disgusting,s a slop, criticized her in the first debate. the feud between the two of them dating back more than a decade. i'm peter alexander. follow me on twitter @peteralexander. instagram, @peteralexandertv. "deadline white house" with my friend, nicolle wallace, begins right now. hi, everyone. i'm nicolle wallace. it's 4:00 and our own lester holt is on deadline today with president trump and his first sit-down interview since the bombshell firing of his fbi director. president trump is contradicting his vice president and members of his senior staff in that exculusive interview detailing his determination to fire james comey. he also revealed to lester the specific circumstances in which he took the rather unusual step of asking the fbi director if he's under investigation. let's watch. >> look, he's a showboat, he's a grandstander. the fbi has been in turmoil, you know that, i know that. everybody knows that. you take a look at the fbi a year ago.

it was in virtual turmoil. less than a year ago. it hasn't recovered from that. >> monday you met with the deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. >> right. >> did you ask for a recommendation? >> what i did is i was going to fire comey. my decision. >> you had made the decision before they came in the room. >> i was going to fire comey. it's no good time to do it, by the way. they -- >> because when you -- you said i accepted their recommendation. you had already made the decision. >> i was going to fire regardless of recommendation. he made a recommendation, highly respected. very good guy, very smart guy. the democrats like him. the republicans like him. he made a recommendation, but regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey. >> let me ask you about your termination letter to mr. comey. you write, "i greatly appreciate you informing me on three separate occasions i am not under investigation." why did you put that in there? >> because he told me that. >> he told you were under investigation -- >> yeah. >> with regard to the russia

investigation? >> i heard that from others. >> was it in a phone call? did you meet face-to-face? >> i had a dinner with him. he wanted to have dinner because he wanted to stay on. >> he asked for the dinner? >> the dinner was arranged. i think he asked for the dichb dinner. he wanted to stay on as the fbi head and i said i'll consider, we'll see what happens. we had a very nice dinner. at that time, he told me you are not under investigation which i knew, anyway. >> that was one meeting. >> first of all, when you're under investigation, you get all sorts of documents and everything. i knew i wasn't under. i heard it was stated at some committee, at some committee level that i wasn't. number one. then during the phone call, he said it, and another phone call, he said it. he said it once at dinner then he said it twice during phone calls. >> did you call him? >> in one case, i called him. in one case, he called me. >> did you ask, am i under investigation? >> i actually asked him, yes. i said, if it's possible, would you let me know, am i under investigation? he said, you are not under

investigation. >> but he's given sworn testimony that there's an ongoing investigation into the trump campaign and possible collusion with the russian government. you were the centerpiece of the trump campaign. is he being truthful when he says you're under investigation? >> i know that i'm not under investigation, me, personally. i'm not talking about campaigns. i'm not talking about anything else. i'm not under investigation. >> lester will join us later in the hour with more details from that stunning interview. but first, i want to bring in my panel, malcolm nantz, msnbc terrorism analyst. steve kornacki, nbc news and s msnbc national correspondent. john heilman, co-anchor and troublemaker, co-anchor of the book "game change." in washington, msnbc political analyst glenn thrush. chief white house correspondent or the noo"the new york times."

phillip rutger for the woe "washington post." you you wwrote the most astonis print stories. glenn, i want to start with you and your piece detailing how the president obsessed with loyalty felt like comey was a rogue operator who could not be trusted as the fbi investigated russian ties to mr. trump's campaign, obsessed with independence, mr. trump was the ultimate loose cannon making irresponsible claims on twitter and jeopardizing the bureau's credibility. what, given your reporting, do you think james comey will make of president trump's comments to lester holt today? >> boy, isn't that a great question? i wish we could get rid of this panel and just have him on, right? >> we tried. no offense. >> everybody's trying. look, i think comey -- my suspicion is comey's voice will be heard at some point in the not too distant future. yeah. but let's just say that his feeling -- the feeling was very much mutual to president trump. our reporting show that comey

