very short period of time. but it's been a relationship that seems to be working and we'll see how long it continues to work. hopefully it will work for a long time. >>unrelated, you can tell us more about your meeting with rod rosenstein and director wray? >> it was a routine meeting. the congress would like to see documents opened up, a lot of people are saying that they had spies in my campaign. if they had spies in my campaign, that would be a disgrace to this country. that would be one of the biggest insults that anyone has ever seen. it would be very illegal aside from everything else. it would make probably every political event ever look like small potatoes. so we want to make sure that there weren't. i hope there weren't frankly. but some man got paid based on what i read in the newspapers and on what you reported, some person got paid a lot of money. that is not a normal situation. the kind of money you are talking about. so hopefully that would be --

and i think the department of justice wants to get down to it and i can tell you congress does. so hopefully they will all be able to get together. general kelly will be setting up a meeting between congress and the various representatives. and they will be able to open up documents, take a look and find out what happened. but if they had spies in my campaign during my campaign for political purposes, that would be unprecedented in the history of our country. >> you can giveis us update, i there is a deal about zte? >> no, president trump xi and i have a great relationship as president moon can attest. but there is no deal. we will see what happens. we are discussing deals. we're discussing various deals. we can do a 301, where we don't need china, where we can just say this is what we want, this is what we think is fair. that is always a possibility if a negotiated deal does not work

out. as i said, we lost $500 billion a year for many years. and then it varied from $100 billion to $500 billion. when you are losing $500 billion a year, you can't lose in terms of a negotiation. it is really easy to win. but i want this to be a great deal for the united states. and i want to be a very good deal for china too if that is possible. it may not be possible. as far as zte is concerned, the president asked me to look into it and i'm doing that. and don't forget, for the ones that say, oh, gee, maybe trump is getting a little bit easy, zte, we closed it. it wasn't another administration. it was this administration that closed it. it is a phone company for those that don't know, a very large phone company. but it is also a phone company that buys a large portion of its parts that make up these phones that are sold all over the world from american companies.

and so when you do that you are really hurting american companies also. so i'm looking at it. but we were the ones that closed it. it wasn't done by previous administrations. it was done by us. so we'll see what happens. but as a favor to the president, i am absolutely taking a look at it. a lot of the stories on trade were incorrectly written. and i'm not saying that is the reporter's fault, i'm saying that -- i'm not talking about the trade deal. i don't like to talk about deals until they are done. so we'll see what happens. but i will say that deal could be much different from the deal that finally emerges. and it may be a much better deal for the united states. >> do you have confidence in rod rosenste rosenstein? >> what is your next question, please? >> skies excuse me, i have the president of south korea here. he doesn't want to hear these questions if you don't mind. >> i'm a reporter from south korea. what confidence and trust do you

have in the president playing a mediator role in resolving the issue with north korea? >> i have great confidence in your president. i think that he has brought a different perspective to the talks with north korea. he wants to be able to make a deal. you've had some very hard line administrations and you have president moon and you've had others before president moon who also had more or less this attitude. i think he is a very capable person. i think he is an extremely competent man. i think that he is a very good person and i think that he wants to have what is good for the korean peninsula, not just north or south, for the entire korean peninsula. so i have tremendous confidence in president moon. and i think that his way, the way he is, really is helping us to potentially make a deal. whether the deal gets made, who

those. you go into deals that are 100% certain, it doesn't happen. you go into deals that have no chance and it happens and sometimes happens easily. i've made a lot of deals. i know deals i think better than anybody. you never really know and that's why i say to you. but this is a good man and he is a very capable man. and i think south korea is very lucky to have him. do you want to interpret that for him so he can hear? because he's not hearing what we're doing here. go ahead. [ speaking foreign language ]

