captioning sponsored by cbs is sunday, june 10th, i am margaret brennan and this is "face the nation". the summit between president trump and north korean leader kim skim about to get underway we will preview the so i think pore talks and tell you what the president is saying on the eve of this historic event. >> it is unknown territory in the truest sense. but i really feel confident. >> president trump made those remarks after a tense gathering of top u.s. allies in canada with all parties still fuming over the presidents's decision to trig ear trade war. mr. trump sparked another controversy for the so-called g-7 leaders with this. >> this used to be the g 8. not the g-7. and something happened a while

ago where russia is no longer -- i think it would be an as society have russia back in. >> brennan: before he left the meeting early for singapore, the president claimed his relationship with our allies was a 10, but acknowledged a serious divide on how to deal with trade. >> i will say it was not contentious. what was strong was the language that this cannot go on. i mean it is not a question of i hope it changes. it is going to change. we are like the piggy bank everybody is robbing and that ends. >> brennan: canadian prime minister justin trudeau responded saying the tariffs were quote, insulting. >> canadians were polite, we are reasonable but also will not be pushed around. >> brennan: the president's chief economic advisor larry kudlow will join us. plus we will hear from former president obama's national security vis sorry and u.n. ambassador susan rice as well as the top democrat in the senate on north korea policy, ed markey of massachusetts. >> finally, we will talk to ken starr who investigated the

president clinton about the challenges that special prosecutor bob mueller faces and as always we will have plenty of analysis on all of the news of the week coming up on "face the nation". >> >> brennan: good morning, and welcome to "face the nation". both leaders have arrived in singapore for the historic face-to-face meetings. air force one touched down just a short while ago and north korean leader kim jong-un arrived earlier in the day and met with singapore's prime minister lee. yesterday president trump was asked if he had a clear objective for the talks. >> i have a clear objective, but i have to say that it is someths be spur of the moment. wow don't know. you know, this has not been done before at this level. this is a leader who really is an unknown personality, people

don't know much about him. i think that he is going to surprise on the upside very much on the upside, we will see -- >> you look for from this initial talks to judge whether you think things are going well? >> well, i think the minimum would be relationship. >> you start at least a die 0 log, because, you know, as a deal person i have done very well with deals. what you want to do is start that. >> how long do you think it will take you to figure out whether he is serious about getting -- >> good question, how long will it take? i think within the first minute i will know. just my touch, my feel. that's what i do. how long will it take to figure out whether or not they are serious. i said maybe in the first minute. you know the way they say you know if you are going to like somebody in the first five seconds. did you ever hear that one? well, i think that very quickly i will know whether or not

something good is going to happen. >> brennan: we begin today with "cbs evening news" anchor jeff glor who is leading our network coverage from singapore. jeff, the president is about to the begin what could be a significant arms control agreement, but he is casting this assort of a question of chemistry with this 34-year-old dictator. i mean, what should we expect to see? >> well, much has been made of these touch and feel comments and the president's comments earlier in the week saying that attitude was more important than preparation when it comes to these talks. that is in keeping with his confidence as a negotiator, ago, as someone who can get the deals done. however he is not walking into these talks blind, as early as 99, then potential fiery candidate trump was talking about nuclear proliferation as the world's greatest threat and he said at the time that whoever was in charge should be talking to kim jong-un, his father, like crazy, trying to negotiate to

disarm, to get the nuclear weapons out of north korea. >> brennan: jeff, you know, it is interesting to watch the 0 pomp and circumstance, because you have a to arguably the most powerful man in the world, the president of the united states arriving on air force one and being put on par with this dictator who has never traveled this far since coming to power back in 2011. the optics are really interesting. >> yes. and we have been watching the stage craft and the theatre so far. the president arriving second, walked out of air force one, landed at the air base and walked out by himself when kim jong-un arrived on air china flights, he was surrounded by an entourage, a big group, we are told that kim jong-un took a 747 to match the president's air force one, also flying with air china shows solidarity with the nebi f chinese,these it is a big deal for the north koreans and then on the streets,

