♪ this is a special edition of "nightline." "trump under fire." shock waves across washington

this is a special edition of "nightline." "trump under fire." >> good even. thanks for joining us. another astonishing turn of events out of washington. the newly appointed special counsel taking over the investigation into russia's meddling in the u.s. election. this as the trump administration battles a barrage of attacks over his handling of sensitive classified information. tonight lawmakers on both sides of the aisle demanding answers. here's abc's david wright.

>> reporter: tonight at the department of justice, breaking news. >> we are coming on the air now with major news. >> the u.s. justice department announced this evening -- >> this a special counsel has been appointed -- >> reporter: the big announcement, there's a new sheriff in town, a special counsel who will now take over the ongoing investigation into russian meddling in the november election. deputy attorney general rob rosenstein chose former fbi director robert mueller for the job. >> a special counsel mueller will have extraordinary power. he can replace all the agents currently working on the case if he chooses. he has 60 days to put together a team of lawyers to work with him on the case. >> reporter: mueller's appointment is a blow to the white house. >> i am told that the senior staff here at the white house did not get word of this until about 30 minutes before the news was shared with the news media. completely taken off guard. >> reporter: tonight the president issued this statement. "as i have stated many times, a thorough investigation will confirm what we already know. there was no collusion between

my campaign and any foreign entity. i look forward to this matter concluding quickly." the president made no secret of his wish for the russia investigation to end. >> as trump todd nbc's lester holt, it was on his mind when he decided to fire fbi director james comey. >> in fact, when i decided to just do it, i said to myself, i said, you know? this russia thing with trump and russia is a made-up story, it's an excuse by the democrats for having lost an election that they should have won. >> reporter: if the president were hoping that would be the end of it, his statement combined with his decision to fire comey appears to have had the opposite effect. on capitol hill, democrats have been clamoring for this. >> the point is, he was trying to interfere with an investigation. >> reporter: even some republicans have started expressing concern. >> republicans can't be okay with this. >> reporter: president trump appears to be bracing for

battle. >> fight, fight, fight. never, ever, ever give up. things will work out just fine. >> reporter: today at his commencement address at the coast guard academy, trump insisted the media and the d.c. elite are being unfair to him. >> no politician in history, and i say this with great surety, has been treated worse or more unfairly. >> reporter: tonight on capitol hill, relief. >> have you seen the latest news reports? >> obviously that's a step in the right direction. >> this takes the politics out of it hopefully, this has gotten too political. >> reporter: lawmakers in both parties welcomed the idea of an independent counsel to sort it o all out. >> it's good to have a focal point of somebody we all trust. >> reporter: mueller was the longest-serving fbi director after j. edgar hoover. confirmed for the job just a

week before 9/11. going on to serve a dozen years during the bush and obama administrations. he's james comey's immediate predecessor and have had this to say about comey -- >> a man of honesty, dedication, and integrity. >> reporter: the feeling mutual. >> i must be out of my mind to be following bob mueller. >> reporter: mueller himself wants to find his approach. in a speech at university of virginia, as public service without politics. >> we must be objective, and be perceived as objective. we must be fair, and be perceived as fair. it also means that we must be apolitical. >> reporter: today key congressional committees signaled they'll press on with their own investigations. the senate intel committee formally asked comey to come and testify asap. >> i think we want to hear from him in a way that's going to be fully forthcoming. and i'm looking forward to that. >> reporter: separately, the committee also demanded the fbi

hand over any and all documents prepared by comey that detail his interactions with senior white house officials over the russia investigation. of greatest interest, that memo comey apparently wrote himself in february. abc news has not seen the memo but sources close to comey have confirmed its existence. it documents comey's account of a meeting that took place shortly after former national security adviser michael flynn had been caught out in a lie about his conversations with the russian ambassador. trump allegedly asked comey to go easy on flynn. allegedly telling comey, i hope you can let this go, he's a good guy, i hope you can let this go. is that the smoking gun in an obstruction of justice case? >> it is way too early to say that it is a smoking gun. but it has certainly energized both republicans and democrats on capitol hill. >> reporter: the white house

disputes that account. >> the president's been very clear the account that was published is not an accurate description of how the event occurred. >> the fact that the president has admitted he had russia on his mind when he fired comey, there are going to be a lot of factors that go into assessing, was the administration, was the president, attempting to obstruct the investigation into russian ties with the 2016 campaign? >> reporter: democrats are already jumping to their own conclusions. >> the white house is obstructing our investigation, covering up for general flynn, and refusing to provide not a single document, not a single syllable, zilch, nothing. >> reporter: tonight one of the founders of the federalist society took issue with that. the democrats seem to be pretty convinced that there's a good obstruction of justice case to be made here. and i gather you don't agree? >> it's clear that if president

