greg, thephone is correspondent for usa today. thank you for being with us. tweets, including the one late last week in which the president accusing the media and the democrats of being on a witch hunt with this russia investigation. what's been happening since then? guest: well, yes, that tweet, i think the one you're referring to is the one responding to reports that his former national security advisor, michael flynn, had asked for immunity in order to testify before congress about this alleged russian connection, and the president says, he absolutely should ask for immunity, because the congressional investigation is a witch hunt. the president has been trying to take that whole russia investigation into another direction by making the issue, as your caller has been talking

about this morning, the issue being the unmasking of the names of trump transition officials in intelligence reports. host: in fact, let me share with you the tweet, the most recent tweet from the president, wow, @foxnews just reporting big news, source the official behind unmasking is high up, known intel official is responsible. some unmasked not associated with russia. trump team spied on before he was nominated, if this is true, does not get much bigger, would e sad for the united states. >> guest: yeah, and the president says this is big news. i have to say, it's a little hard to know if that's true. this fox news report cites one congressional source familiar with the investigation who says that devin nunes, the house intelligence committee chairman, knows who the

official was responsible for the unmasking. i think we have to back up a few steps. first of all, there's nothing necessarily improper with the unmasking of president trump or a transition official. there are any number of contexts in which that's completely appropriate. one says if it's just information that anyone would know by reading the newspapers anyway, those names don't have to be minimized. and also, it's important -- i can understand, it could be important for intelligence officials to know what efforts that foreign nationals were making to -- what they knew about trump and what intelligence they were trying to get on the united states and the president clinton. it's still a little early in this election, and it's impossible to know really how much unmasking there was, how inappropriate it might have been. but remember, this is, you know, this storyline is

alongside the other storyline being pushed by democrats about russian interference in the 2016 election. host: greg korte, you're now covering president trump, and as you talk to white house officials, can you glean any insights into the president's tweeting habits? guest: well, you know, unlike resident obama, who had this @potus twitter account, and you would see tweets from president obama, and we were told they were written in his voice, but not necessarily written by president obama himself. that's clearly not the case with president trump. his thumbs are on his phone, you know, banging out these tweets. there are two twitter accounts from president trump. one is the @realdonaldtrump twitter account he's had all along. the other is the official @potus account, which is the same that president obama used. white house officials are often

in a difficult position trying to explain the context of the president's tweet, some of which, you know, seemed to allude to facts that are unsubstantiated or unverifiable , and, you know, the white house has to come out every day and defend those tweets. i'm thinking of a couple of tweets a weekend or so ago about how much money germany owes the united states as far as the nato bill, which is just, you know, completely untrue. germany doesn't owe the united states any money. they owe money to their own defense. but these are the things, especial on the weekends, you see these tweets when there are fewer officials around, when we get some of these more questionable tweets by the president. host: we're talking with greg korte, correspondent for "usa today." let me ask but president's week ahead, some significant visits, including the president of china, who will be traveling to

mar-a-lago this weekend. guest: yeah, this seems to be a foreign policy week for the president. he's got the president of egypt on monday. king an call from jordan on wednesday. and then on thursday, the president will fly down to his winter retreat in mar-a-lago to meet with the president. this is probably the biggest foreign meeting he's had so far. he's met with theresa may of the u.k., and chancellor merkel of germany. but, you know, china is a huge rival to the united states on the world stage, and this is a very sensitive meeting. it's one that the president has already signaled that trade is going to be on the top of the agenda. he says it's going to be a very difficult meeting. he's going to talk about the trade deficit, which is an interesting choice in and of itself. there are other issues with china, the tensions in the south china sea. there's the north korea issue. there is cybersecurity.

and for president trump to start right out of the gate with the trade issue signals, i think, exactly what president trump is trying to signal, that his administration is all about jobs first and that they're going prioritize that in the relations with other countries. host: and finally, the battle in the senate, as we said at the top of the program, will be over neil gorsuch, a vote by the judiciary committee tomorrow. a full senate vote on friday. will we see a swearing-in of the new supreme court justice by the end of this week or early next week? guest: well, that's difficult for me to say, although the republicans picked up a couple of centrist moderate democrats over the past few days, which would make it likely that one way or another, by hook or by crook, gorsuch will get nominated. the question is whether senate majority leader mitch mcconnell will have to invoke the so-called nuclear option in

getting past that 60-vote treasury hold for a filibuster to end debate and get to the actual vote on the nomination. there's a precedent for senators voting to end the debate, but voting against the nominee, so we'll see how much support there is among democrats that take this all the way to the end. i suspect that by the end of the week, yeah, it's very possible that we'll have a ninth supreme court justice for the first time in more than a year. host: greg korte, covering all of this for "usa today," his work available online at usatoday.com. thanks for getting up early on >> c-span's washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up this morning, the center for law and policy executive director will discuss the proposed cuts to the program in president trump's 2018 budget. the center for immigration

studies talks about efforts from the trump administration to with just to withhold funds -- withhold grants from sanctuary cities. the senior correspondent for government executives discusses the current size and scope of the federal workforce and the potential cuts by the trump administration. to watch washington journal coming up at 7:00 a.m. this morning. join the discussion. it oncase you missed at the senaten -- intelligence hearing. >> at the end of 2015, the russian influence system began pushing things seeking to influence the outcome of the u.s. election. test with adversarial views toward the kremlin.

they were in full swing don't be primary season. >> lieutenant general on the shortage of pilots in the military. >> the total force including our active guard is short 1500 pilots.ilots -- 155 it should be noted that the cost to train to prepare him or her for their first operational squadron is $11 million. -- therede receiver are a lot of police officers that are not involved in the communities that they are serving and are supposed to be serving. i have this crazy theory that if i know you, i am a lot more likely to treat you a lot better than if i don't.

relationship -- if i have a relationship with you, with that relationship i am not going to be so quick to lock you up. >> general joseph hotel on security challenges in the middle east. >> while we establish accountability, i think it is important to recognize the enemy does use human shields, has little regard for human life and doesn't have to use allegations as a tool to hinder our operations. congresswoman -- >> today modern-day israel is a modern-day david. byaimed at the jewish state terrorist groups like hezbollah and hamas. this time, israel has a major upgrade in technology.

amen. -- and theling american defense contractor, raytheon. >> c-span programs are available at c-span.org. next, a super import oral argument that questions when private citizens can soothe the police. the case involves desk and so the police. the case involves a homeless couple. the couple was awarded $4 million in damages. this oral argument is an hour. argument first this morning. county of los angeles v. mendes. mr. rosenkranz. >> thank you, mr. chief justice.