president, vladimir putin, over his own intelligence community, over his own law enforcement community on this critical question of russian interference in the 2016 election. and i think when vladimir putin was asked that question by jonathan lemur of the associated press at the very end whether or not the russians had compromising information on president trump, i thought it was very interesting that vladimir putin paused for a few moments, seeming to understand the question but not exactly sure how to answer it. and there was some nervous laughter in the room. i don't know if you could hear that on the microphones in the room, but there was some nervous laughter. it took all of us by surprise. it sounded as if vladimir putin was trying at that point to come up with a good answer and he didn't really have one. i thought it was striking, anderson, that the russian president did offer to allow robert mueller's team to come over to russia to continue his investigation. i'm not sure that would be greeted very well by president trump, given that that would probably extend the life of the

russia investigation. but i will tell you, it was astonishing, just astonishing to be in the room with the u.s. president and with the russian president on this critical question of election interference and to hear the president of the united states retreat back to these talking points about dnc servers and hillary clinton's e-mails when he had a chance right there in front of us, right there in front of the world to confront vladimir putin and tell him to stay the hell out of american democracy, and he just didn't do it. it was one of those moments, i think, obviously we all think this is a very big deal right now and sometimes these sorts of things can fade away. but i don't think this is one of those moments. this is one of those moments, anderson, i think really crystallizes a very critical problem for the united states right now in that you have the president, the leader of the free world, taking the word of vladimir putin who from all accounts inside the u.s. government, the u.s. intelligence community, the law enforcement community, attacked

american democracy in 2016. you know, when vladimir putin was asked whether he wanted trump to win, that might have been the only honest moment of this news conference when vladimir putin said yes, he did want president trump to win. and then shortly after that handed him that soccer ball. they came across as play mates on a soccer field more than they did international rivals, anderson. the president of the united states very much yielding the field on this day to vladimir putin. anderson. >> susan, have you ever seen anything like this? >> you know, it's really -- i think we are going to remember this day for a long time. sometimes there are indelible images that come out. certainly george w. bush talking about vladimir putin's soul. i think this moment is going to go down with that moment for me at least to hear the president of the united states attacking robert mueller's investigation, questioning the u.s. intelligence agencies, the work of his own justice department, while standing literally next to vladimir putin. he called the probe a disaster

for our country as russia's leader looked on. he began the summit meeting this morning with that extraordinary tweet in which he said that essentially the united states is to blame for the bad state of relations with russia. crimea and the illegal annexation of territory in europe, the first such armed takeover since the end of world war ii was never mentioned until the very last question of the press conference. i think this is one of those moments where, you know, we heard rod rosenstein on friday say this is not partisan, this investigation. well, president trump has made the most partisan press conference i've ever seen between an american leader and the leader of russia. >> he was tougher on democrats and the intelligence community in this press conference. i mean he was given the opportunity by an american reporter to just turn to vladimir putin and say something to him about russia's meddling in the united states democracy, which is ongoing, and he refused

to do that. instead went after democrats. >> this was a worst-case scenario going into this. you know, many people were hoping the hippocratic oath would apply here, do no harm. the first half of the press conference the two leaders' statements made it clear they didn't come out with some grand new bargain, there were no initiatives that would cause alarm back on capitol hill among republicans or democrats. then president trump basically exploded all of that in the second half of the press conference. you know, one year ago his national security advisor wrote an article in which he said the russian election interference was an act of war against the united states. well, john bolton was in the lunch today with vladimir putin. does he still think that's an act of war? how can he serve a president who spoke the way that he did today? >> how can john bolton remain in that position if he truly believes this country was attacked in an act of war and the man he's now working for clearly does not? dana bash is standing by as

well. dana, your thoughts. >> john bolton is one. how about the president's own director of national intelligence. the president of the united states effectively just threw under the bus in favor of the russian president on an issue that has to do with russia interfering in american elections. i mean if you just kind of take a pause and think about that, and that's just one example. david gergen is right, it's almost hard, all of us speak for a living, to put into words what we just saw and how astonishing it is. i also just want to say, anderson, beforehand you were questioning whether either of these men would go after a free press. they didn't. and i think we saw -- i know we saw a prime example of how we need a free press an what a free press can do. jeff mason with reuters, the associated press reporter, they asked the questions of vladimir putin that had president of the united states failed to do.

