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welcome. our guest tonight for the hour is bob woodward. his new book and the subject of it cannot be more timely. the title of the book is "rage." the subject is donald trump's leadership. we are, of course, experiencing a steep recession and the presidential election a little more than a month and a half away. he spoke 18 times to the president in making the book. he recorded the conversations and you'll hear many exchanges for the first time tonight. others have already been released and they've already become front page news, establishing in the president's own words that he knew very early on just how deadly and contagious covid-19 was. he did not share that with the public, with the very people whose security, health and welfare are supposed to be every president's, any president's first priority. once more, the president suggested to woodward in a conversation on the 19th of march, his first priority was to

withhold the truth to, quote, play it down. he said and continues to say he wants to minimize panic. if book, again, is called "rage." bob, thank you for being with us. >> thank you. >> so, jared kushner today said that the president -- that president trump was very forthcoming with the american people about what he knew and when he knew it. i want you to respond to that, but before you do, i want to play a conversation you had with president trump back on april 13th about the virus. >> this thing is a killer, if it gets you. if you're the wrong person, you don't have a chance. >> yes, yes, exactly. >> like a friend of mine died, very great reals tape developer from manhattan. he died yesterday. >> yeah, i know. listen, students of mine, i teach a journalism seminar, have written me, had it, and one of the women said she had it, they said she was cured and they kept

coming back with new symptoms, strange things happened. she had intense headaches, she -- >> what happened? >> she's in agony. and they're telling her, oh, you're cured now. you're over it. so, this -- i mean, you said it, this is a monster. >> it rips you apart. >> this is a scourge. >> the plague. >> it is the plague. and the -- >> and bob, it's so easily transmissionable. >> i know. >> i mean, you can be in the room -- i was in the white house couple of days ago, meeting with ten people in the oval office and a guy sneezed, innocently, not a horrible, you know, just a sneeze. the entire room bailed out, okay? including me, by the way. >> and today, kushner is saying that the president was very forthcoming with all of us about what he knew and when he knew

it. that's not the content that we ever heard from the president. >> or the words. and let me take you to the scene in the oval office, the end of january, january 28th, when the national security adviser to the president, robert o'brien, said, mr. president, this virus is going to be the biggest national security threat to your presidency. he said it with passion. this was a top secret intelligence briefing. the deputy stepped in and said, i agree. he's the person, it turns out, almost perfectly placed by accident. he had been in china as a reporter for "the wall street journal" for seven years. he knew the chinese lie, he told the president this. he had contacts in china,

reliable doctors who said to him, this is not just going to be a little problem. this is going to be a pandemic like the 1918 spanish flu. and the president asked questions. so, fast forward to ten days later, when he told me all of this. i thought he was talking about china, because he'd been on the phone with president xi. i thought for a long time it was china and it was the united states and tragically, unfortunately, he failed to tell the public the truth that he knew. on february 4th, a few days before i talked to him and he told me this, he gave his spe h speech, the famous state of the union speech, to the congress,

40 million people watched. he spent 15 seconds on it, saying, we're doing everything that we can. this is the moment a leader would say, i got a warning, trouble is coming, there are things we can do. but then he goes on and says, oh, i didn't want to tell the truth because i would panic people. that's not what people in this country do when they're told the truth. >> yeah, i mean, americans rise to the occasion, as long as they feel like they're getting a straight deal from somebody. president trump, you know, he said to you in those recordings that were released last week that, you know, he believes in downplaying the virus. he likes to downplay it, he still likes to downplay it. he was asked just moments ago as part of a town hall on another network that he was participating in, i want to play the exchange, the question he was asked and what he said and have you respond. >> why would you downplay a

pandemic that is known to disproportionately harm low income families and minority communities? >> yeah, well, i didn't downplay it. i actually, in many ways, i upplayed it in terms of action. >> it's amazing to me. it is literally -- he said to you, he likes to downplay it. for the record. i mean, in fact, let's just play him telling you he likes to downplay it. >> now it's turning out it's not just old people, today and yesterday, some startling facts came out. it's not just older -- >> yeah, exactly. >> it's plenty of young people. >> so, give me a moment of talking to somebody going through this with fauci or somebody who kind of -- it caused a pivot in your mind, because it's clear, just from what's on the public record, that you went through a pivot on this to, oh, my god, the gravity

