too far. >> leave it there. he's not quite david duke from bill kristol. my thanks to you all. that does it for our hour. i'm nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi, chuck. big news for your cavs, right? trade? you happy? >> my kaivs? >> cavs? >> bandwagon. does that fit on a bumper sticker? ask krystal that, will you? all right. thank you. it's the thursday, it's promise, promise on taxes. tonight, a taxing situation there will be no tax, absolute tax cut for the upper class. >> why the president's promises on tax cuts don't seem to add up with his actual plan. >> just seems like another big trickle down tax cut. >> plus, the white house says it's taking kash of puerto rico. >> wee getting a lot of supplies through. it's perhaps misreporting. >> not everyone agrees. >> 3.6 million of our fellow citizens are at risk.

>> it's like a war zone. >> we'll talk to the governor of puerto rico about the reality on the ground. and later -- what donald trump told hugh hefner's playboy in 1990 that's even more relevant today. this is "mtp daily," and for two years and counting, it starts right now. good evening. i'm chuck todd here in new york. welcome to "mtp daily." if the gop's health care failure was devastating for the party, some republicans like lindsey graham are warning that a failure on taxes could be catastrophic. there's one thing that is supposed to unify the party more than repealing obamacare it's cutting taxes. folks, the plan they unveiled yesterday sauf to a bit of a rocky start, because what they promise about the plan does not yet seem to match the actual plan released. it was a big problem for president trump and republicans on health care.

and it's not going to make this tax issue any easier either. let's start with tax promise number one. >> our framework includes our explicit commitment that tax reform will protect low income and middle income households. not the wealthy and well connected. they can call me all they want. it's not going to help. >> but -- there are a lot of goodies in this plan for the wealthy. the estate tax, which only applied to an estimated 11,000 people with some of the wealthiest statwealth iest estates in country, supposed to be repealed. all miv minimum tax primarily impactsing well off households also repealed in this and top income bracket for folks making more than $400,000 a year, cut to 35% from 39.6%. so the gop wants to keep its promise that the wealthy won't benefit. they're going to have to explain. which brings us to promise number two about this tax plan from the president. >> it's not good for me, believe

me. >> but -- president trump is rich. tells us about it all the time. so all of those thing ice just said about this plan benefiting the wealthy also could apply to him. if you believe the president, that he's worth $10 million, this plan could save his family $4 billion in estate taxes alone. repealing the all miv minimum tax slashed his 2005 tax bill want we know byes 3ds 1 million and we know it, the one leaked tax return we have. and he'd also stand to potentially benefit from, of course a lower top rate. beyond that, this plan slashes rates on pass-through income, how president trump's businesses seem to be generally structured. businesses that he is not die vetted from. the president wants to keep his promise he won't benefit. he's going to have to explain how. and the white house today did not have an answer. >> how can you say that this is not a plan to help him? >> it's not the american people

concerned about. they're concerned about their financial position. >> don't you think it would be good for the president to prove that bereleasing his tax returns? >> what we're triking to do and working on at the white house is to increase the lifestyle of american citizens. >> this tax plan as it stands out in appears it will benefit the president and his family. why not just be candid about that? >> look, i told you it will benefit the middle class. >> republicans say they'll make sure those pass-through change doss not benefit people like mr. trump. they just don't quite say how. promise three, up next. >> every american is, every income level especially the poor and middle class keeps more of what they earn. >> now that is a big promise to make, and one that the white house is already saying cannot keep. >> you can't guarantee that no middle class family will get a tax increase? there will be middle class families that get a tax increase

under your plan? >> george, that's an exception to everything. you can always find a unique family somewhere. >> but if you live somewhere with high state or local taxes you can't deduct those from your federal return under this plan. that could mean a big tax increase for you. folks, bottom line, the devil's in the details and we don't know a lot of the details. which tax bracket do i fall into? 12, 25 or 35%? we don't know. haven't told us which correspond to each bracket and haven't definitively set the brackets. the framework says they might add a bracket for top earners. joined now by republican congressman mark meadows of north carolina chairman of the house freedom caucus. good to see you, sir. >> chuck, great to be with you. thanks so much. >> start with the tax plan here. >> sure. >> what is the promise here that you feel is the most realistic to keep? kevin brady, weighs and me ways

