dished out the answers. now he is stuck in a different role. he is the contestant. his every move scrutinized. he is in the biggest reality show and it's gotten to him. cameras show him rehearsing for his big speech. microphones catch him smoozing on the floor. it shows meeting through top advisers during what appears to be an explosive conversation. this reality show isn't carefully core graphs. he is showing signs of recklessness. saturday morning tweets beginning just after 6:30 a.m. the president accused barack obama of tapping his phones at trump tower. he said this is a new low. it is nixon watergate. he called obama a bad or sick guy. the source of his wiretapping claim appears to be a concerted

radio he's. -- host. >> we have a prior administration barack obama and his sur grats who were supporting hillary clinton and their party using the instrew mentalities of the federal government shlgs intelligence activities to surveil members of the trump campaign. >> that's a voice to be believed. >> a spokesman says neither president obama or any white house official ever ordered surveillance on any u. official. >> if the fbi, for instance, had a court order would that be information you would know or not know? >> yes. >> you would be told this? >> yes. >> if there was a court order on something like this? >> yes! you can't confirm or deny whether it exists?

>> there is no fisa court order? >> not to my knowledge. >> of anything at trump tower? >> no. >> new york siems said james comey asked the justice department this weekend to publicly reject president trump's assertion of the tapping of mr. trump's phones. @president trump continues to push his wiretap narrative. he said the president wants congress to investigate. he said he doesn't think this president picked up the phone and asked his own fbi director whether or not it is true. >> has the president spoken about the allegations he made saturday morning and does he have confidence in his fbi?

>> i am almost 100% certain he has not. >> does he have confidence in his director? >> there is nothing that would ave to believe it is anything than it was prior. >> i am joined by hallie jackson. he doesn't need an investigation. he can call on his fbi director and said did you do any wiretapping on the subject of him. he didn't want to do it because he knows it is all nonsense. your thoughts? >> reporter: i can tell you what he said in that off camera gaggle. it was talking about the idea of potential interference, not wanting to be seen as any type to have d.o.j. or fbi activities. there were several others that dominated the discussion today about allegations that, as you note, are not proven or substantiated and the white house is not backing away from

and neither is the president. >> they don't even nak a nod to the need for evidence. they just make an assertion like this. barack obama hired plumbers and committed felony after felony on the side. there is no option here how it could have been the case and yet we have to cover like it is objective conversation going on here, like it could possibly be true. >> reporter: i would say this. you talk about the white house's response to this. the white house is not saying at all what the source is. you talked about bringing it up friday afternoon as well, the president's tweet coming on saturday. the white house said we are not talking about this anymore. >> sure, because spicer doesn't want to lie. sean spiers has enough

professionalism he will not tweet a repeat the president's words. he will not say that he believes that barack obama wiretapped trump. he doesn't believe that and he won't say so. i listened to his words today. it is all of this clever retreat. nobody over there will actually say they believe trump will they? >> reporter: the question is, when you talk about would what spicer is referring to, sarah huckabee sanders, they konlt to refer to this. the fbi would oversee any type of surveillance if it would ever happen. there's no evidence of that. the fbi under per view of president trump himself. >> i don't think they will repeat what he has been saying. it so ludicris and mickey mouse.

joining me right now member of the judiciary committee. i have been around a long time. i don't think either party has it figured out. this is below discussion. there is nothing to investigate. there was no wiretapping. there is no real serious charge here. he just releases these rabbits and people in the interest of so called objective journalism go chasing after him. how do you cover this? tell me, senator, how do you treat a president because he had a bad day with the press and starts releasing the claim that he is sick and he is nixon and organized some plumber's operation based on no evidence, none, just said it. >> i guess first you remind him there is a warrant application that's required before you can

have a wiretap and that the fbi does those and that the fbi is not under the jurisdiction of the intelligence committees. and that they actually report to him through the attorney general, so he could easily say, i direct my attorney general, my department of justice to make a public report about whether any of this happened. and of course it would come back negative. it raises a larger question that he is not just a candidate any longer. he is the president of the united states. when he traffics in alternate facts, when he traffics in fake news it sends a horrible message from the rest of the world particularly our friends who are seeing fake news and alternative facts as the strategy of putin. >> let me ask you as a political figure, why would anybody believe that was an illegal

