same floor as president trump. again, the president's long time chief financial officer of the trump organization is also expected to be called before the house intelligence committee. all of that in the days and weeks ahead. the news continues right now. i want to hand it over to chris for cuomo primetime. >> thank you, anderson. welcome to primetime. the president reportedly lied to you and about something very serious. the new york times says the president ordered his former chief of staff to grant his son-in-law top secret security clearance against the recommendations of u.s. intel and his top aids. kelly wrote a memo about it. the white house counsel wrote a memo about it. both saying this was a wrong move. then the president told us he played no role. so did his daughter. and now the white house says they don't discuss clearances. we have a very valuable guest here. you know chris christie. governor of new jersey.

he has a long running feud with jared kushner but this is all about full disclosure tonight. he has a book. you can read about it in there. is he willing to speak truth to power about this and other matters like what's going on with michael cohen? what's going on in congress. maybe he spills more beans next week. the governor thinks this alone should send a chill up the president's spine. listen. >> i am in constant contact with the southern district of new york regarding on going investigations. >> about what? >> what do you say? let's just get at it. >> those actively trying to shield him from scrutiny. you heard his disturbing comments regarding the death of otto warmbier. you saw michael cohen laying out a road map of crimes he says

president trump committed before he took office and while he has been there. now there's this. remember all the controversy surrounding top security clearances for first son-in-law jared kushner. remember how he said he would lead the decision to grant them to his former chief of staff. listen to what he told you. >> did you tell general kelly or anyone else in the white house to overrule security officials. >> i don't think i have the authority to do that. i wouldn't do it. >> i was never involved with the security. according to the new york times, he lied. he ordered top security clearance. overruling recommendations from kelly, the cia and other top white house aids. this is heavy stuff. this isn't about lying about his weight or height anymore. governor chris christie supports the president. his new book is called let me finish. you must read it to understand

the depth of the relationship and his feelings about kushner. i'm not going to waste time going into that tonight. >> thanks, chris. this matters. >> let's start with just a macro thing. am i wrong to have serious reservations about whether this president can be believed? >> well, this is -- i write this pretty extensively in the book, chris, this is the biggest problem with having family in official positions in the white house because it's much harder to be objective. it's much harder to handel it that way. what does he do? at least as reported by the new york times tonight? jared wants that top security clearance, they're upset about the fact that john kelly took it away from them based upon objections from the fbi and the cia. and then all of a sudden jared gets it and we now find out from this report that john kelly and the white house counsel wrote memos saying that they were overruled by the president.

they were concerned about this decision. i have to tell you something as having been a governor, i never had a staff member write a contemporaneous memo about one of my decisions. >> they don't do that on a whim. >> they just don't. >> they do that to cover themselves. >> exactly, right. the bad part too is ivanka went on abc and said directly that her father had nothing to do with her clearance or her husband's clearance. >> no hedging. straight faced. right to camera. >> and by the way, there were two comments that are in response today. one that came from the white house where the white house said we don't comment on security clearances. >> since when? >> and second one was from abby lowell who is jared kushner's lawyer and probably still is and he said essentially we are committing to what we were told at the time we communicated that to all of you. boiled down, he is saying to them, this is what i was told at

the time and i communicated it to you but he wouldn't warranty it any further. those are things that should be very disturbing to people and again, chris, it goes back to the familiar relationship. for any other staff member the president would say listen i'm not getting involved. >> but not porter. >> but porter was different. there's no evidence at this point that he overruled. >> he was playing with it. but i hear you about going back to family. >> i think it's a real problem. >> i think it's a real problem but i think it's also a step sideways from the actual problem. the actual problem is this president has no problem lying to the american people about things he thinks he needs to, fair point? >> i think what he has done at times, which has been unfortunate, is in my view, lie about things that he hasn't needed to lie about. that's worse in many respects. whether it's the stormy daniels payment, or whether it's this

