twitter that he has a new fbi director, nearly one month after firing james comey. this with all eyes on capitol hill where in just two hours the senate intel committee is going to begin two days of block buster hearings. today they are going to hear from the top intel official dan coats. coats told associates the president asked him, too, if he could intervene in comey's michael flynn probe. >> and, chris, the main event tomorrow, of course james comey on the hot seat. comey is expected to refute the president's claims that comey told him on three separate occasions that he was not under investigation. we're also learning that attorney general jeff sessions offered to resign at one point after heated exchanges with the president. we have all this for you. live on capitol hill with our top story. jessica. >> reporter: president trump trying to steal back a bit of the thunder that will be

happening on capitol hill over the next two days. president trump this morning announcing his fbi director pick and of course doing it only in the way that president trump does, on twitter. president trump tweeting this just a few minutes ago, saying i will be naming christopher a. wray to be director of the fbi. details to follow. so the president there teasing ahead to what will be his announcement. christopher wray did serve in the justice department, to serve as assistant attorney general in the early 2000s. he also served in private practice as the private and personal attorney to chris cristie during the bridgegate scandal. we gear up for the start of two days of testimony here on capitol hill. >> the top intelligence official dan coats set to testify today amid new washington post reporting that president trump asked coats to intervene and get

the fbi to back off its probe of michael flynn just two days after then fbi director comey confirmed the bureau's investigation into potential collusion between trump's campaign and russia. this after cnn reported last month that president trump asked coats to deny evidence supporting the probe, a conversation coats declined to comment about last month. >> i don't feel it is appropriate to kracharacterize discussions with the president. >> deputy attorney general will answer questions publically for the first time about the circumstances surrounding the letter he wrote recommending comey's firing. the administration originally pinned the president's decision to oust comey's on rosenstein's letter before trump conceded he had been contemplating the move for weeks, in part because of the handling of the russia investigation. >> he made a recommendation.

but regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey. >> i wish him luck. >> sources tell cnn that tomorrow comey will refute the president's claim that comey assured him three times that he was not under fbi investigation. >> i said, if it's possible, will you let me know, am i under investigation. he said you are not under investigation. >> one source says it is possible president trump misunderstood the meaning of comey's words which were nuanced. another source familiar with comey's testimony telling cnn the former fbi director will describe the interactions with the president that made him uncomfortable, including a meeting where trump says comey was pressured to drop the flynn investigation. according to the new york sometimes, that meeting prompted comey to confront jeff sessions a day later, telling him he did not want to be left alone with the president again. and "the new york times" also

reports that james comey did not reveal to jeff sessions that he felt pressured by the president to drop that investigation into michael flynn. the times does report that comey just didn't know who he could trust at the justice department. >> all right, jessica. so we have news that a new man may be on the way in at the fbi and we have a story that someone may be on their way out at the doj. attorney general jeff sessions has had several heated exchanges in recent weeks with president trump, even offering to resign. and then the administration asked directly, does the president have confidence in the attorney general ral and the press secretary refusing to answer. joe johns live at the white house. sean spicer saying, i haven't had a conversation with the president about his confidence in jeff sessions. a nonanswer that volumes.

>> reporter: that's right. we're hoping to hear more today about the president's views on the attorney general. it paints a picture of a president who is furious after losing control of the russia investigation, and it happened after one of his most fervent political supporters has hand picked attorney general removed himself from all things related to russia, setting off a chain reaction that led to the appointment of special counsel. amid a series of heated exchanges in recent weeks again president trump and attorney general jeff sessions, sources tell cnn that jeff sessions threatened to resign if the president no longer wanted him in the position. >> how would you describe the president's level of confidence in jeff sessions. >> sean spicer declining to answer. >> i have not had a discussion with him about that. i'm answering a question, which is i have not had that

discussion with them. >> the white house still has not clarified the president's position. one official telling cnn they wanted to avoid giving a definitive answer. the president has frequently contradicted his aids in the past. a justice department spokeswoman telling cnn sessions is not stepping down. >> i have recused myself in the past having to do with the trump campaign. >> tensions between the two men have been brewing since sessions announced he would step aside from any russia investigations in march after failing to disclose two meetings with a russian ambassador. >> i did not have communications with the russians. >> trump was reportedly furious with the recusal, leading to the appointment of special counsel last month. the president's anger on display last week.

