thank you, we hope you make good memories today. "inside politics" with john king starts i think right about now. have a wonderful day. a defiant rose garden rebuttal. >> no collusion. no obstruction. he's a leaker. >> president trump ups the antesaying he's willing to answer james comey under oath. the former fbi's testimony raises the stakes for the president. >> i took it as a direction. >> and for his attorney general. >> we were aware of facts i can't discuss in an open setting. >> "inside politics," the biggest stories, sourced by the best reporters, now.

welcome to "inside politics." i'm john king, to our viewers in the united states and around the world, thanks for sharing your sunday. remarkable week just behind us, including that election stunner and a gamble that backfired for the british. theresa may, because thplus thi president trump won't criticize russian aggression in europe but breaks his silence on the organizing principle of the nato alliance. >> well, i'm committing the united states and have committed, but i'm committing the united states to article five. >> but we begin and we'll spend much of the next hour on big new terrorists in the russia meddling investigation. attorney jeff sessions announced saturday he will appear in the coming week before the senate intelligence committee. that committee of course was the venue for this past week's powerful testimony from the former fbi director james comey. now locked in a high stakes he said/he said with the president of the united states.

>> so he lied about that? >> well, i didn't say that. i mean, i will tell you i didn't say that. >> so he said those things under oath. would you be willing to speak under oath to give your version of those events? >> 100%. >> with us to share reporting and insights, sara murray, carl of the "new york times," ma manu raju and you heard the president his offer to answer questions under oath, part of his response to the riveting comey testimony. the former fbi director told conversation in a series of uncomfortable conversations president trump asked for a loyalty pledge, raised issues he should have known were off limits and at one point cleared the office of power players before telling comey he hoped the fbi would drop the investigation into michael flynn. >> do you sense that the president was trying to obstruct justice or just seek for a way for mike flynn to save face,

given he had already been fired? >> general flynn at that point in time was in legal jeopardy. there was an open fbi criminal investigation of his statements in connection with the russian contacts and the contacts themselves, and so that was my assessment at the time. i don't think it's for me to say whether the conversation i had with the president was an effort to obstruct. i took is t as a disturbing thing but i'm sure the special counsel will look what was the intention there and whether that's an offense. >> the last part from director comey, "that is up to the special counsel" who has preliminary conversations with comey already and the president committed in the rose garden 100% his willingness to testify under oath. after the riveting week, after the president's rebuttal in the rose garden where are we looking forward? let me start with the question of jeff sessions. is he absolutely central to this. on the one hand here is the administration's chance to rebut comey with a powerful witness

but as we speak this sunday morning he was scheduled to testify publicly before budget committees where he would be asked these questions. do we know if he now says i'm not going to do that, i'm sending my deputy. i'll go to the senate intelligence committee, in public or private? >> we don't know that yet. we assume we were talking earlier we think he's probably not going to do this in public. >> can the republicans allow that to happen? >> they can. they have the power to. will they accept it? we heard senator richard burr, the chairman of the intelligence committee, who is frustrated with the lack of responsiveness from other witnesses before the comey testimony will he want to hear from jeff sessions. what we do know from james comey testimony was he had enough concerns about jeff sessions' role in the russia investigation that he did not want to talk about those concerns in a public session, so when they went into a classified session i'm told by sources who are in the room that he raised the possibility that perhaps jeff sessions may have

had a discussion or some sort of interaction with the russian ambassador in a third meeting that he did not disclose after he amended his testimony with the senate judiciary committee. the request he is, will those questions come up in a private session? they will come up in a private session and will he say something that could open him up to what some democrats say are possible perjury because he did not tell the truth about his interactions with the russian ambassador initially. >> that's the thing. on the flipside, jeff sessions hasn't really proved to be a very strong witness in front of a congressional committee, as you said. he omitted some of the meetings that he had during his confirmation hearing, so while an open hearing would be preferable, you could see if it goes badly for the white house, this could make everything even worse than it is right now. >> my question, i'll come back to this in a minute, what about the republican brand, can they stand for this?

