facebook and instagram @alivelshi. snapchat tth@velshi. thank you for watching. "deadline white house" with nicolle wallace starts now. with no room for error, all president trump had to do was stick to the script. instead he seemed to out israel as a source of sensitive information, information he shared with russia weeks ago. >> thank you, guys. thank you. >> hey, hey, hey. >> keep up. >> just so you understand. i never mentioned the word or the name israel. never mentioned it during that conversation. they were all saying i did. so you had the story long. never mentioned the word israel.

>> now this is cig kachsignific because the defense offered by senior white house and national security officials was that donald trump could not have outed sources and methods because he wasn't briefed on them at the time. it's just the latest example of how you can take the president out of his scandal-plagued white house but you can't take the scandal out of the president. nbc's kelly o'donnell joins us from jer use lusalem along with michael crowley in washington. kel kelly, i want to ask you on this narrow question of whether or not the president outed israel, something that the white house and the administration had never acknowledged and i didn't hear anyone in that room ever asking the question, how does the white house explain how this came to be one of the stories coming out of the stop today? >> reporter: well, the white house is not explaining yet and they have a tendency to say the president's words speak for themselves. really benjamin netanyahu sort of teed up this moment by taking reins, himself, as the handlers

in the room were trying to usher the press out of the room. you saw people were sort of passing in front of the normal camera shot where he said the intelligence relationship with the u.s. is good. that sort of opened the door for donald trump who really had to stop everyone, it was one of those moments where it was really interesting to watch sort of the momentum of trying to usher people out and he stopped. he waited and then he made this statement specifically referencing israel. so in a way, in a much more subtle way, benjamin netanyahu acknowledged that israel was a part of this. reports had indicated that they were the source of the russian conversation intelligence, but you're right, the u.s. government had not specifically said that. what they had said was the president never revealed sources and methods and did not know the source of where this intelligence came from that he shared with the russian foreign minister and ambassador. so apparently the president has read up on this now and knows that the israel issue was sensitive and it seemed to be the only off-script moment today and it was a big one. it was notable but it was also

prompted by benjamin netanyahu who wanted to say to the world, without a question being thrown, that the relationship on intelligence was okay. we know from other reporting that israeli intelligence has concerns and there are questions about whether other intelligence partners may also have concerns, but in that moment, the friendship, the bond, the trip, the scope and magnitude of the moment, they both went off the cuff in a very memorable way. nicolle? >> thank you, kelly o. michael crowley, i want to ask you about the consequences of this, first of all, the strategy of keeping the president in the dark about the sources and methods of the intel that he's receiving in the oval office simply to protect said sources and methods is the first part, but the second, what about the impact for more nervous allies? i mean, not all of our friends are as loyal and as tolerant as the israelis. >> no, absolutely not. i mean, i think that the nervous allies may welcome the idea that trump is being kept in the dark.

i think that what happened today, it's not a game changer, it's not a claolossal error but it's indiscreet. that is the concern that this is a president who doesn't always think before he talks or know in this new realm he's in of classified information and state-to-state secrets what he is and isn't supposed to say and allowed to say. so i think it's going to reinforce nervousness, particularly, you know, if there are countries that might not want to be seen to be working with the united states, i mean, obviously israel has a very strong relationship with us, but there might be some countries that are helping us out that don't want that to be known at all. and i just think that if there's any close calls in the future where countries are deciding whether or not to share intelligence, they might hold back or i think quite likely we're going to start'i inseeing possibly unprecedented

conversations and i think they've probably been under way since the inauguration, foreign intelligence services want to know how much about this are you going to tell the president? if you do tell him about it, can you assure us that you're going to present it in this way where you remind him the importance of not describing this part of it or what the -- anything about what the origin of it is. i think if those conversations haven't already been happening, they're going to be -- they're under way already right now. >> kelly, one last question for you, i feel like i've been watching you for 22 straight hours. i wonder if the white house feels like until this moment with the president on script, that they had started to get a little bit of traction between the trip, the stop in saudi arabias and the stops in j jerusalem until this moment. >> reporter: i think they can identify a number of areas where they see victories and progress in the way the president was received both in saudi arabia with the wider group of arab and

muslim leaders from around the world and certainly here in israel. in many ways, they fill focus on those things. in some respects, the same impulse that caused the president to speak about these intelligence matters with the russian ambassador and foreign minister is much the same impulse that caused him to talk about it today to try to fix it with his friend, the prime minister, and in front of the world media. so in some ways the thread is easy to connect. for the white house, i think their view is this is not new information and a president who is so unconventional did not need to put a staff on this to say, yes, it was israel, that that was sort of out there earn though it was not officially sanctioned. well, the president who can declassify can also retroacti retroactively sanction what was being released and that's what me did today. he did it looking at benjamin netanyahu as well for some sort of, perhaps, validation then of course we saw them together later and there was no sense that there was any harm done.

