them trying to send the alliance. but it was a little bit of tenseness. >> thanks for that report. that's it for me. thanks for watching. i'm wolf blitzer in "the situation room." erin burnett outfront starts right now. outfront next president trump's mo, why his praise of rob porter says everything we need to know. and chief of staff john kelly makes it clear he would resign. are his names numbered? plus stepping down tonight. does this put trump a step closer to taking out bob mueller. let's go outfront. good evening tonight i'm ert outfront defending in defensible. no point in paraphrasing this. just listen for yourself to the president today in the oval office. he's talking about rob porter his close aide who resigned after allegations surfaced that he physically abused both of his

ex-wives and ex girlfriend something senior officials knew for months. >> we wish his well. he worked very hard. found out about it recently, and i was surprised by it, but we certainly wish him well. it's obviously a tough time for him. >> tough time for him. sure. no mention of three hers. and the president continued. >> he did a very good job when he was in the white house. and we hope he has a wonderful career and hopefully he will have a great career ahead of him. >> so the president hopefully hopes for a wonderful career. again, nothing about the three women. and the president continued. >> it was very sad when we heard about it. and certainly he's also very sad. now, he also, as you probably know, he says he's innocent.

and i think you have to remember that. he said very strongly yesterday that he's innocent. so you'll have to talk to him about that. but we absolutely wish him well. >> so the president wants you to know that porter strongly says he's innocent. and that he's sad about porter. no mention about the three women. it seems impossible to imagine, i mean, what about this picture of porter's first wife, she says porter did this to her according to "the washington post" probably told people she was somehow hit with the vase. what about the words of porter's second wife, jennifer. >> i told them all of the details of my marriage, including verbal and emotional abuse and including the incident when he pulled me out of the shower. they were also made aware of the protective order that i signed in june of 2010. >> no mention from the president of the united states that

domestic abuse is abhorrent that the women are two ex-wives and what they suffered at the hands of rob porter including the fact that one of them had filed a protective order against him. maybe the president should take a cue from the vice president in the olympics. >> there is no tolerance in this white house. no place in america for domestic abuse. >> the problem is that this president, the victims are the attackers. the predators. and the assaulters. take his own words. here he is on senate candidate roy moore after multiple women came forward. one of them you may remember was only 14 years old. >> he totally denies it. he says it didn't happen. and you have to listen to him also. >> here he is on then fox chairman roger ailes accused of

sexual assault by multiple women. >> he's been a friend for a long time. and i can tell you some of the women that are complaining, i know how much he's helped them. >> fox news and former bill o'reilly also paid a massive settlement after he was accused. he said i don't think he did anything wrong. and of course to the president's own behavior, he bragged on tape sexual assault, at least 16 women have come forward to tell stories and he said every single one of them is a liar. >> these vicious claims about me of inappropriate conduct with women are totally and absolutely false. these claims are all fabricated. they are pure fiction. and they are outright lies. these events never, ever happened. >> deny and defend.

that's what president trump does when it comes to abuse and assault by men of women. pamela brown is outfront live at the white house. and, pamela, the white house in chaos tonight over the abuse allegations according to your reporting. >> reporter: that's right. it's been a week of confusion and division with finger pointing, a swirl of accusations. and while john kelly the chief of staff has been more publicly blame, facing more of the public blame, those inside the white house are also blaming top lawyer, president trump's top lawyer, don mcgahn why he didn't do things earlier. that he found out about some of these allegations january 2017 when rob porter went to him and alerted him that his ex-wives may say some troubling things about their past relationship to the fbi. and we are told over the course of the year, porter would inform

mcgahn and gave him information about this. and we are told that the fbi actually turned over to the white house this past spring some of their findings after interviewing the ex-wives that was brought to mcgahn's attention and porter's ex girlfriend called him over the thanksgiving and told him some of the abuse from the ex-wives. now, mcgahn told people around him that he called the security personnel at the white house to alert them about what the ex girlfriend had said. but oertthers inside the white house feel he could have done more. and personal relationship with porter, he worked closely with mcgahn on personal documents, over shadowed the situational loug him to say on board. so it has been a chaotic week at the white house, to say the