is almost inexplicable and unexplainable. >> well, i think, bob, really, to be honest with you -- >> sure, i want you to be. >> i wanted to -- i wanted to always play it down. i still like playing it down. >> yes. >> because i don't want to create a panic. >> i always want to play it down, i still like playing it down. and now just tonight at this town hall, he says he upplayed it, he didn't play it down. >> we are living in an orwellian world. and this is not just about some political problem or some geo-political problem, it's about the lives of people in this country and he was told, he knew, he told me about it. i thought it was about china and quite frankly, it took me three months to find out about that

key january 28th meeting in the oval office, which was a top secret intelligence briefi inind the briefer from the intelligence community is saying, well, there are problems in china, but they're working on it and that's when the national security adviser and the deputy stepped in, i have witnesses to this, participants in this and said, no, no, and pushed a very contrarian view based on facts and experience. >> but it was interesting to me, because later on in an interview, you asked -- you mentioned the o'brien -- o'brien saying this is going to be the biggest national security challenge for you, he didn't even remember his national security adviser saying that to him, or he claimed, but he didn't want to talk about it. >> i mean, here -- we have that

tape, look at the dodge here. it's classic. it's so, quite frankly, sick. i asked the president specifically about that, this is in may, after i had learned about it, i said, do you remember your national security adviser saying that this virus is going to be not the biggest national security challenge, it's going to be the biggest national security threat to your presidency. you're president of this country and you know what the president said? i asked, do you remember it? and he said, no, but then he said, but i know he said it. i know he said it. so he doesn't remember it, but twice he tells me he knows that o'brien said it. what kind of -- you know, i

don't know how to not -- my job is not to be emotional and i've done it for 50 years and i try to bleach the emotions out of t it, but this is a story and unfortunately, it's not over. we're right in the middle of the damn pandemic and you talk to the doctors, as i have, and the experts and if we had received the kind of warni ining and thi kind of -- this is what you, as citizens, can do, this could be over. >> yeah. >> many people, i mean, there are estimates, i'm not sure what estimate you're going to believe, but some of them go up to 180,000 people would not have died of those 195,000.

>> i want to -- you know, you said or well yan, i want to play another part of one of your conversations from the president, from just last month, august 14th, where the president talks about his administration's response. >> listen, i mean, you -- >> nothing more could have been done. nothing more could have been done. >> well. >> i acted early. >> we'll -- >> i acted early. >> this will be the history that we start the first draft of and it will continue and -- >> so, you think the virus totally super cedes the economy? >> oh, sure. but they're related, as you know. >> a little bit, yeah. >> little bit? >> i mean, more than a little bit, but the economy is doing -- look, we're close to a new stock market record. >> but you have tens of millions of people in this country who are your citizens who don't have jobs and don't have that money coming in that came in for a number of months and, you know,

you -- i always worry, as you and i have discussed, that in my position of privilege, that i don't realize that enough. and, you know, that's -- that's going to be part of the election, it's going to be -- >> i agree. >> what's fascinating to me about that, him saying, you know, you think, and with genuine surprise in his voice, you think the virus totally supercedes the economy? he's talking about his record, his legacy. he's not talking about human lives or, you know, i mean, to him the high stock market, that was the be all and end all. >> yeah. i mean, just listening to it again, i remember participating in it. this wasn't two months ago, or last year, that was one month

ago when he called me to see if i could get the deal between the israelis and the uae, i said te book was closed, it was not possible and i told him, quite directly, i said, there are judgments i make in the book that i feel i have to make, as an independent reporter and you're not going to like them. it's going to be tough. and at the end, he said to me, well, it looks like i didn't get you on this book, i'll get you on the next one. >> and then -- is that the conversation that then a few hours later he tweeted, once he knew that it was going to be tough, he tweeted out that it was all going to be fake? >> yes. actually, one hour and 30 minutes later, he tweeted out, i guess, as he thought, some sort of defense. now this morning, he was asked

about the book on fox news and he said he read it last night -- okay. >> he's not known to be a big reader and certainly not a speed reader. >> and he said it's very boring. and then the anchor on fox news, thank you, asked him, is it accurate? and you know what the president said? i mean, i want to be accurate here, he said, it's okay. i mean, it's fine. and, you know, he had been out saying it's a political hit job and all of these things -- i don't know, to be honest, whether he's got it straight in his head what is real and what is unreal. that is why, at the end of the book, i say, in totality, my

