that will sound like a cheap shot by the trump people. he explains it as being their fault not his. >> that's okay. i wasn't present. it is certainly clear that this white house, many of the aides there are just lacking in sort of basic professionalism in dealing with reporters and the way this normally works. but -- >> do they want to get the story out? >> some of them do and some of them don't. but, i mean, i guess the point is -- look, they would certainly not be the first person in history to say i want something to be on the record and then say it was taken out of context. that's the easiest way to do it on the planet. all i know is i'm hearing it from their end i wasn't hearing it from him. i guess my thing about the book, books do something different than news stories can. they tie things together in a different way. the people who are acting as if they are learning something new about donald trump, this is the same donald trump we have all

been writing about and talking about on tv for two and a half years. there's nothing different. it has been very clear how aides feel about him for quite some time. i don't know how many people need to hear he watches a lot of tv and he doesn't like briefings. >> look, for a president to have a lawyer write a cease and desist letter to stop publication of media is very unprecedented and completely unfounded. you are the most public of public officials. you are totally open to exposure of criticism is and the book is going to come out. >> it's what susan does all the time. he should have stayed citizen trump if he doesn't want a that. what they have done is managed to turn this book into a best seller because all they have done is talk about it. >> overnight. >> and they have used it as a way to win a war with steve bannon, which we can talk about too. >> how about the top of the hour? >> stick around. you're not going anywhere. >> you're right. >> thanks to our international

viewers for watching. for you cnn talk is next. for u.s. viewers, "new day" continues now. >> a stunning new report raising more questions about president trump and potential obstruction of justice. >> he instructed the white house counsel oren couraged him not to recuse himself. >> he doesn't understand the independence that the attorney general needs to have. >> he said the attorney general wanted one negative article a day and the news media about mr. comey. >> there's real trouble for the white house staff here, and it's not clear if they are actually recognizing that. >> there wasn't been one shred of evidence in collusion between the campaign and one foreign entity. >> the people of this country probably could care less about a book full of lies. >> we have never had a president accused of this kind of stuff. >> this is "new day" with chris cuomo and alisyn camerota. >> good morning, everyone. welcome to your new day. we have a lot of news. there's a "new york times" report out this morning.

it, again, brings the the likeness to this case for potential obstruction of justice in the russia investigation that goes all the way up to the president. the "times" reports that president trump ordered a white house lawyer to stop jeff sessions from rhee accusing himself in the russia probe. the "times" said he is aware of the president's unsuccessful attempt to lobby jeff sessions, and there may even be written notes from reince priebus about this. meanwhile, a new excerpt from michael wolff's bombshell book reveals the president's involvement in crafting a misleading statement about a meeting between russia and members of the trump team, including jared kushner, his son-in-law and don jr., his son. the president portrayed as erratic, easily distracted, uninterested and unsure about the basics of his job is. the white house says it is is complete fantasy. what we are expecting to hear

from the author himself later this hour. we will have it all covered. let's start with cnn's joe johns live at the white house. this "new york times" report, this book, that's a lot on their plate. >> reporter: that's right. a lot of new information this morning, chris. new allegations raising questions about the president trying to excerpt control over the russia investigation. that new book, "fire and fury", going on sale four days early despite attempts by the president's lawyers to block publication. and the president himself stepping up his attacks on the book. president trump attacking the new tell-all book claiming chaos inside his white house, calling it phony and full of lies, before lashing out at former chief strategist steve bannon, nicknaming him sloppy steve. >> did steve bannon betray you, mr. president? any words about steve bannon?

he called me a great man last night. >> i don't know. he called me a great man last night. >> reporter: the book contains stunning new allegations about the president's firsthand involvement in crafting a misleading statement about the now infamous june 26th meeting between top trump staffers and russians. wolff writes that the meeting in trump tower was purely and simply about russian adoption. that's what was discussed, period, period. even though it was likely, if not certain, that the "times" had the incriminating e-mail chain. in fact, it was quite possible that jared and ivanka and the lawyers knew the "times" had this e-mail chain. the president ordered that no one should let on the more problematic discussion about hillary clinton. wolff goes on to write that the president's lawyers thought it was an explicit attempt to throw sand into the investigation's gears and one of the president's spokesman quit afterwards because he felt it was obstruction of justice. according to the "new york times", special counsel robert mueller

