update on what to expect from the white house. kristen? >> reporter: it's a good question, brian. no indication of exactly what he's going to say. i was at the white house last night when sean spicer came out two times unannounced to let us know about those initial executive actions that president trump signed. the first one, of course, being with obamacare and essentially saying to various agencies that they don't have to necessarily live up to all of the regulations required by obamacare if they are overly burdensome. he also signed an executive action as it relates to the fha, essentially rolling back a lower interest rate. there were other actions taken by reince priebus telling agencies to freeze any new regulations. this seems to be par for the

course in the early days of the white house so it is possible that he is going to come out and announce some more actions. i don't know that to be the case. but i do know that more executive actions are anticipated in the coming days. and i can tell you the priorities, brian, are trade and immigration. of course, it's already been a very busy day. the president's first full day in office. he started with an interfaith prayer service at the national cathedral and then went to the cia and essentially sent the message to him, i am still behind you. those words coming, of course, after he questioned over and over again their analysis that russia tried to meddle in the u.s. election and at times sharply criticized members of the intelligence community and really created somewhat of a rift as some would describe it as he was in the transition process. so it seems as though he's attempting the try to bridge that gap and officially in office and a matter of national security. this is something that security experts are concerned about,

quite frankly. because that relationship is so critical. so, it is likely or possible i should say that mr. spicer will announce more actions by the president. it's also possible he'll give us details of what specifically happened when the president was at the cia earlier today, brian. >> kristen welker, thanks. while you are talking, the sound it kind of disjointed. we should tell our viewers, that is our microphone in midtown manhattan near trump tower where these protest earers are coming 5th avenue from downtown. that's as many people as we have ever seen in 5th avenue in new york. you get the kind of concrete canyon effect there. our offices are right by this intersection where it's actually brighter in real life than it is in midtown manhattan because the sun is blocking by the tall buildings but nonetheless,

darkness is descending. and a lot of people, there's a lot of kind of hubbub and activity as they get as close as they can to trump tower. again, on the right, the white house briefing room. we do not know the subject of the briefing. we are awaiting. hallie jackson is waiting with us. hallie, before we talk about what we can expect, i want to show our viewers who weren't with us some of what president trump said within the past hour or so at cia headquarters across the potomac in langley, virginia. >> i can only say that i am with you 1,000%. they sort of made it sound like i had a feud with the intelligence community. and i just want to let you know, the reason you're number one stop is exactly the opposite. >> hallie jackson, to his wording there, did we sort of make it sound like he had a feud

with the intelligence community? can you reflect or refresh our memory on what he said himself about the intelligence community? >> on both the twitter account and in the news conference a couple of weeks ago, brian, he suggested that members of the intelligence community using nazi-like tactics and put the words intelligence in quotes, for example. he went after john brennan all but accusing him of leaking information to the news media about interactions that were alleged to be had with russia, unverified, unsubstantiated allegations, we should note. you look at the word feud, right? i think that there is -- has been bad blood between senior members of the intelligence community and donald trump. and that is just looking at the sort of wealth of information that we have had before us over the last month or so, particularly when you look at what john brennan had to say in "wall street journal" when he

had some very strong words. let's call it fiery language for donald trump. he referenced the very wall that president trump standing in front of today. the memorial wall today in cia. you see the stars behind the president representing the lives lost from members of the cia. and john brennan essentially said and paraphrasing here that it is dishonoring the memories of those lives lost to come out and make those suggestions and comparisons to nazi germany which the president did, again, both on online and then in person at the press conference. we are already seeing criticism here from adam schiff, congressman, ranking member of the house community chit tee saying he hopes that president trump's visit to the cia marks the beginning of a new relationship, brian, the congressman continues, trump gave little more than an acknowledgment of the service and sacrifice saying instead, congressman schiff said, argued at length the size of the crowd,

set out the favorites in the media, meandered through other topics unrelated to intelligence and made the astounding claim that i love honesty. that again is from congressman schiff, the ranking democrat on the house intel committee. and the question now, of course, in talking with a couple of folks who know the cia well, after those remarks happened, the note that it was a saturday, this is not a typical work day for the cia. we understand that incoming cia chief mike pompeo was in the room and not seeing the reverse shots of the crowd, some of whom were applauding and not we're told senior leadership is because the cia has asked members of the media when they shoot this, when they go to film and videotape the president speaking at the cia not to sort of show the intelligence analysts because of operational reasons. it is interesting to see what sean spicer has to say any second, brian. you can see the picture on the right of the screens. is it about crowd sizes?

