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breaking news tonight. the possibility of a subpoena for the president, a notion raised by special counsel robert mueller in at least one meeting with the president's lawyers. cnn has this now from two sources. evan perez joins us. so what have you learned about mueller praising the possibility of a subpoena with the president's legal team? >> well, anderson, we're told by a couple of sources that this did indeed happen in at least one meeting with the special counsel, the president's team heard they were considering issuing a subpoena if the two teams could not come to terms on an agreement for the president to grant a voluntary interview to the special counsel robert mueller. so the possibility, at least, was raised for the first time, and so, look, what this means is that things are moving a lot more quickly than i think a lot of us have thought. there's still been this idea that the two sides are having meetings, they're having negotiations as to whether or

not the president will sit down formally for a voluntary interview. and, of course, we saw last night the 49 or so questions that the mueller team is prepared to ask, but this appears to be now on the table, the idea that a subpoena could be issued to force the president, if he doesn't sit down for a voluntary interview. >> what was the tenor between mueller and the president's legal team? was it cordial or did it become tense? >> well, it appears, at least according to one of my sources. we talked to my colleague gloria borger. she said it was a very tense meeting, simple because john dowd had a very sharp response to the idea, the idea being that this would interfere with the work of the president, and this is something obviously the president's legal team takes something very seriously. is why they believe, you know, it should never even come to this. even the idea of an interview, they believe, interferes with the work of the president, because obviously he's preparing for a summit meeting with north korea. this is something they keep bringing up as one of the many

reasons why doing this would interfere with the president's work. >> earlier the "washington post" was reporting that according to their reporting, the president is now thinking of not going for an interview, not complying. that he doesn't think it's a good idea. is is that what you're hearing as well? >> that is exactly what we're hearing. i think it's become abundantly clear that the president's legal team is getting ready for a standoff, really, on a subpoena. because if a subpoena does come, there is, i think, a lot of thought inside the president's legal team that this is a line that the special counsel cannot cross, that this is something they might fight all the way to the supreme court. in their view, at least according to the president's lawyers, they believe that the special counsel doesn't have the power to force the president to go before a grand jury basically under compulsion. so i think this is something that if it comes to this, if mueller does indeed issue a subpoena, then we're going to be looking at perhaps a year of litigation, appeals process,

then all the way to the supreme court. look, i think it's something the supreme court has previously said, presidents can be subpoenaed, but the circumstances here are a lot different from some of those previous cases. >> evan, thank you very much. we go to jeff zeleny at the white house. there was press briefings where the thought of a subpoena has come up many times. what exactly is the public stance the white house has taken on this? >> reporter: the public stance was that the white house today was actually being more disciplined than i've seen any time i can remember. they were referring all questions to the president's lawyers. but the reality here is this. the president has said repeatedly he would like to sit down with the special counsel. but the also competing reality here is that could not necessarily be good for him. so as evan was just saying there, this is something that the president has said constantly he wants to get this over with. the white house wants to get this over with, in their view, before midterm elections this fall.

if they dig in and resist an interview, a sit-down, this will interrupt midterm elections into next year. there is a mixed view of thinking here. if the president doubles down, says this is a witch hunt, a fake investigation, would that help him with his base? but they know legally speaking, he wants to get this over with. so in the coming days and even weeks, the president will decide if he wants to sort of, you know, roll the dice and sit down with bob mueller's team or not. he said he has wanted to. he says he has nothing to hide here. we'll see if that happens, anderson, because going on and on and on here, legally there is a lot of peril for him to do that. >> yeah. jeff zeleny, i appreciate it, from the white house. >> with me now, professor dershowitz, ashram ga pa,

mildr mildred zelleman and jeff zeleny. >> we may be seeing attempts on both sides to flex some muscles. we're going to give you a subpoena. oh, yeah? we're going to do this that, and the other thing. it may still end up with a narrow four-hour or six-hour conversation between the president and the special counsel -- >> you think they could do it in six hours? -- >> that's the whole point. that may be a negotiating potion. if you're doing those questions, what's the possible benefit for the president to sit down? the only possible benefit the president gets by volunteering and giving up his rights is if he can narrow the questions, he can refuse to answer questions in certain areas, but if they're going to ask him about everything, might as well take it to the courts and fight. >> but isn't there a slight advantage also that if he's not in front of a grand jury, his lawyers can be present and involve themselves in this? >> right, so he'll have his counsel there, and he can still

