thank you so much for watching. "deadline: white house with nicole wallace" starts right now. fight of his life. the man with everything on the line today is not president trump. it's his second national security adviser, general h.r. mcmaster, a three-star general, who commanded troops in iraq and has placed every ounce of goodwill, a sterling reputation, and his credibility on the line to debunk a "washington post" report that alleged that donald trump may have betrayed an ally and shared sensitive classified information. a senior white house official who i spoke to throughout the day today insists that the report is not true and that it cannot be true, because donald trump did not know the source of the most sensitive information discussed. here's general mcmaster on that a short time ago. >> the president wasn't even aware, you know, of where this information came from. he wasn't briefed on the source and method of the information. >> we're going to get back to that briefing in a moment. but a few other headlines.

this senior white house official also told me there was no stenographer in the meeting between president trump and russian foreign minister lavrov yesterday and that anyone detailing what transpired is reading from his or her notes. now, that is important, because "the washington post" referenced a transcript. also from the white house, a post today as to how this got out in the first place, and it resembles that childhood game of telephone, with far graver consequences. a senior white house official telling me one aide described the meeting to a broader universe of national security and intelligence officials, who then shared is it with former intelligence officials, who then disseminated it to the press. before we break all of this down with a truly stellar panel of white house reporters and national security pros, i want to go back to general mcmaster's briefing from a little while ago. >> do you have anything to correct in terms of what you said at the podium yesterday afternoon? >> no, i stand by my statement that i made yesterday. and what i'm saying is really, the premise of that article is false. that in any way the president had a conversation that was inappropriate or that resulted

in any kind of lapse in national security. >> have you reached out to farther than partners who might have contributed such information to the u.s. and talk to them, try to reassure them? and if so, what was the reaction? >> i have not. and i'm not sure what conversations have been held about that. >> going back to what you were saying earlier, if there was nothing that the president shared that he shouldn't have shared, why did his national -- his counterterrorism adviser contact the nsa and the cia about what he had said? >> you know, i would say maybe from an overabundance of caution, but i'm not sure. i mean, i have not talked to mr. bossert about that, about why he reached out. >> all right. with me now from the white house, nbc's peter alexander and in washington, driandrea mitche nbc news chief foreign correspondent, phillip rucker. peter, first to you. and i think this news that broke in the last hour about who was said to be the source about that secret information. >> reporter: that's right. nbc news has confirmed that

israel was the source of that isis-related intelligence. this is based on three government officials with knowledge of this matter. so what's striking here is that israel was the u.s. ally that provided the u.s. this sensitive information and then it was the president who, according to these reports, handed it over to one of the u.s.' and one of israel's adversaries in russia. and of course, the primary concern for israel is that that information could be handed over to their arch enemy, an ally of russia, which is iran right now. we have heard from the israel ambassador of the united states, that's ron dermer. he wouldn't confirm that israel was the source of this intelligence, but he did post a statement and it reads, "israel has full confidence in our intelligence-sharing relationship with the united states and looks forward to deepening that relationship in the years ahead under president trump." it's notable that we have not yet heard from prime minister benjamin netanyahu. no immediate comment from him on this topic, on a day when we also understand that he met for the first time with the new u.s.

ambassador to israel, david friedman. nicole? >> thank you, peter. now, andrea, we are -- the president is wheels up for his first foreign trip in a few hours. not a few hours, a couple days. how does this play out when he lands in israel? >> israel is going to bend over backwards to try to smooth over any problems here. the israeli intelligence service, the mossad, and the u.s. have a very tight relationship. they work together with the cia and other agencies here, and the fact is that this is the most sensitive kind of information, information about counterterrorism sources. that is the kind of information where we need them, the saudis, the israelis, the jordanians and others in the region more than they need us in most regards. because they can blend in. they've got the people on the ground. it's very, very difficult for a u.s. agent, a double agent, to penetrate these kinds of terror cells. so, this was a real breach that should not have been disclosed