judgment is, this is the wrong man for the job. how can you have the experience of living this white house the way i have for the last four-plus years and having not just discussions with him, but people in the white house, people in the cia, people in the pentagon, people in the state department, trying to get the whole picture of what this administration is, how can you have that experience and not reach that conclusion? >> what you just said, though, is pretty terrifying, and that he doesn't know what -- i don't want to paraphrase you incorrectly, but the difference between what's real and what's not real, or in his head, he doesn't know difference between -- >> well, the evidence is right -- >> no, i agree with you, but it's terrifying to hear you say it, given the fact you've interviewed so many presidents. is there any other president who

you would say the same thing of, that they don't know the difference? >> no. and it's -- look, the responsibility he has, i mean, there are two pillars, as he told me once, the job of the president is to pick -- i'm sorry, to protect the people. and the second job is to tell the truth. and i could get out franklin roosevelt's quotes in those wonderful fireside chats, two days after pearl harbor. what did roosevelt say? it's all bad news. the very survival of this america is at stake here. and i'm calling on everyone, we're going to have to work on this every month, every week, every hour, every minute, and then he said -- this is roosevelt, i mean, play it. it will bring you to tears because roosevelt said, well,

i'm counting on everyone to deal with all of this and not lose heart. >> we didn't hear anything like that from this president. >> no. not even -- not even close. and i spent hours digging into this and asking about his fundamental attitudes and if u you -- you look at what's in the book and what's on these tapes, you find -- and this is part of the paradox. he submitted to an interrogation. i was put -- you heard it, you say -- whoa, wait a minute, what do you mean, just a little bit of a connection between the economy and the virus? and when he -- i pushed back, he said, oh yeah, well, it's a lot. well, of course it's a lot.

>> we got to take a short break. more unreleased sound coming up next. what president trump thinks about former president george w. bush and more of bob woodward's thoughts on the president. we'll be right back.

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i like what you're seeing. it's beautiful, isn't it? yeah. td ameritrade now offers zero commissions on online trades. ♪ "could have been me" hey mercedes? ♪ we're talking tonight with bob woodward, author of the book "rage." the president in his own words, and he said, i'm paraphrasing, that when it comes to the pandemic, the president does not have it straight in his head.

they are taken from conversations with the author and hearing many of them tonight for the first time. bob, this next exchange, it's long, it's about four minute, but it's important and i hadn't heard it before. president trump continued to tell you he's doing a great job and when you press him on the realities that's going on, he doesn't budge. i just want to play this. >> the question is going to be, we're going to look back and we're going to say, end of july, august, september, october, what happened with the virus? did people -- people want, you know, we've talked about this. people want their president to succeed. now, you're right, there are some people who don't -- >> no, no, i think you're wrong. people don't want me to succeed. >> no, but if you succeed, they succeed. >> even the rinos, even they don't want me to succeed. i have opposition like nobody

has, and that's okay. i've had that all my life. i've always had it. and this has been -- my whole life has been like this. in the meantime, i'm looking at the white house, i'm staring at the walls of the white house. >> where are you? >> opposition all my life, bob, more than worst and let's see how it all turns out. we got 105 days. let's see how it all turns out. i think it's going to turn out -- >> okay, today at 5:00. >> i was unlucky with the virus, because it came in -- >> sure. but you got it. the country's got it. and the world's got it. but you're in charge of this country and, you know -- >> and we've done better than any other country, just about, doing better than any other country at handling it and it's a bigger, more diverse, more difficult country. and we've done better -- other than with the press. other than with the press, i've done a great job. with the press, i can't do a good job, because it's fake. it's fake news. >> well, but --

