it's intelligent nutrition with 15 grams of protein and 26 vitamins and minerals. for when you need a little extra. boost® the number one high protein complete nutritional drink. be up for it all right. thank you to my panel. i'm stephanie rule in for nichole wallace. mtp damy starts right now. good evening, charles. >> awe, look who is ruling the four o'clock hour. nice work. thank you, ma'am. nice to see you. if it's thursday, here is the question with would president trump have taken that meeting with the russian lawyer. >> tonight, the president defends his son. >> it's very standard where they have information and you take the information. >> but wait until you hear what mr. president trump's former campaign manager has to say. >> if anybody, and i mean anybody, did something with a foreign government that materially impacted the outcome of this election, that person

should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. >> i sit down with the first person to run the trump campaign, cory lewandowski. plus the senate's latest shot at trumpcare. >> this bill is better than the other bill. >> is it enough to bring in the holdouts? and why all of washington should be obsessed with what the first president bush told his family about how to behave at the top of the political world. this is mtp daily and it starts right now. good evening. i'm chuck todd here in washington and welcome to mtp daily. tonight you're going to hear my exclues active is cory lewandowski and as you just saw in that clip, you're going to want to stick around. campaign manager with donald trump junior paul manafort and jared curb ter had that meeting with that russian lawyer when they were told had perhaps information as part of a russian government effort to support the

trump campaign and, quote, incriminate hillary clinton. today president trump spoke to reporters publicly on camera for the first time about the controversy after he met with the french president in paris. >> i think from a practical standpoint, most people would have taken that meeting. it's called opposition research or even research into your opponent. i've had many people -- i have only been in politics for two years, but i've had many people call up, oh, gee, we have information on this factor or this person or, frankly, hill larry. that's very standard in politics. politics is not the nicest business in the world, but it's very standard where they have information and you take the information. >> did you catch that last line there, folks? the u.s. president perhaps seemed to acknowledge that he would have knowingly used info from a russian government backed effort to incriminate his opponent if testifies delivered to him. that is not an insignificant

piece of information if you're an investigator, also, by dismissing the russian meeting as standard opposition research, he's arguably inviting foreign intervention in future elections or at least it could be an unintended consequence. let that sink in for a moment. here is more of the president's defense today in paris. >> nothing happened from the meeting. zero happened from the meeting. and honestly, i think the press made a very big deal over something that really a lot of people would do. >> the way it is significant. while the president criticized the press, notice he are backed off, he didn't go full fake news or any of that business. but the president's argument is nothing came out of it, but if something had, so what? is that a preemptive defense if another shoe drops. leave that to others to decide. then is the president turned his attention to the russian lawyer who his team met with. >> somebody said that her visa or her passport to come into the country was approved by attorney general lynch.

now, maybe that's wrong. i just heard that a little while ago, but i was a little surprised to hear that. so she was here because of lynch. >> i have no idea if this piece of information is true, but what if it is, but the point is this if there was nothing wrong with taking the meeting, why is that detail even relevant. mr. trump wanted to make it known that the other people in the meeting either left early or weren't paying attention. what's interesting, he never mentioned either gentlemen by name, but he did note supposedly what they were doing at the meeting that others have testified to. now, it's worth noting when we found out about this meeting because jared kushner's lawyers aachlded a security clearance form. a person close to kushner confirms to us that he updated three times and he has added more than 100 names to his foreign contact list to update those forms for his security clearance. by the way, "the new york times" did first report that news. i'm joined now by cory lewandowski, who was actually mr. trump's campaign manager at

that period of time when donald trump had that meeting. welcome to the show, sir. >> thank you. >> all right. you were the campaign manager there. you weren't in the meeting. do you know why? >> i don't know the reason. i wasn't invited to the meeting. as you know, i wasn't on the e-mail chain. i wasn't even made aware of the meeting. and what i do remember on that particular day was that was a day that donald trump was doing a rally in the state of florida, so i traveled with the president that day. we overnight that day down in and then we get up the next day and actually did some fund raidsing in florida before we went on to do some more events. look, you have to remember at that time in the campaign, the campaign had basically been divide between myself and then my chairman of the campaign, paul manafort. and we each had our own responsibilities at that time. paul's job at that time because the nomination had basically been wramd up was to look at budgeting issues and policy issues. my job was -- >> delegate fight? no. officially, yes, but basically that was a number of days after the new york nomination and

