welcome to "inside politics." i'm john king. thanks for sharing your day with us. day one for the new sheriff, make that new general charged with calming the trump white house chaos. >> we just swore in general kelly. he will do a spectacular job. i have no doubt, as chief of staff. what he's done in terms of homeland security is record shattering. >> this big white house reboot comes amid big global tensions. russia expels u.s. diplomats to

retaliate for new sanctions and the white house talks tough at both china and north korea. >> we'll handle -- we'll be able to handle it. it will be handled. we handle everything. >> tensions here at home, too, as the president again criticizes his own party for failing to repeal obamacare, and threatens to cut off payments to the health care program that covers most members of congress. with us to share reporting and insights, julie pace of the associated press, cnn's jeff zeleny, kiron demergs of the "washington post" and mary katharine ham of the federalist. beginning at the white house, john kelly sworn in chief of staff this morning and praised by the president at the top of a cabinet meeting called as part of the trump team reboot. >> overall i think we're doing incredibly well. the economy is doing incredibly well. and many other things. so we're starting from a really good base.

i predict that general kelly will go down in terms of the position of chief of staff, one of the great ever, and we're going to have a good time, but much more importantly we're going to work hard and we're going to make america great again. >> setting the bar high there on day one. we all know the president wants kelly to bring marine strength and discipline to the white house the boss thought was weak and ineffective in the tenure of reince priebus. a bigger question. as john kelly changes the white house culture can he change a president who more often than not can be his own worst enemy? >> look, trump has gone through changes before. look at the campaign. went through three campaign heads and could go through these cycles. remember the last one, kellyanne conway and steve bannon came in at the very end. went through a period of time when trump was more disciplined fewer provocative tweets, a little more control over his speeches and can happen in stages. it never happens long term because this is what is known --

trump is trump. i really think that is going to be the most difficult piece for kelly. he can probably get the staff to get onboard with a new plan, bring discipline to the order of the west wing, but can he really keep trump at 6:30 in the morning from putting something out on twitter completely off message on a saturday on sunday morning? i'm doubtful. >> and does general kelly see that as his job? his job reining in the president or view his job as i'm not a political guy. don't have washington experience but i am a general, i have the marines and am going to ribt ax restrict access to the president. how does he view the job? >> more the latter. at least people who have spoken to him believe he's going to try and bring order to the building. and the hallways that come out of the west wing and in to the oval office. quite frankly, now there is is a long list of people who have action to walk in, talk to the president whenever they would like.

he, i'm told, will try to bring some structure to that. i will be surprised if he tries to control the president directly, because as julie said, it may happen for a bit. not going to happen for a long time. look, the president is not going to change in office. i think things around him can become a more disciplined and if the president respects him, i think it's entirely different, because at the end he did not respect reince priebus. viewed him as weak and at least respects this general. >> have you heard the president saying he thinks general kelly will be remembered soon as one of the greats to be a white house chief of staff. someone who gets a lot of credit, jim baker in the reagan days. not a reagan day, brought in by reagan because of his republican establishment. d.c. experience. what jim baker said, focus on the chief or you can focus on the "of staff." those who focused on the "of staff" have done pretty well. what does he mean? >> kelly should be looking up or

down, control trump, control everything else. it may actually help calm some of the president's more erratic tendencies if he controls everything else. trump reacted poorly every time something emerged from the white house he wasn't controlling the message of. if kelly manages to have order over everything else, runs a tight ship everywhere else, maybe less for trump to react to. it's a better bet he might be able to do that with success, because he is their boss. able to do that managing up the chain. like we've said several times you can't control what trump's going to do in thor hours and no one is talking to him. on twit are i mean. >> a good thing about a general, he will be up at 4:00 in the morning and ready for whatever is coming. look, i think that trump respects him, sees he's aligned with him or did what he wanted him to do at homeland security for that brief time. all points in his favor. does trump actually want marine discipline in the white house is

a very open question. i don't think he wants it for himself. the key for kelly make things feel better for trump kwquickly and send the message as kellyin did for him, this is working for you. if at all possible do anything for the trump -- >> if at all possible part in the sense we know the president thrives on chaos. he wants a team of rivals, team of people who -- steve bannon wing is still there. conservatives think of steve bannon more of a democrat. populist proposals, protectionist proposals. the republican establishment is gone pretty much from the white house with reince priebus the last member there kicked out. you have the new york crowd, again, talk to conservatives view them at moderate republicans at best. if not democrats. listen to mick mulvaney. house member, brought in to the trump white house, a conservative, former freedom caucus member now budget director. his take on the big change. >> i think reince was terribly effective, but probably a little more laid back and independent in the way he ran the office and

