running by the end of the year. >> very good, thanks for that. that's it for me. thanks very much for watching. i'm wolf blitzer in the situation room. erin burnett out front front starts right now. . >> next breaking news, damning reports. st kwhar of the house intel committee working for trump? plugs the chilling warning to follow the trail of dead russians. how russia is said to be med allege at this hour. and is president trump to blame? the white house announcing it has uchb kovrds class died in information about surveillance during the election. the press secretary sean spicer says the documents were

uncovered. they're still refusing to answer key questions. >> i never said i would provide you answers. i said we would look into it. or the responsible thing for us to do is to provide the individuals and the can committees who are doing the review the teerlsz they're looking for. >> the way the white house describes this classified information is very similar to the way the house intel chairman nunes described what he got from a "source." the timing is at best questioning, coming after the new york times reported two white house officials were nunes' secret sources. it begs the question is it the same information? did they collude to make it look like they weren't the ones? the top democrat on the intel community certainly seems to think so. >> the white house needs to answer is this instead a case where they wish to effectively launder information through our

committee. >> launder information. when spicer was asked about whether white house officials gave chairman nunes the classified information, he wasn't able to deny it. >> isn't it abun dandly clear that at least some white house officials had to be involved in him getting information here because they would need help to >> i cannot get into who those individuals were. >> right. but it was someone at the white house. >> again, if i start going down did path of confirming and denying others thing, we're going down a very slippery slow. >> jim acosta is out front. jim, a fast moving story. what are you learning? >> reporter: erin, the president is reeling from questions about whether the white house provided that information to nunes during his mysterious visit here last

week. that is hard lid the only problem for the white house. the white house dancedaround a report in the new york times that two white house officials provided information to devin nunes, intended to bolster president trump's claiming that he was wire tapped by president obama. >> i'm not going to get into its. the u.s. press secretary sean spicer. >> we have sent a letter within the past few hours to both of those committees that there was surveillance that occurred during the 2016 election that was improper and that we want people to look into. le. >> just last week spicer pushed back on the notion that white house officials would be involved in assisting nunes when he made the mysterious trip on to white house grounds. >> it doesn't make a ton of

sense. >> spicer was pressed today. >> ichsz cleared saying that based on what chairman nunes said, i believe it doesn't make sense. >> the ranking democrat on the house intelligence committee adam schiff raised questions about the letter. something that could have been provided before nunes's secret trip. >> i expressed to white house counsel my profound concern with the way these materials are being made to the committee. >> schiff openly wondered if it was an intentional distraction unleashed by the white house. >> we are going to get to the bottom of just what the rugszs did and how they did it and whether there was any coordination or clugs with u.s. persons, including those associated with the trump campaign. >> amade the questions about the russian investigation and in the aftermath of the recent health hair debacle, the white house is

shaking up its staff. walsh's department is inviting kiss whether reince priebus would be on the way out. a white house official told cnn he's not next. >> are you expecting any more staffing shakeups in the west wing? >> no. >> reporter: now, this letter from the white house right here does invite intelligence committee members in the house and senate to review documents made available by a national security officials and white house lawyers, adding in this letter here and that the white house is committed to cooperating. in the last few minutes cnn has learned from a senate intelligence committee source that the senate intelligence committee is telling the white house, no we don't want to come to the white house and review the documents there. we want to review the documents up in the senate on capitol hill. that appears to be an indication

that at least the senate intelligence committee wants to put at very, very sharp line here, very clear that they are going to be doing their investigation up on capitol hill, not at the white house. >> on their turf. >> exactly right. >> let's go to the former cia director, former clinton white house aide and david ger again. david let me start with you. you were part of this team for the campaign, for the transition. this report today possibly extremely damning. if chairman nunes got his information from two white house officials, it sure does open the door for a coverup, doesn't it? >> i'm reacting to the same story that you are. i don't have any outside information. from my perspective, as i look

at this, sure seems like the media gets all worked up when someone puts out information that helps president trump, but they sure don't seem to mind when news comes out that hurts him. there's definitely a do you police tus scheme going on. as i look another this, the only issue is why didn't chairman nunes present this to ranking member schiff and ervelg right away. i would think this would be information they would want to get out to erchl immediately. but again, the point here, because the reason why this is such a big deal, this issue of unmasking and back door surveillance, this is felony type behavior and we should be talking about that and john is absolutely right when he said in his press briefing not about who entered what door and where. this is a distraksz.