thought that trump was, quote/unquote, crazy. by the way, i've not -- i don't believe that word has appeared in quotations in "the new york times'" lead in quite a number of years. and he just felt he was irresponsible. so you had two men with startlingly different views of what an fbi director ought to be, and what was really remarkable is we've seen this procession of white house officials including the vice president coming out and telling what appears to have been an entirely air stat version of events the deputy attorney general essentially told the -- the stunning thing is the president sits with lester holt and said i was going to fire them, anyway, leaving sarah huckabee-sanders and mike pence hanging out to dry. >> right. phillip, icht to bring you in on this, your piece which is just as astonishing said the state of rationale was he had committed,

quote, atrocities, never seeing the probe into hillary clinton's use of a private e-mail server. the private accounts of more than 30 officials, that's your business these days, need 30 officials, paint a far tifr sna centered on the president's brewing personal animus toward comey. it sounds like it spilled over. lester holt got an earful today. >> one thing after another over a series of weeks and even months where the president turned on comey. he was upset that comey didn't back up his baseless claim that president obama was wiretapping trump tower. he was upset with a number of other things. he got really upset last week when comey was testifying in the senate and talked about having been nauseous at the idea of influencing a selection and again and again, whenever comey came up in the news or was on capitol hill or was in public, the issue was always russia, which is the issue that trump wants to disappear. the russia investigation is,s in fact, very real and it bothered him that comey kept at it and

kept digging in and finally over the weekend when he was at benminster, new jersey, at his golf club, he concluded comey had to go and he came back to washington monday morning, started talking to his aides and set in motion a serious of evess that concluded obviously with the firing. >> one more question to both of you, because lester moved this story forward in a big way. >> he did. >> by getting the president on the record saying it was my plan all along. my question to you first, glenn, was he liying -- was it an air kiss to the fbi director? lying when he said he's doing a great job? take us inside the mind of the man you cover. >> good luck with that one, huh? i mean, he just tweeted out i think in the not too distant past a 2007 tweet by rosie o'donnell his arch nemesis before hillary clinton was his arch nemesis, before james comey was his arch nemesis where she called for comey -- not 2007,

from last year, where she called for comey to be fired. >> we've got that up on the screenreached out to see if she has any comment. >> he's changed his tune on comey essentially varying with what comey was doing. he was very high on comey during the initial announcement of the hillary clinton e-mail investigation. i think this just goes to show that we have in this president a person who assigns moral goodness and evil depending on whether or not a person is doing something that is in his own interests. you see it with the press. he tends to really like reporters and feel that they're good reporters when they write good stories. i think james comey very much fits into the same category. >> exactly. phillip, one more to you. what do you think about what he thinks -- i watched the fallout from the comey investigation and to me, having worked inside the white house communications apparatus, my judgment was that this was the biggest debacle since muslim ban 1.0 was rolled

out. what's your sense -- there are professional people inside the white house. they haven't been able to rein a guy who thinks he's still telling people they're fired as the host of "the apprentice." how are the professionals around him dealing with this today? >> not particularly well. i talked to one white house official in the west wing yesterday who said this was absolutely the worst pr disaster that they've had since he took office. the problem is that donald trump, president trump, made this decision in a very small circle of advisers. he did not bring in his communications strategist, his press secretary, sean spicer, until about an hour before the news hit the wires. before the news bulletins went out. there was really no time to put together a plan and then trump went back to the residence in the white house, turned on tv and watched the cable news coverage for the next several hours and started fuming there was nobody out there defending him, the white house wasn't putting someone on camera, there wasn't a real explanation and rationale from his own staff. he feels like we has a very large communications staff and didn't understand why they

weren't out there trying to defend him. now, the problem over the last several days has been that the defense, the explanation, keeps changing every single day and the latest version of events is not in keeping with what president trump, himself, told lester holt in that very good interview. so it's a continuing problem and i think they're still trying to wrap their arms around it all. >> if he went back to the residence and watched cable coverage and got mad, i'm guessing he saw you. >> no, not on that particular evening. >> i saw you this morning, you've been pretty harsh on this white house. what do you think's going on? >> what i said this morning, i'll say again. if you look at just the coverage, the coverage has been extraordinary as it has been now for months, we've seen newspapers performing at very highest levels including "the new york times" and the "washington post." if you look at the conflicting explanations over the course of the day, the incredible penumbra of ostensible explanations and if you look at what the timeline is according to what we now have reported by, estimateable news