it's something we're talking about, but i think the white house is viewing this as a thread that needed to be answered. it was answered in a rather trumpian way and they're going to move on. >> all right. kelly o., thank you so much. awesome reporting from the trip so far. thank you so much. michael crowley, you're going to stay with us, but before i bring in our entire panel, i want to show you how national security adviser h.r. mcmaster answered a question yesterday about reports that tie trump's firing of james comey back to mother russia. >> "the new york times" is reporting that's here what the president said in the meeting, "i just fired the head of the fbi. he was crazy. a real nut job. i faced great pressure because of russia. that's taken off." is that what the president said? >> well, i don't remember exactly what the president said and the notes that they apparently have i do not think are a direct transcript, but the gist of the conversation was that the president feels as if he's hamstrung in his ability to work with russia to find areas

of cooperation because this has been obviously so much in the news. and that was the intention of that portion of the conversation. >> wow. so it sounds like the white house is now leaning in to the rationale that everything trump does is to clear the way for better relations with russia. even firing and disparaging his fbi director. on the panel with me today, "new york times" op-ped columnist frank bruni. nbc national correspondent steve kornacki. yahoo! news anchor and rush russia expert, biana. and also in the witness protection program with me, michael steele. i have to start with you, because i feel -- i'm going to get to your piece because i think it hits the nail on the head in terms of some of these political professionals in trump's white house and the keepers of the campaign flame, if you will. were you surprised to see mcmaster say trump felt hamstru hamstrung, ties with russia? >> i think he's trying very hard

to maintain his own credibility while also defending the white house. there have been moments where he seemed to come to trump's defense in a very rousing way. that tape right there viewed to me as he was confirming that trump called comey a nut job. >> i don't know that there's any other way to look at it. >> you go back to the initial stacandal and the sort of follow-up was, oh, he didn't reveal the source. in fact, i think mcmaster said the president said -- >> i have that. i have that. biana just mentioned -- we have that. mcmaster saying he didn't reveal the source because he didn't know it. let's watch. >> the president wasn't even aware, you know, where this thf information came from. he wasn't briefed on the source of method of the information. >> so the theory of the case is he's not guilty of leaking sources and methods to russia, not because he didn't want to or wouldn't, but because we didn't allow him. >> right. he said he probably didn't even know, of course, the president, once again, throwing one of his, you know, top esteemed advisers under the bus. he was out there over the weekend obviously trying to defend the president's actions. he was the first person to come out along with dina powell to

say they didn't see any problem with what the president revealed but the president right now coming out and i think critics say back then it's easy for russian intelligence to piece together who this source was. now they don't have to do that. >> don't you get the sense the president doesn't know who he's allowed or isn't allowed to do? seriously, one of the problems here, he hasn't educated himself on what the boundaries are. >> a politico piece, one problem mcmaster is facing, says this is top secret, don't repeat it, the president's top instinct is to really lee perepeat it. >> let me bring michael l crowley into the conversation. i feel like if i could see you, can't right now, i feel like you'd be shaking your head. does this make us look what around the world? >> it makes us look like amateurs. i mean, the world hasn't experienced anything like this. it's a president who's really not ready for the job. now, you know, trump fans might say he's going to grow into it, he's an outsider, this is why we voted for him, fine, but the fact is, you knows, he seems not

to have known what he was getting into. he had no experience with foreign affairs or classified information or diplomacy. and so the guy is learning on the job and it's like learning how to fly a 747 passenger jet for the first time when you're in the air. it's really dangerous. and it makes people extremely anxious. and the bad news is the learning curve seems to be pretty slow. you know, i mean, trump's been doing this for a few months now. it's not that lodgeng a time bu enough to have sat down with a lot of smart people to say here are the boundaries, here's what you can do, at a minimum, play it safe. if you're not sure what to say, keep your mouth shut. he's not a guy who keeps his mouth shut. i think this may well get worse before it gets better including on this trip and the next few days. >> steve kornacki, there are reports about how foreign leaders were told to keep their speeches really short because he doesn't have a long attention span. they were also told to congratulate him and praise him for his victory last november because that's what he likes to

