welcome to "inside politics it is it is. it is a big breaking news day. the president telling he is considering military action in syria. also this day the senate changing rules over fierce democratic objections to advance

president trump's trip for the supreme court. >> mr. president, the 60-vote bar in the senate is the guardrail of our democracy. when our body politics is veering too far to the right or to the left, the answer is not to dismantle the guardrails and go over the cliff. but to turn the wheel back toward the middle. >> as that break news unfolds in the senate, over on the house sight the chairman steps aside from the russia meddling investigation because he now faces an ethics review of whether he improperly disclosed classified information. >> i'm sure it was a very difficult decision for him. but as he mentioned, i think it is in the best interest of the investigation. it will i think allow us to have a fresh start moving forward. >> and republicans insisting today they haven't given up to repealing obamacare, but as they brag of their progress today,

guess what? they still don't have a plan that has a prayer of passing. >> their amendment makes this a much better bill. it gets us closer. this is the kind of collaborative bottom up effort that we have been looking for. like i said, we have more work to do. >> with us to share the reporting and their insight cnn malika, matt biser and jackie. we have the confirmation supreme court fight. we have big developments in the house russia investigation. also developments in the health care debate. but i want to go straight to dana bash on capitol hill. dana, the possibility of u.s. military strikes to retaliate for the horrific gas a take we saw yesterday in syria? >> that's exactly right, john. we are told that the president himself is making calls to senior members of congress

saying that he is seriously considering something he said he would never do not that long ago, which is military action in syria. as you said, and as he said yesterday, in the rose garden, it is because of the recognition of how horrific that chemical atack was this week and of course what that means for the broader situation in syria. now, i am told by a source familiar with these conversations that the president made clear it is not a done deal. he has not made a firm decision. he is in conversations and consultations with general mattis, but that this is on the table and certainly if you go back and listen to what the president said yesterday about how he has changed and his view of syria and what to do about syria has changed in light of that chemical attack. this would be a potential logical step and now we do have reporting that that is, in fact,

what he was signaling. the notion and the idea of military action, u.s. military action in syria to make clear that the u.s. will not tolerate what happened there. >> and dana, from those conversations with sources, has the president been specific or the sources relaying whether he's talking about targeting chemical weapon facilities, targeting airstrips would have a harder time getting planes off the ground? do we know? >> all good questions. the answer is no. all of those things are very likely being considered. unclear if at this point they have decided if any or all of those targets would be on the list or if -- all of that is still under consideration. one source did mention to me just broadly that vis-a-vis syria and their air capability that they only have six airstrips in syria, so that air strikes would not be that hard

to successfully use to take out at least syrian, you know, air capability. but of course the next question, the obvious question that you just asked about chemical weapons, as far as i know, that is still under consideration or at least was based on the source that i talked to vis-a-vis the conversations with the president. >> dana bash on capitol hill with the breaking news the president beginning to tell members of congress he is considering military action. let's go to the pentagon with barbara starr. you heard dana say the president talking to members of congress saying he's waiting to get op s options from his defense secretary. he will rely on the amgz recommendation of jim mattis. >> these kind of military options have been in existence for some time. it's a question of what the president wants to do. that's what our sources are telling us. he has a couple of very critical military decisions he has to make. does he just want to send a signal to assad? he can do that with striking air

field. but look, chemical weapons are not just delivered by airplanes. he's got artillery. he's got rockets. he's got barrel bombs that come out of helicopters. cratering six airfields will do nothing. if he wants to send a signal, that is an option. there are broader options. do you want to go after all that capability. do you want to end assad's ability to launch chemical weapons, to launch nerve agents against his own people. does the pentagon know how to do it? you bet they do. but that's going to be a real challenge. one of the decisions for the president as he tries to decide what to do is just that. the limited, send a message or take a much stronger military action and one of the key factors is the russians. what i am being told is they want to be very careful about not striking any facilities where once they bomb they might find that there are russian

