good being with you. at the top of the hour, here is

what's happening. harsh words for president obama from a one time member of his cabinet. in an interview with chuck todd, robert gates seemed to suggest president obama set the stage for russia's interference in the u.s. election. >> i think that putin saw the united states withdrawing from around the world. i think there's actually -- the problem has been that president obama's actions often have not matched his rhetoric. his rhetoric has often been pretty tough. but then there's been no follow-up and no action. i think it sent a signal that the u.s. was in retreat. >> john podesta is pleading for more information on russia's role. >> it's very much unknown whether there was collusion. i think russian diplomats have said that they were talking to the -- to the trump campaign.

i think really not what mr. trump knew but what did trump inc. know and when did they know it, were they in touch with the russians. those are open questions. the electors have a right to know what the answers are. >> another challenge facing the president-elect today, a new poll from nbc news and "the wall street journal," 68% of americans say they believe trump will change the way business is conducted in washington. but a full third of those say it will be the wrong kind of change. trump is in florida. there's new reaction across the political spectrum on trump's handling of the russian hack. what are you hearing? >> reporter: yeah. trump is spending the day here after capping off his thank you tour throughout multiple states. while it felt like a victory lap on the trail celebrating his win back in november, there's definitely trouble brewing when it comes to russia. congress taking steps to look

into it. here is what john mccain had to say earlier today. >> i think reality is going to intercede at one point or another just because of the russian activities. and i hope that with people like general mattis and some other people around him that he will very quickly understand what the russians are all about. and that is they are ahead of us in many respects in this whole issue of cyber warfare. >> reporter: now, of course, john mccain saying that trump will eventually realize the russian role here. trump consistently has said, why can't we have better relations with russia, saying that's something he would push for as president and something that he really hasn't backed down from. in the wake of all of these reports about russian influence, trump has continued to say, why didn't we talk about this during the election?

why are we talking about this after i have won? his top aides taking this same tack, one of them saying consistently this is another attempt to delegitimatize his win in november and that now we should come to grips with the fact that these are, in fact, the results. of course, many people still saying that this is an investigation that we should look into. it's consistently going to be interesting how the president-elect and his team formulate their responses to hacks the president-elect doesn't actually agree that russia was behind them. we're going to continue watching this evolution. as for right now, he has cast doubt on the idea that russia was behind the hacks and hasn't begun to delve into the fact that many intelligence agencies are saying they did so with the intention of influencing it in trump's favor. >> we will see what else he has to say. joining me now is beth hewey and erin mcpike.

beth, i want to start with you. would you call this a fair criticism? >> you know, those are strong words from the guy who served in obama's cabinet. he served under republicans as well. he is known as a straight shooter. tough words. of course, republicans have been very, very critical of president owe be a m obama's foreign policy saying he retreated in the way gates suggested, that he hasn't shown the forcefulness that the united states needs to in order to show that we are the world's superpower and that we need to act like that. plenty of people will say that acting like that in the past has gotten us into military conflicting that we should not have gotten into. there's very little support in this country for committing american troops overseas in the middle east or anywhere else for that matter. president obama has been doing what he said he was going do, to pull back militarily and to re-evaluate relationships.

republicans have criticized that. president obama has a lot of support for what he has done as well. >> we heard from john podesta. you heard him saying that he thinks donald trump was in with the russians when it comes to this. i don't know if you heard my conversation before with susan. mow decemb podesta is still in campaign mode. your thoughts? >> you know, john podesta wrote that op-ed last week really criticizing the fbi. representing the clinton campaign has called for an intelligence briefing for the electoral college meeting tomorrow. he is very angry. he feels that as the top person in that campaign the campaign was let down by forces that they could not control, in addition, obviously to some probably campaign strategy changes they could have made. that outside forces did work against him. he is upset and he is doing what he can to seek some sort of closure. >> evidence of collusion between the two, anything substantial to

say that that really happened, that there was anything going on? >> we don't know that. >> i want to ask you, when trump has been quiet about russia, has tweeted about china and the drone telling them to keep it is there an expectation that donald trump would usher in a stronger u.s. presence overseas, even though there's been -- he has been critical of that approach saying that we need to put america first? >> yeah. i don't know that he is going to go in that direction. i think it's more along the lines of what president obama has done. donald trump has really put forth a more protectionist policy whether it comes to u.s. foreign policy throughout the campaign. i think it would be in keeping with what obama has done even though he criticized him. >> beth, i want your reaction on reince priebus who is talking when his boss would accept the intel on the russian hack. >> i think he would accept the conclusion if these intelligence professionals would get together, put out a report, show