at least so far from kim jong-un, we have seen these scenes we have seen before and that is him in the armored vehicle and then his body guards running next to him on the street. that's quite a site. >> brennan: jeff thank you, jeff glor the there this, there in so i think pore. we turn now to cbs news foreign correspondent ben tracy, he is also in singapore this morning with a look at how this much anticipated summit came together. ben. >> margaret, nearly 3,000 journalists have descended upon singapore to cover this historic summit and with both president trump and kim jong-un now on the ground here, security is noticeably tighter. >> the the hotels where president trump and kim jong-un are staying have been turned into special security zones, special forces are being deployed and the airspace above singapore is restricted. >> we have never seen anything like this, yes, this is the most high we have had of any international visitor. >> so far, it is a pair of em

person fairs that have stolen the show in singapore but people here are now ready for the real face-off between two of the world's most -- leaders, even if they don't expect a major diplomatic breakthrough. >> realistically, is north korea going to give their nukes up? not a chance. it will never happen. >> but those weapons and whether kim jong-un is actually willing to part with them are supposed to be the main focus of the summit. admission to an official end to the korean war. president trump says complete denuclearization is the only outcome that will lead to a lifting of strict sanctions that have crippled north korea's already beleaguered economy. >> what is still not known is what kim jong-un would want in return for shutting down his treasured nuclear program. historically north korea has demanded that the u.s. must remove its more than 28,000 troops from the korean

peninsula, and end its decades long security arrangement with south korea and japan. south korean president moon jae-in and japan's minister, minister recently visited the white house to shore up those alliances. there are concerns that president trump might focus too much on north korea's nuclear weapons that are capable of hitting the united states and leave the regime with the short-range missiles and chemical weapons that can still devastate south korea and japan. of course there is a lot at stake for kim jong-un as well who is attempting this transformation from international pariah to something of a statesman, sitting down with the president of the united states gives the kim regime the legitimacy it has long sought on the world stage. >> brennan: ben, thank you. we turn now to president obama's national security vis sorry and former u.n. ambassador susan rice, ambassador it is good to have you 0 here on "face the nation". >> great to be with you.

>> this is a historic summit, for you, what do you think the best possible outcome could be? >> i think the best possible outcome is that we have more than a photo-op or even a thle very concrete steps that they can then pass on to their negotiators in the form of a framework, that the negotiators can then flush out into a substantive agreement. it is going to take quite a while. this is very complicated set of issues. and success can't be declared on the basis of a happy meeting. >> brennan: president obama liked to embrace diplomacy, why did he choose not to try to negotiate with kim jong-un? >> well, in fact, there were efforts at discussions, we had them during the clinton administration and during the bush administration. and we even had opportunities and efforts during the obama administration. the problem is that at every turn, the north koreans would make commitments and then break them. and we need to be mind of that that is, again, what might happen in this context.

but this is a different diplomatic structure, right? it is flipped on its head, you starting with the leaders. >> starting with the leaders, yes. >> brennan: so do you give the president some creditor being willing to take this high level risk? >> well, i think, you know, it is clear that the past set of efforts have not succeeded. i am a believer in diplomacy and i am open to new methods of trying to accomplish the consistent objective that we have of full denuclearization. i think the question is, are we walking in prepared? are we a walking in with our allies behind us? are we in a position to understand that one meeting is not going to be one an done. this is the start of a serious negotiating process. >> brennan: the former director of national intelligence, jim clapper just wrote a book and he was very public about what he said was his personal disagreement with president obama's decision not to engage with kim jong-un and north korea. other obama administration officials have told me they wished and they regret not taking stronger action.

you were the national security advisor. do you take ownership of that? do you regret not pushing harder? >> well, i think you are mixing two things. there is the question of sitting down at the negotiating table and there is the question of pushing harder. >> brennan: right. and clapper -- >> engagement period he thought that obama should have done more of. >> so my view is that we did, and we should have increased the pressure on 0 north korea incrementally, i myself negotiated for tough security council resolutions imposing increasingly harsh penalties on north korea. my successor ambassador power did the same, ambassador hail live has continued that effort and we have layered on increasing pressure. i think that is appropriate. we, in fact, during the clinton -- during the obama administration had the opportunity request you recall the negotiations with we sat down and tried to work on an arrangement with the north koreans and blew it up on the spot, i don't think it is accurate to say there weren't diplomatic efforts, in fact, jim clapper himself went to north

