at 9:00 p.m. eastern i will be in for rachel maddow if you want to tune in and i'll be back here at 6 p.m. eastern. hardball with chris matthews is up next. moron. let's play "hardball." ♪ ♪ good evening, i'm chris matthews in washington where the united states secretary of state is now on record calling the president of the united states a moron. this riff between the president and his top diplomat secretary of state rex tillerson is deep and dangerous. tillerson and the state department are now in damage control after an nbc report offers details of the tension and terrible words passing between tillerson and the president. multiple senior administration officials tell nbc that tillerson was on the verge of

resigning this past summer and mounting policy disputes and clashes with the white house. the report goes on, quote, tillerson openly disparaged the president referring to him as a moron after a july 20th meeting at the pentagon with members of trump's national security team and cabinet officials. vice president pence is said to be intervening or trying to intervene to smooth things over and today secretary tillerson tried to push back with this remarkable public statement. >> the vice president has never had to persuade me to remain as secretary of state because i have never considered leaving this post. i serve at the appointment of the president and i am here for as long as the president feels i can be useful in achieving his objectives. >> can you address the main line of the story where you called the president a moron and if not -- >> i'm not going to deal with petty stuff like that. this is what i don't understand about washington. again, you know, i'm not from that place. but the places i come from, we

don't deal with that kind of petty nonsense. >> tillerson didn't deny threatening to quit nor did he deny calling the president a moron when he could have given two opportunities to do so. president trump tweeted the nbc news story has ju been totally refuted. no, it wasn't, youb heard it. by sec tillerson. it is fake news. they should issue an apology. secretary tillerson has not refuted calling president trump a moron. and in las vegas president trump addressed secretary tillerson's comments. >> i'm honor by his comments. it was made up by nbc. they made it up. total confidence in rex. vi total confidence. thank you very much, everybody. >> for the latest i'm joined by hallie jackson. why is the president dealing with it this way. he obviously doesn't went a tough at this point to break out at the point of a true estrangement between him and his

secretary of state. is that what's going on, he wants to do damage control? >> reporter: it allows him to get shots in at the media which the president has done not just in his administration but also on the campaign trail. here's the thing. we know this president plirizes two things, loyalty and strength. what you saw from rex tillerson was what you could call strong loyalty. right? he came out and very vehemently denied the reporting, some of it. he also emphasized that he believes the president broke the mold as he said when it comes to foreign policy. and this is the backdrop of this, after months of what you described as a rift between these two men, at least when it comes to policy and at least when it comes to what has been said publicly. for example, the crisis with qatar, the crisis in north korea, you have iran, for example, places where in particular on north korea you heard the president say one thing, yub eve heard secretary tillerson say another. and there's a question from world leaders and others about

who is really speaking for the president besides the president himself. it's not surprising at all that that would be the president's response to this story. it is also an indication, at least at the moment, that perhaps the president is not leaning toward eliminating his secretary of state from the administration. i just think back to moments when others had been on the line a little bit. their jobs had been in a little bit of trouble and the president did not rush out to defend them. and i think of, for example, attorney general jeff sessions who obviously remains in his position but as has been widely reported, there have been issues between him and the president. >> it's been wildly reported, a single report by carol lee but lots of sources, up to ten cited in the fact that he called the president of the united states a moron. but here's the interesting thing -- >> reporter: three sources on that particular point. >> what about the larger question of the white house antipathy towards tillerson. three white house staffers

saying they wanted them quit. >> reporter: i'm here on capitol hill this afternoon talking about a different story, chris, in my other role also covering the white house. and i had a conversation with the head of the foreign relations committee, bob corker who actually spoke to some of what you're talking about. i asked him about whether he had confidence in rex tillerson to lead this administration oes foreign policy and he said he believes in rex tillerson. his concern is what he views as the president essentially not giving enough support to his secretary of state bringing up other voices inside the administration. what does that mean? the other voice loud on foreign policy is jared kushner. and there's no secret that perhaps there's some tension there as jared kushner takes on a portfolio that includes peace in the middle east, something that would traditionally fall to the state department. >> i'm sure he's the perfect guy for the job. for more, let's go to the former state department tax person and jason swann. thank you, both of you.

