affordable care act, paving the way for sweeping changes to sweeping legislations jason aldean previously cancelled three shows in california out of respect for the victims and their families. "morning joe" starts right now. good morning. it's thursday, october 12th. welcome to "morning joe." we have mike barnacle, senior political analyst for msnbc news mark halperin. washington anchor for world news america, catty kay. good to have you all on board, i got back late very night from baup. we were at the institute of politic itself, we had a great town hall event there with the institute of politics, it was really incredible to hear from the students. >> it really was incredible. we got great input from them. great insight.

they're obviously very concerned. still very -- >> a lot of anxiety in the room. >> also very hopeful and optimistic. they want to get involved and they want to get involved in a significant way and that's just great and very, very open minded about the very things that are plaguing washington, d.c. right now. some of the things you hear plaguing college campuses, you certainly didn't feel it was there, they were very open minded. >> yeah flu is know, it was so impressive, willie, you know what i told them they were, hold down, i am proud. i took special pride in that. because i've always considered harvard the university of alabama. >> there were a lot of kids from alabama there and a lot of republicans in the room. >> were you telling yale jokes and all thatly would tell yale jokes all the time. py favorite, you know one of my favorite moments in 1960s tv

history 679 did you ever see gilligan's island? this is important. >> i think we are digressing. >> so lovee and thurston howell, iii, gets separated from the group. this savage comes through the bushes, he's eating and spitting and thurston goes, egad, it's the yoman. so -- >> you can certainly tell those jokes soon. >> how about the yankees? >> i never expected that in a million years. i thought the indians were the team of destiny this year. this yankees team, you put on the pinstripes and you can just, you must feel like you can do anything. >> not a lot of people aren't yankee fans root for the yankees, i get that. this was a team that was maybe going to be 500, not much expected, a rebilling year.

they came down 2-0 against the best team in the league, the cleveland indians, a team that won 22 in a row. they won last night. c.c. sabathia, 37-year-old old, had nine strikeouts. they won 5-2 and go on to play the houston astros, great, incredible baseball. >> this pro season seems the best in a long time, but they had another bad start my gosh, they were relentless, they just kept coming at the indians. >> i will say this, this has been a great post-season. you had all stars. you referenced cory clug two

didn't show is up. the yankees, i have to tell you, they are fun to watch. they are an energetic teinner e owener getter -- an energetic team. >> mark halperin, the nationals finally won a game if post-season. >> big game five tonight. they are, there are so many teams left who are great teams who you can imagine winning. they have been one of the best teams in baseball for the last couple years. >> mika gave me something shocking, the yankees game was winding down, she said, joe, i know, in the wild card era,

there have been 23 teams that have won 100 games. that many? >> yeah, that many. it's got to be a great team, 100 games. only three of those 23 teams won the world series. we saw it all the time with the braves, you get exhausted. they go into the playoffs, they lose. you saw it with the mbms, with chris sails. here a guy could not hit spring, summer, fall. isn't that amazing? it's something that's exciting about baseball but also something that's a little maddening that a wild card team can come in, in a five-game series and beat the indians who won non-stop for a month or so. >> for some odd reason having spent most of my life during baseball, it occurred baseball is the only major professional sport that people watch, hockey,

football, basketball, none of them have the time in between the action to savor the tension and the stress. >> is that what you call it? all right. i call it falling asleep. >> are you still going to auction off the score card you do every game? >> no, i understand why you all look like hell this morning. >> i have a lot of different reasons. so. >> yes, you do. president trump reacted to yesterday's nbc news exclusive report about what happened at the meeting at the pentagon last july by attacking the press. this seemingly freedom of the press. he tweeted yesterday morning, quote, with all of the fake news coming out of nbc and the networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their license? bad for country! and again last night, network news has become so partisan, distorted and fake that licenses must be challenged and, if appropriate, revoked. not fair to public! to be clear, the networks themselves do not hold federal

licenses, their individual television stations do. the president said more in a rally-tile interview with fox news held in harrisburg, pennsylvania, and also earlier in the day in the oval office. >> if i was just watching television, you don't know whether or not because you know you are watching a report, but when you are the one being written about, you below it's good or bad. they always make it bad. i call it fake media, so much fake news and we have to -- >> do you agree with that fake news? [ applause ] >> it's frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write and people should look into it.