everybody will see a lower tax bill once this is done. you heard the president say the wealthy are not going to benefit here. some of this is a contradiction. now, i know sometimes people get exuberant at campaign rallies. what are the facts? what are you willing to promise? >> this is not a campaign rally, chuck, and as you indicated in the lead-in there, we're looking at the different brackets. there's two things. let me address the first question. first when we really look at those brackets, trying to make sure that the majority, in fact, the overwhelming majority of middle class, or middle income wage earners, get a break. i can tell you that i saw the president truly weigh in on this particular issue just the other day as they were discussing some of the final details, and what he said was, we want to make sure that we are not actually giving a break to those top income earners at the expense of

those in the bottom brackets. so that's why so much attention has been placed on those at the 12% or 25% bracket. >> right. >> that's what kevin's talking about. when we look at that and take in the 10% bracket now to zero. 159% bracket down to 12 percent the 15% bracket to 12%. make sure moms and dads on main street are the main beneficiary. that's what i'm committed to do. >> what's the definition of middle class for you? what is it going to be? >> you know, it's really about my constituency back home. because that's what it's, important. 750,000 people i represent in western north carolina. many of them are hard working american taxpayers that truly feel like the special interests here in washington, d.c. get their carveouts, their special loopholes and so we're going to do away with those. that's my commitment. not only to you but to my

constituency and as we look at that, one of the big things i got excited about. you mentioned this. that small business tax deduction going from 39.6% down to 25%. because they do the majority of the employing around this country, and so as we look at that, it's critically important that we stay focused on making sure that this is not just a break for the rich, and i think that's what you're hearing in the messaging. obviously you can look at a number that, the deserve is in the detail, but this is about a give and take, but it's taking away those special interest loopholes, giving it to the people back home. >> let me ask you again the question i asked. what do you consider middle class income? what are we looking at here? the range of middle class income? >> in terms of range, yet to be determined. most of the time when you look at that it's those people that are making $250,000 or less. >> okay. >> certainly for middle class to me, it's much lower than that. you know, when you're looking in

that $80,000 to $100,000 range for a family, you know, the correct definition of that, you have to look at the mean number, but i can tell you that this is not about giving those millionaires big breaks on their tax rates. it's about cutting it down and making sure that we do a good job of putting money back in the pocket of hard working american taxpayers, and one of the -- >> do you rule out actually raising taxes on the wealthy to pay for some of this tax cut? >> you know, that's never been anything that i've ruled out, and when they talk about that fourth bracket, i don't see that happening, but say we keep that top bracket at 39.6% which is really was part of the discussion just yesterday. that would essentially mean we do raise the taxes on some of those, because we're getting rid of some of the deductions that are out there. that's why that top bracket was set at 35%. trying to make sure even with some of the cuts that nobody

sees an increase, but the other big part is, doubling that standard deduction goes to those that are working hard, trying to make sure that we protect that first $24,000 worth of income, where they pay zero tax on that. that's a huge benefit putting money back in the pockets, and we'd -- it's our money. it's really their money, putting their money back in their pockets. >> i have a feeling i know what you might say. curious. what is your sensitivity to the deficit? one hand you call, you've called yourself a deficit hawk. when the cbo comes back, what is your pain line, pain threshold on how much deficit spending you're willing to have to pay for this tax cut? >> you've done your research. certainly your producer let you know where i've been consistently for months on this particular thing. i don't believe that it should be revenue neutral. i've been consistent with that even before we saw the

framework, because what revenue neutral means to me is the well connected and those that have big, high-paid lobbyists end up moving around the same tax burden and they -- >> what do you cut? what are we going to cut? >> here's where we cut. i think what we look at primarily is looking at bringing back those foreign earnings, repatriation. at whatever level that is. got about $3 trillion sitting abroad that no one's paying taxes on. we make a mandatory bringing that back. there is income some $300 billion to $400 billion coming back from that. we look also at trying to take out some of the deductions that we'd get, carried interest in one bantered around. the decision hasn't been made yet. but that would be directly at those hedge fund managers. so when you start to see some of those that detail is what matters, chuck, and for me, we believe in the freedom caucus we represent that forgotten man or woman, and that means we've got to represent them on tax reform

as well. and we're committed to do that. >> sounds like you're willing to, about a $5 hadn00 billion o ten years. you outlined about a trillion, potentially. >> when we plook at this, obviously, we put in some mandatory cuts in our budget. $200 billion in cuts. when you look at dynamic scoring. make a compelling case, chuck, when you look at really reducing the tax burden and getting this economy going at a 3.gdp growth or better, that you can end up in a 15 yooe-year window. perhaps not in ten, but a 15-year window, making sure there's not a deficit there. we have to look at it much like people way 30-year mortgage. will we make decisions now and balance over time? that's what i'm in favor of. >> before i let you go, house

