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good evening. we begin tonight with a question. is president trump's tv lawyer rudy guiliani really bad at his job, or is he just very, very good at muddying the waters? keeping them honest, whichever it is, he was back at it again today and over the weekend. first, quickly, some background, not withstanding the water muddying and smoke blowing the central facts were pretty clear. when we left you friday night, robert mueller's office had taken a rare step of disputing some aspects of a report in buzzfeed that president trump had instructed his former corporate attorney general michael coalen to lie to congress about the real estate deal the trump organization was pursuing in moscow. . remember, cohen falsely told lawmakers contact with russian

nationals on the project ended before the february 2016 iowa caucuses. he said, quote, i made these misstatements, he told the judge, to be consistent with individual one's political messaging and out of loyalty to individual one. he lied, he says, his lie benefits the boss's campaign. the only question, did his boss, donald trump, tell him to do it? buzzfeed was and still is reporting robert mueller has evidence he did. mueller's office is saying this, quote, buzzfeed's description of statements to special counsel's office and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office regarding michael cohen's congressional testimony are not accurate. so, that was where things stood going into the weekend. then rudy guiliani took to the airwaves and spoke to "the new york times" and the waters got muddy. we're going to bring you that in a moment, right after a short swim in the crystal clear waters of what candidate and president-elect trump actually said about whether or not he had any dealings in russia. >> i have nothing to do in russia.

i don't have any jobs in russia. i'm all over the world, but we're not involved in russia. i know nothing about the inner workings in russia. i have no businesses, i have no loans with russia. i have no dealings with russia. i have no deals in russia. i have no deals that could happen in russia. because we've stayed away. >> remember that. jake tapper, especially in light of what giuliani told "the new york times," leading the newspaper with the headline the trump up toer moscow discussions were going on from the day i announced, the day i won. mr. guiliani quoted donald trump as saying, during an interview with "the new york times." >> he said he had no dealings with russia and as by your own admission, he was talking with people in moscow about trump moscow project through november, 2016. >> he wasn't talking to people in russia about anything. he didn't talk to people in russia at all. there is not a single stitch of evidence -- >> his team was. >> it was an early stage

proposal that never got beyond a non-binding letter of intent that was being run by michael cohen. it was his project. and it was being done while donald trump was running for president of the united states and wasn't focused on that at all. >> got that. at the same exact time that candidate trump was suggesting he had no business dealings in russia whatsoever, his fixer and attorney michael cohen was pursuing a deal with moscow worth, according to court filings, hundreds of millions of dollars that his boss knew nothing about. really? this is the same donald trump who once cashed a check for 13 cents. you can google it. this is also the same donald trump who said, there is a good chance i wouldn't have won, in which case i would have gone back into the business, why would i lose lots of opportunities? is this a guy that sounds unaware of a deal where several million bucks in a place he had

been obsessed with? and at the same time, he knew nothing about the massive pay 3 day that vladimir putin was dang danging out there, he was saying things like this. >> i spoke indirectly and directly with president putin, who could not have been nicer. putin did call me a genius. he said i'm the future of the republic pa republican parties. he's off to a good start. any time anything wrong happens, they like to say the russians, they don't know if it's the russians doing the hacking. maybe from is no hacking. number one, nato is obsolete. number two, the people aren't paying their way. he said nice things about me. i like him because he called me a genius. >> so as the trump organization was pursuing what could have been the president's biggest single payday in decades, the president was lying about pursuing any deals having any business ties with russia. that, and saying nice things about the man that could make or break the deal. again, rudy giuliani says this deal wasn't really a deal. it was a kind of a sort of hypothetical thing that the

president had no clue about and wouldn't be wrong in any event. but most importantly, the president knew nothing about it, which is odd, considering what he said to "the new york times" also over the weekend. here it is again, just in case you forgot. "the trump tower moscow discussions were going on from the day i announced to the day i won," mr. giuliani quoted mr. trump as saying during an interview with "the new york times." you might think this sounds just like the president's tv lawyer is admitting that the entire time the candidate trump was denying any business contacts with russians, the same period his fixer lied about the same time frame donald trump was running for president and right up to the moment, quote, to the day i won, during that same time frame, talks were under way with russians about a massive real estate deal in moscow. you might think that, well, because that's what he said. tv lawyers always have a trick or two up their sleeve. today's trick, rudy guiliani said it was all hypothetical. here's what he shared on social media. "my recent statements about