korea the fact of the matter is that i believe the 0 north koreans were not prepared to be serious under kim jong-un with respect to sitting at the table until they perfected their nuclear program and their missiles. >> brennan: so -- what has changed. >> i don't think a diplomatic breakthrough would have been possible because of that goal. >> brennan: from the north korean point of view, it is coming to the 0 negotiating table when they did come when they demonstrated to the world that their nuclear capacity and their missile capacity has been perfected and that's in fact what kim jong-un said. >> brennan: you have been outspoken about russia of late, i want to ask you, about something very specific here, that president trump just said. he is calling for russia to be readmitted into the g-8 which of course was pushed out of during the obama administration because ukraine's --ern >> ukraine an necksation of crimea. >> so he said yesterday again

that he would hike to see russia be a part of the g 8 and he basically recognized the, russia's claim to crimea as legitimate here is what he said. >> crimea was like during the obama administration, and, you know, obama can say all he wants, but he allowed russia to take crimea. i may have had a much different attitude. but so you really have to ask that question to president obama. you know why did he do that? why did he do that? >> brennan: would you like to respond? >> it is a disgraceful statement. the fact of the matter, is russia had invaded georgia, it then invaded the ukraine. we rallied the entire european union and many other partners to impose tough sanctions on russia for its annexation. we supported tagreedhat russia o longer be part of this community of the g-8. >> brennan: you are saying but russia still -- it was a feet complete. >> that is outrageous, the united states has long upheld international law, this was the

most brazen violation of another country's sovereignty that has occurred in recent years, for president of the united states .. to blame his predecessor rather than to understand that russia is our adversary, russia has taken on behavior that is absolutely reprehensible including being responsible for shooting civilian aircraft out of the skies and killing hundreds of people. 4 the president of the united states to suggest that all is forgotten, that that doesn't matter, that we are fine with one country annexing another country's sovereign territory and we should just welcome them with open arms back into a community of democracies is outrageous. >> brennan: it is interesting that this russia policy has made some unusual bedfellows, in fact, sen mnet yest rebuking presidentsayingo s bipartisan majorities of americans remain pro free trade, pro globalization, supportive of

alliances based on 70 years of shared values, americans stand with you, even if our president doesn't. he is commenting on what he was upset with the president's rhetoric at the g-7, are you surprised to find yourself in agreement with senator mccain? >> no there are have been other times i have agreed with senator mccain and other times i have disagreed. he is absolutely right, the united states, our leadership in the world, our national security has long depended on having close and unbreakable bonds with our closest allies. the g-7 partners are our closest allies in the world, we share values, we share interests, we share security. and for the president of the united states to walk into that session and to essentially blow it up and disrespect our allies while embracing russia and giving benefits to china, countries that are not our allies and in the case of russia indeed our declared adversary,

is very worrisome and very destructive and it leaves the united states isolated in the world and our allies wondering if they can count on us and we on them. >> brennan: ambassador rice, thank you for joining us. thank you and we will be back in one minute with the president's top economic advisor larry kudlow who is just back from the g-7 meeting in canada. despite all of the smiles you see on that photo, was it as contentious it is a president's twitter feed suggested? we will ask him. >> because safety is never being satisfied and always working to be better.

bp's natural gas teams use smart app technology to share data from any well instantly. so they can analyze trends and stop potential problems in their tracks. because safety is never being satisfied and always working to be better. >> brennan: we are back with the chairman of the white house national economic council and the president's top economic advisor, larry kudlow. larry, welcome, i know you got in late last night from canada from the g-7 talks. the president called the canadian prime minister weak and dishonest. what exactly did he say to get this kind of response from the real estate? >> to be honest with you, prime minister trudeau, by the way, i respect, i have worked with him in good faith, getting through a

good communique on friday andhos conference, the president is barely out of there on the plane to north korea, and he starts insulting us. you know, he starts talking about u.s. is insulting can -- we are not weak, canada are not going to be pushed around. >> brennan: he was talking about the u.s. tariffs. >> that's true and in general, okay, it was an attack on the president. we are going to have retaliatory tariffs now these are things that prime minister said before basically but he didn't say them before after a successful g-7 communique where president trump and the others all worked in good faith to put a statement together, which by the way almost nobody expected to happen, in fact, reporters are asking me before the trip whethe up at he did, he others, we worked it out, we used good language that was

