could be angling to get more time for his chamber to pass favorable legislation. that's all for tonight. we'll be back tomorrow with a lot more from "mtp daily." and "with all due respect" is about to start right now. i'm mark halperin. >> and i'm john heilemann. and with all due respect to donald trump, he may be having a bit of a honeymoon, but it's still the case that not everyone wants to shake your hand. there has been a magnitude 6.9 earthquake off the coast of fukushima in japan, causing a tsunami warning. we'll be monitoring that throughout the show and report with any updates. meanwhile, there continues to be a lot of interest in the potential conflicts of interest when it comes to donald trump's sprawling business empire. so far, the president-elect has done next to nothing to assuage

those concerns. and in fact, in some respects, has only exacerbated them. democrats are howling over an argentina newspaper report that says that trump used this congratulatory phone call with the arrangentinian president tok for help with a stalled project. he denies that ever happened, but it's hardly the first accusation that trump might use his new power to boost his family's bottom line. last week, in between administration job interviews, trump met with three indian commercial partners, who are building a luxury trump office building south of mumbai and according to reports, seemed eager to capitalize on their new connections to the president in waiting. "the washington post" reported that more than 100 foreign diplomats attended a sales pitch about the trump hotel in washington last week and some considered the opportunity to spend bigly at the international hotel as a way to flatter the incoming potus. at least 111 trump-related

companies have done or are are doing business in 18 countries across south america, asia, and the middle east. none of what trump has done to this point appears to be illegal, but it certainly rais s s suspicions that he could, if he wanted to, profit financially from his occupancy in the highest office in the land. only if someone told the president-elect that he wanted to be a little bit more careful about conflicts of interest. >> obviously, my assets were significantly smaller than some other presidents or president-elects. but we made a decision to liquidate assets that might raise questions about how it would influence policy. when i met with the president-elect, i suggested to hip that having a strong white

house counsel that could provide clear guideposts and rules would benefit him and his team because it would eliminate a lot of ambiguity. >> so given trump's history, he is unlikely to be as scrupulous as obama is encouraging him to be. but mike, my question for you, what do you think the tipping point is for trump, maybe, possibly, to start taking these concerns and criticisms seriously? >> this is all so unnecessary and so bad. it's not the right way to start, i think. it's going to take a lot for him to change his ways. i think he wants to get rich off of being president and will do everything he can, as long as some lawyer tells him it's okay if of three possible tipping points, one would be if somebody gets indicted. >> do you have to wait that long? >> two would be if a member of his family says, this is hurting our brand. but i think the most likely way, and hopefully the best way, is he hires a white house counsel who tells him, ala the trump university settlement, this stuff is going to be a

distraction and may be worse, we've got to put a stop to it and do what the washington journal editorial board said or something like it and reorganize the company to make it as blind and cut off from government as possible. >> wow, that's a pretty -- i believe you just said that you believe trump intends to profiteer off the presidency? >> i don't think that's why he ran, but -- >> with impunity, he thinks he can get away with this? >> yeah. >> i think that's obviously pretty outrageous, if true. i don't disagree that all the signs are horrible and if the guy does not want to be enmeshed in scandal and constant accusations of this kind, that this is what he's doing, he must do, then, what seems like the only thing that is proper, which is what "the wall street journal" editorial page you cited a second ago, we haven't gone into a lot of detail about

that, but you've got to liquidate the company, do an ipo, melt it down, and then put it into a blind trust and keep your kids out of being involved in the management of that money and then being involved in the federal government. >> do you know when he'll do that? >> i know when monkeys fly out of a place i can't talk about on national. >> let's live in a world where he's not going to do that, because he's not going to do that. >> if he's going to be a profiteering president openly and think he can do it with impunity, he'll be enmired in scandal throughout the entire of his administration. >> i think of lyndon johnson and leid, two guys who got much wealthier while in public office. >> both of those analogies, true, they both got wealthier, but neither were multi-billionaire occupants of the oval office, who used the presidency in a blatant way to try to profiteer. zplooim a little worried about