to the russians in this kind of casual way. the difference is, according to former deputy, cia director and acting cia director, john mclaughlin, who was talking to me earlier, if he were ever delegated, which he was, at times, to go to moscow or to go to the russians elsewhere and share something with them, there would be a very carefully vetted piece of paper for russian use and under that heading, they would then argue and vet every single word on that paper. and he would basically be reading from the paper. it would not be something very casually relaid by the president in an oval office meeting. a meeting that itself was controversial, as he told lester holt. the reason why he did it was that vladimir putin said, would you meet with mr. lavrov? and of course, lavrov brought ambassador kislyak, who is central to the whole russian probe, involving mike flynn. >> and i'm going to stay with you for a second, andrea. i know we are losing you. you are actually on deadline. isn't this the scenario that you

heard from intelligence officials during the transition that the deepest concern about the reckless tweets, about the intel community was this sort of lack of understanding on president-elect trump's part in how intelligence works. that we don't have spies all over the world. we rely on other countries' intelligence agencies to share. and that what we look at is actually a picture patched together from many, many allies. and isn't this sort of casual and what general mcmaster described spontaneous sharing, wasn't this sort of the nightmare realized? >> yeah, this is exactly the kind of concerns that they have. also, i've been told that people on the trip are trying to tailor this trip very much to support the president on his first foreign trip. he's stopping first in riyadh. that's a big meeting with 50 sunni arab leaders. and there's going to be a lot of the money changing hands in that the u.s. is going to be giving huge arms deals to the saudis in

particular and to the uae. but these are very big deals with supportive allies, the sunni arabs, against iran, trying to isolate iran. it's a well-thought-out trip. but now instead of studying up and preparing, he's spent the last ten days, at least, dealing with self-inflicted wounds, starting with the way they rolled tout firoll ed out the firing of comey. and the white house is in turmoil instead of a very carefully prepared run-up to a critical trip after the saudis, of course, going on to israel and then to a meeting with the pope and then on to a nato meeting. and in fact, foreign policy magazine is reporting that the nato allies have been told, the leaders have been told, keep your speeches short at these closed sessions, because they are usually very dispersive, very long-winded, and they all have been told that president trump has a very short attention span. so, this is a challenging trip in any regard, but now in the

midst of all of this controversy, it will even be more so. >> remarkable detail that you will only hear from andrea mitchell. andrea, i know you have reporting to get back to. thanks so much for joining us. phillip rucker, i want to turn to you and something we just thae heard from andrea about a white house in turmoil. what are you hearing this hour? >> it's been the same story for about a week now, which is that the president is very angry, he's upset, he's fuming. he feels like he's been let down by his staff. he seems unwilling to blame some of these mistakes on himself, and instead is looking for scapegoats, looking for people on his staff who have somehow been failing him on the job. a lot of the fingers are pointing at the direction of the communications office that's led by sean spicer, the press secretary, and mike dubke, the communications director. but it goes beyond that. and trump has been talking casually with some of his advisers inside the white house and more intoleramportantly to his friends outside the white house about a broader shake up

that could include the chief of staff, the chief strategist, steve bannon. we just don't know at this point what's realistic and what could take shape and if anything will actually happen before the president departs on that foreign trip. but his mind is focused on some sort of a change. >> peter alexander, i want to go back to the team that seems to be leading rapid response in their first fire drill, if you will. and this is really the first time -- i guess the second time, since the comey firing, that the white house has put out general mcmaster. i wonder if you have any insight into sort of additions to his responsibilities as now the president's chief defender? >> reporter: i think you're exactly right. what was notable here is that in the past, we've heard from sarah huckabee sanders, we've heard from sean spicer, from a variety of others trying to defend this president, but their credibility has been lessened over the course of the last several weeks and months where their public statements has been contradicted by the president himself, most notably the president's comments several days ago regarding the firing of james comey. so the decision to put h.r. mcmaster out there, who perhaps

is one of the best appreciated, respected individuals within this white house was notable, because he's a guy who has the credibility that they thought could best sort of put this issue to rest. he's a general. he's a guy who can speak with real knowledge about classified information and the declassification process. and also, the white house says, while the president himself had tweeted only a matter of days ago about the fact that, how can you affect my surrogates and even my aides to know, to be perfectly accurate, was his language. they don't know exactly what i'm thinking at all times. but the bottom line is, in this case, they thought h.r. mcmaster was in a unique position, because he is someone who sits in on these meetings. he, rex tillerson, the secretary of state, and dena powell were the only three, the primary three officials who are in there with the president at the time. the question is, how does the president feel about h.r. mcmaster now? is he satisfied with the way mcmaster has handled this so far? they are still putting him ahead as the face of this administration, as they combat this story. sean spicer's briefing today was