let's talk about the real issues here. >> they're talking about leaks and the names would be released. obviously, the understanding at this point is that president trump was one of those names. keith, wolf blitzer asked nunes about his sources. this is important. if his sources are in the kmous and the white house is bringing out the information, did they look like they weren't the ones pushing it. when he was asked explicitly whether it was two white house officials, here's how he answered the question. >> did you meet the president or -- >> no. >> any of his aides when you were there. >> no. and i'm sure that the people in west wing didn't know efs there. >> it appears that someone in the administration was coordinating the release of this information to you. is that not the case? >> no, it's not the case. >> how damning is his denial giving this report that the

sources were indeed two white house officials? >> i don't understand how you could go to the white house and have a meeting and not meet with white house officials. by nature you are meeting with someone in the white house, therefore, a white house official. i think dechb nunes has lost all credibility. this has gone far beyond him. even people in his own party are doubteding hip. i think quite frankly, this has to end. one brek reckless tweet by donald trump a week ago has caused damage to the entire government. donald trump doesn't have the discipline to go through an investigati investigative. >> the white house now is offering to did intel committee leadership that devin nunes got from the white house, right?

that would imply clugs or at least them trying to use david nunes to get this information out. david, donald trump himself, two weeks ago on fox news, we remember this and this conversation. the night he promised there would be interesting information come out which now it turns out is coming out. here's how he put it. >> wiretap covers a lot of different things. i think you're going to find some very interesting items coming to the fore front over the next two weeks. >> you think that's deeply concerning? >> i think there's a pretty obvious trail here. the president was told by his staff, look, we have some information that there was some, you know, incidental collection of data and he fore told that, but very importantly then two white house aides called nunes and invited him to the white house to see documents. he went in. nobody knew about it. they were trying to -- then he held his press conference. they tried to hold for several

days that nobody knew where this came from and he was just the innocent player. come to find out. there was clugs between the white house and nunes. then the new york times, when they had unmasked the story and gotten the names of the two people, the white house wanted damage control and sent these lertsds. >> well, immediately. we have this information. we invite you to see it. >> they don't know if it's been turned over to the fbi. strikingly, one of the two people who let this out was someone brought into the white house by flynn and what we know now from other reporting by the new york times was that h.r. mcmaster, tried to fire this person, tried to get him out of the white house and the president himself intervened to save his job. that's awkward. >> how would you put this together? how worried are you? >> i think we're looking largely at the wrong issue.

what we're looking at is government by tweet and how does this work and whoknew what when and do they have to right to -- it doesn't matter much at all. what matters is what kicked this off which is whether the russians were interfering with our election. and we have heard from those who seemed to know, that if they tried they didn't succeed in affecting the outcome of the election. the russians have a program called disinformation, otherwise known as lying. they work very hard to -- >> mr. ambassador -- >> what's knew is doing this with cyber -- >> but also to be fair, i don't think they've come to a conclusion as to the impact on the election. but let me just -- >> fair enough. >> if ambassador, it is true that denver nunes -- that the whouts was coordinating with him

or colluding with him or giving himself in limb information that backed up the president's tweet and not giving it to anyone else, how big of a sfwloob? >> it is politically interesting but it's nowhere near the problem tha the russians can do in our next election by pitting malware into our voting machines and so forth over the course of the next period of time before the next election. there's a real danger here. 25%, approximately, of our voting machines in the united states do t not have paper backups, so if the electronics have been tampered with, you will never know, and you can't do a recount. >> david -- >> we've got to get that fixed. the rest is very minor by comparison. >> minor by comparison? >> this is about interference in our election. >> yes. >> but there's a second question that the fbi is pursuing these investigation and that's whether the russians were in clugs with

