attorney general, ben carson for hud secretary and nicki hailey for u.n. ambassador. and the oscars award show willvoted the most popular pres secretary by the press corps. so after checking my twitter feed i shot josh an e-mail last night letting him know he can rest easy that his title is secure for at least the next few days. >> good morning, it is tuesday january 24th. welcome to "morning joe." with us on the set veteran columnist mike barnicle, mark halperin, how is the baby? so cute. >> nice. got a good personality. >> i like him. in washington pulitzer prize winning columnist, "washington

post" msnbc political analyst eugene robinson. on capitol hill white house correspondent for "associated press" julie page, the sun needs to come up. >> she was in that briefing yesterday, which actually a little, in fact, it went 43 hours. it was unbelievable. >> it made up for a lot of lost ground. >> they had gatorade on the side. go over there -- by the end, julie was just pouring it over the top of her head. that was long. that's called make good. >> a lot of make good, willie. >> a lot of make goods. >> seven dutch journalists got questions. >> you've got to have dutch journalists but he called on hostile outlets like "huffington post" that ends every column saying he's a racist xenophobe racist pig. that was surprising, wasn't it? >> made up for what happened

over the weekend and for the first briefing. >> did it? >> changed the vector direction, didn't make up completely but changed the dynamic. for the first briefing he handled it well. overrated in terms of answering questions. no one answers questions from the podium but the the tone was better than saturday. >> great tone, 79, 80 responses. i think i read that from phil rutger. there's some -- there was 43 different reporters, 79 questions. after that performance on saturday, the relationship with the media was off to a great start he had to sit and take every question. you may not like what he said. "washington post" deeply reported off-not what you expect to see three days into an administration. talked about donald trump didn't think st. john spicer was strong enough. >> didn't like what he was

wearing. >> didn't like what he was wearing. >> day one of the trump administration saw his press secretary lying about crowd size. day two, more measured tone and emphasis on policy. yesterday was day three. willie points to the "washington post" writing president trump often seemed comfortably at home in the white house as he entertained, signed photos, promised to interrupt washington just as he had electoral politics. president trump spent much of his first monday on campaign promises starting with trade agreements signing a memorandum to withdraw united states from trans-pacific partnership. ordered a hiring freeze for most federal agencies as ronald reagan did in his first hours as president and also followed the reagan model by reinstating mexico city policy that blocks foreign aid to organization that perform or discuss abortions. trump spoke by phone to egyptian president al sisi discussing how

they can work together to combat global terror. dow chemical, ford, lockheed martin and u.s. steel sharing his hope to cut regulations by 75%. later he sat down with union leaders who praised him for canceling tpp and his promising to spend on infrastructure. and he finished the day gathering a bipartisan group of congressional leaders where he came away full of high spirits. >> very good. we have a fantastic relationship with everybody at the table. totally just a beautiful, beautiful relationship. >> yeah, they don't. >> so mark, an extraordinarily busy day, if you go from start to finish. there are things people are saying. well, tpp may not be that significant. chinese are seeing it as

significant. richard haass and other leaders seeing it as significant. the democrats love it. the unions love it. the hiring freeze, the same thing. it sends a message. you can say, well, gee, he's not freezing defense. every one of these things he did, there's a line in the paper saying, well, it's not really all that. actually there was a lot that happened yesterday. >> and a lot he said he would do as a candidate. >> he didn't win the majority of the vote but he won the election. yesterday was a big down payment possibly and starting down the path to sub establishes on things he said he's going to do. he says he's for free trade. he's going to have to start forging bilateral relationships. america must be a trading nation. he just doesn't like these big international deals. i thought they handled the messaging very well yesterday because they are framing this as a guy fulfilling his promises, a man of action, meeting with a lot of people.

again, unless you're dead set rooting for him to fail yesterday was a good day on his promises. >> he starts by talking about votes. getting back to the counting thing. that's at the top of a lot of websites, twitter is freaking out about it. we can focus on it. everybody knows it's not true. we can sit here and scream and yell, which i think he wants people to do because that plays into the circus. if you do, that you don't realize there are a lot of significant things and a lot of things conservatives are concerned about especially on the trade front. there are people that believe we'd ceded asia to china. >> we're talking about tpp. think about a republican president on his first big day, first monday in office, sitting down and doing something that draws the ire of a lot of republicans and statement of praise from bernie sanders on the other side of the aisle. it's a position hillary clinton held on tpp during the campaign.

this is the republican president coming in and immediately doing something that pleases democrats and doesn't please his own republicans. on the other question you're talking about in that meeting with congressional leaders, he claimed again that 3 to 5 million illegal immigrants voted in the election, which would have made the difference between him winning the popular vote. that's of course not true. we've said that again and again and again. reports from that meeting from senators -- >> he should stop saying things that aren't true. >> the question is nobody believes it? is he doing it to gin up 30 minutes of debate and discussion so we're talking about this and not other things? >> in this case it doesn't make sense. yesterday was on message and pretty good for him almost every event he did. >> my point is, whether it's an errant tweet about a movie star or something like there, we could report on all of this for four years. at the end of four years people are going to turn around and say

oh, my god, look at everything that's happened. there are real policy implications to what happened yesterday. >> well, mike, give us your take when you cover stories like this. look, i don't think you ignore the obsession with crowd size and going back to the race. also what he said about, quote, illegals. but i think it has to be put in perspective to what was comparatively, compared to the first two days, a much better day. i don't agree with some of them. >> also for any president, a significant policy day. when you have the head of the top manufacturers in one minute and the head of the unions in thanking you the next minute, that's not a traditional republican. >> there's so much that happened just yesterday that it's nearly overwhelming. the problem for the president is that you end up with a headline above the fold in the front page

of the "new york times." few of us have ever seen before, meeting with top lawmakers, trump repeats an election lie. he's the president of the united states. yesterday he voided tpp. he voided tpp the day after the prime minister of japan went out of his way to convince parliament that he was going to try to work something out with the americans. he basically, as you said, ceded trade to china in that area of the world. there's a front page piece in the "washington post" that is just -- we're only three days into the presidency. >> i'm sorry, "new york times," "washington post," are people talking about that this morning after yesterday or talking to themselves? >> they might be talking to themselves. >> no. they are talking to themselves. >> what? >> a lot of stuff got done yesterday. i'm saying we have talked about the fact that he's been lying about the crowd sizes now and lying about the popular vote now for months.

you can put that old story on the top, or you can talk about how trade is fundamentally changed forever, how union groups came in to talk to republican -- i'm just saying -- >> is trade changed forever? >> yes. yes. there has not been a republican or a democrat since -- who was the last protectionist democrat? yes, you ask richard haass whether america's position on tra trade. you ask other foreign policy people. >> not forever changed, it's changed for now. every president in the last two generations, the organizing principle has been trying to pass big comprehensive multi-lateral trade deals. this president won't do that. >> this is a break on trade, and he's promised this break on trade. it goes back to herbert hoover.

it's an enormous break. as mark points out, he's going to have to cut deals now individually with japan. philippines, vietnam. >> i'll bet the next president goes back to the other model. >> i'll bet, too. i'm just saying this is a break. change forever, no, but a break from what, 50 years, 60 years, 70 years? >> yeah, the paradigm. >> my point is things are happening here. >> yeah, things are happening, and they are being reported, right? these are all big stories. you have to report it all. you have to report, you know, what's going on in terms of the dynamics inside the new white house. there's a story "the washington post" does, and it's a pretty amazing story about the fit the president pitched over the weekend over how the inauguration was being reported. that's a story. also, everything that happened yesterday is a story. the tpp story, yes, it is a big

story because in the short-term, at least, it's going to give, i think, china the opportunity to become the dominant sort of factor in how trade is arranged in asia and the fastest growing region in the world. now, remember that everybody -- by the time we got to the election, everybody was against tpp or said they were against tpp. so theoretically hillary clinton would have been doing the same thing. we'll never know if she would have or not. yeah, that is a big deal. you know, this is going to be a fascinating challenge, i think, for all of us in the media, because you simply cannot ignore the temperament of the new president, the shape of the administration. >> nobody is ignoring the temperament. my suggestion is, at least

around this table, that we -- while we focus on the temperament, we also look at all the policy that's going instead of -- >> absolutely. >> i guarantee you there will be people throughout the day on cable news that will lead with the illegals story and talk about it for 30 minutes. they can talk about it for 30 minutes if they want to or talk about things that will actually change. as "new york times" said, bring about an end of an era on trade. >> we can't control what others do. no, i certainly wouldn't recommend doing that, because there's a lot of stuff going on. you've got to look at these policies, though. what impact does a federal hiring freeze always have, for example. one of the things it does, you know, it means you have perhaps fewer employees in the long run but more contractors. >> right. >> you know, that policy is

generally not all it's cracked up to be but it's a big symbolic thing, especially for voters who, you know, size of government. well, size of government keeps expanding. >> in fairness "new york times" and "washington post" both have trade as above the fold start. so i think the point is that the country wants donald trump not to focus on the size of his crowd and whether or not the election was legitimate, which he's obsessed with and to focus on these things and yesterday he started to do that. >> our job in the media is to focus on policy. that's the tale of the tape. every day, policy. but the side stories, why doesn't he realize he's president. >> yesterday was meet the president for trump and "meet the press" for his press secretary. sean spicer sought to reset relations with the media after his controversial statement on crowd size.

in his first press briefing he took questions by 40 reporters by one count from diverse media outlets, lasting an hour. and he made a lot of news. >> you're allowing any country no matter the size, any one of those 12, including us, to basically have the same stature as the united states in the agreement. when lou at big multinational agreements, multi-lateral, they are not always in the best interest of the united states. what the president has been clear about in foreign policy, to obvious the united states is going in with a lot of money, a lot of manpower and in many cases losing loss of life. we want to make sure our interests are protected. areas like dakota, keystone pipeline, areas that we can increase jobs, increase economic growth and tap into america's energy supply more, that's something he has been very clear about. >> i think the president has been very clear he's going to work with any country that shares our interest in defeating isis, not just on the national

security front but on the economic front. there's been one call, i talked to general flynn about this again last night, one call talks about four subjects. areas in the south china sea that are part of international waters and international activities, the u.s. is going to make sure we protect our interest there. >> will the united states embassy be in jerusalem. >> we're at early stages in this decision-making process. >> there we are in jerusalem again, at the early stages of this decision-making process. i suspect they will be at the early stage for quite sometime on that one because you can't have middle east peace if that's how you start. so julie pace, take us inside that room, that marathon session. i would love for you to describe the feeling as he was walking in there and the hostility that you all encountered on saturday night, comparing that to what happened yesterday. it seemed a little surreal. >> it was a pretty dramatic difference between saturday

night's briefing or press statement, it wasn't a briefing, because we weren't able to ask questions, and then the briefing yesterday. yesterday actually felt very traditional. yes, he mixed up the questions a little bit more than other press secretaries have, but in general it felt not a lot different than press secretaries felt under josh ernest or jay carney or robert gibbs. i think sean came out there trying to make amends. what he did on saturday, though, doesn't go away. it's not as though having one briefing where he was a bit more friendly and smiled and took questions is going to wash away what happened on saturday. >> i wanted to ask you about that. so we had the horrific encounter, the frightening encounter, i think, for journalists on saturday. then you had the marathon session yesterday. what is his standing with the press right now? what was the attitude after? was it watch and wait? what is it? >> it's a little bit of watch