this is something donald trump talked about. maybe every campaign rally i've been to with him. he mentions and likes to talk about how big the crowds are, hit the media for not referencing how big the crowds are and will it be about the inauguration crowd size? will it be about the crowd sizes at the women's marches seeing around the country? that is something we'll be finding out momentarily, presumably. >> hallie, the crowd sizes at these marches can't be ignored. this is -- this has lit a spark and it will be really interesting to see what comes of this. what just started today and how is it on a collision course with the presidency that started yesterday? >> and i think something else important to note as i'm sitting here on set with actually folk who is were just at the women's march, where does this go? because you can look at the crowd sizes, brian, and a word you are seeing repeated again

and again is unexpected. bigger numbers than they thought would turn out at these marches, not just here in the united states but as you look obviously all around the world, the question is, okay, so then what next? we have heard organizers, participants to turn it into a movement but how are they planning to do that? will it be a successful one? that's a question i don't think we get an answer to for a while. >> there are no electoral votes in paris. but just looking at their signs, france hates trump, birds tweet not presidents. it's remarkable. donald trump does not react well to this kind of thing. donald trump will often scramble to come out with counter evidence and a counter version. it's going to be very interesting as we continue to stare at that lectern in the white house briefing room to see what this communication is going to be from the trump white

house, hallie. >> a quick note, too, brian. let's just note the sometimes fuzzy to get of crowd sizes an one of the ones is the march, the demonstration in los angeles. and we are being told now that sources estimate the crowd size there could be upward of several hundred thousand but there's a caution flag here that this 750,000 figure being put out by organizers is too high and a source putting the crowd at 200,000 people. that can be revised upwards and all to say coming to the hard numbers, sometime that is's a little bit tricky to estimate. the visuals of it are certainly something to watch. >> yeah. they are striking. hallie jackson, thanks. we'll be coming back to you. stephanie gosk has been reporting on the protests in washington at ground level all day. stephanie, what do you have? >> reporter: you know, brian, we are not that far from that empty lectern and let's just say this is a very different scene out

here every once in a while you hear a cheer, welcome to your first day, a chant and a taunt of sorts to the new president. and his team that is why they came here. you know, we watched this crowd grow all day long. organizers had said 200,000. the officialless here in the city said they were preparing for 500,000. and then late in the afternoon we got word that officials were concerned that the crowd had actually grown so big that they didn't want the formal march to happen. there's no way to confirm the numbers and that can get tricky and there's going to be a lot of contention on how many people came out here today. but from our vantage point, we saw crowds like i have never seen before and i have covered demonstrations here in the u.s., overseas. i've never quite seen a crowd like this. we were unable to move, even ten feet from our satellite truck to a porta-potty. it was remarkable. all ended up here just over my

shoulder is the white house. and if you're looking out those win does right now, you are looking at the crowd. brian? >> so, you're down at the end of the lips. you are near the base of the washington monument. and we have been reading anecdotally all day today, we knew how much public transportation was funneling people into washington. all day yesterday, having nothing to do with the inauguration and everything to do with the protest. so we knew people couldn't get a train reservation, they couldn't get a plane ticket. they were taking, chartering buses to washington. coming up washington from all angles. buses leaving from the northeast, all kinds of cities. we knew this was going to be substantial. what's happening now after so many people had hotel rooms, they stayed on the couches of complete strangers, where are people going and is the crowd dissipating? >> well, brian, the city's a mess right now.