clearly it was the what they called the primary. donald trump had won most all of those states that day, so strategically he had enough, but paul was in charge at that point of policy issues and finances, and i was in charge of the schedule and the ral liz and the political side of things. >> explain the role of donald trump in the campaign. like how involved was he? >> well, not -- you have to remember, you've got a family that for the first time in their lives they're going threw a campaign. so it's very rare. most of the time when individuals are running for president of the united states they had sought a previous office and so the family had been used to the campaign life. and this family, what they had come to find out, was things are very different from the business world. and so on a regular basis the family, and by that i mean the grown children, ivanka, don, erik, were briefed by senior campaign officials, myself, paul manafort on what was taking place. they also served very candidly, very openly and very well on behalf of their fer as full time

surrogates. they would be on the road, travel, talking to people. don spent a lot of time in iowa. he -- erik would also be out in the business kmumt, ivanka the same. >> surrogates, were they involved behind the scenes in the kpap? was it clear, you know, when you were campaign manager, were you calling the shots or did the family also sort of have a -- was it sort of almost like a travel council type of thing with the family? >> it would be a relationship that developed overtime. you have to remember, when the campaign started, and just think of the launch date in june of 2015 plrks there weren't a lot of people around to have a council of. so i was calling the shots. as the campaign progressed and we were winning in new hampshire, in south carolina, in nevada, the family became more involved. and so they were out. and we have a multi-state operation taking place at the same time, family is more involved. they were involved in fully understanding what the role of the campaign was going to do, helping them understand what the

schedule their father was going to be, some policy initiatives. they were part of those discussions. >> did you or the campaign lawyer ever brief the kids on the idea that, hey, people are going to come at you, maybe foreign governments are coming? was there any -- was that conversation ever had that you are aware of that just be careful, be alert, people may try to curry favor with your father because, you know, there's been a letter that's been circulated that george h.w. bush sent around to his kids and family, hey, people may come to you either looking for favors or trying to do something, be careful. >> i never had that conversation. i was never privy to if that conversation took place. that would have been between the campaign council potentially and the family members. soa i can't speak to if that conversation took place. if my understanding, there was never a formal memo that was put out that said be careful of did you mean tus individuals. >> nothing came of this meet being, but so what if it had?

is that the sort of mind-set that was on the campaign that, hey, whoever wants to help, i want to know where they got the info, but we're going to uses the info? >> i think what the president is talking about is that when you're in the middle of a campaign fight and you have individuals -- look, this happens all the time. they called -- people would call with great ideas and bad ideas and they just want someone to share that information with. and what i think happened in this particular instance was a former colleague or friend of don junior said, hey, i know someone who is going to be in new york city, would you take a courtesy meeting with this person and hear what they have to say, and don obviously took that meeting. >> but it was spelled out, just so you know, they're representing the russian government's efforts to help your father get elected. >> chuck, you have to remember in june of 2016, nobody thought hf russia. >> it doesn't matter. it's a foreign government. that did not ring an alarm bell? >> again, i wasn't on the e-mail chain. i didn't know about the meeting, but what i do know is this, our own central intelligence agency did not brief the obama

administration so this notion that a person is russian doesn't decent. >> the e-mail said she was representing the russian government. >> but what we have now found out is she had no formal role. she had no role with the russian government whatsoever. >> what don't know that. >> we don't know she did. we do know she was a private citizen. >> it was represented that she was going to be somebody connected to the russian government. that's why don junior took the meeting, no? >> i think don junior took the meeting because he wanted to understand that if there was information out there that was potentially damaging to hillary clinton, that said that russians are giving money to the democratic national committee or other sources to impact the outcome of this election and it's illegal, he wants to know about it. look, i think you get offered meetings all the time. i don't even work for the president -- >> would you have taken this meeting? >> look, i don't know. and i'll tell you why. today, every day people will

call me, cory, i've got an idea to save a trillion dollars if you can just get this to the president. can i sit down with you for five minutes, ten minutes. the difference is a former colleague from the campaign called and said hey, cory, is can you sit down with this individual. he's going to be in washington d.c. fo 15 minutes. sure. i don't know the individual. we had aid nice conversation. if you came back to me two months from now and said, hey, this guy is a bad ombre. it was a favor of a friend. that's all it was. >> so you might have taken a meeting. >> i think if it was a friend that i had rpd and known and had a personal relationship with and they said to me, cory, would you please sit down with someone who is going to be in new york for a brief period to discuss some information that might be helpful toll campaign, i'd think about it. >> there was another report named peter smith who is now deceased and he implied that he had both a connection -- he was wanting to look for hillary clinton's e-mails and look in the dark web and he implied that he had a connection to mike flynn and mike flynn, jr. what role did he play on the