least, erin. >> and as you are reporting real if you're owe inside over the handling of this. there are growing questions tonight, pam, about john kelly's future. what are you hearing? >> reporter: that's right because we are told the president has been unhappy how chief of staff has handled things this week. and we are told that john kelly told actually told the president that if he wanted him to resign, that he would resign. now, we are told that it wasn't a formal sort of resignation or saying that, look, i'll do this. but it was more of just telling the president that this is what you want from me, i'll do it. but sources says the president does not want the chief of staff to resign. apparently this is not the first time he said this. sources say he has said the same in past and clearly nothing has happened still in his job. >> thank you very much, pamela. >> outfront let's go to senior political analyst and our presidential historian and former director of the

presidential nixon library. you have been doing a lot of reporting on this. the president defending rob porter not uttering a single word about the ex-wives and ex girlfriend all of whom who have told the same sick and sad story. >> i think for anybody who has been covering this president, his comments today should have been expected and not surprising in the least. this fits a pattern of donald trump the way he responds when people around him or associated with him are cuesed of wrongdoing. we saw him respond in precisely the same way when roy moore the republican senate candidate in alabama was accuse ds of in plop rate sexual behavior and even molestation of younger women. he said essentially that while the allegations were troubling, roy moore was maintaining his innocence. and behind closed doors during the campaign, when steve bannon then campaign chairman was, when

reports surfaced that when bannon was marched decades ago, he had been accused of domestic violence. trump made light of it behind closed doors referring to bannon has bam bam and when donors expressed their concern, trump said oh, bam bam is locked in a room 24 hours a day. nobody to worry about. so i this i we have seen a reluctance from this president to take allegations of wrongdoing of various sorts by the people close to him seriously. that being said, he has seethed at the people close to him in private because of the negative coverage he and those around him have gotten in the news media. so it's not that he doesn't take the allegations seriously. he does when he gets bad press but real reluck tatance to dist himself from people publicly.

>> it fits the pattern. yet to hear him come out today and say the things he said. he totally denies it. we are sad. i wish him a great career and not mention a single thing about what these women went through. somehow it is still stunning. >> it is stunning. and i got to tell you, i've given up a long time ago trying to understand why the president is incapable or unwilling to show empathy, specifically when it comes to a subject similar to this, whether it is domestic violence or whether it's sexual assault. but it also does call into question his political and messaging strategy. remember, when donald trump ran for president, he talked about how he's the greatest salesman and messenger. well, any immediate okay erm consultant would tell you even if you didn't believe these women, erin, that you would still come out and show empathy. that's the smartest thing to do. unless, and this is a very big

unless, unless rob porter knows something that the president doesn't want him to speak about and he's trying to show him some loyalty. now we don't have anything to prove that is the case. but you have to wonder the proximity to rob porter to donald trump over the past year certainly he knows some secrets. >> that's an important question. is that in this case something that you have to consider? i mean, considering rob porter who again did not have full security clearance but had interim security clearance so had access to everything. rob porter knows. >> and he's been there since the beginning of 2017. you know, what's so disappointing and distressing is that our best presidents appealed to our better angels of our nature and understand the white house is symbol of entire country.

and why this president once again when given the opportunity to set a nice and powerful ethical standard refuses to do it. at this point we can't expect him to do it. we can't expect him to do it. he's had so many chances to expect it now would be foolish. >> but the other reality of it is, of course, in a sense he can't. because if he does, then he's opening the door to his own tape where he admitted to sexual assault being true and 16 women who accused him. he always takes the side of the accused when it comes to these men. i mean, every single time. >> it's interesting. this is an area in which trump is consistent and he gives the same defense that he defends others in the same way he defended himself, wherefore those who have accused him of sexual harassment or assault, he has dismissed the claims out of hand. and he does seem to do precisely the same for everybody around

him. he's extremely consistent with that. and there does seem to be, i'm not sure how conscious it is on the president's part, concern that if he says something like women deserve to be heard, or expresses empathy for the women in these cases, that he's going to open the door to questions about the women who have accused him of in propriety. >> which is in so many ways shocking. mark, let me ask you, vice president actually came out tan said what the president should have said. the vice president, i have no doubt he believes what he says, but he's also a very smart guy and thinks before he speaks. and in the interview, he repeated what raj shaw deputy press secretary said on the podium yesterday when raj shaw said the white house had made mistakes. and then there was a lot of reporting. president was angry raj shaw made that admission. and yet listen to vice president and compare it to raj shaw.