i'll leave it to lawyers for obstruction of justice but it's obstruction of accountability for the truth if the attorney general was scheduled to testify publicly and allowed to pull that off the table and get into private after serious questions raised about the top law enforcement official in the united states' conduct. that would be a copout at a minimum. >> i think sessions is making a calculation there that maybe the intel committee is a little more friendly venue for him, too. he has john cornyn, jim risch, tom cotton, people he worked closely with. democrat thought sessions might have had the worst hearing last week that the most damage that was done was actually done to him. >> at some point, john, sessions is going to have to testify. he's attorney general of the united states -- >> you would think. >> -- oversight committees, senate and house judiciary committees have to hear his testimony eventually. >> we'll come back to sessions in a minute. back to the president in the rose garden. he's completely silent on the day of comb yu ace testify which shocked a lot of people in washington.

he did tweet. "despite so many false statements and lies, total and complete vindication and wow, comey is a leaker." there's a lot to that short tweet. the president saying the former fbi director lied to congress which is felony perjury if you can prove it. it is a he said/he said. comey said the president lied. listen to the. the in the rose garden, john carl of abc news trying to answer a question raised by another tweet from the president. might we be able to resolve this. are there white house tapes? >> and you seemed to be hitting there are recordings of the conversations. >> i'm not hinting anything about it. i'll tell you about it over a very short period of time. >> is that in public? >> do you have a question here? >> when will you tell us about the recordings? >> fairly short period of time. >> are there tapes, sir? >> you're going to be very disappointed when you hear the answer, don't worry. >> by the last part one assumes there are not tapes or the white house will say there are not tapes by the "disappointed"

part. they have committed to answering this question for the house intelligence committee for the next week. the house intelligence committee sent a request saying are there tapes? we need the answer yes or no. >> yes, i'm not sure what the whole point of this exercise was of the president throwing out on twitter that tapes might exist and them the white house refusing to answer that question or not. if i had to put my bet in now i'm betting that this is some crazy the president decided to throw out on twitter and there are no actual tapes that exist. it's interesting this plays out at a time where he's asking the american public do you believe me or do you believe james comey. now, we know that james comey understands the consequences of lying under oath, the things the president has said are not under ♪ . so it will be very interesting for him to be making the case to the american public that you should trust me, not the former fbi director, while he's throwing all of these other things out there that may or may not prove to be true. >> director comey knew that going in. he understands washington. he understood and again we talk more about this later but he

undertoot if he said what he was about to say this was going to come down to his word against the president of the united states' words which is why comey repeatedly said of president trump from day one i didn't think i could trust him. >> i think the circumstances, the subject matter and the person i was interacting with, circumstances first, i was alone with the president of the united states, or the president-elect, soon to be president. the subject matter i was talking about matters that touch on the fbi's core responsibility, and that relate to the president, president-elect personally, and then the nature of the person. i was honestly concerned he might lie about the nature of our meeting so i thought it really important to document. >> it's a stunning thing so day about the president of the united states. remember, this is a meeting they had during the transition. there were several other times he said he was afraid the president wouldn't tell the truth. he said that straight up. that is remarkable.

"i was concerned honestly concerned he might lie." >> we're going to learn about that, this seems to be going to be a part of bob mueller's investigation. the thing that should be concerning for the president is that these notes that he took after the meeting are significant. >> right. >> do carry legal weight as well as comey briefed his senior leadership immediately after each of those meetings to tell them exactly what happened. there were multiple people that he told and those people undoubtedly will be interviewed by bob mueller. >> nobody will bring probably any case but certainly against the president of united states on obstruction of justice for one witness. >> lordy, i hope there's tapes. >> said james comey. he hoped there were witnesses to the president shooing people out of the room and gets back to jeff sessions, where the other players are critical. did the president just say i hope you can let my good friend mike flynn go, he's been through

enough which is improper but perhaps not nefarious. >> there's no parsing. >> however, the question becomes well, why did the president raise it in another consideration with comey later and what did he ask of dan coates, the director of national intelligence and admiral mike rogers, the head of the national security agency because this was critical, it got buried, these two men clearly the president brought up something they did not want to talk about in public. >> to the best of of my recollection i have never been directed to do anything illegal, immoral, unethical or inappropriate and to the best of my recollection during that same period of service i do not recall ever feeling pressured to do so. >> i have never been pressured, i have never felt pressure to intervene or interfere in any way, shape with shaping intelligence and the political way or in relationship to an ongoing investigation. >> they said they weren't