sources tell cnn the president does not intend to accept a resignation from the attorney general. the optics of it would certainly be problematic. there is also a question of how to get a replacement. there would be an up roar on capitol hill and even the temporary replacement would be problematic in the views of some here at the white house. that would be rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general who happens to be the same person who named the special counsel in the first place. >> yes, it is complicated, joe. let's bring in our panel to discuss all of the breaking news. we have chris cillizza, abbie phillip and phillip mud. great to have all of you. christopher wray is the name we now know. what do we know of him? >> the biggest thing we know of him politically speaking right there is he was governor chris

cristie's personal attorney during the whole closing of the lanes in fort lee that led to chris cristie's presidential campaign never going anywhere and led to two of his top aids being convicted. interesting in that christy obviously had put himself way out there for donald trump back in february of 2016 with an endorsement, has taken a lot of flak for it. did not wind up getting anything in the white house in the initial hires. has been critical as recently as yesterday of trump's twitter feed, as well as some other people within the trump world. possible that chris cristie recommended this guy to donald trump, yeah, i think so, a sign that chris cristie may be having his voice listened to, sure. but, look, broadly speaking, forget christopher wray for a second. why is donald trump announcing this pick, which has been about a month and a few days since jim

comey was fired? because we have rod rosenstein, because we have dan coats on the hill today, because we have jim comey on the hill tomorrow, because there is a whole slew of negative stories out there. remember, donald trump is essentially a tv producer. he understands that you have to offer some counter programming, and this is an attempt at counter program sglg and it is a good move. >> it is working. >> it's got us talking. it is relevant information and just as a little bit of a sidebar, to put this to bed once and for all, this was told to us on twitter. so if you want to know whether or not the president regards tweets -- >> that's right. >> -- as official policy statements because that's what this is, a policy change, he's going to put in a new person, it is a big material move. he did it on twitter. forget about what everybody else says about the tweets are just fill in the blank some type of nonsense. they matter. there is something else that matters. we are getting ready for this director coats interview today.

there is a new statement from the dni, his statement. it is from brian hail and it says coats does not discuss his private conversations with the president. however, he has never felt pressured by the president or anyone else in the administration to influence any intelligence matters or ongoing investigations. so phil mud, give us your take on that statement. does that conclude any speculation about appropriateness by the president and what do you make of christopher wray coming into the agency? >> let's start with a statement. all he's trying to do, director coats, is to go into the hearing and as soon as somebody says tell us about that conversation with the president he's going to say, already told you, not going to talk about that. that does not include the conversation about what the president said. >> he did say he's never felt pressured. what door does that close?

>> doesn't close any doors. so the special counsel, robert mueller goes in to say i don't care about pressured. i want to hear what the president said when, and i'll make the determination about whether that interaction was appropriate or not. those words are very careful. was he ever asked about the investigation? i thought that was more about the hearing today than about getting him off the hook for further conversations with robert mueller. on the wray issue, people like me are going to smell this like two dogs smelling each other on the sidewalk. >> thank you. >> that's an image. >> well, you were just talking earlier about whether females should be involved in health care issues that made me really uncomfortable. here's the issue. i have no reason to doubt whether he's a good nominee, no reason to doubt that. but the president has options. one of the options was john pistol, the former deputy director of the fbi. one was anry mccabe.

both of them declined. so the president chooses someone who does have direct linkage not only with chris cristie, but evidently from a law firm from which the president has selected other individuals for his administration. people are going to say this fellow wray as a history in federal prosecutions. that's great. is there anything that suggests for somebody to remember a ten-year term, is there anything to suggest he will give privacy to the white house over pursuing the facts in federal investigations. this smells a little and i'm sure to congress it will smell a lot. >> how about when the senators ask him about the russia investigation, what is wray going to say? is he going to say it didn't come up? will anybody believe that? >> what do you think happened to the congressman trey gowdy option and all the other names