narrow the scope or refuse to answer certain questions as they're asking follow-ups,s for. the questions laid out are big broad brush questions, and each of them will generate follow-up questions, but i think we need to remember that this president is kind of like a choose your own adventure, where every ending ends in a constitutional crisis of some kind. the ideal situation is that he sits down and does it. i do have to agree with alan, it's probably not in his interests because he does not have a command of the facts and discipline to answer the way he should. >> and jeff toobin thinks he would take the fifth and that would eliminate all his problems. professor dershowitz said absolutely there is no way he should do that. >> i don't think he takes the fifth, either. i think it's incredibly perilous to take the fifth. to take the fifth amendment basically says he would be incriminating himself if he spoke, and he would be basically

saying he's guilty of a crime. i think that's more of a political question, but i think that is probably the least likely option that he's going to want to go through. >> mike the zeldin, do you see this heading toward a subpoena? >> if they don't reach an agreement, that's where mueller will take it. my time with bob tells me that he believes that his mandate here is to find out what happened and that he's going to follow the facts to find out whether those facts lead to law violations or not. and that the president is not going to dictate to him the terms under which he does his fact-finding. remember that on the team that mueller has is michael dreeben. michael dreeben is one of the most accomplished supreme court criminal appellate advocates. i expect the issue of whether or not the president can be subpoenaed to give oral testimony has been well-briefed by dreeben and dreeben feels he's on solid he'll ground to make that request to dowd at the time known that they will follow that route. >> professor dershowitz, though

to jeff zeleny's point, if this does go the way of the courts, this could go on for a year. >> well, it could go for a year. i suspect first it gets to district court, and the district court splits the difference. and the district court says you must answer questions about your business dealings before you became president. you must answer some questions that you may have waived or some other areas, but there are going to be questions about your motives, your reasons, your intentions that the court will probably say is beyond the power of the grand jury. now, the interesting question is whether or not the argument that i've made, that is, you can't call a subject into a grand jury in order to give him an opportunity to commit perjury. you have to do it in order to get information you don't already have, whether that kind of argument will prevail. it could go both ways on that. >> don't prosecutors all the time ask questions that they know the answers to? >> they precisely ask questions that they already know the answer to. and i think that -- i disagree with alan. they need to get his answers on motive because that is precisely

what the obstruction case terms. it's whether what he was thinking when he fired james comey and what happened before and after, and we have this litany of actions, including his own tweets to explain. i don't see how you can shield that. >> of course it's relevant but it's also privileged. you can't ask a senator or congressman to explain their vote. >> it's not privileged if it's not a legitimate policy decision-making or national security related -- if it's evidence of a crime, it can be pierced. >> would they have asked president bush why he gave a pardon to casper weinberger? when the special prosecutor said that part tore cass before weinberg weinberger and others was motivated to end the prosecution and continue the cover-up. everybody agreed to that, but everybody also agreed you can't ask the president that question. the president, if he has the authority to do something, has

the authority to do it for any reason. he can pardon, he can fire, he can do all these things. it's not that it's not relevant, it's that privilege trumps relevance. >> well, except that privilege really applies here to a very narrow set of questions that we see in the -- among the 49. as you say, professor dershowitz, anything that predates the president's inauguration is not covered by privilege. >> right. >> anything that is not advice that he receives from his advisers, his senior advisers, is not executive privilege protected. with respect to the question of whether or not he can be asked about his motives in firing people that he has a constitutional right to do, that may be one small area that the courts can, you know, battle over. >> i agree. >> but everything else is really not covered by this. and, of course, the issue is in a court setting is one forum. in an impeachment hearing analysis, it's completely different because the fifth

amendment and all those things do not apply outside the courtroom. and that's another whole aspect of what's going on here, too. >> also if the president did receive immunity in order to answer questions, things he says, though, legally he would be fine, but it could be used in impeachment proceedings, correct? >> yes, that's correct. and also, i mean, think about -- that is correct, and think about also the fact that, you know, he would be testifying as well and providing information about other people. so, you know, we're very focused right now on the president being the person that is the target of this -- not using target in the legal sense, but the point person for these interviews, but there is a lot in those questions that relate to other people as well. so immunity doesn't take him off the hook on impeachment, and he also doesn't have the right to invoke the fifth amendment for other people. >> and, frankly, some of these people are family members. we're talking about jared kushner and donald trump jr. >> that's correct. at one point, i think the timing question, i'm not sure it takes years.