and that is something. it is really something. if there is an upside of having this summit aside from the basic idea of having diplomatic relations, it is the fact that they had this press conference and vladimir putin had to face real reporters. and the one thing i also want to say is this is acocording to th transcript and we have to go back and listen to the translation. jeff mason followed up about whether or not vladimir putin directed his officials to help sway the election. putin responded yes, i did. yes, i did because he, the president, talked about bringing the u.s./russia relationship back to normal. if this is accurate and if the translation is accurate and he understood the question accurately, he just stood there next to the president and admitted what we all know. admitted that the u.s. intelligence agencies, which unanimously say this is what happened, are right. >> gloria borger, dana makes

such an important point, that it was two american journalists who were asking -- who were tougher to vladimir putin face to face than the president of the united states was. >> yeah. i mean the president -- it was surreal to me, anderson. the president is standing on the world stage next to vladimir putin and he is not blaming him for the things his intelligence agencies have told him that he's done. also, by the way, i will tell you that what putin did in a way was confirm what went on in that trump tower meeting with don junior. he started talking about bill browder and the magnitsky act, which is about adoptions. but he took on browder, made it very clear that they had dirt on browder who was, he says, allegedly funneling hundreds of millions of dollars to hillary clinton. so now we have a little bit more of an insight on the dirt that they were peddling to don junior. i cannot say how astonishing it

was to be sitting here and listening to a president equivocate, kind of like he did after charlottesville. he said, oh, you know, there are good people on both sides or bad people on both sides, whatever it was. this was a president not being able to get in front of himself and in front of his own election and blame -- you know, blaming the democratic national committee for not having better servers or not locked up their servers, when bob mueller put out this indictment on friday that was open and shut, full of detail, and then saying just as the cherry on the topping, to say oh, yeah, we'll have a joint cyber security task force, which was already proposed, and then once thrown away or maybe, maybe as putin said, maybe we'll meet with mueller's people and we'll get involved in the american judicial system.

and the president sits there. i mean -- i can't believe it. >> yeah. certainly the president calls the reporters the enemy of the american people. as an american citizen, i just personally think today is just an incredibly depressing moment in our time, in our history as an american. former cia director john brennan just tweeted, and i quote, donald trump's press conference performance in helsinki rises to and exceeds the threshold of high crimes and misdemeanors. it was nothing short of treasonous. not only were his comments imbell sillic, he is wholly in the pocket of putin. republican patriots, where are you? that is a very good question. what are republicans on capitol hill, a co-equal branch of government, what are they going to be saying about what we have just witnessed and heard today? >> well, what's striking is there's been this enormous flip-flop in republican sentiment towards vladimir putin and towards russia, taking their cues from donald trump.

you've seen of course a dramatic change in opinion polling. and even in the behavior of republicans on capitol hill who one year ago were willing to raise more concerns. remember that the senate voted 98-2 to oppose and to codify into law the sanctions against russia when there were initial worries right after president trump's inauguration that he might lift the sanctions on russia. basically congress did step in. flash forward a year later, and i think we've heard remarkably little from republicans. you saw senator john mccain an increasingly isolated voice in the republican party after those indictments on friday. he was basically the only senior republican elected official to come out and say president trump should consider cancelling the summit. but it strikes me that president trump actually just had the summit he wanted to have. this was his initiative. >> david gergen, you think of ronald reagan, mr. gorbachev, tear down that wall. saying trust but verify. i mean they're tossing the ball around to each other.

there is nothing -- there was absolutely no backbone publicly on the part of the president of the united states in the face of vladimir putin. >> no. the central drama, we said again and again, coming into this summit was whether the president was going to hold putin accountable as a price for coming back on the international stage. and that was not only going to include questions of the interference in our elections, the effort to steal the election, but it was going to include crimea and include what's going on in syria, include the poisonings in london. you had that list earlier. as far as i can tell, he didn't hold them accountable for anything. there may be something i missed. >> well, no, you haven't basically on this accountability. what we've been talking about a lot, this me tooism, when asked about the foolish tweet, he doubled down and said i hold both countries responsible, we're all to blame, we should

have had these conversations a long time ago. which is the donald trump style, holding each side, including his own country, responsible for, for instance, the annexation of crimea. >> he calls russia a competitor, a good competitor and he means it as a compliment. >> the real question also, apart from what he's just done about the interference in the election is what are the allies going to think now? because they were hoping that at least the hippocratic oath would prevail and that you wouldn't see a weakening of this western front but this is a weakening. >> not only that, it comes literally within days and hours of the annual nato summit meeting at which there was a very strong lly worded statemen by nato essentially restating the western position on ukraine and these associated issues. it reinforces once and for all that president trump doesn't support the policy of his own foreign policy team, he doesn't support the policy of his allies, and he takes a view that

is closer to vladimir putin's view than perhaps putin himself. >> let's just -- this is something the president said. he particularly goes -- focuses on the idea that there's no collusion, which again the mueller investigation is not over. but he continues to focus on that, and then -- but made no mention of actually -- or no confrontation with putin about russia's meddling in the election. nothing about the indictments, nothing supporting the u.s. intelligence community. when point blank asked, who does he believe, vladimir putin or his own u.s. intelligence community, which is his intelligence community now, he didn't say -- in fact he went on to talk about hillary clinton's server. let's listen. >> we have two thoughts. you have groups that are wondering why the fbi never took the server, why haven't they taken the server? why was the fbi told to leave the office of the democratic national committee? i've been wondering that. i've been asking that for months and months and i've been tweeting it out and calling it