floated? this is out of left field. >> all those names you mentioned are all political people. this is one of the bigger sticking points for the white house. and perhaps to their credit, they were thinking about the fact that people in the fbi probably would have gone into full revolt if he had named a political figure, a former politician, a current politician to that post. so in some ways christopher wray is someone who has experience in the agency. yes, he has ties to chris cristie, but he is not a politician specifically and he's been in that building before. he's worked under george w. bush, so i think the white house is looking in the other direction there because they want to get ahead of some of this push back. i think they expect a fair amount of it. but i think there is probably a good chance that chris wray is going to be easily confirmed in the senate because beyond the ties to chris cristie, i'm not aware of any huge red flags here and that's what the white house

was aiming for. they don't necessarily want this to be a gigantic fight at this stage. >> that's true. but, chris, also, let's not lose sight to your own point. wray has been out there. he was one of the names and there was political speculation about chris cristie versus giuliani and now we know the name. but the timing is not a coi s d coincidence. we can show the hearing room which is the beginning of a two-day affair here where we are going to hear questions asked and as phil mud says director coats is throwing a big bucket of cold water on any anticipation about him dishing of talking with the president. but the stakes are real. >> yeah. so first on wray the other thing to remember is other people know, right? this is not necessarily a job everyone is clambering for,

particularly if you look at what happened to the last guy. number two, there are no coincidences in politics. this is my attitude when a politician says i was just driving through iowa and i thought i'd stop and meet the local democrats. it is not a thing, right? the reason they do that is because they want to run for president at some time or they think they could be president some time. even if donald trump didn't have a history, not just with reality tv, but in his back and forth with the new york tabloids, a history of trying to manipulate media coverage to make it look more beneficial to him, to change stories, to throw some chum over here, which he does, even if he didn't have that history, i would draw the conclusion this is clearly meant to take some of that coverage from comey, rosenstein, coats and all the news that's been out there about that and that will be out when they testify over these next 48 hours and have some of it be who is christopher wray what is this pick like? it is a card that president had

to play. i'm not critical of it. other presidents do the same thing, but he is clearly playing a card here. >> phil, it is very interesting. if you do a split screen of what we anticipate coats who has just said he is not going to reveal any personal interactions and conversations with president trump and that he doesn't know about anything to offer about feeling pressured. and then with former dni director james clapper, who is at an event speaking about all of this very stuff. and let me play for you what he has just said. >> i think if you compare the two that watergate pales really in my view compared to what we're confronting now. >> watergate pales in comparison to this investigation? >> that's my reaction.

what are we talking about here? let me step back. i know director clapper served more than 50 years in government. he's very well respected in the government community. that said, what the heck are we talking about here? in watergate we had a president resign. we know what happened was a criminal act beginning with the break-in of democratic offices. we know there was a cover up. we know there is wrongdoing up and down the administration of richard nixon. what do we know in this case? we don't know what happened during the election, whether there is any collusion. the other thing we know for a fact in one circumstance is general flynn made an ethical violation that led him to be fired. we don't understand what the cover up is here. we have a president who is nowhere close to resigning. that would be ridiculous. or being impeached. and we want to compare that to watergate? going into this environment, he is undercutting his credibility by comparing this to watergate.

how do you look with someone with that kind of history and say i believe him. >> especially when another one of his most quotable moments needs proper context, when clapper said i have seen no proof of collusion. now, when we had him on the show, i tested him on that, and he said, well, that's because i wasn't overseeing the case. i don't know what the book is on the case. i don't know the evidence. so how could i know what they have on collusion. still, when he's out there saying i don't know about any collusion and then he says it pales in consideration to watergate, how do you reconcile those? >> exactly. also, he made it clear earlier that he wasn't aware about certain parts of this investigation. his knowledge of it would have ended on january 20. so there is a lot -- there are a lot of questions here about what -- on what basis is he making some of these statements. i will say just to play devil's advocate here, he seemed to be suggesting that the possibilities here -- we don't know a lot to phil's point, but

the possibilities here, if they go to their fullest extent, could extend beyond watergate, which may or may not be a fair point. we just don't know. we don't know where this is going, where it is headed, how far it is. it could be nothing. it is interesting he would say that. i think he's not an average joe. he is someone who does have experience in the intelligence world. so i don't think that we should totally discount the words that are coming out of his mouth. but he did undercut himself by making the point that he wasn't fully read in and he basically would have lost all knowledge of where this investigation was going way back in january. that's eons from where we are right now. >> it's interesting to take the pulse of the people. a new poll out this morning, why did president trump fire james comey? 61% from responded to say to protect himself. 27% say for the good of the country. that's where we are.