i think the president wants to go a different direction, wants a little more discipline, structure in there. you know that he enjoys working with generals. we have several of them in the administration doing extraordinary jobs and the president likes that. >> he did like the job general kelly did at the department of homeland security. general kelly came in, said, okay. study the laws. these are the laws this is what i'm going to do. illegal border crossings down. both the justice department and department of homeland security. what can he do in the would us? stop steve bannon from walking in and out? stop jared kushner and ivanka trump from wandering in any way they want? anthony scaramucci hire add week ago caused a huge dust-up when he came in. look at the vulgar language used or the way scaramucci goes on tv to talk about himself as much as the president of the united states, as chief of staff, general john kelly going to stand for that and can he control it? >> this white house has so many different factions.

general kelly has to get a handle on, one, get these people rowing in the same direction. this idea that you have people who truly on a day-to-day basis are there looking out for themselves and staffed up to look out for their own interests's that is an amazing thing. you always have internal rivalries at a white house, but the way this white house is functioning is unsustainable. the second thing is they have to start focusing on policy. health care was this crazy thing happening where you had the house and senate pushing forward on legislation and the white house sometimes being involved. sometimes choosing to talk about other things. if trump gets to the end of the year and republicans haven't move forward on something like tax reform and head into a mid-term year with not a lot to show for it, he's suddenly going to be in a really difficult situation. >> and reince priebus, not a perfect choice at chief of staff. i think most of washington agrees. but loyal to the president. can't blame him, steve bannon or jared and ivanka or miller or

anyone else walking in or out of the office or scaramucci caught off guard and the president's transgender tweet. taken 8, 10 or 12 positions on what should happen next in the health care debate. that's not anybody on the staff's fault. not saying they don't need staff structure. the "wall street journal" said the shuffling of staff furniture won't matter unless the white house realizes the president isn't mr. priebus. it's him. hiring general kelly, a mission of sorts, never say it publicly, that i need help or sick of reince and will put a general there? >> it's probably more of the latter but not purely the latter. look, trump, the issue is that trump does not fundamentally respect reince priebus as much as he respects general kelly. right? easier to listen to somebody you fundamentally respect and aren't always jockeying with in your head, are they are right or am i right? we've seen in the different positions trump has taken there

isn't one person he's really listening to. sometimes to his kids. sometimes to bannon. sometimes listening to the people that represent the gop establishment. but there isn't one clear end voice that actually filtering that all out, putting it in front of him he always listens to. almost a new role kelly could try to occupy, if he can craft that in a way that doesn't run afoul of anything trump holds very dear. you can't go against jared and ivanka all the time. that doesn't work in their family. >> and he often respects people, outside of his family, the original circle, respects them until he doesn't. and that worries me about this position for kelly and frankly kelly is an extraordinary person an with incredible resume but the white house is a very, very different environment than a military environment and frankly i don't want to find out that this man of extraordinary skill, honor and duty can fought move things in the right direction. i would rather find out that he can and hope that's why trump brought him in because he wants to listen to him. >> talk last week, part of the conversation jared kushner saw his moment to get rid of reince and bannon. bannon stays.

does somebody win here? is this a victory for jared in that reince is gone? a partial victory? if you believe the new york wing wanted cohen, economic adviser ordina powell, wanted one of them in and now you get a general who isn't beholden to any of them? >> not sure if it's a win for them or not. it is a win for the process here, though, and i think that it's going to be fascinating to see what happens to dan xa vino. most people probably don't know a lot about him. scavino. sends out the messages. >> the battery in the phone. >> exactly. we'll see if any of that changes. i get a sense there is a, you know, a hope for a new moment for the without. a reset, if you will. i'm skeptical of it, because of the issues remaining the same. the russia investigation remains the same. the president furious about that. but i think it will restore some semblance of order and that's just been absolutely absent. we'll see. watch anthony scaramucci. he's been pretty silent since last week.

i think that he realizes that he overstepped his bounds perhaps. the president believes that, we believe. keep an eye on him as well. >> all right. first day on the job from general kelly. big questions, we'll keep track of them. more later. next, the world stage. the kremlin retaliates for u.s. sanctions and north korea's latest missile test bring as tough tone from team trump. if you have moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis like me,