raj shaw is first. >> i think it's fair to say we could have done better over the last few days in dealing with the situation. >> i think the white house has acknowledged they could have handled it better. >> mark, did he do that knowing that the president was livid that raj shaw made that admission, or is the vice president that out of the loop? >> no. i mean, look as you said he is very smart. he's right out of central casting for a president. as you said, he thinks before he speaks. he's very careful about what he says. and even as we have seen very loyal to the president, in this case he doesn't necessarily need to be loyal to the president because talking about a third party right now that the president has decided to defend. now, vice president pence has come under a lot of criticism for his defense of donald trump. but it's been about the defense of donald trump not about folks that donald trump is defending. but also if you go back to what he said, vice president pence really did distance himself, didn't he, when he said they the white house, even acknowledged they didn't handle it correctly.

meaning i had nothing to do with it. >> no we in there. it was a they. >> right. >> one of those things you point out a man who knows his words, no the said slightly and without thought. thank you all very much. . and next breaking news john kelly making clear to the president he will resign if the president wants him to. so what is trump thinking tonight? and more breaking news, sudden resignation at the highest levels of the justice department and it could matter for robert mueller and the russian probe. and will he release the democrats member olo? where is the democrat's memo? touch is how we communicate with those we love, but when your psoriasis is bad, does it ever get in the way? embrace the chance of 100% clear skin with taltz.

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breaking news john kelly making it clear to president trump he'll resign if that's what he wants. and talking about possible replacements for kelly. glor glor gloria borger and all these as possible replacements. mike pompeo would also be on the list. offered the job to tom barack. we can tell you he said no.

outfront now who conducted multiple operations with general kelly in iraq. and you know him very well from those times under a great deal of pressure. david, the question here is is the writing on the wall for john kelly? >> yes, it is. the very fact that within a few hours of all of this exploding in the white house we have a story now from the white house that white house aides are saying that general kelly gave a false account of what happened at a staff meeting. people are very disturbed. they leaked that out. sends a clear message that general kelly may be heading for the door and some people pushing him in that direction on the staff. >> let me follow up that. we learned in a meeting that something that appeared something untrue when he learned

about the allegations about rob porter and what he did about them. took immediate action and forced the resignation of porter. what does it say to you that people are willing there who work for him to come out and leak it and say he's not telling the truth? >> i think that it says there is a rebellion going on within. and that it must have the blessing of either ivanka trump or jared kushner or someone for people to start doing this. there has been stories for some time that ivanka wanted general kelly out. those on the outside general kelly coming there was a blessing. but he has crossed swords with a number of people inside and said some things caused the president some trouble. what bothers the president is not people around him have been assaults women, it is he is getting bad publiccy it's just appall zblg it's clear the abuse doesn't bother him. as he's wishing porter well and great ka here and saying how he

feels sad for him. we know general kelly knew about at booze allegations for months and obviously didn't act on them until it broke in the media. he strongly dpee fended porter when the daily mail first broke the story. you know general kelly. is the man that you knew and served with? >> well, i met him in iraq, erin, and we conducted multiple operations together because we had a common boundary between the west and the north. so i knew him from a tactical and operational standpoint and i always saw him as a good commander t but truthfully some of the actions occurred in the last couple of days he's missed something. because good commanders don't do the kinds of things he's done over the last couple of days. i'll give you an example of that. whenever you have one of the members of your team being accused of something or having going wrong and you don't have the fu the full facts, you don't put in

dpee fen defense, you back away. we are trained to do that. so the comments about porter's character and integrity. he may have been hyper formers in duties in the white house. but when something like this comes up and john kelly knew about this for a long time, you start to back away and you question and you actually do a little bit of investigation yourself as the commander or in this case the chief of staff to find out what the heck is going on. this seems extremely strange to me. >> one of the most basic things about domestic abuse it is by definition not visible in almost so many cases to anybody not in the relationship. right. you don't know someone's character outside in a way that he seemed to so quickly jump to. >> right. >> you know, david, if kelly goes, it's going to be latest departure in the white house. we have seen modern record for turnover in the first year of the trump white house, more than a third of the white house staff

are gone. whether fired or resigned. i mean look at this on screen. that's twice reagan. more than three times clinton. nearly four times obama. more than hw and george w. bush. what does this tell you? >> well, i mean, working for this president seems to be like riding a bucking bronco. you can only stay up on it so long before you get bucked off by the circumstances. it is a volatile place. we know they came in with very little experience. he didn't get the top people early on for his white house that one would normally recruit because somebody had opposed him during the campaign they didn't like him because they were against him. and i think it's been a circus since then. which i just can't tell you, i just have never seen a white house with so many people around a president who have been accused at one point or another of being violent toward women or harassing women.