>> it's a fake group of people and you know it and you won't write it. >> okay, but are you going to acknowledge that in the last six, seven months, you made some mistakes in judgment on the virus? >> we'll see how it all turns out. i took a big chance on vaccines. i upped the program. you wouldn't be looking at vaccines for three years. we're looking at them next week. >> no, i understand, i understand. >> no, no, what you don't understand -- >> i do, i do. >> what i was able to do with the fda and scheduling. a vaccine takes years before it even gets tested. we're testing vaccines for three weeks already. >> okay. you're in charge of the national interest and the national -- >> will i get credit for it, probably not. >> you are in charge of the -- i learned one thing in 50 years in writing about nine presidents -- nine, including you, going back to nixon, ford, reagan, obama,

you name it, and that is presidents have power, extraordinary power and people are leaning on you and i'm saying from my reporting. >> but in my case, they never accepted it and they never accepted this president, because they're a bunch of dishonest people and they spied on my campaign and we caught them. they spied before and after i won and we caught them. and we caught them cold. let's see what happens. >> yeah. we're indeed going to see. is there any lesson you take? because i think this is so important. i have, you know, i keep -- because i'm in the business of trying to understand other people, i keep learning about, how do you really understand people? how do i understand you? i mean, you and i have -- >> you don't understand me. you don't understand me.

you don't understand me. but that's okay. you'll understand me after the election. but you don't understand me now. >> you don't think so? >> no. i don't think so. i don't think you get it. >> what are the questions i've not asked that have not been answered? >> i think you've asked me a lot of very good questions, a lot of personal questions. i think you've asked me a lot of good stuff. >> it's a fascinating exchange. the sense of him being a victim, and it's -- a lot of it we've heard before of him, you know, constantly going after the press, of course, and saying, you know, that obama spied on him, you know, the usual stuff that we've heard from him, but that he's saying it in just kind of conversation, it reminded me almost of some sort of tapes i've heard, you know, that were released by the nixon library, nixon was seemingly late at night rambling and talking about enemies. >> well, but he's angry. he's so angry. he's angry at me, he's angry at

democrats, he's angry at republicans, and as i -- >> he sees himself as a victim. >> he sees himself -- yes, as a victim, and he's just striking out at everyone. but i learned from my colleague carl bernstein 45 years ago, i remember we were talking, we spent a lot of time together working on the nixon case, we'd sit in mcdonald's and have coffee and big macs and somebody was really angry about something and carl said, you know, anger is really pain. somebody is feeling pain. and, you know, i'm not a psychiatrist, i can't leap to that, but when i listen to trump on this and i reflected back on what carl had said, what's going

on here? and then you connect it to this orwellian, well, the book's fine, no, it's a hit job, ju just -- you know, today, this morning, he acknowledged that he wanted to assassinate syrian president assad and that mattis then secretary of defense wouldn't let him or talked him out of it. i have in my first book two years ago "fear" exactly that scene where trump calls mattis and i can't use the language, but he says, you know, let's kill him. i mean, in a fury about -- and i understand the emotions, because he'd seen actual video of a

sarin gas attack on women and children by assad. but what did mattis do, he said, oh, we'll get right on it, mr. president, and turned to one of his aides and said, we're not going to do that. we will find a measured response. and they did. >> yeah. i want to move onto another compelling portion of the book that focuses on the president and dealings with north korean kim jong-un. and it's so interesting to me, in the letters that you read about what kim jong-un said and how he played to the president's weaknesses, which are flattery. the president, you know, the times i interviewed him, especially during the campaign, you know, he's -- i've never met somebody at that level who, you know, that wealth or alleged wealth that he has, who is so needy for some sort of recognition and -- and, you know, flattery. and so susceptible to it. i want to play part of your conversations with him. it hasn't been heard before, when he's showing you photos of the two of them at one of the

summits, the idea that he's showing you photos is bizarre to me. the president uses profanity here and it's an important context. >> look at that picture. he's having a good time. you know? nobody's ever seen him smile. look at him smiling. he's happy. he feels happy. but he's very smart. and remember this. when you take over and i really mean this, too, you take over a country and you're 25 years old and you survive, you got, you know, millions of people that are all smart as hell and energetic -- >> well, they show you the reports about those camps in north korea -- >> oh. >> president bush once told me about kim's father, kim jong-il, said, i loathe kim jong-il, because of what he's doing to his people. >> yeah. >> and for -- >> and you know what, that attitude got him nothing, in the meantime, they built a huge nuclear force during those last

two administrations. they haven't done it during me. now, you know, you hear reports that they'll start again. but for three years, i gave nothing. >> has he given you -- >> they say, president trump agreed to meet, what the -- it's a meeting. i agreed to meet. instead of sitting home reading your book, i met? >> he blows right through your question about the human rights abuses, concentration camps in north korea. wondering what you made of that response? >> well, and then he told me actually that kim jong-un, the current leader, killed one of his uncles and put the head on the body and trump makes the point that -- you thought politics was rough here in the united states, look at this. so he -- and there is --