is now examining the statement. >> the president weighed in, as any father would, based on the limited information he had. >> reporter: the "times" reports mueller is also aware of unsuccessful attempts by the president to stop jeff sessions from recusing himself. >> i am disappointed in the attorney general. he should not have recused himself. >> reporter: according to the "times", mr. trump ordered white house counsel don mcgann to lobby sessions against recusing. when mcgann was unsuccessful, mr. trump erupted in anger saying he needed his attorney general to protect him. the president lashing out at sessions after then fbi director james comey's may 3rd congressional testimony. >> is there an investigation of any leaks of classified information relating to mr. trump or his associates? >> i don't want to answer that question. >> reporter: two days after comey's testimony, the "new york times" reports that an aide to mr. sessions approached a capitol hill staff member asking

whether the staffer asking if the staffer had any derogatory information about the fbi director. the justice department denies this account. according to "fire and fury" author michael wolff, he called him jarvanka. a nickname coined by bannon to describe eye advantaivanka and . the first family shared a contentious relationship described as a death match due in part to the conviction that bannon had played a part in many of the reports of kushner's interactions with the russians. wolff writes they exhibited an increasingly panicked sense that the fbi and doj were moving beyond russian election interference and into family finances. ivanka is terrified, said a satisfied bannon. no on-camera event scheduled for the president so far today. the only time we expect to see

him is when he heads out to camp david. he is expected to spend today and tomorrow huddling with the vice president and the leaders of the house and senate. back to you. >> okay, joe, thank you very much. joining us again is cnn political analyst maggie haberman. you and your colleagues have this article out this morning about the next piece in the puzzle to possible obstruction of justice case involving the president. let me just read the full excerpt from this to get everybody situated. president trump gave firm instructions in march to the white house top lawyer, don mcgann, stop the attorney general, jeff sessions, from recusing himself in the justice department's investigation into whether mr. trump's associates had hepllped a russian campaigno disrupt the 2016 election. we know he asked james comey to back off, to say certain things. and he was very upset about jeff

sessions's recusal. he knew he had lobbied through don mcgann. >> this is a lot different. that's where you assume it is going next when he said it was very unfair, i was very upset. he was very careful speaking to me and my colleagues. just to say he was frustrated with sessions. he didn't say because i hoped he would help me. this is very different. this goes further. remember, the other piece of the report -- two pieces. this is primarily my colleague mike schmidt who a few days ago was accused of being a sycophant to trump. i would argue this shows that is not the case. what he found is there was a lawyer in the white house counsel's office who told trump he couldn't fire comey without cause. knowing that wasn't true. he was afraid trump would not make the right decision on his own. the other piece, and this is really important and is actually getting lost a bit, is that sessions, an aide to sessions

went to capitol hill four days before comey was fired, talked to a congressional staffer about a desire to see negative stories out about comey, possibly once a day. that is really straight out of the playbook that trump came up with. >> just to remind people, mccarthy's counsel is close to trump, pafssed away many years ago. this goes to what maggie is talking about. the special counsel received handwritten notes from mr. trump's former chief of staff reince priebus, showing that there trump talked to mr. priebus about how he had called mr. comey. obviously you just reported that here as well. the piece is careful. and rightly so. so distinguish between this is what we know happened. >> correct. >> and this is proof of a crime. because all of this timeline and all these things we lay out on,

they could show poor judgment. attempt to influence, you know, maybe undue influence. but a crime much different bar. >> look, i think that -- i would say this is the most complete and banning piece of information we have learned about what the president was doing in the weeks leading up to the comey firing and the weeks leading up to the recusal from jeff sessions. it's not up to us as reporters to say that he committed a crime. there is i think a desire to see reporters going further than reporters are capable of doing. it is is the role of bob mueller and congress to look at this and make their assessment. but i'm confident this will be a subject that mueller will be looking at going forward, is looking at going forward. and one piece that relates back to the book we were talking about in the last hour. bannon, i saw it on twitter last

night, reminding me that bannon has not appeared before muleer in these congressional committees. he seems to have a lot to say on the record about what he believes is the the case about the don jr. meeting. we know steve bannon has an axe to grind in the case of jared kushner. and we know he has limited firsthand knowledge of a lot of this stuff. it will be interesting to see. >> i think it is kind of impressive he hasn't been called before mueller. it is making a distinction perhaps a guy running his mouth and a person they think has material information. >> the treasonous comment that's in the book, of course it grabbed a lot of headlines. this is his opinion. he wasn't in the white house at the time. >> right. >> we have to see how much mueller values that. >> correct. he has zero firsthand meeting with don jr.