i think this is such an extraordinary matter that courts would move as quickly as possible. now, the parties would still need reasonable time to brief it and get to the court, but i think this is the kind of thing that would move as quickly as humanly possible in the courts. >> i agree. >> i think on the mueller side it's already briefed. >> i agree. >> i think dreeben has briefed this and they're ready to pull the plug if the president resists. which the new lawyers have to realize that. >> it's interesting, in the reporting from the "washington post," we learned that these 49 questions were not questions -- these were written down, according to "the post," by jay sekulow, the president's own attorney. so if the president is critical of these things leaking out, if jay sekulow is the one who wrote down these 49 questions, it's not as if they were leaked by robert mueller, they came from someone within the president's orbit. >> not only that, they may have contained privileged information, because they were his characterizations of the

questions, and he had a right to give that to the president in a lawyer/client privilege way. if someone in the white house leaked that, they may have breached the privilege, too, but we know this white house leaks, like we said, we know this white house leaks like a sieve. >> that brings the other question, would they prevail in a court, which alan dershowitz brought up earlier, which is waiver. the president may have waived that small area of law that protects him, his deliberative process, privilege stuff, he may well have wavived that. so he sits there pretty legally naked when it comes to trying to resist this subpoena if one is issued. >> i think that overstates it. >> the president does have the authority to speak to the public. i think the courts would find waiver only in extreme cases. so i don't think he's completely naked. i think he's partly exposed. i don't want to use the metaphor of putin. he probably has his shirt off but still has his pants on. >> let's not go down that metaphor anymore.

thanks everybody. more on the breaking news after a quick break. so, that goal you've been saving for,

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you don't have to say i'm your best friend. that's okay. you don't have to say i'm your best friend. thethe more you know theme, commute is worth it. for all the work you pour into this place, you sure get a lot more out of it. you and that john deere tractor... so versatile, you can keep dreaming up projects all the way home. it's a longer drive. but just like a john deere, it's worth it. nothing runs like a deere. now you can own a 1e sub-compact tractor for just 99 dollars a month. learn more at your john deere dealer. breaking news. an intense meeting in march where the special counsel raised the idea of a subpoena for the president. cnn has this according to two sources. the story reported in "the washington post" just a short time ago. the anecdote for the subpoena prompted a sharp report from the president's then lead attorney john dowd. dowd has since left the team.

my panel joins me now. before we dive in, i have to mention that amanda carpenter's book is hot off the presses "gaslighting america, what we love it when trump lies to us" is out today. congratulations. that's great. >> thank you. >> so mike shields, is this heading to a subpoena, do you think? >> you know, think one of the things we're learning from the last two days of storys is that there is a conflict with trump and his legal team. "the washington post" story tonight that talked about the subpoena really talks about john dowd, and he left after this. so i think what we know about the president is he goes by his own gut. he made his own company. he's frustrated by the russia investigation because he was the campaign manager. he's the chief of staff for the white house. he's the communications director and i think he thinks he's his own lawyer. so he wants to testify, i believe. he's trying to tell his legal team, i didn't do this. i will defend myself. my gut tells me i can do this, and his team is leaking out questions and trying to talk him out of it saying, you could be