organizations including those two and others it seems obvious as a prima facia level they're trying to cover up the truth of what happened in i instance, more warrantly whimportantly wh trying to cover up by removing comey, donald trump is trying to cover up whatever is at the heart of the russia story. it's still a huge open question what that is does it touch the president or only his associates? does it touch his businesses? does it touch his family? is it personal? is it financial? is it sexual? i don't know. the way they're bebehaving, lie firings, they're behaving like people who have something very bad they're trying to keep from becoming public and that's the dictionary definition of a cover-up. that's what we're in the middle of. >> this idea that they are covering up something, it seems like unless you have something to cover up, why do you ask three times if you're under investigation? >> yes. although, again, i don't -- i mean, we now have a version of the truth from donald trump. a set of claims. you know, at this moment,

those -- the claims he's made about those three questions to jim comey have important political and legal implications, but it's not clear to me -- >> put the legal aside. what are the political implications? >> it's not clear to me they're necessarily true. i'm not saying they're false but it's not clear to me that they're true because donald trump said many things over the past six months, the past 18 months that have been demonstrably false or proven to be false later. so i'd like to hear jim comey's version of those conversations before we make an adjudication about whether those three instances took place or not. >> you've been on the russia beat as much as anyone. what do you think happens to the russia investigation with the head of the bureau taken out at a time when most people will admit on background that on all fronts, it's heating up. >> it's going to have to continue heating up. the president is making sure that that will be the case. i mean, we have the consequences playing out right now of a president who's obsessed with watching television. you can see over the past few months it's not as if jim comey was giving random interviews to different news organizations. he was testifying, he was answering questions that were

directed to him specifically about russia. what we've seen happen is a president growing inkrecreasing angry with the answers he was given. when he was saying -- >> do you think he was going to stop it by firing the fbi director? do you think in his mind that was the consequence of firing jim comey? >> well, it was a terrible mistake if that's actually what he thought would happen because we're talking about it right now. we've heard mccabe say this is actually not going the way, that they're investing a lot in this investigation and it will continue over the next months or years even. >> all right. i'm not ignoring this side of the table. we're going to come to you guys as soon as we come back. coming up, another day, another fbi director on capitol hill facie ining tough question about the fate of that russia investigation. plus, help wanted. the white house is looking for a permanent replacement for jim comey. you might be surprised by one of the names being floated and who floated it. and night at the white house. the "time" magazine reporter who spent 100 minutes with president trump that included a rare look inside the president's private

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we've heard in the news that claims that director comey had lost the confidence of rank and file fbi employees. you've been there for 21 years. in your opinion, is it accurate that the rank and file no longer

supported director comey? >> no, sir. that is not accurate. i can tell you, sir, that i worked very, very closely to director comey from the moment he started at the fbi. we are a large organization. we are 36,500 people across this country, across this globe. we have a diversity of opinions about many things, but i can confidently tell you that the majority, the vast majority of fbi employees, enjoyed a deep and positive connection to director comey. >> so i want to take this to you, malcolm, what do those counterterrorism employees of the fbi in particular do now that their boss was ostensibly fired for pursuing the russia investigation? >> i hope the counterterrorism guys are keeping their day job. it's the counterintelligence officers, the spy hunters of the

united states who the run ones investigating this case. this is amazing. i mean -- >> does this affect their morale? obviously i misspoke. >> no, no. >> what happens to them when the head of the bureau is fired for a variety of reasons? what happens to their investigation? >> nothing happens to their investigation. >> are you sure? >> i mean, you know, you can say through implication that the president of the united states shot a warning shot across their bow but this particular division of the fbi, these are people who hunt america's enemies within the united states. this is not a normal investigation of the fbi by any stretch of the imagination. they are looking for americans or foreign espionage officers who have had communications and effected this cyber warfare operation against the united states. to tell you the truth, it's a career maker for some of them. they're not going to let this up by any stretch of the imagination. >> do you think it affects the morale? some people observed today that they doubled down, now they make sure -- >> oh, yeah, i think that's