out on social media. where is the server? i want to know where is the server and what is the server saying? with that being said, all i can do is ask the question. my people came to me, dan coats came to me and some others, they said they think it's russia. i have president putin, he just said it's not russia. i will say this. i don't see any reason why it would be, but i really do want to see the server. but i have -- i have confidence in both parties. >> all he can do is ask the question. john king is joining us from washington. john, it's extraordinary that the most powerful leader in the world publicly is claiming in front of the russian president that all he can do is ask the question of vladimir putin if he meddled. that's not all he can do. he can actually confront vladimir putin. he can stand up to vladimir putin. he has no problem standing up to

angela merkel. he has no problem standing up to theresa may, not face to face of course but in the pages of the tabloid "sun," a rupert murdoch publication. when he's face to face with people, he does have seem to have a problem to stand up to somebody, particularly to vladimir putin. but he doesn't even stand up to vladimir putin when he's giving interviews or behind putin's back as he does with most world leaders. john, i'm wondering what you thought of this press conference. >> i'm shaking my head like everyone else you've spoken to in the last 30 minutes or so. i've been here for 30 years. i came to washington in the final months of the reagan administration and i have never seen an american president simply surrender to the leader of russia. you should call this the surrender summit. to that point he could have said we're not going to resolve what happened in 2016. president putin says he didn't do it. but i'm here to say if this happens on my watch, there will be hell to pay. that's all the president had to say to stand up for the current actions but he didn't do that.

i'll repeat what everyone else said. he never specifically mentioned ukraine, he didn't mention the nerve agent attacks in the uk, he didn't mention the anniversary of the mh-17 airliner being shot down. not only that, he stood there while vladimir putin said let's work together on cyber security, insert laughter here. let's work together on transnational crime. let's insert laughter, ludicrous, here. and he also stood there while vladimir putin voiced compassion for syrian refugees. russia is as responsible as anybody on this planet for the syrian refugee crisis. the president of the united states stood there and let him sound like a voice of compassion when he is a leader who has been a sponsor of reprehensible conduct. >> i come back to the panel. he sat in the chair of winston churchill in london just the other day, was photographed, outraged many in london about that. a man who stood up to the worst forms of aggression.

his own national security advisor has said this was an attack on american democracy. and he completely slunk away. >> he did. he really did. you're going to have many, many, many days, weeks and months of analysis on this. to john's point about syria, insert laughter here, it is an absolute disgrace. it's a parody of a disgrace. particularly since the two of them, both presidents did talk in very elliptical ways about this bizarre deal that may be being cooked up over syria to protect israel, insert what other people have been potentially saying, that they will let this butcher, bashar al assad, stay if they can figure out how to prevent iran from threatening syria. -- israel rather. that's what is apparently in the works. so the idea that they're now -- and putin has done this for years. the poor people of syria, we'll help them out, humanitarian. it's putin who stood in the way, along with his clients in syria,

of any kind of resolution, including a political resolution. >> i want to read a tweet from lindsey graham. missed opportunity by president trump to firmly hold russia accountable for 2016 meddling and deliver a strong warning regarding future elections. this answer by president trump will be seen by russia as a sign of weakness and create far more problems than it solves. not exactly a blast by lindsey graham against president trump but, you know, one republican at least mildly criticizing, i guess. >> right. the first republican aside from ben sasse who is also a republican senator who is not a fan of president trump, also sent out a statement saying that this press conference was bizarre and flat wrong. the u.s. is not to blame. jeff flake just texted me and also just tweeted that i never thought i would see the day when our american president would stand on the stage with the

russian president and place blame on the united states for russian aggression. this is shameful. jeff flake is retiring. ben sasse has been a long-time never trumper. lindsey graham was critical but certainly not as critical as probably he would have been if this were a democrat. but to your point when you came to me, so far we have not heard from the senate majority leader mitch mcconnell, we have not heard from paul ryan. i have reached out to both of these offices. we'll see what they're saying. i'm guessing they're trying to figure out exactly how to put lipstick on this pig frankly and try to figure out how to explain the inexplicable. you know, what should happen is this should be a nonpartisan situation, that people who have a lot of support and love for this country, who have said that there is no question that vladimir putin and the russians

interfered in american elections, if they just saw what we all saw, that it shouldn't take very long for them to release a statement giving their thoughts, if their thoughts are going to be consistent at all. we'll see. >> you know, it's so interesting, dana, because president trump is obsessed with the idea of other countries laughing at him, laughing at the u.s. he's talked about this time and time again. he's talked about it on the campaign trail, he's talked about it as president. oh, they're laughing at us because of bad trade deals. i can only imagine what vladimir putin and his cast of characters and oligarchs in the limos right now as they're on the way back to the airport, i can't imagine that they are not chuckling about what just happened. >> look, he is a -- has a poker face, vladimir putin, but even for him, you could see it on his face, which tells you something. you could see on his face that he kind of couldn't believe that he was standing next to a u.s. president who was really just