pressured, but they refused to say if they were asked by the president of the united states, and they essentially said we're not asserting any executive privilege but they de facto asserted executive privilege because they refused to answer questions from congress. this gets me back to sessions point. they had no legal standing not to answer the question, what did the president ask you to do. can the republicans let jeff sessions get away with that, too? >> that was funny, that testimony was bad, only because they came so ill prepared to deal with that question. and it actually seemed they were making the judgment, am i more scared of this committee or donald trump, right, because i could really get in trouble for saying something here that implicates the president. >> say what? say what? that's the issue. they're going to have to tell bob mueller what happened. they can't claim privilege to him. >> i don't know what they were told but clearly the takeaway is that they were asked to lay off. otherwise why would you not answer the question.

>> committed to saying this in a classified session to these members, so even if we don't hear about it they'll say it to the members or presumely tell bob mueller and maybe a pattern of the president asking a number of people. >> pressure is subjective, whether you feel pressured or not. they could say they didn't feel pressure, but were they asked. >> at some point they have to answer that question. sit tight. the trump/comey showdown is a huge drama. we'll look at other key players and several key tests coming up quickly in the days ahead. and politicians have the darnedest things happen. this week senator ted cruz getting the hook. >> thank you for speaking out and working to re-take our nation. >> ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage the southern regional director of faith and freedom coalition, virginia galloway.

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tell your doctor if you've been to areas where certain fungal infections are common and if you've had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flu-like symptoms or sores. don't start humira if you have an infection. raise your expectations and ask your gastroenterologist if humira may be right for you. with humira, control is possible. welcome back. any presidential interview under oath with the congress or more likely with the special counsel would come near the end of the investigations and only after questions about other key players in the president's orbit have been answered. the days ahead just might bring some of the answers to those questions, as the president's russia ties are explored by congress. michael flynn, the former national security adviser, trump loyalist in the campaign, a central player. he took money, made trips to russia, had multiple contacts with the russian ambassador, after initially saying no flynn turned over hundreds of pages of documents to the congressional investigators, they are poring through those.

flynn forced to resign. the president's son-in-law, jared kushner, a number of conversations with the russians in 2016, not disclosed on the form when we plied for security clearance, that's one of the reasons congressional investigators are curious. his lawyer says he has nothing to hide and mr. kushner planning to meet with senate intelligence committee staff getting him to answer questions from the committee. jeff sessions as we noted central to all of this, met at least twice with the russian ambassador in 2016, he did not disclose those meetings on his forms. he recused himself from any russia investigations yet somehow took a prominent role in firing the fbi director james comey. his congressional testimony is tuesday. we don't know whether that's public or private. that's important. because why the fbi leadership decided it was best they not share some important information with the attorney general.

>> what was it about the attorney general's own interactions with the russians or his behavior with regard to the investigation that would have led the entire leadership of the fbi to make this decision? >> our judgment, as i recall, was that he was very close to and inevitably going to recuse himself for a variety of reasons. we also were aware of facts that i can't discuss in an open setting that would make his continued engagement in a russia related investigation problematic. >> you mentioned this before, what we later learned was the facts he wouldn't discuss in an open session was the possibility that sessions had a third meeting with the russian ambassador to the united states, could be perfectly innocent, the thing that raises questions is session has not disclosed it, not discussed it and the two meetings we do know he like jared kushner failed to put it down on the clearance form for the government. that's why people are

suspicious. >> the thing about all these controversies with these trump associates, maybe these meetings were nothing, maybe the meetings were just as sessions said, this is normal for them to meet with many diplomats, you know, he did that in his capacity as senator, because he met with the russian am was for it's not a big deal. why weren't these disclosed properly initially? this happened time and again, this happened with mike flynn, there's one reason why he's in serious legal jeopardy, did not disclose the source of his former payments, including security clearance forms, getting permission to do some of these things after he left the defense intelligence agency. same problem with sessions. he did not disclose the two meetings during the judiciary committee when he was asked directly about it. >> that's the problem. >> the third meeting if it did happen that raises real serious concerns as well. >> that to me is one of the things that's stunning about this situation because during the transition, they obviously knew this russia question was bubbling up, it was going to continue to loom over his presidency, and if you are don