military or security personnel inside the building that they don't know about. that would be a huge concern for the united states. so if this goes ahead, it might suggest limited action, but it also might suggest that it really won't be much more than just that. we do not know at this hour what the president is deciding, but we do know all of these issues are in front of him. we know that there are tomahawk missiles in place. we know there are u.s. bombers in place. the u.s. military could under orders from the president begin action anytime he says to go ahead. >> barbara starr live at the pentagon. thanks so much. let's bring the conversation to the room now. as we do and as we discussed this decision for the new commander in chief, i want to note breaking news on capitol hill. they are about to vote in the senate on the so-called nuclear option to change the senate rules to allow the confirmation of judge neil gorsuch by a

simple majority vote. i will keep our eye on that. let's have a conversation here in the room. if you listen to donald trump during the campaign, he was critical of america flexing its muscles overseas, critical of years of military involvement in the middle east. now he has in front of him because of the pictures we've all seen in the last 48 hours, the question to use u.s. military strikes against assad and that's picking a confrontation with putin. if he's telling members of congress he's considering this, then they're moving the process forward. where do we go? >> here's my question. did he not know that the use of chemical weapons had been used before, before he came out -- his administration came out earlier this week saying that they're not going to bother assad essentially, that the syrian people should make that decision. that's one of the questions i have. this is also the same president who has banned syrian refugees who are fleeing this kind of horror from coming into the united states. so there's so many

contradictions here. i have a lot of questions. >> the clarity yesterday, at least from trump's perspective, he said the pictures and the video, which nikki haley showed at the u.n. changed his mind. you can see the president -- >> this president understands the power of media. this president -- he's president because of using the leverage of the power of media. >> i think that in 2013 he criticized president obama or urged him not to intervene when there was a similar attack. i think we are seeing the evolution of his views in real time. >> i think it's natural to come in the presidency. every past president says the presidency changes you. the weight of the presidency starts to be felt. everyone has been looking for this moment where trump, the weight of the presidency starts to lay in. and yes, the chemical atack happened before, but it's different when you're the one in that office and in that chair.

now this responsibility falls on you. i think we're starting to see him view the world in a bit of a different way. i don't think he's reached any conclusions of how he's going to view it. >> let's bring his words in. he was in the rose garden yesterday with the king of jordan. we have been watching for 24 hours the pictures of the children killed in the gas attack. the president himself issued a statement but he hadn't said anything until this. >> it crossed a lot of lines for me. when you kill innocent children, innocent babies, babies, little babies with a chemical gas that is so lethal, people were shocked to hear what gas it was, that crosses many, many lines, beyond a red line. many, many lines. >> it gets to your point about the gravity of the office. you're the guy in charge when this happens. the original statement and even yesterday he wanted to blame president obama saying president obama drew a red line, didn't do anything about it. partially true.

the obama administration had an ineffect -- if he does limited military strikes in syria, he has crossed a line. he has decided on a policy that even successor not in those initial strikes, that changes the domino effect going forward. >> it's also america first president. i mean, the day before we just heard those comments, he said i'm not the president of the world. i'm the president of the united states. so something has changed here with those images. but the options for him, you know, like he pointed out earlier, going up against assad goes up also against his benefactor vladimir putin. so the domino effects of getting involved in this intervention in syria could be massive. >> the power of the pictures is irrefutable. but is this also as the president faces this evolution, is it also because he has hr mcmaster of the national

security kourncouncil. he has more establishment, more by the playbook guys around him, not the campaign team. >> i think that's right. in this way i think we see him becoming a hawkish republican, sort of a standard issue republican. he's certainly going to have a lot of cover and a lot of people in his ear, people like john mccain, people like lindsay graham, people like marco rubio who have been critical of the white house in terms of their approach to assad. we do see those military leaders in terms of using military power around the world to project strength but also to project leadership in this idea that america is a moral authority and a beacon. i think that's what we're seeing kick in here with donald trump. >> i would also keep in mind he's a negotiator. dropping a trial ba llloon that might do air strikes, i'd be very a tuned to those sort of things over the next few days. is he leaking pieces of negotiation as a negotiating tactic.

>> it's a great point. secretary tillerson had some conversations with the russian minister coming up in the days ahead. a key vote on the security council. we're going to keep track of this story and also tracking other breaking news including the united states senate. maybe out there in america you don't understand what this means but the senate is about to go nuclear. beyond is a natural pet food that goes beyond assuming ingredients are safe... to knowing they are. going beyond expectations... because our pets deserve it. beyond. natural pet food.