this. >> you seem concerned. . >> the spectacle that is donald trump's transition process went through another weekend, as a parade of potential hires dropped in on the president-elect at his country club in bedminster, jersey. job-seekers, including former massachusetts governor, mitt romney, retired marine colonel james matz, and other were greeted at the front door by trump himself, who also were sure to throw a quick wave to the shivering cold press corps who were on a stakeout outside. the body language between trump and his visitors alone was, for many, riveting, even though in most cases, it only lasted for a few seconds. like here. today, back at trump tower, stakeout continued. there were cameos from the former texas governor, rick perry, who you saw there get in the elevator. the former massachusetts senator, scott brown, and the current governor of oklahoma, mary fallon. yet, still no new announcements or appointments since last week.

john, what do you think's holding up the additional release of white smoke from the chimney atop trump tower? >> well, i would like to think what's holding it up is that they're doing careful vetting and trying to figure things out. and everything that people from inside that world are saying suggests that's true. i'm willing to take him at face value. and as you know,y view that there are two big jobs in a transition. one is figuring out who the 4,000 people are who are going to staff the government. but on the front of making major appointments, they are, historically speaking, not behind. i'm worried about some of the appointments that have happened so far, but the speed at which they're taking on the major jobs does not concern me at this moment. >> if they get romney and mat tis, they'll have an easier time recruiting. the media is complaining about the parade of people. if these meetings were all in

secret, the press would complain. >> couldn't care less. >> i don't like the kpants about this. i will say this, we're waiting for this video they're supposed to put out to talk about policy, and i do think that he should start having press conferences, start doing interviews. the personnel stuff, i agree with you, i'm in no rush. if everybody's there by christmas, which is the deadline they set. and as you said, the top jobs are concerned, but so are all the other jobs. if you pick good people at the top, you'll have a much easier time recruiting. i've talked to a number of republicans who said, if somebody like mitt romney is secretary of state, you'll have a much easier time recruiting. >> but what we have right now among these appointments, we don't have ideological diversity, all hardliners, or any other kind of diversity at all. again, aisle not for quota system, i'm for qualified peel. but there are millions of non-white and female americans who are worried about the

direction of the trump administration. and as long as every appointment is a hardliner ideologically and an old white man, those people are just going to keep getting more and more worried. so he has plenty of big jobs to fill. so it's still early. but right now you can feel, hearing -- talking to american hispanics, american women, you can feel their concern, even those whoant trump to succeed, you can feel their concern rising. >> not just because i like stuff to cover, but i think it's good when you make major announcements, particularly some of these people that are not well known. they have a public announcement, make a statement about them out of your own voice of why you chose them. let them say a few words. i think that's a transition that has real meaning. the country deserves to get to know the people who are going to staff this cabinet. i wish they would go back to that tradition of doing it. >> someone like pompeo. not a well-known figure in america who is now going to wield vast influence. >> let him thank his family and

say how he looks forward to his confirmation. >> up next, we'll put all these questions to kellyanne conway. we'll be right back with that. tn eagle. my number one goal is getting more funds out to parks because some animals and plants are only found in one place in the world, and that's in some national parks. i find that's a great cause, and i want to support it. (avo) the subaru share the love event has donated over four million dollars to help the national parks. get a new subaru, and we'll donate two hundred and fifty dollars more. ♪put a little love in your heart.♪ all finished.umm... you wouldn't want your painter to quit part way. i think you missed a spot. so when it comes to pain relievers,