associates of donald trump in trying to pull this off. you can't ignore that -- >> to that so far. >> we know that keepy has testified, yes, we're investigating that question, so we don't know one way or the other do we, in truth about what this is it. the way the white house has been responding with nunes, they've created more smoke and kept us away from the underlying question and that's what i think a lot of people are concerned about. are t they intentionally covering up the fire with more smoke? >> ok. >> i got to push back. >> they've been at this for eight months. there's still not one piece of evidence put forward saying that the campaign was in any way colluding or coordinating with some foreign entity. >> i don't know that. le. >> but it is -- >> that's why we're having the investigation. joogt eight months nothing's been put forward for all of the leaks that we have? how come something like this hasn't leaked out?

>> donald trump said the fact that hillary clinton was under fbi vegsz disqualified her. we now have a president under investigation. the fact that you're willing to dismiss the significance of this and move on to another issue is disturbing. it's a sort of stonewaulg. >> back to the final word. go ahead, ambassador. >> the ability of the country to run a fair electoral system is not an ancillary issue. it's the heart of having a republic. if we can't get our voting machines to operate so that the russians can't hack them, we could start seeing the russians controlling who gets elected to congressional seats and the rest. >> all right. >> we have to pay attention to that, much more than the things we're paying attention to in this flap. >> i'm going to hit pause

because you are all coming back. next, a chilling warning that the russians are interfering. one source saying that in their investigation into colluding with the russians and russia involvement is to follow the trail of dead russians. what happened there? >> and president trump targeting his own members by name, party members. he came to office promising big changes. he's making some small moves, though. jeanne mooshas the report.

or how high the pollen count, flonase allergy relief keeps your eyes and nose clear. flonase helps block 6 key inflammatory substances that cause nasal congestion and itchy, watery eyes. for relief beyond the nose. flonase.

usaa gives me the and the security just like the marines did. the process through usaa is so effortless, that you feel like you're a part of the family. i love that i can pass the membership to my children. we're the williams family, and we're usaa members for life. may not always be clear. but at t. rowe price, we can help guide your retirement savings. so wherever your retirement journey takes you, we can help you reach your goals. call us or your advisor t. rowe price. invest with confidence.

. > house speaker paul ryan, phil mattingly is out front. >> reporter: tonight, a stark warning, that russian medaling in this country's politics is

happening right now. >> 2 take away from today's hearing, we're all targets of a sophisticated and capable adversary. >> reporter: clint watts warned that russian interference was picked up just last week as the gop health care bill collapsed. >> this past week we observed social media accounts discredited house speaker paul ryan hoping to ferment disagreement. it's solely base on what they want to achieve in their own landscape. >> reporter: in the first public hearing since the launch of the investigation, senators and witnesses laying out vivid details and urging lawmakers to look beyond even the cyber rrn and delve into the suspicious deaths of russian officials. >> the other part we should be

looking at is follo the trail of today russians. >> while president trump wasn't the focus of the investigation, he and his top associates were never far. >> he denies the intel from the united states about russia. he claimed that the election could be rigged. that was the number one theme pushed by rt sputnik news all the way up to the election. >> i would hope that the president is as anxious as we are to get to the bottom of it. ed torely, the president's recent contact with his wild and uncorroborated accessions about wire tang and his inappropriate and unjustified attacks on america's hard working intelligence professionals duds give me grave concern. >> reporter: both sides stressing that it will be thorough and nonpartisan. >> our efforts will likely fail. >> the bipartisan senate hearing

standing in stark contrast to a stalled effort across the capital where even house speaker paul ryan is calling for calmer heads to prevail. >> i want the house committee to have a full and thorough and bipartisan investigation. this has gotten a little political. let's stake a pause and get all the evidence, all the documents and find out what happened. what i'm worried about with russia is you've got elections coming on line in europe, you know, this year. roiptd obviously, the speaker pointed to the elections going on overseas as being a primary focus or concern. one of the most dramatic moments of the hearing was when they talked about right here at home. senator marco rube oh as you noted talked about his campaign being under attack for president, for senate and then yesterday. clearly this is not happening in the past tense. this is going on now, going forward and it's raising a lot of concern with the senate and