acceptable. >> brennan: and then the president reneged on that g-7 statement. >> no, no. i'm sorry. and then trudeau decided to attack the president. that is the key point. and, yes, you know, if you attack this president, he is going to fight back. but here is the key point, margaret. the president is going to negotiate with kim, north korea and singapore, it is a historic negotiation and there is no way this president is not going to stand strong, number one. he is not going to allow other people to suddenly take potshots at him hours before that summit, andber 2deau should brean:. >> trudeau -- >> brennan: -- to impress an enemy. >>who picked the fight? >> brennan: but -- >> i am arguing the trudeau picked the fight. trudeau. >> brennan: do you believe he was going to step away from those retaliatory tariffs had he promised you privately that is what was going to happen? >> who? >> brennan: trudeau, you are saying he broke his word, he

publicly came out and said things. >> let me say in the bilateral between president trump and prime minister trudeau, which was -- i was in that room, it was a very successful, calm, friendly, respectful bilateral. and we made great progress in moving towards a deal between the u.s. and canada and perhaps nafta as a whole. it was very successful. that is another reason why i think trudeau betrayed trump and the g-7. i mean, look, they put together this good consensus, the western allies were together, it was peaceful, they were good citizens, it was all in good faith, what is not in good faith is when you leave there and you fly out of there and the host canadian prime minister starts taking whacks at you, potshots at you on the eve of this korean summit. president trump had no alternative in my opinion but to express his opinion that he is going to pull out. look. >> brennan: to pull out, to pull out of -- >> to pull out of the communique.

that's what he side. >> brennan: when it comes to nafta which you said there was progress on, you said the president is not going to pull out of nafta. >> that is correct. >> brennan: but the president said he may broker a side collateral agreement with canada and mexico. >> that is correct. >> brennan: how do you do both things at once? how is that not withdrawing from nafta? >> oh, no, we won't withdraw from nafta, we are heavy into negotiations and the negotiation will either be bilateral or they will be try lateral. okay. one way or the other. >> brennan: you still think he can get a trade deal -- >> i don't think i don't know that, margaret, i will say i don't know, because i think, again, trudeau is very unfortunate's statements, his betrayal, he betrayed trump, can i ask, he betrayed the whole g-7. >> brennan: but how. >> by attacking right after. >> brennan: as you said before, the tariffs were insulting and that they follow through with the july 1st -- >> you want to say that right after a successful g-7 meeting is is that necessary? seriously? where is the good faith? where is the optimism?

people came together at that meeting. i am in there working with the heads of state. it is my great pleasure representing the president. the president was there, we are putting words on paper, we are making adjustments, we are making compromises and we are coming up with a document we can accept, most people thought that wouldn't happen, so that happens, instead of being a good push to the singapore and north korean talks trudeau decides to come out and play to domestic political consumption and take potshots at the american president. >who is representing the rest of the world. that's just not fair play. >> brennan: tell me why the president called for russia to rejoin the g 8, was that just meant as a provocation? >> no. i mean, they were in the g 8. it was the g 8 for many years. >> brennan: right. and then they were kicked out after invading part of the ukraine and annexing crimea. >> soviet, perhaps -- many foreign policies scholars agree with trump on this, we have to do business with russia,. >> why but why in the g-7 summit? >> because it was that meeting

that russia used to be invited. to it was the g 8 for many years. >> but the head of u.s. intelligence said vladimir putin is trying to undermine the rule of law, western ideals and democratic norms so why invite him back to the very type of alliance he is trying to blow up. >> i think dan cote was correct in his accusations that doesn't mean you can't do business with them, okay? they are a part of the world story. they are a power. they are a military power. they are not an economic power, and can we switch back, margaret. look, trump spend two days, president trump spent two days, this is something dear to my heart, talking to these ministers, these heads of state about free trade, ending tariffs, ending tariff barriers, ending subsidies, stopping trade wars, moving towards fairness and unfair trading practices, we are the fastest growing economy in the g-7 and g a vision here. he is probably going to be the best trade reformer in several decades the world has seen.