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from bedminster to trump tower, our next guest has been a behind-the-scenes fixture of donald trump's deliberation decisions throughout, kellyanne conway, former campaign manager, now a senior member of the transition, and maybe going to washington, d.c.,, who's. she joins us now from trump tower. kellyanne conway, what is the proper line for donald trump to draw, regarding his business interests, when he becomes president? >> whatever the legal lines dictate, of course, he will comply with all of that. and he's made clear all along, mark and john, that his adult children, ivanka, don jr., and eric will be managing the family business. obviously, they're not -- these are not entry-level positions. they're already respected

executives and mentes of his within the business, in charge of building things, acquiring things taking meetings. you've seen their handiwork. i think the hold post office building in d.c. is a great example of under-budget, on-time work that these adult children do. and they'll do that. he's made that clear. he's got a team of advisers and lawyers and accountants who will make sure he complies with the law. >> president obama suggested complying with the law is not necessarily a good enough standard. is he just going to comply with the law, or worry about appearances, as well, when there's a worry about public interactions and his -- >> that's the typical response of a politician, who's not been a successful businessman and job creator. apart from that, it's, i think he has to comply with the law, and that should be the appearance. in other words, people will know that hays got a full-time job as president of the united states and commander in chief. he's committed to that. he's already said he won't take a salary.

i guess he'll donate that to charity. but there's no reason other than those who think the campaign is in full force to think this man is lying or won't do what he's supposed to do upon taking office. >> kellyanne, i want to stay that on that. "the wall street journal" editorial board wrote a strongly worded editorial board about this. they are not professional politicians, and they have been both friendly to conservatives and friendly to capitalism. the argument they made in their editorial was that the political damage to the administration if mr. trump doesn't liquidate his business holdings could be extensive. he's going to be constantly scrutinized for having pecuniary motives for any action he takes on a wide variety of different policies that affect a wide variety of different countries and a wide variety of different issues. so is "the wall street journal," when it's arguing from the point of wanting him to succeed, not being critical of him, you think there's no merit to that argument, that it would be the

safest thing to liquidate the assets and move forward with a clean slate? >> two things, we already know what his policy positions are, he's been very clear. if you're talking about the fact he wants to create 25 million jobs over 10 years and unleash coal and shale and natural gas and other infrastructures or have big infrastructure projects that even democrats are exude about, if you're assigning a possible pecuniary motive for that with his business holdings, we already know what he stands for. he's not going to create policy that would benefit a business he's o no longer involved in or temporarily involved in. and as president of the united states, he will have no authority whatsoever over what is happening in his business, what the acquisitions are, and i think that the most important point i would make about this, people never look at the other side of the ledger. how many tens of millions of

dollars has donald j. trump and his family lost and sacrificed for him to run for president. deals have been in abeyance. people haven't completed deals, haven't been able to pursue other deals with the three adult children on the campaign trail, keeping their own schedule, quite successfully, trying to get their father elected and him being away from his business for a year and a half and now for the next four to eight. so it's actually the money they've lost nobody wants to talk about. not the money they would gain based on different positions. >> but kelly, he decided to run for president voluntarily, so those are sacrifices are sacrifices he decided to take on himself. i think the questions of policy doesn't go to the questions of job creation, it's what rulings would the eoc make that are all going to have trump appointees, all look to mr. trump, or specific hotels, specific business interests of his would be affected by regulatory rulings, by legal rulings. foreign policy with respect to specific countries, like a particular country in south america or in asia. all of those decisions have not

been -- he's not laid out his policies in advance on those questions, as he makes decisions on them now, if they have a financial impact on his family, they will be called into question if he makes decisions that seem to benefit his businesses. >> it sounds like they'll be called into question, even if he hasn't done that, because you're calling them into question. john, look, i know the election results are very tough to swallow, particularly for those of you who couldn't see it coming or couldn't conceive of the possibility that the other candidate may actually win. that you don't understand america, this man understands america, animated america, and will now represent all americans. but this whole line of argument is presumptively negative and presumptive accusatory -- >> with all due respect, kellyanne, it has nothing to do with me and my views. i'm reading to you from the "wall street journal" -- >> they didn't say that. >> they did. you should read it. >> i read it hours ago.