mcgann and going in as white house legal counsel and building this team you think from a laurie perspective, we need to make sure we are doubly transparent about everything related to russia. we need to cross our ts and dot our is. if it looks like we're hiding something that will make everything so much worse. it is clear they did not go through the steps. >> unless your version of draining the swamp is not being forthcoming on forms on everyone who comes into the united states government are required to fill out. the interesting question as kushner provides documents with the staff general flynn provided documents, we assume that will lead eventually to some meetings with the staff. jeff sessions still a big question mark, public or private. one part of comey's testimony if you listen to it comes out quite favorable to the president, this is a question from marco rubio. >> in essence the president agreed with your statement it would be great if we could have an investigation, all the facts came out and we found nothing, so he agreed that would be

ideal, but this cloud is still messing up my ability to do the rest of my agenda. is that an accurate assessment? >> yes, sir, he actually went farther than that. if some of my satellites did something wrong t would be good to find that out. >> this is what's quite interesting because comey there is saying the president was fine. maybe if by comey ace view obsessed with shutting down the flynn investigation but for other people, go ahead. didn't say shut down the entire investigation, was just in comey's view talking about the flynn part. >> which was actually an interesting word to use. i think that one thing that you're bringing out here, john, this is going to play out over such a long period of time. you're going through all these different people involved. it will take a while to get to the bottom of this. we don't know what the bottom is. the president put himself in jeopardy by his actions when there were indications the investigation wasn't getting to him. >> comey tells him three times

you're not personally under investigation. now the personal circumstances of firing comey have the special counsel taking a look at it. >> right, exactly. this whole, all of the president's bluster or most of the president's bluster has been about how it involves him, and this investigation dismissing it as a democratic complaint over and over again. >> excuse. >> it's excuse. >> i don't mean to interrupt but the president's words in the rose garden were interesting in the sense he's been told by his lawyers to be careful. if you did nothing wrong, be careful. there's an investigation under way. >> but in the meantime, no collusion. no obstruction. he's a leaker. but we want to get back to running our great country. that was an excuse by the democrats, who lost an election that some people think they shouldn't have lost, because it's almost impossible for the democrats to lose the electoral college, as you know. >> that part is an oldie but

goody. >> the fact that he said to comey, yeah, the satellite people, might want to know about that. that's one of the first times you've heard the president or only times you've heard the president say oh, yeah, oh and russia interfered with the election, that's bad. he hasn't said that as often as he said this other piece. >> and it was telling that james comey said he couldn't recall any conversations with the president where the president was concerned about the russia hacking, the russia interference, and said what can we do about this? how can we prevent this from happening again? there is no indication that this president cares about that. there's no indication. >> thousands of other fbi investigations going on ard doing to emcomey's own testimony the only thing he was concerned about was michael flynn and the russia investigation. >> which begs the question, why? up next, who do you trust? prosecutors have one standard but it's a different standard in the court of public opinion, and that's a giant problem for the president.

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we're under siege, you understand that but we will come out bigger, better and stronger than ever, you watch. the entrenched interest and failed bitter voices in washington will do everything in their power to try and stop us from this righteous cause. >> that was the president speaking to crihristian conservatives on thursday, comey day from washington, no direct reference from the president from the fired fbi director but a clear attempt to rally his base. the president's political weak as soon as an important element as the investigations drag on. so is the polarized partisan divide on just about every

important issue in question. let's look at the numbers. overall the president's in rough shape, just 34% of americans approve of his job performance. that's from a quinnipiac university poll, 57% disapprove. at a time the numbers are damning, 36% say the. is the honest, 59% say he is not. dig deeper and see the american divide, only 4% of democrats approve of the president's job performance. 93% of democrats disapprove. the flipside, 81% of republicans approve, just 14% disapprove. is he honest? only 7% of democrats say yes, 92% no but 77% of republicans say the president is honest. 14% say he is not. the partisan divide is not new. polarization is not new but it is exacerbated under this president and as these investigations play out, when you have such a big divide about approving his job performance and more importantly i think because of the investigations