why wouldn't he -- >> brennan:. >> why would you have to undercut him. >> brennan: i will have you come back and explain how all of this is going to add up to the kind of economic growth you are projecting but we have to leave it here for this moment and we will be right back with more "face the nation". >>

>> brennan: there will be a lot more coverage of the singapore summit on our streaming news service cbsn as well as all of our cbs news broadcasts. >>

>> brennan: we will be right back. stay with us. >>

>> brennan: welcome back to "face the nation". i am margaret brennan. we are joined now by massachusetts senator ed markey, he sits on the senate foreign relations committee and is the top democrat on the panel that focuses on north korea policy, senator, welcome to the program. >> thank you. >> brennan: because of the kind of oversight role you have, you keep a close eye on the state department and secretary of state who is with the president and presumably in the room. what kind of promises have been made by this administration in terms of what they will share with congress? >> we have not been included in any of the preparation for this negotiation. the democrats have been kept in the dark in terms of what his approach is going to be. i think it would have been far better for him to have included us since it is a democrat and

republican objective to have a negotiation, a direct negotiation between kim and trump, but thus far, the president has not included democrats. >> brennan: what would it take to win your vote to lift sanctions, so do speak? i mean if they get any kind of agreement and it goes to the congress? what would change your mind? >> well, the president first of all is going to have to extract from kim a definition of what denuclearization means. right now, there is a vast gulf between what the united states and north korea believe that word means. a and in our -- on our side, we believe it means a removal of all nuclear weapons and delivery capacity on the korean peninsula. kim does not actually agree with that. we would also want an inventory of all of their nuclear weapons sites, all of their ballistic missile sites, all of their development, manufacturing, research facilities to be made public and for there to be aver

final way of ensuring that there is a dismantlement of those facts which is taking place again on aver final basis. >> brennan: would you want any agreement to come up for a vote in the congress as a treaty, president obama was criticized for not doing with the iran deal? >> i would like see that come forward as a treaty, because part of this negotiation will alsalso be an end okay the koren war, which is something that goes all the way back to 1953. so i think it would be wise for the president to come to congress to ensure that is a rat ratification of any agreement which does take place between the 0 north koreans and the united states, while not excluding, i just want to make clear, the south koreans and japan, we cannot sell out our allies as part of this

negotiation. >> brennan: would you have an expectation that the president should seek consensus, an authorization for military force if these talks fail and he looks at those other military options we have heard from senator lindsey graham today, a republican that he has an amf drafted. >> there is no military solution to the problem that exists on the korean peninsula. north korea has nuclear weapons. the united states has nuclear weapons. this isn't like the united states and iran. iran did not have nuclear weapons. neither did iraq. this would become very catastrophic very quickly if we have 28,000 troops right on the demilitarized line, we have 250,000 other americans within a 10-mile radius of that border. the casualties would mount up so quickly that it would exceed the first korean war in terms of deaths to americans within the

first few days and then it would just escalate from there. so this is. >> brennan: you would vote no if the president asked for your consent? >> what the president should do, rather than looking for an authorization for the use of nuclear -- of military force, the president should come back to congress and ask for even greater authority to put more economic sanctions on the north koreans. to really squeeze their economy. the president is saying that he has already used maximum pressure on the north koreans, that is not so. there has been no cutoff of all of the crude oil that flows from china into north korea. if we wanted to, we could put together an international coalition that demanded china to cut off that oil into north korea to further intensify the pressure to come to the table to negotiate. a war is not, in fact, something that can be brought which is why i have introduced a bill that

prohibits the president from a first use of nuclear weapons against north korea if we have not been attacked by nuclear weapons from north korea. that would be absolutely catastrophic. we need that debate in our country, a debate as to what the authority is of this president or any president to use nuclear weapons first. >> brennan: i want to quickly ask you about this tariff and trade war that we are now talking about. senator corker says he wants to put into place some kind of restriction to keep the president from being able to ratchet up tariffs, would you support such a measure? >> under article one of the u.s. constitution that is a prerogative of the congress. right now, the president is actually driving our allies away from us as we need them even more, while welcoming in the russians. so i think the conversation which senator corker has raised is something that on a