>> this has nothing to do with election results and everything to do with standards. >> no, you're presuming -- well, a lot of this does, because i think people are still in campaign mode and have political ptsd, i guess. but the fact is, this guy, you're accusing him of doing things -- he's not even in the oval yet and you're accusing him of making policies based on things that aren't even -- that he's not even talking about. you're presuming that he's doing this for the wrong reasons. where most americans that voted for him, 300 and some electoral votes, that ain't nothing, believe he's actually going to go there and work for them, not line his pockets. i find the line of arguments -- it's your show, you're allowed to do that, but i find the line of arguments to be presumptively accusatory. >> let's switch to a new topic that's being reported by msnbc and others. rudy giuliani reportedly being considered to be director of national intelligence. is that true and would he be do

at that job? >> he would be great at any number of jobs. and the first criterion for president-elect trump in appointing anyone to his cabinet or senior staff is that you're qualified and capable to do the job on day one. that applies to mayor giuliani on any number of fronts. i know he was out in bedminster yesterday for a number of hours. i was there as well. he had a great conversation with his friend and ally, the president-elect -- >> is the being considered for dre director of national intelligence? >> he's being considered for a number of positions. >> is that of them? >> it could be. he would demand a certain presence in terms of representing the president-elect and his mirpadministration. but the fact is that when the president-elect is filling his cabinet, he has to think about how everybody is working together and who is the best person for each of those jobs. and to john's other point, i

think the diversity of people who have come through the door here at trump tower and out in bedminster this weekend is just a remarkable group of men and women from different political and socioeconomic and business and public sector, private sector backgrounds, different -- certainly different races and ethnicities, different religious persuasions. it's been quite an impressive group of people, who in many case s want to come and offer advice and counsel and vision for the country. and for some that could lead to formal positions in this administration. but for all of them, i assure you, they're just happy to have the time with the president-elect and the vice president-elect to share their ideas and offer their support. we're also thrilled that includes people from the other side of the aisle like representative tulsy gafrd. it includes businessmen like

robert johnson. it includes people who are at the highest levels of government, like cathy mcmorris rodgers, the highest ranking woman in congress, who gave birth while in congress three times. she has a remarkable professional/personal story. so they keep coming. they're people who are captains of industry. they're focals who have been job creators. they're folks who have been job seekers. it's an incredible collection of men and women and thank you for covering pinpoint >> kellyanne, we've not heard from donald trump since election night, and that's relatively long by normal standards for a president-elect. he has not done a press conference, not done a speech since then. is there a reason why -- he's obviously a very voluble guy, so is there a reason why? >> he's incredibly busy. we publish his schedule every day, it's one after another after another. the guy works 18 hours a day and he's got this punishing schedule of interviews. when he's not interviewing people in person, he's taking

calls from across the nation and the globe from heads of state and other opinion leaders. so he's been incredibly busy doing all of that and then reflecting and discussing the interviews he's just had and the advice he's just received. so he'll talk to the press in due time, but today we had an amazing meeting here, an off-the-record meeting with t top executives and anchors from the three major networks and a couple of the cable stations. and i thought he very much enjoyed that discussion. i thought it was a fabulous opportunity for them to be with each other. and so, we have the press here in the lobby every day. they have access to any number of different people coming in and out of trump tower. we make many people available to them. people who are meeting with president-elect trump and people who represent him, like me. and so, we feel like we are very accessible to the press, and we feel like this is a very transparent process, where you literally can see the people coming in and out of the two buildings, as they meet with the president-elect.

>> has a single thing gone wrong during the transition so far? >> hmm, not really. no. i mean, i could tell you it's high energy. a great deal of excitement, but the excitement is now being funneled into the very serious business of helping him to make decisions on his cabinet and senior staff. >> i was down to washington, d.c. last week and visited our two transition offices there. that's where most of our transition team is. they're in washington, d.c., steps away from the white house. and they are -- it's really remarkable, to me, anyway, to see people standing shoulder to shoulder, millennials who were born after ronald reagan left office and men and women who served on president reagan's transition team and indeed, in his administration. people are really excited they got a republican, frankly, a conservative president to governor and a conservative vice president, certainly. and there's this buzz of activity and focus. and those people who nobody's paying attention to what they're