off-camera, only h.r. mcmaster was out there as the face of the mir administration today. >> and phillip, to you, is "the washington post" standing by all of its reporting, even in the face of the white house's aggressive pushback? >> "the washington post" stands by the reporting. it's a great story by my colleagues, greg miller and greg jaffe. and you know, it's interesting to note that a lot of the defense that you saw from h.r. mcmaster, the national security adviser today, was not over specific facts in this story. rather, it was over the suggestion that the president may have done something wrong. he said, there was nothing wholly inaccurate about what the president was doing in that meeting, but he did not contest the crux of our reporting, which is that the president shared information that was classified, that had been given to the united states from a partner. >> and to your point, he went on to say that that was spontaneous, and not only did he not refute it, he kind of leaned in. so congratulations on another scoop. thank you to both of you.

thank you, phillip. thank you, peter. let me bring in jeremy bash and juan zarate. juan, we have been talking all day, off-camera and on, about how what holds up this administration's credibility in a lot of ways are the essential pillers of mattis at the pentagon, mcmaster at the nsc, and our former colleague, dina powell, and they are for the first time spending from their credibility bank. how do you think this is going? >> well, they're being thrust forward, obviously, to defend the president and push back on the story. we've seen that. and i think h.r. mcmaster has a wealth of capital. >> talk about where that was built from. >> full disclosure, i know h.r. personally. i'm a huge fan of his. i love him. so full disclosure to the viewers -- >> hey, we have a segment called "full disclosure," so thank you for that. >> but he's a real warrior. he made his name in the first iraq war, where he led a tank battalion with great ferocity and great patriotism. has always been on the front lines, was part of the second iraq war. was in afghanistan.

has been an intellectual warrior. "dereliction of duty", his book -- >> it's amazing. >> -- is a renowned book talking about presidential leadership and military leadership and the responsibilities of leadership. so he came to the white house with a great deal of rebcredibiy on both sides of the aisle, seen as a nonpartisan, real professional. he's a three-star general, three acting in that capacity. and so he brings enormous credibility. and there's a reason why they're putting him forward. he was a fact witness to what was happening in the oval office. he's the president's national security adviser. he has great credibility. but what's happening is his capital and credibility is being put on the line here. and i think how we judge the fallout from this will begin to impact him, dina powell, general mattis, even general kelly at department of homeland security. these are really the pillars of the national security team and these are real pros. >> jeremy bash, i want to ask you about the white house explanation that this dribbled out from an aide, they've named

him, to the intel community, and to former intel officials, this scapegoating, is this the hot war against the intelligence agency 3.0, 2.0, 4.0 k? >> i think they need to take responsibility for what happened. first of all, the president did disclose classified information to the rupssians. that has not been disputed. second, he made the decision on the fly. third, they did not go back to israel, if israel was in fact the source of the information and say, hey, we would like to disclose this to the russians in this fashion, would that be okay? i bet had they done that, the israelis would have said "no." >> all right. don't go anywhere. we lost all of our white house correspondents because they were on deadline, as i said. but when we come back, how long can donald trump sustain a hot war with his own intelligence community, as we were just discussing. it started before the inauguration and there are no signs of a cease-fire. also, the case for impeachment. a highly respected legal expert from harvard says the time has come. he joins us today to explain why he believes the president pose that is danger to our government. and how is it possible that

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of the billboard music awards just by using your voice. the billboard music awards. sunday, may 21st eight seven central only on abc. i think the real issue, and i think what i would like to see really debated more, is our national security has been put t at risk by those violating confidentiality and those releasing information to the press that could be used connected with other information

available to make american citizens and others more vulnerable. >> the trump administration once again turning our attention to leaks out of the west wing. the president tweeting this morning. i have been asking director comey and others from the beginning of my administration to find the leakers in the intelligence community. trump doubling down on a war with the intel community he waged soon after taking office. at the table, jeremy bash, former chief of staff to both the director of the cia and the secretary of defense during the obama years and an msnbc and nbc news national security analyst. steve kornacki, msnbc and nbc news national political corresponde correspondent. msnbc contributor, jonathan capehart, and columnist for "the washington post," and juan zarate, also an msnbc and nbc news national security analyst. and we're out of time after all of that. >> go to break. >> okay, jeremy, let me begin with the last conversation we were having. >> and one of the pushback from the white house that your sources were telling you is that the president wasn't even told the sources and methods, therefore he could not have possibly disclosed -- >> we call that the ignorance