u.s. officials around the country right now. >> it gives everyone watching pause. it happened yesterday for marco rubio. this is going on as we speak. phil, thank you. >> senator angus king, there's work to be done as you go through the documents and facts you have and the testimony you will get. on that fronts before we get to today's testimony i want to ask you about a report in the wall street journal, this about flynn, the former national security advisory told your committee and the fbi that he is willing to be interviewed in exchange for avoidance of prosecution. very significant if you know that. can you tell us ability this? >> i don't know anything about that. if it turns out to be the case, that's significant. it indicates that he has

something important to say. i can't confirm it, erin, i don't have any independent verification other than the article you just cited. >> you're not -- you weren't able to share the information. you're just saying you're not aware of it at this time? >> that's correct. >> i want to rooeptd. obviously it would be very significant because it would indicate he has something very important to say and it could be a development in this entire situation. you heard about hacking of u.s. lawmakers. you heard about russians dying. >> this is what they're doing in france right now. they're doing it in germany. they did it here in 2016. this is a new kind of immigration. they're getting a lot of return on a fairly low expenditure, and

you know, to settle the flap that you were having at the end of the last segment about what we should be looking at, the answer is all of your guests were right. we need to look at what did the russians do in the 2016 election in terms of the hacking, the selecting of data. but also we have to look at what are their prospects of getting into our electoral system in the states. jim woolsey's absolutely right. that's of crucial concern. third, part of the investigation is was there cooperation between the trump campaign and the russians. so all three of those things are what we're going to be following through on in this committee. >> and back to the question about general flynn. if this report from the wall street journal is true, when you say he has something important to say, does it lead you in the direction to think that he has something obviously to lead to prosecution? does it make you think that there is fire here when you hear that report or not? >> now you're asking me to pile supposition on top of

supposition and i'm just not going to do it. i'm going to wait and see whether there's confirmation. but as i say people don't generally ask for immunity unless they have something important to impart. that's how the immunity system works. >> so when the top democrat on the intel committee, your committee today said the goal was of the hearing is to determine in there was an actual fire. thus far there's been a great, great deal of smoke. have you seen any? yes or no. >> there's all kinds of circumstantial things. i think we brought up the changesing of the republican platform on the question of arming the ukrainians which was inconsistent with what i have heard from republicans in the armed services committee for the last two and a half years. that's just a facts. somebody -- that happened. who did it. on what orders? that's something. we've also had one of the folks that's been associated with the

president talk about a connection to this guccifer 2.0 pers imagine. >> right. >> i asked about that today from one of the experts. he confirmed that it's probably not one person but a group of people but they are connected to -- associated with the russian government. sow know, there's lots of piece toss this. i want to slow down a little built. there's plenty of investigation yet to be done. we know that the fbi is doing an investigation. >> yes. >> we're going to be working with the fbi. but don't ignore the other two pieces because i'm particularly worried about the russians monkeying around with state election systems. if they can get in and change vote tallies, we've got just an enormous disaster on our hands. so that's got to be part of this investigation, too, so we can prevent that from happening. >>ll right. thank you very much. i appreciate your time. >> absolutely.

next, trump out for revenge against his own party. plus victims of vice president crime not reporting attacks. why? deportation fears. our special report. ♪ ♪ wanna get away? now you can with southwest fares as low as 59 dollars one-way. yes to low fares with nothing to hide. that's transfarency.

i have age-related maculare degeneration, amd, he told me to look at this grid every day. and we came up with a plan to help reduce my risk of progression, including preservision areds 2. my doctor said preservision areds 2 has the exact nutrient formula the national eye institute recommends to help reduce the risk of progression of moderate to advanced amd after 15 years of clinical studies. preservision areds 2. because my eyes are everything. doctors recommend taking claritin every day distracting you? of your allergy season for continuous relief. claritin provides powerful, non-drowsy, 24-hour relief.