campaign? was it voluntary? was he with his dad. >> i spent a lot of time traveling on the campaign. know general flynn as well. may have potentially met his son on one occasion. i had never seen him in the campaign office. to the best of my knowledge, when i was on the kpap, he never traveled on the campaign plane. so any role that he would have played that i'm aware of would have been as support staff to his father, but no official capacity on the campaign. >> and how much would aid surrogate like general flynn or others come to you and say hey, i might have some access to some good oppo? was general flynn one of those folks? >> no, it didn't really work like that. and remember, as -- let me be very clear about this. during slt primary campaign we did not do opposition research on our opponents. we never pitched an oppo story and there was no media outlet that could ever tell you i picked up the phone and tried to pitch a negative story. >> you had a candidate that would -- you had a candidate that was just comfortable saying it.

he didn't have to have somebody else -- >> chuck, it's a complete dichotomy of what every other campaign has done. so for the general election, right, you have to remember at that point the republican national committee had a massive opposition file on hillary clinton. all of this information was already well-known for the most part. they had a massive dossier that they put together because what they do at the rnc. and as such, any information that the campaign would have wanted to use, primarily, against hillary clinton was contained on a flash drive somewhere, i would guess. >> so why have a meeting with this -- why have a meeting looking for more hillary clinton opposition from a foreign source? >> that meeting is took place prior to the rnc sharing the information with is the hillary clinton -- because we were not -- you remember, the rnc was a neutral entity, not until we secured enough dell gats, but until he actually received the nomination at the convention in july, which was a different standard than they had for mitt romney. donald trump had to wait until he was officially nominated at the convention in july.

this meeting took place a month before that. >> so are you implying that you guys had nothing and so you were trying to hurry up and find as much information as you could and this is what this was about? >> what i'm saying is we didn't do any opposition research and i know this is going to stun people on our primary opponents. we don't need to do that. and so as we now are almost the presumptive nominee in our minds we're the presumptive nominee, the rnc has not determined that, so we're now trying to gather information. this is literally days after we have secured enough dell gats to officially be the nominee. so my guess is people are trying to gather information, as much information as they can, find out what is real and what is resident real on hillary clinton and this is one of those individuals who thought that they could share information. clearly it was no information to share. >> so the meeting happens june 9th. the set up for the meeting days place a week later. on june 7th you were traveling with the president. you were down in florida. he talks about he's going to make a speech the following monday to particular through hillary clinton's crimes. now, he never makes that speech.

where did that come from? >> look, the president has said things so many occasions to he list it responses from his opponents and from the media so that they cover this. and the president is a master at -- >> so he had no intention of giving a speech on hillary clinton when he said it? >> here is whatic tell you is. ic tell you that when is the president made that statement, it was the first time i had been aware that the president was going to make a speech the following monday, which is not uncommon and we would -- >> not uncommon in trump world. >> his requirements if that's what he wanted us to do. but when he made that statement, it wasn't that we were forward thinking a week out and we had this planned. it's not the announcement that took ugs six weeks to man. when the president made that statement, it was the first time i had heard it and we had not started the process of planning for him to make a major speech the next monday. >> given now this is now stretching in -- this first contact took place while you were campaign manager. have you been contacted by the special counsel. i have not been. >> have you been contacted by is the senate or house intelligence investigation. >> chuck, i have nothing to

hide. let me say this, let me be very clear. i never colluded, contacted any russians that i'm aware 6789 nobody contacted me that i am aware of and asked to help solicit or fix a presidential campaign. but let me be clear as i can be. if anybody, and i mean anybody, did something with a foreign government that materially impacted the outcome of this election, that person should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law, whoever that person is because we cannot have individuals who are meddling with foreign governments to potentially impact the election. >> why isn't the president as again ti as you were just now snoo here is the thing. it's very clear. this campaign did not -- i spent 18 months next to the president's side, search days a week, 18 hours a day, never, and i mean never did he raise the issue of russia to me, russian investigation, russian cooperation, russian coordination. chuck, we ran a five-person campaign for pay presidential

race on a fracture of aid budget for everybody else and we didn't even get the credit for that until we started growing. so this notion that we were colluding with the russians but couldn't remember our e-mail address in pennsylvania, it's preposterous. the person that was at the top of this campaign for a significant period of time, never ever, ever, ever, ever was russia mentioned, and never was there any kooshd nation and cooperation and collaboration. >> are you confident that people in the president's orbit, he's been talked about it and maybe some satellites, maybe it's a ronler stoep, people that worked for him at one time but didn't before, are you confident that they had nothing to do with wick i leaks or anything of this stuff before it happened? >> i don't know what these guys. what i know is that some of the individuals that you're referring to are the magser of writing the post memo. so if and happens, they write a memo after it happens. is they submitted it and say i predicted this twol weeks ago. most of them have no real relationships. what we do know is those that