i mean, to have that many people here and now either staying -- there are some kind of holding fast here at the white house and still a lot of people trying to get out. we walked by a couple of metro stations that were jammed. i mean, the line to the metro station was well out on to the street and around the corner. there are those people that found friends or family or were lucky enough to plan ahead and get a hotel room. some are staying an hour away. but there's going to be a jam-up here for hours and hours trying to get people out of this city. brian? >> all right. we'll keep coming back to your reporting. thank you very much, stephanie gosk. that's the white house over her shoulder. the white house is also where we are waiting for a statement from sean spicer from the lectern in the press room on a saturday afternoon. you see kelly o'donnell there in the front row getting ready for this to begin. we'll bring in katie packer as

we wait to hear from the white house. katie's a veteran of the bush 43 year. she is a veteran of the romney campaign effort. katie, you and i spoke often enough during the campaign to know that your feelings about donald trump were direct and also complicated and so what do you make of this spark? we are seeing lit today. across this country and around the world. what comes of this do you think? >> well, you know, i'm one that was a republican, that was a little disappointed with where our party went and made the decision after the election to stand beside our president and behind our president and support the country moving forward. that said, i do think that there was a missed opportunity yesterday where the president could have done more to sort of bring people together and lift up the country in a way that didn't happen and so there was a lot of reaction to that and i think that that has something to

do with the crowd sizes we are seeing today. i do think that the republican party and conservatives shouldn't ignore this. this is a very organic movement. i have a lot of friends that i was surprised to learn are actually participating in these marches that are happening all over the country and my home state of michigan, you know, over 10,000 people showed up in lansing today. i'm in denver today. a huge crowd turned out here. these aren't just happening in liberal east and west coast cities but all over the country and i think that's something republicans should listen to. what i do think is missing is we are not really sure what it is they're marching for. you know, there's a lot of different reasons that these women are showing up today and there's a llt of power in this movement and if they can harness that, then i think that some action could come from that but i don't think we're sure today what the march means. >> katie, name some republicans who you'll be watching to react to this.

obviously, they're not going to be named we don't think they're named donald trump or sean spicer but name some people you will kind of hold to reacting to this, learning from it, perhaps basing their policy differences on it. >> well, based on my relationship with the speaker of the house paul ryan, he is somebody that does pay attention to these things and listens to the people and listens to a variety of voices and i think he'll be interested to hear the kind of voices raised today and hear what they have to say. not to say he always agrees with what they're saying but i think he's smart and will pay attention. the incoming rnc chairwoman ron that romney mcdaniel, another person who's a friend of mine is somebody that i think cares about these kinds of voices. and i think that they'll be smart enough to pay attention to what's being said. but again, i do think that these women that are marching today need to kind of together and

figure out what it is exactly that they're marching for. some of the organizers refused to allow pro-life women to participate. that was a missed opportunity in terms of unity among women and issues this all women can come together to agree on. if this is just an anti-trump thing, it's probably a missed opportunity. but to have a lot of women come together and talk about equality an talk about the things beyond just abortion that are important to all women would be in my opinion a wise move for these organizers. >> yeah. as the song lyrics told us years ago, some thing's happening here. and it's just been so obvious today as the time zones have moved to the west, as the crowds have popped up. we keep talking about the visual in chicago. in part, because aircraft were allowed right over it, in part because of the contours of

chicago. and where the people were and the density of that crowd. it's some of the most vivid video of the day. and yet, it's not the leading crowd of the day. it was not the biggest concentration of people. katie packer, thank you, as always for today and for -- >> thanks, brian. >> -- joining us. we're watching the white house briefing room where we believe we are inside two minutes to go until we hear from sean spicer, the press secretary for president trump. we don't know the topic. we have kelly o'donnell who will be among the questioners in the front row unless it's just a statement with no questions. and we have kristen welker standinging by. we have hallie jackson standing by. so we have a lot of candle power to bring to bear on this. we have on the left-hand side of the screen darkness falling in

new york. we have no apparent let-up in new york. that's 5th avenue. we are saying earlier even if you've just been in new york once or twice, you know the import of 5th avenue as a landmark. you know perhaps how much traffic it carries during an average day. these are all protesters. so many of them wearing the pink hats. so many of them carrying signs. so many of them with families, strollers. this was billed as the women's march but the organizers were quick to add that, of course, it wasn't limited to women and they've been quick to point out today especially in new york and washington that it has featured so many men, so many families. all peaceful. we don't know of a single violent incident. this has turned into kind of what they called in the '60s and