it's the question asked before ten times the nuclear capability. i know the capability we have, believe me and it is awesome. it is massive. and so when they make up stories like that, that's just made up. and the generals will tell you that. and then they have their sources that don't exist in my opinion, they don't exist. they make up the sources, there are no sources. >> the nbc report, sourced three unidentified officials in the room at the pentagon when the president reportedly made his comments and now at least one member of the president's party is taking exception with trump's rhetoric against the press. republican ben sass of nebraska said, quote, mr. president, words spoken by the president of the united states matter, are you tonight recanting the oath that you took on january 20th to preserve, protect and defend the first amendment? >> mark, of all the things, the shocking things, the president

has said and he's said so many, channeling chairman mao and joseph stalin by calling the media an enemy of the people. saying that first amendment rights, saying the ability of newspapers to write what they want to write is quote disgusting and someone should look into it. maybe the most frightening of all and the most disgusting and again, we are starting to hear people talking more and more about the 25th amendment. steve bannon, warning the president. that's what will remove him from office. if anything, removes him from office, tom baric, his long-time friend saying he is shocked and stunned by what he's seen from donald trump. and bob corker saying -- we could add all of this up and now you have a president who is

actually dismissing the most sacred right americans have had since 1787, the right of free speech. >> it's an attack on the media to be sure, but more profoundly, it's an attack on the first amendment. the president should be aware, perhaps he is, that we've reached a new phase amongst people around him that the whispers that you used to hear only on the left about the notion he should be removed or that the presidency is in crisis, that is now said by people who are friends of the president who are advisers to the president. they're concerned about his state of mind and his ability to do the job is higher than he has been since he got sworn in. comments he made yesterday only feed that. >> he said it several times. he talked about taking licenses away. you can't take away anybody's license. it's not how it's done. but then saying that it was disgusting that newspapers could write what they wanted to write,

ignores the fact that again in 1787 the supreme court has recognized that political speech is the most protected, the most valuable, the most unasalable speech that americans have. there is, there is no challenging political speech as free speech and the press' ability to report on it. >> yeah, i don't know if the president understands how news organizations work. but, obviously, nbc, bbc, every news organization we have worked for has strict protocols in place that means they cannot write whatever they want to write. you have to do your reporting. bbc we had two sources, this story had three unidentified separate sources before it was reported. so news organizations are very careful about what they put out there in the public domain as news. and i don't know if the president understands what those

editorial protocols are in place, somebody around him ought to inform him of them. for somebody that watches an awful lot of television, you might be curious how news organizations gather -- >> willie, again it proves for his friends and advisers who say that the president is out of touch, and they're growing more and more worried about the president, he doesn't even know that those sources are people who work for him. >> right. >> and this has been, you know, he screams about leaks inside the white house all the time. well, they're the sources. they're the people talking. and he looks completely clueless when he goes out and says things like that. >> this has been happening almost since the beginning of his administration. it's reporting inside the room. it's three people inside this meeting that allegedly led to rex tillerson calling the president of the united states a moron. it's because they're concerned.

this is authoritarianism 101. you delegitimize the press and your opponents and destroy them. luckily in the occupation, we have a constitution that stands in the way of the president that does that he is saying don't believe your eyes and ears when it comes to things that criticize me, don't believe what you are saying, fake news, fake news, fake news, there is no license to be revoked. there is nothing he can do, thank goodness, because we have a strong system. can you go to the history textbook 101. any person has done this delegitimize the press and stroi it. >> it's to be dealt with. if they think they don't have a responsibility to deal with what is clearly an unraveling at the very least. >> the great unraveling. >> of a personality. >> and, mike, these are wards you would expect from turkey out of turkey. these are words you would expect

out of russia. these are words you would expect out of the philippines. the president of the united states actually all day yesterday, not self correcting himself, because it's impossible for anyone to correct him. he certainly can't correct himself, continuing to say that he wants to, he wants to trampple first amendment rights. >> so mark's points, it seems to me a few conversations with people in the white house over the past, there seems to be a clang in attitude over the past three, four weeks, now you have people working in the white house, talking about the president's emotional stability on a day-to-they basis and what he's doing, he seems intent on further dividing the country that is already pretty well divided and he has injected a fever within certain elements of this country. his follower withs witer wither.