discussions during the 2016 campaign between michael cohen and then-candidate donald trump about a potential trump moscow project were hypothetical and not based on conversations i had with the president." so, okay, keeping them honest, i always thought that when you directly quote somebody, it means that somebody actually said it. rudy guiliani directly quoted the president. there's no such thing as a hypothetical attributed direct quote. it's not the way the english language works. as a tv lawyer, rudy guiliani gets plenty of opportunity to practice using said english language. yet time and again he ends up backtracking after revealing later what turned out to be inconvenient truths about his client. yes, the president did pay for stormy daniels' silence. >> it's not campaign money. no campaign finance violation. >> they funneled it through a law firm. >> funnels through a law firm and the president repaid it. >> oh, i didn't know it.

he did? >> yes. >> i like how he has a piece of chicken in his mouth. hannity didn't see that coming. chris cuomo never expected this one just last week. >> i never said there was no collusion between the campaign or between people in the campaign. >> yes, you have. >> i have no idea -- i have not. i said the president of the united states. there is not a single bit of evidence the president of the united states committed the only crime you could commit here, conspired with the russians to hack the dnc. >> a lot going on there. oh, wait, you mean right there might have been -- might have been collusion? just not the president, only the rest of the campaign? now, along with chris and sean hannity, you can add jake tapper to the, wait, what did rudy just say, club? >> you acknowledged it's possible that president trump talked to michael cohen. >> which would be perfectly normal. which the president believed was true. >> keeping them honest, there's nothing perfectly normal about a

subject of an investigation discussing testimony with a witness. there is nothing perfectly normal about a candidate's company with or without his knowledge chasing a lucrative business deal during an election with the country that's interfering in that election. there's nothing normal about just about everything rudy skrul yanni has said over the past months and years about his client's bee have yohavior. while we still don't know what it adds up to, none of it adds up to norm am. more now from a lawmaker who has been watching this story unfold, democrat jim himes of connecticut. i spoke to him earlier. congressman, do you have any understanding of what rudy guiliani is doing here? i mean, is it possible there's actually some kind of strategy behind all this? >> anderson, i think there is. take a step back from the sort of latest crazy that you get from guiliani and this is, of course, not a new thing. what's happening here is, if you think about it, giuliani is not actually the president's lawyer. giuliani is a trusted mouthpiece

to speak to the right wing, to speak to the president's base. when guiliani does what he does almost every week, which is put out con stra diktry, odd, strange statements, what it does is, it muddies the water. and at the end of the day, that's the objective here. that's the main point of rudy guiliani. he, as he says one thing and then walks it back, he raises questions in people's minds who are inclined to be sympathetic to the president as to whether there is any knowable truth. and if there is no knowable truth and in one person says one thing and one network says another and another network says something different, when bob mueller comes out with his report, there is a big chunk of the american population that doesn't really believe there's such a thing as objective truth, and rudy giuliani's regular performances are designed to sort of promote that notion. >> the only alternative theory of that is he's losing it and he's just -- but if that was the case, i don't think, you know, somebody in the president's

orbit would decide not to put him out there constantly. so, i mean, i think to your point, there has to be that strategy behind it, because the alternative is they're continuing to allow this person to just say stuff, not based on any, you know, that we know of, information or later claims that it wasn't based on any information. >> yeah. i think that's right. look, nobody would hire rudy guiliani to be their defense attorney in the classic sense of the word if they were being charged with a crime. it's probably been decades since rudy guiliani argued in court. he is here because he goes on tv which is, of course, not a typical thing for a defense attorney. anybody that's watched somebody charged or go to trial, the attorney says we will be proven right in court and makes no other comments to the press. rudy guiliani is on tv pretty much every week for the express purpose of speaking to the

president's base, by the way many of whose members are in the united states senate and the united states house of representatives, just to muddy the waters, to deny, to throw sand in the gears. >> back in november about this deal in russia, the president said there was a good chance that i wouldn't have won, in which case, i would have gotten back into the business and why should i lose lots of opportunities? does that make sense to you? i mean, it sort of shows where his priorities were, even though he was running for president, there were still -- business was still foremost in his mind. >> yeah. well, that statement says couple of things to me. first of all, obviously, it's a complete repudiation of the president's previous position is he had nothing going on in russia. absolutely nothing, nada. that turns out not to be true, so, now the president has a reason for why he had ongoing discussions with russia. and look, you know, at some level, perhaps it makes sense. i might lose the election, in which case, i don't want to have badly damaged my business.