this discussion, these reports don't come from nowhere. three sources at least, i have to tell you. i'm sure more people know about it than are admitting it. you call the president of the united states a moron, you got to take it back or live with it. what's this guy going to do? >> clearly that audience was for an audience of one. it was for trump and the white house. it wasn't for the rest of the world other than to show unending loyalty to donald trump. and tillerson hasn't had a public profile. barely given any interviews and certainly hasn't spoken or been pub on any of the world issues, the iran deal or north korea negotiations. this is indicative of the u.s. diplomacy being high j ja hijac president. >> don't waste your time, rex in dealing with the north koreans. he's the secretary of state. he's entitled to have

communications with hostile forces. he's been told like a dog pulled back on a leash. >> save your energy, rex. >> what's the point? i think this moron talk is not isolated. it's part of the attitude towards each other. >> i reported six weeks ago that the president said to at least two people in the white house quote, rex just doesn't get it. he's totally establishment in his thinking. trump has been criticizing trump privately for some time. the relationship is frayed. he has, as far as i can tell, approximately two allies in the administration, general mattis and to probably some extent general kelly. if you can find me one other person in the white house who will go on the record and say nice things about rex tillerson, i'll give you a substantial sum of money. i've tried to find people. >> we're all waiting for rexit. >> rexit? that's what you're calling it?

>> rexit. frankly what rex tillerson said about the president of the united states is what world leaders have been saying for quite some time. it's undiplomatic but it's what they're thinking. >> they're not working for the guy either. >> rex tillerson is. pub ling stateme p publ rks c statements like this, you under mine the united states. rex tillerson hasn't been given a state. >> can't get anything confirmed. >> he can't get anything done. >> he can't get the white house to agree. >> we do not have an ambassador to south korea that either one of them can agree on. >> bob corker addressed the tillerson controversy this morning. let's listen. >> he ends up not being supportive in the way that i would hope a secretary of state would be supported. and that's just from my vantage poi point. but i've never -- you know, vi

no knowledge of the comments or anything else. i think he's in a very trying situation trying to solve many of the world's problems a lot of times without the support and help that i would like to see him have. i think secretary sister-in-lti secretary mattis and chief of staff kelly are those people that help separate our country from chaos and i support them very much. >> there's an astounding moment in the film "game change" which reenacts a moment where john mccain is told that the person he just picked for a running meat sarah palin quote doesn't know anything. and now we have a scene in july where the president is being briefed about the world. this is afghanistan, this is iran, being told where all of the countries are that are troubling to us and why we have to play a role in keeping our forces in afghanistan. out of the meeting comes the

secretary of state and calls the president at that moment a more reason. this is serious moment. he's saying the president doesn't know what he's talking about. >> the president hasn't been able to explain why several countries are on the muslim ban list from the travel ban. specifically no one in the national security community can understand why a partner like chad is on the list for not allowing visas and refugees in this country. the president was asked that question and couldn't explain it. yet to come forward with the real strategy and intention behind sending 8,000 troops to afghanistan. what is the end goal. and we still don't know other than some bombastic statement what is the end game is for him with the iran deal coming up and the recertification. what you have instead are the people who work for him making statements and making policy but then get undermined by him. and corker said it best. these people in the cabinet are supposed to be the vanguard against chaos.

chaos is donald trump. >> tomorrow morning, anybody who reads any newspaper is going to know the president has been called a moron by the top policy guy. what are the dimensions of the horror here. what does this mean to the world. you mentioned the world thinks he's a moron but rarely do you hear a cabinet secretary, a secretary of state call the boss a moron. >> in order to be -- your power of secretary of state depends entirely on your relationship with the president of the united states. you're making a calculation. does he speak for the president of the united states? objectively he doesn't. he literally doesn't. he says things and 24 hours later the president says don't worry, rex. safe your energy. it's very hard to see how people could take his word as gospel. >> this crowd is having problems. this is the first time tensions between the secretary of state and the president has spilled out into the open. here's what tillerson said about the president's handling of the