who knows how they will feel on wednesday after they hear some of his testimony. >> and remember that's far from the only negative poll number out there for trump. his approval rating, which has never been stellar, has been low to at best mid-30s, high 30s for the last couple weeks, i can't imagine this week is going to help that. i can't wait to hear what james comey says, but i can't imagine it will be a big boost for donald trump and donald trump's message during the campaign was this amazing sort of virtue yous circle which was i'm winning. the polls show i'm winning. therefore, i am winning. the polls show i'm right. so it was so poll dependant. he has not tweeted about polling since april 24th. he did it on that day solely to bash polling that suggested he wasn't doing well, saying the polls were wrong in the 2016 election, which i will note they were not necessarily wrong. they showed hillary clinton winning by two to three points.

guess what? she won the popular vote by two to three points. so take what you will from it. >> right. but they also predicted we would have a different president. we get that criticism. >> and that's fair, chris. i always say, look, i did not think that -- nothing that i had read, studied, reported on suggested donald trump would win that election. he won. he was right. i was wrong. no question. but his argument that all polling therefore should be, you know, thrown in the garbage if it doesn't see him doing well i think is a vast overstatement of reality. >> he is the quickest to cite a good poll for himself. phil mud, you are right that legally we have to be very careful about what we see in terms of proof and what we see in terms of developments. however, politically, this is very different. let's not forget. this may stay political in terms of its process at all times. that takes us to the latest

iterations, that sessions may be sideways with trump, which is shocking to so many because sessions stuck his neck out to he could stick it out as far as he could and early on for trump and everybody had an actixe in their hands. the idea that trump could get rid of sessions, is that politically something he could top rate? >> look, if you want me to predict after he fired the fbi director and couldn't foresee that would lead to a special counsel, that was one of the dumbest political moves i can see as a nonpolitician in the years that i have been watching washington. i think the message, though, chris is simple inside government. every man for himself. i remember talking to vice president chany and bush before the iraq war, i remember talking to robert mueller in a lot of

difficult moments. when you are inside that bubble, you feel that everybody is protecting the team. i go up for testimony on capitol hill, i'm never going to throw the president under the brush. if the president sets you up, be careful, he is going to stab you in the back eventually. >> panel, thank you very much for keeping up with all of this breaking news this morning. great to have you. >> the senate intel committee is about to hold two highly anticipated hearings. it doesn't matter what side of the political aisle, what outcome you want, you need to hear what is said. we have one of the senators leading the hearing. he's going to be asked what he wants to hear today, what he wants to hear tomorrow, his answers matter. stay with us.

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. we have breaking news. president trump announcing in a tweet by the way, which means it is official policy, that christopher wray is his pick as fbi director. the timing is no coincidence. it comes hours before lawmakers are going to grill the nation's

top intel officials and a day before the main event with fired fbi director james comey breaking his silence. what do the senators want to hear today and tomorrow we have a man in the arena. senator mark warner, the vice chair of the nath intel committee, which is holding these hearings today. you have the fisa oversite issue, you have dni director coats. he put out a statement. two big admissions in the statement. one, i don't gossip. two, i felt no pressure. what do these two comments mean to you today, senator? >> well, chris, i hope that the director coats, who is a good friend of mine. he served on our committee doesn't try to hide behind executive privilege or some other reason. he said when he testified before another committee he'd be happy to tell all when he talks to the investigatory committee, and we

are that committee. what i want to find out is we've had press reports as recently as yesterday that maybe even more than once the president tried to intervene with director coats to ask him to either down play or dismiss the fbi investigation into contacts between trump officials. we also have with the head of the nsa will have some additional evidence that there was that kind of intervention as well. i hope that they will both realize that while they work for this administration, they also have an obligation to the american people. this is such a critically important issue. we have to get the facts out. >> let's discuss why, though. so if coats won't answer, okay, or even if he does, but he just it rat iterates what he put out in that statement saying whatever happens i didn't feel pressure. and comey says whatever happened and now there is reporting that he didn't want jeff sessions to