complimenting him left and right and flat-out refusing to hit a softball frankly from an american reporter saying this is bad. >> also, dana, for vladimir putin, who studies a lot and has -- reads a lot and has studied u.s. politics clearly and not only that meddled in u.s. politics but studied donald trump very clearly, to hear -- i just can't imagine being vladimir putin and actually hearing the president of the united states go back to the well of hillary clinton's server and the 30,000 e-mails and all this stuff, which he's been like rainman going back to time and time again for years now. but to hear him on the world stage doing that standing next to vladimir putin, i mean with all the research putin has done, it's got to have been a surreal moment for vladimir putin to actually hear him return to something he has just -- it's

like some sort of -- i mean it's like rainman, going back to this thing time after time. >> right. it's his go-to, the president's go-to because it speaks to what gloria was saying and we cannot emphasize enough that in the president's mind, he hears russia, he hears election meddling, he hears my presidency is illegitimate and that's why he does this. but even before this press conference, russia was winning. russia had won. take the nato situation with the president going after them and really splitting the alliance. and so many other examples. russia had already won. now, the president argues that russia is winning because of the political tumult here because of mueller's investigation. but we can't let that stand. mueller's investigation is trying to get to the bottom of what russia did and whether any americans were involved in it.

it is not helping -- that is not helping russia win until and unless president trump calls the investigation illegitimate. that is what gives vladimir putin a victory. >> yeah. i want to go to our senior international correspondent, matthew chance, who's based in moscow. matthew, you obviously have watched vladimir putin in a lot of press conferences. i'm wondering what stood out to you? >> reporter: insert the sound of champagne corks popping on the presidential plane flying back to moscow later on today because that's exactly what's going to be happening. symbolically, at least, because that was an absolutely extraordinary display. even vladimir putin, who came to this meeting, this summit in helsinki knowing he'd already won, knowing the fact a summit was being held was already a political victory for him. he basically had been invited to this summit. to speak one-on-one with the president of the united states,

despite the fact that he hadn't changed any of his behavior, he hadn't even apologized for his behavior for his maligned behavior from syria to the shooting down of the mh-17 and the novichok poisonings. he didn't have to change any of that behavior. more than that, he got a pass for it. he got a pass for all of the activity from the united states president. that is absolutely extraordinary. i think it's something that even vladimir putin flying back to moscow this evening and all the oligarchs in russia and all the other politicians in that country will be celebrating and chuckling and, again, toasting president trump this evening. >> i want to also go to cnn's nic robertson for your perspective. nic, you talked about the last time -- the first time these two

world leaders met in hamburg, essentially the u.s. got played on syria and the safe zones that were anything but safe. they have now been under attack systematically. i'm wondering what you make of how the u.s. fared in this meeting? >> reporter: anderson, look, i think you have utterly dissected it on point on message. the last time president trump was played on syria, he's been played on everything here. the idea as john was saying that russia could be some part of the investigation into its own malfeasance if they just sort of -- if the united states just hands over bill browder in advance of that is just ridiculous. the idea that russia could be the ben ferefactor for all thos syrians that along with assad it's been starving, starving, starving them out of these villages and towns. they haven't just been bombing them, they have been starving them out. that's why they have been forced

to flee. the idea that he could hint to the europeans that i could help you with your syrian refugee problem, he's been helping create that syrian refugee problem. but i think the bigger point that i try to look at at the moment is to look forward to what does this really mean? when president trump left the white house last week, he said that nato was going to be tough, that britain was going to be tough and that it would be easy when he met with president putin. none of us had any idea what he really meant. he absolutely ripped a hole through all the european allies, nato, tearing them apart, angela merkel, on to britain, undermining the british prime minister and he comes here and gets a football from president putin that he says he'll give to his son. for his european allies one can only imagine their level of concern. the indication from this will be that president trump will go on his own path, be it on crimea or on syria or whatever it is without looking to them.

it does seem at the moment that their concerns must be manifold and magnified by everything they will have heard at this press conference today. anderson. >> christiane, interesting to hear matthew chan tace talking about the idea of the russians popping champagne on the way back. >> going back to what dana said about jeff flake's tweet, that never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined an american president saying and doing what he did standing right side by side, his principal adversary who's just been indicted, at least his military intelligence, 12 of them have been indicted and thoroughly detailed indictments returned by 16 american citizens, this is not just some sort of authority who's done this, you know, that's exactly the words that came out of russia the other day on russian state television. a russian said never in my wildest dreams would i imagine the president of the united states doing vladimir putin's work for him as he has done.