hear. does this sound like anyone within the mainstream of anything we've ever seen before? >> it stounounds very much with the mainstream of everything we saw in the donald trump campaign. that's what i was struck by over the weekend. i think it was marco rubio who made the point if you just use donald trump's campaign for president as a template, only when you do that does what's happened since he was inaugurated start to make sense. i mean, remember, it was a controversy, it was a source of outrage from the establishment folks out there during the campaign when donald trump had loose lips about the intelligence briefings he received as a candidate. we saw that during the campaign. >> that's right. how about that, michael steele? how about our party sitting by with the few notable exceptions, i'm keeping score, i've got five now, with a few notable exceptions, most of them keeping their mouth shut about a guy who's spilling secrets in the oval office to the russians of all people. >> which is why the whining now about the president is, to me, a little bit disingenuous because it's not like we haven't seen this movie before. in fact, we were, you know -- >> didn't jeb bush say i told

you so? >> you have jeb saying i told you so. and there are a number of republic chance who are now in that space. but the thing about everything that's been said at this table, for me, the underlying idea for donald trump goes to the heart of who he is. he uses everything for leverage. information, people, ideas. so the information that he's taking in in these briefings he sees as leverage when he's in conversation with foreign leaders like putin or his representatives. >> but that's -- >> he doesn't make that connection. he's not making that connection to the point to everything else about the importance of not saying that you can't say this. >> i think leverage is way too kind a word for it. i think he sees all this as opportunities to puff his chest up. when he turned to the media with netanyahu and said just so you know -- it was a moment where he wanted the spotlight back, he wanted validation, he needed to defend himself. i don't think he's looking for leverage. i think he's looking for opportunities for self- --

>> there's the side where the negotiator in him, wants to when he's in those conversations with netanya netanyahu, whomever, kislyak, whomever, he can get the information he has to get he thinks is the best deal. the problem is that's not how our foreign policy works. you keep a lot of stuff to your chest, play your cards very close, don't give an indication where you want to go even with our allies. your point is exactly right. that's the problem. he wants to play the hero role. >> i read the book "the art of the deal" and that is the one big thing i took away from is. those two things ain donald trump's mind, being a negotiator, appearing to be strong and puffed up are the same. he doesn't think he can negotiate unless he shows you how tough -- >> go ahead. >> that's not a good formula. i'm just saying, as a matter of explaining, i think that's the logic. >> go ahead, bianna. >> one missing variable, unlike real estate, donald trump hasn't proven to know anything about the middle east or foreign policy so it's really hard to

negotiate my nush sinutia. no one said we could do it before -- >> i have a word for that on the street, fake it until you make it. >> we're going to hit pause. thank god they're going to be here for the whole hour. still to come, rod rosenstein, the man behind the memo that detailed the case against jim comey. what we're learning about his decision to appoint a special counsel to investigate team trump's ties to are russia. also looking for the exits. republicans begin their slow crawl away from president trump. and up next, he wanted immunity. now michael flynn takes the fifth. so why would he do that? >> there are five people taking the fifth amendment. like you see on the mob, right? you see the mob takes the fifth. if you're innocent, why are you taking the fifth amendment? got it. rumor confirmed. they're playing. -what? -we gotta go. -where? -san francisco.

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michael flynn, donald trump's ousted national security adviser, now pleading the fifth in the senate intelligence committee's russia probe. refusing to comply with the subpoena. but nbc has just confirmed that paul manafort and roger stone, two other trump associates at the center of the investigation, are cooperating. they've already turned over requested documents to the committee. nbc's kasie hunt joins us from capitol hill. oh, a sight for sore eyes. good how i've missed you. welcome back. what do you know? >> reporter: thanks, nicolle. great to see you. welcome to msnbc 4:00. it's great. we're really happy to have you. so, michael flynn, we know, is now planning on pleading the