defense? >> well, i don't know what it's called, but it's wrong. and here's why. there's a lot of classified information that does not have the original sourcing information in it. in fact, if you looked a to the pdb, the president's daily brief, that book given to the president every morning, there's a lot of information there that doesn't have the sources. you would not give that over to the russians. >> can i ask you both a question? what is code? there's something in the fbi reporting about code words. what's that refer to? >> you have different classifications of different information. so you have classified information, secret information, top-secret information, and code word information. these are classified programs that are specific to particular programs -- >> streams of intelligence. >> streams of intelligence or particular programs. that's highly sensitive, because that often -- >> and that's what he shared? >> i don't know. that's what the reporting seems to suggest. >> juan, what was the point you wanted to make about the sources -- >> here's the point i want to make. part of the indignation of the article is that what he revealed was dangerous, because it revealed something, perhaps, about the source or method, something about where the

information was coming from. or in a way that would allow either the russians to take advantage of it or somebody else. i think what the white house is trying to say is, look, the president could not have even revealed anything that was not already known to the russians in a fundamental way and in many ways, didn't reveal sources and methods, didn't reveal anything particular to the threat reporting. and with respect to the russians, he was trying to make an effort to demonstrate some area of commonality, which we know the administration is trying to do. they're trying to build a base of cooperation on counterterrorism. >> is that a foolish endeavor? >> maybe, maybe. >> are the russians good partners? >> that is actually a better question. that's the fundamental question. >> what's the answer? are the russians good partners? >> i don't think they're trustworthy partners. in fact, the obama administration in 2016 shared very specific information with the russians, and what did the russians do with it? they didn't use it to go kill isis folks. they used it to go after

american-supported bases that we were -- >> they killed rebels. >> to kill rebels. so my argument is, let's have a broader debate about, should we be sharing and cooperating with the russians, and less about whether or not, you know, president trump revealed something that the russians didn't know. >> let me just press you. i mean, i agree with you, i've heard all -- i know you know general mcmaster, but why would he be giving the president the advice to try to cooperate -- he obviously knows what you know about russia. >> he's no -- he's no -- >> no dummy. >> he's no dummy on russia. he's a hawk on russia. and you look at the senior leadership of the national security team, secretary mattis, mike pompeo, these are not hawks. >> so why is donald trump sharing our -- >> well, here's the -- every president before donald trump has tried to create areas of cooperation with the russians. >> true. >> on counterterrorism, on counterproliferation, on drug trafficking, on a whole range of issues like north korea, where you try to build cooperation. jeremy knows this.

and so you try to find windows in. now, the other problem here is, you usually reveal this kind of information in a strategic choreographed way. what usually happens in the oval office is the president would say, look, we want to begin coordination. our people will share some information with your folks. then you would have a professional go and reveal the information in a professional way. you would check with the sources. this is much more spontaneous, less choreographed. and so i think the two fundamental issues are less about what we've been grappling with the last 24 hours and more about, should we be sharing information with russia? are they trustworthy. can we work with them in syria. and secondly, do we have a deficit of discipline around how the president handles national security issues and information? >> i think jonathan can answer -- i think jonathan's ready to answer the definicit o discipline question. >> yes, look. the problem here is not h.r. mcmaster. it's not dina powell. it's not general mattis. it's not general kelly. it's the president of the united

states. >> and what is the problem? >> the problem is, well, one, you so articulately pointed out what the problem is. the president's not disciplined. yes, presidents have always tried to reach out to the russians. every president thinks that he is going to be the one to change the relationship and then eventually four years in, seven years in, they realize, we can't work with they will. they're the russians. they are not interested in being our friends. >> especially under putin. >> right. right. so that the president would spontaneously share information with an adversary in the oval office is just mind boggling to me. >> to you and to jm. let me put up john mccain's statements and steve kornacki, let me get you to respond. john mccain releasing a statement to the effect of, "the reports that the president shared sensitive sblenls with russian officials are deeply disturbing. reports of this information was provided by a u.s. ally and shared without its knowledge sends a troubling signal to