'70s a happening. people saw the coverage and it kind of snowballed. again, i'm just going to pause and listen to the roar, just the sound of people as they arrive at the base of trump tower. there have been speakers on and off today. there's been some chanting but then you hear the reaction of the crowd and remember the crowd is a continuum. you see a slow march moving from downtown to uptown. actually, more specifically to midtown manhattan. and then the nypd, of course, is

not allowing people to go all the way to the base of trump tower. they are siphoning people off and dispersing the crowd on at least two side streets. but still, the din is remarkable. and then multiply this by all of the cities from coast to coast. and around the world. the images from paris, france, the images from london, understanding we're just seeing a small slice of those two cities, the signage from today in paris in english, signs you could see in this country, on this day after the inauguration of the new american president, it's certainly feels like we are in for an era of unprecedented political activism. the two parties in our country could not be further apart. it couldn't be a more fractured

environment going in to 2017. we have seen it on display every day. this is obviously the eiffel tower in the background. this is the gathering in paris, france. absolutely incredible. this is long over because the daylight hours, of course, ended hours ago. but this was before a lot of americans were up and at it. and out on the streets of their own cities. looks like it was colder in paris than it was in new york. the demonstrations were also helped by the temperate weather. there were beautiful temperatures today. in chicago, illinois, for example. in washington, d.c. wintertime, yes. but they were very fortunate that it was mild. the weather, actually, has been germane to the discussion of crowd size over the inauguration. there's a picture of rome. because it did start to rain when president trump started his

inaugural address. there have been pictures circulating all day today of president bush 43 wrestling with a clear plastic poncho. it rained. it rained a lot after the inauguration was over. the rain continued on and off. never that bad mostly in the showers category. this is london. pictures from earlier today. prior to sunset there of the crowds gathering. again, all of this part of this post-inauguration protest movement. sean spicer has been further delayed. about ten minutes. no explanation. here's athens, greece. let's go to kristen welker. kristen, speculate openly as to what we're going to hear from the white house. >> reporter: well, we are just

getting some indication that what we will hear is a statement and not a briefing. so, that means he's going to come out, say what he wants to say and then likely not take a whole lot of questions. i can tell you what's going to happen, brian. he's going to get peppered with questions about what we have witnessed throughout the day. these historic rallies which have unfolded which you have been describing taking us from city to city here in the u.s. and all across the world, really. and the question is going to be, what is the reaction? what is the reaction to these crowds in relation to the crowd yesterday at the inauguration? as hallie was talking about earlier. president trump is focused on crowd sizes. so will sean spicer come out with a statement about what we have seen? or will he want to perhaps respond to one question? that's what we'll have to wait and see and i don't anticipate to get a full briefing. i don't think he's going to be

taking five or six questions. but to pick up on one of the points that you were discussing earlier, what happens next? how do all of these protesters translate this in to action? in to policy. in to, for example, upholding obamacare. that's one of the things that they have spent a lot of time talking about today. and that's the real challenge. how do they keep this momentum going? and part of it i think and part of the challenge rests with the fact that you have two parties which are not only divided from each other and divided within themselves and spent so much time focused on the republican party fractured and in reality the democratic party is equally fractured. there's so many different interests and factions of it at this point, particularly when you think about the bernie sanders branch versus the hillary clinton branch and who becomes the leader of the democratic party moving forward and those are all of the questions i think the democrats are wrestling with as they

continue to deal with this electoral loss and these protesters coming out saying, not all of them are protesting against president trump and they're rallying for something. but it's clear a lot of them saying they're concerned about what might happen next. that the person they wanted to win the white house didn't win. how do they translate that in to an electoral victory in the next midterm elections? in the next presidential elections? that's the real challenge as we watch these really impressive pictures unfold, to be sure, but how do they do turn this into tangible action? that's the real challenge moving forward. >> agreed. these pictures can't be argued with, can't be denied. how do they get converted? some of the most repeated comments today, michael moore notably said that the old guard

of the democratic party needed to be taken down. another delay at the white house. we're watching and will go right to sean spicer and fit in a break here. the live coverage continues right after this. my business was built with passion... but i keep it growing by making every dollar count. that's why i have the spark cash card from capital one. with it, i earn unlimited 2% cash back on all of my purchasing. and that unlimited 2% cash back from spark means thousands of dollars each year going back into my business... which adds fuel to my bottom line. what's in your wallet?