in tremendous peril if you go and do this. he believes he's innocent and didn't do these things, it has nothing to do with any collusion so he wants to talk about it. >> in the "washington post," they seemed to be saying he's angry, he doesn't want to testify, and particularly in the wake of the michael cohen investigation. >> that's what i would think. i mean, i would assume he wouldn't want to testify. and everything he's done, frankly, would suggest somebody who doesn't really want to cooperate or treat this as a legitimate investigation. so i would assume they would fight it as much as they can. and then ultimately, if he's not willing to do it, then i think they will have to subpoena him. but they're trying to reach some sort of agreement with him, have some deference for the fact that he's president. but in the end they're going to have to get answers to these questions. only one person has the answers to these questions and it's donald trump. amanda, though, the political calculation in this is that if you fight it in court and it goes on for months and months or a year and you have the midterm

elections, there is a lot of different balls in the air here. >> yeah, you can ride it out. i think the concept of gaslighting pretty much talks about the concept of everything president trump does, and that's the concept of ultimate brinkmanship. forget subpoenas, forget whether he's going to answer all the questions, i think the truth is somewhere between what you're saying. he wants to clear his name himself but he doesn't want to testify. where does that lead? i could see a scenario where he sits down in a video deposition where he says, forget your questions, this is a witch hunt. he repeats all the things he was saying. so what if he gets into a perjury trap? do we really think the fbi is going to haul him out of office? what he will do, i think, is force a political confrontation. he is the come at me, bro, kind of guy and dares other people to back down. do we think the senate will impeach him over this question if there is not a flaming, smoking gun? i don't think so because the country, as much as you may hate donald trump, and i don't like what he does, impeachment is a

very drastic thing. this needs to be resolved through the political process, so i think he stares down that barrel of the senate chamber. >> then he repeats what he's said all along. no collusion, no collusion. our administration has fully cooperated with the mueller investigation. if that's the case, i hope it is, let's put it all out there. go before robert mueller, answer all these questions, put this behind us, let's focus on the midterm elections. the problems is he has a loose association with the truth and sometimes tending to embellish things. a lot of things he won't want to answer or answer them the way he wants to and runs the risk of getting in legal jeopardy. that's the real problem. that being said, it's best politically to get this over with and look to the midterm elections. >> this is a hybrid problem.

his legal team needs to understand that and separate themselves. that is to say, in the white house, the white house counsel does not work for donald trump. he works for the president of the united states. so his job is to forestall impeachment. his private attorneys need to make sure he's not charged with a crime. the best argument is the justice department cannot charge a sitting president. he will not be a sitting president all his life. one day he will walk outside, one glorious day he will walk outside those 16 acres at 1600 pennsylvania ave gnaw and he could be charged with a crime. so there is a tension there. those things which might tend to protect his criminal liability can really hurt him politically, like taking the fifth. it's a really difficult thing, and so far i don't think either he or his legal team have been up to it. >> ayesha? >> i think we also don't want to forget that mueller has a lot of evidence already collected, okay? this is not -- the political case against him, the legal case against him is not going to all be built on what he says or doesn't say.

he has cooperating witnesses. he's talked to jeff sessions. he's talked to people at the cia, the white house counsel, reince priebus, all of these people, and so mueller needs to do this interview as a good prosecutor, as an investigator, because that is what you do when you are completing an investigation. but make no mistake, he will have a report that has a lot of other evidence there that goes to collusion and obstruction, and the president can't avoid that. >> but we've had two reports saying he's not the target of the investigation. so he has a lot of other evidence, but why do you want to get someone to sit down and just broadly talk because you don't hagg something on them where you can already say, you know what, we already have what we need. he's the real target, we want to go after him. if you want to catch him doing something -- >> how can you do an investigation and have somebody who may later have perhaps even exculpatory evidence. you don't know. you cannot, as an investigator, leave that person aside.