white supremacist in charlottesville. >> when the president gets into the controversy that he does and the u.n. committee responds in the way they do, they begin to doubt whether we're living the values. >> i don't believe anyone doubts the american people's values and the government's agencies. >> and the president's values? >> the president speaks for himself, chris. >> whoa. thank you for joining us tonight and thank you jonathan swann. coming up, president trump meets police, victims and first responders out in vegas but the big debate here in washington after 58 people lost their lives is about guns. u.s. congress john lewis is one of the democrats ratcheting up the pressure for congress to actually do something. he'll be joining me right here at this table in a moment. plus, the russian investigation. the leaders of the intelligence

committee says collusion is still an open question. did the russians have inside help when they interfered to win the election for trump? and president trump's very spotty record responding to tragedies and disasters from tossing out rolls of paper towels in puerto rico yesterday to blaming both sides for the violence in charlottesville. he doesn't always rise to the occasion. finally, let me finish tonight with trump watch. he will not like it. you will. this is "hardball" where the action is.

according to a new investigative report by propublica, ivanka trump and donald trump jr. were nearly indicted in 2012 on fraud charges. the report says for two years prosecutors in the manhattan district attorney's office had been building a criminal case against them for misleading respective buyers in a condo development that was failing to

sale. it wasn't until marc kazowitz got involved that the case was dropped. also in 2012 kasowitz donated $25,000 to the reelection campaign of that manhattan district attorney making kasowitz one of vance's largest donors. he went directly to vance to ask if the investigation be dropped. shortly thereafter vance dropped the case telling propublica, i did not believe beyond a reasonable doubt that a crime had been committed. the district attorney returned the $25,000 contribution but months later kasowitz made a larger donation to vance's campaign and helped raise more from other, eventually more than $50,000 in contribution to vance, the da. in a statement issued today a spokesman for the da told nbc news no outside attorney influence any decision in the matter. kasowitz said his contributions

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i just have to tell you that i just met some of the most amazing people. we met patients that were absolutely terribly wounded and the doctors, the nurses, all of the people at the hospital have done a job that's indescribable. >> -- gun violence problem? >> we're not going to talk about that today. we won't talk about that. >> we don't want to talk act gun violence today. president trump visited las vegas today, the site of sunday's horrific massacre. and while he met with survivors, first responders and local leaders and offer actually warm words, he actively avoided any talk on gun violence. for their part democrats are stepping up calls to reform gun lines. senator dianne feinstein

introduced a bill today. 12 of those devices were found in the hotel room on sunday's shooter himself. for more on the president's visit today, i'm joined by john raulston. is nevada never going to do a gun control bill? >> i've been talking about that a lot. there's a huge gun culture here. you're familiar with nevada. there's a wide swath between if two urban areas and they love their guns in rural nevada. we passed a background checks bill in 2016 but all 16 of the 17 counties voted against it except for clark county. as you know, las vegas has all of the population. and yet, this is so nevada, it hasn't been implemented because the republican attorney general and the republican governor, who are gun rights advocates have refused to implement it.

they're now under threat of a lawsuit because of that. whether this changes anything or tho not -- i'm as cynical as things changes in nevada about guns as you are in washington. >> what about a guy who brings 23 guns into a hotel room. if he carried them all up by himself or if he got help, somebody would have noticed. there's metal, guns. these are heavy bags. i guess it doesn't matter if the guy who carried them up thought they were guns because they were all legal. all 23 guns are legal. >> that's only part of the point. you're right. it seems unfathomable that this guy had all of those guns, the bump fire stocks, they found dozens of guns at two other locations, his home here and then in reno. but how does the guy get all of those guns up to the casinos, up to the hotel room inside the casino resort. what are they going to do?

i interviewed steve wynn last year and he said he was worried enough about the concentration of people at events here that he actually essentially has hired exnavy s.e.a.l.s. to patrol the casino floor. he had metal detectors hidden all over the place. are these guys going to have to do that? how do you do the balance between security and not scaring people away from las vegas after what's happened. >> thanks you so much. by the way, john, when i see those two holes where the broken windows are on the 32nd floor, it does remind me of 9/11. it's iconic. terrible. thank you. democrats held a press conference today calling for action. among the speakers was former congresswoman gabby giffords who was shot herself in 2011. let's watch her. >> stopping gun violence takes courage.