instance. it doesn't serve him well and it doesn't serve the country well and, you know, i understand that both of those things were very personal matters. one involved his son-in-law and what he son-in-law wanted. another one involved an alleged relationship with a woman outside of his marriage. so we saw there was problems on issues that were very personal, chris. >> right. >> but i understand that. but it doesn't serve. there's no way to defend, and i'm not going to, the new york times story tonight assuming it's true and i have to assume it's true because the white house didn't deny it. nor did jared's lawyer. >> the memos, they know that there's paperwork there and they know if they lie it's going to be exposed on top of this lie. >> you have to believe that's true. >> but look, right now we're talking about this, if you stop talking, we will hear silence. that is the echo of the nothing coming from everybody in

leadership in your party. they have said nothing about this. they sat in that hearing yesterday beating cohen over the head with his own lack of credibility, fine. but cohen lied about all the same things that the president did. and they never said anything to defend him and they have never stood up to his lying. how can they keep their integrity? >> listen, i didn't think that it was a very good display yesterday. i watched all of the hearings. >> listen, i wouldn't have done it that way and what i said was, i think one or two people should have gone after michael cohen on his credibility. but let's face it, we know he's a liar. we know he's a cheat. we know he's a thief. he pled guilty to those things. >> how do any of those not apply to the president of the united states? >> heres the difference. the difference is cohen has admitted them in a court of law, under oath and pled guilty. >> but that's just the proof part. >> but that's the important part, chris. >> no it is. i can prove it right now that the president has done those

same things. >> but we have a presumption of innocence in this country regarding people. you respect that. i respect it. so my point is that michael cohen has blown through that. he has admitted it. my point on the congressional hearings was there were a couple of ways to defend the president on the substance of what cohen said. no one did it. >> why? >> it was easy to me. i was on another network commenting on this. >> abc. it's my old home too. >> i said there were two things that came out from cohen that i think are helpful to the president. the first one is that he said there was not one reason for the stormy daniels payment but two and that the second reason beside the campaign was that the president didn't want melania to know and that he added to that tapestry by saying that he, in fact, lied to the first lady about what the purpose of that payment was. >> although the precedent from the case and it doesn't have to

be. it could be some of the reasons. >> what you say is the southern district in new york isn't going to bring that kind of prosecution against the president after he leaves office because your best witness says there's two alternatives. >> it's a mixed bag. >> the defendant will say there's none. >> and cohen said i don't know if he knew what the e-mails were that roger stone told him about. >> right. >> i don't know that he knew that the meeting that his son took was with russians. i don't have any proof of collusion and i know that he would never hurt his wife. if cohen were there just to blow up the president, he wouldn't have said any of those things. >> i thought those were moments of credibility for michael. that doesn't change in essence who he is there. let me finish this one point is that nobody in the republican party was making those statements. so my point to you is if they're as much a slave of the president

as you made out in your comments -- >> do you feel differently? >> either -- >> help me. >> if you were really doing that, you'd be more aggressive on offensive defense. but instead, all you're doing is going after the guy who is already been established to be a liar. i got bored after three of those sets of questions. >> but how do you ignore another liar that has to be president. the other man is the president of the united states and he lied about the same things. told you he didn't know who he is or what the hush money payments were. he's lying to your face. your party is supposed to stand up against this stuff.

>> i don't want to get too far off the track. i'm going to take a little bit of a different track but parallel one. democrats weren't saying anything about bill clinton in '98 or '99 nor did they stand up to do anything, anything at all to undercut the president. the problem is that since the clinton years and it's gone on since the clinton years, we have become so partisan, so blindly partisan in the national congressional scene and at the white house that nobody is willing to say anything against their party even when they know it's wrong. everybody knew what president clinton did for lying under oath was wrong. everybody knew it. democrats didn't say anything about it. you're criticizing the republicans for the very same thing. it's a valid criticism. but my point to you is its not just a republican problem. it's a political problem in our country but we're not willing to speak the truth. >> the reason why someone like -- this is my theory. the reason why governor christie didn't punch through in the

primary was because you were skill, even though renegade in your own right, even though outspoken in your own right, different, the disaffection, the hatred for the toxic political culture gave birth to somebody who would be seen as a virus to the same. trump wasn't seen as an antidote. he was seen as a virus. you were a governor. you're part of the season. sure you were an outlier and you had your fights with the media and everybody else. that's how he got in. people expect politicians to lie. they expect no integrity. but what i'm getting at is where does it stop? we've never seen lying like this. >> i hope that what happens here now is that over the course of the next number of years, whether it's 1 or whether it's 6 that the country gets exhausted from all of this. >> then what happens. >> and then i think the pendulum swings back. >> to what. >> you rightly put and i'll tell a quick anecdote from the book.