just to be clear, the line between subject and target is very fine and it can change in a nanosecond. so i would not hang your hat on that distinction. >> asha, there is a lot of debate on this, but isn't there the intent question? is there anyone else that can answer that other than donald trump? >> nobody else can answer it, and it may behoove him to give that information. because if all the circumstantial evidence is he knew about flynn, he wanted it to go away, he wanted sessions to not recuse, he tried to get the cia and nsa to stop the investigation. this doesn't look good for him. if he can be disciplined it, it might help him. >> to your point, there is a fine line between subject and target. there is also a fine line between when they told him, you're not a target today but you may be one tomorrow. the fact they delayed the sentencing for mike flynn, i think that says they're still gathering information and some of that information may be damaging to the president, so i think more than anything, we're

going to find out more information that will bring him more into the loop than the other way around. >> here's a prediction, not my advice, but what is likely to happen, he'll answer all these questions in a rally in mobile, alabama. >> yep. >> he's just going to go on in one of his performance art toy raids for an hour, hour and a half. his lawyers are all just going to die inside because it will be awful for them. >> they're already dead. >> he may just tweet 10,000 tweets answering each question. >> this is my point about the conflict within his team. there may be some reports where he says, i don't want to talk about this because he thinks there's no collusion and he thinks the investigation from the very beginning is a joke. but i think if you were to put him on the spot and say, if you were to defend yourself, and staff around him manipulating him on wait he does things, that's not his instinct. his instinct is, that's not what i did, let me explain it. let me go talk to them. they're saying that's a bad idea. you have a push and pull within his own legal team on this. he believes he's innocent.

he wants to make the case to the american people, it looks like. >> we're going to take a quick break with more reporting on the other side. we'll be right back. [phone ringing] need a change of scenery? the kayak price forecast tool tells you whether to wait or book your flight now. so you can be confident you're getting the best price. giddyup! kayak. search one and done.

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any time soon. they're preparing and bracing, certainly, for the possibility this could end up in some long-term legal fight with the special counsel, and especially because they've been talking about doing this voluntary interview, the president sitting down and talking to the fbi and the prosecutors from mueller's office. and obviously those talks have been going on and on, and as we saw from the 49 questions that were leaked to the "new york times" last night, there is a lot left for the special counsel to cover. we've noticed, you know, the change in their behavior the last few weeks that really signalled there was a change in thinking about whether or not this could be over any time soon. >> pam, you're also reporting that mueller himself has raised the idea of subpoenaing the president, so have talks broken down with mueller at this point? >> well, it appears that they have. there certainly has been a change, as evan pointed out, in posture ever since the raid on the president's personal attorney's home and office. just that day there was a meeting that was very tense

we were told, rereported on at the time, between mueller's team and the president's lawyers. they were upset about the raid and that they didn't know about it. in a sense talks have broken down, but at the same time you have new lawyers coming on board including rudy giuliani, the raskins, the husband/wife team as well, so they bring a fresh layer to all of this. but, certainly, there is a change here, anderson, in terms of what was before, the thinking was, let's wrap this up as soon as possible. let's do whatever we can to wrap this up as soon as possible to now bracing for the possibility of a subpoena and a lengthy court fight. >> evan, we've been talking about this tonight. couldn't the president just plead the fifth? >> he can. he has the same rights as everybody else, but the president's legal team believes they don't even have to get there. they believe that first they're going to litigate whether mueller even has the right to subpoena the president, that it it interferes with his article ii powers. this is the part of the constitution that says what powers the president has, and it

interferes with that ability for him to really conduct in powers in office. it's one reason why they believe, and the justice department has said, in legal opinions that the president cannot -- a sitting president cannot be indicted for a crime. so all of that's, i think, goes into their thinking, essentially they're daring mueller to go there. >> pam, wouldn't that drag out the fight? >> it certainly would, but what's interesting here, according to my colleague gloria borger, is the change in political strategy among those close to the president. originally they were thinking, we need to wrap in up as soon as possible. now they're thinking, hey, it's okay if it drags out if there is a lengthy court fight. let's just get through the midterms. we've done enough, in their view, to discredit the investigators in this case, to undermine the mueller investigation. let's drag this out and get to the midterms and then we can revisit some of this. >> i appreciate your reporting. our panel is back next. we'll be right back. hey ron! they're finally taking down that schwab billboard. oh, not so fast, carl.