i've never seen a white house that got information about a top person on their team, one of the most trusted people in the white house, that there was a dark side in which he was accused, they were credible reports, that investigators, fbi and others had gotten about his past, and to sit on that, i don't know any legal counsel who would have sat on that. they would have immediately had red flags go up and say we have to know more about this. i don't know any chief of staff who would sit there and not done something more. i don't understand. there something about the culture in this white house that deserves examination because it's not right. >> that's deeply broken. go ahead, general. >> there is an old expression, those of us who studdie leadership says that the organization takes on the personality of the leader. the personality of the commander. in this case, i think there are certainly some issues with character across the board. we have seen that during the

campaign and even during the first year with the president. and i think that's unfortunately affecting some of the people in terms of what they are doing. because it's what they think they are allowed to do. and it's represented in this most recent case in terms of what is happening with security clearances. as a guy who has worked with security clearances and having people within my organization required to have security clearances for the protection of the country and defending our nation, it's appalling what's going on. >> 30 to 40 to give eve one the number. 30 to 40 white house officials do not have them. they are working on interim as rob porter was. >> this has been going on for a long time. and many have watched this saying what the heck is going on. and people who do not have security clearances are doing major appliance are allies which

requires reading intelligence. you don't go into the meeting with the saudis without top secret. so some of the folks who don't have security clearances are going into those meetings, either reading it without authority or not reading it at all which is even more damaging. so all of this concerns anybody that's interested in national security. >> let me just to make the point obviously there could be many people involved with those talks, but one of those leading those talks jared kushner does not have full security clearance, it's been over a year, and still operating on ain interim. david, before we go, you know the porter family. what can you tell us? >> i do. well, first of all, our major concern should be of course with the women, victims here and i'm glad you are emphasizing this. also deeply saddening to see what is happening to the porter family. roger porter was the top domestic adviser in the white house. >> that's rob's father. >> he's been a friend. roger is the father. and he's a wonderful man. been a friend for years, over 40

years. he and his wife ann were dean's, what used to be called masters of one of the houses at harvard. very popular professor. he was a road scholar himself. very proud of him son. and i'm sure he did not understand this. i don't know. and the son has had a remarkable record as well. one of the only two father son teams in history. so something here that's obviously there is a dark side we don't understand. it's so sad. it's crushingly sad. roger, the father, lost his wife ann to cancer just a few months ago. and now to have this, i just can't tell you. roger is such an upstanding person. this must be crushingly sad for him. >> all right. thank you both, so very much. >> thank you. >> and next the breaking news third in command of the justice department suddenly gone tonight. what does it mean for the russia investigation? and kim jong-un sister not

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breaking news, third ranking official at the justice department tonight resigning. rachel brand only been on the job nine months. next in line to run the russia investigation. if rod rosenstein leaves or is

fired. hence, she's crucial. evan perez outfront. evan, we know the president has had criticism of rod rosenstein happened link of the russia investigation. asking whether rod rosenstein was on my team. people have said well if rod rosenstein goes away, brand would take over. so her departing is a big deal, isn't it? >> it is a big deal. as you mention t erin, she would be next in line if, as you mention, the president does go through with the decision to fire rod rosenstein or force him to resign. rachel brand is actually leaving for a top legal job at walmart. and we are told by people close to her this is a job that pays in the millions of dollars. and she considered essentially a once in a lifetime opportunity. but, look, there is no secret that there is a lot of dysfunction going on in this administration. there is a lot of positions under rachel brand. she's number three official, associate attorney general. a lot of jobs underneath her that are not filled with

permanent people who have been appointed by the president. so she's really carrying a heavy load at the justice department. she's gt a good reputation of somebody who has a lot of experience in national security law. but the question is what would happen if rod rosenstein got fired or forced to resign has been hanging over her head. because she doesn't have a lot of experience on handling criminal cases. so if rod rosenstein were to go, she was going to be next in line. now that she's going to leave in the next few weeks, we are told by the justice department, the next person in line is noel francisco who is the solicitor general. another problem with him in that he was a former partner at jones, day law firm, and that's a law firm that is handling a lot of the legal work for the trump campaign. so if he becomes next in line to oversee the mueller investigation, the russia investigation, erin, he might have to recuse himself, again, because his former partners at jones, day are doing work for the trump campaign.