trump suggested to director comey that he do something in an investigation, that's entirely within his role as president of the united states. >> but it's not just he asked him to do a favor for him, it's also that he carried through on the veiled threat, right? he fired him. >> well, that's also appropriate for the president. he can pick and choose who works in his administration. and he lost confidence in director comey. >> if there are tapes of this conversation, does that change the equation at all? >> no. because i think it's okay for the president to give direction to the fbi about which investigations they should do. >> there's a guy from "nightline" here today, "nightline" is the shoot -- shooting the entire show out of which they'll use train seconds. >> reporter: today we visited a corner of conservatism in the ultra-hip tribeca neighborhood here in manhattan. >> every single day it's an impeachable offense. >> i feel like i'm living in a bad made for tv series here. >> we're at the studios of i

heart radio, the mark simone show, taking the pulse of the trump faithful. >> did they ask you how you can defend this president? >> yeah. >> reporter: mark simon is a staunch defender of president trump. >> these are all attempts to get rid of him, these are kill shots, every one of them. >> so what are you hearing from people? are they concerned? >> no, not really. you remember, most of america, they really don't pay attention to james comey. most people are watching "dancing with the stars" or "shark tank." >> at a certain point they're going to know who james comey is, he's going to be out there, it sounds like this could go the next step. >> i've been covering this campaign for a year and a half. every two months, this is it, this could go the next step, he'll never get out of this. he always gets out of it. in the end he always succeeds. i think this will go nowhere. let's go to steve in brewster. >> caller: good morning, how are you guys doing? >> good. >> reporter: are we still in the

chattering phase? is this still idle talk, nothing more? >> any talk of impeachment at this point is way, way, way too premature. and probably will never happen. >> is it wishful thinking on the part of the democrats? >> it is entirely wishful thinking. >> reporter: that said, where this goes now depends very much on two men, both former fbi directors. one of them expected to tell his side of the story in congress as soon as next week. the other assembling his team. special counsel mueller has swum in these waters before. he has the experience and now the authority to take this where it leads. i'm david wright for "nightline" in new york. when we come back, close friend and trump insider roger stone on all the president's men, and women. and what he should do next. ♪ depression is a tangle of multiple symptoms. ♪

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this special advertise of "nightline," "trump under fire," continues. >> we return now to a white house in turmoil. plagued by seemingly unending leaks. tonight we hear from a long-time friend and adviser of president trump, the outspoken political operative roger stone. on why he thinks the president is surrounded by disloyal staff. and what trump needs to do to save his reputation. here's abc's tom llamas. >> i could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and i wouldn't lose any voters. punch him in the face, i tell you. we are going to make america great again. >> reporter: he was called the chaos candidate.

>> he'd an chaos president. >> reporter: and now for many, those words may be ringing true. he campaigned as the outsider. who could fix washington. >> we are going to drain the swamp. >> reporter: critics and friends alike now saying it's his white house that needs fixing. >> frankly, i'm concerned that the president has surrounded himself with people who have no loyalty to him. and of course it's obvious that they leak like a sieve. >> i'm surprised that people are surprised. because donald trump has been rolling this way for the better part of 45 years. >> reporter: the president's 118-day term has been racked with contention. over the past week, one political bombshell after another has sent the white house into what some are describing as a tailspin. >> fbi director james comey fired by president trump -- >> reporting that president trump disclosed highly classified information to the russians -- >> did the president ask james comey to "let this go"? >> the department of justice

reveals that they will appoint a special counsel. >> this is a white house that is trying to be business as usual. they've got that big foreign trip coming up. that is where they're concentrating today. behind the scenes, this is a white house in panic mode. >> reporter: the president even seems to be sending out key staffers with a message one day -- >> the deputy attorney general determined that the fbi director lost his confidence, he forwarded that recommendation to the attorney general, and the president agreed with it. >> reporter: only to undercut them the next day. >> oh, i was going to fire regardless of recommendation. >> i'm an agent provocateur. >> reporter: close friends like roger stone whose relationship with the president is the premise of a new netflix documentary -- >> sure, the president has his own idiosyncratic leadership style. just the fact that he's not whom money newsed washington politician and conducting the presidency the way career