claim to have a back door access to assange and all these other people, when questioned by the fbi, is you know what nesd? well, i didn't really have that. i was just talking about it. this is what they do to perpetuate themselves -- >> you're referring now to roger stone and obviously he's no fan of yours. he makes that clear. >> these individuals who claim things that are factually inaccurate and this is how they get themselves in trouble because they go out and say, well, i've got a back door and i know how this happens and expect this to happen. and then when questioned under hoet under the penalty of perjury, they say i didn't have a back door. i didn't know what i was talking about. that's not surprising. >> all right. i'll leave it there. if asked you'll testify to anything. >> 100%. >> leave it there. thank you, sir. appreciate it. that's a lot to unpack. we're going to unpack that later in the show because we'll have more on what we know and what we don't know right now about the latest twists in the russia story. other big story today in washington. republican leaders unveiled their revised healthcare plan with zbleer stow room forrer.

introducing the easiest way to get gillette blades text "blades" to gillette on demand text to reorder blades with gillette on demand... ...and get $3 off your first order binders, done. super-cool notebooks, done. that's mom taking care of business. but who takes care of mom? office depot/office max. this week, get this ream of paper for just one cent after rewards. ♪ taking care of business.

it includes a number of changes aimed at showing up support from both moderate and conservative members. here is what's new. a version of an amendment by senator ted cruz that would allow for cheaper but much skimpier plans if the insurance also offers a plan compliant with obamacare standards. there's $45 billion to fight the opioid addiction issue. $70 billion more for state's to reduce premiums. it's $182 billion extra in this bill for that fund. now, is people could use health savings accounts to pay for premiums. that's another --. and there's a few different obamacare taxes on the wealthy that actually would be extended.

now, the new bill does keep medicaid cuts in place. we'll debate that later, which could be an issue for a number of the senate's moderates and of course especially from states with republican governments who want to expand. >> the bill put forward keeps the majority of obamacare taxes, keeps the vast majority of the obamacare regulations skrks keeps the majority of the obamacare subsidies and creates a brapd new insurance bail out fund. >> president obama in my view. i don't want to see us make the same mistake. >> who would say with health care being such an issue to people back home they don't want to move to a bill to debate it or offer amendments? i just can't imagine it. >> if this is the bill, are you on board? >> yes.

i think today was a very important day 6789 it was a productive step in the right direction. >> a lot of republicans were on the fence before today say they're waiting for a cbo score. mcconnell needs 450 out of 57 senators toll pass this bill. ♪ everybody two seconds! ♪ "dear sebastian, after careful consideration of your application, it is with great pleasure that we offer our congratulations on your acceptance..." through the tuition assistance program, every day mcdonald's helps more people go to college. it's part of our commitment to being america's best first job. ♪ your bbut as you get older,ing. it naturally begins to change, causing a lack of sharpness, or even trouble with recall. thankfully, the breakthrough in prevagen helps your brain and actually improves memory.

the secret is an ingredient originally discovered... in jellyfish. in clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve short-term memory. prevagen. the name to remember. . lindsey and i have talked about this and bill too, i mean, what we're waiting for is for mitch mcconnell to decide to let this be a bipartisan, rational process that's transparent so everybody in america knows what the choices are. so far it's always been behind closed doors. but if these republican senators want to sit down and make this healthcare system stronger and better, count me in. >> welcome back. that was the senate's democratic whip saying he's spoken with twro republicans about working on health carement well, those two republicans, they're senators lindsey graham of south carolina and senator bill cassidy. they introduced their own health care proposal today, just as the

senate leadership unveiled their new republican bill. so joining me now is senator cassidy. senator, welcome back to the show. >> thank you for having me. >> so are you competing against leadership with this bill? explain why with you and senator graham put this out today? and then i'm curious, what happened to senator collins? >> so this is an amendment to the underlying bill. it would keep, for example, the revenue that comes from the pharmaceutical companies and the health insurance industry that they agreed to pay in the negotiations for obamacare, it would keep that money, increase the amount of money available for states, and then block grant the cash to the states to take care of patients. it doesn't replace this bill. it adds to it. susan collins, of course i don't speak for her, although we've worked so closely together, but she has concerns. i think this might address some of those concerns. again, not being able to speak for her, but block granting are the extra dollars to the states may address her concerns. >> all right. so let's -- help me with an example here.