>> all right. thank you very much, evan. it's a significant development. let's go outfront to congressman. thanks for your time. this news breaking tonight. are you worried about rachel brand's resignation and what it could mean for robert mueller russian investigation? >> good evening from phoenix, arizona. this news is concerning. she does have a very good reputation at the justice department. we want as much structure in place around this investigation. and i hope that she would be willing to talk if there was anything she had seen that was concerning, as far as pressure being placed on the department by the president or jeff sessions. but the best thing we can do in congress is putting in place the bipartisan legislation that would require a judicial oversight of any potential firing of his investigation.

>> congressman, tontd we are also awaiting the release of your democrat memo from the committee which rebuts the nunes memo. nunes memo alleged fbi abuses to spy on the trump campaign highest levels of the fbi. democrat memo now in the president's hand when the president was asked today when it will be released, here's how he responded. >> it's going to be released soon. release the letter soon. >> we'll release alert soo lett. any idea when? >> it should be released soon and free from any political edits. looks like he's playing games. most people want us to move on with our investigation. we haven't heard from any witnesses in this investigation for over a month now. and, remember, erin, that just in the last two weeks, cia director it mike pompeo and secretary of state rex tillerson have warnds that the russians are still interfering in our

democracy. so we would be wise to get back to work and do all we can to protect this upcoming november midterm election. >> so, you know, after the president said the memo would be leased soon, you say he's playing games. i want to share this with you. the white house put out a statement which reads in part the president this afternoon met with the director of the fbi, principal associate deputy attorney general, white house counsel office to discuss the memo from the house permanent select committee on intelligence and received input. here's the operative line congressman. president is weighing his options and will responds soon. he said it's going to be released soon. they say he's weighing his options. is it possible they may not release it? >> well, it certainly looks like he's showing discretion that he wasn't willing to show and republicans weren't willing to show when they released their memo was having the fbi closely look at t i do think it's telling, erin, they have not publicly expressed any objections to the memo as they did with the republicans memo.

and i think that goes to the facts that we put in it very carefully to bolster the seriousness of this investigation. if he doesn't release it, it comes back to the house of representatives and we could vote as a whole house to put it out. the public should see it. but the public wants us to get back to our investigation. >> of course your committee did vote unanimously to release it, but we hope that would proceed. but hopefully the president will release it as did he the republican memo. one more question about your committee because you talk about it's a month since you heard from witnesses. look, at the very least, i think the public can see there is some serious problems on the committee. and two sources now telling cnn on this, things are so tense that republican stach is thinking about installing a physical pairier, a physical barrier to separate republican and democrat aides. has it really gotten that bad? >> it has. i hate to see it that way. i don't think the committee is irrelevant redeemable. erin, went to the committee

because i saw it's work after i worked on capitol hill as september 11 intern and i saw the committee come together then to solve that crisis and put reforms in place. and i always thought of that committee as a place you go for bipartisanship. and i think we can go back to that place. but just not with devin nunes as chairman. he has caused serious damage. and i think it's time to have new leadership there. so we can do the important work, protecting our democracy next time americans go to vote. >> a moment ago i was talking to general mark hurdling who served with john kelly in iraq and talked about he had known about the allegations and not done anything about it. he was raising the point about the fact that deep concern that political appointees in the trump administration 30 to 40 all interim, 30 to 40 have not gotten approval for a full

security. and that includes jared kushner who has been going to saudi arabia and going to israel and leading all of these talks. how big of a problem is this? >> it's a big problem and reflects the poor judgment of the person whose name is on the door there. that's donald trump. it's not just jared kushner. remember, michael flynn was also a part of the white house and they didn't have any concerns about his prior relationships with russia. my colleague shawn maloney from new york is looking into this. former bill clinton staff secretary. he understands uniquely this problem. and he has referred an inquiry oversight committee in congress to see what we can do to make sure we don't have any compromised on intelligence going through the white house. >> all right of the thaupg very much, congressman. i appreciate your time tonight. >> of course. my plesh sure. thanks, erin. next, the worst week on wall street since trump took office. are the tax cuts to blame. and gop conspiracy theories