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supreme court. as we went to break i told you washington always speaks a funny language. this is called going nuclear. that's what they call it. break out the civics vote. here's mitch mcconnell moments ago explaining what is going to play out. >> we need to restore the norms and traditions of the senate and get past this filibuster. i raise a point of vote that the vote set on november 21st, 2013, is a marmjority vote on all nominations. >> filibuster, point of order, precedent. lucky for us we have a good senate translator. dana bash is back with us on capitol hill. dana, as the american people watching this out in the real america follow this, essentially the bottom line here is you're going to have a dramatic change in the rules to put neal nil goh in the supreme court. where are we? >> democrats using delaying

tactics before that vote to change the rule. they've been -- the democrats have been doing things like we're going to move to adjourn at 5:00 and it wouldn't be surprise figure they made a motion to say that today is in fact thursday. things like that that they will try to do to delay the inevitable. at a certain point probably everybody is going to want to go home for their spring break, so that's going to stop. but what this means and i know you all have been talking about it is a really important significant shift in how the united states senate acts. right now it's just vis-a-vis the judiciary saying that any president can nominate anybody for any federal bench all the way up to the supreme court. again, there was in filibuster thanks to the democrats starting about three or four years ago. now starting today with this rules change that will happen it also includes the supreme court. so any president can nominate anybody for any federal court and only need a 51 vote

majority. now, people out there going okay, i think i remember from civics, that's only the way it's supposed to work. it's only supposed to be 51 votes. that is true. the tradition of the senate has been that there has been a 60-vote threshold, a filibuster allowed. if there is a real problem with any of the nominees coming up, they wanted to maintain that. that is going to go away today. so there's consequences for the judiciary, but the big question is whether or not there is a slippery slope from nominees, but also for legislation, which traditionally the reason the 60-vote threshold, the filibuster i should say has been in place and the rareason it it worked and been important is that has forced bipartisan consensus on major legislation

that has shaped this reason. and even more recently the only way that the immigration reform bill got done a couple years ago. it died in the house but the only way it got done in the senate was because of the bipartisan consensus. it hasn't happened yet but that is the concern among many senators today. >> the big vote expected sometime today. they're voting now on the floor of the united states senate. we'll watch as it plays out. there are some people in town who say this is the end of civilization. to dana a point the 60 vote threshold has been used to force conversations between competing factions, to force a word we don't speak in washington very often, compromise. others who say get over it. majority rules? 51 votes? sure, that was a nice quaint consensus driving machine at the time, but our politics have been polarized for 20 years and this

is just catching up. which is it? >> if you think about the impact of this with the polarization of the supreme court, the actual justices there and how that would prohibit sort of this consensus picks, even if you think about some of the more politicized justices, ruth bader ginsburg was confirmed with 96 votes. scalia, whose seat this is was confirmed with 98 votes. there was a time when these people got unanimous votes on the senate floor. i think we're seeing the end result of a long period of deep polarization. but now it's hit the supreme court. >> and the senate is going to be more partisan now. if that is possible. because this is gone. or this will be gone very shortly. and that in and of itself brings the senate, especially if you're up there enough, they do view themselves as a cut above the house house. it does move them closer to how the house is. that is a drastic change tch.

it's not time to go into the bunkers. >> i think it could be difficult for the president's agenda going forward because as we learned from the health care bill, you may need some democratic help and you may have a better friend in chuck schumer, when i think the president missed an opportunity to form an alliance there than you do with some members on the far right. it's going to make it difficult for some pieces of legislation. >> earlier in the administration, 77 days in, we've had a fight about obamacare. now a fight about the supreme court that has everybody off in their corners. sometimes even if you agree on something, once you're in your corner, it's hard to get back to the middle and make that deal. >> that's where america is. everyone is in their corners. it's a very partisan time. get affirmations from their view from different media sources and facebook friends. this is a reflection of where we are. it's almost i think the senate has been leaning in this direction for many, many years. we sort of think of it as the