you're a state that has spoonded medicaid. let's take your state of louisiana and obviously you expanded a little later than most states. you had a democratic govern than some of those other when it happened. so what does this mean for louisiana? does this mean you keep to keep your medicaid expansion, your rate of growth? explain what your amendment would do. >> so our amendment would give our state the dollars that it's currently receiving, minus the amount for the individual mandate penalties and the employer mandate penalties. it would give the state that money, and it could continue the expansion if it wished. >> with federal dollars or want with federal dollars? >> it would take the federal dollars it's currently receiving, it would then receive it as a block grant. the state would then continue a maintenance of effort, putting up its share, if you will, and take that sum total to come with a solution that's pick particular for louisiana. >> but would the federal government continue to increase its share or no over triem with that block money? >> there would be an inflation

rate built into the amount of money the state received. but the state would also be given additional responsibility. sometimes the government puts states in straight jackets, gives them a lot of money, but the money is used inefficientel. better use of the dollars, more bang for the buck. >> why didn't your bill get off the ground? why was this -- did your bill have to be the bipartisan vehicle and is that why and since this is going to be a reconciliation process it doesn't work? >> so our patient freedom act that i did with senator collins, so many aspects of it are there this bill. ted crews's amendment was in the patient freedom act. other aspects of this, for example, with senator graham and i are doing now and which would effectively block grant the dollars, is parted of the patient freedom act. so i think more and more components of the patient freedom act are being incorporated. would i wish that it would have

been bipartisan? yes. is there evidence that democrats made aid political decision not to cooperate, yes. so i'm doing the best i can. >> in fairness, isn't that also a way of saying, democrats, you're not invited to the party, we don't need you? >> it could be, but i will still say if two to three to four democrats walked into mitch mcconnell's office and said we're willing to deal, this is what we want, it would happen. it would happen. if they had come to susan kol ins linls and me and said listen we're willing to get on your bill, we want this or we want that, that would have -- >> well, dick durbin just said he would. have you sat down with him? has it become the graham cassidy durbin bill. >> as you mentioned, durbin spoke to that and without giving away a confidential conversation, obviously it still was cassidy collins or it's now graham cassidy, unfortunately

not senator durbin. >> do you think if senator mcconnell took reconciliation off the table and allowed it to be, you know, force the 60 vote, do you think you would have more democrats that would be willing to work with you? >> that political article that was written a couple weeks ago in which it basically quotes chuck schumer saying that he was going to keep everybody in line, debbie stab now saying every time i wanted to do the right thing, i was told don't do scenario, someone else saying i couldn't speak with republicans unless given perms. again, i'm frustrated by that. this should be an american solution, not a democrat or republican. i've done my best. i'm still going to do my best. >> where are you on this bill if your amendment doesn't pass? >> i have started reading the bill. i'm on page like 8 because i'm flipping back through the obamacare bill. i'll know hopefully bied end of the weekend how this bill afelkts by state and whether it fulfills president trump's campaign promises. >> so what was your biggest

concern with the last bill that you hope this bill fixes? >> there was a provision that stuck it to louisiana, a big $1.8 billion just hit to us like no other state. that was not good. you can't have your state singled out for almost punitive -- >> is this because you didn't expand medicaid in time? is that what you're referring to. >> correct. it was a severe disadvantage. then we lost in the other way. that has been addressed. now i just have to look at the other features. >> i've got to ask you on that specific feature, so somebody could say, okay, now you're voting for it because it's better for louisiana. does this come across as, okay r now they're finding a way to make you happy with that and make cap i toe with opioid funding, make portman happy with x.? is this what this is looking like right now. >> not with me. it was like putting a gun to louisiana's fiscal head and putting the trigger. you don't put a fiscal gun to my

state's head and pull the trigger, period. also, i want to point out the opioid funding is important to cap i toe. important to portman. people are dying from opioids across the nation. so i think that's actually a positive thing that we're addressing national needs in this legislation. . >> what's your sense about voting nor this bill to just simplely proceed. >> when nancy pelosi said we have to pass this bill to know what's in it, i want to read the bill to make a decision about voting to go forward. and so i want -- if you have the opposite of speaker pelosi at the time, i want to know the bill. so those kind of questions i'm deferring my answer until i've read the bill. >> and in the cbo scoring, what's going to matter to you more, number of people covered, premiums? what specifically are you going to be looking for in the new score. >> yeah. president trump ran saying he wanted to continue coverage,