dou doing. they make sure they're working with president obama and his current administration on these very important decisions and very important activities. so it's very exciting to all of us who are involved in it. and i will tell you, it's going incredibly smoothly. it's just, it's like, it's like the interview -- it's like scheduling the interview's version of rally for president-elect trump. he just can't -- >> kellyanne, they're telling me you've got to go, but i've got to ask you about one report in the "new york post". it said today during the meeting with the network anchors and executives, that donald trump exploded at them with anger at one point. is that true? >> no, that's not true at all. i sat right to his left. and it's an off-the-record meeting, and whoever said that and mischaracterized it should think twice. but he did not explode in anger. he's the president-elect. he won. winning makes a lot of statements. and i'm very happy that he reached out to them after a very

hard and bruising and not always fair campaign. >> kellyanne, thank you so much for taking the time. we'll be right back. i am totally blind. i lost my sight in afghanistan. if you're totally blind, you may also be struggling with non-24. calling 844-844-2424. or visit my24info.com.

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trump administration officials at the tower today, the president-elect held off-the-record conversations with several media types, including several network executors and anchors, including lester holt, wolf blitzer, and george stephanopoulos. the "new york post" reported tonight that the meeting did not go all that well. they said trump occasionally lashed out at some of the participants. kellyanne conway denied that a few moments ago. trump has done only one one-on-one interview on camera since he became president-elect. he has done no press conferences and he has not done any victory rallies, no thank you tour, no veterans day event or in-door photo op since he became the next leader of these united states. so far, every person he's hired for his white house team or proposed to the cabinet has been announced by a written statement. you heard kellyanne conway, just a few minutes ago, say that trump's, quote, punishing

schedule was just too packed for him to make public paesappearan now. john, do you buy the notion he's too busy doing other things or is there some other reason he's staying off camera? >> i do not buy the notion that he's too busy to do some things on camera, because all president-elects are busy and many have found time in the past to address the american people and do a press conference. i was not arguing for press conferences, per se, although it would be good if he did them. he hasn't done a speech or any of the things you just retailed. to your point earlier in the show, these appointments would benefit him to contextualize them, to explain them, to make the argument for some of these somewhat controversial people. mike flynn is a controversial guy, jeff sessions is a controversial guy. to make the argument for them, at least in a brief way, setup the discussion for what his motives are would be smart. and he's finding time to tweet about "hamilton."

it's not like he's so busy he can't find a little bit of time to explain what's going on. >> my theory is, he's enjoying doing what he wants to do. he enjoys these meetings and putting together his media and having all this power and the media speculation and all of this. i think when you run for president, particularly someone who's never done this before, a lot of his day was filled, you have to get on the campaign at this point -- >> he's less scheduled now than he was then. >> he is. and i think he's enjoying the fact that he doesn't have to, you know, perform in public and he's taking a break from it. >> and also, he's home. there's some part of that. i don't think this is, again, one of these things, i don't think it's disastrous he's not done more, it's just odd given how voluble he has in other settings, when he used to be on television wall to wall. part of the secret of his political success was his availability -- >> except that he basically did one or two events a day for the most of the campaign. i think that he likes to doll out portions of trump on his own

timetable. and right now, there's no reason for it. and i think he's having an extraordinary number of meetings. he could fit in a public appearance a day, but he's choosing not to. >> i'm not going to ask you to call kellyanne conway a liar, but having read that "new york post" story, given the multiple sources confirming the c contentionoco contentionne contentioness of the meeting. >> unless the sources were trump officials, shame on those who agreed to go an off-the-record meeting and then shared the t cans of it, but there is a disparity in the accounts. >> there have been some people who have gone to off-the-record meetings who have shared those accounts with us and i wouldn't want to shame them too much. >> i can tell you this, he is mad at cnn. i can tell you that. >> i think he's pretty mad at a lot of people. >> i would say he's particularly mad at cnn. not to diminish how mad he is at