cooling body, but i don't think obama really thought of it as the cooling body in terms of his legislation. we'll see what this means for this white house. see what it means for legislation. for legislation you need 60 -- i think at some point you need a little more, 67, and some of those rules have been changed. this is what happens. it's an institution that i think is meant to change. and we'll see. maybe they'll change it back at some point. >> like it or not it is changing. almost lost in this fight over the rules is the fact that a 49-year-old man neil gorsuch by the end of this week is likely to be on the supreme court. he's a judge on the tenth circuit court of appeals. harvard law degree. very much a student of scalia. used him as a mentor. it a a conservative for a conservative, but a young conservative who let's be honest, most democrats came out of the hearing and say he's more conservative than me but he's a

pretty impressive guy. >> this is someone who's qualified. this is someone probably at a different time wouldn't have had a problem. >> if there's a ruth bader ginsburg or kennedy vacancy down the road, simple majority now after this vote we're watching now. >> some of that is the ill feeling. some of the democrats felt that about merit garland. so i think that you're feeling some of that lingering animosity from democrats. >> democrats view this as a stolen seat. that's one of the reasons they're fired up. the senate voting to change the rules so that it can confirm president trump's vote. up next house intelligence chairman devin nounes does what he said he would not do. he steps aside from the russian investigation for now. your insurance company

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mar-a-lago, his resort in florida. dinner tonight with the chinese president. then more meetings tomorrow. trade and possible military with north korea. we'll keep track of that tonight and into tomorrow. important conversations for the president there. let's watch him board air force within. p pretty miserable day here in washington. back to the united states capital, we're keeping track of the voting in the senate. voting on the so-called nuclear option to reduce the number of votes needed to confirm a nominee for the supreme court. we'll track that vote and the high drama on capitol hill not limited to the senate side. remember this from just last week? >> are you going to stay as chairman and run this investigation? >> why would i not? you guys need to go ask them why these things are being said. >> can this investigation

continue with you as chairman? >> why would it not? aren't i briefing you guys continuously? and keeping you up to speed? >> but they're saying that it cannot run with you as chairman. >> you've got to go talk to them. that sounds like their problem. my colleagues are perfectly fine. they know we're doing an investigation and that will continue. >> well, that was last week. today congressman devin nunes stepped aside because the chairman himself is now under investigation by the house ethics committee. manu raju joins us live. did the chairman go on his own or was the chairman pressured? >> we don't know the full story about whether paul ryan asked him to step aside. i tried to ask and he heard my question but he did not answer that question. they did say that nunes and ryan met last night. that they agreed on the decision

for him to step aside and ryan said in his statement, john, that it was a distraction for him to continue to run because of this new ethics investigation that had been announced today. this ethics investigation about whether or not chairman nunes revealed any classified information when he discussed about this incidental collection of potential trump team communications with foreign officials. i had repeatedly asked devin no nunes whether any of that information was classified. he insisted it was not. but others believed that not to be the case. the real concern was whether or not he could continue to run a credible investigation in light of all these calls for him to recuse himself and in light of his decision to cancel a public hearing that was scheduled for earlier in the week about russia and which you hear from a number of people to talk about those potential campaign ties between the trump campaign and russian officials. they believe he got a little bit too cozy to the white house. this decision to try to get the investigation going.

a huge surprise. house intelligence committee members didn't even know this morning when nunes met with them. they were handed a statement from nunes's staff as he left right after he left their meeting abruptly. >> doing it his way until i guess the very end. manu mention ed the chaeirman under fginvestigation. the committee is aware he may have made -- the mere fact that it is investigationing this allegation does not indicate that any violation occurred or reflect any judgment on behalf of the committee. this is a review that is just starting. he is presumed innocent until otherwise. but this is a big deal. he had resisted this for a long time. democrats lost faith in him. >> republicans weren't all together happy either. one of the things you saw last week was the senate intel committee step in and