majority whip steve scalise made it there. give us a sense of emotion on the floor? >> i don't know i've seen that much emotion on the house floor between democrats and republicans. it's certainly a day i'll remember forever as we see steve coming back. not only is he a good friend, but gave a compelling, compassionate return speech that was not really a speech. it was communication from the heart, and so -- it was a wonderful day. he's already been whipping from the hospital bed on tax reform. so it's going to be hard to tell him no as he starts to work on behalf of the american people. >> there you go. the new secret weapon to whipping votes there. congressman, thanks for coming on spending a few minutes and sharing your views. >> thank you. tonight's panel, tom brokaw, and jim walsh and contributor and firmer political director sarah. welcome all. tom, start with you. look, this is the third

interview i've conducted with somebody touting the tax plan and keep learning new, different things that all don't quite come together. yesterday kevin brady everybody gets a tax cut. mark meadows today trying to say, the wealthy isn't going to get the cut everybody thinks. seem to have a messaging problem. >> i don't know what metaphor they use, but use common in sports. everybody has a game plan. work perfectly. kickoff comes rules change. i can't tell you how many tax plans i've seen come and go over the year. right now on k street, burning midnight oil. figuring out what they're going to do. congressman meadows constituents in the western part of south carolina. say she's a stool teach choolte. $90,000 in income. they don't have anybody doing a sharp pence what they'll do. take whatever comes across the board for them. everybody else as higher levels a way of figuring it out. always elasticity in every tax

plan. intentions good, but it will change a lot between now and then. we can go through all the analysis. the fact is every administration people know it does have to change. >> you guys did this. okay? and -- one of the things, you did give everybody a check. if i recall. >> yes. >> but explain the stumbles you ran into, what the thought the plan would be and what you ended up having to do end of the day, a more bipartisan congress and the president had to give on some of the rates. had to give on some amounts. had to give on some deductions. had to give on cap gains. >> give on the ten-year window? >> on the ten-year window. had to give on, you know, a little bit of everything. and we needed democratic votes. i mean, every member going with the president to montana. this was critical to getting it done at the time. that's going to be largely unheard of, i think, in this debate. everyone's talking nice today, but you know, when you talk about the 10% bracket and

perhaps a top bracket that comes down. i don't know how many democrat, going to vote for this. certainly not very many. you did the right interview which is the folks are going to matter in this debate are the freed caucus in getting this done. >> joan? >> democrats will matter, because they'll probably sit it out. i was struck listening to him and listening to all of this for the last two days, chuck. it reminds me of the very beginnings of obamacare repeal where you would talk to different congress members and they would all have a different notion of what the bill or bills is going to do. >> and u potopiautopian. >> and not hurt this person and a bill that was unpopular. that's what we're heading toward. when they have to put it on paper and tell us what the brackets are, tell us who's benefiting, who's not, it's going to be very unpopular. >> look, the polling on this, it's -- they've got a messaging problem here, tom, already.

for instance, corporate tax rate, frankly that's something that has bipartisan support. >> right. >> ask the people if they think corporations need a tax break? it's just not there. one of the -- there actually is bipartisan support. >> there are brackets but also reality. our old company ge paid 5.3%. >> effectively. >> the effective tax rate is much lower. >> what happens with a lot of these corporates. and a little different, extract oil from the middle east, taxed heavily and pay a higher number. a lot of conversations in america eastern the most successful are not paying at that fixed 36% rate. >> i think we were very effective in selling this, even though we had hurdles you pointed out. we put a 450uhuman face on this. we had a tax family everywhere he went almost three years when speaking about taxes. which was, this family of four or five is going to see a --

this amount of taxes reduced based on a new calculation. based on a very detailed plan put out. i don't know they're wrong in not putting out details because of what you said which is you've got k street sitting there trying to figure it out now and not spending dollars yet today, but having said that, they've got -- i think we're having the wrong debate about rates. you know? if i were advising these congressmen i'd be talking about real wage growth and putting a number to it, which is, some estimates say if you cut the corporate tax rate to 20%, you could see a real wage growth of almost $2,000. that's a number we should be talking about. >> and joan, interesting. the president has some protectionist instincts. >> yes. >> you could picture some democrats talking into saying, okay. repatriate that money, make them use this portion. >> right. >> for new jobs or this portion for -- my -- that is something, where i'm curious to see. do democrats, do chuck and