for fewer interruptions from the amazing things you do every day. live claritin clear. every day. i mwell, what are youe to take care odoing tomorrow -10am? staff meeting. noon? eating. 3:45? uh, compliance training. 6:30? sam's baseball practice. 8:30? tai chi. yeah, so sounds relaxing. alright, 9:53? i usually make their lunches then, and i have a little vegan so wow, you are busy. wouldn't it be great if you had investments that worked as hard as you do? yeah. introducing essential portfolios. the automated investing solution that lets you focus on your life.

so you'rhow nice.a party? i'll be right there. and the butchery begins. what am i gonna wear? this party is super fancy. let's go. i'm ready. are you my uber? [ horn honks ] hold on. the biggest week in tv is back. [ doorbell rings ] par-tay! xfinity watchathon week starts april 3. get unlimited access to all of netflix and more, free with xfinity on demand.

. . tonight, the house intelligence committee devin nunes is arriving in his district in california. he's fleeing one fire in washington to face another at home. >> reporter: pressure mounting. the hits keep coming. for republican congressman devin nunes. hammered for his mysterious conduct and close ties to the trump white house from both sides of the aisle. >> mr. nunes has simply disqualified himself. >> he's gone off on a lark by himself. sort of an inspector clouseau investigation here. >> something's got to change otherwise we'll lose credibility. >> that outrange from d.c., just noise to much of tulare, california. it's his home district. >> i know devin personally, his

integrity. if he was something i didn't know, i'd be wondering, too, but knowing him personally all these years, his family, his background. he's a straight shooter. >> his constituents believe in him. they watched him grow up from skinny teenager to now washington, d.c. he won a whopping 58% of the vote. danny grew one him and doesn't believe he will recuse himself. >> he's very direct. he'll not stand down. if he believes in something, weezhe's going to pursue that and make it right. >> reporter: the sharpest criticism, is that he's doing the bidding of the white house instead of leading an independent investigation. >> chairman nunes seems to be more of a partisan for the president than an impartial participant. >> reporter: many people believe his ties to the white house helps them.

t they saw the connection up close. >> they really hit i off and i enjoyed seeing donald trump putting that confidence in devin. >> not everyone believes in the embattledcongressman. a resistant movement has sprung up. and as he arrives home in california tonight, plans are under way to let him hear from them directly. >> he's not participating properly in this investigation. he should have recused himself already from that investigation. there's so many signs and signals. >> reporter: that woman you heard from is not the only person in this congressional district who's not happy with the congressman. there's an event he's holding tomorrow. they anticipate 300 people will be outside holding signs, letting the congressman know that they're not happy while he's inside with supporters. erin?

>> all right. thank you. back to our panel. also joining us, amanda carpenter. amanda, welcome to the conversation. does congressman nunes, david, need to step down? >> i think so. listen, i have no doubt he's been a man of strong character and the people in his district like him. >> yeah. >> more than once you and i have seen people in washington get drawn into a white house web. they called him. he didn't call them. they called him from the white house and asked him to come see these doments. i think hi got in over his head. i feel badly for him. but investigation is so compromised by the house now, i think they have to call it off. not just step down. they need to call it off. we saw the senate in action today and they looked like adults. it gives you more confidence. >> jason, you heard what we just heard in the piece, right, words

used to describe chairman nunes, straight shooter, man of integrity, a person who won't stand down. to david's point, people can be dragged into a white house web. is that what's happening to chairman nunes? >> i think chairman nunes is finding out what happens in the enormity and the bright lights ofn investigation like this. good for chairman nunes for going home and talking to his constituents. i think too many members are probably going to run for the hills. i'm glad at least he's trying to get to the bottom of this. where congressman schiff, who famously complained about the leaks that we saw coming during the hillary clinton investigation or the letter that conyers and cummings sent to the fbi or senator franken talked about a rogue agent. you don't see it in this outrage from the left.