my wife went door to door in new hampshire and she said i'm governor christys wife and they said i love the governor. we're voting for trump but we love your husband. why are you voting for trump? they said oh, honey, we don't need another politician. so your point is absolutely right. i think the country needs to understand. i think hillary had the same problem. i think the country needs to understand that we need to have a system again where people are willing to talk to each other. i will tell you though, the biggest complaint i heard in new hampshire when i was running for president was that i was nice to barrack obama during hurricane sandy. the single biggest complaint. they despised the president so much that their view was that i should have somehow given him the heisman when he came to look at the 350,000 homes that were destroyed in my state. so what i'm telling you is this feeling, this toxic feeling has in my view been going on ever

since the clinton impeachment and ross peroe and moving forward. >> now you have to deal with the solution. you can't have your party keep dummying up. i was with president obama when he went to cairo. he says i want to make peace with the past. i want to be better than we have been. you went crazy on him. you weak apologist talking to these guys that are predators. it wasn't a fair characterization of a billion people, the muslims. now you have the president being an apologist. i had one of my best producers today because i don't want to be wrong. nobody said a thing about what he said about otto warmbier being the wrong thing to say other than rick santorum. >> i said it today. >> why don't they speak up? >> i don't know. but i will tell you -- >> you do know. >> they do deserve some credit.

>> for what. >> now appear as if you're going to have a vote in the senate that is going to stop his use of a national emergency powers for the building of the wall. lamar alexander announced i think it was today that he is going to vote against it. >> do you think the republicans will go against it. >> they now have 51 votes. there's 4 of the republicans that have now said that they will not vote. they will vote for the resolution. >> if he vetoes it -- >> they're not going to have enough to override the veto in either house. but the point is that's a standing up to the president. there's nothing that the president cares more about than the wall. nothing. maybe trade. that's about it. >> i shouldn't be -- look. >> so they deserve some credit. >> it's such a low bar. >> democrats voted with a margin of one vote to put obamacare into place. they changed a large part of the entire national health care system based upon one vote and not one republican vote. listen, both parties have been

suffering from this disease. >> true. >> it's not one sided. >> i didn't have the choice in new jersey. i had a democratic legislature for every day of my 2,920 days and that required me to work with the other side. to work with democrats to find the good in democrats and to find ways that we could both get something so we could both win. nobody cares about doing that anymore. >> but also you didn't antagonize the other side. >> they differ. >> but it's how you do it. like you won't do your job, call them out, okay. fine. the american people should like that. they should reward that as leadership. point out, be transparent. he lies all the time about things that matter and nobody comes out against him on your side. you need the people at the time to do it. >> i just don't get it. >> and we're seeing it. this is a no brainer. they got him. he lied about something and it

matters. his daughter lied about it. they don't cover this, right? >> they should have. >> but they don't. >> fine. >> and now he doesn't know where they're concerned about his son-in-law. he doesn't even know why they're concerned. >> here's my response to that. if he wanted to override it anyway because he said i trust them. i know them. i want him to be my guy regardless of the merits, that's fine. the problem is because itself family you're worried about how people are going to react and engage your objectivity and instead of announcing it you cover it up. i read it about an hour or an hour and a half ago. have to tell you after written the book and experienced everything that i have experienced in dealing with the