>> in the book there is a little bit more information about the air force one meeting that happened. once the president, i guess, found out or got worried about the don jr. meeting in trump tower with the russian lawyer. they were trying to figure out how to spin it once they figured out the "new york times" knew more about it. the president insisted that the meeting in trump tower was purely and simply about russian adoption policy. that's what was discussed, period. period. even though it was likely, if not certain is, that the "times" had the incriminating e-mail change -- in fact, it was quite possible jared and ivanka and the lawyers knew the "times" had this e-mail chain -- the one about offering up dirt on hillary clinton. the president ordered that no one should let on to the more problematic discussion about hillary clinton. >> i mean, that's actually, with all due respect to michael wolff, that was largely reported by the "washington post". we reported there was this air force one meeting. >> did we know the president is

saying this is all we will ever say publicly? >> according to the "washington post", the president put up and dictated that statement that was not fully explaining what the meeting was about. so i don't think this is very different. >> they have always tried to play a hedge on this. the e-mail chain shows there was an intent to want information that was bad about hillary clinton. but there's also -- there is a companion piece to it, which is at the meeting, but all accounts everyone was disappointed because that information wasn't related. it became about adoption. you could play it either way. having the president weigh in at that level is a little different. >> their argument has been privately, look, it is not a crime to lie to the "new york times". it is a crime to lie to investigators. the flip side of that argument, and chris would know more about this than i do, i think, in your opinion trying to cover up the true intent behind something, that that could constitute obstruction.

but i'm not an investigator or a lawyer and i don't know. >> it's not easy. i keep saying this. i know it is a bucket of cold water for people who love the political discussion. there was a fundamental question about whether a sitting president can be indicted. you have to feel as a prosecutor you would win the case which is a bar is here. and on television we are playing down here right about the belt line. >> i understand. but to your point about what the public wants, they want some of these dots connected. and i know you're right. journalists can't always connect the dots. but sometimes we can. sometimes the stories help connect the dots. >> sure. >> that's what robert mueller is doing. >> right. >> slowly these dots come out. >> correct. there's two things that trump critics primarily on the left but also some on the right want to see. they want -- they feel very frustrated with what they are

seeing in the country. they feel whipsawed by this president and looking for an end that doesn't exist. ander they are looking for them to be strategy or larger meeting behind what trump does and waiting for all of us to force him on that, to admit that is deep strategy as opposed to you are looking into a pretty dark void. >> talk about connecting the dots. it is in disputable. >> right. >> the way the white house is functioning is a them cal to its cause. anthony scaramucci acknowledged the first year there were some bumps. >> thelma and louise style. >> you fall out and you don't get in again. i was joking and said if you stay in this administration a full year, you have a white beard. they have had big problems and it's scaring the people down

there because they are not used to playing the game this way. >> that's true. and i would make one other point. reince priebus has been p pilloried. what john kelly has done is john kelly made the staff feel safer from one another. what you saw was this gun slinging going on when bannon was there in particular. he made the staff feel safer from the president. what he has not done is do anything to more tightly control the president. and so you're seeing the president be more expressive about himself. this is not a different version of donald trump. this is more visible. >> so there is some suggestion that something has changed over the course of, i don't know, two years, five years, and that he is more volatile, more impulsive. but that is not your impression.

>> he is five or six years older than when he first started running in 2011. it first started in this century. but i don't know think that there is some massive change. i do think that he has certain ticks that he falls into during times of extreme stress and those tend to exacerbate irrationality and obsessiveness about certain things. i think that's a lot of what you're seeing. >> that's actually perfect. i agree with that 100%. you have context. you have known the man a long time before he was into this stuff. so have i. you can't judge somebody until he is in a circumstance. is he different? no. but he is in a very different situation. this man never had to run anything like what he is dealing with right now. he's never had this kind of pressure on him. he's always been a showman. and now he's being hit in a way that he has never dealt with.