exactly what's going to happen. these guys are bloodhounds. they're going to say, you know, anyone who tries to come and cob instruct justice with us, you know, having any type of discussion with them where you lie, any type of, you know, obstruction of justice, that's felony for them. and that's their greatest tool. i think this is only going to deepen their determination to get to the truth and i don't think it's going to be anything other than the fact that the truth is going to come out of this. the president could have been an solved of all of this. we don't know, but when they get to the bottom of it, whoever's in the way, anyone that's had any contact with any foreign intelligence, anyone that may be a part of a plot, they're going to find out and they're going to regret it. >> steve kornacki, you had interesting observations today about sort of the lines between lies and incompetence and what was that? >> i just -- i look at this whole thing and i think there's an interpretation here where we are seeing the trump that we have seen all along. what are some of the characteristics that defined trump as a candidate and now president? he's very impulsive, pretty much

winging it. he doesn't think in terms of complex strategy, i'm going to do this, i'm going to follow it up with this. it's going it have this effect, i'm going to counter with that. >> he's not a chess player. plays whack-a-mole. >> not playing three-dimensional chess. also has no permanent alliances or personal loyalties. he's subject to turn on you if you look at him the wrong way, if you say the wrong thing. so i add that all together and i think of it, there is an interpretation here where donald trump personally is confident that he is in the clear when it comes in this question of russia and collusion. people in his orbit, people in his universe, no way for him to know for sure, you can only tell -- >> it's like he doesn't even care. he's like, i was told i'm good. >> he was driven by this sense of i know i am in the clear and i'm going to just -- that's it, you've got some nerve. >> i heard that in the lester answer, too. i want to bring back our guys in washington because you, i know, were covering and tweeting along with the white house briefing today. i want to play some sound from sarah huckabee-sanders today and

have you respond on the other side. >> i don't think there was ever an attempt to pin the decision on the deputy attorney general. well, look, i think his rej, again, it was extremely clear. the president, though, makes the decision. the buck stops with him. nobody's ever tried to say that this wasn't the president's decision, that he wasn't the one that carried it out and to try to, i think, conflate those things is just not what took place. >> glenn thrush, my brain may be too simply wired for this, but there seems like a very clear effort, kellyanne conway stood on the north lawn and read from the memo, from the guy that was supposed to be in charge of the decision to fire james comey. so what am i missing? >> listen, it's just entirely ridiculous to believe what your eyes see or what your ears hear. i mean, why would you possibly go with what they've said yesterday?

today's today. it's a -- >> whole new day. >> a totally different set of facts. i mean, it's just a through the looking glass situation. you know, i personally like sarah huckabee-sanders. i think she has certain virtues at the podium. she -- you know, i think this is a very difficult baptism by fire for her. that said, yesterday she was banging this drum as hard as humanly possible that rod rosenstein provided the rationale for the president to do this and today she says you crazy craven obsessed media are, you know, keep hitting this story line when, in fact, that wasn't the way it went down at all. and then at the very tail end of the briefing, she said, look, i was acting -- and this was the most telli inin ining thing, i g before i had spoken to the president of the united states about this. >> i've spoken for a president, it's usually a good idea to check in with him before you go on television. listen s listen, we weren't perfect but i made my visit on the way to the

reporters, not on the way back. >> the other thing, nicolle, the president of the united states for all of his flaws, seem to be fairly accessible. >> right. he's not busy. >> i'm -- right. people are walking in and out of the oval office. you know, it's not as if he sort of has a sentinel like reince priebus the chief of staff is standing there be a baseball staff not letting people come in and out. i don't understand why it that we have this confusion when the facts seem in the way that trump talked about it to be really clear. >> phillip, your paper had incredible reporting about press aides and the bushes and i'll stay away from the bushes because, man, you don't touch the shrubbery on the white house. it's like museum quality. but what do you make of how sean spicer and sarah huckabee-sanders, how are they doing this week? i really do think this is one of their sort of -- it's up there in the pantheon of public relations debacles so far in this young presidency. how are they doing? >> well, it's difficult to

assess that. i would say that the president, president trump, is quite upset with how his communications team is doing, but i don't think that's really fair to pin it all on them. they're actually trying to take orders from him. they're kept in the dark about things until, you know, right before the news breaks. and then they have to, like, kind of put together a plan to explain the firing of the fbi director and that's difficult and they're not getting clear facts at the front end. i don't think they knew, frankly, tuesday night the reason comey was fired because the president, himself, for several days now decided he wanted to fire him. the explanation that they were given to go tell all of us was this was all because the deputy attorney general recommended it and trump followed on his recommendation and every day the story changes and that's because the president's story is changing and i think the problem here is that the white house isn't getting ahold of the set of facts. they're not able to make the convincing case because the facts keep changing. there are a lot of alternative facts here and that's the problem. >> and we're back to alternative facts.