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all right. breaking news, we can tell you the president of the united states has decided not to

release the democratic memo, rebuttal to the nunes memo that alleged abuse at the highest levels of the fbi. he says there is changes that need to be made. he's sending it back to the committee. let's go to jim acosta for breaking news at the white house. jim, obviously this is going to sthok a lot of people. >> reporter: it's going to sthok a lot of people. but probably not everybody here in washington, erin, that's right. looking at this letter that was sent back to the house intelligence committee democrats from don mcgahn white house counsel it says, key sentence here, although the president is inclined to declassify the schiff memo of the memo, because the memorandum contains numerous properly classified and especially sensitive passages, he is unable to do so at this time. however, given the public interest and transparency in these unprecedented circumstances the president has directed justice department personnel be available to give technical assistance to the committee. and so what they are saying

here, erin, in all of that washington gobbling gook, the president has decided he is not going to declassify that memo. according to the white house release along with this letter it says something has been sent back to the house intelligence committee that was not given to us, obviously, and that is a classified version that's been sent back to the committee that they can now go over to determine whether or not they are agreeable to the changes being sought by the fbi, by the justice department. we should note as you probably heard earlier today and have reported earlier today, erin, the fbi director, justice department official and the white house counsel all met with the president about this earlier today. so this is the outcome of that decision. the president is not releasing the schiff memo at this time which was going to be ten-page response to the nunes memo which we are told was released without any changes, basically uncorrected and unredacted. so this is pretty big development. i think you've just touched off

a pretty big debate that's going to be unfold go over the next several days over this. democrats are not going to be happy. >> jim, thank you very much. as jim gets more information. let's zb back to congressman eric swalwell, your response, the president is not releasing memo as the democrats on your committee submitted it to him. >> erin, it looks like more obstru obstruction behavior from the president. i'll wait and see when we return to washington on tuesday. we asked them to take a look at it. this is not something the republicans asked department of justice to do. they have not publicly objected to the release of our memo. so if they do have lockobjectio we should look at them in the context already been released, we should allow the full memo to go out. but if these are just political

edits, then i expect nunes to release the memo to the public. that would be consistent. >> so how are you going to figure it out? so there is theler from don m mcgahn from the white house, and signed by rod rosenstein deputy attorney general and christopher rae director of the fbi. and in this two paragraph letter, they say they are attaching aversi attaching aversion that highlighted information which would present concerns about the protection of intelligence sources and methods ongoing investigations. and then they continue to say we have further identify fied in red boxes subset of such information for which national security or law enforcement concerns are especially significant. does this make you think, all right, this is real, and you all gave them something that was going to compromise national security as oppose ds to political edits because this

letter comes from rod rosenstein and chris rae? >> wray. >> thaert's right. if these are national i had iese don't want it to go to the public. but we also told the department of justice we want them it look at this in the full context that the president and house republicans have already put out a misleading memo. so the only way to correct the record, to make sure that the fbi's reputation is not unfairly tainted is to give the american people the full picture. so if we can put out a memo that does that and addresses these concerns, we should do that. but again i'm skeptical of most things the president says, because he is consistently inconsistent and consistently obstructive. so let's see and have them come in and brief us on tuesday. >> all right. so the bottom line is you are disappointed but not going to

jump to the conclusion this is political obstructive move from the president until you hear from chris wray and rod rosenstein? >> that's right i trust the officials at the department of justice and fbi. i don't the president. >> well, congressman, thank you very much for your time. obviously very significant development tonight. >> of course. >> maybe not surprising to some. but this was a ten hen page memo sitting out there for days and people expected the president would go along with the unanimous view of that committee. also vote today release it. >> okay. more breaking news, another white house aide is resigning, that story, and worst weekend in wall street since trump took office. are his tax cuts to blame? because each day she chooses to take the stairs. at work, at home... even on the escalator. that can be hard on her lower body,