>> he's never had this kind of criticism. that's the problem. he -- i think what the wolff book gets correct, but i don't think it's deep insight because if you look at him you know this. he is a whipsaw of wanting to punch people and then wanting love. it is like michael scott saying i want them to fear how much they love me. that's what a lot of this is like with him. he has a fundamental misunderstanding of what the white house press corps does. >> maggie haberman, always great to get your perspective. thank you very much. we'll have much more on the "new york times" report saying president trump tried to stop attorney general sessions in the russia investigation or get him to recuse. does that rise to obstruction of justice? we debate the legality next.

the "new york times" is reporting that president trump ordered his top white house counsel to stop -- to try to stop attorney general jeff sessions from recusing himself from the russia investigation. is that obstruction of justice?

let's discuss cnn political commentator ana navarro and rick santorum. rick, are you concerned when you read this that the president ordered don mcgann, white house counsel, to go to jeff sessions to say do not recuse, even though you're involved in the russia investigation, do not recuse. that is not piece of the puzzle in terms of whether that's obstruction. what do you think? >> i think jeff sessions shouldn't have recused himself and the president has every right to tell his attorney general to stay on the case. that was a judgment call. i think it was a bad judgment call. i think the president has every right to try to influence that decision. >> how do you see it, ana? >> none of this is surprising. how many times have we heard about donald trump telling comey, lay off michael flynn. and we've seen donald trump for months treat jeff sessions like a human pinata. whack him, whack him, and do it

publicly. none of this should be surprising. the only surprising part to me is where you have white house deputy counsel keeping facts from donald trump because they are afraid of the kind of decisions he may make. the fact that the president of the united states gets treated as a child who needs to be protected from himself and protect the country from this president. >> he was told he didn't have the authority to get rid of sessions or comey. i guess, comey. and it turns out they were just telling him that because they didn't want to see the cascade of events that unfolded after tat. >> if you remember back then there was this building pressure. there was this revelation that jeff sessions had met with the russian ambassador kislyak. he had categorically denied any meeting with russians. so the pressure had built up. you remember all of this talk about comey getting fired, how upsetting it was to john kelly

and people close to trump. what we are seeing is written in black and white. this chaos, this intrigue, this very upset staff by what they thought the repercussions could be for his presidency which in fact, turned out to be true, none of this is new. >> i will read to you about the president's desire for undying loyalty. mr. trump said he expected his top law enforcement official to safeguard him the way he believed robert f. kennedy as attorney general had done for john f. kennedy and eric holder had done for barack obama. he said where is my roy cohn who was his fixer in the 80s. is that the attorney general's job to protect the president? >> again, we don't know how much of this is true. >> this is the "new york times". we trust the "new york times" reporting. >> dow.

you do. >> i do. maggie haberman has sterling credentials. i see that you are joking and you have a different take on this. >> i love maggie haberman. >> why doubt the voracity when we have heard him say this publicly, when we have heard him ask for blind loyalty publicly. >> loyalty is a very important thing for him. the premise is correct. the president values loyalty maybe above anything else. he was greatly disappoint odd jeff sessions. it's because jeff sessions made a judgment call. this was not something contradictory. this was not a lay down hand that he had to turn over -- >> i get that. that's not my question. my question is is it the attorney general's job to protect the president? >> i think it's the attorney general's job to do his job. in my opinion, he wasn't doing his job.

he should have taken control of this investigation. >> right. but when the investigation involves the president, does the attorney general have to protect the president? >> well, no, i don't think that's the principle role -- >> of any role? >> yeah. in this respect, i think the appointing a special prosecutor doesn't protect the president as donald trump and doesn't protect the presidency. and i think that is important. i think that allowing special practice, as you are seeing now. all the reports are coming out saying it doesn't look like there is much collusion here but there could be obstruction of justice. what does that mean? had this not taken place to the scale it was, we would have no crime. this is the kind of things you get into when you turn over responsibility to someone who is dedicated to finding -- defining someone. not finding the truth. i believe special prosecutors aren't interested in finding the truth. they're interested in getting convictions.

that's the problem that donald trump saw, and i think it was the right concern. >> so you wouldn't have had any problem with jeff sessions not allowing a russian investigation to go into farther because he was protecting the president? >> jeff sessions should have taken this responsibility and conducted the investigation. he should have moved forward with an investigation. i don't think there's any question there should have been an investigation. turn it over to a special prosecutor and recusing himself is what upset donald trump and he has every right to be upset. >> it is a very difficult spot to be in. you are appointed by the president. you technically work for the president -- >> you report on the president. nobody is a bigger supporter than jeff sessions. the most vocal. >> and you also take an oath to defend the constitution of the united states. your country should be your top interest. thaos why precisely why we have the statutes that we have, the check and balance of special counsel. janet reno saw themselves in

this he very difficult spot where your boss, technically your boss, the president who appointed you, who you should have some loyalty to, is also being investigated. you need some distance. that is why we have special counsel statutes. i think jeff sessions did the right thing here. we have known for months that it drives donald trump crazy. because here's the thing. when something drives donald trump crazy he talks about it like a broken record over and over and over again. for god's sake, he's been president for a year. he's been relitigating the election for a year and will probably do it another three if he is president. he has been talking about this recusal of jeff sessions, which has driven him crazy for months, since the moment it happened. and he's never going to stop because he thinks that's where he lost control of the russian investigation. it is saul emanating from the seed that was sown the moment jeff sessions left.