leave him alone with the president. he wrote a memo about feeling uncomfortable about it, but he felt no pressure, doesn't that close the door in terms of how wrong the president's behavior could have been? >> chris, i think i will allow the american public to make that judgment. the one thing about our intelligence leaders are they're supposed to be nonpolitical. they are supposed to speak truth to power and they are supposed to be responsive no matter whether they work for republicans and democrats. whether it is dan coats, jim comey, i have great respect for all of them. but if we have evidence that the president of the united states intervened in an investigation and asked coats and rogers to back off and then we have director comey tomorrow descr e describing the conversations he had with the president and the fact that he felt uncomfortable, why did he feel uncomfortable, why did he have to produce

memos? we know he was fired partially because the president wanted to take the pressure off the russia investigation. he acknowledged that to the russians and then he basically slurred jim comey's name in front of the rusrussians. that's just unacceptable. but if we see this pattern, it raises to me a huge amount of questions because, chris, this is before we get to the details of the number of contacts and types of contacts that took place during the campaign between trump officials and the russians. then we had the president saying after the election there was no ties, no contacts with the russians. that's just not true because we've had general flynn resign because he didn't talk about his contacts with the russians. we have had the attorney general sessions recuse himself because he didn't disclose contacts with the russians. we had mr. kushner not acknowledge he had a series of contacts with the russians

during the transition. why so many contacts with the russians when we know and there is 100% certainty from all of the intelligence community, not only officials, the intelligence community that the russians tried to throw the elections towards mr. trump and what we have seen more recently, evidence that they tried to interfere in a number of states in terms of our electoral process. this is extraordinarily serious process. i will leave it to the judgment of the american people if we see the president in an unprecedented way, at least three times and how many more times with intelligence officials to say back off and back off on an active investigation of people close to the president. >> let's hear what said today and tomorrow. two other questions. we have two republicans on today. both in the house. one of them said i'll tell you

what the real story is for comey is what happened on that tarmac with clinton. we had another one say that's nonsense. that was during the campaign. i'll tell you what the real story is, this wrongful unmasking of done for political reasons. what do you make of those assertions. >> i make of those assertions that i'm sure those kind of questions are going to get asked. i think what you are seeing from some of my republican colleag s colleagues, we're committed to getting to the truth, following the facts. but i think you are seeing some republicans, particularly house members try to throw up other stories. i think it is more than a little bit curious that the president chose this morning as the time to announce his new fbi head, who by the way i understand has a pretty good reputation. there will be a time and place to review him. but it seems to me that this is

an effort to try to take people's attention off what is going to be the main event, at least for the next two days. the leaders of our intelligence community and the fbi director. think about this, chris. the president fired the guy in charge of the investigation and two individuals that were close to this president and their possible collaboration with the russians. i mean, you can't make this stuff up. >> right. but that was a political judgment and there were plenty on your side of the aisle that were calling for comey's head for a long time. so what do you want to hear from him tomorrow that you believe is of the greatest import? >> well, i think you have to take these two days actually in series. if we have today coats and rogers not denying that these conversations took place and particularly with rogers i believe we will have additional evidence to point out that there was a conversation, that he felt

pressured, there was a need to memorialize it. if you have those two contacts in what i would call inappropriate at the least and then you have jim comey finally telling his side of the story, jim comey, whether you liked him or didn't like him, this is a guy of high integrity that was well respected by all his colleagues at the fbi, who even the president has already acknowledged that he fired him because of the fbi investigation. then he went in front of the russians and smeared jim comey's name and basically said he was firing him to try to take the pressure off from the russia investigation. i want jim comey to tell his side of the story of what happened and if you take these facts in total, i think the american public is going to start, maybe not reaching a full conclusion, because we haven't even gotten to the meat of this investigation, which is what happened before the election. >> right, right. >> and why so many contacts during the transition when the president said there were no contacts at all. >> understood. let's see what is said and

please do me a favor. once we have heard the testimony, come back on the show so we can test what it means to you and the american people. >> chris, russian hackers reportedly behind a fake news story that has sparked new tension in the middle east with nine countries cutting diplomatic ties as a result. what will president trump do? >> and history or actually herstory at the box office. "wonder woman" biggest debut for a woman director ever. the director joins us live next, and we will discuss why i always wanted to be wonder woman. >> that is an insight. >> wait until you see my golden -- r, taste-free, 100% natural daily fiber... that's clinically proven to help me feel fuller longer. benefiber® healthy shape. this i can do! you're in the match app. now tap on the new missed connections feature.