nancy. >> chuck and nancy. >> go to the president and, you could see a -- how you get joe donnelly in indiana. even a tim ryan, himself has shown openness to some of this stuff. >> you could. >> to get onboard. >> right. the president does not seem engaged in that particular way. you know, he could have started with this. could have started with infrastructure's reached out to these people. done bipartisan things and didn't. i don't see it happening. i guess i would add, sarah, you successfully cut taxes. president obama did not raise taxes on anybody but the people over $450,000. that was really, really controversial to many of us liberals. >> and negative impacts on the economy, because it meant less investment. >> i don't know about -- i don't -- >> i can see this debate. >> not personally but a negative impact on investment in business. it did. >> i never have seen those numbers. >> where bush had it, the right

decision for investment purposes not just for cutting taxes on the wealthy, but may have to give on that a little bit, a few points. >> interested in a couple extras. what about reducing brackets to about three? i mean -- consolidating, just a simpler idea of who's going to be paying how much. we got brackets all over the place. >> a very good point. the one thing that will sell to the american people is severaller tseveral severaler taxes. three brackets is semplsimpler seven. >> you can't get the mortgage deduction and a one-page form at the same time. >> tom, i'll always argue for a higher top margin's tax rate. that's how we built the middle class in the '50s and '60s. >> stop there. >> sorry. >> that's okay. on the ground in puerto rico. relief efforts stalled due to the distribution chain. we'll be right back. think again. this is the new new york.

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bshwelcome back. "mtp daily" turns two. two years ago today, candidate trump unveiling his tax plan. what he promised about the plan didn't match the actual plan. sound familiar? so what else was happening on that day we started this "mtp" daily journey? presidents obama and putin meeting face-to-face at the u.n. big conflict, syria. exclusive with hillary clinton talking about what bill's role would be in the white house. we now know, you have to go back farther than two years in the time machine to find out a white house where bill clinton has a role. on that first "mtp daily" we talked how jeb bush's top donors warned if poll numbers didn't improve they'd defect. i think we know how that turned out. speaking of polls, a new one that day among republican primary voters. donald trump and ben carson leading the pack with 21% and 20% of the vote republicantively. carly fee on rena and marco

rubio tied with 11%. no mystery how that turned out. and running to replace speaker jon boehner of the house and we know how that turned out, to, and nasa announced liquid water on mars. that's reantship . isn't it? and that one. still actually a mystery. new findings suggesting jumping the gun on that two years ago. thought a little trip back in the time machine there to celebrate our "mtp" daily second anniversary. your carts, look for them in the mail later today. we'll be right back.

discover card. i'm not a customer, but i'm calling about that credit scorecard. give it. sure! it's free for everyone. oh! well that's nice! and checking your score won't hurt your credit. oh! i'm so proud of you. well thank you. free at at discover.com/creditscorecard, even if you're not a customer. wack pack -- welcome back. puerto rico. much needed supplies not making it to the island pap logistical problem at port of san juan. stuck at the port. after president trump suspended the joents act this morning lifting restrictions to the island more supplies are on the

way. the supplies aren't getting to the people who need them in december precision. the island supply chain is broken. the big issue, fuel. fuel isn't getting to trucking companies. no trucks to pick up supplies at the port to get them where they need to go and many roads impassable from the storm's destruction. the construction equipment, you guessed it. stuck in crates at the port. the port needs thousands of gallons of diesel a day to move them around and power refrigerated storage for food supplies. remember, maria knocked out the island's power grid and everything is running on a generator including the port. generators need fuel. this afternoon i spoke to the governor ricardo rossello and asked what he needs. >> the reality is that this has been a perfect storm of sorts. right? not only have we in puerto rico encountered two category 5, 4, hurricanes in the past, in the span of two weeks, but also the

whole of the power grid, as you mentioned, is down. that has limited te telecommunications and essentially this storm hit every part of puerto rico. so capabilities's down everywhere. adding to that, puerto rico's an island. so getting assets over here has been a great limiting step. when i talk about assets, we were prepared. we already voover here fuel. we have food and water, but certainly because of the devastation getting truck drivers, getting actual equipment trucks to crate diesel and fuel to different parts of the island has been a challenge. however, we inform that these challenges are, you know, the resources are growing every day. identifying more people willing to work, and, of course, we've solicited help of the federal government, and they are sending, from the federal level experts on transportation, on fuel, from emax on the state