fifth in this investigation into russia meddling. the senate intelligence committee wanted to know by wednesday if there were any documents outlining meetings he had had with russian officials, meetings or discussions he had with the trump campaign, and essentially their argument is, look, if we turn over material related to that or we acknowledge that any of that exists, it is essentially going to be providing testimony that could be -- that could incriminate michael flynn in the context of all this investigation. and of course, the criminal probe, the one that could actually have severe consequences, the senate intelligence probe wouldn't result in criminal charges, but, of course, any evidence or information gathered in the course of the probe could then become fodder for a criminal investigation and we know that that has been ongoing. so at this point, we're not expecting anything else regarding the committee and flynn at this point. we know that we have seen a copy of that letter as of this afternoon, although the committee has yet to confirm that they have received it. that, of course, coming from

flynn's lawyer, nicolle. >> now, one of the rationales in the letter is the media frenzy. obviously i think it was march 31st that he sought immunity. that has nothing to do with a media frenzy, that has to do with some concern, i would assume, about legal jeopardy, o no? >> reporter: it would seem that way. they're essentially arguing, look, there's a frenzy around this in the media, also members of congress who have called for investigations, prosecutions, they say, look, this contributes to kind of an overall atmosphere that would make it potentially more problematic for him to testify. but the bulk of the letter from his attorney really is focused on proving that producing these documents would constitute testimony on the part of flynn because essentially, you know, invoking the fifth means you don't testify against yourself. so they kind of is to prove, look, if we provide you with these documents, that would amount to testifying against himself. so i think that that's the more important of the two legal arguments here. i think, you knows, you obviously have seen a lot of

litigation of this in the press. you've seen kind of a lot of smoke around this, but i think your point is well taken that the fire is around the potential for legal jeopardy. >> all right. kasie hunt, thank you so much. thanks for that. glad to see you back. all right. i want to bring in paul butler, former federal prosecutor and a professor at georgetown law school. paul, take us through how you get from seeking immunity to asking -- to pleading the fifth. >> so, there's different rules regarding the fifth for personal testimony and documents. you have a right not to testify if your answers would get you in trouble in criminal court. now, some members of congress have called for charges to be brought against michael flynn, so any competent defense lawyer is going to tell him to take the fifth. documents are different. you don't have a fifth amendment privilege against turning over documents, but you do if the act of production would tell the government something that it

doesn't know about you already like the documents exist or that you control them. that usually doesn't work. it's kind of a hail mare ary pass by defense attorneys. so i think at some point, mr. flynn will be compelled to turn over those documents and you start talking about immunity. >> what is usually happening when you get to the point legally when you're throwing a hail mary pass? what could be happening? what could they be responding to? what kind of pressures could be bearing down on their team? >> a couple things, first of all, right now, nicolle, the government has enough information to charge mr. flynn. reportedly he lied to the fbi when he told them he didn't have any conflicts or any communications with the russians. >> and paul, would that be like a perjury charge? what would he be charged with? >> yeah, it would be false statements. 1001, used to bring those cases all the time when i was a public corruption prosecutor. his lawyer also says he has a story to tell, he wants to

snitch. now, that story's only significant if he can deliver someone higher in the food chain than he was. he was the national security adviser. so we're looking at the president, the vice president or top officials in the white house. he may get immunity, so it's a long way from now, it's going to be the decision of robert mueller, the special prosecutor, and, again, only if flynn has a very big fish to deliver. >> all right. humor me, i've never been anywhere near law school and i admitted to ari melber i learned everything from watching "l.a. law." it used to feel like we you pleaded the fifth, it was because you were guilty of something. what about just the optics of either flynn being guilty of, like, something you described, lying to the fbi when they came to interview him about the speeches, or could it be something bigger? i mean, is there still a concern, perhaps, that he's covering up for the president? >> you know, it's one of these areas where you get different advice from political advisers than you do from legal advisers. any good defense attorney is

going to say, shut up, look, congress is out to get you, you need to keep your mouth shut and don't say anything you don't have to. the political advice is very different in part because of the optics you mentioned. as many times as us professionals say just because you take the fifth, it doesn't mean you're guilty, most lay people including the president of the united states don't think so. >> paul butler, you are the good sport of the day for humanerihuy nonlegal mind's questions. hope you'll come back. >> great to be with you. >> even chris christie today piling on flynn. i think we have that. >> that's what i said. yeah, he's not my cup of tea, michael. you know, if i were president, i get to decide who comes in and doesn't. i mean, could go on a tour if i wanted to. that's what i said, if i were president, i wouldn't have let general flynn -- that's not my choice. it's the president's choice. the staff is staff, michael.