now is the time to come together, be responsible. democrats, republicans, everyone. we must never stop fighting. fight, fight, fight. >> i'm angry, angry that we are here yet again. >> they've failed the american people. what is the number? how many more dead bodies will it take to wake up this congress. i've been around too long. i lost colleagues in mississippi and alabama to gun violence. we lost dr. martin luther king jr. to a man with a rifle. we lost senator robert kennedy to a man with hand guns. i've seen too many gun deaths and i am here to say right now this must stop. >> congressman john lewis of georgia joins me now.

you were the personification of the civil rights movement. you've been through all of this. you won that fight at least in the law. is this ever going to be won, the battle for gun safe any. >> chris, we will win this fight. the american people will not stand to see hundreds and thousands of their fellow citizens mowed down because the lack of action on the part of the congress. we have to do something. you know, at 50 today, 58 or 59, how many tomorrow? it made me very sad to see what is happening. >> do you think this number will do it? i remember when bob kennedy was killed, your friend, i wrote my congressman, maybe the only time i ever did, and something happened. there was a safe streets act or something there. but nobody has really done anything. dianne feinstein's bill allowed e lapse, toomy and mansion,

they're not going to reintroduce. except for you, a lot of people feel like they're falling back. not willing to show the courage on this right now. >> we must show the courage. nothing short of raw courage. as gabby said, we must be brave, bold and we must fight. we're going to organize on the house side as democrats. we're going to organize. we would like to do something in a bipartisan fashion. but we're going to organize all across america. >> what's your message to republicans? >> come and join us. let's do it together. we should do it. the american people are demanding action. i went to the speaker the other night on the floor of the house and i asked the speaker to join us in a bipartisan fashion, and he said if it going to be about law? he said he couldn't do it. >> well you know, i'd like to believe what you say but i've

seen ronald reagan almost killed. if he hadn't gotten the hospital in three minutes, he would have been dead. mart martin luther king, all these people getting killed. no country in the world lives like us. there's no country in the world like us. we keep putting up with it. >> is there something in the water we're drinking, the air we breathe. we've got to fix it, be brave and courageous and the voters must stand up and speak up and speak out and do what i call, they got to get in the way. >> what do you make of president trump. why does he say don't talk about gun control or gun violence today. today he said let's not talk about gun violence in las vegas he said that. >> well the time is always right to do what is right. we waited too long. how many more people would die. would it be a few hundred? a few thousand? several thousand? we have to act. we cannot wait.

>> let's take a look at this. well, we're out of time. unfortunately we're out of time for you, too, congressman. you're one of my heros. >> thank you, sir. >> that's john lewis of georgia. up next, the top members of the senate intelligence committee say that russia is determined to describing future elections in this country. we're going to make to rob reiner, he's launched a new group to help americans understand the threat posed by the russians in getting into our electoral politics. this is "hardball" where the action is. ( ♪ ) dad: molly! trash! ( ♪ ) whoo! ( ♪ )

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what i will confirm is that the russian intelligence service is determined, clever, and i recommend that every campaign and every election official take this very seriously as we move into this november's election and as we move into preparation for the 2018 election. >> welcome back to hardball. that was republican senator richard burr warning that the kremlin's influence campaign continues to pose a threat. as chairman of the intelligence committee, senator burr and senator mark warner held a press conference on the progress of their investigation. they made it clear that the possibility of collusion remains a question despite the president's insistence it's a hoax. >> the committee continue to look into all evidence to see if

there was any hint of collusion. [ inaudible ] >> i'm going to let you quote the president and ask him questions about what he zblez do you have any information to suggest that the president knew anything about these contacts, his associates and the russians? >> i thought i was pretty clear. the issue of collusion is still open. >> i'm joined by msnbc national security analyst clint watts and rob reiner, renowned filmmaker. he's also the director to have upcoming film on former president lyndon johnson entitled "lbj." can't wait for that. clint, how did you read chairman burr's statement that eit's an open question that there's collusion. does that mean they don't have anything hard yet or he doesn't want to say what it amounts to. >> i think he doesn't want to say yet.