i think it's disingenuous. nunes needs to spell out how this information came to the light and get it out to erchl so we can find out what was going on with the unmasking and details of these americans whose details are. i -- those would be my two paths that i would recommend. >> mena? >> what has happened to congressman nunes is what's happened to washington. we're looking into the investigation whether russia medaled. donald trump with one tweet that saturday morning in march drew attention to the fact that president obama had wiretapped trump. nunes got wrapped up into this because they're trying to find evidence of something donald trump alleged. everybody's going on a wild goose chase trying to prove a case that president obama

conducted some kind of surveillance against trump. i'm listening to what chairman nunes has said very carefully. he's only said that he found incidental surveillance that people were uncomfortable with. the new york times reported today below the headline of the officials talking to nunes, the new york times said they found evidence of officials being discussed. in other words, no trump officials. i'm own to the possibility that maybe this happen. the onus has been on trump the whole time to come up with a shred of evidence to prove that tweet threw. he hasn't done this. he's distracted washington completely from the investigation that's going on by sober officials. >> how did the information about general flynn come out? >> jason, do you think that was his attempts to distract everybody from the conversation

about possible clugs with the russians or was it because he was angry and lost his temper? you know him. >> you think he was frustrated. his inauguration day the new york times talked about wiretap data. i think he was kwlupt that didn't get the attention deserve. so he's bringing the attention to it. >> the evaluate at least from all the facts we have right now, the thing with the fbi director didn't happen. >> what was that? >> i'm saying what he alleged in the tweets did not happen according to the top intelligence chiefs in the country. >> i think the administration walked it back a bit and made the president regarding overall surveillance. we do know surveillance were going on and the president trump

aura was getting swept into it. >> isn't there a different between being surveilled and the other possibility that fbi heard fishlsz talking about trump people? that's a huge difference of officials doing their job to something that borders on treason. >> how did the flynn conversation come about? >> i'm very worried the fbi resources that should be taking care of security, the possible of terrorists attacking our homeland are being diverted and these wild glues chases, stupid tweets on saturday mornings that take up all of washington's attention when we have real national security threats that we should be making. >> well, then how -- >> you have amanda making your points. >> i'm reluctant to get between them. imagine if i as a democrat, hillary clinton supporter, were leading an investigation of

hillary clinton after she had been elected president and i went to her white house to get information to ex cull pate hillary clinton and i went back to her herself and told her this information i'd gotten from her own staff people and went up to the cameras and told the press and the public what i'd just gotten from hillary clinton's white house. you would think that would be outrageous and every republican would rightly discredit me for doing so. that's what's just happened. >> appreciate it. next, president trump under fire for climate change. jeanne moos on president trump. it's his move.

hey, ready foyeah. big meeting? >>uh, hello!? a meeting? it's a big one. too bad. we are double booked: diarrhea and abdominal pain. why don't you start without me? oh. yeah. if you're living with frequent, unpredictable diarrhea and abdominal pain, you may have irritable bowel syndrome with diarrhea, or ibs-d. a condition that can be really frustrating. talk to your doctor about viberzi, a different way to treat ibs-d. viberzi is a prescription medication you take every day that helps proactively manage both diarrhea and abdominal pain at the same time. so you stay ahead of your symptoms. viberzi can cause new or worsening abdominal pain. do not take viberzi

if you have or may have had: pancreas or severe liver problems, problems with alcohol abuse, long-lasting or severe constipation, or a blockage of your bowel or gallbladder. if you are taking viberzi, you should not take medicines that cause constipation. the most common side effects of viberzi include constipation, nausea, and abdominal pain. stay ahead of ibs-d... with viberzi. and i finally found our big idaho potato truck. it's been touring the country telling folks about our heart healthy idaho potatoes, america's favorite potatoes, and donating to local charities along the way. but now it's finally back home where it belongs. aw man. hey, wait up. where you goin'? here we go again. guests can earn a how cafree night when theypring book direct on choicehotels.com and stay with us just two times? spring time. badda book. badda boom. or... badda bloom.