level about 17 states have already been part of this effort. so right now they're arriving. as soon as we can get that logistical problem going, we can get more fuel and more food, but that doesn't mean, chuck, that we are not getting food to the people. right now we've gotten about 2 million liters of water out to the people. about a million servings of food, and this is a supply chain that's continuing. we need to do it better. that's why we need more assets. we're asking for those, and we are confident that they will get here. >> you say you're confident. get there. these assets, something that -- that perhaps the defense department, you need help from them? when they build sort of temporary structures, temporary bridges sometimes, just to -- just to get this supply chain moving again? >> right. well, we're looking for assets. the d.o.d. can help, for example.

they have strategic forces on transportation, fuel management, engineering and medical services. those are critical competences we need here now. the national guard has already been doing the efforts on the road so that we can get those bridges to the areas that have collapsed. >> right. >> so we have moved significantly forward in terms of clearing the roads, but it's a matter of getting those resources. we've had to airlift resources to hard to reach areas in puerto rico and, of course, the main limiting step is getting fuel, because it is such a, a specialized vehicle that we need to transport them. >> maybe this is too early to ask you this question, but i'm curious. do you think the response -- do you have a, a sense that the response from the federal government or maybe the response from, would have been stronger if you'd been a state? >> well, obviously that was always a concern originally, and that also has been a concern, as

you know, we're not a state but proud u.s. citizens. we're proud u.s. citizens that have served the country at the highest rates per capita in our military services, for example, and just two weeks ago we came to the aid of about 4,000 u.s. citizens that were stranded, didn't have a shelter. we gave them shelter, food and water and transported them, but that if equal treatment is hot given to puerto rico there could be given

month treatment to anybody else. >> governor, we're all pulling for you and will continue to share different ways people can help. thank you for coming on, and letting folks know what you need and what's being done. thank you, sir. >> thank you. by the way, also talked to the governor what his plan is for getting kids back to school. an interesting answer. you'll be able to see that as part of my full interview with the governor on the website. and apparently florida offered to do virtual classrooms. interesting. hopefully you'll take a listen. and tensions increase with pyongyang. are north korean officials reaching out to u.s. analysts to make sense of president trump? ambassador on the north korean nuclear program joins me, next. you know who likes to be in control? this guy. check it out! self-appendectomy!

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coming up, almost 30 years ago businessman donald trump in an interview with hugh hefner's "playboy" magazine with more resonance today. first, here's kayla tausche for the cnbc market wrap. >> thanks chuck. dow closing 40 points higher. s&p up by three points to a new record. nasdaq up under a point. u.s. economy grew faster than expected in the second quarter thanks to strong consumer spending. the commerce department upped its gdp estimate to 3.1%. hurricane recovery is likely to

slow that growth. put your tools down. ikea purchased task rabbit to assemble furniture. u.s. customers will be able to hire someone to do the hard work. the swedish company is looking to expand its digital reach. that's it? cnbc. first in business worldwide.

if it's possible, the situation in north korea seems to intensify even more this week responding to president trump increasingly bombastic rhetoric, north korea accused the u.s. of essentially declaring war which the white house called "absurd." chairman of the join chiefs told senators it's a matter of time before north korea has a nuclear capable intercontinental ballistic missile. >> whether six months or 12 moss or 18 months and we ought to conduct ourselves as if it's a matter of short time before north korea has that capability.

>> president trump warned he'll take action if needed. >> if we take that option, it will be devastating, i can tell you that. devastating for north korea. that's called the military option. if we have to take it, we will. >> joining me now, chris hill, former ambassador of south korea and somebody who is just back from south korea. so ambassador, let me start with this accusation of a declaration of war. what do the north koreans mean when they say something like that? is there another hidden message we're missing? >> a lot of bluster there, to be sure, and they can say something today. they can change it tomorrow. the fact is, though, that this is quite a crisis. i mean, i negotiated with them for four years and there was a sense, this was a nasty problem, but we have really entered a crisis and frankly it's a full-blown policy issue that we are not all sure what this administration is trying to do. >> for months we've been told, oh, the south koreans aren't nervous. aren't nervous. you're there now. they're starting to get nervous?