>> did i do a good job? i can't do better than that. that is called an a-plus rating, right? okay. we'll take a couple more. >> what are your conditions for meeting with kim jung-un? >> i'd rather not say, but we

are working on something. and there is a chance that it will work out. there is a chance that it is a very substantial chance that it won't work out. i don't want to waste a lot time and i'm sure he doesn't want to waste a lot of time. so there is a very substantial chance that it won't work out and that is okay. doesn't mean it nt would work o won't work out over a period of time, but it may not work out for june 12. but there a good chance we'll have a meeting. >> in terms of denuclearization, could it be incremental with incentives along the way? >> all in one would be nice. i won't go beyond that. it would certainly be better if it were all in one. does it have to be? i don't want to totally commit myself, but all in one would be a lot better. [ speaking foreign language ]

>> at least for physical reasons over a very short period of time. you do have some physical reasons that it may not be able to do exactly that. so for physical reasons, over a very short period of time. essentially that would be all in one. [ speaking foreign language ] >> president, i'm a reporter from south korea. [ [ inaudible question ] >> i will guarantee his safety, yes. we will guarantee his safety and we've talked about that from the beginning. he will be safe. he will be happy. his country will be rich.

his country will be hard working and very prosperous. they are very great people. they are hard working great people. look at what happened with south korea. don't forget, we helped south korea. we have spent trillions of dollars, not billions, trillions of dollars over many, many years. we helped south korea. and south korea is one of the most incredible countries in terms of what they do. you know that, that is where you are, that is where you're from. same people, same people. so, yeah, i think that he will be extremely happy if something works out. and if it didn't woit doesn't w honestly, he can't be happy, but he has a chance to do something that maybe has never been done before. and i think that it would be -- if you look 25 years into the future, 50 years in to the future, he will be able to look back and be very proud of what he did for north korea. and actually for the world.

but he will be very proud of what he did for north korea. >> what did you want to ask president moon about his own summit with -- [ speaking foreign language n [

. >> just to finish that because it is a very important question, south korea, china and japan, and i've spoken to all three, one i happen to have right here, they will be willing to help and i believe invest very, very large sums of money into helping to make north korea great. [ speaking foreign language ]

>> what do you want to hear from president moon about his own summit with kim jung-un? what can he tell you? >> that's what we're hear for. he has his own meetings that he's had. we'll discuss that. he may have a meeting coming up. he may not. word is that he may not, it may go directly to us or it may be a later date. but that is one of the reasons that he is here to talk about that. >> anything you want to ask him specifically? >> no. we speak a lot on the phone. this should not be that long a meeting actually. [ inaudible question ] >> he may or may not. right now he doesn't know whether or not he has a meeting. he may or may not have a meeting with kim jung-un. [ speaking foreign language ]

>> mr. president, are you pleased with you how the trade talks with china went? >> no, not really. i think that they are a start. but we need something -- look, china has been -- i really call it a dereliction of duties. if you look at it, in the military they would say takes dereliction of duty. what happened to our country that our representativestakes dereliction of duty. what happened to our country that our representatives allowed other countries, and i'm not talking about china, china is the big one, to take advantage of us on trade the way we've

been taken advantage of. so china has an example has made a fortune. i mean, a transfer of wealth like knobs has ever seen nobody. china is the big one, but they are almost all there. so, no, i'm not satisfied, but we have a long way to go. but i want to go fairly quickly. you are talking about numbers like that, you are talking about billions of dollars a week, okay? so when they say let's meet in a couple weeks, no, that is $2 billion. i trview it that way. we're talking about billions of dollars a week that we suffer. we lose. and so we're looking to go quickly. i will say i'm a little disappointed because when kim jung-un had the meeting with president xi in china, the second meeting -- first meeting we knew about. the secretaond meeting. i think there was a little change from attitude from kim jung-un. so i don't like that. i don't like that. i don't like it from the

standpoint of china. now, i hope that is not true because we have -- i have a great relationship with president xi. he is a friend of mine. he likes me, i like him. i mean, that was two of the great days in my life being in china. i don't think anybody has ever been treated better in china ever in their history. and i just think that it was -- many of you were there. it was an incredible thing to witness and see s. we built a great relationship. but there was a difference when kim jung-un left china the second time. and i think they were dedicating an aircraft carrier that the united states paid for, okay? because we pay for a lot. that was built in china. >> do you think china may be discouraged kim from -- >> no, but i think that president xi is a world class poker player. and i'm probably maybe doing the same thing that he would do. but i will say this, there was