the american people that they are actually on the same page as opposed to third parties through "the washington post." we haven't heard from clapper. we haven't heard from comey. look, i think that these guys should be straight with the american people and come out and say it. i don't think they have been clear about it. i think that it's been all over the map. >> is that realistic? you have senators graham and mccain saying that russians were involve and that's it. we don't need to see more. >> president obama has commissioned a report exactly what reince priebus was talking about, a report collecting the evidence that they had to look into the russian hack and to get it out before president obama steps down and president-elect trump takes over in january. we will see the report that reince priebus is describing. we know today that democrats are calling for a bipartisan special committee to look into the russian hack. you are right, mccain and lindsey graham have been forceful around that. congress is out right now. it remains whether other

republicans will join them in the call for further investigation. >> we have new numbers from a poll that show on the issue of russia, 55% say they are bothered by russia meddling in the election and 37% believe it helped trump win. any sense this could undercut the incoming president's authority when he does take office? >> sure. there's always going to be that kind of concern. i would point out that, when george w. bush took office, half the country thought that that was ill egitimate as well. it's a problem donald trump will face throughout his presidency. i don't know we will get to the bottom of this any time soon. this particular issue will give way to years of books about this. i don't know if we're going to get to the bottom of whether or not it actually tipped the scale, russia hacking, tipped the scale of the election to donald trump. just what they did and why and who was involved, we do need to see the end of that. it's a long time until we actually do see an answer. >> that same poll shows that 50% of americans say they approve of

the way that president-elect trump is handling the transition to the oval office. beth, you know, you look at the numbers compared to past presidents, obama and clinton. they scored when they made the transition. should that be something that donald trump and his camp should be looking at closely? >> you know, this was a close election. hillary clinton did win the popular vote by more than a 2% margin. that's not small. the country's very, very divided about this incoming president. there's no question about it. trump has said that he knows that. he wants to heal the country. he wants to bring people together. he is going to these big rallies that he has been doing now for the last couple of weeks, only going to places where he won, talking to supporters and touting how well he did. we haven't heard a lot of that outreach to people who are nervous about the incoming president who didn't support him and want to be assured that he is going to bring america together. >> it's interesting how he reacted and responded to mish e

michelle obama in saying we're not feeling -- not having hope or we're now feeling whatnot having hope feels like. let's take a listen. >> michelle obama said yesterday that there's no hope. but i assume she was talking about the past, not the future. because i'm telling you, we have tremendous hope. and i actually think she made that statement not meaning it the way it came out. i really do. because i met with president obama and michelle obama in the white house. my wife was there. she could not have been nicer. >> what do you make of how he handled that? and how he countered within the same breath almost defending her? >> well, listen, this is the first time that we have seen the tables turned. often, donald trump goes after his critics. this is one time he was mag nan

muss. she has been saying, when they go low, we go high, it's the one time that she made a really interesting comment on the way out of office, after eight years of being first lady, she made this interesting remark. i think it's possible that for all the times that we have heard barack and michelle obama saying michelle obama will not get into politics and not run for office, i'm not so sure. i continue to hear a little bit of chatter here and there about different senate seats that she could seek in the future, maybe a senate seat in illinois. she had to have been setting herself up for something because she's been so positive all the way through. >> interesting to hear that take. to hear donald trump and kind of have a chance in the way he reacted to it. >> well, donald trump is all about donald trump. when michelle obama was nice to him, that changed his opinion of her. that's what he basically said to that crowd there. he said, as soon as she was nice to me, nice to my wife,

suddenly, i'm going to say nice things about her. that's very typical of the way trump handles things. it was because she had been nice to him. >> that visit to the white house that did it and where he started saying, they are nice people. thank you very much. happening now, cities throughout the midwest may hit record lows and temperatures could dip into negative digits. windchill it feels like minus 30 in some cities. the national weather service issued advisories. how are we doing with the cold? earlier there was some sun. >> it's a little chilly. the sun is out. it's warmer than we were expecting here today. they were thinking this could be the coldest bears game ever. that record set in 2008 when it was 2 degrees. my phone is showing ten right now. i don't think we're going to hit 2 degrees by game time here in a few minutes.