other people, but i think he's particularly mad at cnn. all right, president obama may not be saying sayonara to politics just yet. "the new york times" reported today that the president is rethinking his plans to become a political hermit once he leaves the oval office in january, citing white house aides who say that he may occasionally go after trump, head-on, if he feels as if his legacy is being unraveled by the next president. so, mark, what do you think? we've been covering barack obama for a long time now. what do you think the likelihood is that these intimations that he might be a very active political participant in his post-presidency, what do you make of those? do you think that's likely? >> i'll believe it when i see it. i think he'll move on, for two reasons, he won't be doing this. one is, he's got to move on to doing other things. and regardless of how donald trump conducts himself in office, his instinct, which he'll gravitate back to, which is to be more like president bush than president clinton and say a post-president should not

be critics in chief of their successors. >> i also think it's the case that president obama is highly rational and the extent to which he could actually do anything to prevent the unraveling of his legacy is limited. i think he's going to focus on writing that book, in which he will make the case for his legacy on the page, and i think he thinks that's probably more powerful and more lasting than anything you can do in the short-term, from out of office. >> the other thing is, i think he will be convinced, if he's not on his own by others, that he needs to make way for other democrats who are future leaders to be -- >> the big voices. >> in the front lines of going up against donald trump and not trying to do it as the next president. but i think he believes now, as he's saying, and i think he thinks he'll going to do it, but i'll believe it when i see it. >> it was interesting to make the counter point to our general instinct about this. it was interesting at the end of this election season, when i felt like he kept saying he was going to campaign a lot, but i thought when it really campaign to it, he wouldn't do very much.

he ended up doing more than i thought he was going to do. >> that's the fall apparatus of the presidency, when something concrete was on the line, his actions could have had an effect on the outcome. >> i agree with you. >> much more amorphous. >> i agree with you about where my instincts are, but there's something about donald trump that has brought out a side of barack obama that is not the side that we have come to know over the course of reporting on him. i want to leave open the small possibility that he might find it irresistible to dive back in. >> i have three words for you, dnc, that's one board, chair, biden. >> really? >> we'll see. >> really? >> we will see. >> that would be hot. that would be smoking hot? we'll have a reporter's roundtable without the table, but it's a good group of reporters, you won't want to miss it. that's coming up in just a moment after these words from our fabled sponsors. . # picking up for kyle.

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involved in opdivo clinical trials. we are joined now by a quadrangle of reporters following donald trump and his transition. nbc correspondent katy tur is here in washington. in various bureaus, we have ma teah gold, and political reporter for "the new york times," soon to be with "the washington post," ashley parker. ashley parker, congratulations on that move you are already a star, but you are going to be super nova when you get to "the washington post." i'll start with you, ashley

parker, since you're -- >> in the news today. >> you've been covering donald trump for a pretty long time. watching him in the transition, what do you make of the way he's conducting himself and his transition so far? >> what's striking to me is that he's sort of conducting himself and his transition exactly the way he did his candidacy, right? he's tweeting a ton about things he doesn't like, although maybe his tweets carry a little more power, as the president-elect. he's is over holed up in trump tower, which those of us who covered him and had to return to new york every night, so he could be there, is his most favorable and comfortable space. he's in his office, where he still has that sort of open-door policy with his aides and his children kind of shuffling in and out. so people who thought he was going to win the white house and become a different donald trump, that simply hasn't happened. >> katy tur, i ask the same question to you, at this point. is trump conducting his transition the way you expected or is he doing things that you think are, in some way, new or

out of character with the new trump? >> i think you know what my answer is, john. my answer is, this is the same donald trump that we saw on the campaign trail. it's somebody who doesn't abide by the traditional trappings of politics. he's not announcing people in a lavish press conference hays not doing things in a traditional way. he's parading folks in and out of trump tower and in and out of his golf course. he's enjoying the suspense of it. he's enjoying seeing people talk all day on television about who might fill these roles. he's enjoying seeing how folks react to various peoples in r e roles. i would bet he is taking into account the reaction of people in the media and his supporters and followers on twitter about various positions that he is trying to fill. and who might fill those positions. so this does not seem like a different donald trump to me, at all. again, he's still tweeting about the media. he still seems to have quite a