are these credibility questions, is he honest, is he level-headed. >> but he wasn't -- he was elected with upside down honesty numbers. hillary clinton also had upside down honesty numbers. voters were prepared to vote either way for someone they didn't necessarily trust. so i mean, it has gotten worse. absolutely. but perhaps this is what happens when you go in, not trusting the person who you've elected to be president. >> the numbers also give the white house some opportunity in order to rally their base if they turn these investigations, try to make it into a partisan witchhunt, this is why he constantly says this is a mainstream media witch hunt, trying to get his base to rally behind him. you're seeing reflected in the numbers. the problem for him is what's happening in the senate intelligence committee is a bipartisan investigation right now. what's happened with bob mueller is widely respected on both sides of the aisle, eight a serious investigation, and when he says to the american public, trust me, people don't trust him, that's really hard when he

says that i didn't do anything wrong. >> it was clear that again comey was trying to work this issue, because he understands where this is going to, this is months at least. these investigation also go on and he knew the white house was likely to attack his credibility. on a number of occasions he called the president a liar, talking about he said he was fired, he went home, he was watching the administration's reasons and -- >> although the law required no reason at all to fire an fbi director, the administration then chose to defame me and more importantly the fbi by saying that the organization was in disarray, that it was poorly led, that the workforce had lost confidence in its leader. those were lies, plain and simple. >> that's director comey testifying to congress and the president a little later than normal but on twitter, 8:29

a.m., moments ago "i believe the james comey leaks will be far more prevalent than anyone ever thought possible. total total illegal? very cowardly." ? >> there is a question whether he violated the fbi handbook you get permission before you leak any documents you obtain during your tenure. i don't know anybody in the legal environments who thinks this is not classified, this is his own notes of his conversation with the president. the president firing back something i guess his lawyers would tell him is not wise. >> my guess is his lawyers are not babysitting him at this hour on sunday morning, just a guess, but look, i think we are seeing the president lashing out, fine, he kept calm throughout the testimony. that's not what we're going to see from him going forward. they clearly decided that they want to question comey's credibility. now that may very well work with president trump's base of supporters but i thought it was interesting to see susan collins

out the day after this hearing, wasn't doing interviewing saying if the president asked james comey to back off on the flynn investigation, she was saying it's trouble the president asked comey to back off. >> that's a key point in the rose garden in the tweets the president is trying to keep space, it may be 30% but he's trying to keep solidly behind them. the polling suggests he's been able to do that. my question do the republicans hold in the sense you're right, none came out and said mr. comey you're not telling the truth, mr. comey i believe the president over you. they found other reasons to try to help a little. >> i guess i think it's understandable to me why the president would be a little bit put out with comey, and say to comey, good grief, if you're telling me i'm not under investigation, why don't you tell the american people, because this cloud of an investigation is really damaging. >> this is the first president in our history who has had neither a military nor political background and i think he just

does not fully understand or appreciate the boundaries, and that it is totally wrong. >> interesting to see the different republicans. rand paul, kentucky, strong trump base there. susan collins, maine, more of an independent, moderate voice but a strong trump base in maine. she's being kind of president. >> but her points have been throughout this, like a lot of the other republicans, well, he doesn't know what he's doing. paul ryan came out and said he's just not steeped in the protocols, and -- >> that worked well for hillary clinton when she said it was just an email server, i had no idea. republicans didn't take that then. >> to your earlier point on the leaks, i will say for trump, that feeds into the long running narrative that he has been pushing, right, that the deep state is against him and feeding the media, so even if they're not leaks and leaking classified