thank you, glenn, phil, thank you, malcolm and john. you're leaving me so soon. >> thank you. >> we'd never leave you. the new acting fbi director taking issue with one of the president's claims about his old boss, james comey. plus lester holt will join me with more on his exclusive interview with president trump. we'll be right back. so when i need to book a hotel room, i want someone that makes it easy to find what i want. booking.com gets it. they offer free cancellation, in case i decide to go from kid-friendly to kid-free. now i can start relaxing even before the vacation begins. your vacation is very important. that's why booking.com makes finding the right hotel for the right price easy. visit booking.com now to find out why we're booking.yeah

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monday, you met with the deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. >> right. >> did you ask for a recommendation? >> what i did is i was going to fire comey. my decision. it was not -- >> you had made the decision before they came in the room? zblifs goi >> i was going to fire comey. there's no good time to do it, by the way. >> in your letter, you said i accepted their recommendations. you had already made the decision. >> i was going to fire regardless of recommendation. he made a recommendation. he's highly respected. very good guy. very smart guy.

the democrats like him, the republicans like him. he made a recommendation, but regardless of recommendation, i was going to fire comey. >> lester joins us now from washington with more on his exclusi exclusi excuse interview with the president. congratulations, lester. this was a stunning moment to be there with the president. i saw kellyanne in the room. what's your sense of how they're reacting to this seismic fallout from the comey firing? >> i think they're finding their full voice at this point. i think it's fair to say that they were a bit surprised at the backlash given the amount of criticism from both sides of the aisle that have been aimed toward comey over the last year. and to suddenly see this onslaught. it appears maybe it wasn't totally thought through when you consider the russia investigation that comey was leading, but i think there's a sense of now they have found their voice and that's to come hard and come strong at comey. the president using terms like grandstander, a showboat, being

very personal, very critical making this seem like an urgent matter that he had to go. >> i wrote down those words, i watched your interview come in, i wrote down same things you just said, he called him a showboater and a grandstander, said this was my decision all along. he seems to speak with such conviction even though his aides were out with a completely different story yesterday. do you get the sense that in the moment this is exactly what he thinks or did you sense anything from anyone in the room about how they might be on shaky ground here? >> well, there are other people who spent a lot more time in that building across the street than i do, who probably have a better read on that, but i think we all recognize that sometimes they're not always on the same page. listen, we've all known president trump even before he was president. he is his own man. and, you know, he makes his calls. he does things as he sees fit. and i don't know that he always necessarily communicates those things to the people who stand up at the podium in a timely way. and i think that may -- this is just my speculation, that may explain some of the disconnect

between some of the narratives of how this went down. >> you covered a lot of ground. is there anything -- did you ask him about the meetings yesterday with russian officials, the russian foreign minister was in his office. minutes after this news broke. >> yeah. >> did he have anything to say about that? >> at one time i said, the optics of this, you decide to make this firing the day before you're going to sit down with lavrov and the russian ambassador and he said, look, i'm not about -- i can't remember the term he used, but essentially not about optics and he wouldn't reschedule it based on that. that these were important meetings. then he went on to describe his other contacts with world leaders and the importance of that. >> he seems very proud of the foreign policy team and he seems eager to sort of share with you and others how well he's doing on foreign policy. did you pick up any sort of excitement or sense from him this is one area where he's doing well? >> he does. he likes to make that point and we all know he has had successes

on the foreign policy front. we talked a little bit about north korea. i raised the issue that there's a new incoming president who has a little more liberal stance coming into south korea, what that would do in terms of negotiations with the north. and he reiterated that he would be onboard under the right circumstances to engage in talks with kim jong-un. we talked a little bit about isis and afghanistan. i said, you know, you showed some emotion after the chemical attack. he talked about the pour children. would you allow those children to come in the country as refugees? and he went into his defense about, you know, you can't be too careful, you've got to worry about terrorists, that they should create safe zones for these folks. >> i know you have to go to your own brast. i broadcast. i'm burning with questions. i saw you asking him over and over again about his questions for the fbi director about that investigation into his campaign. he made perfectly clear that to you i guess that he wasn't under investigation, but was there anything else on that front?