10 degrees would crack the top five coldest bears games ever here in chicago. the cold is not deterring fans who have been out early tailgating. listen to some of them. >> i'm not really that cold. it's the momentum, the adrenali adrenaline, it's great. just being out here in the elements, supporting the team. >> actually, right now i got a hoody sweatshirt. two weeks ago it was colder when it was raining or the heavy wet snow. this is better than that. >> they are breaking records today in minneapolis. take a look at some video from my weather channel colleague. he was out with tailgaters there outside of the vikings game. they were putting their beers into the fire to keep at the the beer from freezing during the tailgate. they hit 20 below this morning in minneapolis. it's the first time they have seen temperatures like that in

december in 20 years. even places like kansas city, they are in the single digits today. to give you some perspective as mike pointed out, you have minus 20 in minneapolis. it's 100 degrees warmer in miami today. >> as i told you, steve petterson covering the president in hawaii, you are not going to want to see his live shots. >> i need to make better friends with my bosses. he gets to go to hawaii and here i am. >> there you go. blake mccoy for us, appreciate it. thank you. how did the russians hack and how to hack them back. i will ask up with of the nation's most notorious hackers. ♪ think of your fellow man. ♪ lend him a helping hand. ♪ put a little love in your heart. ♪ ♪ take a good look around... ♪ ...and if you're lookin' down, ♪

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mitt romney opens up about donald trump's overtures to him. romney says he was more than a little surprised trump reached out to him about the secretary of state post. would have been more than willing to serve. romney adds that he sees being considered for the job as a welcome sign that trump will be open to alternative views and even to critics. john podesta slammed russia on "meet the press" for hacking the presidential election and influencing the results allegedly. >> both cia, the director of national intelligence, the fbi all agree that the russians intervened to help trump and that as they have noted this week, nbc first revealed that vladimir putin was personally involved with that. >> russia disputes those claims and has called for the united states to provide evidence.

joining me now is kevin mitnick, once the world's most computer hacker, is now a consultant. i appreciate you being with me, especially with your background. >> hi. >> given the 17 intelligence agencies who say there's no doubt that russia hacked the dnc and joe podesta, russia wants the united states to provide evidence and so do americans as well. there's a question, why not release what they have? you have adam schiff who was asked that this morning. here is what he said. >> we have good sources of information. we don't want to disclose those. the russians would love to know the source so they can take counter measures to prevent us from being able to attribute other russian malignant cyber activity in the future. the administration shouldn't disclose that. >> the congressman has called for some information to be released with limits. why can't the united states release some information to prove russia did it? and what would that evidence look like? >> first of all, attribution is

really hard. they would be releasing forensic evidence. intelligence agencies don't like to give out this information because then the other side could try to evade that in the future. the real problem here is this hack, okay, to john podesta's e-mail really just started with a simple e-mail, what we call phishing. we call it social engineering. he was fooled by this e-mail. it came in from what looked like g-mail. there's an incident that happened. he needs to reset this password. they said it was okay. he went ahead and did it and provided his user name and password. we call this credential harvesting. if podesta actually enabled two factor awe thenty indication, two step, what you could do with a lot of e-mail accounts is actually enable two step-off

indications. you get text code or you will have an application -- >> is that the thing with what was your pet's name when you were in kindergarten? >> that's a password reset question. there's actually -- when you log in, you need your log in and your password and then it will text you a code, for example. then you have to have the code. you open an application up on your phone and see the code. if he had that on his phone, even if the bad guys had his user name and password, they wouldn't have been able to get in. >> interesting to do that. i have that for facebook for security measures there. >> you have to wonder. >> you are saying, this was not a sophisticated scheme in doing this. right? >> that's why -- attribution is hard, whether it's the russians, chinese, we have to defer to the u.s. government who is not going to release the evidence. it doesn't matter who right now. it matters that it was done in my opinion.

it was done because they really had bad security. they didn't even think to enable this two factor awe thenty indication which most businesses do. when you receive an e-mail, if it's asking you to reset your password or open up an attachment, that potentially could be malicious. the bad guy can gain access to your computer or your information. >> you keep talking about attribution and how difficult that is. if that's the case, why is the united states convinced it's russia? >> well, they won't tell us. as a hacker -- i was on the other side many years ago. one of the things i would do to make it really hard for law enforcement to find out who it was, that it was me at the time, i would break into other computers around the world and then what i would do is from the computer i hacked into is i would hack another computer. if that connection was traced back, it would be traced to a cutout computer like in china, for example.

