turning around, well, then the nominee did return from the key post. this kind of going to -- >> i think some of that is the boss pushes him to do things that sean might know at the time aren't going to turn out to go that well, but he has a boss. we all have bosses, don't we? everybody sit tight, and the winner is, interesting night at the oscars to say the least, and no shortage of politics. turals gal, isn't it? coffee: look, she's sweet, she's got natural stevia, no bitter aftertaste, and zero calories. all the partners agree? even iced tea? especially iced tea. goodbye, sugar. hello, new splenda naturals. goodbye, sugar. why are you checking your credit score? you don't want to ride the 13l forever, do you?

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>> everyone who has seen the oscars last night got quite the shock. jimmy kimmel had the unfunny task of coming back on stage and announcing a monumental mix-up for best picture. democrats went to twitter electing, man, why couldn't that happen back in november? away wasn't terribly surprising, the highly politicized talk from the stage in hollywood. take this. the statement read on behalf of the iranian director whose movie won best foreign language film and who protested he would not come to the ceremony last night because of the president's proposed travel ban. >> my absence is out of respect for the people of my country and those of the other six nations

that have been disrespected by the inhumane law that bans entry of immigrants to the u.s. thank you. dividing the world into the us and our enemies categories creates fear. a deceiptful justification for war. >> we knew there would be a lot of anti-trump politics at this event. some of it was funny. yim ji kimmel asking meryl streep is that dress from ivanka trump. was it about what you expected? was this -- this is going to to be a trademark. hollywood doesn't like this president? >> yeah. i think that's pretty clear. i could actually thought it was a little less intense on the political piece than we had seen in previous events where it felt like almost every person needed to say something about it, where there is quite a few speeches by winners who didn't mention or refer to him at all. i actually found it a little bit less political. of course, it was there, though, and right from the opening

monologue. i don't know. maybe a little less. >> i actually agree. i thought this was going to be donald trump, you know, session where thern going to tee off on him left and right, and there were those jokes and, you know, jimmy kimmel talking about trump's twitter feed and the like, but not as overt as before, but clearly a lot of opposition in hollywood. his travel ban, to the wall, with mexico, but this is the kind of thing that republicans like, conservatives like. this is going to rile up their base. >> i think it's also pretty hip critical. hollywood probably one of the biggest per have aors of racist, ageist, sexist imagery across the globe, across the decades, and so this idea whether they should get out there and lecture anyone about inclusion, about diversity, it's laughable. in the history of the academy awards, one african-american woman has won best actress. the oscars has been around for 90 years. these sort of self-righteous

smug liberals, i think it's really hip criticypocritical in what their industry is. >> reporters are people too. we watch the oscars too. matt, during the break you were telling us about going to bed. forget the politics for a minute. we had a bit of a mix-up last night, and you had to come back down. >> yeah. i thought "la la land." i turned the tv off right away, and ended up coming back, and after i saw on twitter an indication of my twitter habits at midnight checking and coming back down to realize that "moonlight" had won. i think this whole thing -- i mean, i agree. like i thought there would be more. there wasn't a meryl streep moment the way there was a couple of weeks ago, but it did indicate like how much donald trump has infiltrated our mind. >> he is driving the conversation in this town and driving the conversation out there. it was an interesting night. in the end they got it right. congratulations to "moonlight". next hour -- wolf blitzer picks

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♪ hello. i'm wolf blitzer in washington. we want to welcome our viewers in the united states and around the world. it's 1:00 p.m. here in washington, 6:00 p.m. in london, 8:00 p.m. in jerusalem. whenever you're watching from around the world. once again, thanks very much for joining us. right now we're following several major developments, including this. take a look at the live pictures coming in from the white house briefing room. sean spicer, the press secretary, about to take questions from reporters this hour and there will be plenty of questions likely be asked about today's comments from