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call now to request your free decision guide. welcome back. the trump white house begins the week in a war of words or tweets with both russia and china. not to mention a new stare down with north korea. >> we'll handle north korea. we're going to be able to handle them. they'll be -- it will be handled. we handle everything. thank you very much. >> but just what does that mean?

north korea you might know staged a second test of an intercontinental ballistic missile friday and the would us response included flying b-1 bombers over the korean peninsula. as well as testing an american missile defense system based in alaska. with the muscle flex came a blunt critique of china. the president on twitter. i'm very disappointed in china. our foolish past leaders allowed them to make hundreds of billions in trade yet they do nothing with us with north korea. just talk. we will no longer allow this to continue. china to easily fix this problem. where are we going? the president day one label china a currency manipulator. talked to the press the last six months getting tougher on trade. sounds like the president reached the end of the rope when it comes to the china piece of this. when he sits at the table and says we will handle it with north korea, what does that mean? >> a great question. the only thing that's changed substantively since trump took

office related to north korea is pyongyang's capacity seems to have increased here and we have tough talk from the trump administration. a little flurry of activities a few weeks ago, the trump administration taking a couple steps looked like they were cracking down trying to force them to cut off north korea economically, but trump so far has been reluctant to take big steps against china and still seems to be in a mode where he wants to talk tough. see if that changes the chinese. the thing he doesn't grasp about the way beijing handles pretty much any policy situation is china moves slowly. china is not the type of government that says, we're going to shift on a dime here. you talked tough there. we're going to suddenly change. they are methodical and slow and do not react to public pressure. >> and bring in the chinese foreign minister spokesman says china fulfilled its responsibility in promoting a proper solution and efforts clear to see. this issue was not caused by

china and its resolution requires multilevel operatives. the trump administration says there's nothing to discuss until kim jong-un is willing to sit down and the goal giving up the nuclear program, which isn't going to happen. >> right. the other options trump has at his disposadisposal, economic ss and military options which nobody wants to see what happens. you don't know what happens with the first step. with economic reactions china knows it hurts the united states to take harsh action against china. we can't do it without disrupting our other economy. we are co-dependent. a lot etzer for russia. why europe doesn't like it but we're fine with it with china. china, there's a cost and the government in china knows that bluff call it there sow exploit nep can look at angry tweets be like, okay. show us what you really mean. no incentive for them to talk,

too. >> and the president's credibility at some point, look, no the to pick on him. you can go back to the clinton administration, the george w. bush administration, the barack obama administration had this problem. north korea accelerated its program. to your point, the pace of developing a missile capability. nikki haley, no point in having an emergency session of the security council if it produces nothing of consequence. china must decide whether it's willing to take a vital step. the administration eggs are all in the china must get tougher basket to the point of the president threatens trade retaliation. to karen's point, start a trade war hurting both economies maybe and hurt the relationship maybe but not change beehiver in -- behavior in pyongyang. >> to me, international diplomacy tough talk and angry tweets can be a strategy in and of itself a tool to use. we're taking a duffer line. th different line.

and you can move forward. a strategy behind that? that concerns me. i think nikki haley has one, make tillerson. but the chief of staff situation, i'm not sure he has that and is communicating is down -- >> also the missile, nuclear program progressed to a point it's hard. options are limited. military options almost non-existent because of that. keeping the conversation going and shift to russia. the kremlin over the weekend retaliated for u.s. sanctions the president hasn't signed into law yet. president vladimir putin says the number of americans allowed to work at diplomatic outposts slashed dramatically. used by the state department, now seized. >> i think this retaliation is long, long overdue. we are not gamblers. we're people who can consider things very seriously, and very responsibly. i can assure you that different options are on the table. >> you want more proof there's no warming with moscow on the

horizon? here's vice president mike pence in estonia earlier today. >> and no threat looms larger in the baltic states than the specter of aggression from your unpredictable neighbor to the east. at this very moment russia continues to seek to redraw international borders by force. undermine democracies of sovereign nations and divide the free nations of europe one against another a. number of ways to come at this. starters, listen to what the vice president just said including undermining democracies. have the president of the united states ever spoken so aggressively in a coherent way to the baltic states, messing with your borders undermining democracies. in three sentences, there it was. boom. where is that from the president? >> he doesn't say it. maybe russia. never specifically said that. the vice president saying it is interesting. not free lancing.