somewhat different attitude after that meeting. and i'm a little surprise. maybe nothing happened. i'm not blaming anybody. but i'm just saying maybe nothing happened and maybe it did. but there was a different attitude by the north korean folks when -- after that meeting. so i don't think it was a great meeting. nobody knew about the meeting and all of a sudden it was reported that he was in china a second time. first time everybody knew about, second time was like a surprise. and i think things changed after that meeting. so i can't say that i'm happy about it. >> mr. president, what is -- >> let them -- [ speaking foreign language ]

>> president moon may have a different opinion, i'd like kroir your

opinion on that, what you thought of the second meeting with president xi. what is your feeling. [ speaking foreign language ] >> a i don't want to get him this trouble he lives right next to china. he's not too far away. [ speaking foreign language ]ro china. he's not too far away. [ speaking foreign language ] >> translator: first of all i'm very much aware that there are many skeptical views within the

united states about whether the upcoming u.s./north korea summit will truly be successful and whether are the complete denuclearization will be realized. [ speaking foreign language ] >> but i don't think that there will be positive developments in history because we assume that it failed in the past that it will fail again. [ speaking foreign language ] >> translator: there have been many agreements between the united states and north korea previously, but this will be the first time that there will be an agreement between the leaders. [ speaking foreign plan ] >> translator: and the person in charge is president trump. [ speaking foreign language ]

>> translator: and president trump has been able to achieve this dramatic and positive change that you see right now. [ speaking foreign language ] >> translator: and i have every confidence that president trump will be table to achieve

historic feat of making the upcoming summit with north korea successful and end the korean war that had been lasting the past 65 years and along the way achieve complete denuclearization of north korea, establish permanent peace regime on the korean peninsula and also normalize relations between the united states and north korea. i have every confidence that he will be able to make a historic turnaround in this sense and i will expend no effort to provide support. [ speaking foreign language ] >> translator: and i believe that all of this will lead to a great thing, that it will also guarantee the security of the north korean regime and also promise peace and prosperity for north korea as women. >> do you believe president xi

is committed to peace? >> i would like to think so. i hope so. we're dealing mostly on trade. but you see, when i'm dealing on trade, i have many other things in mind also. every time i talk to china about trade, i'm thinking about the border because that border is a very important element in what we're doing. it has been cut off largely. but it has been opened up a little bit lately. i don't like that. i don't like that. so we have a very powerful hand on trade. and i read you folks and you say why doesn't he -- there is a much bigger picture that i have in mind. trade has always been a very important element in my life in talking about other countries ripping off the united states. i've been watching them do it for 35 years. i've been watching them do that for so many years and nothing has changed other than over the last 15, 20 years it's gotten worse. and it is not just china.

but when i think of trade with china, i'm also thinking about what they are doing to help us with peace with north korea. that is a very important element. so we'll see how it all works out. but in the end it will work out. i can't tell you exactly how or why. but it amit always does. it will work out. thank you all. john, you have one more? >> just wondering what is your vision for the long game with north korea. is it two koreans peacefully co-existing or would you like to see reunification? >> i think what is going to happen is you will start off certainly with two koreas and then it will be largely up to them as to whether or not they get together. that border was artificially imposed many, many years ago. and imposed to a certain extent and to a very large extent by us. it is an artificial border, but it is a border that nevertheless took seed and that's what you have. i would say that we are looking

certainly right now at two koreas. two very successful koreas. you could have a very successful north korea and you could have a very successful and you already do south korea. south korea was in condition that was as bad as north korea many years ago when they started this great experiment that worked out so well for them. now you look at samsung and lg and the ships that they are building and what they are doing, it is incredible. when i was over there, i flew over plants that written credit are incredible. so i see two koreas and ultimately maybe some day in the future,credit are incredible. so i see two koreas and ultimately maybe some day in the future, maybe them get together and you will go back to one korea. and that would be okay with me too as long as they both wanted that. okay? thank you all very much. thank you. >> you mentioned that you were looking into zte. how do you anticipate that ending up? >> well, again, zte buys a