essentially say they would be the adults. you even saw mark warner in the hearing last week essentially say the house is kind of off and we'll be the ones to take care of this. you also saw lindsey graham criticizing what nunes did. i guess the issue here is would any of this have happened have nunes and his credibility without that early morning tweet from donald trump? this sort of conspiracies theory he floated about allegations, false allegations about obama tapping his phones and then the story evolved to surveillance and then it evolved to unmasking and you had nunes there, i think at least democrats will say, trying to run cover for the white house and provide them with some talking points and some information that would give them some credibility. >> hang on just for one second. we continue this conversation. i'll show you the floor of the united states senate. republicans now have the 51 votes to invoke the nuclear option. >> the debate on the nomination of neil gorsuch to be an

associate justice of the supreme court of the united states shall be brought to a close upon reconsideration. the yays and n -- the clerk will call the role. >> mr. alexander. mr. bor ras so. >> they're back now to another vote on the floor of the united states senate. the reason we broke in is the senate has now voted to invoke the so called nuclear option. he can be confirmed with a simple vote. all 52 republicans voting yet to change the rules. the democrats including the independents who caucused with the democrats voting no. more of the partisanship in washington. this is part of the partisan atmosphere in washington. the conversation we were having before we checked in, this has also infected these investigations which the intelligence committees are normally the one place where they meet in secret. they pick members by seniority.

they pick members who know to get along and do this in an almost nonpartisan way. devin nunes has stepped aside because he's under investigation by the house ethics committee. the new lead force on the house side will be congressman mike c connoway. most of america probably doesn't know much about him. serves on the armed services committee and the intelligence committee. served in the united states army. he is about to become now like it or not a national figure because he is the leader, stand in leader of one of the most sensitive investigations in this town. >> if you think about some of this where jeff sessions had to recuse himself from russia investigations, mike flynn had to resign because of some aspects of russia and now devin nunes to step aside. >> and the documents in question, the documents in

question that devin nunes talked about that some people now say he was disclosing classified information just by acknowledging he had looked at documents that were obtained under a court order, some say that is even a lack of classified information. that is what has brought us to susan rice, president obama's former national security adviser. the white house says unmasked meaning masked for information. who is this american they're referring to in the report. the president of the united states said something quite remarkable yesterday. he accused the former president of plot to wire tap him. no evidence. yesterday he told the new york times he believed susan rice has committed a crime. susan rice said high has done nothing wrong. i want you to listen here. who knows this stuff as well as anybody in the business. here's his take. >> on its face what i know about the susan rice unmasking story, what has gone on here was

lawful, appropriate, and here's the punch line. pretty routine. not exceptional. >> general hayden's take, now susan rice is going to get called up before congress without a doubt. she said she has done nothing wrong. she said she didn't leak anything. but pretty remarkable for the president of the united states to say i think she's committed a crime. >> also with no new evidence. >> keeping with what he does. sort of this constant search for villains. the first villain was obama who he also accused of committing a crime until susan rice who has long been hated on the far right is a pretty good stand in for obama. i mean, if you look at the list of sort of enemies from the point of conservatives t's probably obama, hillary clinton and susan rice. sort of the perfect switcharoo for this president. in keeping what he does in offering this why no evidence t's just a rumor something is

going to get breitbart folks very animated and it's also very dangerous. you feel like if you're susan rice you're kind of a target. >> anmatiimating your base is important to politicians. >> but they had a few days where everyone was talking about rice. now what are we talking about today? nunes again. as far as controlling the messages, they just lost that right story they were enjoying and now we're back to talking about nunes. >> hopefully perhaps i'm naive, i'm new here, hopefully we'll have credible investigations that will find out the facts and hold the people accountable, whatever party they're in and clear this all up for people. that's hopeful in all this. quick break. we'll be back with "inside politics" in just a moment. like using glucerna to replace one meal or snack a day. glucerna products have up to 15 grams