and she was referring to what had happened in britain and in brussels and this beating over the head of allies. we've said it over and again. president trump feels more comfortable beating up on allies than beating up on foes. he feels more comfortable cozying up and sucking up to foes. who knows why. it's absolutely clear that he does not believe in alliances, he does not believe in the liberal world order of peace and prosperity. that the united states has birthed and midwifed for 70 years and led and this is going to be what all the allies are thinking now. did president trump come here to expand and solidify american world leadership or is brussels, london, helsinki the death nell for the moment of american leadership. >> jeff zeleny is joining us as well. >> i've been talking to white house officials and one senior white house official sent me a text. how bad was that? they are watching this and viewing this. a republican who is close to and friendly with the white house

says this. we now know why he wanted to meet one on one. so these are the early reactions. the worry from the white house that the president and his team are flying back to washington now, they'll be in the air for seven or eight hours but there's very little spinning of this. we heard from the president's own words what he was saying there. i think the most extraordinary thing, i can't remember the number of trump rallies and speeches i've heard where he has always said that they wanted hillary clinton to win the election. that russia wanted clinton to win because he would be tougher on russia. we heard from vladimir putin's own mouth when asked the question did you want trump to win. he said yes, i did. >> i want to go to michelle kosinski for some reaction from the state department. >> that reaction is typically and extraordinary in this circumstance. no reaction at all. we couldn't get any reaction from the state department on secretary of state pompeo's meeting that he had privately with the russian foreign minister, sergey lavrov. now after this press conference, we asked the question directly,

is mike pompeo okay with this? no response. pompeo then on location is faced by reporters asking questions specifically is the u.s. going to be okay with russia playing a role in interrogating suspects in this russia probe? pompeo said each president said his piece. i'm not going to take any questions. here you have secretary of state known in the past for his tough views on russia, along with the national security advisor john bolton, much, much tougher than president trump has been on any of this. here he is refusing to say anything about it. in fact it was particularly pointed this morning when we heard -- we heard from president trump an then before that he was tweeting about witch hunt and fake news and that it was the fault of the mueller investigation why relations are so bad between the u.s. and russia. mike pompeo during his confirmation hearing, he was

asked do you feel that that why relations are bad? and he said definitively, no, that's not why. it's because of russia's bad behavior. but after this as he's traveling with the president, he chooses to have absolutely no reaction. nothing to say. nothing from the state department. i think it's also striking that hillary clinton that probably without knowing it had almost a p prebu prebuttal for this when she tweeted yesterday, president trump, do you know whose team you're playing for? today president trump himself did not seem to know the answer to that question. >> yeah, they're certainly sharing the ball and they did on that stage. let's go to manu raju for congressional reaction as we continue to monitor what, if anything, republicans are saying from capitol hill. manu? >> reporter: we haven't heard a whole lot from republicans yet, anderson. one reason why is because this is monday and members are just starting to trickle in. we've heard some members on

twitter, the republicans, the usual critics of president trump voicing their significant concern. people like ben sasse calling it bizarre to say that the united states was involved and bears some responsibility for the deteriorating u.s. relations with russia. jeff flake, the retiring senator from arizona calling it shameful. but by and large, most republicans have not said a whole lot. darrell issa is right here if he wants to weigh in. >> i wasn't intending to. >> what is your reaction to the president throwing cold water on the u.s. intelligence community's assessment that russia was behind the interference in the u.s. elections? >> i think just last week in these very halls we saw an example of the fbi not being trustworthy. we saw the downgrading of hillary clinton's criminal activity, the words being changed on peter strzok's own computer. so for the president to cast doubt is not unreasonable. at the same time, we take those

charges seriously and so i personally would neither rule in nor rule out the validity of a very interesting and odd-timed indictment of people who can never be brought to justice and for whom there's even a question of how do we know? did we use spy technique in order to find out? did we hack them in order to find out who they were? so i think for the president to cast doubt is appropriate. >> cast doubt on the u.s. intelligence community? >> cast doubt on the validity of any number of these things. that's fair. having said that, putin is an evil man who has killed many people in his own country. there's no question at all that russia is still an ald verse entity to the united states. so no different than ronald reagan. we have to work with them.