>> stock market's holding okay, but, yes. they are beginning to get nervous for a couple of reasons. first of all, kim jong-un is quite untested, doesn't listen to anybody, doesn't care about the chinese and they're worried where we're coming from, where our administration has gone. the president may talk about a military solution, or he may say, well, we can recognize north korea as a nuclear state. you never know with this president. i think the big problem is the chinese don't know what to do, and there's going to be a certain tipping point where the chinese kind of give up on us and cannot rely on us and that could be a kind of dangerous moment, because we need to cooperate with them on a solution. >> what does that mean, if they give up on us? i've heard other diplomats -- word it a different way, which is, they're not going to assume we know how to solve the problem. they're just going to solve it on their terms. >> first of all, the chainese teamed up with russians on the so-called freeze for freeze. north korea freezes tests we freeze exercises.

not a good sign. really, the chinese are very worried about a nuclear north korea. they don't want to recognize. >> isn't it already there. >> it's not already there. >> they're not nuclear. i do not buy the argument that they have a warhead that could survive a missile test. i don't think they're there, quite there yet, but i would -- >> do you buy what the general -- >> absolutely. whether there in three months or six months, they're heading in that direction. the question is what are we going to do about it? i don't think the trump administration has any idea, certainly not any idea they've been able to explain successfully to us, let alone to the chinese and the south koreans. a lot of concern, nobody really can kind of predict extrapolate where chump is going on this and it's dangerous in terms of foreign policy to give clear signals. >> and still an ambassador sow south korea. somebody who was one, how problematic is that to the south koreans right now? >> south koreans wonder why that's the case. i mean, after all, you would

think in these times we would want to hold them close. part of our whole strategy, should be, to hold allies close, work with the chinese and don't see an ambassador and wonder, what is this administration thinking or more ominously, whether this administration is thinking. this is not just a crisis that's going to go away next week. i mean, this is a long-term hideous foreign policy issue we have to face. >> and a striking story, i believe in the "washington post" a couple days ago that north korea was quietly reaching out to republicans they knew to try to get a better understanding of the trump administration. i'm curious, by the way, if you, if they've reached out to you, since you have a relationship, trying to get a read? >> i have not had the north koreans reach out to me. i have had the chinese reach out to me and other players in the region. japanese, south koreans reach out to me, but full disclosure, the north koreans have not reached out to me and that's fine with me. i can handle that. >> do you buy that they are, have you heard they are trying

to reach out to other republicans saying they want to do diplomacy? >> it tells me they want a sense where this president is going because they've actually heard positive things from him about his willingness to sit down with jing jong-un. they don't go away. we say, look, campaign rhetoric. they're never so sure about that and they listen, parse the words carefully. but when they try to put it together they can't find a coherent direction, and so they're looking around to figure out what that coherent direction is. >> there are 16 people that ran against president trump in the primaries, that are still trying to figure him out. so i don't know if the north koreans will be able to do it either. thanks for coming in, ambassador. >> my pleasure. still ahead, why it really pays sometimes to read the articles in "playboy." what is that? it's you!

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welcome back. tonight noting the passing of hugh hefner. built an empire, promote add way of life and lived it. in other words, made his bed and slept in it. a lot of them, actually. reminding us sometimes people should buy "playboy" for the arbels like this one. an interview with businessman donald trump in march of 1990. highlights -- on ego. "playboy," how large a role does pure ego play in your dealmaking and enjoyment of publicity? >> trump, every successful person has a large ego. >> every successful person?

mother teresa, jesus? >> far than you will understand. >> on his strengths. >> trump, vision my best aspect. i know what sells and what people want. on his children -- my kids are extremely well adjusted but i wonder what they think when they walk into march lorg mar-a-lago and see ceilings that rises and when a date picks up ivanka and how will he feels and tries to impress her with a studio apartment? finally on the trump show. "playboy." what does all of this, then, the yacht, the bronze tower, the casinos really mean to you? trump, props for the show. "playboy," what is the show? >> response, trump -- ishs the show is trump. and it is sold out performances everywhere. i've had fun doing it and will continue to have tfun and i thik most enjoy it. >> the last one reminded us of our interview with candidate trump in august of 2015.

>> are we all a part of a show? there is -- you know some criticisms, we feel -- are we in a reality show? >> no. this is the real deal. >> say what you want about hugh hefner, he lived his life without hypocrisy. for president trump, can't criticize him for not being consistent. at least on the subject of donald trump. we'll be right back.