and wait. i think we understand that he has probably the most difficult job in washington right now. the press secretary job is always hard. it's particularly hard when you're press secretary to donald trump, someone who has very strong opinions about what he wants to see at that podium. we're going to give sean the benefit of the doubt on the policy, on filling out some of these did he taste because the administration is new. at the same time, some of the things that happened on saturday, coming out and sort of ranting at us and not giving us an opportunity to ask questions, that's not going to sit well with the press for a long time. there were factual inaccuracies in what he said on saturday. he tried to clean some of those up yesterday, not all of them. more broadly, the idea that was white house is going to lecture the press on what we should be covering, which was another piece of what he said on saturday. we expect the white house will disagree with what we said or what we cover sometimes but

we're going to continue to cover what we feel is the news. that's not something that's going to go away. the white house can, again, disagree with it but we're not going to take kindly on being lectured on what the story should be. >> speaking of more news we haven't talked about pompeo voted in as cia. >> gets very high marks. >> he really does. it looks like marco is backing down on tillerson. so he's going to have tillerson, who was, you know, pushed by robert gates and condi and jim baker. and pompeo, who even donald trump's toughest critics say is going to be great at the agency. then you've got general mattis who is considered an all-star by everybody. >> general kelly. >> general kelly is in there, too. it's a strong, strong team. >> you mentioned robert gates. still ahead on "morning joe," robert gates joins us here on set. we'll get the former defense

secretary's take on the new trump administration and the man he strongly backed for secretary of state rex tillerson. but first rough weather throughout the country, let's bring in bill karins with a check on that. >> how about those winds up the east coast, continue this morning in new england. here is some pictures out of jersey city. this scaffolding rig was not tied down properly. if you're in that building, those windows ar dangerous place to be. unfortunately one fatality from a sign that fell yesterday because of high winds. waves at the shore impressive, a lot of erosion on the jersey shore and continued overnight in long island and areas of cape cod. as far as the storm goes right now, a break from the heavy rain, new york, philadelphia done with heavy rain, up towards boston, very icy, a lot of sleet mixed in with snow last night. a lot of scraping in central new york. here are current wind gust, 46 in boston is the highest. winds beginning to calm down in other areas. additional snowfall about two to four inches especially in areas

of northern new england. that will be about it. we also have friends in the middle of the country who will be dealing with snowstorm in areas of iowa and nebraska. here is that snowfall forecast. a good four to eight inches sioux city to sioux falls. airports a problem in the northeast today as winds continue to stay high with on and off light rain. tomorrow will be a much better day. you just have to get there first. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. when standard cancer treatment no longer works

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plus 40,000 on demand tv shows and movies, all on the go. you can even download from your x1 dvr and watch it offline. only xfinity gives you more to stream to any screen. download the xfinity tv app today. >> perhaps somebody did. >> last night -- you are just terrible. last night mike pompeo was sworn in as director of the central intelligence agency. vice president mike pence administered the oath to the third cabinet nominee to be confirmed. a few hours earlier pompeo won a 66-32 vote in the senate with 15 democrats voting in favor of the nomination and one republican,

kentucky's rand paul voting in protest for more oversight. south carolina's governor nikki haley's nomination as ambassador to united nations is expected to receive a committee vote today and could possibly be confirmed by the full senate within a few hours. the senate energy and natural resources committee postponed a meeting scheduled for today in which it planned to vote on two cabinet nominees, rick perry energy and ryan zinke interior. second round of questioning for education nominee betsy devos after being limited last week. >> probably not going to happen. >> health, education and welfare. i agree with you, i think that -- >> this is a rough one. >> devos. >> more surprising. health committee chairman said,

no, claiming devos has spent more time answering questions than either of president obama's education nominees. i think there's a reason for that. her answers don't feel like she knows enough. right? >> yeah. >> also yesterday the senate foreign relations committee narrowly approved rex tillerson's nomination for secretary of state last night. the vote was along party lines after early kept civil and sharp questioning of tillerson during his confirmation hearing, marco rubio ultimately voted in support. yesterday rubio said president trump deserved deference and it would be against national interest to have tillerson's confirmation unnecessarily delayed or embroiled in controversy. "the washington post" reports that ahead of the vote rubio received an onslaught of calls and texts, particularly from past owners in support of tillerson, but he denied undue pressure from the white house on his decision. >> you asked about the administration, i've got to say,

guys, they have been incredibly professional in my interaction with them, responsive, respectful. they did what i would do, if i were president and wanted to get my nominee through. you try to provide information and nudge people in the right direction. it was all very respectful. i have to be fair about that. >> he got rolled. i respect his vote, but this goes to what everybody thinks, these hearings are just theater. you can have big moments and strong questioning and all that but at the end of the day republicans are going to vote for republican nominees. >> he really didn't want to. >> it was cokie roberts on our show. she was like, please, it's all theater. as cringe worthy as one is -- >> the presence of your own party want to give deference to the president. >> marco didn't want to do that but his donors did, give deference. >> long-term politically a safer place to end up.

he has questions about tillerson but so does mccain. mccain is voting for him. >> why is that? mccain and lindsey moving towards -- they are supporting him now. >> they are voting yes for three reasons. one, lots of people support him they respect. jim barracker, two, deference to the president of their own party. three, lo he didn't show it to everybody at the hearing, he's an impressive guy. i think he was able to convince them in the room privately that he's not going to be as warm to russia. >> let's go to senior writer polit co-and co-author of "the playbook" jake sherman. you've got a lot of different things you're covering in the playbook including valerie jarrett's next act. >> she signed with caa, the big hollywood talent agency, which is making a big push into washington and trying to gobble

up as many foreign administration officials and capitol hill folks they can including barbara boxer and valerie jarrett. watch out for valerie's next moves around the country as she signs up with this big talent agency. one more point on devos, if i could. she goes down if she withdraws. she's going to need pressure to withdraw. what you said is right. these senators want to give deference to the president, taking down a nominee would be a big thing. especially if you can republicans they aren't all too concerned with the education department, not something they see as a key post in the first days of this administration. >> well, in terms of more questions for betsy devos, does anyone think there's something beyond really needing to hear more from her in that? i didn't see the entire hearing but for those who cover it completely, and jake, you can speak to this, weren't people unlike rex tillerson left

hanging a bit. >> for sure they were. she was not as prepared as she could have been. i think republicans kind of took umbrage at that. lamar alexander is trying to drag her across the finish line here, shutting down the hearing against many people wanting to hear more from her is a move to show she doesn't really have the -- they don't want her to answer more questions. they really want to drag her across. so i don't know that there's more there but he's doing his best to seal this thing up. >> so jake, give us a quick run-through. you heard us talking about a lot of the president's selections for cabinet. give usa quick rundown of what you're looking at, which ones you think are fait accompli and where this still may ab fight or two left. >> i don't think there's a fight or two left anywhere. tom price, though, as we discussed last week, a bunch of unforced errors with his stock trades. you're right, i think it takes some of the pressure off. one of the big things we're watching out for in the next

couple of days, and this is what everyone on the hill is talking about, what trump means on a border tax. he keeps saying he wants a border tax. i don't know that anyone on capitol hill knows exactly what he's talking about. if he wants tariffs he's going to run into a lot of resistance. at the highest levels of republican leadership in both chambers there's a lot of confusion about what he wants. we've been told he doesn't like how border adjustment sounds. he doesn't understand why it's been given such a bad brand. i think it's spooking a lot of folks on capitol hill who can't get a straight answer out of the white house as to what the president wants to do when it comes to tax reform. >> julie pace, it's been sort of a rocky three and a half days of the trump administration. do they feel like that press conference yesterday righted the ship a little bit yesterday internally? >> there were a lot of aides who ended yesterday pretty pleased. they felt like that was the rollout they wanted to have, not the fight over the weekend over crowd size. you saw trump doing what trump does best really, bringing people to the table. he was april really good mood.

multiple times throughout the day he told aides to call the press corps quickly to koip and see him with union leaders standing behind him in the oval office including some who endorsed hillary clinton. he called the press back in to see him, meeting with the lawmakers around the table. this was the president they wanted to portray, a person who is coming in for his first day actually trying to get things do done. jake is right, though, when these lawmakers come out of the meetings, they are left with a lot of questions about what he wants to do. he talks in broad strokes. one of the big questions about his presidency is whether he is actually a president that does get into the weeds or okay with lawmakers negotiating details and him giving yea or nay. that's a big point we have to look at as lawmakers dig into these issues. >> thank you very much, polit co-'s jake sherman, thank you as well. >> thanks, guys.

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on saturday between 3 and 5 million people, mostly women, gathered to support him -- was that what they were doing? not only was this the biggest

protest, it had hands down the funniest signs of any protest ever. here are some of my favorites. these are real signs. we shall overcome. mal male melania, blink twice if you want taos save you. trump skis in jeans. this sign isn't very good but neither is our president. i hope -- other children focused on issues personal to them. i love legos and i heart trains. >> this is the cutest. i like that little kid's sign that's just scratches. hi, donnie. >> just kind of eye candy. >> god, i'm going to read gene's must read because you're here. eugene robinson, "washington post." trump inspired a movement, all right. it matters that the crowd for

the women's march on washington was far bigger than that for president trump's inauguration. remember that the tea party movement looked at first like nothing more than a rowdy, incoherent bunch of sore losers until it swept democrats out of power in the house in the 2010 midterm elections. i covered some of those early tea party rallies, and i saw similar levels of energy and engagement. and yes, anger, at the women's march. the millions who participated nationwide now constitute the kind of broad-based network that can be harnessed into effective political action. the trump administration can hautely semis the dissenters by saying, as the obama administration once did, the elections have consequences, but the next election is right around the corner. eugene robinson, that was a data grab, as was pointed out on our show yesterday. people were asked to text in their support, their phone numbers, their e-mails, all being gathered and possibly

coordinated into the next act. >> yeah. there really was something for everybody in these first few days of the trump administration. for those who opposed trump's candidacy and who worry about a trump presidency, there were these amazingly huge demonstrations. it did remind me of the sort of beginnings of the tea party, which were not as organized but had the similar sort of energy. now, the proof is in whether it lasts and consolidates into something that is effective. where you should look, i think, and everyone should look, is what happens at kind of the grassroots level. democrats and progressives have lost 1,000, i think, state legislative seats over the last eight years.

so have viability as a party, democrats are going to have to win back some state legislatures, win back some governor's mansions and do better in midterm elections, so we'll see. >> what i think i find vexing, joe, i know the incoming administration knew about this women's march. it was in the planning. i had discussed this with some members of the administration, ivanka. i don't -- how is it -- it's such an easy place to go to address the issues that impact women, who drive this economy, who run this country, who are breaking the glass ceiling. it also could involve some grace to hillary clinton who won so many votes. i just don't understand why this can't be dealt with on many levels, including a grace level. >> i think it can. the fact is, almost nobody expected them to win, including

people around donald trump. i think if you ask donald trump he would tell you he was pretty surprised that he won. so they had their own inauguration to get ready for. i don't think they were obsessing about a march that was coming up. they need to do whatever they can to bring over some people, bring over some supporters. but i will say, donnie, looking at the march on saturday -- >> while they were obsessing about their crowd size, the biggest crowd ever was gathering around the world. >> here we go. >> no, it's just my eyes. my eyes saw this. >> i don't want to defend anybody. you know what i saw when i saw the event on friday, the inaugural events on friday. >> you saw highlights. >> you saw the inaugural events, i thought you were talking about the marches. go ahead. >> can i finish? >> go ahead. >> i saw on friday a president

speaking to his people and his people only. i saw people in the march on saturday speaking to their side. that's why i thought the most poignant line out of the buffalo springfield song we played yesterday with us people carrying signs mostly saying hooray for our side. the question is, do you convert the other side. the tea partiers, they didn't ask are you pro-life or pro-choice? they are like you want a smaller government? you want to fight this health care? come on. they had all these people who weren't naturally together coming together. that's why they are called reagan democrats. what i saw on friday was president trump speaking to president trump's most ardent supporters. not showing any signs -- saturday was a massive international march but mainly for progress i was on tives on . you can say for women. if they were women they would not have banned pro-life groups marching.