family dynamic there, i wasn't, unfortunately, shocked because i know. it's any family right if your kids really want something, it effects you. now you're hoping people will stand up and think it's right and you have a different feeling about your own children than anything else. >> it would be one thing, i'd give it to you -- >> i understand that we could spend the evening going on whatever it is the washington post -- >> we don't have enough time. we would be on until midnight. >> but i think tonight what people theneed in the light of t happened over the last couple of days, what really does matter, what are the issues? there's a lot of yelling and screaming. a lot of fire. which are the issues that really do matter. >> good. let's do this. i want to take a break but i want to take a break on a question and we'll come back and let's layout what you believe

are actual avenues for concern and what you are not concerned by going forward cohen et al, mueller, the white house has new reporting tonight saying they believe the special counsel guidelines give protections to the president. i want to go through that with your mind. but let me ask you this, as we go to break. >> i'm sorry. excuse me. go ahead. >> don't fake cough me, governor. i'll watch you pass out. jared kushner, are you surprised that the people in the business of knowing and judging have questions about his background? >> no. >> do you think they are real questions? >> listen, i have faith in the fbi and the cia so i believe they're real questions. now they may not be unresolvable questions but i believe they're real questions, sure. i don't have any doubt about that. >> well, in many your party do. it's good to hear a different answer. let's take a break. when we come back, governor chris christie.

what are the avenues of concern with this probe and the investigations which are on going which are not conversations worth having. stay with us. ♪

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that's a democrat and i asked are you going to really involve the president's kids? because that will be a major move. here's what he said. >> or dispute it. >> but that is like real dynamite. you're asking for a war, are you not? >> i think we have one. >> i think we have one. back now with chris christie. his insight into the family dynamic and it's toxicity to the cause. thank you for speaking to these issues. there's a little bit more ease doing it when you're not actively on the inside. you are on the inside. you're a supporter of the president, you're in contact and

your side does not want to address what is real. thank you for doing that. lynch says we already have a war going on, do you agree? >> i don't. but here's what i would say. the president placed his daughter and his son-in-law into official positions in the white house. n not as informal advisers but as official job holders in the white house. you can't say they're off limits now. now you can say eric and donny are a different story. that's different. they're not involving themselves in government. >> except to the extent that they are involved, don jr. specifically in transactions and contacts that are relative to the interference. >> but that wasn't about government. that happened during the campaign and bob mueller is looking at that. they're government employees. i told the president this,

they're not going to period to at anything. >> i think michael cohen had a list that the house now has to give serious thought to calling in. there's going to be a big fight. the fight that's going to happen now i think is between congress and the southern district of new york because congress had a big show yesterday. they're going to want more. they're going to want the president's children, et cetera. the southern district of new york is not going to want that. they're trying to build the case. >> do you think so? >> i do. >> because of what michael cohen said. when michael cohen says he's in

constant contact with some districts and when he is aware of other crimes that the president has committed and he can't talk about them because he was instructed not to do so with the southern district. that means they're conducting an investigation. we're investigating the state legislature in new jersey. and i called to him and i said to him, do not do hearings because people are going to want immunity because they have fifth amendment concerns. i'm not going to be able to potentially prosecute it. >> how concerned are you about what we know so far and what you may know that's not in the public space that the southern district will peel back on this president. >> i always said that bob mueller is not what should concern the president to white house. that's the southern district of new york and the reason for that is threefold. first they have no limit on their scope.

they have guys that can take them through -- >> from what i understand, he has a limited impunitmunity. >> you're saying he may not want to talk about these other things. >> i said give me total immunity, i'll tell you whatever you want. otherwise i'll plead the fifth. >> would we know what his impunity stat immunity status is. >> they haven't announced it publicly. >> no, they definitely haven't. >> i've heard it's a limited immunity. if that's the case, there's going to be a fight between the congress and the southern district of new york but it's always the southern district that's a problem and a threat. nobody wants their lawyer for ten years to be cooperating with the government to talk to the government about your business life and personal life. no one would want it. >> the lies are the lies. he just lied. we excuse it because the president lies so much.

but that is an ancillary lie until felix winds up being relationship van relevant to a transaction. he lied about the moscow deal. it's not going to get much deeper unless there's money involved. the stuff with the foundation. how worried are you about that? not just playing with a painting that he wanted and paying for it through a foundation. that's all wrong. you could come after people like that. the ags office does it all the time but what concerns you the most? >> what concerns me is what i don't know. listen, i did these investigations for 7 years. i did 130 corruption investigations. got convictions without a defeat. the greatest thing about that job i used to say is i know what i know. the folks at the southern district, all they know is what they know. the head of the fbi in new york was a guy ten years ago running my corruption squad in new jersey. he's now in charge.