>> on that note, thank you very much for the debate. chris? the author of the bombshell book about president trump is speaking out. what does he have to say? does he back up what's in the book? of course he does. how? you'll hear next in his own words.

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"fire and fury", the new book that is bringing insight into life inside the trump white house. just moments ago, the author, michael wolff, said he absolutely spoke to the president during his reporting. the president put out in a tweet that he didn't speak to him about the book. and he spoke about steve bannon's role in this book. take a listen. >> the president has tried to put this. this book is about steve bannon. so let me say very forth rightly. this book is not about steve bannon. this book is about donald trump. as for steve bannon, and i spoke to steve as i spoke to many people throughout the length of the reporting here, and really saw a transformation. not only of steve but of everyone. but steve in the way is most

vivid or his language is the most vivid. and the transformation was, you know, he we thought this presidency could work. we thought trump is an interesting and unique character and we might be able to do something here. and they saw him come to the conclusion he cannot do this job. >> all right. here to react is keith koeffler, author of bannon always the rebel, and former breitbart news spokesperson. good to have you on the show. we know still bannon has had lots of opportunities to back off what he said. and he has not. now we're in this battle of michael wolff suggesting that bannon, over time, shifted. keith, let me start with you. the notion that bannon started off with trump thinking, boy, this guy is unique and he seems to want to play ball with what he defines as the base and then

over time he shifted and started to question his competence, trump's competence to have had the job, do you buy that? >> i don't know if i buy it or not. i can tell you as i did the research for my book, i talked to bannon for 10 hours in july and then in august right after he left the white house. and i didn't sense any of that. look, steve bannon is media savvy. he could have been spinning me. but he was full of praise for trump at that point. and he would have to be a tremendous dissimilar lator to have been not on the level with me at all about that. so i did not sense any diminution in the esteem with which bannon held trump at that point in his conversations with me. >> curt, you still know people in the shop at breitbart. is it true what bannon has said in this book and this perceived division with the president may mean his outer? >> yeah. i think we have seen the last 24 hours the feet beneath breitbart

has completely shifted right now. the people at breitbart don't know whether he will last a week or not. they don't know what the future of the platform will be. rebecca mercer, a very private person put out a public statement distancing herself from bannon, saying she will not fund his initiatives anymore. where will the money come from? is that contingent upon having steve bannon being removed from breitbart? that's the question they have to answer for themselves. >> since we spoke yesterday, keith, i'm sure you have been working the sources, there has to be a decision made the. bannon is trying to have it both ways right now. he is saying i support the president. we support the agenda. he has been throwing haymakers at trump's family since he was in the white house. what are you hearing about how he wants to be perceived? >> i think what bannon is trying to do is say with trump, look, trump is still the man. he's the president of the united states. if bannon is separated too much

from trump, that hurts him. that hurts bannon's standing with the republican base, with the populist nationalist movement. but, hey, he's only going to take so much. and at a certain point, if he is still in command with breitbart, and i don't thinkers necessarily out of there, he will start to turn on trump. he will start to talk about some negative aspects of the presidency. but i think one thing we also need to think about is what does steve bannon know. he said there was about a 30% chance of trump completing his presidency. i think the thing that made trump really angry is not so much that he went after donald trump jr. but he talked about this money laundering. >> a lot of it is unconventional. he can't exaggerate really how unconventional this has all been. whether or not he supports the president just got a cease and desist letter from the president. you have another level of absurdi absurdity, how could the president of the united states

think he could stop someone criticizing the president of the united states, the most public official we have? but here is what the president said about steve bannon yesterday. >> has steve bannon betrayed you, mr. president? any words about steve bannon. >> i don't know. he called me a great man last night. he obviously changed his tune very quick. all right. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> thank you. i don't talk to him. i don't talk to him. that's just a misnomer. thank you. >> i don't talk to him. who believes that? show of hands. no hands. >> curt bardello, the president engages in truthful hiyperbole. do you believe that he is estranged from steve bannon in terms of not having spoken to him for a long time? >> he might be estranged right now. all evidence to the contrary about their relationship to this point. you pointed this out.