tremendous amount of equipment and parts for their telephones. as you know, they are the fourth largest in the world. and they buy them from american companies. so immediately when i looked at it, it was my administration that closed them down. but when i looked at it, i said you know, they could pay a big price without necessarily damaging all of these american companies which they are because you know you are talking about tremendous amounts ever money and jobs to american companies. so i envisionever money and jobs to american companies. so i envision a very large fine, i envision perhaps new management, new board of directors, very tight security rules. but we caught them doing bad things. we caught them, not anybody else, we caught them doing bad things and we essentially made it so difficult that it was shut down. by shutting them down, we're hurting a lot of american companies. really good american companies. and i will tell you, don't think that we didn't hear from them by

shutting down this massive phone company. so what i envision is a very large fine of more than a billion dollars. could be a billion three. i envision new management, a new board, and very, very strict security rules. and i also envision that they will have to buy a big percentage of their parts and equipment from american companies. okay? thank you all very much. thank you. all right. reporters still shouting questions, but the president wrapping up a lengthy exchange there with president moon answering a whole bunch of questions from reporters for nearly a half an hour given the translation from english into korean and vice versa.

i'm wolf blitzer. we welcome our viewers here in the united states and around the world. extensive news on a potential summit between president trump and kim jung-un. the president raising doubts whether the june 12 summit in singapore will actually take plous questions about the north korean attitude suggesting perhaps kim jung-un's attitude toward the president of the united states changed after his most recent -- after kim's most recent meeting with president xi. at the same time the president reaching out to the north koreans saying that the united states will guarantee the survival of kim jung-un if in fact the denuclearization program involving north korea goes forward. lots to discuss. and we have an excellent panel to assess what is going on. samantha, what was your immediate reaction to the prospects of this scheduled summit june 12th, the president saying it may go on, may not go on, raising some doubts about whether it will go on?

>> well, there is definitely public distance between president moon of south korea and president trump. president moon seemed to treat the summit as a foregone conclusion. whereas president trump did obfuscate on whether the meeting would actually happen which contradicts his national security adviser john bolton, his press secretary sarah sanders, who said last week that the summit was going ahead as scheduled. now, i do think that this is smart. i think that the president should try to get north korea to meet specific pre-conditions before he shows up in singapore, but i also think it is important to have a coordinated line among at least his administration whether it will happen. >> and you heard, max, the president say that there was a change in attitude on the part of the north koreans, kim jung-un, following the most recent meeting that kim jung-un had with president xi of china, there was a difference when kim jung-un left china the second time. so if it doesn't happen, he seems to be blaming at least in

part china. >> that's right. it is interesting that he is now seeming to attach pre-conditions to the meeting which he of course did not come when he accepted the offer to meet with north korea. now he is wondering about what will happen because he raised expectations so high over the course of the last few weeks talking as if denuclearization was a done deal, saying many want him to win the nobel peace prize and then the events of last week kind of poured cold water on those high hopes, threats to poult. pull out. and this is very much in keeping with north korea's historic attitude which you have to be incredibly naive and know nothing about north korea to imagine that after having spent decades absen s and billions of developing nuclear weapons that they will you just hand them over at the negotiating table and not expect something pretty substantial in return. >> and we'll go to our white

house reporter in a moment, but rich, i want to get your reaction to what the president said, i will guarantee his safety, referring to kim jung-un. he will be safe. he will be happy, his country will be prosperous, we will help just like we helped south korea with trillions of u.s. dollars. these are the same people they will be extremely happy if this deal is worked out. >> we should ever anything if they will immediately denuclearize, but that seems extremely unlikely. if i were the president, i think he should back off the summit entirely. part of what north korea was doing last week is yanking our chain to make the point that we might want the summit more than they do. if they are serious about pursuing a new path forward, let it bubble up from below and low level meetings rather than giving them the summit right away. and something that i think the north koreans probably focused on, he said we want complete and immediate denuclearization as the ideal, but maybe they will be short of that. so you see the north koreans