seriously? book now at choicehotels.com

nchts. breaking news. president trump's former national security advisory michael flynn has agreed to be interviewed over russian ties with president trump. he said he'd do so with assurances against undue prosecution. it's been agreed. jessica snyder live on capitol hill, we just talked to senator

angus king and the kmejs kmeed. he said obviously if this was true it would mean general flynn has something very important to say. what exactly is he saying? >> reporter: well, his lawyers are talking now, erin. he just reached that statement. i actually talked to them yesterday. interestingly, the lawyers told me that they themselves, not general flynn, had in fact been talking to the house senate zbejs kmeelgts. so now it's coming out that he may have something to say. they're saying that general flynn certainly has a story to tell and he very much wants to tell it. should the circumstances permit. however, the lawyer not exactly commenting on these reports that general flynn will in fact testify before the committees saying that out of respect for the committees we will not kmenltd right now. then at the end of this statement a little bit of double talk as well. saying that no reasonable person who had the benefit of advice from counsel would submit to

questioning in sauch highly pli politicized witch hunt environment with witnesses against unfair prosecution. the lawyers leaving the options open a bit, not clarifying whether or not general flynn will testify. a lot of uncertainty right now. but i have been in touch with the lawyers. they're saying they're not commenting on those reports but perhaps leaving the door open. >> thank you very much. i want to go to paul cowen. paul, when you hear this, what do you hear? let me lead these last two sentences from general flynn's lawyer. he is now the target of unstash ate public demands that he be criminally investigated. no reasonable person who has the benefit of advice from counsel would agree to such questioning without assurances against unfair prosecution. it sounds as if, he is saying, i'll come if i get immunity.

>> yes, it sounds like he's saying that and there's also a secondary meaning to that which is if you don't give me immunity and you force me to appear, i'll assert the 5th e-mail andment. this is a big important move by congress if they're going to try and subpoena him. >> senate on the intelligence committee told me earlier on this program that if this is true, if he was requested immunity and now we have the statement indicating such, that he has something very important to say. gem flynn himself says -- general flynn's lawyer says he certainly has a story to tell when you put those things together and you see him saying that he wants immunity from prosecution, what do you take away in terms of what he has to say? is it fair to say that he thinks whatever he has to say, somebody

would want to prosecute him for it? >> you don't often hear criminal against attorneys say my client has a story to tell unless that attorney is looking for immunity for his client and he does have a story, a story that will implicate somebody else. now, who the somebody else is, of course, we won't know until he testifies. so that's an important statement. but there's another thing that could happen here, elin, we have to pay attention to. which is how will the president and white house act? will they assert privileges saying conversations with protected by executive privilege? and we could wind up with that being pursued in the u.s. courts. so i don't think you'll see flynn testifying very soon. i think this is going to blow up into a pretty complicated issue. >> paul, stay with me. i want to bring back jason, amanda, keith and david. david, you think this is hugely significant?

>> it's a big story. the clouds are darkening over the white house tonight. that -- i think the only reasonable -- the most reasonable interception of that statement is that he wants immunity in exchange for -- for talking openly about -- and telling his you had senator king people don't generally ask for immunity unless they're worried what they say will make them vulnerable to prosecution. it could wind up who has executive privilege and who doesn't and keep him from testifying just as they tried to keep salliatey yates. >> she's not testifying. >> it looks more suspicious and like there's more fire there. why would the national security advisor even be talking about

immu immunity? what is it that arouses that? what's the underlying story there? that's all along been the really critical issue. >> jason, are you surprised when you hear this that general flynn is doing this? >> i'm not a lawyer and not part of his legal team. i don't want to pretend i am one. i can speak from the court of public opinion all this is doing is elevating the attention to him. i'm not sure essentially what their end game or end goal is. if they were trying to minimize it, it's going in a different direction now. >> amanda? >> it makes me think two things. one, he is trying to get ahead of something, seeking legal p - prosection, that seems obvious. using the words, i have a story to tell. that sounds like when you're shopping, a book deal, trying to draw attention, i know something. looking at mike flynn's history that we've learned, i've learned a lot about him in the last few weeks, he had a lot of deals