he's going to try to keep his cards close. that is in the mandate. but i also have to wonder how this is being deconflicted with the mueller investigation. the mueller investigation has way more experience in the case and in terms of pursuing with criminal charges, anything in terms of collusion is going to fall to a criminal charge. i'm curious as to how the committee and the mueller investigation are working this through. it's very much on the table and something that shouldn't be ruled out. >> rob, thanks for coming on. it seems to me that the admonition from the ranking member and the chair is if you see something, say something. point out dangerous signs you see. and yet the trump administration never pointed out anything last year. we never got a whiff of it from them. >> and that's the big problem and it's why we started the committee to investigate russia. because in the past whenever the united states has been attacked, whether it's pearl harbor or 9/11, we have always come together as a country to fight

against -- you know, the cliche that politics ends at the water's edge. but we are so divided that putin was able to exploit it. and we have a president who doesn't acknowledge that we have been attacked. and we're in a new kind of war, a cyber war. and clint can certainly tell you about it. clint is on our advisory board, along with james clapper and mike morrell and michael hayden and leon panetta. we've got some of the best national security experts in the world basically shouting from the rooftops that we have been invaded and we have to understand this. because if we don't, we're going to have our democracy fray at the edges. >> rob, are you conducting the investigation alongside the mueller investigation and the two house intelligence committee investigations and i guess generally the fbi, are they all complicit together? >> well, no.

what we're doing is we're trying to bring together all of the elements. it's wha very confusing situati. you've got, you know, cybersecurity, you've got possible money laundering, you've got three investigations in the congress, and then you've got mueller and the fbi. so we tried to give people an overview. plus the history of what the russians have been doing. chris, you know, we're the same age. we ducked under desks when we were kids. >> i remember. >> we worried about the a ltom bomb. there's no desk to duck under now. we've been invaded and we have to understand the nature of this war. >> senator burr says the committee has been unable to interview christopher steele and cannot assess his credibility. he suggests that they've corroborated some parts of the dossier going back to june of

'16. let's watch the chair. >> we're investigating a very expansive russian network of interference in u.s. elections. and though we have been incredibly enlightened at our ability to rebuild backwards the steele dossier up to a certain date, getting past that point has been somewhat impossible. >> you know, clint since the beginning of this republican have worried, arguing, debated and feared about politicians getting involved with other countries whether it was the french or the british. the declaration of independence it seems to me is the abiding document for this. just independence. how independent are we as far as you know in our politics from abroad. are we independent? is there serious influence going on? >> i think the point that chairman burr made today about we have an upcoming election season. what everyone is forgetting is

putin's plan wasn't about one election. it was about winning audiences and then influencing them. what we see going on today is a continuation of that plan. he has pulled off an amazing fe fete. he's unified audiences in germany, france and all across north america on a nationalist rather than globalist agenda which he will use to influence politicians. active measure is about the force of politics rather than the politics of force. he's going to use our politics, our divisions against us to try to push candidates one way or the other. and what i think chairman burr was alluded to is whether it's the integrity of elections, whether you think your vote counts or not or whether you're being shaped by opinions coming from abroad, we have not responded to. this we have no counter to this. so putin right now influences an audience in this country which he can weld against any

politician if he so chooses. >> rob, i know you've been interested in politics since you were born. i think you started reading the "the new york times" when you were 3. anyway, why do you think putin, who is a nationalist, the russian nationalist, wants the old empire back again, and steve bannon who is sort of like the 0 by one kano by of this administration, they both are nationalists. why do they have something to common. why do they want us to be nationalists? >> they're not interested in that. they want, as you say, regain the strength they had when they were the soviet union. at the end of the cold war, the soviet union collapsed it collapsed largely because we were in a nuclear arms race and it sunk their economy. now he's using a relatively inexpensive tool of warfare to do what he wants to do, which is to regain that power. he is sewing all kinds of

division in europe with the european union, nato, brexit was a part of that. and any kind of division he can sew and tear away at the fabric of democracy he's going to do it. because then he emerges. >> i'll call you citizen reiner out of respect. thanks for coming on. thank you clint watts for your expertise. up next, the hardball round table weighs in on president trump's response to tragedy to his divisive response after charlottesville. he hasn't always hit the right notes, don't you think? you're watching "hardball." of being prescribed for nearly 10 years. humira works inside the body to target and help block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to symptoms. in clinical trials, most adults taking humira were clear or almost clear