>> he's good? >> he's very good. special agent sweeney is excellent. >> but if the doj has guidance, a couple of memos that say you can't indict a sitting president, what are you burning my tax dollars for? >> i'm not. they're building a case for two things, one to go after those around the president that may have committed crimes and two, to build a case if they have one they're trying to build one against the president for when leaves office. statute of limitations on most of the tough my guess is would not run. >> so the white house puts out word tonight, we think the special counsel regs protect the president. all right. in the regs, i don't agree. neil doesn't agree. more importantly, who cares if i agree. he doesn't agree. it says that putting out the report to the ag could be told

upon a finding of legitimate investigative and privacy concerns requiring confidentiality and it could be released when those concerns don't exist anymore and the next provision is by the way, all of that is subject to the ag thinking it shouldn't come out in the public interest. do you think it should come out and do you think they have effectively recovered? >> i think he'll release everything he thinks should be released. >> what does that mean? >> i think what it means is -- remember why these things were written. neil was very cute tonight. i saw him on the show earlier. that was written and that statute was written in response to the report that all of this ancillary information got out there and it's like what jim comey did to hillary clinton. >> yeah. >> now i think we have to prevent that. in this country we either have to charge or we have to shut up. now the thing that complicates it here is if it's about the president, you have impeachment as the only remedy. so i think what will happen,

what will play out here is if bill barr holds back any of the report, and i think he will hold back some based upon the principles but congress will then subpoena the report. >> or comey or both. >> i think that they will subpoena the report from bill barr, congress has the right to do that subpoenaing and there will be a fight over whether or not congress is entitled to that report because it's the only thing that would give them information to inform the decision on whether to impeach or not. i don't know where the courts come down on that one. i don't know the statute well enough but that's going to be a legitimate fight. but the other thing i'll tell you is bill barr is going to air on the side of releasing as opposed to holding back. >> you think so? >> i do. listen, bill barr is an outstanding lawyer and a guy of great integrity. he knows the public import of this information. but i think we all have to be cautious about what happened in

2016. that had a material effect on the election. and jim comey shouldn't have done it. it was wrong to do it and it would be wrong despite the hysteria going on right now for bill barr to do something similar. the difference here is congress would be looking to subpoena that. hillary clinton couldn't be impeached. the president is the president. i think that's what this is going to come down to. maybe six months from now, maybe nine months from now is a fight in the united states supreme court based on a house subpoena over whether or not bill barr must turnover the entirety of bill mueller's report. >> do you think that the leadership of your party should do more to check this president's abuse of the truth to the american people? >> listen, i think the american people are in charge of holding him to account for that. because everyone is going to have a different view of it, chris. i know the way you feel. you feel strongly about it. i feel a little bit differently than you do about it and there's probably people out there that

feel like the president is abused and beaten every day by a media that's unfair to him than has written more negative stories about him than any president in recent memory. >> with cause. >> we live in the real world where people have different points of view. ultimately the american people are going to get to decide whether or not the president deserves re-election or not. i don't believe that anything i have seen so far merits the president being impeached at all. i think that's outlandish. i don't see anything at this point that equals that because you're overturning an election and that's a grave thing to do. only been done twice in our history. >> understood. >> and only one residence egg nati -- resignation. what do they want from a president? but no one should be surprised by a lot of this stuff. we were talking earlier about how he doesn't, you know, go along with any of the norms of what we have gotten to