essentially the position of the administration but the president simply won't say that. back to the chief of staff position. i think it's coming at a great time to have someone new in that corner office in the west wing, because all of these threats are -- are very important and urgent. >> to your point, can i come up here a minute? a crisis playing out in venezuela in our backyard in the western hemisphere. strikes me, the president six months in we hardly hear from him. he gave a speech in poland, tough talk. to the president's credit. he laid out what he thought in that speech. we rarely hear from him talking about sort of his views on how we got here, where we're going. sort of the north star about the international crises. why is that? >> he may not have them. this is the problem. he may not actually have thought out the genesis how we got to this point and what needs to be done from this point forward. in certain spheres like north korea it's hard to come up with that hance. the president is not in a good

position, in defense of the president. venezuela, we don't pay that much attention and that's why things get to this point before we talk about them in the news cycle. with russia, trump and russia a theme several months. came at it with a very different mind-set. an investigation implicating him involving russia and himself. never been able to see that purely either. to expect them to have a very well thought out policy, i mean, perhaps there are staffers working for him that do and would put it into a speech but he likes to speak off the cover and may not be the -- >> sorry. >> go ahead. >> those three sentences from pence and some of the tweeting you're seeing today from minikk haley on venezuela. sentences easily came out of the party of reagan and's mitt romney thinking russia wa was the number one geopolitical foe. the president is a shift away from that party. there is -- divide between how they'll talk about it. like you said, oddly seems to be the position of the

administration, but the president is not speaking to it because that's not his language. never has been. >> there is a remarkable gap, though, between what we are used to having from u.s. administrations about the world whenever barack obama took over, focus on domestic policy. send hillary clinton around the world. and tillerson doesn't speak like this. a major gap there. >> we'll see what happens in the week ahead. a lot of pressing foreign policy issues front and center. see what happens. up next, what chaos? the president welcomes in a new chief of staff and said for the most part, all is well. the guy says you picked the wrong insurance plan. no, i picked the wrong insurance company. with liberty mutual new car replacement™, you won't have to worry about replacing your car because you'll get the full value back including depreciation. switch and you could save $782 on home and auto insurance. call

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make dinner-time device free. [ music stops ] [ music plays again ] a smarter way to wifi is awesome. introducing xfinity xfi. amazing speed, coverage and control. change the way you wifi. xfinity. the future of awesome. welcome back. bringing in a new chief of staff a week after bringing in a new communications director is a big deal this early in a new administration pap sign to many in washington of a fundamental discipline and management problem at the trump white house. but the president, listen to him earlier today. he has a different take. >> we were discussing a little while ago before the meeting how well we're doing. however, we have the highest

stock market in history. we have gdp on friday. got very little mention, i guess in the business area as it did, but got, i think, very little mention. 2.6 is a number that nobody thought they'd see for a long period of time. unemployment is the lowest its been in 17 years. business enthusiasm is about as high as they've ever seen it. in fact, it is as high. the highest point in 28 years according to a certain graph and certain chart. >> that's the president at the cabinet meeting. a certain graph and chart. he likes visuals. i assume he means the university of michigan or business roundtable studies that do show the president is right. more optimism in the economy. they see deregulation from the administration betting on tax reform, the markets could change. if the tax reform conversation goes south in congress. but at the moment, president is right. highest stock market ever. closes at the top every day. he's the president now gets credit.

echoed that point in a tweet earlier this morning. up on the screen, won't read it. the very end of the tweet says, no white house chaos. he's pushing back, because he's been paying attention to the media all weekend with the appointment of general kelly. you don't expect a president to come out and say my product is a mess, my white house a mess. back to the question. what is his understanding of what he needs? that's the biggest question. >> i think that's an open question. the reality here is julie said earlier, there are no major legislative achievements. this is happening at a time when republicans control this town, all branches of government for the first time in a decade. that's the frustration of republicans. hav not sei they've not seized. this is supposed to be the easy part. harder from this point going forward. yes, the stock market is good. he might not want to have too much ownership. goes in the other direction, he'll own that as well. the thing frustrating republicans if things are going