>> what is it about him and dictators? >> there's other audio that we've played. well, we have that tape where he says, extraordinary tape just out of the blue, he said, well, i get along with the turkish leader erdogan, who has probably got the worst human rights record possible, a -- a tyrant. and trump says, gee, i get along with this guy. explain that to me sometime. and i don't get along with the bad guys. and he -- he asked me, he said, as i say, explain it to me and i kind of thought, well, that wouldn't really be hard, because he loves that sense of power. so, as president, he's in charge of foreign relations, as we know and so he can -- the face of america is the face donald trump

puts out. and he has said, oh, we're going to have good relations with putin or the crown prince of saudi arabia, other repressive regimes, oh and he'll deal with kim jong-un, but he tells me south korea, he wants to get out, he wants to pull all of our troops out and at one point, it's almost shocking, he said, we have those troops there and we are allowing them -- south korea -- to exist. the idea that we would -- that the president would think we're letting a country that is an ally, where we have 32,000 of our troops and he's got these inflated numbers that it's costing all this money and it's not. >> i want to listen to another part of your conversation with president trump about kim jong-un and again, i want to warn viewers, the president uses

some profanity. >> he didn't respect obama, didn't like him, thought he was an asshole, okay. bush was too stupid to know what was happening. bush has no clue. that's why we ended up in the middle east and spent $8 trillion there. when i did this, i said, what do we have to lose? my famous expression with african-american. what do i have to lose? a great statement. now the best employment, the best this, okay. so the fake news says -- the first 24 hours, people couldn't believe it, cnn's on, holy shit, he wants to meet with president trump, never happened. the second, you know, after a few days, i said, well, let's pull it back, it's making trump look too good. let's pull it back. so, now what they actually said, i've given him so much. you know what i've given him? nothing. i met. i met.

you know, i haven't taken sanctions -- >> and what's coming through -- you realize how important it was to him. he keeps, you know, your excellency, your excellency, you know, this is going to go down in history. >> and you've seen what he called obama, what he called others. >> i understand. >> kim jong-un knows how to play trump. he calls him your excellency. kim -- he's not calling the others that, that's -- it's fascinating to me that the president thought that that is what registered with the president. do you see what he called me? i mean, that's -- it's the easiest trick in the book. >> and look at the pictures. he's smiling, well, i've had one of my assistants, evelyn duffy and steve riley check the photos and there are lots of photos of kim jong-un smiling and so forth. again, trump has got this

reality in his head and you -- the first interview, i sat there in the oval office, i brought my tape recorder, in fact, because he would call at odd hours, i had to carry this olympus tape recorder around with me because once he called and i didn't have the tape recorder, so, i had to have one by the side of the bed, one downstairs and so i took this -- this is december 5th last year, plunked it down on the resolute desk in the oval office and said, this is all on the record. this is a history, it's going to come out before the election. he had these pictures of kim jong-un, he had the orders appointing judges, which is very important to him and he had a stack of the letters between kim

and -- >> he was trying to impress you. >> i don't know what he's doing, i mean, these are props. i've interviewed a number of presidents in the oval office and you sit at the other end and you -- you do it without props. but trump had -- >> yeah. >> had his props in this case. >> yeah, i -- there's -- we're going to actually play that a little later, we're going to take a quick break. next, why the president agreed to talk to bob woodward. we'll hear him explain on tape when my conversation with bob woodward continues. knowing who we are is hard. it's hard. eliminate who you are not first, and you're going to find yourself where you need to be. ♪ the race is never over. the journey has no port. the adventure never ends, because we are always on the way. ♪

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bob woodward has been chronicling american presidents for nearly 50 years, since he and carl bernstein exposed watergate. president trump declined to be interviewed for woodward's first book in 2018. that was the book "fear." president reversed course for "rage" in a big way. before we play some more sound, bob, i want to ask you about the national security details. you recount a falling out between president trump and two of his top officials, secretary of defense mattis, director of national intelligence dan coates after a meeting which president trump wanted to withdraw u.s. troops from afghanistan and south korea. mattis and coates said the president has no moral compass. the bluntness should have shocked coates but he'd arrived at his own hard truths about the most powerful man in the world. mattis said that the president is unfit. this is extraordinary.