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it could save your life. the energy conscious whopeople among usle? say small actions can add up to something... humongous. a little thing here. a little thing there. starts to feel like a badge maybe millions can wear. who are all these caretakers, advocates too? turns out, it's californians it's me and it's you. don't stop now, it's easy to add to the routine. join energy upgrade california and do your thing. welcome back to hardball. in the face of crushing tragedies like las vegas and natural disasters like hurricane maria, americans turn to the president-for-reassurance, stability and sometimes unity.

be well the public wants a president who can share in the country's grief and also offer a sturdy hand forward. it's a hand all presidents have been called to perform. here he was in las vegas today. >> the message that i have is we have a great country and we are there for you. and they're there for us. >> but in reflecting on national tragedies, the president has often fallen short. there was charlottesville, here he is. >> we condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides. >> i think he added that on many sides. there was hurricane harvey. >> thank you everybody. i just want to say we love you, you are special, we're here to take care. it's going well. and i want to thank you for coming out. thank you everybody. what a crowd, what a turnout.

>> what a crowd, what a turnout. then there was puerto rico. >> i hate to tell you puerto rico, but you've thrown our budget a little out of whack because he eve spent a lot of money on puerto rico and that's fine. we've saved a lot of lives. if you look at the -- every death is a horror. but if you look at a real catastrophe like katrina and you look at the tremendous hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people that died -- >> who can forget the president flicking rolls of paper towels to a gathered crowd just yesterday. for more i'm joined by the hard table tonight, annie carney, eugene scott and shannon, white house correspondent for block berg. in this order how do you rate -- the words are unfortunate but they're his words on both sides. hatred and all of this on both sides. a great crowd, great turnout like it's a political rally. and all of the rest.

>> well the best -- i talked to a close trump friend over the weekend. the best defense he had was this guy is never going to take a sensitivity course. he's not the consoler in chief. it doesn't come naturally to him. >> but he's good at gigging people up to anger. lock her up. he knows how to work that emotion. >> the other one doesn't come natch rlly to him. we've seen him read off of a teleprompter for a day, his statement on the first day after the shooting in vegas. he didn't make a bad situation worse. his actions did nothing to inflame the situation. but it never sticks and he goes off script and says things that don't feel appropriate for the moment. this is who he's been for nine months and it's not his natural role. >> eugene, it comes with the territory. you're head of state if you're president of the united states. we don't have a king. we have a president. he or she is supposed to represent the people personally.

>> yeah, absolutely. and i think that immediate speech following vegas was very consoling. he appealed to many of the values of, not just his base but people in america broadly. he quoted from the songs, talked about prayer and the need to be unified by faith, which is significant considering how divisive he was accused of being just a few days before when hae he attacked the san juan mayor. if he stick to that i think this recovery, this response shall i say to vegas -- >> so there is a touch of narcissism when he talks about the crowds he's drawn. even throwing out those bounty paper towel rolls. it's like he was the big shot. he was feeding people that were almost desperate to get anything. it's just weird. it looked like a superior attitude. >> narcissism is key. >> it's an embarrassing picture. >> even people who are friends

with trump, people who support him, they'll say yeah he tends to be a narcissist. he perceives the situation as all about him. any light, it is all about him. the puerto rico mayor, san juan mayor saying i need help, send resources, it's all a slight to him. that's one of the things that inhibits him from being sensitive to a bigger situation because he can't step outside of his universe. he's been an inarticulate messenger and even his supporters would agree with a lot of that. he's an inarticulate messenger. but the people who like him and support him acknowledge that and accept that because they agree with his policy and bigger view on things. i don't think any of this is costing him anything with at least his base. >> what about compassion? >> what about it? >> is there any here? it's not just the people in front of him. this country has 330 million

people and a good number of them in trouble all of the piem. not just homeless people you can see, but people at home, sick. you know, you see a lot -- lately i've seen a lot of people in wheelchairs and there's a lot of people with real problems. does he care about them? i'm asking the question, does he have any evidence of caring about them in. >> i'm going to give you an example. after we saw the syrian president use gas on his own people, trump was said to be moved by images of babies and children being gassed and he talked about the babies multiple times. these images seemed to really move him. that's the last time i can really remember him being moofd. he didn't seem moved in puerto rico by meeting actual victims. he went back to texas after not meeting victims on his first trip to meet people who had been displaced from their homes. and i talked to some gun control advocates yesterday who said they didn't expect him to make policy on this visit but there's value in him visiting the