it's really simple for attackers to make it look like it came from a country or a group or somebody else. it's really not that difficult. >> fascinating to see, especially when you have yahoo! getting -- all those making headlines as far as that. i appreciate your perspective. >> i would love to see the evidence. the same thing with the sony hack when the u.s. government claimed it was north korea. nobody ever saw the evidence. we just had to take their word for it. same thing in this case, we have to take the word of the government through the intelligence sources. it comes down to john podesta having really bad security on his e-mail. >> fascinating insight for somebody who has been there hacking away. appreciate your time with us kevin. thank you so much. >> thank you. heartbreaking video from aleppo today. children begging for food. their attempt at evacuation uncertain. we will have the latest. that's next. beyond is a natural pet food

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welcome back. at the half hour, here is what we are monitoring. a new deal in the crisis in aleppo. the agreement between the government and rebels will allow trapped people to evacuate. no sign of any movement. militants burned five evacuation buses assigned to carry the sick and wounded. it's certainly a dire situation. many residents have been without food or any essentials. we were in aleppo this morning. >> reporter: hello from aleppo. desperate scenes here. these people have been freed from eastern aleppo after being besieged for years. this vehicle with food inside has arrived. you can see the desperation here. the food is being thrown from the back of the vehicle. people are fighting to try to

get their hands on it. as i say, these people have been under siege. they have not had proper food or medical care. they lived in miserable conditions. they have only been out for a matter of a few days. >> i want to turn to matt bradley in london. the u.n. is expected to vote on a resolution demanding immediate access to those besieged areas of aleppo. russia may veto it. get us up to date on what's the latest. >> reporter: thanks. russian diplomats said that they will, in fact, veto this french security council resolution that's meant to bring international observes to aleppo to oversee evacuations of civilians and fighters. that's not unexpected. russia has vetoed six resolutions throughout the years of this civil war. russia's ambassador said he

wasn't against the idea of observers, but that such observers would be unprepared to, quote, wander around east aleppo. still french officials are planning on pushes through their resolution basically forcing the russians to exercise their veto over a cease-fire that could save thousands of lives. this only two days after the outgoing u.n. secretary-general called aleppo a synonym for hell. you saw that just now. russia has long been a steadfast ally of president assad. it was russia whose intervention on his side last year that really turned the tide of the fighting in the regime's favor. the effects of that intervention, they are what you are seeing now. syria's largest city aleppo has been levelled, nearly to the ground, particularly the eastern neighborhoods of the city that were held by anti-government insurgents for several years. since a lightning fast assault began in november, government officials have retaken nearly the entire city.

there's still thought to be 50,000 people, fighters and civilians, still remaining in small pockets of resistance. their fate is now tethered to the fate of tens of thousands of wounded people in four other syrian towns. all of these places are now supposed to be evacuated simultaneously. pro-government fighters and anti-government rebels have spent the week debating these evacuations. today, pro-government fighters complained anti-government rebels burned at least five buses that were set to evacuate wounded people. two government leaning towns in rebel-held idlib province. it's hard to verify this. it's another example of how the diplomatic disputes are only delaying relief for so many innocents. >> we will see what comes out of the u.n. security council and that vote for humanitarian aid. much needed there in aleppo.

matt bradley, thank you. new reaction in the fallout of china's seizure of a u.s. drone in international waters. john mccain is going after the administration saying foreign countries are taking advantage of the u.s.' weakness. >> maybe they saw the success that the iranians had after they captured two american vessels and put american sailors on their knees and when they were returns the secretary of state thanked them for that. look, there's no strength on the part of the united states of america. everybody is taking advantage of it. hopefully, that will change soon. >> nbc's steve patterson is in honolulu where president obama is spending his vacation. any reaction from the president? >> reporter: i apologize if i start spontaneously smiling. it's about 73 degrees right now.

that's going to be the low today. to that point, president obama basically stepped off the plane last -- friday night, got the news that the drone agreement was made, that that drone was going to be returned saturday morning. he hasn't had time to directly address that news or the statement from senator mccain. he basically said, this is a very sensitive time in between two administrations in dealing with a very sensitive situation in china. perhaps the most important bilateral relationship in the world. in dealing with that, having huge ramifications for geopolitics for the global economy, for national security. he made those statements in the final press conference of 2016 before he came here to hawaii, basically addressing a reporter's question and saying with the relationship of the u.s. and china and the incoming trump administration that he has been advising the trump administration, because that's whose lap this is in.