starting the negotiation where they believe they have made some progress. >> and jeremy diamond, the president spent almost a half an hour answering reporters' questions. pretty extra ordinary. but the focus clearly being on north korea. >> reporter: yeah, absolutely. it was just yesterday that we reported that trump administration officials were growing increasingly skeptical about the chances of that this meeting between the president and kim jung-un actually taking place next month. and what we heard from the president today was him reflecting that very same skepticism. saying that he believes there is a substantial chance that this meeting between him and kim jung-un will not take place next month. he did leave open the possibility to it happening later on if they are not able to agree to this june 12th summit. and this is the president reflecting a lot of these internal conversations that are happening every day inside this white house. sparked in particular by the north korean statements last week which really did pour a lot of cold water on the high hopes for the summit that have existed

in the west wing and that the president in particular has had. but it was also interesting to hear the president say that north korea needs to meet certain conditions in order to have this meeting take place. this is the president trying to regain control of the narrative, regain control of what it will take to actually get to this summit next month. clearly we heard two very different feelings from the president and from the south korean president moon jae-in who was much more optimistic about this, really signaling the importance of having this summit and the history that could be accomplished by having it. so that is what will continue to happen behind closed doors here, the south korean president emphasizing to president trump that this summit still should go through and can still be a success. >> i want you to listen to what the vice president mike pence said last night bringing up the whole libya example in terms of future negotiations with north korea. listen to this. >> there was some talk about the

libyan model last week. and you know, as the president made clear, this will only end like the libyan model ended if kim jung-un doesn't make a deal. >> some people saw that as a threat. >> well, i think it is more of a fact. >> jeremy diamond, clearly it was a threat that not only mike pence but the president's new national security adviser the other day on one of the sunday talk shows john bolton, he made a similar charge that look what happened to libya. >> reporter: yeah, that's right. this administration and its ale lies, we heard this similar line from senator lindsey graham the other day making clear that the only alternative that they see is a military option. they have laid that out repeatedly and clearly that that is the only alternative that they see and that they do intend to resolve this issue by the president's first term. that is also something that they have said.

and the reason for that being that either diplomacy will run its course and it will be successful or north korea will likely continue to advance its nuclear weapons program and this administration has made clear that it is not taking the military option off the table and it is also considering this potential of a preventive strike something that has received a lot of criticism from foreign policy circles in washington, this notion of going after north korea before it attacks to prevent it from obtaining the nuclear weapons capability to strike the united states. >> stand by, will ripley our correspondent is in pyongyang, he is joining us on the phone. will, what are you hearing over there from your sources as this summit on june 12th in singapore between the president and chism goi kim jung-un going to take place? >> reporter: i think there is a lot of questions on the ground here in korea about whether the summit will take place. north koreans have said that they would walk away as well if they feel like they are not getting what they need from the united states. and there have been some things

that have happened that have angered the north koreans. here on the east coast, they are expecting perhaps in a matter of hours to go on a train to go up to a nuclear test site in the mountains. and obviously this development makes me wonder if north koreans will still go through with that and take journalists up to see this site, will they still blow up the tunnels and continue the dismantling process. this is why have been brought here, but this development could be a game change on the ground. north koreans are angry about the remarks from mike pence. before that, john bolton. they consider it a threat saying that north korea could become the next libya. they also think that the united states is practicing to invade north korea right now because of the military drills that are happening in south korea this month. they don't believe that the u.s. climbing claims that they are defensive, they see bombers an fighter jets

and they look at that time as yet another practice invasion of their country. and so there has been some posturing here ahead of the summit, north korea i can't saying what they want which is they want the military drills to stop, they want the sanctions to stop, they eventually want u.s. forces off the peninsula, they want economic opportunities in exchange, but they say that it won't be a unilateral surrender which they feel the united states is calling for. so tough talk also from the north koreans. and keep in mind where i am here just less than a year ago when i was here, they were launching missiles from this city, they were conducting live fire drills along the beach. now they are building a beach resort along that same beach where they were shooting artillery hoping to attraction tourists because of increased economic opportunity partially from opening up with the u.s. obviously a lot of that is up in the air if this summit does not