you shrug. everyone shrugs. i'm going to say what i said to everyone else. politics is a game of addition. it's not about making your self feel good. you want to reach out to people, convert them to your side. you want to get them if you're in the march on saturday, you want toting them voting against republicans two years from now. if you're in the march -- if you're in the inauguration on friday, if you're donald trump, you want to bring them over to your side. i saw none of that on either of those sides. >> gene, let me answer. the difference is, one is the leader and the other is the people. to me the obligation is on the leader. >> i agree with that. >> i thought you were saying -- >> i'm only talking about the political impact of these. just like gene is asking. the march is great. will the march elect democrats

on the state, on the local, and on the national level. donald trump, will he move up beyond 42%. that's what i'm saying. no. the responsibility on donald trump is to be bigger and more gracious and reach out to everybody. that's what i believe. the question is, donald trump could have given a speech that could have been more gracious to hillary clinton and everybody else and he would have gone up 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 percentage ratings. he debate, idn't, so he won't. if democrats want to beat republicans, they are going to have to do a better job converting independents and republicans to their side. >> i guess what you're saying no particular theme to the march -- >> i wouldn't say that. the theme was about women's empowerment but it was a party that was closed off to people who were pro-choice -- people

who were pro-life were told, don't come. again, i'm sure there are people out there shrugging, i don't care. i'm agnostic as to this. my job is to be a political analyst. my job is to tell you what's going to convert people to get to the voting booths so democrats can start winning again. i think you tell everybody, come on in. just like trump. come on in. everybody come in. >> we have to stop. what's interesting with donald trump at 0 years old and a way of doing business that has served him very well. his modus operandi isn't going to change when you oppose him he's going to say come under the tent. that's not who he is. we have to start covering him as a human, not a president. you know him very well. that's not who he is and that's not who he's going to be. >> he had unions in yesterday. >> for a photo-op. that's what he cared about. get the press in. it's not in here. >> they were agreeing with him

on tpp. >> two of his biggest things were trade deals and infrastructure. >> not talking republican, democrat, i'm talking about -- >> let me toss to gene to say there was a large crowd. since this president cares about crowd size, i know you like to take it to, they didn't allow a certain sector of people in, there's a certain sector of people who don't feel allowed into this presidency. he spoke to those people. >> you're making my point. you are making my point. >> he should have addressed these marshes. >> you know, the fact is, though, that at least in my observation, which i think is valid, there were a lot of people out there on saturday who are not traditional democratic party activists, who have not been active in the party, have not really been political. so i think the march did -- did it do everything it could possibly have done to make the

biggest possible tent, probably not. but i don't think it's true that it was a closed, restricted, you know sort of doctrinaire progressives only kind of march. i think it did invite a lot of people into this activism, some of whom describe themselves to me and to others as, gee, i'm a republican but here i am. >> not to be a pain, but i kept my -- >> here we go. >> here is the deal. i bit my tongue toward the end of the campaign when i saw people up on stage doing things. i was like, oh, that's not going to sell in middle america. oh, why is hillary doing that. i had to bite my tongue because it wouldn't have been politically correct. so i bit my tongue. so i don't repeat the same mistake now, because everybody is having this massive celebration over this women's march. i tuned in for my daughter. see, you can't even talk about

it, telling me i would be careful because you don't want me to tell the people the truth. let's just go to break. >> what's the truth? >> not about madonna. >> you guys feel good about your self, you had a great march and now republicans are going to win for ten years. please, be comfortable. >> a march, republicans win. >> no. no. name me one person. >> carefully. >> name me one person that got up on stage that spoke. somebody that voted for donald trump, who voted for barack obama eight years ago and four years ago or that's been voting for republicans for the past four to six years because they believe democrats are culturally disexpected for them. name me it would or three speakers that are going to change opinions in des moines. >> i don't think the march was to change opinions. my takeaway from the march was there was a huge part of the

country that feels very disenfranchised, feels very frightened. basically saying we're putting you on notice, we're watching hard and we're not going to sit by idly. >> all i'm talking about, again, i know people at home have already stopped listening, a lot of people have, but for those that have ears to hear. >> i'm listening. >> the only thing i'm talking about is how do you convert this energy, this discussion, to victory for democrats. i'm trying to do your job for you. do i sound like regis? i'm trying to do your job for you. who is out there that makes somebody say i voted for trump but maybe -- >> the first step was democrats and liberals and progressives did something on saturday that restored their confidence that they can organize and fight back. they have done nothing since the election to stand up against donald trump in any meaningful way. that was the first step. a leader is going to have to

emerge for them. >> if you don't convert it to victory, it doesn't matter brf your political mind looking at it that way, i get your point of view, there is a point of what you're saying. you're saying the question i started up with, because you're caught up in that. i get it. let me explain to you my question was what could donald trump and his incoming administration, in which i know there are many plans in the works that address policies that are good for women, in the works. why couldn't he address those people at his inaugural speech or even in response to the massive crowds. since the guy is obsessed with crowds, he did not miss what happened saturday. he was watching it and probably wringing his hands because the crowd was so big and so angry at him. why couldn't he deal with it? why couldn't he focus on people who have felt left out every step of the way from his campaign, on women who feel like

they have been completely set back 20 years because of this administration. he could have fixed a lot with his words, with his actions and with the plans that he has inside this administration that i know about, okay, so it's there. they can't even address it. that's arrogant. that's mean. that makes me want to go march even more. >> you go, girl. so -- >> you have to stop looking at it politically in des moines and all that. that's bs. >> you have to let me do my job. >> go ahead. >> let me tell you what my job is. >> do your job. >> my job is to tell people what's going to happen in the future. >> that's fine. i disagree. >> this conversation started with you asking why donald trump couldn't do that. that's how you ended it. >> what could he have done? >> all i said was that's not what friday and saturday was about. friday and saturday, let those who have ears to hear hear, what friday and saturday was about were both sides talking to

themselves. that will offend the trump people and that will offend a lot of the marchers. but you win and you change the dynamics of politics, which democrats desperately need to do by actually reaching out and going to the other side. i saw no evidence that happened. i will ask one more time before we go to break, name the speaker, name the person, name anybody that would be seen as somebody that could reach out to middle america or moderate america or conservative america. >> joe, you're missing the purpose. joe, it's day one. it wasn't a policy -- i don't have to scream. >> i said that donald trump's address was not an inaugural address, it was a primal scream. if you're just telling me that the purpose of this was just to tell donald trump how angry they were, that is a primal scream

back. that is not productive on either side. you disagree. >> it was to get off the mat. to me the most telling and moving remarks were from women who said this made me feel like i'm not alone. what i'm feeling is shared by other people and people around the country. >> elizabeth warren, scarlett johansson. >> we're not going to sit back and watch this administration play out, we're going to organize. i agree it's a necessary first step. >> i believe it was a huge missed opportunity to come out explicitly and say if you're pro-life you're not welcome here. >> a missed opportunity where i started for the trump administration to quell these concerns that are clear in terms of the size of the crowd. gene, thank you very much. we'll be reading your column in today's "washington post." >> you bet we will.

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even "new york times" photograph showing that a misrepresentation the crowd on the original tweet. >> for a number of reasons, all of you in the stadium understand how big this win was. but we have to go to houston and win one. >> jonathan, congratulations. coach belichick, i'm going to hand this to you. >> willie. >> wow. >> i didn't realize. >> lost his train of thought

there. >> i loved bob kraft, wasn't his best oratory moment. >> sean spicer, too. it must have gotten worse on saturday. >> it was blocked by the podium. >> i don't understand that. >> welcome back to "morning joe." it's tuesday january 24th. how are we all doing? >> i'm totally fine. >> good. >> pass the peace pipe around. >> how are you doing? >> i'm totally good, totally confidence in what i said and i hope people take that energy and organize it. >> they should. willie geist, donny deutsch and mike barnicle. day one of the administration, that was rough. shaes sean spicer in his hodge video not meaning what he was saying and sweat pouring down his face was half the sign and flickering eyes was painful. >> a more measured tone and emphasis on policy. yesterday was day three.

"washington post" -- >> things got better. >> president trump often seemed comfortably at home in the white house as he entertained, signed orders, posed for photos and promised to disrupt washington just as he disrupted electoral politics. >> president trump spent much of his first monday on campaign promises starting with trade agreements, signing a memorandum to withdraw the united states from the trans-pacific partnership, ordered a hiring freeze for most federal agencies as ronald reagan did in his first hours as president and also followed the reagan model by reinstating the mexico city policy that blocks foreign aid to organizations that perform or discuss abortions. trump spoke by phone with egyptian president abdel fattah al sisi discussing how they can work together to combat global terror. the president held a listening session with leaders of american manufacturing from companies such as dow chemical, ford, lockheed martin and u.s. steel sharing his hope to cut

regulations by 75%. >> later he sat down with union leaders who praised him for canceling tpp and his promising to spend on infrastructure. let's stop right there for a second. talk, willie, about the reordering of the political process. you actually had union leaders, bernie sanders, nancy pelosi, chuck schumer, democrats all on donald trump's side on tpp. i can tell you that is actually significant and you would have to go back to the teamsters actually endorsing ronald reagan in 1980 to find that. >> certainly got against republican party orthodoxy to come out against free trade. this is not a surprise to anybody. this is central campaign promises, something he lined up with hillary clinton on during the campaign. a big statement put out yesterday from bernie sanders celebrating, endorsing the decision to pull ow of the negotiation for tpp. so you have a republican

president who, as we've said many times during the campaign, became a republican about two years ago. so some of the things he believes, this is just the first example on day three, will go against everything republicans who are working with him right now in congress believe about the way the country should be run. >> we all -- everybody got a lot of things wrong throughout the year about what was doing to happen. there was no way you could predict what was doing to happen. one thing most of us said from the very beginning was if you had trump as republican nominee, it was going to shake up the electoral map. if ted cruz won i could tell you which 54 electoral votes he was going to win. donald trump, we said it, the obama people said it, everybody said it, it shakes up the electoral map. that meeting yesterday, for everybody that thinks donald trump is bumbling into this, wisconsin, a state republicans hadn't won since 1984, that was about michigan, the state republicans hadn't won -- did

bush win it in '88? that was '84 as well, maybe he won it in '88. that was about ohio, a state obama won twice and pennsylvania, another state republicans hadn't won since 1988. that meeting, while we're all chasing the bright shiny objects out there, that meeting was significant because it plays to the four states trump had to win. >> i'm pretty sure dukakis won michigan. bipartisan establishment totally united. multi-lateral trade deals are good for american economy. trump argued for decades they are not. he's not a protectionist. he wants trade. he knows we need to import goods to china, export goods to china. he wants bilateral deals with better terms for u.s. that has bipartisan support, too, just not in d.c. >> a lot of people, donnie, pulling their hair out.