>> well, that was interesting, i went back and read the transcript and he says, he makes a distinction, "i'm not under investigation." >> right. >> i'm not talking about campaigns or anything like that. so by extension, he leaves room to understand that this investigation that comey had been leading which is into whether the campaign had any contacts with the russian government by extension, that means, you know, he is part of that campaign technically could still be linked in this investigation depending where it goes. >> it's an incredible interview. thank you so much, lester, for talking to us about it. >> any time. >> everyone stop whatever you're doing, watch "nightly news" tonight were his exclusive interview with president trump on "nbc nightly news." we'll be back in a moment. instead of getting so lost in the process, did this happen at 12:01 or 12:02, did he fire him because he wore a red tie or blue tie? he fired h ed him because he wa fit to do the job. it's that simple. [fbi agent] you're a brave man, mr. stevens.

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joining me on set now, columnist of the "new york post," steve kornacki is still here, joel benenson, senior adviser to hk hillary clinton, before that barack obama. we started the show with a tweet from donald trump where he's trolling rosie o'donnell. put it up, saying "we finally agree on something." an old tweet from rosie, he called for the firing of fbi director james comey. rosie responded on twitter. i sent her a text and sid what do it you think of trump trolling you? she said, it's a clear indication of his seriously declining mental health, this is no joke. i said can i read your text in she said, sure, tell the truth. what do you make of this, steve kornacki? twitter war with donald trump and rosie o'donnell. is this how you want to see his time -- >> look, if he want to have the debate over whether and how he should be using fwiter, that goes back to january 20th. i give you 1,000 examples that

are probably worse than this one. on the scale of things he's tweeted, i think this one, it was a bit of -- it was a troll, a little funny. i think there's a bit -- a point there. we have to admit, democrats can certainly make the argument that they had concerns, they had questions about james comey and worse, but they think this is the wrong time and the wrong way to fire him. that said, some of the rhetoric you had from comes you have to say, for instance, maxine waters from california, said after receiving a private briefing from james comey back in january, james comey in her sviw had no credibility. how can you say it's essential to have james comey overseeing the russia investigation, how can the investigation produce a credible result if you believe the man has no credibility? some of the rhetoric democrats offered about james comey is trouble for them right now as they try to make this case. it is a bit of a delicate dance for them. >> i remember talking to you, joel, on the night the comey letter came out, it was a friday night, right? i think i -- >> really? you remember that that specifically? >> i remember two nights i talked to you. >> october 28th to be exact. >> it was before i went on "the

11th hour," some ungodly hour. called you saturday night before the election. we'll save that for another show. i mean, do you think it's funny donald trump is trolling democrats who once thought comey should be fired but now think the russia investigation is so important he should have stayed there and finished that work? >> here's what i believe, i was a critic of james comey on october 28th. clearly, democrats and republicans at the time said he was violating longstanding fbi traditions and procedures to not do things that interfere with an election in the last 90 days. he definitely violated those rules. he's not a night in shines armor. on the other hand, we have this investigation into russia which, you know, in reality, what we've seen is meddling in our election. last week we saw it in france, one of our strongest allies. we have a president who's been in office more than 100 days and has not said a single word. let's be clear, russia is the strongest, most anti-democratic power on the face of the earth. we have a president of the

united states ostensibly the leader of the free world. he hasn't said a word about it. a lot of this stuff about comey is a bit of a distraction. i think this is how donald trump operates. when you talk about all this press stuff that's going on back and forth, he believes his greatest chance of successes distract twr -- >> shiny object. what do you think the republican party stands right now on the question of whether they understand putin's motives, whether they understand the ramifications of what trump just did by firing james comey. four exemptions, john mccain, jeff flake, most republicans seem to sort of fall if line. >> i think they've been put in an untenable position. you have a new president, he is acting in ways that either they're going to have to separate themselves from him, if anything goes wrong, if the story of the ongoing investigation is bad, they are in trouble going into 2018 because they are allied united with him in a partisan