happen. >> just to ob plbe precise, you there with other journalists to be observe the destruction of the nuclear test site that is supposed to happen when? >> reporter: we don't know. we were told that we were going to get on a train several hours ago, but it has beaeeen raining here and it is a treacherous journey. we have to go 12 hours on the train, then four hours in a car and then we have to hike an hour to get to this test site. there have fewer than two dozen of us here. the government has been selective about who is on the trip. but we are supposed to make this journey at some point possibly in a matter of hours once the weather clears and it is safe enough to go through the mountains to get there to watch them destroy the test site. that is the whole reason we were brought into the country. and the government really has rolled out the red carpet. they refurbish bed an entire

restore the wher resort where we are staying. but clearly these remarks from president trump do make me wonder what will really happen now on this trip here inside north korea. >> lots of uncertainty right now and the president raising some doubts whether or not that june 12 summit with kim jung-un will take place. he says if it didn't tait doesne now, maybe down the road. will ripley, be careful over there. we'll stay in close touch with you of course. the president also answered a question on the latest developments involving the russia investigation undertaken by the special counsel robert mueller and the role the department of justice, deputy attorney general. listen to this. >> a lot of people are saying they had spies in my campaign. if they had spies in my campaign, that would be a disgrace to this country, one of

the insults anybody has seen and very illegal. probably major every other event look like small potatoes. i hope there weren't frankly, but some man got paid based on what i read in the newspapers and on what you reported, some person got paid a lot of money, that is not a normal situation the kind of money you are talking about. so hopefully that would be -- and i think the department of justice wants to get down to it and i can tell you congress does. so hopefully they will all be able to get together, general kelly will be setting up a meeting between congress and the various representatives and they will be able to open up documents, take a look and find out what happened. but if they had spies in my campaign during my campaign for political purposes, that would be unprecedented in the history of our country. >> josh campbell is joining us. he is our cnn law enforcement analyst, former fbi supervisory special agent. the president keeps referring to

the possibility that not a spy, but spies planted by the obama administration into the trump campaign. he says that would be unprecedented, a huge scandal. what is your reaction to that? you used to work over there for the fbi director james comey. >> words matter in the intelligence business and it is important to define our terms. when we compare a spy to an informant, let's look what the we're talking about here. when we talk about a spy, this done injures up images of people in the dark maybe with questionable 340i6s.injures up in the dark maybe with questionable 340i6s. it is illegal in every country, but we don't spy on americans. let's compare that with what law enforcement does when they use an informant or source to further the investigation. and with the fbi or department of justice, that is one of among the most highly scrutinized investigative tools within the department of justice both because of the risk and you want

to make sure you are not violating civil liberties of someone that may not be warranted. so there a high level of oversight. so two separate issues. if one were to look at that more critically, it could be described as conflation. >> so what is your reaction specifically to what the president just said? >> you hear the qualifier. what he is saying is if the fbi or if the government was spying on my campaign, this would be among the biggest scandals in history if for political purposes. and it is that last part that we really have to focus on. because i actually agree with him here that if the fbi had implanted a human source for political purposes, that would be outrageous. the problem is it is somewhat of a straw man because no one is claiming that. even some of the reporting appears as though this person was helping further and on going counter intelligence investigation.