immigrant, a fan of being who nobody knew at school who also said ted cruz's father helped kill jack ken dichlt they are recall out there and from the same mouth and brain of this president and then they -- would anybody believe this one? who are the people that would believe what's been disproven time an time again to have any a semblance of prove and continue to buy his act? >> when will republicans start standing up to the guy and say you know what? by any objective standard this is out of line on unhinged. it is not becoming for a president of the united states. people count on the president of the united states to tell them the truth. when you stop doing that and when you start politicizing the truth the ramifications of that run very very deep.

>> both mike warned as you said the president's tweets could undermine his credibility of commander in chief. let's watch him. >> he is trying to distract attention from what was a very very bad news cycle. the president of the united states put his own reputation of his nation at risk to get at least draw out of thnext 2 hours news. >> he also called my former boss a bad and sick. when you do that you lose credibility. you lose credibility with your allies and with the american people. >> what has to happen, senator, you're a level-headed guy. you're not like one of these people that tweets at 6:00 in the morning. i think the behavior itself is a question. what do you think of his stability. >> what do you think of a guy that tweets his --

>> it doesn't the message of stability that our allies are counting on. when he traffics in the exact same type of techniques used to try to undermine de democracy and makes an american echo of putin's technique, it is en more alarming. if you want him to be the leader of the free world you have got to stop him from engaging in this type of behavior. if he is going to be like a character on, you you know, a reality show of the modern white house that's one thing. people all around the world and people in this country count an a responsibility president. we are not seeing that right now. >> is he responsible? >> to me, absolutely not. that was a completely irresponsible thing to say. it was irresponsible in every conceivable dimension. it was irresponsible.

president obama is more popular than he is right now. it was irresponsible not knowing what the jurisdiction was. it was irresponsible suggesting this kind of thing happens in our country. it was irresponsible if every conceivabldimension. up next, this isn't the first time trump fanned the flames of conspiracy, how long can republicans afford to put up with this sort of stuff? this is hardball. every body is different, but everybody gets dry skin. feel moisturized without feeling your moisturizer with lubriderm. absorbs in seconds. moisturizes for hours. lubriderm. every body care.

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>> let me answer that globally. he is the president of the united states. he has information an intelligence the rest of us do not. that's way it should be for presidents. >> welcome back. that was kellyann conway defending that barack obama tapped trump tower. while republican lawmakers giving the president the benefit of the doubt they say that the burden of proof is on the executive barrage to provide material to support his allegation. let's watch. >> i have no incite into what exactly he is referring to. i would imagine the president and white house will outline further what was behind that akization. >> i think it is interesting the department of justice has not weighed in on this and looking forward to hear what they are going to say. >> it is hard to cross examine tweets. i need documents. there would be a paper trail, it is now controlled by the

executive branch run by mr. trump. >> well said. now the white house has asked congressional intelligence committees looking to russia's interference to also investigate the president's charges. the white house can really do a pretty good job of telling people what to say and answer questions. he said yesterday we will continue to investigate this issue if the evidence warrants it. i'm joined by jim and john. i don't say spicer is always totally truthful but they are all hedged in their bets. nobody wants to echo what the president has been saying here, the previous president, that he is some kind of crook, wiretap or felon. they will say things like he has a lot of information, like kellyann said. or he want to have a full investigation like spicer said.

none of them say i believe the guy. do you believe the guy? do you believe he has evidence? >> let me be the first to say that donald trump has information that i don't have. >> oh, here we go. >> here is the part i don't understand. during the entire campaign donald tru wasrilliant at hijacking news and news cycle. what part of us is surprised as president he would do that? >> so this is another rabbit chase? >> well, i think it is and i think he's winning. to me this is like -- >> so you don't believe him either? >> every time the liberals think they have him -- >> this is not about liberals. this is not a philosophical discussion. does he have evidence he was wiretapped by barack obama or not? do you believe -- >> but let me ask you this information. what do -- >> i'm just asking you a question.