at the same time we cannot trust russia fully. >> so you're okay on the world stage the president of the united states not calling out u.s. election interference and not calling for the extradition of those 12 russians who were indicted by the mueller probe? >> well, i've said repeatedly that the calls for extradition are absurd, they're not going to happen. we don't extradite our spies when they get alleged or even caught doing things and vice versa. having said that, i want to see those indictment -- the information in those indictments go forward. the fact that they'll never be brought to justice doesn't change the fact that we should know more about what we believe they did and how they did it and that's where i stand is let's flesh this out and see if it's real. let's remember that we're more than a year into an investigation that claims there was collusion with the russians without a shred of evidence there was. so, you know, doubting something until it's been vetted and verified is reasonable. having said that, i'm going to repeat i find putin somebody we

have to deal with but somebody who is obviously part of that old evil empire and hasn't changed his stripes. thank you. >> thank you, sir. so there you have it, anderson. one prominent republican defending the president. back to you. >> manu, correct me if i'm wrong, he's speaking out of both sides of his mouth there. on the one hand he's raising doubts about the indictments of these 12 russian agents. he's being very critical of putin. but then he says he wants to see where that investigation goes. he's raising concerns about how the intelligence was gathered on those indictments. it's an interesting tact that representative issa is taking there. >> reporter: yeah, and he's also saying it's okay for the president to sow doubt on the u.s. intelligence community's assessment that russia was behind the attack that tried to

help president trump become president trump. you're seeing some -- his allies here in the house start to rally behind him in a real split in the republican party about russia. the usual critics speaking out, but his allies in the house are certainly giving the president some cover and feeling okay about what he said and just did on the world stage. >> appreciate that interview you were able to grab right there with representative issa. i want to go to gloria borger and dana bash. gloria, if we're looking at profiles in courage in congress standing up, we might want to get a magnifying glass out here. >> it's only the people who are leaving who are able to call this disgraceful and shameful, as jeff flake did, because just in trying to take all of this in this morning, and there's so much. i was sitting back and thinking am i watching an american president appease vladimir putin, who admitted that he did want donald trump to win, even

though as jeff points out trump said during the campaign, no, no, no, no, no, putin would really want hillary clinton to win, not me. he admits he wanted donald trump to win. he calls the american justice system and the charges against his intelligence officials utter nonsense. utter nonsense. and the president just sits back and starts talking about the democrats and hillary clinton. and i think this is a moment for people to decide not only members of congress, particularly in the republican party, but also for people inside the administration. what are they going to do? jeff is pointing out they're all flying back and they're going to try to figure out some way to spin this. i don't know how they can. but if you're the dni and you have just said that the red lights are blinking the way they were before 9/11 in terms of

talking about russian interference in american elections and you have every intelligence agency behind you and you've explained this to the president multiple, multiple times, how do you stay and do your job? how can these intelligence officials stay? mueller will no doubt continue, but i guarantee you he's not going to bring his evidence to russia and share what he's got, as putin might want. but i think it's a moment of decision for people who work for this president right now, people like john kelly, for example, who have to sort of scratch their heads as they go back to washington and say how can we -- how can we talk about this now when everybody around the world has seen the president stand next to vladimir putin and basically cave and say, yeah, sure, fine. there are problems on both sides. he caved. >> i want to bring in former director of national

intelligence james clapper who is joining us by phone. director clapper, your thoughts on what you heard? what did you think? have you ever seen anything like this? >> anderson, no. you know, like everyone else, i'm struggling with some way to capture or describe what we just witnessed. it is truly unbelievable. on the world stage in front of the entire globe, the president of the united states essentially capitulated and seems intimidated by vladimir putin. so it was amazing and very, very disturbing. >> did it -- do you have any sense of why he in your words capitulated, why he seems intimidated by vladimir putin? >> i really don't know. i've wondered that from the outset, whether he is just

overwhelmed or impressed with autocrats in general, but particularly vladimir putin, who seems to strike the image that our president unfortunately admires. but again, i just thought that was just an incredible, incredible performance. >> you know, there are probably a number of people who support the president who watch that press conference and may be watching and saying, look, you all are overreacting, what's the big deal. maybe some of the things he said, he wasn't ronald reagan telling gorbachev to tear down the wall, it wasn't saying trust but verify, it wasn't all that bad. can you just explain why you think it was so appalling, why you think it was so damaging? >> well, here you have an arch enemy of the united states.

vladimir putin's personal animus towards our country and everything we stand for. he has got to be celebrating on the way home to moscow. i mean this is an incredible capitulation. he was determined to undermine our election and undermine our basic system. and he has to be displaying the big "v" right now with the president of the united states on a world stage like that basically throwing in the hat to vladimir putin. it's just incredible to me that he did that. >> it's interesting, director clapper, because donald trump as a candidate and certainly even as a president has prided himself on his quick analysis of people, that he's able to get the measure of a man or woman very, very quickly and act accordingly. he talked about that ahead of the meeting with kim jong-un, that he would know within the

first minute or so. has he misread vladimir putin? >> i don't think it's that so much as -- well, he could have. he just is very reticent about direct personal confrontation. so just as he did in the uk with theresa may, bad mouth her in an interview but yet when faced with a personal confrontation, a personal engagement, he won't do it. it's even worse when it's our arch adversary, russia, and his opposite person, vladimir putin. while he likes to project the image of being a tough guy, he really isn't. >> i want to bring in our chief national -- director clapper, thank you very much for talking with us. i think we'll talk to you throughout the day. i want to bring in our chief national security correspondent