understand and learn about public life in this country. that's what people voted for. that's what they voted for, chris. they were so upset about washington d.c. that if you had a title in front of your name when you were running in 2016 it was a detriment. >> sometimes you have to be careful what you're asking for when you put somebody in there that's abused it more than anyone we have ever seen. >> but i believe in the american people making those judgments. >> me too. >> so we're going to have an election in 2020. i assume the president is going to be the nominee of our party and we'll make a choice. the american people will make a choice. >> with one caveat. everybody on the right side of the aisle, they're going to be held to what they did or did not do. >> they were held to account in 2018. that's why they lost the house. >> you're telling me. >> governor chris christie, there's not many people on your side of the aisle, even though we should all be in the same family that want to have this conversation. thank you for doing it. >> my pleasure. >> i appreciate it. the book is let me finish. i don't know why it's called that because i've only had him

overrun me every time we talk. that's the book. governor chris christie, thank you. >> thank you, chris. >> so i harp on the president's abuse of the truth. why? because if we don't have that, it's a very difficult job to go anywhere else that's positive in the name of progress. now his son-in-law, accused of getting top security clearance despite warnings. where does it take us? that's the great debate. let's have it next. from sh rweigh you down. new infallible fresh wear foundation by l'oreal. get longwear coverage from our most lightweight, breathable formula. defies sweat and transfer. stays fresh. feels light. all day to night. new infallible fresh wear by l'oreal. you won't find relief here. congestion and pressure? go to the pharmacy counter for powerful claritin-d. while the leading allergy spray only relieves 6 symptoms, claritin-d relieves 8, including sinus congestion and pressure. claritin-d relieves more. - want to take your next vacation to new heights? tripadvisor now lets you book over 100,000 tours,

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son-in-law's security clearance. that he lied to you. >> the president had no involvement pertaining to my clearance or my husband's clearance. >> that is not true. so what do we do? internal memo written by chief of staff john kelly refuting it saying that the president ordered him to give kushner top secret clearance over expressed concerns from intelligence officials and people that do that job for a living. also a memo by the white house council about the same reservation. why lie? what do we do about it? great debate. jennifer and rick are here. let me push my luck. chris christie speaking truth to power. will rick santorum double down? or did you get it out of your system by telling the truth about otto warmbier. if ivanka trump looked in the face of that camera and said something that is a lie and if the president of the united

states lied to us about the security clearance, what does that mean to you? >> it's disappointing if -- >> disappointing. the fact that i can't lose weight is disappointing. lying to the american people about a security clearance. >> look. i go back to what chris was saying. this is a family member the president has known for a long time and feels like he probably knows jared kushner inside and out and believes that he is someone that he can trust -- >> why lie? >> i don't know. look, every time i come on your program, chris, you ask me the same question. >> what does that tell you? >> well, i think that does tell you something. that we're always talking about something the president said that was not factual. >> lie. >> okay. lie, whatever. >> it matters. it matters, rick. it matters. >> look. i don't like it. >> you are going to want me to say this. ic i congratulate you for what you

said about otto warmbier. you don't have a primary to worry about but you spoke truth to power and it matters. i appreciate you taking this on. but let me not dominate with just you. we see what's going on here. how do you check this? that's the question. and i know that this is not the only administration where there have been lies. we have just never seen this much and it seems to permeate the entire fab liric of what th president touches. what is to be done? >> it's a cancer. it is a cancer upon this entire white house and it is such a shame that the republicans in congress are being accomplices to these lies. 8,700 lies by the washington post fact checkers as of the 15th of february of this year. 8,700. that's 15 lies a day and most of the lies are about the president

trying to cover something up or protect him in some way or embellish. it's always about something that he has done or hasn't done. and in this case, i mean, this is about a security clearance, what you have seen now is clearance by nepotism as adam schiff pointed out earlier today. that is a danger for the u.s. these are not just innocuous lies. but here you have the president saying something entirely different. thank you for pointing this out. but he condemned the regime as brutal and despotism and he flips because he doesn't want the american people to believe he walked away from a deal.