going on. he was on cnn's air talking -- excuse me, mr. woolsly was talking about he was made uncomfortable with mike flynn with the plot and turkish politics and he was going to russia and he had a lot of deals going on. either this is part of some kind of deal he's making for personal opportunity which would seem a little crazy but not out of the realm or he seriously knows something, he's scared and wants legal protection. >> keith, which is it? i can say you were the one who said imagine if the devin nunes situation was the democratic white house and democratic chairman the republicans would be crying foul. if this were benghazi and a h h highly politicized witch-hunt environment i wouldn't testify without immunization to

progresprogres prosecution? >> it could be but nobody has mentioned the word prosecution and certainly not about michael flynn. there are a lot of other people they can talk to besides michael flynn. paul manafort and jeff sessions and carpeter page. >> none of whom have demanded anything remote lie like this, i want to be clear, they have not. >> they volunteered to testify. >> why would the house intelligence committee or anyone in the congress give up immunity to michael flynn unless he's willing to give up somebody else higher up than he is in exchange for that immunity. who else is higher than the national security advisor. >> chairman nunes denied he had anything to do with it a short while ago. we now know he wasn't correct about that. i want to ask paul something now. this is one of the issue that arises. when you get immunity from the senate for open testimony, how does that complicate the fbi

investigation? does that immunity what he says there, he is now protected in the fbi investigation? >> need a great question, david. it's come up in the past. grants of immunity by congress have really interfered with prosecutions in the past. oliver north's prosecution was destroyed by grant of immunity that interfered with the investigation. normally you will see a close cooperation by the fbi and house and senate committees to make sure -- >> paul, to be clear, the "wall street journal" is reporting this letter went to the fbi also. they would make a different decision, i premium, than congress or no? >> if the fbi were looking at a serious investigation, they would have the lead on this. congress could override and force him to testify. normally, the fbi would play a big role.

i would have to say, the thing about the fbi -- criminal lawyers say the first guy through the door often gets the immunity deal. you were talking about the fact there have been a lot of other witnesses talked about but nobody has been asking for immunit immunity. i'm wondering if he's the first one trying to get through the immunity door he must have an interesting story to tell as the lawyers said so i think we will see interesting developments here. >> jason, you know all the individuals involved who said they will testify. do you expect any of the others from what you know of them to do the same or ask for this or no? >> i don't know. the other individuals from the public reports that i've seen seem like they're coming forward and actually want to go and testify and get their side of the story out so they can knockdown the absolute silliness, the charge saying there's collusion or coordination here. what we're hearing from general

flynn seems to be different from what we're seeing from some of the other folks. ultimate ultimately, this will be the committee's to figure out. >> we have to pause for a moment. obviously a significant breaking moment at this moment with general michael flynn saying he will testify if granted immunity from prosecution. we'll be right back. you know who likes to be in control? this guy. check it out! self-appendectomy! oh, that's really attached. that's why i rent from national. where i get the control to choose any car in the aisle i want, not some car they choose for me. which makes me one smooth operator. ah! still a little tender.

(vo) go national. go like a pro. but with my back pain i couldn't sleep or get up in time. then i found aleve pm. the only one to combine a safe sleep aid plus the 12 hour pain relieving strength of aleve. and now. i'm back! aleve pm for a better am. this is brooke's yard. with cute kids. an adorable dog. and..ugly bare spots. bare spots that are hard to fix using seed alone. but scotts ez seed changes everything. it's an all-in-one solution. our finest grass seed plus quick-start fertilizer and natural super- absorbent mulch grow grass anywhere. the very first time, guaranteed. bare spots be gone. this is a scotts yard.

thanks for joining us. don't forget you can watch "out front" any time anywhere on cnn go. "360" starts right now. good evening. thanks for joining us. we begin with breaking news on the russian investigation and it is potentially nuclear. michael flynn, the security advisor who lasted only 24 days on the job offered to talk to the fbi and others. flynn was fired for lying about phone conversations with the russian ambassador. carol is on the story byline. what have you learned former national security michael flynn has offered to the fbi and others? >> reporter: we learned through his lawyer he had conversations to achieve some sort of