connection. if it goes nowhere -- >> what's so weird is we used to be the party that spoke the way john mccain and lindsey graham speak about russia. >> right. so you have this -- you have this -- the constant truth about trump, you see this actually in the behavior of sean spicer and sarah huckabee-sanders yesterday and today is that he seems to require that his -- the people who work for him and the people who are in the party for him bend the knee. like, it is important for them -- >> very russian. >> it is important for them -- it is like, i'm sure it's an asset to sarah sanders that she lied yesterday and lied today, that when she gets off stage -- >> like she may be -- >> when you gets off stage and goes back, he's like you did great. that's the way to do it. >> untenable position, james comey is a republican the president is bad mouthing. meantime a few hours later he's slapping the back of sergey lavr

lavrov. >> if you're a republican on the hill, a senator up for re-election in 2018 or one of the 242 republican congressmen who's up for election in 2018, maybe you might have a challenger. you don't want to be on the wrong side of this story, on the one hand, and don't want to be on the wrong side of the story of your leader -- >> there's only one right way. >> hit pause. we'll come right back. still ahead, dinner at the white house. the "time" magazine reporter who spent 100 minutes with president trump including a rare look inside the president's private quarters. he joins us next. what's that?

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we've been talking all hour about lester holt's exclusive interview with president trump coming up on "nbc nightly news." "time" magazine revealing their new cover story. nearly 100 minute wide-ranging interview with president trump, with donald trump weighing in on everything from what's on his tivo to the meal they enjoyed together. we have so lucky that joining us now to discuss this interview is zeke miller, white house correspondent at "time" magazine. zeke, thank you so much for being with us. >> thanks for having me. >> this was extraordinary and my favorite parts are the lighter humanizing moments. i want to start on a more serious note. it's the same question i put to lester holt. this president seems very proud of the relationships he's built on the foreign stage. on the world stage. and he says at one point the world used to laugh at us but they're not laughing now. does that seem ironic in the wake of the kind of weak he's

had? >> certainly there's an element of irony there in terms of the way the world views american domestic politics. when president trump was talking to us on monday night, he was pointing to things like the fight against isis, again the steady parade of isis leaders and various countries whether it be iraq, syria or afghanistan taken off the battlefield in recent weeks as part of his stepped up efforts there. president trump said we'd hear some more about that in the coming weeks. also talked about things like his relationship with president xi of china or president el sisi of egypt. talking about bringing back the american aid worker who's over there. and there's a lot of nuance in all of those cases, obviously, but in the president's mind, those are being under cover and it was a nice window into the way the president views his foreign policy but also views that through the media as well. >> i won't waask you to give aw your trade craft.

he felt comfortable with you guys. he showed you what was on his tivo. what did you watch? >> the sally yates and jim clapper testimony on monday testifying before the senate. it wasn't exactly his primetime lineup. but, you know, the president was essentially giving us his color kmem te commentary in his private dining room off the oval office pointing out when he thought senator grassley did a great job questioning or lindsey graham, he's a good questioner. then analyzes the responses to the crowd reaction. it wases almost like watching, you know, color commentary in a football game. >> my colleague, steve kornacki, has a question for you, zeke. >> everybody knows donald trump, people who don't like him, people who like him, know him as the character first from the reality show, now obviously now as the president of the united states, but in the exposure you had, did you see any aspects of his permisonality, that you saw side of donald trump that the rest of us watching him through tv all these years haven't seen before? >> i think this is something a

lot of reporters see when they meet him in person or visiting dignitaries or business leaders, they say when they heat him in person that the president is very warm and welcoming when you meet him, he wants to get you on his side. that's his goal. throughout the interview, the tensions seemed to be, he was trying to sell us and the american people there us, our stories, trying influence the story by being very gracious, very, very hospitable. i think the tension throughout the story is he's having trouble figuring out why he can't have that relationship with the american people. why his poll numbers are where they are why. he is getting blowback from capitol hill. in person, he is a very different person than you see on television. >> can you talk about any sense you got from him on the story surrounding tension within his administration? specifically steve bannon, jared kushner, reince priebus, what is his relationship with them like today compared to three months ago?