the reason you're my first stop is that as you know i have a running war with the media. they are among the most dishonest human beings on earth. and they sort of made it sound like i had a feud with the intelligence community. and i just want to let you know the reason you're number one stop is exactly the opposite. exactly. and they understand that, too. >> the media made it sound as if donald trump had a feud with the intelligence community. we have gone back over his twitter feed regarding the dust-up with the intelligence community. quoting donald trump has sufficed, exactly what he said about the intelligence

community. that was the new president over at cia headquarters in langley, virginia, the left of the screen some of the sights of today's marches and and across the country, huge crowds in washington, huge crowds in new york. safe to say overwhelming crowds in both places. at one time or another. public transportation, public facilities. there were various announcements. there were various rumors that at different times they were going to divert the march, call off the march, change des in additions, change routes. this is chicago. we keep saying these are some of the more stunning pictures of the day. because aerial photography was allowed. it's just not possible in parts of new york and washington the way it was today in chicago. you see there people basically filling the entire frame at times.

we're waiting for sean spicer, the press secretary at the white house. we've now been told to expect a statement, not any kind of an open q&a session or a news conference. all we know is when they were setting up both of those television monitoring flanking the lectern had pictures of the crowd of yesterday's inauguration. we'll see if there's an effort to relitigate questions of crowd size yesterday as opposed to today. we'll see if it has anything to do with today's marches and rallies. we have our own standing by, kristen welker, hallie jackson continues standing by for us. we want to bring in the head of vote latino. and to be fair, you and i spoke many times during the campaign, your confidence was high that you had signed up so many new

voters that it was going to be a part of the coalition that was going to favor hillary clinton, lead to a hillary clinton victory. it did not. the question in light of that is, what do you think today's marches and rallies indicate? what has been sparked? and how can it be? how will it be converted politically? >> yeah, no. thank you, brian. a biggest takeaway from the election and still waiting for the voter matching and we're finding is that latinos did come out in record numbers. compared to 18% for donald trump. that said, it was clear that the coalition was not enough and it's something i keep saying. what the hillary campaign failed to do is not only make new friends but keep the old. she did not invest in the white working class and what the marches signify today is people are paying attention and that these individuals that either

decide not to vote on election day all of a sudden thought that the result that they -- it was a clear that she was going to be the president did not happen. and so, what folks are saying i will be present and continue marching and now what hallie said earlier. what happens the next day. i know that as organizers are trying to scramble, scramble at the success of these marches, how do we capture that energy, i think one of the most telling things of the election is all of a sudden americans started to get a very live civic lesson and almost in live tweeting and understood better the electoral college and the civic process and the voting rights. and because donald trump was a controversial choice winning the white house despite lacking 3 million votes behind hillary clinton, people are going to be very engaged moving forward but we have to make sure that we have a clear agenda and that agenda that was clear on the marches i was there on the ground floor is intersectional. people are not only talking

about reproductive sites, lgbt issues, globalization. i heard practically every single language under the sun. i saw parents marching with parents. it was a special moment. >> i have to tell you the video that we have been running on a kind of constant loop on the left-hand side of the screen that we over the course of the day have added locations to, we were just watching denver. crowds that in parts of downtown denver i have never seen before to my knowledge. crowds, the likes of which in chicago i have never seen. look at the streets of denver. look at the plaza. boise, idaho, in the snow. paris, france. london. limited crowd sizes but as i said there's no electoral votes in paris, france, or london in this election.

the presidency of donald trump, perhaps the messaging of yesterday, the speech beamed around the world, speech with powerful messages, we have read the critiques, the analysis. we saw and heard the words yesterday. something's happening. we're joined again by maria teresa khumar. something is going on. >> i think when you -- the juxtaposition of the president's speech yesterday saying that we are going to become isolationists more or less, america first, he failed to understand the deep love and care that the rest of the world has for america and didn't happen overnight. we have been there for the allies when they needed us and today the world stands with us and they stand in the right side of history and again, not only is the size of the -- unprecedented but it also demonstrate that is people are paying attention and they want a strong america, but they also want a fair america because we

are the -- we are still the beam of democracy worldwide. and if we fail and the rest of the world fails and they are in solidarity with us at this moment, bri yn. >> i'm told we have some darkness fallen along the east coast and told we have some video outside the white house. this is live. it is from the ellipse. so we normally see the white house from the other side, the north lawn. this is a long, long shot along the south lawn. and if you extend this past where the camera is, this is where a lot of the protesters have wound up. the long, long oval driveway that forms the ellipse that eventually merges on to the grounds that make up the base of the washington monument. that's the truman balcony through there bisecting the southern side of the building at the white house.