i've been saying for 30 years i'm for free trade but i want fair trade as well. i think the mistake we've made as a country is we've had economists who told us we have to bow at the altar of unfettered free trade without asking questions. people might say i'm sucking up to donald trump, you're extraordinarily stupid. let me finish. can i finish? can we get ross perot. can i finish? >> measure. >> you are telling me this morning to be measured. >> absolutely. >> can we get tape from the end of the last hour, alex? >> what was the question? >> so what i said when i first got in congress in 1930 was, 30 years ago in 1994 was you want to have fair trade, and you have to be skeptical about every trade deal you go into with the goal of having free trade at the end of the day. we have not asked the tough

questions of these trade deals. we have said, let's have a trade deal in asia. let's have a trade deal with columbia. donald trump is doing what at least i believe and what the workers believe our leaders have needed to do for 40 years. >> guess what, the protest, millions of people, there are no signs about tpp. the interesting thing is most of donald trump's policies made a lot of sense. that's probably the reason he got elected. the issue people had with him is the other thing that you guys were debating earlier in the show, why was the news reporting it, that at the same time he was putting forth, cutting fat, the federal jobs, the tpp that nobody could argue with, at the same time the president of the united states was out and out lying about the immigrants changing the election. that's what people -- it's the temperament issue. the thing keep going back on, why are we covering this? why are we covering this?

you're right, nobody was enraged about trump's policies. they made a lot of sensa lot of them do. the thing people enraged about. wait a second, we can't have a president that just factually stands up and lies. >> which is why, willie, he has 22% approval rating when it comes to temperament. it is weighing him down. if he stays busy like he did yesterday and doesn't commit unforced errors like he did last night, those numbers will turb around. but that was an unforced error last night. >> temperament matters because it plays into how he handles those things. if he had not focused on the crowd size. read "the washington post" account, sitting there watching marches, listening to pundits talk about how big the crowds were, bigger than those at his inauguration, that's what sent him off and sent the administration into 24-hour tailspin that distracted. >> that's worth nothing. >> talk about reagan's temperament, temperament matters

to the extent it affects the agenda and the policies and message the white house wants to put out. >> mark halperin, those unforced errors, those things surrounding the policies that we're also talking about, i do think the democrats start to gain ground in the next two years, they just do, by default. there will be nowhere else to go. >> first of all, dukakis lost michigan. >> i was worried about that. >> i talk all the thing about good trump and bad trump. good trump can change the electoral map. >> yes. >> to an extraordinary degree. >> remarkable. >> republicans are not going to depart from him. he's proven that. i don't think he's going to lose a single republican if he's a success as a president, even if he pursues these more centrist policies. he has the capacity if he's good trump on infrastructure and even on tax reform, he has the capacity, as joe suggested, put democrats in a really tough position. the democrat party is weak now.

trump is great at taking advantage of weakness. that is probably one of his greatest strength. when there's weakness on the other side, trump takes advantage and democrats are weak now. >> mike barnicle, what's the democratic response to take back wisconsin, to take back michigan? i'm saying that sort of symbolically how do they start winning back the 1,000 state legislative seats they have loss over the past eight years against this type of president? >> that's a very good question, joe, it's going to start from right there, the ground up, state legislators. yesterday was pretty important especially for two people. rex tillerson who is going to have to go to japan and explain about tpp because it was a landmark day and the person who wasn't there yesterday. richie trunka, head of alf cia, democratic through and through all his life praised what trump did yesterday. the states you mentioned, wisconsin, michigan, ohio,

pennsylvan pennsylvania. it's only day one but you have richard trumka head of the alf c -- afl-cio, that's a problem. >> i don't know politics of casinos, but didn't he have to deal with a lot of union people to get into jersey? >> every day. you could actually see in in just the few clips we showed, with no verbal interchanges between union guys and trump, there's a level of comfort trump has with people like that. you could see it visually. >> interestingly enough as a human being, he sounds and moves and talks more like a union guy than the ceos he met with earlier in the day. totally personality-wise he's going to connect with them. >> we said it all along, willie, if i had to take the people in

washington that he connected with the least, it would be republican leaders. he's never hung out with guys like mitch mcconnell and paul ryan. he's hung out with guys like chuck schumer and women like nancy pelosi and guys like richard trumka. that's who he is most comfortable with socially. and if good trump shows up every day at work, that causes a world of problems for democrats and republicans. >> yeah. i don't think people should look at his temperament as a political issue. i think you should look at it as something for the country. the country should not be mired in conversations about crowd size and his latest lie about illegal immigrants voting. the country doesn't want to talk about those things. the country wants to talk about moving forward, tpp, how do we bring jobs into the country. the more he stays away from that stuff, the better for the country. the question is, can he do it? can he let slights pass.

>> so he's like -- he loves golfing. this would be like a guy trying to shoot onto an island green and he's got a foursome in the tournament and he keeps dumping it in the pond. he keeps shooting it in the pond. instead of picking up and moving onto the next hole -- it's getting dark. no, i'm serious. he's still shooting it in the pond. everybody is like in the bar afterwards talking about their round and he's still chipping it into the pond. i'm not even trying to be funny here. he is still chipping the ball in the pond when he talks pout crowd sizes. nobody gives a damn anymore. they are trying to figure out how to either beat him or how to support him, and he's still, at nighttime, chipping it in the pond. somebody needs to go up to him and go, hey, boss, tin cup, the

tournament is over. go inside. >> the thing that's critical -- >> he needs to stop doing it. >> why he does it -- >> nobody -- >> i want to clear this up. >> so misrepresented today. i'm going to be so misrepresented. i have never said -- i did not say off the top we should not cover temperament things, it's all i've been doing for the past five days. all i'm saying is let's be careful that we don't spend all of our time on that, because really big news is happening all around. >> what's critical about covering it is not that he's doing it, the motivation behind are we going to have a president who is going to be so driven by his own narcissism that it's going to start to affect and destroy certain policy. that's what's critical, is he making decisions based on his own self worth or making decisions on the worth of the --

that's the tale. >> i've got the answer. if he has five more days like saturday, his approval ratings will be in the 20s and nobody on the hill will follow a damn thing he says. this is very simple. i said this to members of the obama administration when they weren't reaching out to democrats in the senate early on and the democrats were getting angry, washington always wins. you play by washington's rules or us chewed up and spit out. the same thing will apply to trump. >> that applies to trump as well. >> if he keeps chipping the ball into the milling of the pond when the rest of the world has moved on, his approval rating in the 20s, nobody will follow him on capitol hill and his will be over. >> every error he made is an unforced error. >> every one. >> as a new father i say, every president tells lies, you just can't have a president who lies

about things and see front page stories everywhere, president lies. >> let me correct you. now is a great time to say this. i say this to valerie jarrett. i'm hearing everybody say, hey, every president -- you know what, i know my conservative friends will kill me, i never once had anybody in the obama administration tell me anything that wasn't the truth. >> if you like your doctor you can keep him. >> okay. there you go. >> sometimes -- >> one in eight years. >> sometimes you make political problems. >> a big one. >> one in eight years. we've had ten in eight days. don't even. >> let's divide that. sometimes you make a political promise you cannot fulfill -- >> he knew at the time it wasn't true. >> do you know he knew at the time it wasn't true. >> one in eight years. think of another. >> since you're going to fight me on that front. i never had anybody in the object administration or the president ever lie to me and that sets him apart from every

other politician i have ever covered in my life, ever, despite the fact extraordinarily harsh on foreign policy. if your child -- if you want your child to have somebody, a politician whose character they can exemplify, i'm not talking politics, barack obama is a damn good place to start. >> i agree. i agree most of the time his administration was. you can look at what wen rhodes did on the iran deal and there are other examples. i agree overall the last administration was laudable in their failure to tell lies. this president did like he did yesterday, the popular vote, continues to tell lies that bring him no benefit. >> chipping the ball into the pond. >> if you listen to sean spicer yesterday he talked about the coverage of the early trump administration as being demoralizing reflecting this was about donald trump's feelings, that he doesn't feel good and he's made and saying the things he's saying.

we can't worry about your feelings, you're president of the united states. >> how his feelings affect decision making. >> i'm going to take another risk here. >> my lord. there have been many today. >> i think it's kind of like why people watch the show. sometimes we say things and our mics blow up rhetorically. but if you read the rest of those stories after he finished venting about the, quote, illegals and telling a lie, what do they say? he had really good exchanges with nancy pelosi and chuck schumer. >> i know. >> nancy pelosi and chuck schumer have known donald trump for a long time. we should be shocked. we should -- >> that's the story. >> we should be shocked. that should be the story, the fact he's liked. i'm telling you the practical effect of yesterday's meeting is schumer and pelosi rolled their eyes yet they are building a

better relationship with donald trump. that's the net net of that meeting. we should be shocked and stunned and deeply saddened by the lies. but the net net -- >> so far. >> it undermines it in the press, doesn't undermine with nancy pelosi and chuck schumer. they know who donald trump is. >> plus one. >> that's the net net. if we really want to know the impact of that meeting. >> willie. >> some developing news out of great britain, landmark ruling from britain supreme court, the uk government must get parliament's approval to trigger article 50 to leave the eu. nbc news foreign correspondent lucy kafanov joins us from london. lucy, what does this mean for brexit going forward? >> willie, good morning. a setback for the government, one they were prepared for. quite frankly it's not going to change much when it comes to brexit. to be clear this ruling is not about whether brexit will happen. it will. but rather the legal process how britain will lead european union. simply a question who has the

power here. can theresa may begin on her own or need to get approval from parliament. ruled 8-3 parliament does have to weigh in. lawmakers will vote whether or not article 50 of the lisbon treat y, this kicks off two-year process of negotiating uk's european divorce. now, theresa may wants to do this by march. this morning she said they were sticking to that timetable. it is expected to pass. 52% of the people voted to leave eu in june. the fact public mandate makes it difficult for lawmakers to go against the tide. most of may's conservative party supports leading and opposition labor party said they won't block article 50. might slow a bit but brexit under way. guys, stay tuned on friday when theresa may meets donald trump at the white house. >> lucy, you believe, lucy -- you believe it will pass parliament? >> no one is opposing triggering article 50, including the opposition. what they might try to do is

soften things a little bit. add amendments. for one of the major parties to effectively step out against this, that would be a huge no-no just because of that public mandate, because of that public vote we have in june. >> nbc's lucy kafanov from london. thanks, lucy. still ahead on "morning joe," secretary of defense robert gates joins us here on set. also ahead -- >> how is the meeting going, mr. president. >> very good. we have a fantastic relationship with everybody at the table. it's totally just a beautiful, beautiful relationship. >> donald trump touts -- >> donnie, you're laughing. >> that's him. >> beautiful. >> it's a beautiful relationship. >> the whole relationship. >> beautiful. >> beautiful relationship with congress as his nominees speed through committees. we'll get a live report from hallie jackson at the white house. >> still laughing.