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cnn exclusive for you. u.s. officials believe that russian hackers breached qatar's fake news agency. joining us now is republican congressman of illinois. he is a member of the foreign affairs committee and veteran of the iraq and afghanistan wars. good morning. what is russia's play here? why would they want to sow chaos in the middle east? >> they look at every opportunity as what can benefit them. and what they see in the gulf states is a coalition of people against iran, a coalition of nations that really are friendly to the united states after president trump's good visit to the saudi area and good address to the 50 arab leaders and they want to sow dissension in that.

in russia, whenever there is chaos there is opportunity. they see an opportunity to hurt the united states and give russia a play in the middle east. that's exactly their play here. >> okay. so they are creating now this fake news story appears to have created division between qatar and other nations. of course the u.s. was allied with qatar and saudi arabia. what should trump do about this? >> i think he personally needs to stay out of it. let's bring all the parties together, explain this is what the russians want, that the comments that were attributed to the leader of qatar are not real. that's an amazing role that the united states plays, is the ability to quarterback sometimes very different countries with very different focuses. but there is a reality. there is some funding of terrorists from the middle east from nations like qatar that

needs to be addressed. same with saudi arabia. qatar gives people safe zones, so you could have taliban offices there. i think these are issues that need to be addressed. but when russia plants fake news stories, this is where the whole world needs to be aware, it doesn't just happen in the united states or europe. russia is using 21st technology to do it. >> last night you tweeted directly to president vladimir putin, and i have not seen a tweet like this before. can you trabs late to us what you tweeted to him? >> what it says is mr. putin please stay away from our democracy and, in essence, shove off, right? so i don't know the exact translation, but that's the gist of it. i thought it was a funny way of bringing people the awareness of the fact that russia is trying to intervene, whether it's

elections and democracies and fake news. the russian economy is the size of italy. this isn't the old soviet union. it is basically italy. and so this idea, you have to take them seriously. you have to respect them. but this idea we're going to let the russians push us around or we're back in a bipolar world is ridiculous. >> italy might take issue with that analogy that you just made. but i know you also want to talk about the fight against isis and case in point this morning there is breaking news there was what appears to be a terrorist attack in iran of all places at the parliament building. there was what appears to be a suicide bomber. there was an explosion. at last count there was 7 people dead, 35 injured. isis is trying to take responsibility.

confirmation. >> obviously iran is shia. that would be the opening of a new front. this is a very desperate organization that is desperate to convince people on the edge of gee haddism to join them. and isis is losing territory. they're frankly getting their butts kicked right now. when you try to recruit somebody, it's hard to convince them of that when you're losing. so they are trying to lash out to show we're still here, we're back. so i do expect there is going to be more attacks in different places. but this makes it even all the more important to keep prosecuting the fight against them and lib rat rocca. but we have to win the next generation, which is the 7 or 8 year olds that need to learn how to read and write, need to have opportunity because having people with opportunity denies isis the opportunity to recruit its next terrorists. >> okay.

thank you very much. always great to have you on "new day". >> any time. take care. >> winning the peace, always so important. all right. we have big news for you, and it's not tragic. the top movie in the country, shattering records. "wonder woman" making herstory as opposed to history. no woman has done what she has done at the box office before. what does this movie mean beyond the screen? next. greatest racehorse who ever lived? of course he was strong... ...intelligent. ...explosive. but the true secret to his perfection... was a heart, twice the size of an average horse.

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time for cnn money now. looking for more good news. job openings hit a new high. christine romans is in our money center. >> it is a goldilocks report. there are six million job openings. a record. but hiring slowed. it is a sign that employers are struggling to find qualified workers for those jobs. the record number of jobs means businesses want to hire. they would hire more if they could and the hikely pay more. wage growth has been sluggish, even as the joblessness rate falls. if there are six million job openings, why aren't they getting hired. the u.s. struggling with a

skills gap. that has led to a hiring slow down. jobs growth last month, in fact, growth from february to may was the slowest in the past three years. this doesn't help with president trump's promise of 25 million jobs over the next ten years. the u.s. has not added the average you will need to meet that goal. >> thank you very much, christine. wonder woman making history, las sewing big bucks. we will talk with the real wonder woman behind the block buster film. the director made history with this. she'll tell us why it matters to her. there she is. think is today goie day, that we find a cure? i think how much i can do to help change people's lives. i may not benefit from those breakthroughs, but i'm sure going to... i'm bringing forward a treatment for alzheimer's disease, yes,