the flag illuminated above. you see the fountain. but because of the darkness i'm afraid we're not able to see a lot of what's going on in the foreground. ditto new york city. our live camera showing 5th avenue. you can get just in the reflected light -- you can get the idea of the crowd. look at the surging crowd. this has gone on all afternoon. crowds coming from south to north up 5th avenue and then being routed around the base of trump tower. we're seeing activity in the white house briefing room. here's press secretary -- we're seeing some of his aides come in. we saw a photographer come in. the door is open to the lower press office so some white house aides are taking their positions. we are just going to stay on this here.

5:38 p.m. eastern time. sean spicer came in here last night to talk about some of the measures, the new president was going to sign in the oval office. indeed, we saw a video of him signing some of the larger certificates making official the defense secretary, the secretary of homeland security. he signed an executive order that would be a component to this dismantling of obamacare. but this will be the first kind of formal remarks. again, for those just joining us, we're told -- hallie jackson is with us. she can bear me out. we're told to expect a statement and not q&a given with the press corps? >> that's the expectation. as you know, things can watch as we see sean spicer walk out. >> good evening. thank you for coming. i know our first official press

briefing on monday and i wanted to give you an update on the president's activities. before the news of the day, i think i'd like to discuss a little bit of the coverage of the past 24 hours. yesterday, at a time when our nation and the world was watching the peaceful transition of power, and as the president said the transition and the balance of power of washington to the citizens of the united states, some members of the media engaged in deliberate false reporting. for the talk of the proper use of twitter, two instances yesterday stand out. one was a particularly example of which a reporter falsely tweeted out that the bust of martin luther king jr. had been removed from the oval office. after it was pointed out that this was just plain wrong, the reporter casually reported and fweeted out and twi tried to claim the about must have been standing in front of it. this was irresponsible and reckless. secondly, photographs of the inaugural proceedings were intentionally framed in a way in

one particular tweet to minimize the enormous support that it gather and the national mall. this was the first time in our nation's history that floor coverings used the protect the grass in the mall and highlighted any areas of people not standing while in years past the grass eliminated this visual. this was also the first time that fencing and mag me no, ma'am ters prevented the people from being able to access the mall as quickly as they had in inaugurations past. inaccurate numbers of crowd size were also tweeted. no one had numbers because the national park service which controls the national mall does not put any out. by the way, this applies any attempts to try to count the number of protesters today in the same fashion. we do know a few things so let's go through the facts. beknow that from the platform where the president was sworn in to 4th street holds about 250,000 people. from 4th street to the media

tent is 220,000 and media tent to the washington monument out 50250,000 people. all of this space was full when the president took the oath of office. we know that 420,000 people used the d.c. metro public transit yesterday and compares to 317,000 that used it for president obama's last inaugural. this was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration. period. both in person and around the globe. even "the new york times" printed a photograph showing that a misrepresentation of the crowd in the original tweet in the paper and showed the full extent of the support, depth and crowd and intensity that existed. these attempts to lessen the enthusiasm of the inauguration are shameful and wrong. the president was also at the center as you know at the central intelligence agency and creted by a crowd of some 400,000 cia employees, over

1,000 requests to attend prompting the president to note he'll have to come back to greet the rest. the employees were ecstatic he's the new commander in chief and he delivered them an empowerful and important message. he told them he has their back. and they were grateful for that. they gave him a five-minute standing ovation at the end and in a display of patriotism and they enthusiasm for his presidency. i'd also note that it's a shame that the cia didn't have a cia director to be with him today because the democrats have chosen -- senate democrats are stalling the nomination of mike pompeo and playing politics with national security. that's what you guys should be covering and writing instead of sowing division about tweets and false narratives. the president is committed to unifying our country and that was the focus of his inaugural address. this kind of dishonesty in the media, the challenging to bring about our nation together is making it more difficult.