america's allies and partners around the world and may impair their willingness to share intelligence with us in the future." it also, steve kornacki, seems to be accepteding insending a tl to republicans on capitol hill. i see the beginning of the unraveling. >> yeah, well, we've said that before, for the last two years. i don't know if john mccain is the barometer of that, because he is one of the first that trump attacked as a candidate. i think the bottom line thing we can say here at a very basic level, this is totally at odds with traditional protocol, when it comes to these sorts of things. if you are a republican and you're looking to sort of hold your fire on this one, if you're the republican and looking to give the president the benefit of the doubt, i think what you'll latch on to is basically what mcmaster put out today. essentially along the lines, what mcmaster was saying was, yes, he shared classified information. no, that information was not really damaging in any significant way. and he really wouldn't have had any way of knowing, because he's kind of lazy when it comes to this kind of stuff. now, you'll latch on to that in

this case, but of course the implications of that are, what is to prevent him when he has truly sensitive, truly damaging information, and he's in another one of these situations, what's to prevent him from blurting it out then? that seems to be the defense they're offering here. i don't know if it's much to hang your hat on, but that is what i'm hearing. >> the national security hawks are not going to give the president the benefit of the doubt here, is because it's about russia. and they are very suspicious. it's not that he's not disciplined. it's that, in fact, in some ways this may be deliberate or subconscious. there is an affinity towards russia. there's a spontaneous outbreak of affection. the idea that he wanted to give something to the russians to -- >> it's crazy! >> it is nuts. and i think that republicans on the hill are going to sit up straight in their chair and say, what is going on here with russia. >> okay, you're going to be hired full-time. that's a perfect tease. we're going to get to that. still ahead, a look at how both sides on capitol hill are exasperated over president trump's sharing of classified information with, jeremy? >> with russia with love. >> if the reporting is accurate,

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this is an incredibly dangerous situation. i think the president has endangered people who trust the united states, have shared information. >> i'm not disputing it. i'm not zmitadmitting it. i need to know more. we'll speak to the white house in the appropriate setting and go from there. >> we have a saying in the navy, loose lips sink ships. and the idea that not everybody who has a clearance for classified material needs to know that classified material.

and i think the president, from what i can tell, just violated both of those principles. >> democrats saying president trump has created a dangerous situation. republicans saying they want more answers. cia director mike pompeo is expected to head to capitol hill this afternoon to brief the house intel committee on what they know. joining us on capitol hill is mike viqueira. mike, is pompeo on the hill as part of the white house cleanup effort? >> well, mike pompeo is supposed to be here at a previously scheduled briefing of the house intelligence committee. the senate intelligence committee just broke up, as well. but you can bet that these members, members of the house of representatives, just back now from a ten-day break are going to be peppering pompeo with questions about just what happened, what he knows, and how badly this breach of classified information actually is. you know, nicole, it's not as if republicans on the hill are turning their back on president obama at this point. but i have to say, this is a little bit different from even as recently as last week, in the jim comey affair. they're not rushing to defend him, either.

there's always this balancing act, they're trying to find the right formulation to express just the right amount of concern, probably the word that we've heard most from republicans now is they're troubled or concerned about these reports. they want to hear more. we haven't -- we've been checking all day. as far as we know, the white house has not really come forward with any kind of full explanation for these members and their concerns. democrats, of course, are pressing their advantage here. chuck schumer, you could basically just ask him, what color is the sky today at his weekly press briefing, and his answer was, we want to see the transcripts. we want to see the transcripts from this interaction between president trump, sergey lavrov, and ambassador kislyak. so a great deal of controversy. obviously, everyone here at capitol hill is sort of walking on eggshells, especially on the republican side. >> mike ver querra, thank you.