with only a few days left, this now falls on president-elect trump. he has been advising trump. these incidents do happen, that this may not be so unprecedented. if you remember, it was 77 days that george w. bush took office before there was a chinese warplane that slammed into a u.s. surveillance plane. it was 44 days that president obama took office before chinese vessels surrounded a u.s. naval vessel. these incidents do happen. chinese authorities do tend to test the incoming administration. that's not new. it's not new to handle this in a diplomatic traditional sense, which is what the obama administration wanted to do. they got a swift diplomatic resolution to this. at this point, they are happy where they are. there are huge ramifications for the incoming administration and donald trump. >> interesting to hear that historical perspective. we will let you get back to the smiling and sun and sand.

new poll numbers on how america views the twitter habits of president-elect trump.

less than 24 hours until the electoral college convenes to cast its vote for our president. some congressmen are calling for transparency. >> donald trump is only the president-elect only as appointing cabinet memebers because there's a process. it was the will of the american people, hillary clinton would be the president-elect. it's the electoral college process that has mr. trump in the position he is in right now. let's honor that and give them the information they need to make a good decision. >> joining me now is representative jim heinz who is calling for congress to lead an investigation into the hacking. i appreciate you being with me. we heard from your colleague who is calling for a delay in the electoral college vote until

voters have more information. do you think it should be delayed? >> i think it's unlikely. i have been fairly aggressive in saying that the electors should ask themselves, are they just a rubber stamp or are they as alexander hamilton intended a group of people who are supposed to come together and decide whether the president to be has the requisite qualifications to be president of the united states? my understanding is that the only way the electoral college meetings could be postponed would be if congress voted to do so. congress, of course, firmly in the hands of the republicans. i don't think that's likely. the good news is that there is now a consensus among the intelligence agencies on the facts of the hack as well as the motives for the hack. the fbi and cia are on the same page with respect to the russian hack being undertaken on behalf of trying to elect donald trump as president. at least we have clarity whereas before we had dispute over what the point was. >> we will talk about that in a

moment. wasn't to bring this in. you have president obama who called for a retaliation against putin and russia. here is part of that. >> we need to take action. we will at a time and place of our choosing. some of it may be explicit and publicized. some of it may not be. >> we have called for a retaliation. what kind of retaliation are you thinking? >> a number of us were concerned that the consequences to the russians have not come as rapidly as they perhaps should have. any parent knows that punishment to be effective must be fair and swift. we haven't been swift in receipty bureceipt receipty retribution. i don't want to get into what they could do. it could involve embarrassing information for people involved. if you follow the history of

cyber security, you know that you can damage data, you can damage hardware. i don't know what the right answer is. i'm sure american officials shouldn't discuss what would happen. it's true that vladimir putin on these issues understands only a very naked benefit. we need to make it clear that there is a significant cost to be paid for his activities in this election and that we will be happy to escalate should he choose to continue to go after us in this realm which we are better than his people are at cyber warfare and cyber activities. >> a lot of that really weighs on intelligence and briefings. you are on the house intelligence committee. the chairman, he blasted the fbi, cia, national intelligence after they refused his request to be briefed on the cyberattacks. was your committee briefed sufficiently? why do you think your committee has not been briefed? >> we have been briefed.

i'm not actually sure what the chairman is referring to. two weeks ago we did receive a briefing from a number of elements of the intelligence community on the russian hacking activity. we have been kept apprised in the months -- you will recall that well before the election in september, october, director clapper said that they had high confidence the russians were hacking the election. the senate, of course, received a briefing on the same topic. we have gotten this. the step is now that we know and we have consensus, now we need to appoint what will hopefully be an independent and non-partisan committee to investigate this and to really get all of the facts about this out. that's an important thing not just for us but for the russians. we are going to name and shame and really disclose what was done to us. the russians will get the message we know what they're doing and we know what they did. >> isn't there any information, any sense of evidence that may not jeopardize the

investigation, that may not tip off hackers in the future that they can provide us now, naysayers, the american people? >> you do want to be careful in this realm. any activity you undertake can expose your own capabilities. in fact, any retribution we might choose to take would expose what we are capable of doing. you do want to be careful in thinking about how you proceed. i actually as much as i -- in the group of people wished the white house acted faster in enacting punishment, this is not something you do without being thoughtful. you want your response to be proportionate. you don't want it to disclose what capabilities we have that you may want to use in the future. >> i want to ask you about this. john podesta, he accused team trump of colludes with the russi russians. >> i would argue that there's very -- it's very much unknown whether there was collusion.