politicians have, doesn't mean his form of leadership is not effective. >> reporter: some claim the media unless a frenzy saying the real story is the white house leaks to reporters. >> there's a weasel here. it's the traitor who disclosed these facts to "the washington post." >> reporter: yet the contradictions within the administration continue. at first the white house denied that he shared classified intel with russia. >> the story that came out tonight as reported is false. >> reporter: then trump himself tweeting, i wanted to share with russia. saying he did so because, i wanted russia to greatly step up their fight against isis. >> as i said for the third time, there is nothing further to add on that. that's frankly offensive. >> reporter: the apparent mixed messages from the white house have put press secretary sean spicer on the defensive. buzzfeed showing reporters crowding his office monday night. demanding comment to a report the president allegedly compromised classified intelligence by sharing it with the russians. and the night of the comey

firing, reports sean spicer was standing near some hedges to avoid tv cameras. inspiring this homemade lawn ornament. >> there are two things that make donald trump tick. one is self-aggrandizement. the other is self-preservation. the fact of the matter he's not a strategic thinker and never has been. i think the question about how long he stays in the game with this probe on his doorstep is how much he can actually think beyond mere self-preservation. >> reporter: from the beginning of his run, there was both skepticism and enthusiasm surrounding his campaign. a real estate mogul and reality tv star. >> you're fired. >> reporter: trump didn't hold back on the trail. >> little marco. lying ted cruz. crooked hillary clinton. >> reporter: unpredictability still a staple in his approach to the oval office. on the trail firing two campaign managers. his ability to bounce back after headlines that would sink a storied political career earning

him the nickname teflon don. >> having someone go out into great big rallies and talk about how great it's going to be once he's there makes people feel good, gives people a sense of hope and optimism. the voters want that to be true. and so that is something that is very appealing on the trail and very difficult to translate into action. >> reporter: but of late, it's the president's support system that is also taking hits. kellyanne conway a constant on cable news taking some time out of the spotlight, prompting this "snl" skit. ♪ where in the world is kellyanne conway ♪ >> reporter: president trump's son-in-law, jared kushner, who many think of as a trump whisperer, keeping a low profile. john oliver joking -- >> we did find an interview of him talking on tv in 2009. here it is. >> my main business is real estate! >> i know what you're thinking. hold on, you just took that clip

and dubbed in gilbert godfrey. but you don't know that for sure. >> frankly think to survive he's going to have to clean house and replace the people around him with people who are loyalists. who understand him and understand his agenda. >> sources of mine have told me that trump has said he needs to clean up the white house. but that's also profound denial. donald trump's problems right now are entirely self-created. >> reporter: but in the midst of turmoil, there have been successes for the administration. namely, a recent win in the house on health care reform. a supreme court pick pushed through. rolling back obama-era leniency on sentencing. >> i've accomplished a tremendous amount in a very short time as president. >> reporter: but tonight as trump prepares to depart on his first foreign trip as president, many are hoping this so-called chaos president will find a calmer approach to diplomacy. >> one thing i can tell you about donald trump, he's very tough. and it's always a mistake to

underestimate him. >> reporter: for "nightline," i'm tom llamas. chelsea manning officially a free woman. tonight the first photos after her release. >> this special edition of "nightline" is brought to you by bounty. for mom" per roll more "doing chores for dad" per roll more "earning something you love" per roll bounty is more absorbent, so the roll can last 50% longer... ...than the leading ordinary brand. so you get more "life" per roll. bounty, the quicker picker upper and now try bounty with new despicable me 3 prints. in theaters june 30. when i feel controlled by frequent, unpredictable abdominal pain or discomfort and diarrhea. i tried lifestyle changes and over-the-counter treatments, but my symptoms keep coming back. it turns out i have

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finally tonight, army private chelsea manning is out of prison tonight. president obama commuted her 35-year sentence for leaking documents to wikileaks, the harshest penalty for any whistle-blower in u.s. history. the transgender soldier spent seven years in prison, almost a year of it in solitary. today tweeting, first steps to freedom, and her first hot greasy pizza, to her 163,000 followers. in an exclusive statement to abc news, manning said, i appreciate the wonderful support that i've received, the past will always affect me and i will keep that in mind while remembering how it played out is only my starting point, not my destination. thanks for watching abc news. stay tuned for overnight developments. as always, we're online at abcnews.com. and our "nightline" facebook page. good night, america.

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