the president has told us -- chris cillizza wrote about this on cnn.com. he told 2,000 miss truths or exaggerations in a year. when he says something like that, it is tough to believe him. we have him on record on tape how he respects steve bannon, what a good man steve bannon is. there is a tweet how he welcomed him back to breitbart and said it would be good for the platform, good for the conversation. with donald trump we know you're in his good graces until you're not or until you have become a political liability. under the spotlight of robert mueller, they can't distance themselves quick enough. but until then, they're best friends. >> it's interesting. keith, we got the two peas in a pod analogy that we're getting from curt. fair enough in terms of what we have seen in this relationship. but it is interesting that for all the opinions that he has, the incendiary word treasonous.

i have seen nothing that they have reached out to bannon for his perspective. what do you know? >> i haven't heard anything about that. we don't know for sure, i would say. but he's going to do that now. i mean, if bannon suggested that there was some type of illicit activity and something wrong with the meeting that occurred and there may have been money laundering or something like that and the whole troop may have been marched up to talk to trip as well, i don't imagine mule ser not going to want to talk about it. >> unless you give a nod. we go on what people say. they go on what they believe is material to a case and what they can show. this guy having an opinion about a meeting when he wasn't even in the white house at the time is different than somebody who is a party who has firsthand information. we'll have to see. you could be right. maybe they will reach out. >> remember, chris, the only thing about george papadopoulos until mueller dropped that on

everybody. they have been good about keeping things secret when they want to keep them secret. >> true. i would say there are distinctions but fair point. i assume there will be a next chapter. >> safe assumption. a massive winter storm slams the northeast. there's now record-breaking cold here. we have the forecast for you next. ♪ when heartburn hits... fight back fast with tums smoothies. it starts dissolving the instant it touches your tongue... and neutralizes stomach acid at the source. ♪ tum tum tum tum... smoothies... only from tums

the state department announcing that the u.s. with withhold millions of dollars from pakistan saying that government is not doing enough to fight terror groups within its borders. cnn's michelle kaczynski is in washington with more. what have you learned, michelle? >> the u.s. had suspended $250 million from pakistan. but over the last several months, there have been these multiple high-level talks with pakistan. the state department isn't describing it as an impasse, but they say pakistan knows what the u.s. wants it to do in terms of combatting terror, and they just haven't done it. so now the u.s. is withholding even more. one senior state department official tells us this is going to be at least hundreds of millions of dollars more in military and security assistance. but this move comes only days after president trump's first tweet of the year, saying the united states has foolishly given pakistan more than $33

billion in aid the last 13 years and they have given us nothing but lies and deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. they give safe half tone the terrorists we hunt in afghanistan with little help. no more. is this coming now because the white house demanded it or because of the tweet? they would say only that they can't discuss internal communications. on the the another state department official said this was decided among the white house, secretary of state and secretary of defense. pakistan denies providing safe haven to terrorists. they just put out a statement on this withholding of money saying, working towards enduring peace requires mutual respect and trust along with patience and persistence. arbitrary deadlines, unilateral pronouncements and shifting goalposts are counterproductive in addressing common threats. chris? >> boy, oh, boy, michelle. it doesn't get much more complicated than it does with the u.s. relationship with pakistan. another thing people are going to have to start reading into. if this stays, we're going to

hear a lot more, and a lot of it is not going to be good. good to see you on the show. okay. so people in the northeast are digging out. a massive storm dumped more than a foot of snow in some parts. parts of new york facing blizzard conditions. neighborhoods are buried. i know because i live in one. record storm surge in new england. did you see the flooding on the streets of boston. there is record-breaking low temperatures, dangerous combinations. cnn meteorologist jennifer gray live in the weather center. did you see that video of the fire truck trying to make it through the streets of boston? there was like three feet of water there. now it is all going to freeze. >> i did, yes. it's unreal. we see the storm surge we see with hurricanes. it shows how powerful the system was. on the backside of it, as you mentioned, very, very cold temperatures. for a lot of people this will be difficult to deal with, more than the nor'easter. we have people without power. and the temperatures will be some of the coldest we have seen in years. here we go.