jim sciutto and shimon prokupez. jim sciutto, i saw some of your tweets about what was not said, what was said, what stands out? >> listen, the threat of russian interference is not only still a threat, it's happening right now. everybody has been briefed on the intelligence. you speak to folks on the hill and this would include the president. he knows this because his intelligence briefers would have let him know that there is evidence of not only continuing russian involvement in social media, divisive issues here in the u.s., but also probing attacks on actual voting syst s systems, which russia did in 2016 as well although it did not act on those attacks and interfere with the actual voting process in 2016, but it's continuing probing attacks on things like voter registration rolls, et cetera, to set up that possibility. that is the great concern of intelligence officials today. so for the president to stand there next to the russian president, who it is believed

ordered not only interference in 2016 but continues to order such interference in the u.s. an around europe, for him to stand with him and say that he accepts his denials is both retroactively just indefensible but also today, because it's happening right now. and the concern is that russia will take it to another level in 2018 and 2020 by actually interfering in the voting process. the other thing i would say is this, anderson. the president raised something that you've heard on some far right websites over the last few months that, well, the assessment that russia did this is wrong because the dnc never turned over their server, et cetera. it's utter misdirection. so anyone who pursues this either is ignoring the intelligence or doesn't know the intelligence. for the u.s. intelligence community to make this assessment with confidence, they have a whole host of factors that go into it. certainly electronic evidence that traces the actors who stole this information and distributed it. but also intercepted

communications where you have russian officials discussing this and their intentions in doing this. in addition to that, they match those electronic fingerprints with previous attacks that they know that russia carried out. for instance, one reason the u.s. intelligence community is confident that these groups like the gru, russian military intelligence, interfered in 2016 is that the same groups hacked the white house and state department e-mail systems prior to the election so they can compare their m.o., as it were, to then make that assessment. so the idea that -- and you even saw darrell issa there to say, well, it's right to raise questions about this assessment. it's a remarkable thing for american officials and lawmakers to do in light of the depth of the evidence behind that assessment. >> before we go to shimmon, we're showing on the screen the president said all i can do is ask the question whether russia meddled. that's just such a ridiculous statement. that's all he can do is ask the question. he can do what reporters do, which is actually arm themselves with facts.

he has access to more facts and intelligence than anybody else on the planet and he can confront vladimir putin with that. he can show, he can walk vladimir putin through exactly what the united states knows and he can demand that there will be hell to pay if this continues, which according to u.s. intelligence, it is continuing. so for the president to stand up on the world stage and say all i can do is ask the question and he was really strong in how he answered that question, it's just pathetic. >> that is one word to use and one word to describe. i'm struck by, for instance, what gloria was saying and the oerds that we others about the president's psychological makeup. he does beat up on people behind their backs but as soon as he's with them, he reverses course. whether it's angela merkel, after saying she was controlled by russia, angela amerimerkel o people. and i'm struck also by just reading before we got here,

donald trump in the '80s took out big, big ads in "the new york times" criticizing president reagan's foreign policy towards russia, calling it spineless. calling reagan spineless as reagan was with gorbachev winning the cold war. you could say reagan was winning the cold war an donald trump took out this ad. there's something strange about the inner makeup that he has very thin skin. he's obviously feeling a little bit maybe strange about the election. >> it's hard to get into his head. >> but in the end you have to start trying to get into the head because the facts don't make any sense whatsoever. >> jim sciutto, i know you have more diplomatic reaction. >> this is from a senior ukrainian diplomat who sent the following. i asked for his reaction to the president not calling out the russian president for its invasion of eastern ukraine and annexation of crimea and just listen to these words.

this is a diplomat prone to diplomacy. he says the following. i'm exploding here like so many people around the world who hold america dear. he goes on to say for the president to say all this next to the criminal, describing putin standing next to him, he just finds unbelievable. but i'm exploding here. that's a ukrainian diplomat. few people have experienced russia's interference more than ukraine with its annexation of crimea and ongoing war with ukraine. but that fear is something i've heard from other european diplomats, members of nato close to russia's borders who are concerned that in effect the u.s. president would throw them under the bus next to the russian president. it appears that that's what he did. >> yeah. we will go back to shimon, but i want to bring in democratic senator chris van hallen who's standing by. senator, to the point jim sciutto just made, for all those people who traditionally around the world have looked to the united states as a beacon of