well, they're not going well on capitol hill. they're going home without any accomplishments. and tax reform is an open question to say the very least here, because that was incumbent on health care reform, which hasn't happened as well here. so -- we'll see if -- if it changes going forward, but they need a legislative win of some find or anyone on the ballot next year is nervous. >> and need a legislative win. john kelly's expertise is not legislation not meani inin inint be effective's sometimes with a fresh set of eyes helps. what does it tell us about inside the white house? look at departures in six months of this administration. general flynn and k.t. mcfarland, leaving. set it aside. flynn had problems not related to policy but the russia investigation. and going out when h.r. mcmaster came in. ambassador to singapore i believe. the other four, reince priebus,

mike dubke, sean spicer, katie walsh, worked at the republican national committee when members of congress or interest groups in town used to the way washington works wanted to talk to somebody at the white house. those are the people they went to. they are gone. what does that tell us? is the president saying, good-bye republican party? good-bye washington republican party? what's the message? >> well, part of it is that the republican party managed to elect a president while going through a very ugly divorce. and now they're continuing to go through this divorce while governing the country. and that is, that divide is illustrated in all of this. in the legislation, which trump doesn't have any particular position on and therefore not bully pulpiting a ton to push for any of these things sometimes undercutting what they did with the staff meaning that the gop union with the new york forces and the trump family, not going smoothly. those guys are out at this point. i think that is the central problem with all of this. it comes back to that trump as a very odd manager who likes some chaos and the fact they were in

chaos before they got here. >> officially make him our first independent president? >> interested to see what happens next now that kelly is taking over with mike pence. he is still a traditional old guard, old gop republican. contacts with congress. they try to have him speak in es sta este estonia and just a one-off, and all of this started because flynn did not represent his conversations with russia. pence brought back in the loop? maybe a sign the divorce is healing. >> and they have tom price at health and human services. mick mulvaney. three traditional conservatives all from the house. mike pence a governor. far more than trump without a doubt. the question, the president has been mad at both price and pence for not being able to get votes on health care. where do we go here and -- doing

this in the context of a new chief of staff. what next? how do they fix that? >> i think one of the questions is whether trump does start moving in a direction that some people thought he might, because he's not an ideologue. find democrats. not the democratic party as a whole, but those democrats that are running next year in states that trump won. does he start making overtures there? maybe throw infrastructure back on the board? it's important to talk about this in context with some of the other things we saw happen last week. one, health care. it is clear that republicans are not afraid of donald trump on these big legislative decisions and maybe more important, the pushback he got across the board from republicans when he started floating an idea of getting rid of jeff sessions. that to me was very telling. you don't want to overstate it. not that republicans completely walk ared away from him. i don't expect that anytime soon but moments when they are not afraid to stand up to him. >> and what got lost in all this, interview with the "wall street journal" hoping to raise taxes on the rich. i just want to -- >> tax reform will go great! >> i want to bring a contrarian

view in. chris collins from upstate new york, buffalo area saying those of saying this is all bad aren't paying attention. >> this has been a great week for the president. i was at the jamboree. 40,000 boy scouts shouting "we love trump. we love trump" banning transgenders probably supported by the vast majority of americans. he's dealing with north korea. he's dealing with russia. and now he is solidified the inner circle of the west wing with john kelly, with anthony scaramucci, two great individuals. i think it's all coming together extremely well. >> the boy scouts had to apologize for the president's tone, his words and political tone. police departments are now distancing themselves from something the president said friday about essentially a meshal, rough them up when throwing them into the paddy wagon. you hear chris collins, there is a trump base that elected him president is that kool-aid?

unrealistic denial kool-aid or out in america a different take? >> he's right in some respects. no question. people view this as, you know, he's being trump. being a strong leader. the thing missing in that sort of, you know, long list -- >> hard to find a word for it. >> of kum ba yah, a legislative achievement. somebody republicans control the senate and house and should be able to get something done. there's no leadership from the white house happening here. i think one thing that -- the president has done. united the democratic party against him now. again, had he started with infrastructure reform he would have divided the democratic party. so i think it's very difficult to go back to that. >> and hold your breath. continuing the conversation dividing the democratic party. also about to divide the republican party further? the president has a new plan to revive obamacare repeal efforts. tell republican senators they look like fools and threaten to take away their health care. casper makes one perfect mattress.