pre-existing conditions. we are eliminate right leg mandates. how it addresses those other three are important. their methodology weighs heavily bone the individual mandate and so the fact that we eliminate mandates, the american people want those gone means that the cbo score will not be as good in coverage numbers. so i want to look at how they discuss their methodology and then make my own decision as to the adequacy of coverage. >> all right. you've been all over this issue. appreciate you coming on and sharing your views as always, sir. >> thank you. >> you got it. coming up, health care, the russia connection, can lots for the panel to dig into. that's just ahead. over-up for g? over-up for g? that's cool. showing off my arms? that's cool. being comfortable without a shirt? that's cool. getting the body you want without surgery, needles, or downtime? that's coolsculpting. coolsculpting is the only fda-cleared non-invasive treatment that targets and freezes away stubborn fat cells.

visit coolsculpting.com today and register for a chance to win a free treatment.

binders, done. super-cool notebooks, done. that's mom taking care of business. but who takes care of mom? office depot/office max. this week, get this ream of paper for just one cent after rewards. ♪ taking care of business.

delicious pasta marinara. but birds eye made it from zucchini. mmm! bird: mashed potatoes and rice. but made from cauliflower. looks like i need a fork! oh, no. (giggling) bird: new birds eye veggie made. so veggie good.

. still ahead, will donald trump jr. tech before congress on his meeting with a russian lawyer. and will the revised healthcare bill gain traction with its republican did he tractors. we'll squus all of that with our panel coming up next. award winning design. award winning engine. the volvo xc90. the most awarded luxury suv of the century. this july visit your local volvo dealer to receive sommar savings of up to $4,500. this july visit your local volvo dealer theso when i need to book tant to mea hotel room,tion. i want someone that makes it easy. booking.com gets it. and with their price match,

i know i'm getting the best price every time. visit booking.com. booking.yeah!

. let me be clear as i can be, if anybody, and i mean anybody did something with a foreign government that materially impacted the outcome of this election, that person should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law, whoever that person is, because we cannot have individuals who are meddling with foreign governments to potentially impact the outcome of the election. >> welcome back. panel is here. shane harris, ruth mark us, robert train or, and of course

msnbc political analysts. welcome all. shane, i'm going to start with you. you are doing as much digging on this. let's start with cory. there's still some confusion about where donald trump was on june 9th. >> right. >> he said we were down in florida on june 9th. he still believes they were. he's checking his records. our records indicate they were in new york on june 9th. there was a june 7th florida speech, and he was in florida, we believe w two days later. look, we can give cory the benefit of the doubt a little bit. he's traveling. he's the one traveling all the time. he was not in that meeting. that's for sure. that is something that everybody agrees to. so we're trying to clear up that date, confusion there. what did you learn here? what do you think is going on? >> what i was struck by is his saying that he might have taken the meeting. he holds out the possibility maybe i would do that. you get opposition research all the time. we weren't trying to do opposition research on hillary clinton, so i don't know how you scare those two things.

to read that letter s though, with the explicit over tour that it is making from a russian government connected source, if somebody had isn't me that e-mail as a reporter, i would have thought it might be fraudulent. it hit so many notes that are being alexander in this conspiracy. to see that message come across and say well, maybe i'll take the meeting. >> it would have felt hoax i. >> exactly. it looks too perfect. >> ruth, in fairness, we didn't know how are big russia was truly doing at that point in time publicly. is it possible they saw this more innocently than we think? >> well, at that point in time the u.s. intelligence community had not come forward, and let's give the trump campaign the benefit of the doubt. they were not aware of insip yent russian effort to help. however, at that time the trump campaign like everybody else in america knew who russia was, knew that russia is not just some other country like a good

friend, like the united kingdom or france just to take a random one. this is russia, okay. remember during the fund-raising scandal, there was a big back in' 96 with the democrats. >> chinese money. >> and it was why is it a problem to do this at a budist temple and they wrote on it because it's a temple, you idiot. that's how i feel about this one, because it's the russians. any reasonable campaign, whether or not we knew anything about russia in advance, would not have taken that meeting. and i have to say, i was shocked that cory lewandowski said he might have taken that meeting. no reason for him to need to go there. >> robert, the other thing that intrigued me is cory is pretty confident of everything that happened on that campaign. >> yeah. >> through june 20th. >> right. which is his last day on the payroll. >> right. >> ironically, in that period he may have been relieved he was not cc aed on that e-mail. >> absolutely. >> that is when the trump