information in the conventional sense it does help him with his base. >> he can't let it go. and i don't know that you know, outside of d.c. that people are going to vote on the russia investigation, what they're upset about and what i heard is that the disarray, the chaos, they're sick of the president talking about things like this, and not the things that he said he would get done, and that's what members of congress are hearing when they're going home. >> that's the way the republicans in congress are trying to compartmentalize, trying to push all the russia issues, all the distractions over here, let's try to get this done over here, but the problem is they can't get this done if they can't get health care and tax reform done, when it all becomes a disaster. >> the white house is trying to do the same thing. they farmed out all the russia questions to his personal lawyer. that said, the president he wouldn't let it go. >> it's early. last week was the new legal team but republicans are saying

they're doing this as a political not legal strategy. they're still building t they're not sure they understand washington investigations and bob mule per >> this is white collar government investigations are different from any kind of investigation in legal matter, you might handle in new york. i think that's got people worried here. >> as we go to break a number that suggests there's a risk for democrats overreaching. the question, is the president abusing his powers, 88% of democrats say yes. 83% of republicans say no. so democrats want to go impeachment, he's abusing his powers, we're not there from a factual perspective yet, shows you the competing political pressures. up next a surprising week on the world stage, just about everywhere you look.

welcome back. friday secretary of state rex tillerson released a statement criticizing qatar for extremism

and calling for dialogue for others to halt an economic blockade. >> there are humanitarian consequences to this blockade. we're seeing shortages of food, families are being forcibly separated and children pulled out of school. >> short time later at the white house, tillerson was standing nearby as the president of the united states, his boss, took a very different tone. >> the nation of qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level, so we had a decision to make. do we take the easy road or finally take a hard but necessary action? >> no mention of lifting the embargo. the white house insists the president was not undercutting the secretary of state. >> they said they were on

different parts of the same page. doesn't seem like they're reading from the same book but this is why it is so difficult and so consequential on the world stage to have a president who freelances and answers his own questions. other questions don't trust the words coming out of other diplomats. >> promised to be unpredictable. >> and he is but that just means that other countries look at the u.s., okay, this is not sort of the stable democracy we're used to seeing and we're not buying it what you're selling unless it comes out of the president's mouth. >> that part is key. the secretary of state says this, you want to hear from the president before you do it. you want pressure from the president of the united states. if he doesn't mention it maybe you think you have some slack here. >> this demonstrates the impact saudi arabia had on him in that visit there, and he's close to them. the tweet on qatar, talking to

people in both parties on the hill they were alarmed. that shook people because one thing democrats and republicans on the hill agree with is protecting our bases and the people on those bases and that really came out of nowhere. >> giant u.s. military installations moved from saudi arabia over the last 20 years into qatar. >> bob corker, who was asked that question about the trump tweet actually foreign relations committee chairman republican considered for secretary of state he paused for several seconds, he didn't know how to process it because he didn't believe trump would say that. >> you also saw that something on the other side, when trump finally said that the united states is going to abide by article five, there was a sigh of relief because i heard republicans after he neglected to do that during his foreign trip were like why did you do that? >> lecture the nato allies in brussels, did not mention his support for article five. mike pence on monday seems like a month ago, it was just last month went to an atlanta council

data dinner in washington and said of course the united states stands by article five. it is significant the president finally did that in the rose garden at that same event. but listen to also what drives what i'll call the black helicopter russia crowd around trump a little crazy. listen to the question and then the answer. >> on the matter of security, sir, many of the countries on the eastern flank of nato, including romania see russia as a threat to the security and the peace in the region. do you share this vision, and do you think that the united states should act under article five, if any of this country will be under military aggression? thank you very much. >> well, i'm committing the united states and have committed, but i'm committing the united states to article five, and certainly we are there to protect, and that's one of the reasons that i want people to make sure we have a very, very strong force by paying the

kind of money necessary to have that force, but yes, absolutely, i'd be committed to article five. >> it was the latest in a long list of events. this one standing next to the president of romania, in the rose garden of the white house, where he's asked about russian aggression in europe and he doesn't touch it. yes, yes, he said we're committed to article five but he's asked, do you share that? do you share the views that russia is a bad actor in europe? and he says nothing. >> i watched that a few times now and it's almost like he does this off the cuff commitment to article five to avoid answering the other questions, like well what can i say that would go beyond the russia question there. >> this is a real problem, too, for him, because you see people on the hill, the investigators, they point to the president's own statements his affection for vladimir putin, his resistance unwillingness to really attack russia the way other people in his own administration are and certainly the republicans on the hill to make the case that maybe there's something there, so perhaps if he would have taken a more firm line, firmer line on