there's talk in the media of holding donald trump accountable and i'm here to tell you it goes two ways. we are going to hold the press accountable, as well. the american people deserve better and as long as he serves as the messenger for the movement he'll take the message directly to the american people where his focus will always be. and with that, a few other updates from the day. the president had a constructive conversation with prime minister true doe of canada about strengsenning the relationship of the two nations and discussed sethling up additional meetings in the days to come which we'll follow up on. he also spoke to prime minister of mexico and a visit on trade, immigration and security. that will occur on the 31st. the president has -- will welcome the first foreign leader this thursday when the united kingdom's may will come to washington on friday. on tomorrow the president will

oversee his assistants to the presidents being sworn in. he'll then the staff will have an ethics briefing and be -- briefing on the proper use and handling of classified information. further updates as far as what he'll do -- oh, and then in the evening he will have a reception for law enforcement and first responders that helped support the inauguration. thank you guys for being here tonight. i'll see you on monday. >> sean spicer in the white house briefing room. a lot to discuss there. but his central charge, he came out charged up, certainly, was accusing some in the news media of deliberately false reporting. you heard it there and it falls into two categories. number one, based on a visual,

if not a personal observation last night in the oval office, it was falsely reported that a bust of the reverend dr. martin luther king jr. had been removed from the oval office. we know a bust of churchill had been added in the oval office but apparently the view of the bust of the reverend dr. martin luther king jr. was blocked. zeke miller, the journalist with "time" magazine who published that took it back. white house aide confirms the mlk bust is still there. i looked for it in the oval office and didn't see it. my apologies to my colleagues. said, zeke miller, who have been observing in the oval office for colleagues in the news media. sean spicer as you see here earlier posted apology accepted. but has doubled down on that today. now, the second area that sean

spicer had vehement opinions on was the coverage of the crowd size of the inauguration yesterday. he specifically noted something we took pains to note and that was the white plastic flooring. you see there at the bottom of the screen. it was meant to protect the national mall because we're in the kind of wet, soggy and muddy season. it gives people a more substantial place to stand. and cuts down the effect of the foot traffic. this is one of the still photos taken from the top of the washington monument. sean spicer was disagreeing with the photos that were out yesterday both on network television, on cable television, print media, social media comparing and contrasting the record breaking crowds of '09 on

the right, the obama inauguration with the trump inauguration yesterday. he hit us with a fuselage of numbers there, admission, how many people were allowed in certain sections, through certain gaetds. part of the defense was magnenometers were prevalent this time than in '09 and would have potentially held down the crowd size. he cited some figures from metro in washington, d.c., the subway system, and it's unclear as to whether he was talking about individuals using metro or the number of rides recorded in a day which could be multiples per person. lawrence o'donnell was listening with us from our studios in new york. lawrence, that was a unique appearance and meant by sean spicer clearly to lay down the

law and say as he said rather exples sitly, we're not going to take this and this is going to be the way it is. we're not going to accept what he called deliberately false reporting. >> well, unique is what we expected, brian. and we have reason to ponder what the delay was about. this was scheduled for over an hour ago. and usually when there's a delay on something like this, it means that there's some kind of backstage struggle about exactly what public elements should be used in the discussion that's about to occur in the white house press briefing room. we heard spicer's boss earlier today at the cia say that he saw a crowd when he looked out from the podium of a million to a half a million. that was donald trump's official personal crowd estimating skills, being put to work there. we have reason to suspect that that might have been a subject of debate prior to this press briefing that we just saw with the question being, should that be repeated?