that lying culture permeates an entire administration and that's what you're seeing and that's why this cancer has to be removed. we need a trumpectomy. >> are you worried about your party paying the price for this in 2020? >> look. i have admitted here tonight and admitted many times, yesterday i did the same thing. look, this president tells a lot of untruths there. unnecessary that are just -- i don't understand. the reality is that we had a previous president that told very material lies. did he put out things that were incorrect on a regular basis? no he didn't.

but on important things like health care and iranian nuclear deal and a whole host of other things, previous presidents told lies. all this president has done -- >> this is not equal. >> it's not what aboutism. >> it's not equal. the volume of these lies. >> make your point and then have to go. i want you to make your point. >> the point i'm trying to make is that we have a public who sees elected officials and presidents as people, they don't tell the truth all the time and so, you know, they don't see -- i understand you're upset with trump but i don't think the american public sees trump as being materially different than previous presidents. >> well, that will be the subject matter of an election and you know what, it should be. governor, thank you. rick, double thank you to you for what you said because not many speak truth to power these days on your side of the aisle and i appreciate it. thank you for coming on the show. so, speaking of speak your truth to power, things got very heated between two lawmakers at the cohen hearing yesterday on the subject of race.

now troubling video is emerging of one. we're going to tell you about it, next. at fidelity, we help you prepare for the unexpected with retirement planning and advice for what you need today and tomorrow. because when you're with fidelity, there's nothing to stop you from moving forward.

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all right. we thought that there was going to be peace, but controversy continues for congressman mark meadows a day after that very heated exchange with congresswoman rashida talib where she suggested meadows' use of lynn patton, an african-american woman, was a

prop and therefore racist. today video's resurfaced of meadows making birther comments about barack obama back in 2012. listen for yourself to a piece. >> what we're going to do is take back our country. 2012 is the time that we're going to send mr. obama home to kenya or wherever it is. >> d. lemon, thank you for being here. >> there's another one, too, of him saying similar things. >> yes. is that a racist statement? >> well, if you consider that the birther -- whole birther thing was a lie, yes, it is a racist statement. as i said last night in my opening, because you say something that's racist or you do something that's racist, that may not mean -- it may not mean the entire part of you is racist. but, yes, this whole conspiracy theory and lie that barack obama was not born in the united states is, indeed, racist because you're other-izing him and questioning whether he is an

american citizen. >> hold on. >> using it to rile people up saying, we're going to send him back to kenya, what else is it? >> his only defense would be -- >> go back to africa. >> -- i believed it, if he says, i believe he wasn't born here, that's fine. then he's not owning it as a deception. but if he meant it to play along to the deception and go back to africa literally, racist? >> yes. well, i mean there's evidence. he showed you the birth certificate. why would you, why would you question that? >> why did talib apologize? >> why? why did talib apologize for what? >> calling him a racist? >> well, she said the act of what he did was racist. >> right. >> not that he was racist. there is a distinction there. >> tell me. >> well, chris, have you -- you're a smart person, don't you think? >> yes, but i want you to go through it. >> do you do stupid things sometimes? >> all the time. >> make stupid decisions? >> with stunning frequency. >> does it undercut your intelligence? you are a human being. >> sometimes i do stupid things

that make me hate myself. >> so you can do something that is racist and you're ignorant of and you don't know about it. >> right. >> but it doesn't mean that necessarily the sfwientire part it -- it doesn't mean you are part of the kkk, it doesn't mean you run around saying the "n" word. barack obama said this, they think it is like running people around calling people the "n" word or they have to be part of an organization like the guys marching in charlottesville. sometimes it is implicit bias. i had this whole thing -- i didn't want you to prepare anything because i had a surprise for you. do you want it or not? >> yes, i always want a surprise. >> here is what happened. so i was looking for something on the subject that you and di, and i was doing a google search and i hit the shopping button by accident. this started coming up. you know who that is? who has that haircut on our air?