this is the top national security people around the president. this is mad dog mattis, who the president kept praising on the campaign trail until he actually met him and spent time with him and then threw him under the bus. >> well, but he threw him under the bus because mattis did his job and as i quote mattis in the book, saying, he, mattis, ran the pentagon, got almost no guidance from president trump except through tweets and mattis knew, you can't run national security or defense policy with tweets. and time and time again, these impulsive tweets come and the portrait of mattis -- i had the luxury of time, really, to dig into the story, is almost a book in itself. >> yeah. >> because this is a man who was retired, who was willing to serve.

it got to a point where he was worried about some war with north korea and -- >> hey, bob, i got to -- >> sleep in his gym clothes. >> i'm sorry, we have a glitch on the transmission so i couldn't show you right now, so i want to play something, we'll fix it while it's playing, ab t about, one of the things that really struck me that was consistent throughout this process was the president, i mean, interviews are fascinating things between a reporter and a president or anybody. he has this habit of praising the person he's talked to, trying to butter them up, essentially, thinking that that's going to work with bob woodward. i just want -- this is him praising you throughout this process. >> i love this guy. even though he writes shit about me, that's okay. >> what? >> i have such respect for you. >> i wrote four books on george w. bush's wars. i went through nsc notes, cia

reports, i spent hours with bush, all of the people. >> oh, you did? >> and you know why? >> didn't he come out terribly in those books? >> well, see, what he did -- i mean, the third book was called "state of denial," because he got into denial. >> let me ask you -- >> sure. >> he spent all that time with you -- >> yes. >> and you made him look like a fool. okay, in my opinion. >> no, no. my job is to find the best obtainable -- >> in the end, you'll probably write a lousy book. i respect you as an author. >> i mean, he -- i don't know, i don't know if he's ever read any of your books. i would be be surprised if he had. but had you experienced that with a president before, that essentially, i mean, it's such an old trick, it's such an old thing to try to do to an interviewer to schmooze them, i've been watching you for years, you're doing great, the ratings are crazy, they're great, all that. >> ah, no. and what's so interesting --

look, i knew what i was doing -- i was trying to find out what happened and if you look through the book like on the north korean relationship, it was unorthodox, it was risky but it's something that, as trump kept beating into me, we did not have a war. and he's right, now, where it lands in history, obviously, we don't know. but i -- i knew i couldn't say, oh, yeah, don't worry. the book is going to turn out great. i just went poker faced and learned from reporting on the cia for many, many years that the power of silence, sometimes you just have to let the silence suck out the truth. >> that is very true indeed. you know that better than

anyone. jared kushner was asked today about something he said to you that, quote, the most dangerous people around the president are overconfident idiots. something you wrote as a reference, or interpreted as a reference to former secretary of defense mattis, rex tillerson, gary cohn. this is how kushner responded today and i want you to respond to that. >> yeah, so, he actually mischaracterizes who i was referring to. obviously the people that we had, some people from the campaign, who were in there who were obviously always trying to tell the president with confidence without the real facts. >> you just said -- woodward says you were referring to general mattis, tillerson and gary cohn. you're saying that's not who you meant. >> no, that's not clear. he has tapes of everything, i have tapes of everything. that was never implied in that regard. >> i want you to respond. >> yeah, first of all, this is the whole trick.

and you have to give kushner an academy award for saying, oh, well, i mischaracterized. and then he goes on to say, some people from the campaign who were in there, suggesting that he was talking about campaign people. as he says, i have tapes, he has tapes -- i could prove to you that he was talking about people who worked in the white house, who were in the administration, who were these overconfident idiots and mattis and tillerson and coates are the ones that left and president trump, when i asked him about mattis said, oh, he's just a pr guy. publicly called tillerson, who was his secretary of state, dumb as a rock. he -- anyway, it's -- >> and general kelly. he said kelly wasn't up to the