>> i have no way of knowing that, just like you don't. >> you have to have something behind an assertion. >> but chris, all of this started with the democrats saying they had information about the trump and the russians. the only thing they have done is exposed hillary clinton was in -- >> okay. let me go on. we do know the russians said. there are a lot of context. i have been open on this every night. have they fill until this puzzle yet? no. there is a lot of frame work to it. a lot of evidence the russians on hillary losing and they lucked out and got trump elected. in terms of hacking the dnc, all of this evidence suggests a grand effort by russians to crew our election process up and hurt hillary clinton.

there is a lot of hard evidence that were never admitted to in the first instance people finally got caught. we didn't know jerrad was meeting with him at trump tower. michael flynn denied it. it has been kept secret and we exposed it in the media. i don't have the final answer but this other one has nothing to it. you know, john, it has nothing to it. >> why is the president saying this stuff at 6:00 in the morning on a saturday morning? take the day off, donald. >> the president is trying to deflect from all of the things you just mentioned. if they didn't do anything wrong they should stop acting guilty? why is it they won't tell the truth about the meetings chlts even tonight jeff sessions saying he didn't mislead the committee when he said he didn't meet with the russians. >> he said he was meeting with him as a senator, not as a surrogate. >> oh.

>> let me ask you this, whooi i know what's going to happen now, there will be hearings by nunez. they will accomplish nothing. they will just have to say was there any wiretapping? yes or no? have them come in. that doesn't take more than a few days. >> that's right. remember, a clapper said the same thing. he is director of national intelligence. he said they weren't doing it. >> it is the biggest nothing. >> and press secretary sean spicer was asked to we lap rate whether he believes a warrant was issued to improve a wiretap. >> does he believe it's a fisa warrant? >> it could be fisa, it could be surveillance. >> does he not know what kind of surveillance it was? >> i think there's no queson that something happened. the question is is it surveillance? is it a ware tap or whatever but

there has been enough reporting that strongly suggests that something occurred. >> i was too nice to sean spicer. he said we know there was something that we don't. if somebody else puts it out it doesn't mean -- that's not a news outlet. >> we don't know anything about this. here is the thing. let me say this -- >> you want do get in here? >> this makes no sense to me. if there's nothing there why is everybody objecting so much for it to be investigated? >> thank you. when we return, let me finish with trump watch. he is not going to like it tonight. this is hardball.

he did so without evidence, without even a nod to the fact that evidence might be relevant

when you're accusing an american president of a felony, a felony. trump is either saying that the fbi bugged him or president obama created an illegal outside group, a plumbers operation. if that's what trump means he should say obama created a plumbers operation that he went out during last year's campaign and found app ratives -- operatives to plant a wiretap. don't his fans remember he spent years saying obama was an illegal pim grant, don't they remember saying nobody knew him in school? the only conspiracy trump doesn't subscribe to is the one that 17 intelligence agencies actually took place, that putin over there and kremlin did everything they could to put guess who in the white house? that's hardball.

join me tomorrow night at 7:00 eastern. see you then.

tonight on "all in" -- >> the president's tweets speak for themselves. >> a furious president rages at leaks, at his staff and his predecessor. >> this is simply a president who cannot separate fact from fantasy. >> tonight the meltdown inside the white house with robert costa, the unprecedented rebuke from the president's own fbi director. the origin of donald trump's

latest baseless claims. >> this is not about president trump's tweeting. this is about the obama administration's spying. then -- >> it would be the biggest political scandal since watergate. >> why president trump's ongoing obsession with more nixonian than you might think. plus, meet the one man standing between democrats and a special prosecutor. and why today's trump travel ban, born from the trump muslim ban, may already be in trouble. >> we have no choice. >> when "all in" starts right now. >> good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. we are growing alarmingly accustomed to a president of the united states who makes incendiary claims with no basis in fact and a white house that stands by those claims despite all evidence to the contrary. today the white house is still fending the president's explosive and basele allegation that his predecessor