children's orbit was trying to get rid of cory and bring on manafort pull time. >> in a strange way he's probably thanking donald trump jr. >> for pushing him out. >> can i go back for a second? i want to start with a positive. i thought cory lewandowski did a very good job of speaking very declare actively about things that he knew, and he seemed to be very genuine and very sincere. there was no halting in his voice. he appeared to be very sincere. i also think he's got two people that he's trying to serve. one is the president still. i still think they're very close. i still think the president probably would be watching this program or recording of this program. >> right. >> and i probably -- and i think lewandowski wants to say, president trump, i defended you. but you also was, i thought, very declarative by saying no matter who it is should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, which i believe means everyone including the president. so i think he did a very good job of threading the needle there. >> he may have threaded the neelgd, but i thought he misstated the law.

the notion of the test whether you engaged in conduct that -- that is not the test. >> there's something less than that that might also be very serious. it becomes grounds for impeachment or a political -- >> i want to go to the president's statement today. what was kbreeging to me about it was less what he said. it was the tone. it was not defiant. it was not blustery. it was sort of like, yeah, we know this one looks bad, but it's still not what you think it is. >> it was very unnatural. >> right. >> it's uncharacteristic for him in a way. calm, relaxed. a friend rf mine e-mailed back and said he's fatigued. it's a lot of jet lag. okay. maybe that's what it is. >> it could legitimately be so. he just came back from a trip and now you're going back. >> correct. so it could be that or perhaps maybe even his gut is telling him, oh, my goodness, this is a big deal. >> yeah, or he's been humbled a little bit. but the other thing i would

point out, ruth, he went sougou his way to put distance between donald trump jr. jared curb measure and paul manafort. what did you make of that? >> well, he said one was playing with his phone, right, and one walked out rft room pretty quickly. >> right. information thatible it's the lawyer that has said that to us. the russian lawyer in the interview with -- that's not necessarily verified information, but suddenly the president is using it as his own. >> and the other is a good boy, a good boy who happens to be like the same age as the president of france who he's meeting with. >> my husband does that to me too. >> oh, great. god, i am going to get a lot of tweets on that. >> when you see all the various camps in here separating from each other, right, and the question of course has been who was it that actually leaked this e-mail, was it somebody in kushner's camp, was it someone else? the way that everyone is sort of pushing each other off into their corners here, that really struck me about the way this has played out this week is you

don't see any kind of rallying of the troops or the forces. r one has their story and is sticking to it. the president did not kol out swinging on this one. it involves his son. i'm sure he's very sensitive to that. but that e-mail is so explicit. >> there's notice fake news there. >> i think you guys are being way too nice to the president. i know that's -- i think sure he didn't sound trumpian and blustery, but most people who read this understood that this is a very bad idea to have this meeting. this is a really disturbing thing. i agree exactly with what shane said. it was so inculpatory. so incriminating -- >> it's almost like saying just so you know, if you take this meeting, you are saying, yes, we know, russia is helping. almost felt that way. >> i know i'm imagining a president that's different than the one that we had, but this meeting was inappropriate, and that's what should be said. >> we'll make that the last word of this segment. when we come back, we're going

to talk a little health care. but up next, some timely presidential father-son advice. at panera, a salad is so much more than one thing. more than one flavor, or texture, or color. a good clean salad is so much more than green. and with panera catering, more for your event. panera. food as it should be.

i was thinking around 70. to and before that?re? you mean after that? no, i'm talking before that. do you have things you want to do before you retire? i'd really like to run with the bulls. wow. hope you're fast. i am. get a portfolio that works for you now and as your needs change with investment management services. . welcome back, tonight i'm obsessed with family ties. the white house and the proper way to avoid the appearance of conflict of interest or actual conflict of interest. awhile back "the new york times" republic lishd a letter from george h.w. bush as he ran for president in 1988. the letter is addressed to his son about how bush family

members should conduct themselves during the president alcampaign. in the letter the are future president warns that as november draws near, bushes will find they have a lot of new friends. he then goes on, they'll ask for things. do you know anyone at customers? can you call joe doeks at state? this is more from bush. my plea is this, please do not contact any federal agency or department on anything. a call from a bush will get returned, but there is a great likelihood that it will be leaked, maybe deliberately misrepresented. if there is a legitimate inquiry, call my office. it is certainly appropriate to contact your own government, but let's do it through my office so no one can accuse any of the family of trying to use influence. no matter where you stand on the presidency of george bush the elder, it's hard not to take note of the grace, foresight and simple decency of that letter. lights hope this letter is read in every corner of washington. we'll be right back. whoooo.

going somewhere? here's some advice. tripadvisor now searches more than 200 booking sites to find the hotel you want and save you up to 30%. trust this bird's words. tripadvisor.

i am totally blind. and non-24 can make me show up too early... or too late. or make me feel like i'm not really "there." talk to your doctor, and call 844-234-2424.