should that become the white house's officialest snat should that be something that sean spicer embraces? he didn't. he didn't quote it or refer to it in any way. he referred to the public estimate that is we have so far of 250,000 of being woefully inadequate. he credited "the new york times" with running what he says are the correct sorts of photographs to run that compare side by side the two crowds. and he claimed that the difference between this year and the obama years was that there's a white surface now over the mall that when people aren't standing on that surface it highlights the absence of people. i hope anyone who's in possession of "the new york times" takes a look at these pictures that i'm looking at now holding "the new york times" print edition in my hands and i hope they're online because you can see in the "the new york times" photo that -- there it is. you won't get it on the tv camera but there's absolutely no confusion when you look at it

determining in "the new york times" photograph where the people actually are and where they are not. you can see in that photograph where people are and where they are not. you can see there's a thinner tn the 2009 photograph just above the nbc logo. you can see it thins out there a little bit, and then it thick uns on each side of it. the crowds show a massively bigger crowd during the obama inauguration than during the trump inauguration, and it shows vast empty spaces where there were no empty spaces before. and so i'm glad she suggested people look at "the new york times" for the evidence of that crowd, but, brian, i'm sure what you meant by unique is this is the first time in history that the first white house press briefing is about crowd size at the inauguration and disputes

with all estimates of the crowd size not made by donald trump. >> it comes on a day, lawrence, we're engaging in it right now, live wall-to-wall coverage of marches and rallies that have arisen organically where the idea is a retired lawyer in hawaii who made a facebook post went to bed, woke up to hundreds if not thousands of postings, the notion of this being the day after the inauguration was kind of set ablaze, and this has happened today organically around the world and certainly from coast to coast. that can't go over well. it has nothing to do with governing or the business of the new presidency. >> well, except the protest does because this protest is directed

at the anticipated governing by the presidency and the positions advocated by the presidency. that's what people were out there protesting today. when the president arrives with his new agenda into a new congress, the most valuable thing the president can have is public support. he certainly didn't have that today, and his pick up support has dropped every day since election day to the point where he went into the inauguration as the least popular president taking the oath of office for the first time in history a 32% favorable opinion of donald trump on inauguration day. we have never seen anything like that before. that is a weakness going into his governing with congress, the likes of which we've never seen. even trump partisans are going to be getting really nervous if these polls continue to

basically stay as low as they are. you know, it's easy for people who have never been in protests or don't know the history of protest to disregard them when they occur. but life has not been good to presidents who face massive protests. massive protests were part of what drove linden johnson out of the white house. he was on his way, he believed to an easy re-election in 1968, but in the second term of succeeding jfk, it was the first time people in massive numbers came in. peace marches were even bigger than what we've seen for civil rights mrchz. martin luther king himself joined the movement.

lbj became the part of the massive protest in history. richard next to became its next target. he survived the four years and won a massive electoral re-election. he won against george mcgovern in the aftermath of 1968. he was read as far to liberal for america at that time. to this day, george mcgochb stands as the most liberal nominee of a major party in history, and so that led to basically a voter return to the safety of richard nixon. he was driven to resign as a result of impeachment

proceedings. what drove him to madness and lines he crossed, a lot of what drove him to that was the protest movement and his obsession with the protest movement and collect intelligence on the protest movement. any senators who joined the movement or members of congress. you could argue in some ways it drove richard nixon crazy to the point of losing his presidency. >> lawrence o'donnell in new york. this is also in new york, donald trump's hometown. 5th avenue tonight even after darkness has fallen after an afternoon of this same surging pulsing crowd, it's still going. we're coming up on 6:00 p.m. at night. it's a winter evening in midtown manhattan. you can hear the noise the crowd is making. they are being diverted around

the base of trump tower, not allowed to protest around trump tower because it is the president's home and it's a highly secured site now in midtown manhattan. we've been showing you crowds, and we've been accurate about the crowd sizes we've been depicting today, accurate about pointing out that it's earlier today these pictures were from earlier this afternoon. but that is along the mall in washington, d.c. we've just seen this extraordinary statement by sean spicer from the podium in the white house briefing room calling out the news media, elements, members of the news media for, quote, deliberately false reporting. some of the assertions from sean spicer need to be reported out and put through a strainer by us. some of the passenger figures from the washington, d.c. metro system and the like. we're going to end this hour of

coverage. greta van susteren will take over at the top of the hour. a lot to show you, a lot to discuss after a busy day from coast to coast.

. i'm greta van susteren with more of our continuing coverage of the massive rallies here in washington, across the nation, and even around the world. the trump white house press secretary blasting the media. sean spicer making an extraordinary statement. >> photographs of the inaugural proceedings were framed in a way in one tweet to minimize the norms support that gathered on the national mall. this was the first time in our nation's history that floor coverings have been used to protect the grass