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president trump is keeping the health care heat on republican senators and annoying the republican leadership in the process. in a series of tweets over the weekend and continuing this morning the president said republican senators look like fools for failing to keep their repeal promise. he urged them to try again. then upped the ante threatening to cut off tlol payments, he calls them bailout not only helping lower income americans and help cover members of congress. >> he's going to make that decision this week and that's a decision that only he can make. >> now, stopping those subsidies would be a risky play by the president. >> it really would be detrimental to some of the most vulnerable citizens of those payments, if those payments were cut off. >> listen here, the trump budget director mick mulvaney says the senate should not move on to tax reform or anything else until it makes good on obamacare repeal. >> you promise folks you'd do think seven years and cannot go back on that.

>> are they willing? this is, an interesting play by the white house. because if they want to get tax reform, if they want to move on to infratrur, want to sign anything big this year, besides a russian sanctions bill they don't like -- they have to get congress to do other things, but they are saying, no. stay put on health care. when the votes aren't there. what's the play? >> there's disagreement inside the white house on this. i was interested to see him say that because we talked to the legislative affairs director on friday who said they were moving on to tax reform. i think there's a disagreement inside the white house on this. you know, august is going to be a time of a reset on capitol hill as well. i think we'll see if there actually is a hard, concrete tax plan. there's been an outline of one. we've not seen the pacific bill. i'm not sure mick mulvaney is speaking for everyone at the white house when he said that. the president, perhaps. >>s this iteration of the president. that's the confusing part. his own twitter feed or pub

politic say it's, repeal, repeal and replace. implo implode. you mentioned mark short. this is mark short on the idea of president saying now -- this is a leverage, a threat, call it what you will. do this or else i'll stop the payments to your health care plan. listen to mark short linking that, legislative affair director, to the president's populist agenda. >> what helped propel donald trump into the presidency was american's outrage about congress living unlter a different set of rules and this is one more example of that happening. the president can't help drain the swamp and perfect example of the swamp-like atmosphere in d.c. >> he's right in the sense a lot of trump voters and others who don't think muff of congress saying, amen. i got struggles in my life let them struggle. but does that get you a health care bill? >> i'm not sure that's the point. a strategy, he may want to land a populist upper cut and move on

to something else. is is a decent hit when talking about the members of congress specifically. many people go, look, i'm in the individual market. you guys messed it upi'm not subsidized, some are. not working for me. shouldn't fork for you. >> and hitting insurance companies, after individual ceos. see what he does on insurance companies. i'm surprised there haven't been pitchforks, insurance ceos making a lot of money over the last years. a popular thing to do. >> mick mulvaney, the budget director. he does just that. >> if obamacare is hurting people and it is, then why shouldn't it hurt insurance companies and more importantly perhaps for this discussion members of congress? i think the president simply is looking at this saying is it fair obamacare is hurting people, and shouldn't insurance companies and members of congress bear some of that burden as well? >> you're right. a great populist punch. the question, does the president

want an issue or a bill? >> two options with the individual market. cut down on regulations to have less expensive plans or bail out insurance companies. talking junk about insurance companies and the senate pivots likely to teaming with schumer and bailing out insurance companies, then what do you do? not a populist position. >> and the president keeps saying, they, they, they, making clear i'm not one of you. or saying i'm not republican or separate you from congressional republican and make yourself a trump republican. pushback there. jeff were flake, a vulnerable republican senator up for election in arizona. wroeft an interesting book how think thinks conservatives and republicans. push back, separate from us? maybe we should do the same? >> the party lost its way. we've given in to nativism and protectionism. you've got to stand up and call, whether it's the white house or other elected officials, to task when they're not doing what they

should, and i do think that we bear the responsibility if elected officials to do that. >> president trump launched a hostile takeover. donald trump did, of the republican party. he's now president trump. so much daily drama. are we missing something here? is this what has happened over the last week or so? the failure on health care, the president calling them "they." more and more republicans not afraid of the president. poll numbers in the high 30s saying i don't want to do this on immigration or on trade. we know there's been a fracturing in both political parties, but will this happen during a republican presidency? >> i think if it is happening you're starting to see the seeds of that. jeff flake is someone who has come in for a lot of criticism from this white house. his political advisors, trump's political advisers throwing out rumors about funding a primary challenge against him. i do think you'll see individual members making those decisions echoing jeff flake. heading into next year i think it's more of a problem for trump if these republicans split off.