i think russian diplomats have said post election that they were talking to the trump campaign. i think really not what mr. trump knew, but what did trump ifr inc. know? >> do you think that there was collusion? >> well, john podesta is right in that there were statements made by russian government people that there was contact, if i recall correctly. it's a pretty explosive charge. i don't have nearly enough information to be able to address whether that is true or not. is it a possibility? of course it's a possibility. again, you know, what's being described, of course, would be american citizen collusion on espionage at best. so my hope is -- if we can put together an investigatory committee and remember -- in the last couple of years we have seen eight or nine put together for benghazi. we have one out there examining

planned parenthood. all of these things that were nakedly political. i would hope my republican friends who now solidly control both the house and senate and the oval office would have the same amount of rigor in putting to the committees and really going deep on this investigation so we get precisely those answers. >> let me ask you this quickly. if this committee is put together, do you think we will find anything more than we know? >> i think we will. i think our people are very -- our intelligence people, the fbi are very, very good. i think that we don't know the whole story here. if only because it's been breaking so rapidly and of course, it's only now the intelligence community has gotten a consensus. i think it's possible we could learn more. >> whether we know as far as the public if that information will be shared to be seen. representative heinz, thank you very much. >> thank you. the president-elect's twitter habits and what americans think about it. the results of a new poll, that's next. minutes away from "meet the press." chuck todd speaking with robert

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trump and twitter. the looking at twitter, the president sees the platform as well known, and he has tweeted over 34,000 times and what do americans think about all of the twitting? in a new survey, 64% called it reck leless and distracting and% said they thought it was informative, and 13% were uncertain. all day. it's the best thing that ever happened to me. can you say thanks nicoderm cq? every great why needs a great how.

this afternoon, there is a new call for electoral college members to have a reasonable discussion on whether the public made the right decision on november 8th. joining me is the former ambassador to the czech republic, and assistant to president obama, ambassador

yizen, and we know that you have been personally calling members to urge them to have this discussion and why is that important and how productive has it been? >> thank you very much, fran ci, for having me. the founders of the county -- country intended for the electoral college to act as an independent institution to make sure that we didn't choose somebody for the presidency that is unfit. it is important for electors to consider all of the context as some have reached out to me, and i have written a lot, and some have picked up the phone, both parties to understand questions like the constitutional emollient clause, and that is the fancy 18th century term, but it means the question of whether mr. trump is allowed under the

constitution to get the foreign government payments that he is receiving now from his businesses. >> and sir, when it comes to the vote of the electoral college tomorrow, and in the last two hours, i have been talking to people who say that the outcome won't change anything, and so how productive have you been in these calls to have this discussion? >> well, we have to be realistic about what is likely to happen tomorrow, and i have not told any elector what to do. i think it is important to have a public debate, and i think that it is effective for people to understand the extraordinary interference in our election processes by a foreign power in the run-p up to he lek shun, and the financial conflicts of interest, and the potential for corruption if donald trump does not follow precedent, and select the trustee to manage his financial affairs and sell his business interests, and that is very important for the e electors and the country, and

now it is up to them to use the information, and we have issued a brookings report friday on this clause for the foreign corrupt influence problem, and the payment, and that is for the e elects -- e electors to decid that is the health of our democracy. >> and i would like to know how that would change how he is president at all, be you served under president obama and you said that president-elect trump could be in violation of the constitution when he gets to the white house, and what are you talk about there and could you see him iple peached down the road? >> it is a bipartisan consensus of legal experts, and the report we issued at brookings on friday included president bush's ethic adviser in the white house as well as the distinguished constitutional scholar larry tribe and myself, and the basic

problem is that the founders of the kcountry were very worried about the ability of foreign governments to direct funds to a sitting president and influence his judgment. it is corrupting. they put it in the constitution and it is a serious issue. >> all right. >> and for president-elect trump. >> i am sorry to cut it short, but i am out of town, and i wish that we had more. that it is for our live coverage, and up next is "meet the press." i'm francis rivera, and thank you for being with me today.

this sunday the putin connection, how big a role did this sunday the putin connection, how big a role did russia's hacking play in the election? a lot says hillary clinton. >> we're also learning more every day about the unprecedented russian plot to swing this election. >> not much says donald trump. >> i think it's ridiculous. i think it's just another excuse. i don't believe it. >> hard to know says president obama. >> not much happens in russia without vladimir putin.