remember, remember what nancy pelosi said about ronald reagan, too much chief and not much staff. >> always good when you can throw in a quote like that. chris christie's battles with flynn i think probably cost him a job on the transition and maybe even a job in the white house. flynn's been like that flashing red light now for months. >> he was a flashing red light long before the president took office. i mean, what's amazing if you go back in time and look at some of the things mike flynn has said and mike flynn has tweeted, how did he get close to donald trump as a candidate in the first place? >> nobody thought he was going to be the nominee is the answer, right? >> we're all intrigued by what match happened. if you go back more months, mike flynn even gets stranger. >> largely because president obama fired him. he was fired by president obama. >> more importantly, he's donald trump's guy. he was there from the very beginning and he stayed with him throughout so that loyalty bond that he has -- >> he's not loyal to anybody,

michael. he's not loyal to chris christie, not loyal to newt gingrich, not loyal to -- >> he's loyal to flynn. he's loyal to flynn. >> why? >> what does mike flynn have on him? >> because flynn was -- i don't know, maybe there's something in the backstory. there was something about flynn getting out in front early and being with him the way he was. >> no one was more out front than newt gingrich. >> my theory why trump is to loyal to flynn, the way trump sees it, if flynn goes down, flynn takes any hit, flynn is the kind of person that trump's po poent opponents and critics say they undermines trump's legitimacy as president. not a personal bond of loyalty, it's hey, that sense of -- you know, he's so aggrieved at any claim he didn't really win the election, oh, clinton won the popular vote, oh, russians, oh, wikileaks, that gets him so defensive. i wonder if that same instinct is attached to the status and fate of flynn, if he sees mike flynn going oun, he sees that's something his opponents will seize on to say, there is something brig to this stuff we've been talking about that delegitimizes -- >> trump by proxy?

>> if flynn survives. that might be how he see ts. >> also interesting to watch is the flynn/kushner dynamic. >> talk about that. >> these two were very close. we know flynn was with kushner when they met with kislyak and also when they met with the ceo of a russian bank that was sanctioned. obviously, both gentlemen did not disclose those two meetings. even more interesting is that kushner has volunteered in the past to testify. so we shall see. we heard -- >> you think that ever happens? you think kushner testifies? >> i'm not holding my breath, especially after the news of the past two weeks. we even heard last week reports that kushner and ivanka both sort of promised them this job for his loyalty. >> right. >> to trump. >> all right. up next, eye of the storm. what we're learning about the man who appointed a special counsel to investigate russia. mom, i have to tell you something. dad, one second i was driving and then the next...

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deputy attorney general rod

rosenstein has been on the job for less than a month, but he now finds himself at the center of two controversies surrounding the white house. the firing of fbi director james comey, and the investigation into alleged ties between donald trump's presidential campaign and russian officials. "the new york times" writing on sunday that, "lawmakers and former colleagues were left to wonder how an experienced and scrupulous lawyer known as being apolitical allowed himself to be drawn into a highly politicized firing either as a willing participant or an unwhiting accomplice." joining us to talk about this is one of those form eer colleague fomp former maryland attorney general doug gantsler, worked closely with rod rosenstein. thanks for being with us. >> my pleasure. >> i had reporting at the time there was exasperation on both ends, the white house would have liked to have seen deputy attorney general rosenstein defending the memo, and why white house officials were standing on the north lawn reading from his memo as the

rationale for firing jim comey. can you speak to either of those? >> you have to take a step back, you said it in your header, rod rosenstein is as apolitical as you can get, a prosecutor's prosecutor, completely ethical, completely aboveboard which is why he's somebody in his background actually participated in the ken starr investigation yet and was appointed by a republican president yet was able to be the united states attorney in maryland, one of the most democratic states in the country, throughout the entire barack obama administration. this is a guy who has an impeccable reputation and really wants to serve his country. he served as u.s. attorney for 12 years. he then accepts the position of deputy attorney general which is kind of the best job you can have and in some ways in this particular administration when you have donald trump as a real estate casino guy and jeff sessions as a politician senator who hadn't practiced law, rod rosenstein was basically going to run and is going to run the united states department of justice on a day-to-day basis and he wanted to do that. then what. s was they wanted to get rid of