but at any level of decency or right or wrong, when you are running for president, certainly when you are president, when there's some chance you might be the leader of the free world, it is, at that point, of course, that you stop doing anything that could give somebody leverage over you, that might create a sense of a conflict of interest. the president, of course, doesn't understand the notion of a conflict of interest or of somebody having leverage on him. so it's not surprising he came out the way he did on that statement. >> what giuliani is saying about the president, talking to cohen before he testified in front of congress, giuliani says it would be, quote, perfectly normal to have such a conversation. it may not be illegal, depending on what what was or wasn't said, but it's not perfectly normal, is it? >> no, it's not normal. there is nothing normal about this. and you're exactly right. it would probably be improper at any time for somebody who is being investigated to talk to a witness in that investigation.

but where it could become seriously problematic and illegal, of course, is if the president suggested, asked, demanded that michael cohen say any particular thing. certainly, if that particular thing was not true. and of course, we know that michael cohen is not particularly faithful to the truth. the president is not particularly faithful to the truth. so if there was a meeting, and the president was encouraging michael cohen to lie to the special counsel, this, of course, takes us back to the still controversial buzzfeed article, that is a very serious problem. >> congressman, appreciate your time. >> thank you, anderson. >> let's get more now. joining us, jeffrey toobin and cnn chief political analyst gloria borger. so, jeff, i mean, are these shifting narratives from giuliani and the kind of putting out a statement to explain what his prior statement meant, is that a problem for him or is

that just part of his strategy? >> i think it's probably a mix of things. but i think there is one overriding goal at the moment in the trump defense camp, which is that he now has submitted answers to the mueller investigation under oath, signed, you know, the take home exam. we haven't seen the results, but we know he's done it. guiliani has to tailor all his comments to what trump said in those answers. undoubtedly, some of those trump answers are different from the things he said all along, especially about when these negotiations were going on. i mean, as you heard from, you know, in all those things where he said there was nothing going on. obviously, something was going on. so guiliani has to sort of move trump's answer in line with what trump said in the questionnaire without seeming to. and it's impossible, so, he sounds ridiculous. >> gloria, what are your sources telling you the strategy is behind what he's doing?

>> well, first of all, you have to assume, to jeff's point, that the real trump lawyers, not the tv lawyer, but the real trump lawyers, are pulling their hair out over this. because they have answered questions in writing and this could, if there are -- if there is a difference between what rudy guiliani is saying in his television appearances, his many television appearances, and what they have written to mueller, this gives mueller the opportunity to say, wait a minute. i need to talk to the president about what he actually said, because his tv lawyer is telling me something very different from what is in the written answers. and i think that could be a real problem for them. i mean, the congressman suggested there might be a strategy that he's crazy like a fox and he's throwing up everything against the wall so he can deflect and confuse people, and there may be something to that. but i think it really is more

likely that guiliani may be talking to the president a number of times and maybe getting different stories each time he talks to the president. and then the other lawyers are kind of going nuts over this. >> neil, i mean, if giuliani is now saying things that conflict with the president's written answers to mueller, how much weight would that carry in terms of mueller's efforts to get some sort of followup interview with the president? >> i think it can carry a lot. i think putting it mildly, rudy guiliani is not behaving like most lawyers, whether on tv lawyers or any other kind, certainly not a presidential lawyer. i mean, really it's like every sunday is now open mike night with rudy, and it's like, you know, what's he going to test out this time in terms of material? it will bomb and then the next day he's got to walk it back and we've seen it now time and time again, but you know, one pattern that has emerged is, that first time, whenever he says something, those turn out to be true. so, like, a year and a half ago, he said it was a muslim ban.