>> indicakate baldwin. >> kate will get this shirt. who is this guy? >> that's a.c., baby. >> that's anderson. >> the one and only. >> who is that guy? >> oh, man. melon head. that's a lot of lemon. >> and who is this guy? >> uh-oh, there's your boy. >> and, chris -- >> that's a good hairline. >> look what i did because you know i call you both sides cuomo. >> uh-huh. what did you do on the other side? oh. if that's you, i hope it is going to cover my butt when i wear it. i'm pulling it down in the back. >> i was like, wow. that's me -- >> the one you had of yourself had three times the size of your face on the front of the shirt. what does it mean? >> i needed to fit both sides for you and i guess they knew so they made it smaller. >> that's big nostrils. >> thank you for the gift. and. ♪ happy birthday to you

♪ you're going to be 62 >> 25. i'm still younger than you. >> you look great. people say all of the botox and surgery isn't worth it. >> wait, wait, i'm mad now. >> you can't do that. it is a lot of money. >> i need a toupe to do that. >> happy birthday, my brother. love you. >> thank you. >> he has a show in four minutes. all right. so you heard it. i heard it. we all heard the president do it again. he let a despot off the hook, this time for the death of an american. it is not just him. do you hear this? that's all the silence from the republican leadership in congress. i won't let it go. you shouldn't, and i will argue why next.

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it was a moment that made the world gasp. >> i have president putin. he just said it is not russia. i will say this. i don't see any reason why it would be. >> then came the mild response from the gop. >> we believe the european union countries are our friends and the russians are not. >> vladimir putin walked away from helsinki with a win.

>> you were warned that you needed to call the president out, that what you ignore you empower. but the word was, oh, he won't do that again. then came mohammad bin salman, the saudi ruler. trump put out a statement of the killing of khashoggi that said our intel agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the crown prince had no knowledge of this tragic event. maybe he did, maybe he didn't. bs, and he should have known it. this time a loss of life ignored. a non-american, as if that made it less urgent. once again, the gop brass, nothing. >> if you give this guy a pass after he disrespected you, you will look weak. >> i disagree with the president's assessment. it is inconsistent with the intelligence i've seen. >> it was about disagreement. there's only one set of intelligence. you were supposed to call it out but you were afraid. so now comes the trifecta and the worst of them all, of

course, because bad things get worse when ignored. this in vietnam. >> i don't believe that he would have allowed that to happen. it just wasn't to his advantage to allow that to happen. i don't believe he knew about it. if he tells me that he didn't know about it, and i will take him at his word. >> not just disrespecting intel, not just disrespecting a dead man, but a dead american. the warmbier family as well, that this president pretended to console. >> tonight we pledge to honor otto's memory with total american resolve. >> pretended. that's right. because he did the opposite. there is no type of compassion that can support such callousness, not for any reason, let alone the sweep of vanity and shameless self-interest that takes this president and this moment so far from compassion and into the mo prrks ass of compulsion, his compulsion to do

what he thinks works for him. otto warmbier was an american college kid in prison in north korea, 15 years of hard labor, accused of trying to steal a propaganda poster. we don't know what happened to him. >> an innocent scapegoat. >> look at that. we don't know what happened to him between this north korean press conference in the spring of 2016 and june 2017 when he was released, but his family says when he landed back home in ohio he was unable to speak, unable to see, unable to react to verbal commands. they say he looked almost anguished. he died within a week. see this for what it is. this president is not just breaking our country's code of never elevating a base despot, not only forgiving past crimes but future misdeeds by malefactors. to the leaders and elect yororaf

the gop, if not now, when? if not you, who? not one of you ever said after any of these what you would have said in a moment to a democrat for doing something as fraction as toxic. this warmbier insult should matter to you. it hurts america's image. it distorts the truth. to comfort those that you should keep uncomfortable. don't say the president had to do this about kim to avoid a war. it was this president saying, rocket man best not blah, blah, blah. that was the only real concern about any hostilities we had. you took the oath to serve the interest of americans and their values and the laws and values of this country. you know this president is disrespecting the same by saying this. by standing by quietly as he does this, you do it too. thank you for watching "cnn tonight with don lemon" starts right now. and our lawmakers standing up against that may be the only recourse we have. did you see the new reporting