this feels different than a week ago. the firing of comey, you could say, democrats were unhappy, he overstepped the normal bounds of this role, but a little more hesitant to go out and defend the white house today. >> yeah, i think there's a clear difference here. last week, they had something they could say proactively. here's the defense and here's the opportunity to go on offense and say, hey, the democrats are a bunch of hypocrites on this. because democrats have been talking about how terrible james comey is and suddenly they're evaluating him to sainthood. there was a lot more republicans could sink their teeth into. the problem here, what you're seeing from republicans, they're not offering as aggressive or as proactive a defense right now because they don't know what to say. i think they're looking at this and they're worried, is this going to a reach a point where we are now compelled by politics to speak tout againout against house. right now with what mcmaster said today, most republicans are going to resist doing that. we're not going to hear the kind of defense we heard last week,

but i don't think right now with mcmaster saying what he's saying, you'll have republicans rushing to the microphones to condemn him. >> what i think you need to do is look at comey and the oval office as a one-two punch. one, yeah, they could try to hang their hat on the fact that democrats were also hating on comey, but they had -- democrats had the larger issue of rule of law. the president just fired the guy who's in charge of the investigation into his campaign about russia collusion. and then you have what we found out, gosh, what is it, 24 hours ago now, that in that meeting, classified information was shared by the president of the united states, with an adversary, in the oval office. and i think then, you take comey plus this. that, i think, adds to the explanation that steve gave, which in the reticence of republicans to come immediately to the president's defense. it only makes me wonder, what the hell is going to happen next that will be the third punch that will actually get the

republicans to start doing what they're supposed doing by the constitution, and that is to be a check on the executive. >> and juan, how about ben sasse's comment? that's sort of where i am. it's just weird it's always russia, isn't it? >> and i think that's what's given this such life. it's the context of russia. it's the investigation, the firing of comey, the visit in the oval office, the russian press only in the oval office, releasing the pictures. and then now this, right? and so, it is the context of russia that feels very odd and feels suspicious, especially those who are skeptical of the president and suspicious of potential collusion, right? that's the theory, that this is troubling. i try to bring it back to basic principles. is what the president did, does that make any sense? was he trying to do something that's actually advancing u.s. interests? and i think, again, going back to this question of, can we trust the russians? can we work with them. certainly, we should try. but maybe not. and i'm no russian lover.

i think, you know, we should be incredibly skeptical. and secondly, how is the president managing these issues from a foreign policy perspective, especially at a time of heightened concern and interests with north korea, iran, and on the verge of this big first foreign trip? >> all right, we're going to hit pause for one skpeecond and get back to you. up next, though, a call for impeachment for one of the country's foremost constitutional law experts. harvard law professor, lawrence tribe joins me next to make his case. ♪

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use the chase mobile app to send money in just a tap, to friends at more banks then ever before. you got next? chase. helping you master what's now and what's next. i've been blind since birth. i go through periods where it's hard to sleep at night, and stay awake during the day. learn about non-24 by calling 844-844-2424. or visit my24info.com. it is my belief and i believe this insesincerely, thae president has obstructed justice. the president fired the person who was investigating him, impeachment does not mean that the president will be removed from office. it is merely the charging of the president in the house of

representatives. >> the "i" word, impeachment starting to be thrown around in washington. congressman al green of texas, calling for proceedings to start. harvard law professor, lawrence tribe, writing in an opinion article, saying the time is now for congress to act. democrats may not need much persuading to get onboard with such a charge, but what about republicans? joining us is lawrence tribe, constitutional law professor at harvard law school. i'm flanked by a couple of harvard law alums, but i promise i won't let that ruin our fun here. i want to read something from your piece, because this is the one that gave me a little jolt that i think a lot of us were feeling these days. it would require serious commitment to constitutional principle and courageous willingness to put devotion to the national interest above self-interest and party loyalty for a congress of the president's own party to initiate an impeachment inquiry. it would be a terrible shame if only the mounting prospect of being voted out of office in 2018 would sufficiently concentrate the minds of representatives and senators

today. what other than the risk of being voted out of office do you see motivating anyone to do anything? >> well, you know, maybe i'm an idealist, nicole, but i do think that people who go into public service, they want to retain their jobs, but they also, hopefully, at some level, care about the country. and when you said earlier in the program, i think talking to andrea mitchell, that what we just witnessed with the sharing of top-secret information, without even checking with its source, israel, with the top diplomats of all countries, russia, in the oval office, when you said that that was the nightmare realized, i think it's only installment one of the nightmare. you know, i think you were saying and senator sasse was saying that it's just weird, all of this affability with the russians. it's not so weird. just think about it.