it turned out it was a muslim ban. then he said the president knew about the payments to stormy. it turned out that was also true. and now, last week with chris cuomo, he said, he essentially admitted that there was some collusion, it just wasn't with the president. and then he tried to walk that back and it does seem like all of that is true, as well. so, i think one of the things going on here, and i think jeff pointed it out, is that you've got this mueller -- these answers to mueller, but you've got a guy who is serially incapable of telling the truth and he hires people around him who are incapable of telling the truth, so, any lawyer on tv is faced with this difficult thing that giuliani faces. >> but i do think his lawyers have beaten him up enough so that the answers to questions under oath are either sufficiently vague or sufficiently true that they will not be actually perjurious. but those true answers have to be different from what he said all through the campaign. i mean -- >> i agree with you.

>> it's just obvious that his story has changed and you can see giuliani is sort of moving the story in his ham-handed way, towards the way it's been. >> rudy guiliani is telling every story. he's not, you know, he's not advancing the story. what he's doing is he's telling different versions of the same story. and that could be because that's what his client is doing. >> neil? >> oh, i think one thing that's going on here is, we're talking about the crime, and that's what jeff's talking about, that careful lawyering in answers to mueller there's something else really significant here. forget about if a crime was committed with russia. trump lied to the american people over and over again before the 2016 election, saying no business dealings with russia and all the stuff, anderson, that you just played in your video. forget about if it's a crime or not. that is something of momentous importance, and i think this is why giuliani is trying to walk these two roles, lawyer and also public relations consultant.

>> the sheer totality of lies that have been told, i'm not -- i'm not sure it registers with, you know, the hard core believers. >> it may not. look. i don't think -- >> i mean, in normal times, i think, neil, what you're saying is, yes, turns out he was lying the whole time, that would be a big deal. at this point, it seems sort of normal, or baked in. >> but this is a different kind of lying. this is not lying about some personal affair or something like that. this is lying about money. hundreds of millions of money he stood to gain, a $50 million payoff they were going to give to putin. it was on the eve of the election. and, you know after repeated times of denying it, i think there's a reason why there's still so much lying to this day, which is, they don't want the american public to find out what happened. >> and it's even more than that, i think. it's not just lying about money, about sort of financial transactions. it's about, where was donald trump loyalty actually going?

was his loyalty to the american people or was it to the russian government that was in a position to make him hundreds of millions of dollars? >> yeah. >> that's what makes this so profound. >> and that's what had everybody scratching their heads throughout, you know, the election, which is, why is he being so nice to putin? >> yeah. >> and why is he saying the things he's saying about putin? well, this may explain it. >> gloria, thank you, jeff, neil, as well. always. coming up next, the shutdown, a new move from senate republicans. and more questions about just what kind of dealmaker the president actually is. is he actually a dealmaker? we'll talk about it with two people who have seen him up close. later, lawmakers go there, openly calling the president a racist.

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day 31 of the government shutdown. the pain, of course, spreading. 800,000 men and women not getting paid. food stamps may end shortly. the fbi setting up food banks for employees. tomorrow mitch mcconnell may introduce some legislation to end the shutdown. tomorrow, whether senate democrats will get on board, that remains to be seen. and late today, here's what the president tweeted about the speaker of the house and the wall at the center of the standoff. "if nancy pelosi thinks walls are immoral, why isn't she requesting that we take down all of the existing walls between the u.s. and mexico, even the new ones just built in san diego?" in a moment, we'll dig into the

president's dealmaking skills, but first, our kaitlan collins at the white house with the very latest. so, 31 days into this, still no deal. what are you learning? >> reporter: well, we're essentially where we were when we started this 31 days ago. now, as you noted, mitch mcconnell is expected to introduce the president's proposal tomorrow. that could set us up for potentially a thursday vote. but not one democrat has voiced support for the president's proposal, and a senior democratic aide tells our hill team that this is essentially a nonstarter. they don't think it's going to be able to get 60 votes to pass, even if the white house hoping they can convince some democrats to come over to their side. now, the white house knows there's very much a possibility that it won't go anywhere, but then, at least, they feel they'll have the optics on their side. they have made it look like they are at least trying to move the negotiations forward and it's the democrats who are refusing to come onboard. >> and senate republicans put forth a show of effort what are we seeing from democrats? >> reporter: well, democrats are expected to lay out bills this