>> one of the things he went out of his way, monday there was a story about general mcmaster, he went out of his way to knock that down. it seemed to us that there is less of attention. there are certainty tensions over ideology in the white house but almost these two different structures. the institution of the presidency in the west wing which includes bannon and priebus. the folks trying on get the government running on time. then there is almost the trump organization that has moved down to washington that are there to protect the president, preserve his interests. and the president certainly is the leader of that organization, as well as the other one. where he spends time in his office protecting himself, being his own best story teller. >> zeke miller, congratulations on the cover story and thank you for being with us. >> thanks for having me. >> so his strategy is to soften up the press one journalist at a time. are you a candidate? >> apparently not.

no one has made any phone call to me. i'm struck that he's made all these gestures and visits. yet at the same time once a story like the comey story hits, "the new york times," the post, there are vicious details about his behavior being leaked if inside the white house about him. raging, screaming at people, throwing things at the television screen, deciding to get rid of comey because he's mad with the sunday talk shows which is not a good spin for him. it makes him look petty and silly and not a serious guy. the simplest thing to be said, if you're going to get rid of your fbi director, the president has lost confidence in him and his judgment. and instead you get the wild stories about the deputy attorney general's doing. and then everybody who is working for him, the people who work for them, are speed dialing

reporters to say, to spin awful things about him. this is a terrible press strategy. terrible. >> for someone who cares so much about his coverage, what do you think explains it? >> the die animaleck where they're all on speed dial. >> first of all, i think he thinks he can always control the narrative. i think this goes back to his days in new york where co-influence a couple of tabloid writers. his fake publicist. he was the creator of fake news. i think he believes, he is a very egocentric guy. i don't just mean in terms of the power. there's a permanent government in place, some of them are in the white house. a lot of people who are still in that executive operation who were not flut by donald trump. they have access to information. his obsession with leaks is probably well founded from his

perspective but he won't stop it. the more he obsesses about it, the more there will be more leaks. >> a good point. a surprising name floated in the seven for the new fbi director. you mean after that? no, i'm talking before that. do you have things you want to do before you retire? oh yeah sure... ok, like what? but i thought we were supposed to be talking about investing for retirement? we're absolutely doing that. but there's no law you can't make the most of today. what do you want to do? i'd really like to run with the bulls. wow. yea. hope you're fast. i am. get a portfolio that works for you now and as your needs change. investment management services from td ameritrade.

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a better moment of proof. ask your doctor about victoza®. just when you thought you heard the last of president obama's unsuccessful supreme court nominee, he is back in the news. mike lee tweeting that president trump should nominate merrick garland to be the new fbi director. what do you think? not a bad idea, right? >> i don't think it is a great idea for trump. >> is it a good idea for merrick

garland? >> god, no. i don't think the judge should take that job from donald trump right now under any circumstances. >> this is a troll on mike lee's part. because garland is on the d.c. court of appeals. the balance of the court of appeals is will he be ral. not conservative. were he to leave the court of appeals, he could tip the balance to the right. it is a little bit of a game. >> my sources -- >> a very smart guy. >> and making republican nominations. so my sources at the white house suggest that the search for an fbi director hadn't begun at the moment that comey was fired and they were casting, i won't say a wide net. mike rodgers is a name that came up today. what do you think about this process to replace the fbi at the moment when the investigation is heating up? >> the spotlight would be on them. it is a thankless job. you have all this pressure on

you. it would look terrible if the president were once again to fire you. but the president has been able to get away with almost everything he's done. >> can you imagine the president firing a second fbi director? it seems this might be the one person he appoints could never be fired. >> this is a very important decision. this is one republicans on capitol hill are pinning their homes on. the idea of a special prosecutor, an independent commission, if republicans feel they can point to the next choice to they had fbi and say this is an independent person. someone who will maintain the investigation. this is not a trump crony. they want to point to this person and say we're okay. you can trust this person. you don't need the special prosecutor. i think it is important to keep republicans in line, that this not be seen as someone who will go in and do trump's bidding. >> that raises another important issue. think of what he's done to the republicans on the him.

if he had fired comey and at the same time announced i am appointing so and so, he would have will be given them something to latch on to. comey is in the past and we have this great person. >> all right. we'll pick this up ahead. thank you. that does it for this hour. i'm nicole wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi, chuck. you've had a busy day. >> so have you. >> you had a great panel. i promised some poll numbers so stick around. if it's thursday, it is a parade of contradictions. good evening. i'm chuck todd here in a very wet washington. welcome to mtp daily. we have a ton of breaking news to get to this hour. the fallout from the president's decision on fire the fbi director has m