it wasn't that long ago when donald trump jr., in a casual moment said, oh, yeah, we don't have to get money from american banks. it's pouring in from russia. we need to follow the money trail. when the president fires the guy who's on his trail, saying, but i won't necessarily fire you if you get off my back, that's really what happened in that sort of quasi-job interview with fbi director comey. that's all about russia. the president admitted it. russia is at the center of this. now, i've got nothing against russia. i'm a russian jew by heritage. but russia is not our friend in these matters. and when we have a president who has, as somebody, i guess, put it, a deficit of discipline, and when we know that he's got to have some good reason for hiding everything, for disgracing himself on the world stage through what is obviously a

strange cover-up, by not releasing his tax returns, it all adds up to at least good reason not to wait before we start the kind of impeachment inquiry in the house that could lead to a trial in the senate. >> okay, let me ask you this. i'm a non-lawyer, keep that in mind, and a follower of the political process, but i keep thinking that when ted olson and david boies join forces as two brilliant legal minds to try to bend the arc of history when it came to same-sex marriage, sort of the combustion of a democrat and a republican, agreeing and making a legal argument, they were able to change the course of history, change the course of public policy. do you harbor any hopes that you will find a conservative legal mind to match your desire to proceed with impeachment on these, i think, you lay out two pillars of the impeachment argument, right? the obstruction and i'm not going to say emoluments, because i can't define it, but the whole

bucket of things around conflicts. are you looking for or are you seeking conservative legal partners to help you advance that cause? >> i can tell you, there are a lot of conservative lawyers who agree with me, but are not yet ready to go public. >> are they in the witness protection program with the rest of the establishment republicans? >> i don't have the resources to provide witness protection. but richard painter, who was the ethics counsel in george w. bush's white house, you probably worked -- >> i know, he scrubbed my -- you know, i couldn't go to lunch with a reporter without, you know, proving to him that i bought my $4 subway sandwich. i know him very well. >> he is very much -- he and i are working together on suing the president. we sued him on the very first working day of this presidency, under the two clauses of the constitution. they have strange names. emoluments clauses. they sound like suntan lotion. but they are the clauss that are

designed to limit the chance that the president, when he does do weird things, like voluntash secrets with a particular country, is doing it because of a judgment it's in the national interest and not because it will help make him more wealthy. this president, we are arguing, from the very beginning of his presidency, was in defiance of the two clauses that prevent the president and his businesses from profiting as a result of foreign investments in basically the president's stock. and because richard and i and norman eisen, who had richard's role in the obama white house are working together with a bunch of other lawyers, not all democrats, on this fundamental cause, even though i'm the only one of the group who uses the "i" word, we're not that far apart. because all of us, i think, believe that congress has good reason to start an impeachment

investigation, whether it leads to a trial in the senate, we'll have to see. >> all right, thank you -- >> i'm not saying jail him, you know, i think we should start. >> all right. well, promise to keep us posted. it's an honor to have you here and we'll have you back anytime. >> it's great to be here. >> thank you so much. >> thanks, nicole. >> up next, the russia connection. why president trump would reportedly give russia's foreign minister classified information and how all of this chaos is being viewed in moscow. more people than ever are making the move to nissan. because of rogue, the best selling suv in america. titan, with america's best truck warranty. and the most advanced safety features on alitma and our best selling models. that's why we're america's fastest-growing auto brand. get 0% financing for up to 72 months on 11 models. ♪ i can't wait for her to have that college experience that i had.

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we had a very, very successful meeting with the foreign minister of russia. our fight is against isis, ascm. i thought he said, and i know he feels that we had actually a great meeting with the foreign minister. >> that was president trump in a press briefing with president erdogan of turkey. joining us now to talk about this is evelyn far cuss. msnbc news and natural analyst and a former deputy secretary of defense for russia, eurasia and ukraine. i promised i would come back to you. >> sally yates, the former acting attorney general went to the white house council on january 24th to talk about mike flynn and her concerns, we learned today in the interview she gave to cnn that she was concerned that he had violated federal criminal statutes. that the underlying contact was

possible illegal. what could those federal criminal statutes have been? my sense probably disclosing information in violation of -- >> where would he have done that? >> in the conversations with the russian ambassador on the day sanctions were being imposed on the russians. interestingly, that disclosure of classified information is similar to the disclosure of classified information in this case. it's a pattern here and this is what's concerning. it goes to the issue of why are we so eager to give russia our secrets. that's what's concerning people. >> evelyn, did you ever think you would get this question, why are we so eager to give russia our secrets? >> no, never. this is insane. i think we need to step back. why were the russians meddling in our elections? because they wanted us to be weak. they wanted us to be in disarray, fighting with one another. they wanted us to be questioning our democracy and questioning our democracy so we couldn't