week that include up to $1 billion for border security funding, but no money for the president's border wall. and that would mean that bill is dead on arrival in the senate, especially, according to the republicans there who say they won't do that if it's not got the money that the president wants as part of that. those two plans are for what - republicans and democrats, neither of them seem like they have a future, that they're going to go anywhere. essentially, that leaves us right back where we started. white house aides are getting a little bit for desperate, hoping to find an exit strategy here, that's why they laid out the president's proposal on a saturday afternoon, buzz thecauy are aware of the polls that most americans are holding the president responsible for this shutdown. and even if they can't find a way out in the next few days, they want to be able to change the optics. >> catlin cokaitlan collins, th. the shutdown calls into question what president trump long called his forte, "the art of the deal." as he did during decades of

business, mr. trump insulted adversaries, undermined his aide us, repeatedly changed course and induced chaos. joining us now, two people who have seen donald trump's dealmaking up close. former trump executive barbara re s, also trump biographer, michael dantonio. barbara, i mean, is donald trump a master dealnegotiator? >> you know, i've been thinking about this a lot, because people have been asking me quite a bit, and also because it's new the news -- he did have certain things that he could do well, and he did do them, i think, better when he started out than as time went on. he got more used to getting his way and more demanding. but he's never been any kind of a collaborator. he's never worked with other people. as a matter of fact, even when he had partners, it killed him

to make money for other people and he always bought his partners out. >> is that right? >> he was a one-man show. even employees, he'd make a deal to give them a piece of something and when it became valuable, he'd get very angry at them. >> really? >> yeah, yeah. donald wanted his hard work to be to his benefit and his benefit only. you know, this is about the country. it's not about him. and i think that there's a little bit of questioning where that line is, and what he's acting now. he's letting his ego get completely in the way of the negotiation. which he didn't. he didn't always. >> early on, he didn't do that? >> no, no. first of all, he worked with people much more closely and trusted people, polititiciapoli mostly, people that he owned. and lawyers that were really, really connected and had done this a million times. and he let them take the ball and he listened to them a lot. as time went over, he thought the ideas were his and he thought his ideas were better and that's when i saw some of

these changes in him. >> was president trump actually a great dealmaker when he was a businessman or was that more public relations than reality thing? >> well, i think what barbara said about the president doing well at the beginning with negotiations, especially working with others, especially when his father was his primary partner and people forget that in the beginning with trump tower, which barbara worked on, also with the commodore hotel, which was his first really big project, his father was really the power behind the power. and donald was very good at working with his dad and working with the relations that his dad had built up over the years. but later, you look at things like when he bought part of eastern airlines and rebranded it as the trump shuttle, or the plaza hotel, he was terrible at making those deals and even

worse at executing them. so, over time, i think he came to regard his own abilities as maybe something like what people read in "the art of the deal," now, most of what's in "the art of the deal" was not from the president. it was from tony schwartz, even the title came from tony, so we have to wonder, at every step of the way, what is donald trump really responsible for? and how much is just this hype that's the development of his reputation? >> and none of which would really matter if he wasn't the president of the united states and meeting one-on-one with vladimir putin multiple times, meeting one-on-one with kim jong-un with no one else present in the room, which is highly unusual. he, for whatever reason, he insists on meeting with these people alone. i mean, the polite explanation is that he feels so confident in his dealmaking that by force of

personality he can somehow make something happen. >> yes, but that owouldn't explain he doesn't want anybody to know what was said. i'm very worried about that, to be honest. >> are you? >> yes. but going back to what michael said, he did have a lot of skills in the beginning. and one of the things he doesn't boast about, his greatest skill is his salesmanship. he could sell ice in the winter to eskimos. he built his reputation on him selling himself and this dealmaking thing is a part of and he has sold himself to people. in looking back at it, well, some deals were good. by and large, most of them were not so good. like the later ones, the plaza and the shuttle. he just paid asking price. >> the casino stuff that didn't end well, right? >> no, no, it didn't. especially the taj mahal, which was probably his downfall. he had to have it. it was the biggest casino in atlantic city. that's when i say his ego took over. >> is that, michael, part of the problem, you think, his ego?