a windchill threat. we have about 140 million people under some sort of windchill alert. with current windchill, it feels like 10 below in new york, 21 below in pittsburgh. look at duluth. it feels like 42 below zero there. so temperatures are cold and goinglisyn, those folks without power, they need to stay warm. thousands of flights cancelled again today. >> oh, my gosh. yes, i can attest it's freezing out there. thank you very much. listen to this. a former ethics chief says he's furious after the report that the president tried to stop sessions from recusing himself in the russia probe. he will tell us why he's so upset today. - [narrator] imagine a shirt that actually makes

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and relief for achy shoulders and back. visit tommiecopper.com to see the entire line of wearable wellness compression. they have you covered from head to toe. go to tommiecopper.com right now and find out how you can save 25% on your first purchase, plus first shipping. life hurts, feel better. the "new york times" today president trump ordered the tape white house lawyer to stop attorney general jeff sessions from recusing himself from the russia probe. walter schaub is the former head of the office of the government ethics and cnn contributor and joins us with his reaction. i read you said this is the most infuriating story you have ever seen. really? of all the stories we reported this one gets you the most

infuriated. why is that? >> maybe it's because i am close to it, and after reading this story, he drove the federal election commission into a ditch to undermine our election laws and did a direct assault on the ethics program and now we are learning he attacked the department of justice. while i was on the phone talking to department of justice officials telling them jeff sessions had no choice but to recuse in order to resolve a criminal conflict of pressure, we learned don mcbegan was pressuring sessions to do just the opposite, participate in that investigation. he can try to hide behind the i was only following orders, it's not going to work here because as an attorney the president is not his client, the office of

the president is his client and he's ultimately answerable to the american people. i don't have words i can use on tv this morning to describe how angry i am to learn this. >> you are using strong words. you are saying that you think that the chief attorney for the white house is the president's puppet? >> yeah, and i don't mean to liken it to tphaour enberg, i am just saying that excuse didn't work and we have established that. it's a crime for a federal employee to participate in a particular matter in which he has a financial interests. an investigation is a particular matter, a subject of an investigation as a financial interests in that investigation, and jeff sessions was a member of the trump campaign who spoke with russian officials in 2016 in one capacity or another and did not reveal that in his congressional testimony under oath, so he was certainly a

potential subject of any investigation into the trump campaign's communications with russian officials, and he knew that, which is why he did do the right thing and recuse. i have to say, and i can't talk details about individuals or time because i am limiting myself to what is already publicly known and i revealed that i gave this advice to doj, but i can share i felt the doj officials were rattled, and i couldn't figure out why, and it turns out don mcgann was leaning on them to recuse, and that fills in the missing piece of the puzzle that they were rattled when i was talking to them. >> do you think it's an

objective obstruction of justice? >> i don't like to say for sure a crime has been committed because we don't know all the facts yet but at this point it would be irresponsible not to look into it, and the members of congress who are actively trying to undermine the mueller investigation really need to back off at all if they care about their country. >> since you feel so strongly about this why do you feel that don mcgann went through with those investigations? >> this is his history, and he drove the fec into the ditch to prevent it from the election law, so what would stop this man from undermining the department of justice's independence. there was a report he went to find out about a fisa warrant, something any white house counsel would not do. the role of the white house

counsel is to keep the white house out of trouble, and it's an imposing figure that makes president's nervous, and that's not don and he's over his head in that job and i question whether he has the character he needs to be able to do that. >> what are you saying? what are you calling for with don mcgann? >> don mcgann should go back in time and undo what he did. >> thank you very much for expressing your strong feelings to us this morning. appreciate talking to you. >> thank you. we are following a lot of news this morning, so let's get right to it. "the new york times" published a blockbuster story about president trump's efforts to keep control of the russian investigation. >> it speaks to the very depths of deprivilege tea of the white house. >> i have never heard of anything like that.

>> it's absolutely his decision. >> this author is, quite frankly, a crack pot fantasy news faction writer. >> we're caught up debating the mental health of the president. >> this is "new day" with chris cuomo and alisyn camerota. >> good morning and welcome to your "new day." it's friday, january 5th, 8:00 in the east. we have two big stories following. first, the man behind the explosive tell-all book behind the white house, and dropping even more eyebrow raising claims about donald trump, and his name is michael wolff and he insists 100% of the people around the president question his fitness for office, and 100%, and quoted that one said he is like a child.