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nufing the neil gorsuch nomination along. back to the house side. hard to believe, but it was just 13 days ago speaker paul ryan was forced to pull his obamacare repeal and replace plan from the house floor because there weren't enough votes to pass it. a new idea for a high risk insurance pool is part of this progress. >> i actually think that divide is narrowing quite quickly. what this idea represents is a goal that everyone from the freedom caucus to every other group that's represented here is seeking. how do we lower premiums? how do we lower premiums and continue the protection with people with pre-existing conditions? this idea does that. >> mark me down as skeptical. phil mattingly joins us on why they may take this to a committee vote even though they don't have a plan to pass the

full house. >> because the white house told them to. it's that simple. at a meeting last night, speaker paul ryan, met with some of the other senior officials in the white house and i'm told it was a very contentious if not borderline panicky meeting coming from the white house perspective saying look, the vice president put himself on the line trying to recess tate this effort that imploded 13 days ago. you need to show progress. one individual briefed on the meeting tells me they said they needed to have a vote by the end of the week on this bill. the speaker and the marriajorit leader g leader said they are nowhere near that. it may have brought them further apart. that's not the answer the white house wanted. the leaders came back and figured they needed to put on theater. there is actually agreement on the amendment that they're adding in the house rules

committee and that does move them closer. in terms of the major issues that still separate them, those still exist. i will say if you took a leak at the speaker's press conference, you'll notice there are more than a dozen members smiling behind him. that was theater. as one aid told me, you know it. we know it's expletive, but hey, here we are. >> what's that old saying? let them know how you make the sausage. phil, live for us on capitol hill. i understand they want to show progress. they want to show they have a win. the ultimate outsider donald trump is now begging for a committee vote to prove there's progress on health care. give me an inside. pull me an inside lever so i can predend we' p pretend we're moving this forward? >> after he said we're not going to do this, we're going to do tax reform. the think the members should have done this without the advice. they're the ones that have to go

home to the districts. oh, we move something along even though it's all for show. >> that going home is going to cost them, because when members go home, they tend to get for the away from leadership in recent years. particularly these freedom caucus guys who were welcomed back home after they stood up to their leadership. and when you talk to leadership off the record yesterday, they concede to that. that it makes it tougher now that they're gone. >> and it does -- it shows very incremental and symbolic progress, but not actual progress. >> they brought a bill to the floor. you embarrassed the speaker and the president. they were embarrassed if not humiliated by what happened and now they're going to try to do this again? >> it has not been handled good from the beginning f. someone wanted to put together a bill that was going to lower insurance costs, you wouldn't be doing it in the piecemeal. you would have done this talk g talking, this consulting trying to look at ideas before you

actually introduced a bill and tried to have a vote on it like in 48 hours after introducing a new amendment. >> if you listen to the speaker this morning, he brought a vote to the floor. then he had to beg the president let me pull the vote. the president wanted him to have the vote. he had a list of the republicans to vote against it. they had a big plan 13 days ago. listen to the speaker this morning say no, no, no, we're fine. >> we have to work with the united states senate. the senate moves a little more slowly on any given weekday or month or year than the house does. so we have plenty of cushion built into our plans and we are well within that spectrum of timeline that we envisioned on dealing with the obamacare legislation. >> they're not even -- >> there's people within the white house and people close to the president who are losing patience with paul ryan. right now his job security is that there's no clear replacement. i don't know where the president stands on paul ryan, but i do

know there are people who talk to the president regularly who are losing patience with him. >> let's go back up to capitol hill. dana, they have now changed the rules and ended the filibuster, correct? >> that's right. which was easy to do because they changed the rules and now the overall rule, this particular case was the first test case is that to break a filibuster you only needed a simple majority which is 51 votes. since republicans have a 52-seat majority, it was simple for them to do. so in the short term, in this particular case, filling the ninth seat on the supreme court, it means that neil gorsuch is on his way pretty quickly to being confirmed by the united states senate to fill justice scalia's seat on the supreme court. as you were talking about, as we were talking about earlier, it is a very big day in the united states senate because for the first time they changed the rules in order to effectively

take away the rights of whomever is in the minority to try to stop any nomination of the president for the supreme court. again, this is the first time we're seeing it. they change today for neil gorsuch and it's never going to be the same. >> never going to be the same. the question of neil gorsuch and final confirmation, am i right that this vote they just took now that they've voted with the majority, the filibuster is over, they start what? a 30 hour clock and then we vote on final passage? >> that's right. that's technically how it happens. sometimes when the senators can smell the jet fumes, especially when they're about to go on a two hi two-week recess, they can magical magically shrink that clock. we'll see what happens in this case because this is obviously a very important vote and the atmosphere is so toxic so it might not happen in this case. >> the atmosphere toxic? i can't believe you would say