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president trump is tweeting this morning writing will be meeting at 9:00 with automobile executives concerning jobs in america. i want new plants built here for a car sold here. nbc news white house correspondent hallie jackson joins us now. hallie, what's going on today? >> hey, mika, another busy day on day two. starting off with that auto industry meeting you're talking about the president was tweeting about proprietary and early. we know the president has kind of an affinity for automakers, an interest in their activity. part of it stemming from sort of his rust belt victories in places like michigan. those folks are coming in at 9:00 this morning. i would expect the potential to

renegotiate nafta, something he said he would do at the appropriate time is something that will come up given the study oorve industries saying renegotiation of nafta could lose 30,000 jobs. after that sign an executive order, meet with chief of staff, do things you might expect, trappings of the presidency. later this afternoon a one-on-one with top senate republican mitch mcconnell. expect, of course, the supreme court to come up in that conversation. all of it as sean spicer gets ready for day two, second briefing behind me. his first briefing covered quite a bit of news including cabinet nominations. over on the hill today we expect elaine chao, transportation secretary to be up for full senate confirmation vote after cia chief mike pompeo sworn in over at the executive office. >> i'm just curious, hallie. which sean is going to show up today. >> same one as yesterday. >> good sean or bad sean?

good sean? >> i think very similar to what you saw yesterday. you know why? he got good reviews from people in the west wing about what happened 24 hours ago. >> nbc's hallie jackson. thank you very much. >> thank you, hallie, good luck. >> thanks. joining us -- >> by the way, he went to the "new york post" first. >> the post. >> went to the post and christian broadcast network and in surprise turn went to unvision. right? >> yeah. >> joining us now republican strategist ed rollins. i was about to say i was with ed's wife last night. last night i joined some very impressive women at an event u.n. for peace association, part of a global effort to stamp out violence against women and girls while providing educational empowerment opportunities around the world. we have pictures. there they are. it all leads up to the annual awards luncheon march 10th and a major rally in celebration of international women's day here in new york city on sunday march

12th. you should go to that march. can you find more information at u.n. women for peace.org. my friend brought me to that. >> a great conversation about what's going on in washington and around the world and a huge supporter of this event as well. it was great to see your wife. >> thank you. very critical issue that needs to be discussed. >> absolute i. absolutely. >> we're talking about how for republicans, "jesus christ superstar," having trouble figure out if they love him, the type of political analyst you are is going to be fascinated by a guy who can go and bring industrial midwest. what are you seeing beyond the chaos in the first days. >> i'm a little intimidated. you put me in donnie's seat. >> you look comfortable. >> he's a pretty good strategist. this is going to be an interesting administration to

watch. in a certain sense you have a bunch of people who haven't been in the white house, vero beach been in the government, including the president. but he is a force. i think the key thing on his inaugural address is 1600 major players in the podium behind him and didn't speak to one of them. he basically spoke to the country. >> is that a mistake? >> no. >> you don't think? >> no, i don't think it was a mistake. at the end of the day he had to go out and tell his troops across the country, i made these commitments to you. now that i'm president i'm going to lead up to those commitments. at the end of the day congress has to deal with him for foreseeable future, pushing and shoving all the way through. i think everybody once they get offices settled figure out what they are doing. he had an active day yesterday and continue to act today. >> what's first piece of legislation he'll sign into law and how will that lay out. >> first of all congress has to decide what will be the major piece of legislation. i think the government will be important, repealing obama care is complicated.

we all know that we've spent decades trying to do that. i think he's going to reverse executive orders like he did yesterday. that's easy stuff. >> repeal and replace tax reform, infrastructure. >> both are tough issues. tax reform is complicated. i think at the end of the day there's a lot of support on both sides, particularly repealing corporate tax. infrastructure will be important. you have elaine chao basically labor secretary, deputy secretary of transportation. she'll be able to move the ball forward. obviously she has a great ally with her husband in the senate. my sense is there will be a lot of activity. i think you're going to see pushing and shoving. as you know, joe, congress, six miles between the white house and congress, might as well be 1,000 miles. two diverse worlds. i was an opportunity white house political director to sit on the house. how much time does the white house spend focusing on us. i'd say zero, unless a big piece of legislation. through that i found them focusing on the president every

single moment. this president they will focus because they don't know what he's going to do. >> co-chair of super pac supported donald trump, supported him during the campaign but you also were critical of him at times, with the khan family. if the election held today, no way because of the way he's conducting himself. what would you tell a man, new ronald reagan about comporting himself in the wows. >> one of the advantages with the super pac you don't get to deal with the candidate. one of the disadvantages you don't get to deal with candidate or campaign. part of my role on the network, i try to be honest, i'm 74 years old, i've been around this game a long time, i always try to tell what i see happening. i think to a certain extent there were mistakes in the campaign. it was an up and down campaign. at the end of the day he tapped into the environment nobody else saw or saw as well as they should have. we ran around for two years thinking hitler was inevitable nominee and inevitable

president, obviously -- hillary was inevitable nominee and inevitable president but obviously not. the only thing about ronald reagan he didn't take criticism. said to me, how do you deal with nasty stories. i was a movie star. i wasn't a big star. i got crappy stories every day, photo journalism, what have you. i think this guy has to basically not react to stuff out there every single day because it will be out there every single day. >> my favorite story about reagan is he was -- who was his official biographer. >> luke cannon. >> morris. >> a disaster. >> a disaster. but tells this great story about ronald reagan. he was supposed to go up and interview him. the morning that he woke up, he opened up the "l. a. times" and there it was on the front page, something about iran contra, reagan knew more than what he was saying. there's this thing about how reagan's deficits would cripple america for 50 years.

this is the worst day, i'm going to get nothing. so angry. goes in, nancy is at the door. her teeth are gritted. he said, this is the worst thing. there's reagan reading "l. a. times," front page. morris goes, good morning, mr. president. reagan says, you know, he's red in the face. he said, have you read the "l. a. times"? he said, yes, mr. president, i have. he flips it over, stands up, throws it at him. he points to an article at the bottom of the page and says, i can't believe the o'malleys would think about selling dodgers to murdock. he said i froze. i realized the genius of ronald reagan. he just completely shut out the ground noise. >> i think that's very important. i think the key thing i would say to trump is, you know, 60 years ago and 50 pounds lighter

i was a boxer and i coached boxing. i boxed 12 years. the the first rule, never show pain. no matter how hard you're hit, never show your opponent how hard they hurt you. this man needs to never show pain. >> that -- >> you can fire -- there's going to be pushing and shoving all the way through here. he's not going to get everything he wants. there's lots of criticism. the media is not going to be for him. at the end of the day, lots of internal fights with the campaign staff and white house staff. there's all kinds of turf wars that will take place. you've got to be above it all. you basically have to say, this is what i'm going to do. >> a great way of looking at the problem. ed rollins, thank you so much. >> thank you. nice to be with you. i can hold donnie's chair. >> you can take it. >> donnie is coming back. >> he's coming now. >> he's rented it to you. >> okay. he calls you brilliant, donnie, but he was just kidding. former secretary of defense robert gates joins us on set.

>> good. >> here is donnie. >> hands off. there's a move going on here. >> former president george h.w. bush's day in the hospital we'll talk about that. we have an update for you. plus an update on the governor of minnesota after he collapsed during his state of the state address. dramatic moments. we'll be right back. america's beverage companies have come together to bring you more ways to help reduce calories from sugar. with more great tasting beverages with less sugar or no sugar at all, smaller portion sizes, clear calorie labels, and signs reminding everyone to think balance before choosing their beverages. we know you care about reducing the sugar in your family's diet, and we're working to support your efforts. more beverage choices. smaller portions. less sugar. balanceus.org.

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my advice to you, even when he still had the breathing tube in, he gave us the thumbs-up, which is, again, a testament to his intestinal fortitude. i sure would want to be knocked out if i've got a tube down my throat. remarkably great attitude. >> he asked me today when he gets to go home. i was telling him he gets to get out of this today, but he said, i don't need to be here. can i go home? >> i believe the statement was prior to intensive care unit stay, i think mrs. commented to me, you need to get us out of here and tuned up because we've got to host that super bowl. >> those were the doctors treating former president george h.w. bush and mrs. bush after both were hospitalized last week. the former president moved out

of the intensive care unit and on a regular floor. still dreeted for pneumonia. mrs. bush treated for pneumonia was discharged entirely. tweeted out this photo of mrs. bush at her husband's bedside yesterday. the doctor said if the president continues to improve at the current pace he could be released from the hospital friday or over the weekend. that's great news. a scary moment in minnesota when governor mark dayton collapsed about 40 minutes into his state of the state address. the video from last night shows the 69-year-old slurring his speech before falling into the lectern. you can see lawmakers rushing to his aid. the governor's office released a statement saying he quickly recovered and walked out of the state capital on his own. the governor still plans to present his 2017 budget as planned. good for him. i'll bet you everybody will be there listening. what a scary moment. >> scary film. >> seems like he's okay.

we'll see. up next dictator of defense robert gates wrote, at least on national security i believe mr. trump is beyond repair. he's stubbornly uninformed about the world and temperamentally unsuited to lead our men and women in uniform. he's unqualified and unfit to be commander in chief. >> that's pretty clear. james mattis, pompeo confirmed and rex tillerson not far behind we'll get his take now on the administration. bob gates joins us next.

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because safety is nevtadirectv now.fied. stream all your entertainment! anywhere! anytime! can we lose the 'all'. there's no cbs and we don't have a ton of sports. anywhere, any... let's lose the 'anywhere, anytime' too. you can't download on-the-go, there's no dvr, yada yada yada. stream some stuff! somewhere! sometimes! you totally nailed that buddy. simple. don't let directv now limit your entertainment. only xfinity gives you more to stream to any screen. the old expression to the victor belong the spoils. you remember i always used to say keep the oil. i wasn't a fan of iraq. i didn't want to go into iraq. i will tell you, when we were in, we got out wrong. i always said in addition to that -- i said it for economic reasons. if you think about it, mike, if

you kept oil you wouldn't have isis, because that's where they made their money in the first place so we should have kept the oil. okay. maybe you'll have another chance. >> you unequivocally state this administration will not send more troops into iraq to, as the president puts it, take the oil. >> i'm not going to talk about what we may or may not do. president the is clear he doesn't telegraph forward taking options off the table. that's not a good negotiating skill. that's not how he works. there's a reason he's been successful negotiating, he does it in a way that doesn't telegraph to people what he takes on or off the table. >> secretary robert gates, his book "a passion for leadership" is now out in paper back. mr. secretary, thank you so much for being here. obviously too early to assess this president. that was quite a disturbing saturd saturday. what is your take, first of all, on donald trump's cabinet picks

for foreign policy, then we'll get to the specifics. >> i think his picks for the national security team are really quite strong. mattis at defense and john kelly at homeland security both worked for me. i have the highest regard for them. >> tell me about mattis. will general mattis be the sort of person that will speak truth to power. >> absolutely. >> say go into iraq and seize oil, what will mattis say. >> i don't think jim mattis has any problems speaking straight to anybody about anything. i also think that obviously rex tillerson is a great nominee for secretary of state. frankly i was disappointed he was voted out of committee on a strict party line vote. that's not been the tradition in foreign relations committee for secretaries. i think he's eminently qualified and i think will be a very good

secretary. >> there's a russian concern there. >> the one thing i like about all three of these guys, and i will say mike pompeo who i don't know as well but talked to on several occasions, they are strong independent minded people who will tell the president what they think. >> tillerson, there was relationship about his relationship with vladimir putin. >> i introduced him on foreign relations committee and i addressed this directly. because he was a successful businessman, who better to negotiate with vladimir putin and russians than somebody who knows who they are, how they negotiate and how they do business. i think as i said at the time, i think rex tillerson's only goal is going to be to do what's in the best interest of the united states. >> and in all your conversations with him, do you believe he understands vladimir putin has

been adversarial toward united states best interest for the last decade? >> absolutely. >> mr. secretary, throughout your esplanade it career and it has been a splendid career. you've always framed thing for the media. when you hear president trump say keep the oil in passing reference in langley on saturday and linking keeping the oil perhaps this would have prevented the creation of isis, what would you advise the president of the united states -- would you advise the president of the united states that words matter when they come from a president? >> well, i think that they are sort of parallel universes here. there is for the administration, there is the sort of public piece that includes the tweets and things said to the press and so on and so forth. and that sometimes can be pretty jarring. and then there is the serious

policymaking side and the donald trump that people see in private meetings who is thoughtful and considered and takes things and listens to people, seeks out other people's points of view and then makes decisions. and i think the thing we're going to have to pay closest attention to is what he does. by the same token need to understand the first universe of public commentary does have impact on the second. >> you found him behind closed doors to be thoughtful? >> we had a very serious thoughtful, conversation. i might add, given the quote you've led with, he was very gracious to me.

he said you were pretty rough on me. i said there are a lot of things about national security that caused me trouble. now that you're elected it's very important you're successful in national security and i'll do everything to help you be successful. >> the cia, i'm curious to hear what you think about relationship between donald trump and intel agencies given everything we've heard donald trump say about intel lately, given that speech he made in front of the wall on saturday. former director brennan came out and said he was appalled by that. what's the practical implication of intel agencies having this sort of war, if you will,well president of the united states? >> the relationships between presidents and cia has been awkward in the past.