>> well, it definitely is. i remember when i discussed with then-businessman trump this idea of negotiating so that everyone wins. and, you know, experts on negotiation will say that the key to it is having empathy for the other party to understand where their win is located, and then get to a place where everybody wins. and so, i said to him, what do you think of this concept of win-win? and he said, i prefer the concept of i win. so that's really where he's at when it comes to negotiation. and it's -- i think, why he has so much trouble on the world stage. there are so many moving parts, so many bilateral relationships that he can't keep track of them. >> michael, barbara, thank you. on this martin luther king day, some lawmakers are letting loose on the president, drawing

sharp contrast between the president and the late civil rights icon. there was no holding back. was it fair? well, you'll hear it next. of c. they work together doing important stuff. the hitch? like you, your cells get hungry. feed them... with centrum® micronutrients. restoring your awesome... daily. feed your cells with centrum® micronutrients today. bipolar i disorder can make you feel like you have no limits. but mania, such as unusual changes in your mood, activity or energy levels, can leave you on... shaky ground. help take control by asking your healthcare provider about vraylar. vraylar treats acute mania of bipolar i disorder. vraylar significantly reduces overall manic symptoms, and was proven in adults with mixed episodes who have both mania and depression. vraylar should not be used in elderly patients with dementia, due to increased risk of death or stroke. call your doctor about fever, stiff muscles, or confusion, which may mean a

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on martin luther king day, most u.s. presidents honor the holiday with service projects of having remarks in a ceremony. today, president trump did neither. he visited the civil rights icon memorial in washington. this president has faced an onslaught of criticism from the left for setting back race relations during his time in office, and some lawmakers took it further today. >> we have a hater in the white house. the birther in chief. the grand wizard of 1600 pennsylvania avenue. >> that was congressman hakeem jeffreys. chairman of the house democratic caucus. this is senator bernie sanders. >> today, we talk about justice and today we talk about racism.

and i must tell you, it gives me no pleasure to tell you that we now have a president of the united states who is a racist. >> well, they certainly went there. joining me is charles blow, an opinion columnist from "the new york times" and former trump campaign adviser steve cortez. charles, is it appropriate for a sitting member of congress to refer to the president as the grand wizard of 1600 pennsylvania avenue? >> i can't object to that. because i've referred to him as the grand wizard of birther-ism, myself. i'm vexed by the whole idea we keep coming back to this question about whether or not the man is a racist, when it is clear that his pattern of behavior over his entire life suggests that he is. and the fact that we keep discussing this as if it is an arguable point does damage to the truth. i mean, my definition of this is a combination of your words and

deeds and your responses to other people being aggrieved by your words and your deeds. do you say things that are racially insensitive or racist? do you do things that are racist? when people call you on it, do you apologize for it? do you try to clarify? do you back off of it in any way? he's not done any of that. he has done all of it to the former two to qualify. the fact we keep coming back to this -- i remember, i've been in news for 24 years. i remember a time when we did not call people a liar. because we were saying, well we don't know what their intention was. we said, intent was the definition of lying, what's in their heart? now we say liar all the time, because in fact it is not about what's in your heart. it's about what is true and what is not. it is about the result of it. this is the same thing we're now facing with this issue of race and racism. we keep saying, we don't know. i can't say. i don't know what's in his heart. it's not about his heart at all.

and the fact that we keep posing this question as if it is a question does damage to the truth. >> steve? what about that? i mean, i clearly -- i assume you do not believe the president is racist. he's certainly said racist things, yes? >> no, i won't certainly concede that, what has he said that is racist, anderson? >> well, calling african countries, you know, s-hole countries, the people there have aids in haiti. people in nigeria live in huts. >> okay. >> that he would rather have people from -- >> is any of that substantiated on the record? >> that there's good people on both sides at a neo-nazi rally? >> let's take those one at a time. >> hundreds of white supremacists, he's saying there's good people on both sides. >> let's talk about that. that's not at all what he said. it was very, very clear in the context that he was saying there are good people on both sides of the confederate monument debate and that is very true, there are