the atmosphere in washington is toxics. i can't believe it. if we could show the chair just a minute here as we bring the conversation to the room, warren hatch is in the chair. i believe he just stood up. he would chair the proceedings. he's moving now off the key victory for the republicans here. a traditionalist like warren hatch residing over this debate. neil gorsuch will be on the supreme court. the question is how does the character of washington change because of this? >> again, it just becomes more pa partisan now. we'll see it in several pockets. as we were talking about earlier , it doesn't affect regular legislation. >> not yet. >> not yet. should there be another vacancy on the supreme court, we're really going to see the result of this. >> i mean, now, i was looking at the approval rating of congress, it's sort of high for congress. it's like 24 or 25%.

it was at 13% before. >> let's throw a party. >> so we'll see what this does in terms of people's feelings about congress and it will probably i think further this partisan divide. >> so much for the president. i'd love to work with democrats. i talk to democrats all the time. i'm going to work with them. so much for that. >> and yet neil gorsuch is his one big win. legislative win. we underestimate and we underreport sometimes the executive things the administration can do to change policy policy. if you're a trump voter, you're probably with some of the things. but in terms of a big legislative win, health care off the rails, tax reform we don't know, border wall not exactly what he proposed. neil gorsuch messy in terms of the changing the rules but it's going to be a win. >> the republican party was able to be united in the senate. they have not been walking locked up arm and arm as a

united front like i think people expected they would back in november. so in this issue, you chose yes, you get republicans together on something. >> you're watching there in the corner of your screen chl this is john who is a member of the republican leadership from texas. we're told by our congressional producer when they had the vote to go nuclear, to change the rules, john and the leader mitch mcconnell exchanged a high five. the republicans know they will get neil gorsuch confirmed. the republicans know they will win this batch. for mitch mcconnell, as an individual, he is the one who played the risky strategy that merit garland is not going to be confirmed. 11 months he refused to have even a committee hearing on merit garland. >> and it worked. as they're high fiving, orrin hatch is presiding. i think if you're a democrat, you are praying even more for ruth bader ginsburg and her health and sort of the older --

and justice kennedy, because like jackie pointed out, toor, the next nominee can be a lot more conservative. if you only need the 50 vote threshold, that changes the -- >> what happened to this mitch mcconnell? called the filibuster one of the most cherished safeguards of liberty in our government. the right of a political minority to have a voice. >> the balance of power. he was in the minority then. >> exactly. republicans will be in the minority again. you see mitch mack ccconnell hi fiving. >> i think the pick of gorsuch was an interesting choice to show republicans that i am going to pick someone -- a conservative traditional. and to give them cover and

comfort level to the more moderate deserves that let me get these through and i'll give you some good supreme court picks that the whole party can come around. >> as we watch the debay play out, i guess the question is the spill over effect. it will get more partisan. allegely thaifr goi allegedly they're going to try to do health care again. he wants to do infrastructure, because a lot of conservatives won't want to do the spending. how are you going to pay for it. sometimes we view things in a vacuum. i assume everyone agrees this one is part of the toxic stew. >> yeah. this is part of the toxic stew, but it is -- if you were donald trump trying to look for a win in these first 100 days, this is a "w" for him. and it's a big "w." he talks about that list he put out and this is one of the reasons why he's president. his idea of -- he was able to bring republicans around to him and vote for him. >> nothing brings them together faster than a supreme court

nominee. >> who didn't agree with him on a lot of areas who voted for him -- >> just because of this. the president on his way to florida. thanks for joining us. wolf blitzer in the chair. big news day. stay with us. wolf takes over after a break. oh, how waso good!en house? did you apply? oh, i'll do it later today. your credit score must be amazing. my credit score? credit karma. it's free. that's great! um hm. just whip bam boom, it's done. that apartment is mine! credit karma. give yourself some credit.

hello, i'm wolf blitz ser i washington. we begin with breaking news on multiple fronts. first trump is considering military action in syria in retaliation for this week's chemical attack. the president said yesterday that he now pairs the responsibility when it comes to the syria conflict. we're going to have much more on the options the president is now considering. a live report coming up from the pentagon. also the chairman of the house