>> i think the challenge for pompeo is to get the

relationship in a place where the president actually takes advantage of this huge asset that is cia. >> now that tpp is -- at least our participation in tpp has been downgraded and perhaps excluded, what does secretary of state tillerson tell the prime minister of japan. >> i think the united states is going to have to, the administration is going to have to come up with some initiatives to reach out to asian countries to try and establish if not a multi-lateral relationship, a bilateral relationship economically and so on. economically and so on that the disappearance of tpp creates a vacuum and the chinese are going to fill that vacuum in asia unless we come up with some ideas on how to replace it with something that may be ballilate that demonstrates we are still out there, still engaged and

it's still very important -- the area is very important to us economically. >> so your book "a passion for leadership" is out now in paper back. what do you think the most important message is for president trump, now president trump, in terms of what you've learned about what leadership takes. >> i finished the book 18 months ago and the whole first chapter is about the need for disruptive change in government in big institutions and how frustrated and angry americans are at just the everyday bureaucratic hassles that they encounter. everything from getting a driver's license to remodeling their house to their income taxes and so on. and the message is you can change and reform government and the book is basically about how you do that. i say how i did it at cia, at texas a&m at the department, my style is clearly very different

than the president's but i wasn't elected president but i think one of the messages in there is make the people in these institutions your allied in change because then they will want to carry it on once you're gone. >> so it's interesting, you talk about in the first chapter in this book why bureaucracies -- in duty you talk about how bureaucrats could keep you busy all day to stop you from making the change and you could see your calendar filling up. and the more it filled up the more suspicious you got that maybe they didn't want you to go in and cause disruption. so what's your warning to incoming cabinet leaders. how did they stay a step ahead of that? >> one of the things i tried to do in the institutions i led was -- you know, the institution tries to manage you through your inbound a inbox and meetings. i tried in each place to block

out an hour to an hour and a half a day and say that's my time to pursue my agenda to make sure i'm moving this institution forward. the rest of the time you're controlling me, this is my time. leave me alone and -- because i want to think about whether to fire you or not. [ laughter ] >> i love it. robert gates, former defense secretary. >> really quick. we have to go but one bit of advice you have for mike pompeo who has probably the most difficult job in washington. >> get to know the folks at the agency. they are terrific professionals. they are apolitical. they want to do their best to support the president and this country. >> and you can't wait to get back to washington, can you. >> the state of washington. the real washington. >> i told him he would be good until north korea. >> former defense secretary robert gates. thank you once again. >> what a great honor. >> always an honor. it was an action-packed day three for the trump administration as the president took his first steps toward

trying to fulfill several campaign promises and his press secretary teed up a mulligan. we'll have all that and hugh hewitt joins the conversation. "morning joe" is back in a moment.

>> i know is josh earnest was voted the most popular press secretary by the press corps. i let josh know he can rest

easy, that at least his title is secure for the next few days. good morning, it's tuesday, january 24. welcome to "morning joe." with us on set we have legendary mike barnicle, political author and co-author of "game change" mark halperin. how's the baby? >> he's so cute. got a good personality. >> i like him. >> in washington, associate editor of the "washington post" and msnbc political analyst eugene robinson. and on capitol hill, white house correspondent for the associated press julie pace. the sun still needs to come up. >> she was in the briefing yesterday which actually a little-known fact, it went 43 hours. it was unbelievable. >> it made up for a lot of lost ground. >> they had gatorade on the side. they'd go over there and by the end julie was pouring it over the top of her head. that was, like, long. that was a long -- that's called make good. >> a lot of make good.

>> a lot of make goods and called on, what, how many -- 43? >> no fewer than seven dutch journalists got questions. >> you have to have dutch journalists. >> but he called on hostile outlets life the huffington post who says with every column by saying he's a racist xenophobic sexist pig. that was surprising, wasn't it? >> made up for what happened over the weekend and for our first briefing he was -- well, changed the vector direction, didn't make up completely. first briefing he handled himself pretty well and i think he overrated in terms of answering questions because they tend not to -- no one answers questions from the podium but the tone was better than saturday. >> great tone in 79, 80 responses. phil rutger, i read -- >> yeah, i think it was 43 different reporters, 79 questions. but after that performance on

saturday, the relationship with the media was off to such a bad start he had to sit and take every question. he may not like everything he said but there's a fascinating piece in the "washington post," deeply reporting, not the kind of piece you'd expect to see three days into the administration but talking about donald trump didn't think sean spicer was strong enough on saturday and that he had to go out and be tougher than he was. >> and didn't like what he was wearing. >> so make you asked the question. let's lay it out for you. day one saw his press secretary lying about crowd size. day two saw more measured tone and an emphasis on policy, and yesterday was day three and willie points to the "washington post" writing that president trump often seemed comfortably at home in the white house as he entertain entertained, promised to disrupt washington just as he had electoral politics signing a memorandum to withdraw the

united states from the transpacific partnership, ordered a hiring freeze for most federal agencies as ronald reagan did in his first hours as president and followed the reagan model by reinstating the mexico city policy that blocks foreign aid to organizations that perform or discuss abortions. trump spoke by phone trump spoke to abdel fatah a al sisi. while the president held a listening session with members of american manufacturing from companies such as dow chemical, ford, lockheed martin and u.s. steel he sat down with union leaders who praised him for cancelling tpp and he finished the day gathering a bipartisan group of congressional leaders where he came away full of high spirits. >> reporter: somehow the meet going? >> very good and we have a

fantastic relationship with everybody at the table. it's a totally just a beautiful, beautiful relationship. >> yeah, they don't. >> so mark, an extraordinarily busy day. if you go from start to finish richard haass and seeing it as very significant. seeing it as negative. his supporters love it. the democrats love it. the unions love it. the hiring freeze, the same thing. it sends a message to every one of the things he did there's a line in the paper saying "well, that's not --" there was a lot that happened yesterday. >> he didn't win a majority of the vote but he won the election and yesterday was a big down payment symbolically and starting down the path of substance on things he said he

would do. he says he's for free trade, he has to start forging these bilateral relationships because america must be a trading nation, he just doesn't like these big international deals. i thought they handled the messaging very well yesterday because they're framing this as a guy fulfilling his promises, a man of action, meeting with a lot of people and unless you're dead set rooting against him to fail, yesterday was a good day on the down payment on a lot of promises. >> at the end of the day he's sitting down with congressional leaders and starts by talking about votes. he's getting back into the counting thing. now that's at the top of a lot of web sites, twitter is freaking out about it. we can focus on it, everybody knows it's not true. we can sit here and scream and yell which i think he wants people to do because that plays into the circus but if you do that you don't realize that there were a lot of significant things that happened yesterday and a lot of stuff that conservatives are very concerned

about, especially on the trade front. there are people that believe we' we've seeded asia to china. >> think about a republican president on his first big day, his first monday in office doing something that draws the ire of a lot of republicans and statements of praise from bernie sanders on the other side of the aisle. it's a position hillary clinton also held against tpp during the campaign. this is the republican president coming in and immediately doing something that pleases democrats and doesn't please his own republicans. on the other question you're talking about this that meeting with leaders, he claimed three to five million illegal immigrants voted in the election which would have made the difference between him winning the popular vote. that's, of course, not true, we've said that again and again and again but reports out of that meeting including from senators say that is what he said. >> he should stop saying things that aren't true. he should stop. >> nobody believes it so why is he doing it? is he doing it to again up 30 minutes of debate and discussion so we're talking about that

instead of other things? >> in this case it doesn't make sense. otherwise it was on message. >> my point is whether it's an errant tweet about a movie strar or something like this, we can report on all of this for the next hour in years and at the end of four years people are going to turn around and say "oh, my god look at everything that's happened." there are real policy implications to what happened yesterday. >> well, mike, give us your take when you cover stories like this. i don't think you ignore the obsession with crowd size and the obsession with going back to the race and also what he said about "illegals" but i think it has to be put in perspective to what was comparatively compared to the first two days a much better day. then we can talk about the

polici policies. >> i was going to say also for any president a significant policy day when you have the head of the top manufacturers in one minute and the head of the unions thanking you the next minute, that's not a traditional republic republic republican. >> the problem is you end up with a headline on the top page of the "new york times," "meeting with top lawmakers, trump repeats an election lie." he's the president of the united states. yesterday he voided tpp. he voided tpp the day after the prime minister of japan went out of his way to convince parliament he was going to tripe to work something out with the americans. he basically as you said ceded trade to china in that area of the world. >> there's a front page piece in the "washington post" -- we're only three days into this presidency. >> but, mike, i'm sorry.

the "new york times," the "washington post," people talking about that this morning after yesterday are talking to themselves. >> they might be talking to themselves -- >> no, they are talking to themselves. >> about what? >> stuff got done yesterday. i'm saying we have talked about the fact that he's been lying about the crowd sizes now and he's been lying about the popular vote for months. you can put that old story on the top or you can talk about how trade is fundamentally changed forever, about how union groups came in and talked to republicans. i'm just saying. >> is trade change forever? >> yes. yes. there has not been a republican or a democrat since -- who was the last protectionist democrat? you ask richard haass whether america's position on change has forever trade. >> i wouldn't say it's forever changed.

it's changed for now. every president in our lifetime -- in the last two generations, the organizing principle has been trying to pass big comprehensive multilateral trade deals. this president won't do that. >> this is a break on trade possibly -- and he's promised this break on trade. it goes back to herbert hoover. >> it's an enormous break. >> next president -- >> as mark points out he has to cut deals now individually japan, the philippines -- >> vietnam. >> i bet the next president of the united states goes back to the other model. >> i'll bet. >> i'll bet, too. i'm just saying this is a break. change forever, no. but it's a break in what, gene, 50 years? 60 years? 70 years? >> yeah, the paradigm is -- >> and my point is things are happening here. >> yeah, things are happening and they're being reported, right? these are all big stories. you have to report it all.

you have to report what's going on in terms of the dynamics inside the new white house as the story in the "washington post" does and it's an amazing story about the fit the president pitched over the weekend over how the inauguration was being reported. that's a story. also everything that happened yesterday the a story. i mean, the tpp story, yes, it is a big story because in the short term, at least, it's going to give, i think, china the opportunity to become the dominant sort of factor in how trade is arranged in asia in the fastest-growing region in the world. now, there were -- remember that everybody by the time we got the election everybody was against tpp or said they were against tpp so threoretically hillary clinton would have been doing the same thing. we'll never know if she would have or not but that is a big

deal. this is going to be a fascinating challenge for all of us in the media because you simply cannot ignore the temperament of the new president, the shape of the new administration. >> nobody is ignoring the temperament and nobody should ignore the temperament. my suggestion is at least around this table that we -- while we focus on the temperament, we also look at all of the policy that's going, instead of -- >> absolutely. >> i guarantee you there will be people throughout the day on cable news that are going to lead with the illegals story. and they're going to talk about it for 30 minutes and they can talk about it for 30 minutes if they want to or they'll talk about things that will change. as the "new york times" said, bring about an end of an era on trade. >> well, we can't control how -- you know, what others do and obviously, no, i certainly

wouldn't recommend doing that because there's a lot of stuff that goes on. you have to look at these policies, though. what impact does a federal hiring freeze always have, for examp example? one of the things it does is it means that you have perhaps fewer employees in the long run but you have more contractors. and you know, that's a -- that policy is generally not all it's cracked up to be but it's a big symbolic thing, especially for voters who -- you know, size of government. well, size of government keeps expanding, freeze or no. >> and in fairness, the "new york times" and "washington post" both have trade as their big above-the-fold story. >> i think it's all being done. >> i think the point is the country wants donald trump not to focus on the size of his crowd and whether or not the election was legitimate which he's obsessed with and to focus on these things and yesterday he started to do that. >> our job in the media is to focus on policy.