people who believe it's important to preserve that heritage who are not racist. >> he was talking about the friday night -- he was talking about the friday night tiki torch march where people are chanting -- >> that's just not accurate. it was very clear in context that he was talking about the debate. but look, i think on a bigger point, here's the issue. when people like charles blow and when people like congressman jeffries slander the president and continue to call him racist, here's what they're trying to do. they're trying to marginalize him and our entire movement. they're trying to say, you have no standing in polite society. why? you're disrupting the system that we have built on identity politics, which serves the interests, yes, of a lot of politicians who happen to be of color, not communities of color. when i met the president for the

first time, in the oval office, the first thing he said to me, was what can i do to empower the hispanic community? we had substantive conversations. not conversations, results. my answer was small business. the best way to have black and brown people in this country is to revitalize entrepreneurialship. that has happened in so many ways, it's really amazing, over the last two years and i believe it's one of the reasons why hispanic support for him, according to pbs, has risen all the way to 50%. if he's a racist, he's the worst racist in history. >> charles? >> no, he's not the worst. and let me tell you this, never say on television that i tried to slander anymore. i'm telling the truth and you're lying, as you normally do, right? >> calling him a racist is a slander. >> i didn't interrupt you. i didn't interrupt you and you're not going to interrupt me when you were telling the world i slandered somebody. and secondly, i believe people who pretend not to see racism or defend racism as steve just did are part of that racism.

which i believe steve is part of that racism. >> okay, so, i can't tell you a slanderer for calling the president a racist, but you can ultimately call me a racist without any evidence or justification. this is exactly the demagogue. >> i just told you the parameters. people who pretend not to see it and people who defend it are part of it. you just pretended not to see it, you just pretended not to see it and then you defended it, that means you are part of it. >> how could you possibly know that i'm pretending? >> steve, does the fact that the president -- >> because you're not mind. because you're on television all the time. they play the clips in front of you like they play it in front of me. the fact that you came on and asked anderson to e num ranumer ways he was racist, and pretended you didn't know them already, was already false, was already false. >> no, because -- >> you wanted to take up the

time and try to enumerate the things you already knew. when he e num rated those things, you started to try to defend them as not being as everybody in america knows what they are. >> i disagree. >> i'm not knocking you for supporting his racist. that's what you're doing. i have eyes and i have ears and i can see you doing it and you can see yourself doing it and you just need to own it. >> no. and as a matter of fact, you know what's truly racist is to say that we're going to consign entire american communities to low expectations and quite frankly, to low output when it comes to education, when it comes to the economy. what this president has done is said, no, we're going to have the highest expressionation of all americans and our policies are going to pursue prosperity and security for black and brown people, first of all. last year was the first year in america that hispanic incomes outpaced white incomes. that's not accident. that's the result of policy. the reason, for example, that the president is so insistent on

illegal immigration, he knows that the principled -- >> steve, what about -- >> he wants to protect them -- >> that's called a deflection. anderson that is a deflection. he switches it over to stats about -- >> that's fine. >> he was talking about the monument debate. >> that is a classic example of deflection. >> steve, does it concern you at all -- >> i applaud you, i applaud what you do, you're really good about this thing, taking an issue, you don't answer the question, if you do answer, you lie or deflect, and then you go to something else. >> what lie did i tell? >> it is a problem, what you are doing, because it is a damage to the truth. >> steve, does it bother you that somebody like david duke is such a supporter of the president and always, you know, giving him plaudits for the things he says? the things that the president says register on the radar so strongly of white supremacists

and racists? does that not raise any concerns to you? >> it's a fair question. of course -- it bothers me when crazy support any legitimate political moment. it bothers me that david duke approves of the president. it bothers me that the -- >> he pretended he didn't know who david duke was. >> it doesn't mean that senator sanders endorses that reprehensible attempted murderer. so if we want to start affixing crazies to political movements, i think that's an unfair way to proceed and we can do it with both sides. would it bother me, of course. it would bother me tremendously more if the president were doing anything in policy terms, if he were doing anything that david duke would actually like. in fact, he's doing the opposite. >> that is precisely what he's doing. i lived through david duke running through office in louisiana and watched that in real-time. and this past least cycle, i taught a course at yale. there have been some amazing