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before the break we heard the new reporting from evan perez and pamela brown that the president's legal team is preparing for a legal shutdown with special counsel robert mueller. bracing for a legal fight that could go all the way to the supreme court. this is a dumb question, but the president doesn't actually have to be served with a subpoena, correct, asha? >> we were just talking about that. i just want to say this legal showdown that may be coming is both -- it could be a smart thing to do or a really, really, really dumb thing to do. it's smart in the sense that you don't have the facts, and i don't think this administration has the facts, you fight the law. you fight on the law. so at least this keeps the battle in some, like, normal, legitimate battlefield as opposed to firing and pardoning. but on the other hand, as

michael zeldin mentioned before, mueller's team has briefed all of these constitutional questions. they know exactly every nuance, they're supreme court clerks, they're scholars, they're prosecutors. they will win. so ultimately the president is going to lose, even, i think, on the law. >> i think the legal route, fighting this legally, does help the president, because it just takes it into a place where the public goes. there is some kind of thing going on. had there been some evidence out there that showed real collusion where the president was implicated, that would be bad. because we don't have that, it just becomes a thing where it it's like, the public is going -- we're experiencing a good economy. i worked to newt during the trump impeachment days -- excuse me, during the clinton impeachment days, thank you, and one of the things we had working against as is that the economy was doing well and people were pretty happy. the public's desire to go after him at that level wasn't going away. as long as they keep it a legal fight in some way, it's probably

better to keep it there. >> what would would you use to describe the trump tower meeting with donald trump jr. and the russians? jeffrey toobin has dead that is either evidence of collusion or a desire to collude. >> the word i would use is stupid. i've said this to you before. the trump campaign could barely collude with the rnc. they had no ability to collude with the russians. the russians would have had to come over and built a campaign to collude with. >> maybe they offered. >> but if russians are saying, russians who have links with the government and who say they have links with the government, are saying, we can give you dirt on hillary clinton and don jr. is saying, great, the timing of this would be great a couple months from now, let's meet, doesn't that just seem like at least a desire to collude or cooperate? >> i think it sounds like a really big error in judgment. it doesn't prove they took it to end corruption. the public -- there is not -- the public does not believe that there is evidence so far that

the president has colluded. and now we're moving into other issues. we're moving into his businesses. we're moving into obstruction. we're moving into things this wasn't first about. so if trump pushes this into a legal fight and keeps it there, that's probably to his advantage because people go --. >> even past the election, the midterm? >> look, to whatever advantage they can keep it there as opposed to making a political fight and talking about this every day in terms of actual collusion, i think it's better for them. >> it's true the polls are showing that the public is sort of moving in the direction of president trump's point of view of this. but the fact that it has gone on, you're saying 14 months, i mean, look, richard nixon complained that, you know, this was going on for a year and they haven't found anything, well, of course, they did find something.

just because it's been 14 months doesn't mean they aren't going to find something. we don't know yet. i think we need to wait and see what they actually have. >> just because it was dumb or most people agree it was stupid or not very competent doesn't put you in legal jeopardy. that's the issue that we have here. in addition to the meeting they had where they knew they were meeting with people from russia, russian leaders during a campaign, they should have known not to do that. then following up with that, getting together and writing the response. the statement that was written on air force i just raises a lot of questions. i think it's very difficult to believe when the president says no collusion, no collusion, when we already have evidence that shows there was some working at least in some form or fashion with the russians. >> if he's so innocent, why are he and his team so terrified? apparently they even gave him the questions for the test in advance and he doesn't want to answer the questions. does he want the answers, too? >> i don't think his team want him talking.

because he doesn't stay on top of it. >> he's attacking mueller in the investigation every day, to no avail, by the way. in the abc poll a few weeks ago, 69% of americans said they had confidence of mueller looking into the collusion issue, 54% into the noncollusion business issue. that's he's attacking rosen, he's attacking the fbi. he knows that. >> we keep making this mistake and it gets back to my big theme in gas lighting america. we think donald trump needs to fight on facts because we're used to that, it's logical, it's what he's supposed to do. no, he does not fight on fact. he developed a whole counternarrative of a coup being staged against him. if you tune in fox news, you see this again and again and again. a lot of people believe that. they don't believe there's not

collusion, they believe there is an entirely different reality happening that he has created. until we fully understand how that process works, we're going to keep making the mistake of saying, what does he say in the deposition? >> is robert mueller the one person he can't gaslight? >> it becomes a defensive move. donald trump is very effective at a defensive measure when he's creating his own narrative. gaslighting doesn't work when you're not in complete control. that's why everybody has to understand he's his best master manipulator. he creates chaos constantly as a way of taking control of the media environment, as a way of taking control of the political environment, and that's why you can't ever really predict what he's going to do next because he does things no one else would do because he's seizing that entire -- >> he's also critical in chaos and most people are not. and that's an advantage. >> especially in a media environment where there are hundreds of outlets that will seize on any new development. in the past it was only the