that's the tail of the taple of lsy, everyday policy. but you have the side stories. why doesn't he realize he's president? >> still ahead on "morning joe," republicans have the white house, congress and are making gains on state legislatures and governors mansions, but can they hold on? hugh hewitt joins us with his new book on how they can. plus, marco rubio comes around to vote in favor of rex tillerson. how did he get to yes, especially after tweeting "being a friend of vladimir is not an attribute i'm hoping for a secretary of state." but first, here's bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> well, yesterday we had the high tide cycles with the jersey shore. see aisle city, this was some of the flooding done because of the powerful nor'easter. not every nor'easter is a snowstorm. some are just big rain makers, this is almost like a march or

april-like storm. we had a lot of sleet overnight. we had a sleet storm in central portions of new england. a lot of cancellations and delays there. winds are coming down now. only 40 in boston so the wind damage is pretty much done, additional snowfall, looks like around three to six more inches in the mountains of northern new england. little additional snowfall for coastal areas of maine. the other storm, this is brewing in the middle of the country. this will be in south dakota, nebraska, portions of northern iowa. this area of pink to this red, that's nine to 15 inches of snow. that's a hefty snowfall there. here's the best news of all for everyone from coast to coast. the west coast is clear. no more storms for you any time soon and once we get rid of these two storms in the middle of the country in the east, it looks like we're in for a nice quiet weather pattern. typical winter weather through the upcoming weekend. we could use a break from the crazy weather we've been experiencing over the last two to three weeks. that's beautiful. washington, d.c. that's the backside of the nor'easter, the low clouds

heading out to see. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. your path to retirement may not always be clear. but at t. rowe price, we can help guide your retirement savings. so wherever your retirement journey takes you, we can help you reach your goals. call us or your advisor t. rowe price. invest with confidence. bp gives its offshore teams 24/7 support from onshore experts, so we have extra sets of eyes on our wells every day. because safety is never being satisfied. and always working to be better.

last night, congressman mike pompeo was sworn in as director of the central intelligence agency. vice president mike pence administered the oath to the third cabinet nominee to be confirmed. a few hours earlier pompeo won a 66-32 vote in the senate with 15 democrats voting in favor of the nomination and one republican, kentucky's rand paul, voting against in protest for more intelligence oversight. meanwhile, south carolina governor nikki haley's nomination as ambassador to the united nations is scheduled to receive a committee vote today and could possibly be confirmed by the full senate within a few hours. the senate energy and natural resources committee has postponed a meeting scheduled for today in which it planned to vote on two cabinet nominees, rick perry at energy and ryan

zinke at interior. and senate democrats appealed for a second roundover questioning of education nominee betsy devos after willing limited to just five minutes each last week. >> that probably ain't going to happen. >> yeah, that one -- that one. >> that's probably good news for tom price at secretary of health, education and welfare. >> how's that? >> well, i agree with you, i think that might not happen, devos. >> this is a rough one. it's more surprising than you thought but health committee chairman lamar alexander said no claiming devos has spent more time answering questions than either of president obama's education nominees. i think there's a reason for that. her answers don't feel like she knows enough, right? >> yeah. >> also yesterday, the senate foreign relations committee narrowly approved rex tillerson's nomination for secretary of state last night. the vote was 11-10 along party lines. after early skepticism and sharp

questioning of tillerson during his confirmation hearing, marco rubio ultimately voted in support. yesterday rubio said president trump deserved deference and it would be against the national interest to have tillerson's confirmation unnecessarily delayed or embroiled in controversy. the "washington post" reports ahead of the vote rubio received an onslaught of calls and texts, particularly from past donors in support of tillerson but he denied undo pressure from the white house on his decision. >> you ask about the administration, i have to say, guys, they've been incredibly professional in my interaction with them, responsive, respectful. you say -- i mean, they did what i would do if i were president and wanted to get my nominee through. you'd try to provide information and nudge people in the right direction but it was all very respectful. i have to be fair about that. >> so -- >> he got rolled. >> yeah. i respect his vote but this goes to what everybody thinks that

these hearings are just theater. that you can have big moments and strong questioning and all that but at the end of the day republicans will vote for the republican nominee. >> like -- >> he really didn't want to but -- >> it was cokie roberts, remember on our show. she's like "please, it's all theater. as cringe-worthy as one is, so is the other." >> i think most senators, particularly if the president is of your own party, want to give deference to the president. >> marco didn't want to do that but his donors did. >> and long term politically it was a safer place to end up but he has questions about tillerson but so does mccain and mccain is voting for him. >> why is that? so mccain and lindsey graham are both moving in tillerson's direction. >> russia. >> they're supporting him now. >> but there are questions -- >> i think they're voting yes for three reasons -- lots of people support him that they respect like jim baker and dr. rice. two is deference to the president of their own party and three is although he didn't show

it to everybody at the hearing, he's an impressive guy and i think he can -- he was able to convince them in the room privately that he is not going to be as warm to russia as had exxon. >> let's go to washington now. senior writer at politico and co-author of the play book jake sherman. you've got a lot of different things you're covering, including valerie jarrett's next act. >> she signed with caa, the big hollywood talent agency which is making a big push into washington and is trying to gobble up as many former administration officials and capitol hill folks that they can including barbara boxer and valerie jarrett. so watch out for valerie's next moves around the country as she signs up with this big talent agency. one more point on devos i'll make if i could. i think the only way she goes down is if she withdraws and she'll need pressure to withdraw. i think what you said is right, senators want to give deference to the president.

taking down a nominee would be a big thing. if you ask republicans they're not too concerned with the education department. this is a key post that gets into the first days of the administration. >> well, in terms of more questions, does anyone think there's something beyond really needing to hear more from her in that? i didn't see the entire hearing but for those who covered it completely and jake you can speak to this weren't people unlike rex tillerson left hanging a bit? >> yeah, for sure they are. i think she was not as prepared as she could have been. i think republicans kind of took umbrage at that but already a mar -- lamar alexander is trying to drag her across the finish line, shutting down the hearing against many people who want to hear more from her is a move to show that she doesn't really have the -- they don't want her to answer more questions, they want to drag her across so i

don't know that there's there are but he's doing his best to seal this thing up. >> politico's jake sherman. thank you. coming up on "morning joe," donald trump spent yesterday meeting with top business luminaries. lee gallagher of "fortune" magazine joins us in just a bit to help figure out where were the women? "morning joe" is back after this. we've done well in life, with help from our advisor, we made it through many market swings. sure we could travel, take it easy...

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oh, my gosh, this is so exciting. >> this has been a big year for us because i have to tell you, as you guys all know, willie and i were ripped off on several nobel prize -- for physics, right? >> it's a tough category. >> they stole our formula. it's not tough if you steal my work. >> gosh, get to the news, joe. >> we should have won the nobel but our work -- it's the same thing. >> yeah. >> on top of that your sister just got nominated for an academy award. >> libby geist wilds, one of the producers of the best documentary film of the year "o.j., made in america" along with the espn team. my sister was just nominated for an oscar. i can't believe it. [ applause ] >> this is also a very big morning. everybody remembers nicklaus won

it in '86, right? who won in '87. >> joe scarborough. >> nobody remembers. but the guy who won it in '88 is here today. hugh hewitt. >> i'm throwing the book at you. hugh hewitt will join the conversation -- >> it was a wonderful moment. touching. >> we just hugged each other for a while. >> seriously, you find a way to mess everything up. >> what's that? >> i'm supposed to say hugh hewitt joins the conversation in just a moment with his book but first -- >> this book, by the way, how many years will this add to somebody's life if they read it? >> about one week. >> one week? >> one week. >> i'll take a week, you can do a not a week. >> at this point you can use a week. here's a look at the ground we've covered so far on this busy tuesday morning. >> it was a pretty dramatic difference between saturday night's briefing and the briefing yesterdays. yesterday actually felt very traditional.

>> for a first briefing he handled himself pretty well. >> what he did on saturday, though, doesn't go away. >> which sean is going to show up today? >> same one as yesterday. >> president trump spent much of his first monday on campaign promises signing a memorandum to withdraw the united states from the transpacific partnership, ordered a hiring freeze, held a listening session with leaders of american manufacturing. >> there are real policy implications to what happened yesterday. >> immediately doing something that pleases democrats and doesn't please his own republicans. >> that was the rollout they wanted to have. not the fight over the weekend over a cloud size. >> you end up with a headline meeting with top lawmakers. trump repeats an election lie. >> when these lawmakers request come ott of these meetings, they're left with questions about the details. >> the first rules i learn is never show pain. this man needs to learn never show pain. >> the senate foreign relations committee narrowly approved rex tillerson's nomination. marco rubio ultimately voted in support. >> this goes to what everybody

thinks. >> relationship between presidents and cia has been auk ward in the past. zbig brzezinski took the president's daily brief into him everyday. >> he kind of sucked up the oxygen in the room. >> here's your moment. >> he was always mr. nice guy. >> no, actually he wasn't. >> you can order those sweaters at "morning joe".com. there was an incredible catalog. >> not like mig outfit. you didn't not like your outfit. >> officially with us not, officially, the author of the national syndicated radio host, msnbc political analyst and, of course, master's champion for 1988 -- >> hugh hewitt and his new book "the fourth way, the conservative play book for a lasting gop majority" is out today. >> what's it like being a conservative in the age of donald trump. how do conservatives -- how do they sort through this? >> they're meeting today in

philadelphia, the congressional retreat which you used to go to, joe. for two days. the president will go up there later and i think this will be a merger of trump promises which he's delivering on and conservative tool box, how do you do it? how do you do infrastructure with a conservative twist? how do you do immigration reform with a conservative twist? build the fence. how do you do tax reform. he's delivering. >> let's talk about what happened yesterday -- this morning, actually. he's talking about tpp yesterday. he met with union leaders and signed -- which didn't mean a whole lot because it was on its way out anyway. i have been more of a conservative populist, people like largent and myself came in in '94. that was -- but the traditional conservatives, paul ryan, mitch mcconnell. >> i'm a ryan conservative. >> you're more traditional. how do you guys sort through this and bring the two sides

together. >> the vice president is key to that. the president has gotten very well along with paul ryan. they have to sit down like they did yesterday. president trump did more outreach in one day yesterday than president obama did in a year when he brought in the trades people. the trades people are folks who build things. he's a builder. they've been dealing with each other for years so if the republicans get over their infrastructure phobia and they give a hundred billion dollars to local people to use to build things, tangible trump trophies, that's what i call them in the book, tangible trump trophies like the wpa bill. my first job was at a wpa pool. i went to a library built by carnegie. they're still there in the towns across the united states, 1600 of them. if the republicans give money like trump wants them do to local people to decide locally what to build he'll get his trophies, he'll fulfill his promise, we'll win reelection and the trades will be happy.