bipartisan basis is welcome. i think it is time for the united states congress to begin once again to reassert its authority under article 1 to play i if a key role in the imposition of any tariffs. >> brennan: so that's a yes vote from you, senator. >> absolutely. >> brennan: we will be right back with our political panel, so stay with us on "face the nation". >> ingenuity, and grit, we're not only capturing energy from the sun and wind, we're storing it. as the nation's leader in energy storage, we're ensuring americans have the energy they need, whenever they need it. this is our era. this is america's energy era. nextera energy. oh, look... another anti-wrinkle cream in no hurry to make anything happen. neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair® works in just one week.

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>> brennan: it is time now for some political analysis. molly ball joins us, she is the national political correspondent at "time" magazine, getting tongue-tied this morning, salena zito is with us, she is from the washington examiner, also a columnist at the "new york post". evan osnos writes for "the new yorker". he is reported extensively on north korea and has a piece out this week on the historical context of the current diplomatic effort. and seung min kim covers the white house from capitol hill for "washington post". welcome to all of you. evan, you have spent some time in north korea reporting what you have seen on the ground. this is diplomacy on steroids, on a fast-track. do you have any sense of what is happening inside north korea when it comes to their own expectation ms. >> i think the big question for all of us how do we go from talking about nuclear war to sitting at the negotiating table today? and the answer is that actually beneath the pyrotechnics there has been this big dynamic going

on that north korea has been trying not only over the last several months but the last few years to try to figure out a way of how to engage the outside world. they are sort of trying to do what china did in the late can 1970's and we have, you know, they don't want to be compared to china but remember china because communist country and still is, and we have to open up economic control, maintain political control. and part of sitting down with donald trump is to say how do we hold on to our dictator schoop in pyongyang while beginning to page the outside world economically. >> brennan: little by little without threatening their control i think is the key there. >> exactly. >> so when you look at these talks, i mean you heard senator markey on this program say a few moments ago he doesn't feel that congress is being briefed and key information is being shared. are you hearing similar gripes? >> i think -- i think the way that the diplomacy is being engaged is kind of leaving almost nerve the dark right now, but i think what is going to be critical to see in the summit and in subsequent meetings going on, to see whether if the

president does submit something to congress for approval and as we have talked about before, that was a major concern there republicans during the obama administration, that he didn't get official congressional signoff for iran deal. so i think it will be interesting to see senators have said in the administration, have already made those commitments to submit any sort of agreement to capitol hill, but obviously that would only be, a massive fight in congress whether to approve that deal. >> brennan: it is interesting to hear senator lindsey graham has an authorization to use military force ready to go, which means he his the president would have to ask permission before making military strikes and i think it is interesting with senator markey earlier fusing teven entertain the prospect of an amuf because there is no military option on the korean peninsula, a lot of he believes of congress feel that way as well and that's why they both democrats and republicans have been so eager to see this diplomatic, see these diplomatic efforts succeed. >> salena you have your ear

often to the ground when it comes to how the trump supporters and trump base receive some of this information. this is a high risk gamble for the president. what is the perception here? like does he walk away with a win just by walking into that room with kim jong-un? >> pretty much. i mean, that is what he does best is high risk gambles and he does things that are a little bit unorthodox and not as traditional as you would see other presidents. i have found not just with people that supported trump but people that either stayed at home or supported clinton have been able to step back on this issue and understand, we are in the middle of something very historic, and if you are older, it is sort of like nixon and a china or if you are a little less older it is sort of like reagan in geneva with gorbachev. so i think people understand there is a moment here that we might all be able to benefit from, and so i think they are enjoying -- or they are at least

sitting back and watching this with maybe hope and skepticism. >> brennan: molly, you on a different topic have a cover story in time, you write that, about the mueller investigation, something the president doesn't really want as much press about, but is certainly angered by and tweeting about himself. this is a major diversion from that, of course right now. but you did see a development in the case with more indictments against the former trump campaign chair, paul manafort this week, how significant? >> well, mull search playing hardball as he has been all along but there has been a notion that he so ratcheting up the pressure on trump's former campaign chairman paul manafort, who was out on bail, pending a trial, who has unlike several former trump associate whose have pleaded guilty so far, manafort has continued to fight the charles very hard, and he is now accused of tampering with potential witnesses and mueller is seeking to throw him in jail