but we haven't seen any claim yet that it was the obama administration injecting a spy in order to gather information and do something sinister. and the reason i think that we know that is because look at what we've seen. we've seen appointees under president obama launch the investigation and approve this type of activity and they were able to somehow convince appointees under president trump both rod rosenstein, attorney general and fbi director to now gend tho defend those telling. >> all right. congressman swallwell is joining us. the inspector general has been ordered to dig into any possible wrongdoing as the president alleged that maybe there were spies planted by the obama administration against the trump campaign. do you believe that the

department of justice is doing the right thing? >> i wish they wouldn't do that, wolf. i have reviewed a lot of this evidence. i have not seen anything improper. what i do see is a president who is acting sprangly more like a dictator. one of the most precious things we have in america is our rule of law. the separation between those being investigated and the independence that we give to investigators that they can put their cases forward, that an independent judiciary can sign off on warrants to allow them to go forward and ultimately a jury decides the fate of anyone accused. we have the president of the united states prying to break into the safe, the evidence locker that holds evidence in the case against him. and that is just wrong. and i understand mr. rosenstein and mr. wray are not in an easy position here, but i would really caution against doing anything that invades upon the real wall that must exist between a subject and an investigation and the work that

the fbi is doing and sources who they must protect to make sure that their lives are not in danger. because in the future we will need people to work with the u.s. government and trust that they will not be exposed. >> but if a u.s. confidential source was instructed by either the fbi or the cia or someone in the u.s. law enforcement or intelligence community to go ahead and reach out to three advisers to the trump campaign to cozy up to them, to pick their brains, to find out what they know, what they were doing, is that spying? >> so wolf, no. and i guess i don't accept that that is what happened and i don't accept the president's version of the events. what i have seen is a lot of alarming behavior on the part of people on the trump team and now we've learned by the trump family members in the contacts that they had with russia. of course in the interest of our national security we'd want the fbi to investigate that.

they have a number of different tactics that they can use to find out what is going on before they launch a full scale investigation. and what i'm telling you is from where i sit and the evidence that i've been able to view, i have not seen them act improper at all. >> does the congress in its oversight capacities of intelligence community have a right to know all the details what led to this decision to have this u.s. confidential source contact these three officials from the trump campaign? >> not while an investigation is ongoing. and that is what is so troublesome here. of course we want to look at investigations once they ever concluded to make sure that civil liberties were followed and that there were no abuses. but what you are seeing here by the president and his fixers in congress is an attempt to just reach into the evidence locker of the fbi, review the evidence and then it compromises the case and then they seek to undermine the work that the special counsel is doing so that if he

were to bring forward indictments, they have cast a cloud over those indictments and it would hurt the ability to prosecute the case to any jury. that is so irresponsible. i really wish my colleagues who care i know deeply about the rule of law would step back and think about the long term damage they are doing to the independence of the department of justice in our country. >> congressman, thanks so much for joining us. >> my pleasure. homeland security secretary kirstjen nielsen says she is not aware of the u.s. intelligence assessment that vladimir putin specifically tried to help president trump win the 2016 presidential election. the comments was made after nielsen and other top officials were briefed this morning. only 40 or 50 -- more than 430 members of the house of representatives actually showed up for this classified briefing. i want to go to our cnn senior congressional correspondent manu raju up on capitol hill.

you were there. give us the context of secretary nielsen's remark that she wasn't aware of the u.s. intelligence community 's conclusion. >> reporter: she discussed behind closed doors with the house members about what the united states has learned since 2016 when the russians meddled in the elections. so i had a chance to ask her specifically about the intelligence community's assessment about what happened in 2016 elections. and in that assessment, it is quite clear that the intelligence community believes that donald trump was favored by vladimir putin and that putin had a clear preference that donald trump win the election and took steps, russia did, to help trump win. when i asked homeland security secretary directly whether or not she agrees with that assessment, she side stepped it and also said that she was unaware of that finding. >> to that point, do you have any reason to doubt the january 2017 intelligence community assessment that said that it was vladimir putin who tried to

meddle in the election to help president trump win? >> i do not believe that i've seen that conclusion. what i do -- that the specific intent was to help president trump win. i'm not aware of that. but i do generally have no reason to doubt any intelligence assessment. i think what they are trying to do in my opinion, and i defer to the intel community, is disrupt our belief and our own understanding of what is it happening. it is an integrity issue of who is saying what or why and how that may or may not affect an american's behavior in what they believe. >> but the assessment did say that putin did try -- orchestrated a cyber campaign with the intention of helping donald trump. do you have any disagreement with that? >> i do believe that russia did and will continue to try to manipulate american's perspective on a whole variety of issues. >> reporter: now, afterwards homeland security department did put out a statement saying she believes the assessment and says that the question was asked did