yes, trump has a loyal base, but jeff was making a point and it's so true. this is the easy part for a president. this first couple months. head into re-election year, historically, your party comes under siege. particularly if you haven't passed a lot of legislative accomplishments and the idea of donald trump without a republican majority, it's not as though democrats will suddenly jump onboard if in charge with donald trump. they're heading straight for 2020. thee dynamics get complicated quickly for trump if republicans pull away. >> a big, big if. you just had the health care bill crash and burned but it crash and burned in a 41-49 vote. my last stand, mccain said, in the senate. mccain doing that meant people like lindsay graham and jeff flake didn't have to make that decision. will they make that decision because the spotlight is on them or what they did a good amount of time. back to the regular order, this isn't the way to do thing but

there are things he wants from the president even if they're not totally with him. >> the heat of moment after one big collapse or the begins of something that will continue. sit tight. from policy to baseball. chris christie caught on tape shouting down yet another baseball fan. no peanuts. no crackerjacks, big shot. that's mom taking care of business. but who takes care of mom? office depot/office max. this week, filler paper just one cent with five dollar minimum purchase. ♪taking care of business. parts a and b and want more coverage, guess what? you could apply for a medicare supplement insurance plan whenever you want. no enrollment window. no waiting to apply. that means now may be a great time to shop for an aarp medicare supplement insurance plan, insured by unitedhealthcare insurance company. medicare doesn't cover everything. and like all standardized medicare supplement insurance plans, these help cover some of what medicare doesn't pay.

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allergytry new xyzal®.ou have symptoms like these for relief is as effective at hour 24 as hour one. so be wise all take new xyzal®. welcome back. chris christie is supposed to in the news today because of words addressing a national crisis. instead, at least so far, headlines are answer new jersey governor adding drama to our national pastime. he serve as chief in the opioid crisis. critical work at a very important time. drug deaths in the united states rising faster than ever. that commissions inrim report due out this afternoon. already delayed twice, past its deadline. yet search for the governor's

name this morning online and you won't find much ar the opioid crisis. instead headlines about -- this. >> appreciate that. >> oh, my -- >> what did he say to you? >> there was the secret service right there. >> what did he say? >> akd like a big shot. >> apparently a little bit of a -- um -- what would we call it? dispute. a friendly dispute in democracy that is, baseball, why not? every time he goes to a baseball -- the guy, i don't know what to say anymore. >> at least he didn't steal hess nachos. that would have been even worse. >> certainly nighter to a public official if i want to address him. out to a basketball game, guy says it to his face and maybe expect a reaction. what does he have to lose at this point? >> the cubs fan in the confrontation. his take on all this. >> he told me, hey, why don't you have another beer? which i thought was kind of fun and playful, a decent comeback. although we hadn't really been

drinking at all. >> what did he say to you? >> first, have another beer. i thought it was funny. maybe he was taking it in stride and then started calling me a tough guy. >> actually seems to kind of like him, after the conversation. which maybe move to new jersey, because chris christie's approval rating 15%. chris christie maybe could use that guy there. >> not sure he cares heading into lame duck months but a reminder to public officials everybody has a smartphone these days. everybody. >> everybody. >> everybody. >> do we make too much of this? is it just because he's -- christie loves this stuff. mixing it up with people. >> one of the things so great about him, going after people at his town hall meetings. i think washington, you know, will miss him, and national politics will miss him. could have brought order. once upon of time could have talked about chief of staff. now video at a baseball game. >> once upon a time, as president. >> he was. >> at the very least he was. >> all right. governor, come to a ball game

anytime with me. i'll buy the beer. thanks for joining us on "inside politics." see you back here tomorrow. wolf blitzer is back here after a quick break. hundreds of dollars on youmy car insurance. saved me huh. i should take a closer look at geico... (dog panting) geico has a 97% customer satisfaction rating! and fast and friendly claims service. speaking of service? oooo, just out. it was in. out. in! out. in! what about now? that was our only shuttlecock. take a closer look at geico. great savings. and a whole lot more.

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hello. i'm wolf blitzer. it's 1:00 p.m. here in washington. 8:00 p.m. in moscow. 8:30 p.m. tuesday in pyongyang, north korea. wherever you're watching from around the world thanks very much for joining us. up next, west wing makeover. president trump's new white house chief of staff officially on the job today. the appointment of john kelly represent as reset for the trump administration. the president praised kelly for his work as homeland security secretary. >> we just swore in general kelly. he will do a spectacular job. i have no doubt, as chief of staff. what he's done in terms of homeland security is record shattering. you look at the border. you look at the tremendous results we've had. >> observers will be watching to see if kelly, a retired u.s. marine corps general can bring order and discipline to this white house, but this morning president tr