books written about david duke's political life, not him as the grand wizard, but his political life. and the parallels, both in terms of policy, in terms of the way he treatments the media and the way he articulates his campaign and his appeal to white voters is exactly the same as donald trump. and, ncin, "the new york times" wrote a story about how, if you strip away all of the white supremacist stuff, he was basically a blueprint for how the present gop is running, on a policy level. not about, like, i'm the ex-grand wizard of the ku klux klan, the policiepolicies. this idea, i would be upset if it was a policy issue, you have to be upset. >> we have to leave it there. charles, steve, thank you. the democratic field for the 2020 presidential election getting more crowded, seemingly by the day. california senator kamala harris is the latest to announce. i'll have more on that next. ♪[upbeat music]

♪now i'm gonna tell my momma ♪that i'm a traveller

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just about a year until the first major battleground test for the 2020 democratic test in iowa. kamala harris made her entry official today. here's what she said today at howard university. >> we are a diverse country. yes. some people suggest that in diversity when there's a diverse

population, one cannot achieve unity. i reject that notion. this is my belief. yes we are diverse. and we have so much more in common than what spraeparates. when we recognize that commonality. we will achieve greater unity. >> the democratic field is bound to get bigger. big question is who will have staying power. to appeal to the democratic base. joining me now van jones. and kir sten powers. >> i'm happy. i have known her 20 years. raised my family in california. she's extraordinary. she's one of the she's a special person. a special leader. people forget. california is mostly california/alabama. the rest of the state is bright

red. she can compete in both places. she'll do very well with the democratic party. >> do you see -- think anybody knows how to run against president trump at this point? >> no. i think this is unchartered territory. for most politicians. they haven't had to run against somebody like donald trump. we saw what he did in the republican primary. where he just threw everybody off base. so much. now we have had a little more experience with him i think. so it was sort of a shock to the system. i still haven't seen anybody other than nancy pelosi, really, who seems to know how to interarkt with him. and stand up with him and come out on top. >> listen, i remember when he came down the escalator. and we were joking about him. and appalled.

there was a running joke about how many more weeks until he blows himself up. we're having the conversation three years later. i think the democratic field is going to be two things happening. who is going to be the best champion to go against trump. will people chow this person stack up against trump. the other is who can pull the party together? our party is a big ten. there are different views. about should we go all out progressive or towards the center. that's going to get sorted out. >> do you have a -- where do you stand? >> it comes down to the candidate. if you have a world class candidate you can do either. somebody who looks good but can't pull it off. it will fail. i'm excited we'll have -- we were laughing at the republicans for having 12 or something. we're going to have like 22. risers at the debate.

we have a choir stand in the debate. people are going to be tested. whoever the nominee is will have to over come everybody in the party and will be very strong. >> is there a weakness in having so many candidates? obviously democrats are touting it as a great strength. to have 20 people running is that -- does the best rise to the top? >> they'll have to. of course it would be more ideal if there was somebody else who was the perfect candidate and make everybody happy. that person doesn't exist. i think that there's a lot of tension in the democratic party about what people want in their candidate. and i think that there's going to be pressure obviously from the progressives who have gotten more influential. i think that it's probably because nobody has emerged as really the one. there is no obama type person

who emerged. necessarily. people thought it was beto rourk. it is good. you want to have as many people as possible. you can figure out who might be the person. and make a judgment about what they would be like against trump. >> if joe biden gets in the race, can you -- would president obama endorse him? >> that's a very good question. i don't have a good answer. except to say even when hilary clil ton ran. he didn't endorse until early june. he stayed outd. it was just hilary and bernie. nobody had doubt about who obama wanted in the contest. he stayed out until june 6. i don't think he'll clear the field. a lot of them are obama babies. beto looks up to him. he's really model himself after

obama. kamala harris and obama are peers and friends. certainly biden is somebody who goes down in history. with obama. >> appreciable it. stay with us. a lot more ahead. breaking news on the government shutdown. possible action in the senate. tomorrow. in a new move by mitch mcconnell. and the russia investigation and rudy giuliani's latest walk back. ♪

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