"washington post," the "new york times" that you had to win, but now there's a million news outlets that not only will carry your counter-narratives but the fake news to go along with it. >> asha? >> just to your point, this is exactly why the questions -- the interview is dangers for trump. because the fbi and mueller are going to approach it as open-ended and an opportunity for him to tell his version. he will see that as an opportunity to create his own narrative. >> just blow it out completely. >> and blow it out. >> i want to thank everybody. amanda's new book is is "gaslighting america." will it be a generic demonstration or a photo op when the president meets with president kim? you know what they say about the early bird...

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the idea of a summit between president trump and north korean leader kim jong-un is enticing, of course, and to the president, so is the notion of a possible nobel peace prize for him. a reported asked him about that today. >> i just think that president moon was very nice when he suggested it. i want to get peace. that's the main thing. we want to get peace. that was a big problem and i think it's going to work out well. we'll see. we're setting up meetings right now, and i think it's probably going to be announced in the next couple days, location and date, but i thought it was very generous of president moon of south korea to make that statement, and i appreciate it. but the main thing is to get it done. i want to get it done. >> joining me tonight are fareed zakaria, host of "fareed zakaria gps" and author of the book "the world in disarray."

fareed, how much do you think the location of this summit matter? is the dmz a good idea, as the president seems to be indicating? >> there are two ways to think about these summits. one would be a place where you have an extended negotiation. for that the dmz is a terrible idea, because what you really need is a place like geneva or paris, a place where you have lots of hotels, people can regroup, it can go on for a long time. that's a long negotiating process. this doesn't seem like that. this seems to be more a kind of photo-op, a symbolic meeting, which is often the case with heads of state. the dmz is a great idea. trump is, above all, his greatest claim to fame has been the star of "the apprentice." he understands how these things work. he has produced boxing fights. this would be pay-per-view television, to have it at the dmz with these two incredibly

larger than life figures. it's a very good idea for a photo-op summit. it's not a good idea for a negotiating summit. >> ambassador haas, in your opinion, is it pressure the president has placed behind north korea that we're seeing or something to do with south korea driving it because they're scare what could happen as a result of the increased rhetoric? >> it could be either of those, and let me suggest the third possible reason we've gotten to this point, anderson, which is that north korea has reached a level of development or maturity in its nuclear weapons agreement -- program where it feels content to essential pause. the fact that its testing site can't be used for the foreseeable future, if ever, again, means they're not in a rush to do anything. so it's quite possible that this stems from their own state of affairs, and it's not usually exclusive. it's also possible that, as you say, american threats, obviously tighter sanctions and chinese pressure, all of these things may have played a role.

>> fareed, do you agree with that? >> i agree, but i think the point that richard makes is very important, which is that the north koreans have gotten to the point they wanted to get. for 25 years, they have been pursuing a path to a robust nuclear capacity with intercontinental ballistic missiles. they've gotten there. now they want to negotiate, and presumably the negotiation would involve further freezes and such. if trump can really get them to massively reverse the program, if he can get them to do what the iran nuclear deal looks like, which is which is to freeze in a pre-weapon stage, that will be a big accomplishment. they would then be giving up 25 years of what they've given up. my guess is going in they want to do exactly what richard said, which is to keep the gains they had and no more tests. they aren't going to keep going, but they want to freeze some large part of what they have.