job, in over his head, that sort of stuff. i mean, it does strike me with this president, i mean, everybody is a sucker or a loser or, you know, what are some of his other -- everybody's an idiot, they're a sucker, they're a loser. it is his view, his of all the people around him. unless you praise him and especially if you're a dictator and then it's fine until suddenly he senses that you've turned against him and then all of a sudden you're an idiot, too. >> no, it's not -- you don't have to turn against him. what -- i mean, people like coats and tillerson and mattis were doing -- >> well, yeah, true. >> -- their job. as i show in the book. i mean -- i mean think of these meetings that they have to have. national event conferences. which are very supersecret. and mattis was -- is in charge

of the defense department. trump authorized mattis and trump confirmed this to me to shoot down an incoming missile from north korea on his own authority. and mattis took this seriously because he realized the nuclear arsenal that north korea had was stunning. it was hidden. it was probably a couple of dozen nuclear weapons. and so mattis is in his quarters and he has a light that will flash in case he's in the shower, ashower and there is a national event conference called and he has to get on the secure line and watch the missile coming out of north korea, and in some cases it landed in the sea of japan. >> right. >> none never came to the united states.

but -- what a responsibility. >> yeah. i want to play some -- some new sound, and it's about the president's leadership and how he sees this moment in history. you asked president trump about it. let's listen. >> was there a moment in all of this last two months where you said to yourself, you know, you're waking up or you're, you know, whatever you're doing and you say, ah, this is the leadership test of a lifetime? >> no. >> no? >> i think it might be, but i don't think that. all i want to do is get it solved. there are many people that said that to me. they said you're now a war-time president. >> who said that first to you? >> oh, many people have said that to me. i don't want to think about it. >> might make it concrete. >> i don't like to sit back and think about that kind of thing. >> why? >> because i don't have that much time to think about it, bob. i'm busy as hell.

>> it's like when he was asked about what his favorite bible passage is. you know, there's so many he can't even name one. the idea that there's a lot of people telling him he's a war-time president. it sounds like more like he, himself, is the one who said he's a war-time president, but did his explanation make any sense to you? >> he said that publicly. >> it's like when he says people are talking. he says he's as busy as hell, but last week he said he watched fox's morning show and all their prime time programs, binge watching fox. just compared to other presidents, all the presidents you have interviewed or reported on, i mean, the word "liar" is not a word reporters generally use to describe a president. but in this administration, it's -- >> i don't use that word. >> i know. it is -- i hadn't until really this administration. because it is -- there is no way that the president does not

understand what he is saying is not factually correct. and so there is both intent and not just incorrect information, but it seems to be repeated intent to -- to mislead. >> look, i'm not a psychiatrist. i'm not -- i can't put my finger on his motivation. my -- i mean, where he says -- i think you played this. well, i don't understand him. i think that's a fair point. but what i'm trying to do is describe his actions and his motives and the result of his actions. and he -- a couple of friends of mine have said, you know, they've read the book and they say these are psychiatric hours. they are not psychiatric hours. i -- that is not my business. my business is to find out what

happened and what he is willing to say about it. and what astounded me is he would let me push him. on the impeachment issue, i went down to mar-a-lago and essentially for 20 minutes did the impeachment interrogation of him that the senate and the house was never able to do. and we were shouting at each other. another time he called the house and my wife elsa said, you know, you're shouting at the president. and she said you shouldn't be shouting at the president. and i said, well, i've got questions to ask. >> yeah. >> what is -- was important for me is that he would let me do that. >> yeah. stay with us. as you mentioned, bob woodward's book ends with something he had never done before in all his books about previous u.s. presidents. that's next. hmph...

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famously, in all his books on u.s. presidents, bob woodward never deliver an overt opinion on people he's writing about. through his reporting, he lets readers develop their own conclusions. as he said to me earlier in the program, not this time in his book "rage." i can only reach one conclusion, trump is the wrong man for the

job. what made you do that? >> a conclusion based on overwhelming evidence. i -- i looked -- i was typing along and -- the epilog, and out it came. and i realized and consulted people that that was actually my obligation. i got as close as an outsider might get to the inner trump and what -- how the white house works and functions. and i -- can i tell a quick -- do i have a moment to tell a story about katherine graham who was the owner and the publisher of "the washington post." >> i would love to hear. we've got, like, two minutes. >> okay. i'm going to do it q