>> what about tax reform? is donald trump a conservative on tax reform base odden what you seen? >> i hope not. the "wall street journal" republicans i refer to them. they're my friends, i like them, they want to get rid of the mortgage interest deduction. that fwuls the home building industry which fuels america. you can't get rid of it. you can't get rid of the state and local income tax deduction. you cannot get rid of the charitable deduction. the "wall street journal" republicans want to do that. kevin brady, however, was on yesterday with greta and made a very series of concessions that they will meet trump halfway on tax reform, not do stupid things like the mortgage interest reduction but smart things like making it a simple form. >> why can't you just cap those things rather than eliminate. >> it's one market for housing. if you cap them you diminish the value at the homes on the top level. a $900,000 home becomes a 2k4 s $700,000. capping is bad. >> i don't agree with you on

that but i want to ask you about the balance. the republican house plan, the president's plan gives a big tax cut to the rich, smaller tax cut to the middle-class. would it be good policy to do more what democrats would want? more move deductions to the middle-class? >> absolutely. they should move to take the middle which president obama never did. he stayed hard on the left. if president trump edges the republicans just a bit to the center with some infrastructure spending and i think his nixon and china moment is an immigration overhaul. you don't ever move the dreamers out, you regularize most of the people here illegally who are just working hard, he wins resoundingly in 2018. >> on the tax cut. >> less for the top. >> more on the middle-class? >> the top doesn't need it. they want simplification. the top wants to get rid of the alternative minimum tax which makes it a nightmare but you're right. win 2020 in 2017. >> it would revolutionize our politics if he did it. >> yup. >> hugh, switch hats, one of the most fascinating questions that i haven't heard a good answer

for is i can explain why hillary clinton lost. donald trump outworked her. but how did democrats lose a thousand legislative seats over the past eight years. and my question to you is how do democrats start winning those seats back? >> they missed their chance. tim ryan is a friend of mine, he's very good. they should have put him into the leader's role. kamala harris ought to be their poster child. >> she stood out at the march. >> she was terrific as opposed to being grindingly bitter she was forward looking. >> she was. >> there are ways for them to rebuild but not with that leadership team. >> what's happened over the past eight years. >> the echo chamber of the left is centered in this city in d.c. and los angeles and tim ryan went to my high school. >> it's what happened to hillary clinton. >> it's trumbull county, you have to go back to ohio and they don't do it well. >> we were talking off camera about how corrosive late night

shows are to open thinking on the left because if you're liberal you can turn on those shows every night and just laugh at conservatives, laugh at moderates, laugh at people in ohio and just -- this reinforcement is constant. >> called the samantha bee problem. right now foxconn is thinking about bringing $7 billion of investment and 30,000 jobs somewhere in the united states. i pet you president trump is on the phone saying put that in ohio, put that in wisconsin, naught in pennsylvania so i can viz state in two years. >> how does the left break out of the bubble that we republicans -- >> i don't want them to, joe. >> i know but i was talking about after mitt romney lost they were still watching fox at 12:00 at night listening to karl rove telling them they were going to win the election. there was such a bubble that reinforced their bad habits. >> david axelrod told me when we were doing a daily bit during the series when the cubs beat the indians that president obama should have been doing more

conservative media and that's what they need to do. they need to get out of their ghetto of elite media and start talking on the air and come here and take tough questions from conservatives because you'll never win an argument you don't have. >> that's what we're talking about the conservative ghetto of fox news, talk radio, et cetera. if you're a conservative, you need to get out. if you're a liberal, you need to get out. what's the fourth way. >> that's the way you marry conservative tool box techniques with donald trump's promises because he ran and he won and he is the president and he won a huge win at a constitutional majority in the loeelectoral college. not the popular vote but the constitutional majority. if you're paul ryan and the leader kevin mccarthy or kevin brady, remember, he won. he's the boss. he's the president and he gets to have his agenda implemented and his people confirmed. big story. chuck schumer double crossing the republicans on mike pompeo. that was a breach of trust. there was a shouting match

between tom cotton on the floor with chuck schumer where schumer said if you had been here eight years ago -- and cotton interrupted "i was getting my ass shot at in afghanistan eight years ago" and he said you lied. when does anyone ever say that in washington? >> well, i remember it once happening. >> oh, you're right. joe wilson. a very fine gentleman -- >> he lost control. i couldn't believe that was joe. >> so any way, willie, the man who put an amen in amen corner. this looks like a great book. >> i was surprised he won after you shot the eight on 17. >> oh, my god. >> but 17 is a nightmare. jitters. >> can you imagine, it's only tuesday? i can't right now. hugh hewitt, thank you. >> thank you. >> hugh, come back. >> i will. you guys are opposite me in the morning. we'll find a way to talk sometime. i watch you everyday on the show. i'm stealing your stuff every single morning. >> love it. thank you so much. still ahead, donald trump

continues his meetings with business executives today. he brings in the heads of auto companies as he tries to shame them into keeping jobs in america. we're back in just a moment.

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> >> some people have taken advantage of it and decided to create de facto hotels and gotten apartments and rented them out and basically it's a business not a residence. if you're a business you should be registered as a business, you should pay taxes like a business, you should go through safety inspections like a business. >> that was a look at last year's public relations battle in new york city over airbnb, "fortune's" lee gallagher brings us the story of the company that on some nights has more than a million people booked in rooms

across the world. keep it right here on "morning joe." i mean wish i had time to take care of my portfolio, but.. well, what are you doing tomorrow -10am? staff meeting. noon? eating. 3:45? uh, compliance training. 6:30? sam's baseball practice. 8:30? tai chi. yeah, so sounds relaxing. alright, 9:53? i usually make their lunches then, and i have a little vegan so wow, you are busy. wouldn't it be great if you had investments that worked as hard as you do? yeah. introducing essential portfolios. the automated investing solution that lets you focus on your life. at angie's list, we believe there are certain things you can count on, like a tired dog is a good dog. [ dog barking, crashing ] so when you need a dog walker or a handyman, we can help you find the right person for the job. discover all the ways we can help at angie's list.

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plant or when dell wants to do something monstrous and special you're going to have your approvals really fast. >> donald trump met with top ceos yesterday and he'll bring in automakers today. looking very comfortable at the table there. >> very comfortable. >> let's bring in cnbc's dominick chu, and also lee gallagher. >> also looking comfortable. >> we'll get to lee's book in just a minute. she's comfortable because the book is done. first, dominick, what do we expect from the president and automakers today? >> you have mary barra, ford ceo mark fields, fiat chrysler sergio marchioni going in for a breakfast. front and center on this agenda will be american jobs. what can the u.s. auto industry do to ramp up employment domestically instead of moving manufacturing jobs to places like mexico. car makers have been pretty early and consistent in terms of being a target for the president

and this will be the first time the big three auto ceos will meet jointly with the president since july of 2011 when barack obama met with them to go over fuel efficiency standards. you mentioned the comment he is made yesterday, a lot of talk will not just be about the jobs picture but tax policy, what will happen with the overall fuel efficiency standards picture, regulation overall and when you have guys like lockheed, tesla, ford, johnson & johnson weighing in the discussion, it will be a big deal. we hear, though, of course, and this is a big deal the fact that they'll come back in 30 days with some kind of actionable plan to bring manufacturing and jobs back to the u.s., guys. >> all right, cnbc's dominic ch chu, thank you so much. remember back in 2009 when republicans were getting slaughtered and a guy reason for governor in virginia and all he talked about was jobs, jobs, jobs. >> yes, i do. a good campaign. >> he ended up win big how many points? 20 points or whatever?

you look at every one of those headlines that we flashed up there from the hill and all the other places. jobs was in just about every headline. >> up. >> jobs, jobs, jobs. that's what donald trump is talking about. a message across the midwest and america. that's what people will focus on if he keeps talking about jobs, jobs and that's his obsession. >> lee, what's your take with these business leaders? some say there's not enough women in the room though there are some. >> well, that's business. but i do think it's very clear that this is a central piece of what he wants to do. stay here, have your manufacturing here, don't leave, ceos will listen to him but it's not that simple. a lot of people in the middle of the country, there is a declining -- the decline of manufacturing has been a long-term trend and it strikes at the fear of people and the

fear is what happens next? if we lost this many jobs, what happens next? but there's something else happening which is the digital revolution and we at "fortune" have called this the third industrial revolution and this is way bigger than manufacturing, this is impacting every industry and this is something that isn't treatable by building the factories here in the u.s. this is much bigger and meg whitman had interesting comments about that. >> it's perfect synergy with your fourth coming book which is called "the airbnb story, how three ordinary guys created billions and created controversy." so on certain nights there are over a million people staying in airbnb? >> and in fact they have their biggest night on new year's eve and it was more than two million people but that's what drew me to this topic. this is a company that's grown like a weed since it was founded

in 2008. people dismissed it. >> castles. >> where are the castles, mark halperin wants to go to a castle. >> white castle. >> you can stay in a castle, you can stay in a tree house but one of the most interesting things i found as i was researching the book -- it gets headlines for those quirky properties, shipping containers, lighthouses but most of its business is one and two-bedroom apartments in cities and this's what made it disruptive and why it's posed such a challenge to the hotel industry and why so many people have used it so the growth was something i was drawn to. >> we have -- i just got breaking news from the "new york times." president trump plans to keep james comey as director of the fbi, the agency investigating mr. trump's associates. that is fascinating choose which i'm sure might get one or two people on the left stirred up to write a blog post. willie? >> back to the book. i'm always interested in how

these ideas start. we sit around with our friends and say we should do this, how do you get to an idea to a company worth $8.5 billion in three years? >> its valuation is $30 billion. that's what surprised everyone. two of the three founders needed to make their rent and they had extra space in their apartment and there was a big design conference coming to town, industrial designers, something the silicon valley was not used to seeing and one of the reasons nobody would invest in them. they did it on a lark but one of the most interesting things that i was so surprised by was just -- we've heard that story before but after that getting it off the ground was this incredible challenge and they almost failed. they had meetings with investors. people thought this was crazy. people said someone is going to get murdered in one of these houses and there will be blood on your hands. i won't do near this. these people were trying to sell

10% of 2 company for $150,000 back then. that would be worth $3 billion now so everyone -- there was one investor who literally got up in the middle of their meeting in a restaurant and walked out leaving his half eaten smoothie on the table and they thought he was going to pay his parking ticket and he never came back and many people had that reaction. >> why am i not surprised it was a smoothie. >> sounds like some of my dates in college. >> it's a fascinating story. then how they grew and learned to become leaders because unlike a lot of other companies these three guys are still running this company and now it's bigger and it has a lot of challenges, a lot of opposition, a lot of controversy. >> and they're young. >> i was at their headquarters and it's typical silicon valley, all open space and i talked about this question. what are their costs? >> well, that's an interesting question. and they -- their model -- a lot

of people compare airbnb to uber because they're this disrupting sharing economy companies but airbnb's model, because it is built on other people's assets it has low cost structure. the way it grows is by global network affect. you use it, you go back to where you live in your city and start renting out your house there and it spreads because of word of mouth and the more people use it, the more valuable it becomes to other people. so they have spent less than $300 million over eight years as i say in the book and that compares to uber which will lose one billion in six months. >> wow, the airbnb story is out next month available for pre-order. leigh gallagher, great to see you. >> i missed you guys. >> come back more. >> thank you for having me, i'd love to. >> tomorrow morning, senator john mccain will be our guest. tomorrow will we get along, joe? >> mika, we get along everyday.

>> you were not good today. >> yes, we were. >> jen? >> the question is whether general gets along or not. >> she's going like this. that does it for us this morning. >> and as always -- >> yay, libby. >> thank you. an oscar nominee in my family. >> and yay james paul. >> i like him. >> and when you turn on the show at 6:00 in the morning, we thank you in advance for packing your patience. now stick around. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage. a lot of news to cover, stephanie. [ muted ]. a lot happening right now. starting with hitsing the gas. president trump ramping up his corporate outreach, meeting with automakers, ceos at this very moment and you remember it's after criticizing them for making cars overseas and not true, also known as a lie. the president repeating his debunked claim he would have won the popular vote if not for undocumented immigrants voting