russia, that could have disspelled some of those. >> i don't know the answer. is is it that or is he stubborn? why won't you talk about russia? i'm not going to do what you want me to do. >> it's amazing how long it's been since we've been asking this question and how long not a clear answer. there was a moment during the transition some of his aides were holding out the hope that he would say something, tougher on russia after he was elected and actually became president. it just doesn't happen. it's never happened. >> it's early on. our shoppers share from nair notebooks next including insights from something once unthinkable, senator ted cruz showing team spirit with the majority leader mitch mcconnell. okay. got it.

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mpl let's close heading around the "inside politics" table and ask our great reporters to share from their notebooks and get you ahead of the news. sara murray? >> the president may feel vindicated in the wake of comey's testimony but a number of republicans are queelg queasy how the gop is handling this. i spoke to one who got the republican talking points around comey essentially questioning his credibility and this person told me, "i feel like i live in the twilight zone," just reacting with disgust one of the two major political parties is smearing the former fbi director and that's the talking point. >> that's the talking point from the white house. carl? >> i hear more and more that republicans are going to get rid of this old senate practice called the blue slip where senators get to weigh in on whether a judge can go forward, there's a lot of states that still have only democratic

senators. republicans don't want these democrats senators to be able to block this push for trump judges, so i think there's going to be some changes there, and there will be some uproar over that. >> one of the places where trump has kept fidelity with the conservative base, not happy with the judicial picks. >> as republicans move progressively to cut their health care bill they find an ally of sorts in ted cruz, a man who has been a thorn in the sides of republican leaders for years, behind the scenes i'm told he's working productively with republican leadership and trying to cut a deal and this is significant, because already republicans are probably down two votes in the senate with rand paul, susan collins unlikely to vote for whatever they come up, that means they can lose anyone else. ted cruz has his own issue, up pour re-election, he has to be concerned or considered for a primary challenge or against him, one person who has not ruled it out, mike mccall, the congressman from texas. i asked him if he's going to run, he would not rule it out.

his people say it's unlikely but that's something he has to worry about depending on how he positions himself. >> ted cruz same page mitch mcconnell. >> we'll see how long it lasts. >> i was going to say i feel the earth shaking. jackie? >> speaking of health care while all of us were focused on the comey hearing there were other important testimonies, including that of health and human services secretary tom price. tom price was defending the debt's budget including deep cuts to medicaid. this is something and it's a departure from what the president promised on campaign trail. as of may, gallup said health care is the most important issue to americans. while the russia investigation is very important, it's important to keep an eye on the issues that are driving the conversation outside of d.c. and new york. >> 2018 democrats think that's probably more fertile than talking about the investigations, just hope the investigations help. that special congressional election in suburban atlanta is a week from tuesday, and if the

democrat wins, what has long been a republican seat you can be sure that will cause widespread gop worries about a so-called trump drag headed into the 2018 midterms. democrats are celebrating a public poll this thank shows their candidate up seven points headed into the stretch but two other polls shared with cnn show a closer race, one has democrat john ossoff up two points, the other down two points. guarantees heavy campaigning and the big winner local atlanta tv stations who are making so much money off the ad spending one added an extra newscast so it can rake in even more dough before the june 20th vote. yes, we're on the wrong side of the television business. that's it for "inside politics." thanks for sharing your sunday. catch us weekdays noon eastern. up next, "state of the union." have a great sunday. the average family's hectic home: its witnessed 2 diy duos, 31 crashes, 4 food fights, and the flood of '09.

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showdown. fired fbi director james comey's dramatic testimony. >> those were lies, plain and simple. >> revealing how he crafted his case against the president. >> i needed to get that out into the public square. >> and trump strikes back. >> no collusion. no obstruction. he's a leaker. >> saying comey is the one who is lying. >> some of the things that he said just weren't true. >> and he's willing to testify under oath to prove it. >> 100%. plus, secret tapes? >> lordy, i hope there are tapes. >> is the president