pending his trial, and also bringing charges based on that alleged witness tampering. so we see, you know, increasing pressure on manafort, potentially trying to get manafort to cooperate, to turn on president trump and offer evidence having to do with the substance of the investigation. remember, the charles against manafort have to do with things he did long before he ever joined the trump campaign. it is money laundering and other charges from his career as a lobbyist. so that is not what the mueller investigation is supposed to be about. his mandate is to investigate russians meddling and this is one of the criticisms from the president and other critics of the investigation is he has wandered quite far afield of that supposed mandate. so the idea is that mueller may be putting pressure on manafort and others in order to try to get at the potential collusion he is investigating in 2016. >> brennan: salena while this may be far afield, the mandates,

these are significant and this is actual legal momentum here. these are individuals being charged, companies being charged as well here. so can the president still get away with calling ate witch-hunt? >> he probably will whether it is true or not. i mean, that is sort of -- that is the mantra that he has adopted, and i don't think he is going to -- i don't think he is going to stray from it, and to molly's point, the president is unhappy with how far out this scope has come, and he believes that to him this is proof that this is not about him, and that -- and that the charges against him are unfair, and, you know, this is proof in the pudding, and i think that that is -- that is where the president's head is right now on this issue. >> brennan: seung, are we going to see anything from congress on the immigration front before these congressional races in november or is this just an internal fight with no

progress? hik big day to watchimgratontol is tuesday, because that has been kind of the imposed deadline for this petition which is a complicated procedural maneuver to trigger these immigration votes in the house. tuesday is a tentative deadline the moderates have set on whether these quiet negotiatios with conservatives would actually succeed or just going to go ahead and force votes over the desires of their leadership. but republicans have constantly struggled on immigration issues for years and years, and there is a reason why when immigration legislation that involves any sort of pathway for citizenship, whether for dreamers or a broader population it is passed under democratic control, a democratic led senate in 2013 and lame duck democratic house in 2010 that passed the dream act. so if there is a way to 0 coalesce both the moderates who want these legal solutions for the dreamers and the 0 conservatives who do also want a

legal solution as well but they have talked about the need for more security measures, if there is a way to coalesce 218 republican votes on that, we will see about tuesday, but, again, count me as a sceptic. >> brennan: evan, you heard larry kudlow on this program, the economic advisor to the president saying that the flowup with the canadian prime minister really had more to do with the north korean leader and making him look weak, making the president look weak ahead of those talks. >> yeah. >> brennan: you don't normally hear those two countries in the same sentence. but is there something to what the white house is arguing here, that so much of the u.s. weight has to do with perception? >> well, that the president decided that this was a grave insult, that he couldn't abide from canada. the reality is, our allies and our adversaries, things are being thrown upside down right now, the real estate walked into what should have been the friendliest club he will ever be in, and he managed to leave that in tatters, and that is a problem that just doesn't pose a challenge poor the president

tomorrow, this is a long range issue that he has to confront, how do we keep americans safe over the long-term, the way you do that traditionally is by keeping your allies close and working through problems in ways that make sense. this is not how we have done it in the past and i don't think it puts us in a particularly strong moment as we go into singapore. >> brennan: seung, do you think, i mean it has been disinteresting to see some republicans speak out on the trade front with this dispute at the g-7, but they are sort of far and few between. there has been an outcry. >> i think we saw a moment earlier this week when we did see republicans starting to coalesce around legislation that would limit the president's power on tariffs. we had that legislation from senator bob corker, so, who isn't always a trump ally but senators like jeff flake behind that legislation as well with a bunch of democrats, but the president gathered about a dozen senate republicans at the white house on wednesday, mostly friendly senate republicans, and he made the message clear that i don'idon't like this bill.

i think it infringes on my power to negotiate on trade issues and are republican leadership tell us that this 0 bill, you can get a vote if you want but if debt doesn't have a president july signature it is a futile exercise. >> brennan: it is interesting to see how this develops. thanks to all of you. we will be back in a moment. >>