comey and wanted to get rid of director comey because director comey was escalating the subpoenas into the investigation of donald trump. rod rosenstein, in fact, any deputy attorney general would not have the authority to make a recommendation or decision to fire an fbi director. it's just not done. j. edgar hoover wasn't fired. william sessions s was fired because of his own ethical problems. don't fire an fbi director particularly for the sole reason because that person is looking into the president. what rod rosenstein was asked to do was write his thoughts about why, you know, what he thought director comey had done wrong during the clinton year -- during the clinton investigation into the e-mails and there was a lot of people who had a lot of criticism about that and so he put that down there but he didn't say you should fire me, he said these are reasons why you could. all of those reasons are actually true and rod rosenstein's view and many people's view but they existed for the four months prior to that, for the four months prior to the escalation. so then the entire trump

administration tried to blame rod rosenstein, throw him under the bus for the firing of director comey, and rod rosenstein and everybody who knew him knew that couldn't have been the case and wasn't the case. and so, typical rod rosenstein fashion behind closed doors, behind the scenes, he clearly pushed back so that by that night, donald trump, himself, was saying, you know what, it was my idea to fire director comey, not his, and then rod quickly became the hero in this whole affair by appointing bob mueller as the special counsel. bob mueller actually was my boss at the u.s. attorney's office in the homicide section and like rod, he is apolitical, beyond reproach, just -- he is not going to be influenced by political winds. he's going to do the right thing for the right reasons and be able to articulate those reasons. so now that's why we are really truly between rod rosenstein and his selection of bob mueller truly in potential impeachment territory where we weren't necessarily prior to this. >> you talk about being an

impeachment territory. you think we're in impeachment territory because of what bob mueller might discover in the special counsel investigation? >> yeah, i think donald trump firing director comey, by doing so, he bought himself bob mueller who's a real prosecutor, real law enforcement -- >> i feel like you censored a thought. what were you going to say? he's a real? >> he's the real deal. you know, he's very smart. i mean, i dealt with him on a couple high-profile cases when i was in the u.s. attorney's office. i've dealt with rod rosenstein, high-profile cases when he was the united states attorney for maryland. these are two guys that are not political hacks. they're the opposite of political hacks. and i don't think they're going -- that anybody in the trump administration and the amateur hour that's sort of going around that administration is going to be able to get to bob mueller. he's going to conduct a fair, ethical, aboveboard investigation and the chips are going to fall where they may and i think by trump firing director comey, he bought himself a true investigation that could

ultimately lead to the downfall of this administration. >> wow. thank you so much for your thoughts and for your time. i hope you'll come back. thank you very much. >> thanks. when we come back, we're going to get into republicans and their slow crawl, it might be a little faster if they heard that interview, away from this president. >> it's time your the "your business" entrepreneur of the week. michael is a frustrated musician turned urban winemaker. he started city winery to put together all of his loves. it's a restaurant, a winery and a music venue. he's taken the leap, expanding now to five cities. for more, watch "your business" weekends at 7:30 on msnbc. will your business be ready when growth presents itself? american express open cards can help you take on a new job, or fill a big order

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welcome back. i want to get reaction from you, michael l steele, about what we just heard from attorney general doug gansler. i mean, i was surprised to hear him invoke impeachment and to draw a direct line between the appointment of bob mueller, the decision from rod rosenstein to do so, and impeachment and to describe mueller and rosenstein as the opposite of political hacks. who are the political hacks? >> well, yeah, those two gentlemen particularly rosenstein is well regarded in maryland. a lot of us know him and have great deal of respect for his work. so having him be in the political crucible the way he's been for the last few weeks was problematic for him and he seems to have moved himself out of

that. no one would claim he's a political hack by any stretch. i thought doug going -- the attorney general going to the "i" word, impeachment, was a little much, off the back pages of the democrat talking points which i understand. let's follow -- i think the t e takeaway, these two gentlemen are about following the facts and following the information as they get it. will it lead to something as big as that? we don't know. it's a very high bar, as you know. there's a republican congress you're going to have to impress the hell out of to get to that point. i don't see any of that happening. >> let's watch some of the republican congress responding yesterday on the shows about their mounting discomfort with this white house. >> if any president tries to impede an investigation, any president, no matter what it is, by interfering with the fbi, yes, that would be problematic. it would be not just problematic, it would be, you know, obviously a potential obstruction of justice. >> you would like, i would think, the president to kind of