hope, as a beacon of strength to stan up for human rights, for democracy shall t democracy, the rule of law, i'm wondering what message president trump sent to all those people who still may hold on to some sort of idea about the u.s. as a bu bullwark against darkness in the world. >> anderson, just when you think it can't get any worse, the president of the united states manages to hit a new low. this time going into a meeting with president putin and coming out saying that he believes putin over his own intelligence agencies, over all the evidence that has mounted up with the 12 gru indictments we saw friday, the earlier indictments. the question people around the world are going to ask is where is american credibility? we have always stood up for the rule of law. we have stood up for democracy. we have not stood up for catering to dictators and being

their sort of right-hand person at a press conference. so we already had some very dark days coming out of the nato summit where the president threw our nato allies under the bus, where he said that the european community was our top foe. he singled them out first. now we have this today. the united states president throwing our own the united states president throwing our own intelligence agency under the bus and says he believes putin first. >> it's so interesting when you think of past statements that bolton has made about russia, about russia's meddling as an attack, as an act of war against the united states. what must he be thinking? how does he move forward on this -- in this white house administration? >> well, anderson, what we worried about john bolton is at the end of the day he would be a yes man to president trump. he got rid of his earlier national security adviser who was willing to provide him with

independent advice. president trump doesn't like independent advice. he wants people to do what he says. and that's what we've seen out of john bolton. i will say, anderson, this lends urgency to a piece of legislation that senator rubio and i have introduced called the deter act, which would establish automatic, very severe sanctions on russia if they get caught interfering in our 2018 elections or any future elections. it has bipartisan support, and since the president's not willing to defend our democracy, it's really incumbent upon the united states senate to move on that legislation right now. >> you know, senator, let me ask you then on that point, there haven't really been, as far as i understand, cabinet level meetings headed by the president of the united states about the interference, about what happened, and about how to prevent it. we have heard from chris wray and others testifying on capitol hill that efforts individual agencies have done to try to combat ongoing cyberattacks from russia and other players, state

actors and otherwise and other attempts at interference, even in the upcoming midterm elections. i mean, does -- given the president's attitude, which he has voiced clearly in front of vladimir putin, is there anything you see this white house being able to do or willing to do to try to strengthen our defenses for the midterm elections, or is it just going to be an ad hoc agency by agency effort? >> no, i don't see this white house doing anything to protect the integrity of our elections. we just heard the president of the united states say he believed president putin, that they have no reason to attack our democracy or our elections. i don't know how you then turn around and tell your administration to do something about it, which is why congress really has to act here. we have as a congress provided additional resources to try to harden our election systems around the country, but in my

view, the best defense is to deter putin from interfering again to begin with. raise the cost so high that if he gets caught, he knows there will be severe punishment. that's why we call it the deter act. it creates a trip wire. if the director of national intelligence finds that the russians interfere in the next election or any after that, there would be automatic, very severe penalties on the russian banking sector, the oil sector, and that would cause putin to think twice because the costs of interference would become much higher than the cost of not interfering. >> all right. senator, i appreciate your time on this extraordinary day. thank you very much. i want to go to jeff zeleny. we're watching the presidential motorcade of president trump leaving the presidential palace, which is right behind us, i assume heading home. >> that's right. the president apparently was planning on doing interviews with a couple fox anchors.

we believe that's happened, and he's now leaving with his entourage, going back to washington, as people are trying to dissect this. i talked to a u.s. official involved in the planning and said this was not expected. we knew going in he was not going to suddenly change tunes. this was not the plan. the plan, i'm told, was to try and pivot and then move on to bigger issues that he talked about this morning. i think it's interesting. >> it's amazing he's not capable of pivoting. he's not capable of not talking about hillary clinton at this term, on this world stage n t, this moment. >> talking about electoral college votes. that's not what you would expect president trump to say in front of vladimir putin. >> to say the least. what's interesting to me, you hear a lot of commentary already on twitter about this. are we sitting here today, are we surprised? i think the answer is actually no in some ways. the shocking part of this is that president trump restated

his long-held views while standing side by side with vladimir putin. it's not that president trump believes that this is a witch hunt. we're not surprised by that. it's not that we're surprised that he would say that the mueller investigation is a disaster, to talk about hillary clinton or the electoral college. what's still stunning and i think does bear noting, even if it's not a surprise, is that it's a shocking thing to see the president of the united states basically say there's a moral equivalence between america and russia. to undermine his own intelligence agencies overseas somehow still has the capacity to cause all of us -- >> because it is a surprise, it is a shock, and we cannot accept this as a new normal. we cannot accept this as a new normal. any other presidential trip, had we been anywhere else with any other president throwing the united states of america under a bus in a foreign country, standing by the key foe, the entire system would have been up

in arms. as a member of congress said, in any other situation -- and this was just after nato and brita britain -- they would have demanded a psychiatric revaluation. today, it's whatever, it's trump. we have to be careful. >> we have to take a break. our coverage continues in a moment. join t-mobile. and get netflix included for the whole family. so you can get lost in space in your own backyard... or get pumped up for your grand entrance.

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