thin skin when it comes to perceived slights. so i don't think we should expect a new or improved or a different donald trump going forward. >> mateah, forget about, for the moment, at least, potential appointments and names that have been floated around. we have some appointments, at this point, right? of the ones we currently know, are any of them in my genuine political jeopardy as we turn towards this becoming an actual administration? >> well, it doesn't appear that there's going to be the votes obviously on the democratic side to hold things up very much. and as much as i think we're going to hear a lot of debate after some of the controversial statements made by some of these nominees, this is a republican administration turning to a republican congress, with their appointments and i think they're going to find a lot of support. one thing that is striking to me is the message that he sent very early on with these appointments. i mean, everyone was sort of waiting for a nod to, you know,

an olive branch to a rival or a sign that he was going to immediately bring in a woman or a person of color. he has sent a message he is bringing in some very hard-line people into this administration. and that's exactly what he said he was going to do. so i think we're seeing him follow through on these promises. >> you've got jeff educations own wft of the big four cabinet agencies that have been picked. i know you're writing about this. tell me about where the sessions nomination is headed. >> john, i think in addition to what katy pointed out, that trump is approaching his transition and seems like he would governor much the way he campaigned, i think that's true both on a permit level and i think it's true on a policy level, as well. the sessions pick speaks to this very clearly. sessions has been a strong anti-immigration figure in the senate. he's also very much against trade deals.

you have mike pompeo who has spoken favorably about water boarding, saying it's not torture. you have general mike flynn that has said some negative things about muslims. and jeff sessions as attorney general would have significant authority to create a climate around the issue of immigration, not only illegal immigration, but legal immigration. going after companies that try to hire foreign workers, going after investors that try to lure customers with the promise of a green card. there's a lot that trump can do to track down on the issue of immigration. >> ashley, you covered both the trump campaign and the romney campaign. that is the one job that everybody has been focused on in the last 72 hours. there's mixed reporting. either this could just be all window dressing, or mitt romney might be the front-runner. what do you know? >> so, you're exactly right.

from trump's people, we've sort of heard that mixed message. most of the people i've actually spoken with have said, this is a very serious meeting, this isn't just a sort of bipartisan olive branch or for show. although i did speak to one senior adviser who said, look, this is mitt romney coming to kiss the ring and pay his respects and sort of, you know, trump kind of enjoying this show of potential groveling from mitt romney, but can i certainly tell you on the romney side, everyone believes this is very real. and i think it's something that he's considering, how he would respond, if he were offered this job. the one thing you have to understand about mitt, because everybody has played those clips of him sort of really going after trump in a way you don't expect from governor romney, but it's that he feels, in addition to being very ambitious, he feels a deep and acute call to public service. and i think if he was offered and he did say yes, that would be the motivating factor for someone like him. >> right, okay.

we're going to take a quick break and come back with all of you. hang out. you get mark halperin, next. right after this. ♪ ♪

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back with our giant powerhouse, super call franlg listic panel of reporters, ashley parker, soon to be of "the washington post." mateah gold, ourloomberg colleague, and katy tur of the peacock web. katy, you've never covered a transition before, i think is true of everybody on the panel. it's hard to know what's normal and what's not. how is the trump transition different to cover than the trump campaign? >> well, the trump transition is not that much different. they are still maintaining a relative secrecy around how they do things. they're trying to get a better relationship or at least a

better communication path between reporters and the trump team than they were, i think, in the primaries or during the campaign, i can say. but there does seem to be a level of disorganization to it. they didn't know that they had to tell reporters when donald trump was going out for dinner. the definition of a lid seemed to be a little bit beyond them. there still are a lot of questions surrounding how they will govern, as there was during the campaign. and there are questions about donald trump's own promises and vows during the campaign, specifically when it comes to what he was going to do with his business. he said multiple times on the campaign trail that he would give his business to his children and that would be the end of it, if he were to win. we found out about two weeks into this transition now, he hasn't quite given up the business. a number of reports out that say that he met with business partners in india, while they were here in the united states, talking to them.