push back on them in europe against what they're doing in ukraine. right now today there's a war ongoing in ukraine because of russian actions there. second of course syria. they want us to stop pushing back against what they're doing in syria, come to the peace table and take the terms they want which of course we can't accept, neither can the allies that we're with on the battlefield in syria. so i think it's really important to remember this all started because the russians wanted americans to be fighting amongst ourselves, to be weak as a country, and not to have a foreign policy, not to have a strong foreign policy to push back on russia. today h.r. mcmaster talks about this issue and about the trip that president trump is about to take but he doesn't talk about a foreign policy agenda. he doesn't say here are our objectives visa vee russia. none of that. very appalling.

>> steve kornacki has a question for you. >> please. >> bigger picture here because i was talking about this on the show yesterday. we can ask the question why does this stuff keep happening with the russians. is it intentional. is there some sort of underlying connection there? is there also, can you see a scenario here where, look, this is donald trump who in the campaign talked about he wanted to have a closer relationship with russia, and then all of the controversy over comey. it's a thin-skinned president who can't deal with criticism, who lashes out in a blunt and dramatic way, doesn't think of the consequences, won't back down. can you see a scenario here where there's a lot more smoke than there actually is fire? >> yes. but the smoke is disturbing enough because he's going down a path that's not going to bring the united states any benefit. if he thinks that buddy-buddying with russia and volunteering to them intelligence information from a foreign partner, foreign ally, is going to get us

somewhere with russia, that you can just butter them up and they're going to do what we want, he's wrong. he needs to study better and listen to his experts. he has an expert director now on russia who can tell him what motivates the russians, and what motivates them is when you stand up to them, you're firm, draw them red lines, tell them what u.s. interests are, what we expect from them and if they do more or less, then we're not going to play ball. >> we have to remember what the obama administration was trying to do. last summer the obama administration provided classified information to the russian government about activities on the ground in syria as a way to try to cooperate better with russia and to try to motivate -- >> we entrusted russia to remove chemical weapons from syria. >> exactly. the idea that cooperation or attempts of cooperation with russia just started with president trump is folly. all you have to do is look at how many trips secretary kerry made to see his counterpart,

foreign minister lavrov, and how many times we relied on the russians to try to get us out of problems. to include the chemical weapons deal, the red line that we did not enforce, and to try to push back and have the russians help us on things like iran where we agreed to the ballistic missile rollback because the russians wanted that in the deal. this idea that cooperation with the russians just started when president trump was inaugurated is just folly. >> i'm going to hit pause. we're coming back to you, jonathan, on the other side of the break. the table is jonathan capehart's, don't miss it. what's the best way to get

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we are back and the last word of the day goes to the one man at my table on deadline. jonathan, what are you looking ahead to? >> of course president trump but three things. his draining credibility of the president himself and the administration, the draining of trust in anything that the president says or anything that comes from the administration, particularly the white house podium, and then the fear factor. i interviewed senator chris kunz in his office yesterday and asked him, he's a yale divinity graduate and i asked him are you praying any more than normally and he said, yes, i'm praying for president trump and i'm praying for all of us. this is a u.s. senator who is fearful for the country right now. so those are the three things i'm looking forward. >> no draining of the swamp. you see draining of other things. >> it's overflowing. >> thanks to an awesome panel. that does it for this hour.

i'm nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. >> it's only 116. >> you with your numbers. >> we're only on day 116. >> how has it only been 16 days since 100? that's what i'm grappling with. >> unbelievable. nice show. thank you. if it's tuesday, is it ever okay for a president to reveal classified information? tonight the fallout. >> what i'm saying is really the premise of that article is false. >> national security adviser h.r. mcmaster says what president trump told the russians in that infamous meeting was wholly appropriate, and then points his finger at the press. >> i think national security is put at risk by this leak and leaks like this. defining success, president trump gives his characterization of that meeting. >> we had a very, very successful meeting with the foreign minister of russia. and remember this? >> she mishandled classified information and now