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for the most important part of you... your brain. with an ingredient originally found in jellyfish, prevagen is now the number one selling brain health supplement in drug stores nationwide. prevagen. the name to remember. the presentation that the twitter team made to the senate intel staff today was deeply disappointing. their response was frankly inadequate on almost every level. >> welcome back. time for "the lid." sarah, i'll start with you. you boring in the digital space quite a bit. mark warner unloading on twitter. he's not alone here.

it sounds like twitter didn't take this that seriously today. >> i think all of these companies that make their money in advertising are having a real problem. this will have a trickle down effect on their businesses. they can stop this if they choose to. and you know, we know that law enforcement cracked down these networks and they routed out child porn. they didn't rule out piracy, ads from russian influencers and a whole lowest of other illegal activities. and this will shine a spotlight on them that will be far more devastating than the pr crisis of the day. >> is silicon valley the new wall street? they're getting hate from all sides. >> yes. they're going to need some regulation if they don't start being more proactive. we all use some form of social

media. and it is great. it makes your life better. you see your kids, your kids' friends, your grand kids. but you expect a certain amount of privacy and i don't think twitter or facebook have really kept up with this part of the russian influence. but also, they're terrible at customer service. as somebody who is on twitter a lot and gets trolled a lot. the things people can say to you on twitter, it would shock you. i can't repeat they will. >> unfortunately, i know, too. it is disgusting. as bad as it is for men, it is always 50 times worse for women on twitter. i don't think they quite get it yet. facebook is starting to get it. i think zuckerberg, maybe he's doing it because he's forced to. he is starting to realize, we have more public responsibility here. >> the people who have created the digital world are jegeniuse.

they're also very ardent. i got started very early getting to know bill gates. but they accomplish what they accomplish through their arrogance. i know best, i know better than you do. we'll take charge of the world. but this is a big wake-up call. we talked about this. the fact is, that there are so many pirates out there who can stay ahead of the curve. that's what always distresses me. they can build all kinds of fire walls. somebody will figure it out sitting in a basement somewhere. and we don't know how and suddenly they're posting stuff. >> that's true. the challenge for these businesses is once government gets a window into your business practices, they largely have been unregulated. >> totally. >> so this has happened to other countries. microsoft went through this in the 1990s. scrutiny into everything they do.

>> and they seem to not understand, if they would be more forthcoming, they might be able to hold this off. >> wee all learning, you can have an approach of we're all learning together. this is brand new. we put it out there. we're now understanding how it can be used for evil. and we want to get to the bottom of it. >> here's a political issue for them. the greatest constituencies say you can't do that. we created this. >> the libertarian mindset is what created the internet. >> we don't want any fire walls. this has to be open to everybody. liberals and conservatives politically and everybody else. when it comes to the digital world, that's a whole different environment for them. in terms of how open sourcing they are. >> you brought up the finances here. how concerned is twitter about admitting howl of their accounts are bots. >> yes. that's a great example.

one of many. not to mention the ads that ran on their network from russian adversaries so you take pirated activity, plus, perhaps, russian influence activity. all of a sudden, a bad revenue story is much worse. >> i'll out of time, even though not out of things to say. what is a mini canary and why could it be a really good thing for the democrats? i'll explain after this.

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in case you missed it, democrats won two state elections thing two states from red to blue. one was a state senate seat in the miami area. it was last won by a republican. the other was a new hampshire state house, a state that donald trump won by nearly 29 points. there have been 49 of these elections. republicans have filmed one state. the democrats have flipped eight. they're not high profile wins. not national reporting. there's no big money being spent and no big name endorsers. but don't ignore these. these could be minnie canaries in the coal mine. the first hints of trouble perhaps for the gop nationally.

the first indications the winds are shifting at the state level in a way that could turn into a major storm nationally. like early weather forecasting when you see the low pressure developing off the coast of africa. anyway, mini canaries. we're claiming we're coining this phrase. that's all for the tonight. we'll be back tomorrow. "the beat" starts right now. >> is this butter fly theory like weather? or baby canary? >> we're going mini canaries. wait a minute. a canary is already small. but hey, they're state legislative seats. we feel like congressional seats are the canaries. i wanted to go with finches personally but that annoyed some people. >> getting darwinian. chuck todd with the analogy and watching the races as a leading indicator. thank you. president trump's approach to law enforcement is under scrutiny after he snubbed the swearing in ceremony for his own fbi director today. and we can tell