. >> time for shane harris ruth markham. you put it best. washington tries to pretend it's normal. and the normalcy moment of the day has to do with health care. >> policy. >> with what's going on in health care. >> i'm normal. >> it's not being done in the norm ways of washington but tleet it's of an issue and not espionage. >> we'll take it. >> robert, rand paul is still a know. susan collins skeptical. cap it o skeptical. none of us know how dean heller can ever support this considering what he said the first time but cassidy looked like he felt loo. >> portman. >> capito is a new deem. >> it appears to be dead on arrival. >> you think so. >> yeah. >> wow. >> i think this is yet another

attempt to amy to the base and the moderates in the party but not going anywhere. >> what do you say, ruth. >> it's not over until it's over. i never underestimate mitch mcconnell. and you know you're playing with very small margins. but that also means you can -- you need to get very small numbers. so you only need to be able to count to 50. it is not looking good. i find it incredible and not normal at all that we're talking about an amendment from senator cassidy that i don't understand thap i don't understand. i haven't seen in writing, that would really remarkably change the contours of the legislation at this late date. and this is not a minor piece of legislation. this is all that hearing stuff. >> all that hearing stuff. >> and cbo stories of the cruz amendment and everything. so i think you're right. i hope you're right. i'm not sleeping until that's

done. >> until ground hog maybe with the cbo score coming next week that provides people the out they want. i agree with you about mcconnell, magic mitch. but it feels like they are trading over degrees. that is how they legislate maybe they pu pull it off >> the cbo analysis that they can't did he bunk the easiest is the idea of will premium goss up or down, right. >> right. >> and they'll fight about coverage. the last two scores one for the house and one for the senate process. while they go down at first particularly for older folks they go up and up fast if this cbo score does the same thing then it's dead. >> the way to argue against cbo is not to argue whether they're right or wrong on this this and that is attack the credibility. >> that's what they're trying to do. >> although senator cassidy. >> senator cassidy was not doing

that. but the propose ponyants for the bill to get it over .finish line they have to convince some of the people that cbo is not credible. in which case you have to say okay you got a better one or are we just throwing up the legislation and hoping for the best. >> the premium issue is what's going to drive, flake portman, cassidy, cap it o at the end of day. >> this has been the complaint of the republicans, is that you can get health insurance and nobody can afford. >> nobody wants to be the third vote to peel off you have to get a pufrmg. >> it will not go down by one vote. it's going down by 15 or pass. thank you guys. after the break-in our in case you missed an. op edna really missed it. >>

it's time for a getaway. the lincoln summer invitation is on. now get our best offers of the season. on the agile mkc. on the versatile midsize lincoln mkx. or go where summer takes you in the exhilarating mkz. the lincoln summer invitation sales event. ask about complimentary pick up & delivery servicing. right now get zero percent apr plus 1,000 dollars summer savings on the lincoln mkx, mkc and mkz

tthat's why at comcast,t to be connected 24/7. we're always working to make our services more reliable. with technology that can update itself. and advanced fiber network infrastructure. new, more reliable equipment for your home.

and a new culture built around customer service. it all adds up to our most reliable network ever. one that keeps you connected to what matters most. well in case you miss to do it two of trump's top advisers wrote an op-ed in "the new york times." praising the president for his vision abroad. . the chief domestic guy chief national security guy in the trump white house touted all the meetings trump had with wormed leaders in europe. the meeting with 12 leaders from the three c's marng the din we are president moon from south korea and president shinzo aib of japan. the president of indonesia talked about in the op-ed np in case they miss to do didn't they miss one, someone kind of

relevant, kind of big and semi important. oh yes. the president's meeting with that guy. vladimir putin. a meeting that lasted two hours. somehow i don't think mcmaster and cohen forgot to mention putin or in the entire op-ed. but somehow every part was mentioned except that two and a half hours. be back tomorrow with more mtb daily see you then. inkts i'm with msnbc live president defending his son's secret meeting with a russian lawyer. the the president telling his reporters his son is a good boy. and speaking in paris for the first time about the meeting when his son was spegting incriminating dirt on hillary clinton. >> i think from a practical standpoint most people would have taken that meeting. it's called opposition research or even research into your opponent. i've had many people i have only