also, ivanka and jared kushner s sat in on donald trump's meeting with the japanese prime minister. now we have a word that he may have discussed something about his business in tarnargentina w the president of tarnargentina called to congratulate him. the president of argentina pushing back on that claim, saying they did not talk about anything other than a brief congratulations for donald trump winning. so with respect to there are still a lot of unanswered questions and very little clarity or access to the president himself, that is pretty status quo, is what we were seeing during the campaign. he has not had a press conference since the middle of the democratic national convention. that was in july. it's been over a hundred days since then >> mateah, what's your sense of the role moneyed interests are playing in this transition compared to the norm for both parties? >> one thing they also did not

seem prepared for was how to immediately put in place his pledge to drain the swamp. immediately his transition turned to his cabinet stocked with lobbyists. we have reported that some lobbyists have deregistered, but are still taking part in the transition. and he's also considering major donors for cabinet positions. so i think that they are still finding their way and try to figure out how to stay true to this pledge. it will be a real challenge on the donor and lobby front, and as katy mentioned, when it comes to his empire. the fact that he's going to turn the management of his business over to his children, which is what he said, but no talk of changing any ownership, raises a lot of questions when it comes to foreign conflicts of interest. >> i believe kellyanne conway said that donald trump's meeting with "the new york times" is norm. you know anything about that? >> i know a little bi aut that. i mean, the one thing generally

that's interesting about donald trump and his relationship with "the new york times," and i believe that it was the trump campaign who requested the meeting, is that for as much as he loves to tweet about the failing "new york times" and to call out times reporters by name and be very critical, the reason is because he cares. he -- you know, he gets up and he reads the "new york post" and he reads "the new york times." and he is acutely aware of what the paper says about him, positive and negative. as much as he claims to dislike "the times," what "the times" writes deeply affects him, to the point where he can read critical sentences, past the jump, many paragraphs down in a way that might surprise people. >> is he meeting with reporters and doeeditors? >> i think the publisher will be there, some reporters and editors, a small off-the-record session and maybe an on the

record. >> do you expect there to be any yelling at that? >> as you know, for all of his public posture and bluster, he is often trying to win over the room he is immediately in. so i would imagine if he behaves that way tomorrow, there would not be a ton of yelling. >> we see this "new york post" report that the meeting with network executives and anchors on the tv side according to the "new york post" was quite contention. kellyanne conway, who was present, said it wasn't. do you think it's possible that it was contention? >> absolutely. i would be surprised if it wasn't. the question is, how contention did it get? and according to this report, it got very heated. it sounds to me the trump's administration team is trying to set a marker in the ground against the media. they're trying to set the tone and say we call the shots. this will be a gut-check moment for us in the media, in terms of how much we enforce these traditions, such as having a

protective pool. a man who's gotten this far all the way to the white house by breaking every norm and transition in the political playbook is not going to feel bound by them when he has all of this power. that's going to a key story line to watch, trump's relationship with the media going forward, and this signals that trump will be about as accommodatining he s been with the media, and that is not very much. it's unusual for a president-elect to go this long without having a press conference to kind of, you know, clue people in and give people a sense of where things are going. i think he's suggesting that he's goupg to run things his own way and it remains to be seen how well that works for you. >> amen, hallelujah, happy thanksgiving to all four of you and congratulations again to the ashley parker. john and i will be right back.

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those reporters, what do you think about them? >>. >> they were fantastic. >> the four musk tieteermuskete.

>> it was pretty great. check out bloomberg politics.com for some reporting on which wall street veterans are advising trump through this transition period. wall street veterans. hard to believe. until tomorrow, for mark and i, we say to you, sayonara. booze over broadway. let's play "hardball." good evening. i'm chris matthews in washington. well, donald trump continued meeting with prospective cabinet appointees and others today at trump tower. over the weekend, trump held a series of 21 different meetings at the trump national golf club in bedminster, new jersey. among the prospects, mitt romney, rudy giuliani, retired general james mattis, governor chris christie, scott brown, rick perry, and newt