>> ambassador, the new national security adviser says the president is looking at libya for example, as negotiations with north korea. what do you think the lesson of libya is? >> the lesson of libya, not to mention the lesson of iraq and ukraine is to keep ahold of your nuclear weapons. if that's the case, we're setting ourselves up for failure. i'd expect kim jong-un is very familiar with what happened to moammar gadhafi after he got out of the nuclear weapons business or saddam hussein. so the lesson as we see it though is north korea has to give up everything. i have to agree to all intrusive monitoring verification. before they can expect any benefits. i think this is going to be an extremely short summit. the location won't matter and we're going to end up with a diplomatic failure on our hands of the first order. >> in terms of iran, fareed, last night the white house released this statement that said, iran has a robust

clandestine nuclear weapons program. obviously they quickly only online changed has to had. sarah sanders was asked about that. i want to play that for our viewers. >> how does a mistake like this get made and do you believe that the white house has a credibility problem around the world with its statements like this? do you take this seriously? >> absolutely. which is why we immediately corrected it. but, again, i think the biggest mistake is the fact that the united states ever entered into the iran deal in the first place. that, to me, seems to be the biggest mistake in this process, not a simple typo that was immediately corrected and notified individuals as soon as we knew it happened. >> fareed, does a mistake like this matter? does it create some sort of credibility problem? >> i feel as though with the administration, they play fast and loose with the fasts so often that it does create a credibility problem. they almost seem as though they're so eager to make a partisan point that the truth becomes the casualty. i think for the president of the

united states, you know, they're not nearly as careful as they should be with just sticking to the facts. >> ambassador haas, fareed zakaria, thanks. up next, the drama here at home over dr. ronny jackson, with drew his name as v.a. nominee. no longer the president's personal physician but president trump still supports dr. jacksen and feels that he's been treated unfairly by a democrat on capitol hill. wait until you hear what the senate chairman of the veteran affairs committee has to say about this when we continue. get more stories to share. get more from your summer getaway with exclusive hilton offers. book yours, only at hilton.com >> vo: they want more out of life in every way. so they're starting this year's garden with miracle-gro potting mix and plant food. together, they produce three times the harvest to enjoy... and of course, to share. this soil is fresh from the forest and patiently aged

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tonight, the republican chairman of the senate veteran affairs committee is speaking out on "360" over president's criticism of ronny jackson to head the v.a.

the president may not like what the republican has to say. jackson withdrew last week and no longer the president as personal physician, that's after allegations surfaced around him including that he improper dispenses medication. he claims to have done nothing wrong. >> the president wrote, quote, secret service has informed me that john tester's statemnts on dr. jackson are not true. there were no such findings, a horrible thing we in d.c. must live with just like collusion. tester should lose the race in montana. very sick. so, does the republican chairman who works with the senator gary tucker caught up with the senator today and joins us now. >> i did catch up with him where he was speaking in carrollton, georgia this afternoon. i asked him for he agrees with president trump that allegations made or dr. jackson are not true, and he said, he does not agree with that. >> well, fortunately, last night

a story broke that made that a false statement. because part of the allegations made in one of the affidavits was verified by a manu -- what's manu's name? manu raju, a great guy, by the way, and does a great job. the allegations incorporated in some of the complaints held against admiral jackson were validated in that. so it looks like there has been a story that corroborates the fact that there were some of those allegations which were correct. i did my job. every senator has the responsibility if they're presented with accusations to try to seek the truth. and that exonerates everybody who seeks the truth. so if you're seeking the truth then you're covered. if you're not seeking the truth or if you're twisting the facts, that's something else, but i don't think that was done. >> anderson, snerk isaacson

telling us that since he defended senator tester yesterday, he has heard nothing negative about that from the white house. with dr. jackson no longer in the running to be v.a. secretary, his committee's investigation is now over. >> fascinating. gary tuchman. thanks. thanks for watching "360" as well. time to hand it over to don lemon. "cnn tonight" starts now. see you time. this is "cnn tonight." i'm don lemon. another night of multiple big stories and we're following all of them for you. our breaking news right now, sources tell cnn president trump's lawyers are preparing for a showdown with robert mueller. that's over the special counsel's warning that he could issue a subpoena forcing the president to appear before a grand jury. that is a battle shaping up and we will bring you all of the latest reporting on that. plus, president trump really seems to have some doctor issues. just one week after that scandal that brought down the white house physician ronny jackson, trump's