beat him over the head with the fact that if they did, the russians, if they actually did interfere in any way, shape or form, how wrong that is and how outraged america is on both sides of the aisle. >> i don't know how to read it except that -- i'm almost speechless because i don't know how to -- why someone would say something like that, but i know this, mr. lavrov is the stooge of a thug and a murderer. he had no business in the oval office. >> frank, draw a line for me between -- now we got rubio talking about obstruction of justice, got chaffetz beating someone over the head and got john mccain speechless. are the republicans sort of coming around to understanding that they have a huge problem? >> yeah, absolutely. i think they understood it for a while, but now there's no getting away from it and i think they u see, i mean, your previous interviewee was talking about impeachment, i agree with michael, prematurely.

they can see where this goes. they're watching their remarks. if this goes to the wrong place, they don't want to be late in expressing their concern and showing skepticism about president trump that they look like complete idiots. they're looking to their own futures, looking down the road an being very careful. in the case of marco rubio and jeb bush who you also could have put in that montage, there's some very sweet revenge going on here. >> sort of i told you so. >> let's not forget how donald trump talked about them during the campaign, you know, what goes around comes around. >> but the republican dance for me is not so much with the marco rubios and the john mccains. it's with the house freedom caucus. when those members start expressing more publicly their nervousness and concerns and using those same words, then i think you're going to see much more of an earthquake within the party. right now their base back at home is telling them full steam ahead, this is our guy, we love him, he's breaking up the entire cabal in washington. we like that. that a lot of this other stuff is media noise, it's fabrication, it's fake news. that is still a real story line

out there for people within the base of the party. so you do have the sort of bifurcation -- >> within the republican base or within trump's coalition? >> well, yeah, so that's a good question. >> right? >> they're not the same thing no. >> no. >> they're not the same thing. you have the trump coal liition over here -- >> the republican base still likes us. >> the tail wagging the dog, white honestly. if you did not have that faction, you'd have much more of a response by rank and file republicans how the past 120-plus days have played out. >> the freedom caucus wasn't elected to become experts on russian foreign policy, they were elected to bring change to health care, talk about tax policy, what have you. the longer that doesn't come to fruition, the more pressure they're getting at home. as we're already seeing take place in town hall meetings. >> steve, rubio also spoke to that last night how under this cloud there will be no progress on the agenda, be no tax reform, there will be no conservative answer to obamacare, there will be no governing. how's that going to --

>> right. right now everything sort of legislatively is on pause, but, again, i think republicans are really trying to sort of -- last year spooked republicans. i think especially on the house side. the fact that you say there's two republican bases but the bottom line is donald trump won the republican nomination and he didn't just win it when you looked at the exit polls with a faction of the party. it wasn't like people who call themselves tea partyers were all for him and nobody else was. in state after state, he won moderates, he won conservatives, won teaiers. he won across the board. i think that spooked republicans he pulled that off. a lot were lukewarm about him in the fall, a lot outright abandoned him after the "access hollywo hollywood" tape. i've heard from a lot of republicans in office since then, all levels of the ballot, made me wonder does he know the base of this party? is he more in touch with its pulse than i am? that's the biggest thing that's given them pause so far. on the other side of the break, you're going to show us where some of this is happening.

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some build walls to keep people out. but these are walls that welcome you in. within these walls, california's educators create safe places for every student to learn and grow. where teachers open minds to history... unleash creativity... and show our kids the future. some build walls to divide us. but the california teachers association knows these are walls that bring us together. because quality public schools build a better california for all of us. welcome back, everyone, the segment you've all been waiting for. steve kornacki at the big beautiful wall. >> we've been talking about it in the last segment what would it take to get congressional republicans to really break with donald trump? they're worried about their own party. does their base like him? are they loyal? what would get their attention? the answer is if they start worrying about their own seats in the general election, you know what could get them

worrying about that, the special elections that are coming up. we've already had one in kpst ks kansas. the republican did hold it. that was 20 points closer in the special house election that was last november. had a preliminary down there in. you had a preliminary in georgia. here's one coming up this week, this thursday. montana, the entire state votes. special house election. keep this in mind. that wasn't supposed to happen. this is starting to get some election. this is a state donald trump won by 21 appointments last november. it was a land slide. this is match-up on thursday. an open house seat. there hasn't been much polling but republicans are putting up signs and saying they are worried. saying their internal polling has it within 5 points. democrats are starting to pour money in. if they won, it is a state that trump won by more than 20