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>> here she is, the wonder woman that the world is watching, the number one movie in the country is "wonder woman" the film shattering box office records and a glass ceiling because it is the biggest opening ever for a female director. who is that? patty jenkins who joins us right

now. you made a movie, and you made history. can you believe it? >> i can believe i made a movie. it is shocking to me that i made history. i wasn't even thinking about that, but it's been amazing and touching ever since. >> what does it mean to you, patty, that this movie is being received the way it is, a name that is going to be new to a lot of people, that she is being received the way she is? >> i mean, that is incredible. i mean, the funny thing about making a movie like this is you are slightly in a vacuum of your own highest ambitions. i'm every day blown away with her. she's incredible. she moves me. she's my wonder woman. but then to see the world not only embrace and like be so excited about her, but be so excited about the whole movie, it's incredible. you're taking something very personal and you're seeing people, you know, embrace it

back. >> now, we're watching while you are talking we were playing a little bit of coverage of you behind the scenes during the making of this. the intensity is obvious. this wasn't just another movie for you. this was you getting to live out a dream that you have had ever since you were a kid. tell us about it. >> yeah. so when i was seven years old, super man one came out and it just rocked my world. i sat in that theater. i was transported. i thought i was superman. i thought i could be superman one day. so all of my life -- and i love film making of all kinds, but i always hoped and wished one day i could make a movie that made people feel that same way it made me feel. so when i came to hollywood and people asked me what i wanted to do and i saw no one made wonder woman, i couldn't believe that was still sitting there. ever since that time, i have been saying i would love a crack at making wonder woman and get a

chance to bring that experience to other people. >> but you wanted to do it your way. interesting context for people. patty was behind the movie as director and really author of the story of monster. this was special for you. and your notion of what linda carter represented as wonder woman and what you wanted this movie to be about and not be about. tell us that. >> yeah. i wanted -- so i love wonder woman. i love what wonder woman in the form of linda carter made me feel as a kid when i would go on that playground at not only be a badass fighting the bully but looked like linda carter while i was doing it. what i cared about the most was preserving the spirit of the true wonder woman, not only is she strong, not only is she the strongest and an incredible fighter, but she's also warm, loving, stands for something very good, very clean and very honorable and that's something

that i -- there are plenty of other heroes in the world and they stand for all kinds of things, but she stands for something so pure and so good and there is a special ability to do something beautiful with that in the world right now. >> i'll tell you that timing couldn't be better. so many of these movies have a message of more violence, more action, more of that kind of stuff. you wanted to talk about love and you wanted it to be a love story and you wanted wonder woman to not just be for the girls or even women. what is your case for wonder woman to be a figure that is embraced by men? >> well, since the beginning of time, we have told stories through universal characters. recently we have for some reason only chosen men. what i cared about about wonder woman is the same way i was super man as a kid in my mind. wonder woman is for everybody, and she stands for something. i mean, a very special kind of being a hero. she stands for not only having all of those abilities, but

thinking for yourself and choosing love and choosing justice and choosing kindness whenever she can. she doesn't want to bring, you know, any darkness to the world. so that's for everybody. you know, she's a hero for everything. i love what it's meaning to women. but i'm so excited to inspire all kinds of people the way that all kinds of heroes have inspired me. >> well, it is a message for everybody, but there can only be one number one, and that is you and this movie. congratulations to you. and if there is any sign that the message is resonating to men, i was trying to get a wonder woman shirt and they are all sold out in my size, so good indication, patty. >> i'll find you one, chris. i'll find you one. thank you. >> take care. >> and i'm going to find you the gold bracelets. >> i have those. >> cnn news room with poppy harlow and john berman picks up after this very quick break. we'll see you early tomorrow morning.

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good morning, everyone. i'm john berman. >> and i'm poppy. there is a little bit going on in washington right now. consider it the mother of all pregames. the warm-up back to the most anticipated congressional testimony in decade. but the set up this morning could be every bit as big and impo