hospital and seeing what gun violence does to your family and your body and that maybe it would sink in. we'll see if the visit had any effect on him. but his remarks today were totally in line with what a president should do in a situation. they were scripted. but we'll see if he'll talk about that extemporaneously. >> remember that line in shakespeare, a touch of harry in the night, they get a feel for him and there's a sense of eisenhower did that before d day. he said good luck soldier. that personal connection between president and a soldier. it's not always in a sick bed. you dot to be able to do it to be a popular president. >> especially if you want to be reelected. two weeks ago nbc news did a poll about how millennials felt about republicans and democrats open trump. and most millennials think that neither of these parties and the president actually care about

them. so i think something for the republican party has to look at if these voters -- this is the largest block, age group in our country. if they don't think the president cares about them or the par. ty, what impact could that have on them in 2018. >> one on one people say he does connect with them empathetically. if you're in a room with him, he is connecting with you sensitively. but he's not translating that and maybe that's something he will learn how to translate that to a larger stage audience. >> thank you. great round table. sticking with us. next, three scoops tonight. i'm putting the pressure on scoops you'll be talking about tomorrow if we're lucky. "hardball" back in a moment. whoop, whoop! [crowd 1] hey, you're on fire! [mascot] you bet i am! [crowd 2] dude, you're on fire! [mascot] oh, yeah! [crowd 3] no, you're on fire! look behind you. [mascot] i'm cool. i'm cool. [burke] that's one way to fire up the crowd.

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on every purchase i make. everything. what's in your wallet? well steve bannon is wading into ooth republican campaign. former republican congressman michael grim tweet thd photo of the two of them with the caption game on. #make america great again. bannon is backing grim as he tries to win back his congressional seat from dan donovan. grim served two terms in the white house before stepping down to serve a prison sentence for tax evasion. he's best known for threatening to push a reporter off of the balcony in the capitol while the cameras were rolling. >> congressman michael grim does not want to talk about the allegations concerning his campaign finances. we wanted to get him on camera but he refused to talk about that.

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we're back with the hardball round table. annie tell me something i don't know. >> i'll stick with bannon. you were just talking about him. trump is still smarting over the luther strange loss. he hasn't spoken to bannon since then. and he worries about the other races that bannon are going to get involved in. >> eugene. >> the arizona senate race, everyone is looking at whou the republicans are going to put up to go against jeff flake. we have kirsten from congress deciding she's going to run. that's what everyone is hoping and saying. >> on the mueller investigation,

the white house is almost complete with responding to all of the requests that mueller has asked for on documents and information. next they're going to interview white house staffers so things should get interesting. >> thank you. when we return, let me finish with trump watch. as i said, you'll love it. he'll hate it. you're watching "hardball." when you're close to the people you love, does psoriasis ever get in the way of a touching moment? if you have moderate to severe psoriasis, you can embrace the chance of completely clear skin with taltz.

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confident president surrounds themselves with a cabinet and advisers smarter than they believe themselves to be. by that standard donald trump expanded his horizons. he selected a secretary of state, who thinks the president is a moron. interesting choice of words. according to the dictionary secretary tillerson could have said idiot, block head, dunce, half whit, dope, dim whit, dumb be, dits, numb skull, thick heads, jug head, chowder head. these are not words but the direction nair offered a synonym for what secretary tillerson didn't deny call the president. when given a chance to take it back, refused to do so. the characterization lies on the record until someone clears it and that would have to be the secretary of state himself. he can deny saying the president is a moron or take it back.

and today the honorable secretary has refused to do either. if these were still the days when men were challenged to a duel we could expect to see trump and tillerson meet soon on the field of honor. that would be something. and that's hardball for now. thanks for being with us. all in with chris hayes starts right now. tonight on "all in". >> address the main headline of this story that you called the president a moron. >> an nbc exclusive. >> i'm not going to deal with petty stuff like that. >> a secretary of state does not deny calling the president a quote moron. >> hit was made up by nbc. they made it up. >> tonight the angry trump response and why one republican senator says rex tillerson separates our country from chaos. as it relates to the steele dossier. >> what he learned from the senate intel to