>> brennan: welcome back, we turn now to ken starr who you probably remember very well from the bill clinton era, he has served as circuit court judge and u.s. solicitor general, and many americans came to know him during the investigation into whitewater and other controversies, including monica lewinsky during bill clinton's presidency and i think in many ways, thank you for coming on today, you are so uniquely positioned to give us some perspective on what is playing out w in ter counsel's probe of president trump, his campaign and these russian interference allegations. when you see the developments like we saw this week with the campaign chairman being a indicted, another charge here of obstruction of justice, i mean how should americans understand

what they are seeing? is this the political witch hunt the president alleges? is this a serious case? >> it is definite everly a serious case. with eno that from the indictments and guilty pleas that have already been obtained, so what we are seeing is the special council, bob mueller who i know and i greatly respect, just following the evidence as he sees it, now these are charges, presumption of innocence in the united states and that is a very precious right that we have. these charges are going to have to be proven. but what this shows is that bob mueller is very seriously looking at a variety of issues and questions. >> brennan: well, we also know that bob mueller's team is talking with the president's own attorneys about getting a chance to interview him. you faced some of these questions when you were dealing with then president clinton, i think you went to something like six times you had to subpoena before ultimately he agreed to sit down. if you were consulting with president trump's lawyers would

you advise him to sit with council, sit with bob mueller? >> i think they need to be cautious and i think they are being cautious. first we have to remember this is the president of the united states and this is an authorized law enforcement investigation. so that makes the situation unique. looking at it simply from the perspective of a defense lawyer you never want your client, unless you have an extraordinarily high level of confidence, to be exposed in this way. so there are only two perspectives here, the president, you are talking to the president of the united states, but he also is at least the subject of a serious investigation. so i think caution is the rule of thumb here. >> brennan: but an obligation, is there an obligation on his part to sit and answer these questions? >> i think there may be a moral obligation, frankly. because he is the president of the united states, and unless he takes very decisive action, such as directing the firing of the special council, and there has been no suggestion to my to my

knowledge that that is in the offing at all. >> brennan: do you think he could? >> oh, yes, the president clearly has the north to direct the firing, if not a direct firing himself. >> brennan: what would that signify to you? >> it would be, i think, but it is a political question, i don't think it is obstruction of justice and and i disagree with those who seem to find obstruction of justice in almost anything that the real estate has done. but it certainly would be, i think, a political firefight of the highest order, because you have people on both parties saying, this is an authorized investigation. let it run its course. >> brennan: you have been supportive of the president's decision to hire rudy giuliani who i know you have known for some time. but in terms of the work he is doing to defend the president, what do you make of his strategy? >> well, i am not sure. i just have gate confidence in rudy, but rudy has access to facts that i don't have.

would, would i have said it exactly the same way, that rudy has done it, perhaps not, but don't underestimate rudy giuliani. he is an extraordinary lawyer. >> brennan: 0 you, when you were dealing with president clinton and that very long investigation of him, he faced charges of obstruction, perjury, there were questions of that, and his strategy seemed to be to comment on the country this was a political witch hunt. >> right. >> brennan: that souped a lot like what we are seeing now. do you see parallels? >> oh, there is no question. any time a president is under attack the president or at lppte attack. hey, he is my guy and you are attacking my guy. >> brennan: and it is an effective strategy? it can be. happily -- i shouldn't say happily but i think there was accountability, whatever people think of the investigation during the monica lewinsky

phase, the president had to eventually concede that he had not conducted himself as he should in a very serious matter when he was under oath. that's the key. it was all about the rule of law. >> brennan: i want to ask you about monica lewinsky, who went public this past year saying she met you once. >> for the first time. >> brennan: for the first time. >> right. >> brennan: and she said she kind of expected an apology for how things went for her. but you didn't offer one. do you think one is needed? >> no. with all due respect, monica and i wish her all of the best, her life has been disrupted, but the evidence is the evidence and she was part, as we saw it, of an effort to obstruct justice and to commit perjury. >> brennan: ken starr, thank you very much for coveraging on "face the nation". >> my pleasure. thank you. >> brennan: we will be right back. >>

>> brennan: that's it for us today. thanks for watching. until next week for "face the nation", i am mar margaret bren. >>

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