points, that is the result that would get the attention of the average house republican saying i have to worry more about my own seat. >> do we ever overread special elections? >> scott brown -- it is politics. of course we do. there could be red herrings. but elected officials, members of congress, this is what dictates their public behavior. they overread every indicator they get. >> when we come back, how do we know so much about this white house? it's because they tell us. thanks for the ride around norfolk! and i just wanted to say, geico is proud to have served the military for over 75 years! roger that. captain's waiting to give you a tour of the wisconsin now.

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sometimes the best conversations that take place in an hour like this take place during the break. i pumped my panel, they were talking about leaks. this is about leaks coming from within the white house. there remain insiders with consciences. some work for the president. they're willing to work against him if circumstances warrant it. >> this is the leakiest white house i've ever seen. i've never seen an administration this leaky, washington this leaky, and what is really interesting about it is normally leaks the province of troublemakers. >> it is the opposite, right? >> they went into the administration with some trepidation and wondering, would they be propping up a bad president, would they be clu

colluding or whatever. some of them thought i want to mitigate any problems. those are some of the people who are leaking. their using leaks to mold, control, and check the president's behavior. that's a fascinating thing about this. is it noble or is it undermining him? >> i think it dpenlts on the moment, the leak and the leaker. i think the intent is largely noble. i think they're trying to keep the country, not to use too cliche a phrase. when you have pledged fetloyalto a president, how far can you go before -- >> it is a question of whether this is the new normal. we were talking about this and the story over the weekend about cia operatives were being killed and arrested during obama administration. and i was struck that there were 20 sources for that story so.

this had nothing 22to do with president trump. >> you're finding, some interesting about leaks. that is they've weaponized it. it is now used as an offensive tool to your point, to sort of shame the administration and push it in a direction away from certain things or toward others. >> my observation is this is how they talk to their president. they know he's watching the kids. he is reading the paper. this is how they get in front of the audience. >> you watch through cable news. >> you get into the media conversation and he absorbs and reacts to the media conversation. that's probably the most effective way to get to him. >> can we go back and point out how scary this is that we have a president, we keep talking about him as if he is an infant because he is behaving that way. his people are managing him by leaking to cnn, to the "new york times." they're having to play these

media mind games to keep the president in line. as an american, this terrifies me. >> you see the pressure it puts on intelligence heads. you have brennan and others speaking bout the leaks while wanting to focus on the russia story and the investigation. saying yes, these leaks unprecedented and it is worrisome for them. >> the last administration, the one in which i worked, they prosecuted leaks of classified information, the white house i worked in was investigated for such. does the president have the ability to call for an investigation into leaks? it is literally the people all around him leaking? >> he probably realized it. everybody would be out lawyering up. he said from the beginning he wants to get to the bottom of it. we'll find out who they are. and here we are and they're getting more profuse, not less.

that's because the president finds two particular goals are served. he is getting information. and two, i don't think he wants to open pup pandora's box. he may not want to know. >> donald trump can't explain during the campaign, he complained during the obama administration that government wasn't transparent enough. he is running the most unintentionally trans parent. >> your paper is doing the most stunning reporting. in most of the stories, there are 20, 30 sources. have you ever seen such heavily sourced white house reporting? >> no. i haven't. that shows how motivated they are. and we have drink, all numbs have terrific people. it speaks to the number of sources out there. people who really feel if they don't talk to the media, they're not serving the country and they're not to your point. >> and going back to serving the country. one can say that passing

intelligence. can you imagine if that was reported by the russian media? if kislyak reported that? >> i'll let that be the last word. thank you to my panel. that does it for this hour. i'm nicole wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. >> thank you so much. if it is monday, 5:00 p.m. means breaking news. tonight reports that the house oversight committee has documents proving michael flynn lied to investigators. plus, baggage claim. >> never mentioned the word "israel. ". >> why the president's trip abroad isn't giving him enough political privilege at home. and after flynn invokes the fifth amendment, we're counting down how many times president trump has not pleaded the fifth. >> fifth amendment. horrible, horrible. >> this is