not reflect the specific language in the ic assessment. but the exact language in the ic assessment said that putin and the russian government developed a clear preference for president trump and aspired to hep president trump's election chances by discrediting secretary clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him and also the senate intelligence committee on a bipartisan basis has reaffirm whatd intelligence community at large has said. some house republicans dispute what the intelligence community said. so it is uncertain exactly where secretary nielsen comes down on this specific point as we know the president himself has thrown cold water that russia did anything to help his election chances in 2016. >> pretty intriguing stuff. thanks very much. rich lowry, secretary of homeland security doesn't know what the u.s. intelligence community concluded? it is a public document. it was released january 6,

201737 we further assess putin and the russian government developed a clear preference for trump and they aspired to help president trump's election chances when possible by discrediting secretary clinton and publicly contrasting her unfavorably to him. how is it possible that the secretary of homeland security doesn't know that? >> i think she probably doesn't want to say she knows that in case there is an audience of one paying attention and didn't like her saying that. i think that conclusion is probably correct. there is some ambiguity. property tests, most successful protest was in new york after the election protesting trump's election. so there was an elements much just trying to create chaos and breed distrust of the entire system. but it seems fairly clear that they did develop a preference over time in the election. >> and it is shocking to me that the secretary of homeland

security is denying what any reader of the "new york times" or watcher of cnn knows because this is the person who is charged with defending us from future attacks. and these are not over. our intelligence chiefs are saying that russians are planning to hit our next election. their interference is not over. and one of the most shocking things of what is going on, president trump is trying to obstruct the investigation. he doesn't seem to care if the russians are going to meddle in the future. secretary nielsen is the person on the front lines who is supposed to protect us from these kind of occurrences. she's denying that it happened in the first place. they are not protecting and defending the constitution of the united states. >> she's speaking to an audience of one. she already got herself in trouble earlier. >> that's a sign that the president is so in denial and so

refuses to accept reality, that his head of homeland security can't speak truthfully, people are going to lose confidence in her. >> is she going to read the intelligence that's still coming in? it's a very bad precedent. >> everybody stick around. there's more news that we're getting. get this, journalists, from the associated press we're today barred from covering pa san epa summit.

>> the associated press is saying one of their reporters when they protested and asked to talk to a public affairs person, that this were shoved outside the building, something that our journalists witnessed. >> physically shoved? >> physically shoved by a uniformed security guard. the statement says that the selective barring of news organizations, including the a.p. from covering today's meeting is alarming and a direct threat to the public's right to know about what is happening inside their government. it is particularly distressing what any journalist trying to cover an event in the public interest would be forcibly removed. cnn put out a statement separately saying we understand

the importance of an open and free press and we open the epa does, too. >> it's shocking. this is an open event. it's not classified information. reporters were invited but they specifically told the associated press and cnn get out. >> right. the epa said it's a space issue but a journalist with "the hill" published a story saying there were vacant seats in the press area. we obtained a photograph that shows there was certainly space for additional cameras. >> very often when some journalists are expelled for this, the other journalists stand up and protest and they walk out as well. in this particular case, they went in? >> there's no walkout that i'm aware of. we did talk to one of the journalists in the room and there was room for cnn to have cameras there and for the ap.

>> pretty shocking stuff. there's a dinner tonight, reporters committee for freedom of the press. it's shocking. >> you might want to extend an invite to the epa. >> thanks very much, oliver, for that. >> the president is now saying the summit with kim jong un may not happen after all next month. you're seeing the president of south korea, president moon now leaving the west wing of the white house. (vo) we came here for the friends.

and we got to know the friends of our friends. and we found others just like us. and just like that we felt a little less alone. but then something happened. we had to deal with spam, fake news, and data misuse. that's going to change. from now on, facebook will do more to keep you safe and protect your privacy. because when this place does what it was built for, then we all get a little closer.

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