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breaking news, another wild day for stocks. the dow closing higher by 330 points. the swing was 1,000 points. pretty stunning and worst week overall for the dow since president took office. t two biggest point drops in history. outside is steven moore. also with me robert reich. thanks to both as always. robert, are trump's policies to blame for what we are seeing in the market? >> certainly taking a toll in terms of the market getting jittery. tax cuts and spending, additional spending that is fine when the economy has room to

grow. when your house is cold, up you want to put logs on the fire, when unemployment is down to 4.1%, very, very low, when the economy is doing well, you don't want to put more logs on the fire because it can burn the house down. the markets worry about inflation, about the federal reserve board raising interest rate and that can reduce stock value. >> usually you give a tax cut and then you do a spending bill, you do that when you are in a bad recession. right now, we are at the opposite end of the cycle. >> thank you, robert reich for finally admitting that we have a great economy under trump. we do have a great economy, it is booming. whether it is corporate profits, investment spending is off the

charts. i would make the case that it didn't happen by accident. now is donald trump responsible for the reduction in the stock market? this was a bad week no question about it, but i will let trump take the blame for the reduction in the stock market over the last two weeks -- >> as he has taken the credit for every gain. >> i am just saying, my point is it is the trump economy right now, no question about it. this isn't the obama economy. obama is not responsible for the big boom and not the reason the stock market is fallen. i am very bullish. good time to buy stocks. i was on your show a few weeks ago, saying the market is getting ahead of itself. i agree with robert reich, the spending bill passed was

shameful. and republicans are going it have to be responsible for that. >> erin, can i make one correction to the record and that is the expansion, the good economy has been an expansion that started years ago, started under obama. a continuation of that economy. for steve moore to say this is trump's doing is ridiculous, all of the stock market gains in anticipation of the tax cut have been eliminated. there has been no actual impact of donald trump on this economy and on this expansion that started in 2009. >> all right. here is the thing -- >> what about -- >> hold on. >> what about the bonuses and the spending by those companies. >> wait a minute. steve moore, those bonuses were very tiny.

a stock market that is really lagging and volatile right now. >> i want to play for you something, rand paul shut the government down. but i want to ask where this is coming from. whether it is coming from republicans or the top. here is the president bragging and bragging about debt and how wonderful it is. here he is. >> i am the king of debt. i am great of debt. i am the king of debt. i love debt. i love playing with it. >> his companies have declared bankruptcy four times. should america be concerned that he has the same attitude about the country. >> it wasn't by accident he became a billionaire. on this debt ishshasue, i am of

opinion, borrowing is appropria appropriate depending on what you are borrowing it for. i think there is room for more employment in this country. workers need wage increases so i like a tight labor market. i don't think borrowing to make america a more prosperous place is a bad thing or borrowing from infrastructure pay off is going to make an impact. >> i think borrowing is important and justifiable if you are going to build the economy. and the problem is, and here is where we get to the crux. ishsha issue. we are not building the economy. we are not getting health care, job retraining, road infrastructure.

it is not something that is growing the economy. and yet republicans for years, erin, have been saying, deficits are bad, debts are bad. and suddenly they don't agree. >> that i agree. huge hypocrisy. >> the democrats didn't have a problem with all of this spending either. >> but they didn't before. you call someone out for being a hypocrite when you say something and then another. i want before each you of go, we have breaking news. another white house official resigning tonight. this is according to the washington post. speech writer dave sorenson claims he was abusive. this comes two days after another administration official rob porter after we all know

that his two ex-wives and live-in ex-girlfriend say he abused them. >> it is just sad. i knew porter and it is a sad thing and you know, i don't even know what to say about it. how do you screen for that kind of thing? did the justice department know about these things? there should be a screening for it so we have the best people in the white house. >> to an extent there is screening it is security clearance. and people don't have it yet. >> you know, erin, donald trump ran as a business man who would whip the white house into shape, whip the government into shape and i don't -- this is a sad story and i don't want to politicize this particular story, but it is part of a pattern.

these people are there, on temp clearance, and fired and hired. and you have a white house that is in chaos. >> thank you very much. i appreciate your time. and thanks to all of you for joining us. have a great weekend. "ac 360" begins right now. >> more now on the news that broke just minutes ago. two competing memos. the republican version is out. president trump releasing over objections from the fbi and others. now, after several days considering the democratic rebuttal, the president decided not to make it public. jim acosta is standing by at the white house. >> reporter: a lot of people want some explaining when it comes to the decision.