with a fever -- followers with a fever about the press, it's taken hold, while he's done in, you have other disrupted elements, he has chosen to try to destroy health care. he has chosen to try and destroy environmental regulations. he has chosen to destroy the iran accord, tpp, nafta. all of this is going on and it's incredibly dangerous. >> the three things that have focussed the minds of the people around the president one is the north korean standoff, people are feeling skittish. two is the mueller investigation, which is putting pressure on people in the white house. three is the reality they may end this year not passing a single piece of legislation. those three things combined to create a lot of awareness what's happening the way the president is conducting himself in office isn't working. what he did yesterday is

alienating people more. they know it is a reality show distraction. >> and bob corker's statement, questioning the president's fitness, questioning whether the president's actions relating to nuclear war, towards world war iii, one of the most republicans that are powerful on capitol hill, words not challenged by fellow republicans on the hill. >> no, obviously from somebody that he needs if he's going to do any of the things that the white house is so worried that he's not doing. i dwoirnd about the press thing, whether this is trump's deliberate attempt to get us all talking about the press and you put out that shiny object, which he feels up for him has worked. check out fake news, it's red meat to his base and you know the more we make this a story, the more we talk about it, the ability to froth about something, whilest real things are going on, we may be put out

of the nuclear deal, major cuts are made in environmental protections this week. throw out fake news, we will all talk about it and i think, you know, we have to be careful about the way we approach this story. >> it's more than fake news, a challenge to the first amendment. >> it's wrapdz up with a challenge challenge, but it's not going to happen. >> we hope not. i want to go back to what senator sass said, a republican stepping forward, saying something that should be easy and obviously, whether a democrat or a republican, i think what he is saying is, we can't accept this as normal. we can't accept and roll our eyes and say, over, there he goes again, you have to step forward and remind people that this is not acceptable, this is not normal, i'll be interested to see if other senators come forward and challenge what the president said. >> senators into ed to stop, they need to listen and they need to understand that the

president of the united states said that he was going to look into undermining and actually destroying the most sacred right, constitutional right that americans have had, afen, since 1787. and the fact that he's talking that way in a way no other president has ever spoken in american history, showing complete ignorance of the constitution the law, 240 years of precedence, shows, again, that he is just, he's disconnected. >> not fit. and i think we're at the point where the conversation has changed. >> easily fought fit. >> i know, i think the conversation has changed where there are people beginning to, to show that even those close to him, perhaps, might feel that way as well. >> well, we have more on that coming up. >> we'll talk about. that still ahead on "morning joe," president trump says, when push comes to shove, it's his

attitude that matters the most when it comes to north korea. we'll talk to long-time ambassador christopher hail about how that's going over around the world and joe mentioned that "vanity fair piece." we'll speak to the author of the piece, first, bill cairns with a check on those deadly wildfires in california. bill. >> the death toll up to 23 people from those fires and homes destroyed. somewhere in the two to 3,000 range. yesterday the smoke was so bad blowing down from the napa fires in sonoma county into san francisco. a lot of airplane flights were delayed or canceled, horrible air quality, very unhealthy air to san francisco today, unprecedented levels of pollution.

it really concerns a lot of the elderly, of course the winds came up again last fight. we have red flag warnings continuing for these areas. i haven't heard reports of new playss that have moved quickly. there were some new evacuations overnight. these are the spots where the fires are. this is san francisco the napa area. the wine country. some vineyards have been completely destroyed here. offshore winds gusting this morning. >> that will be a little bit better. the next big wind event looks like friday night into saturday morning. otherwise, this unusually warm october continues, still in the '80s, we have cooled down the flakes in the northeast. very warm in the southeast. we can hit 90 in st. louis and the east coast will easily be in the mid-80s. you are watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. ♪

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a new poll shows americans are feeling better about the economy but not the president. a national quinnipiac university poll find that 38% of voters approve of the job president trump is doing. that's marginally better than their polling two weeks ago, 70% of those polled says the president should stop tweeting from his personal account. that's a new high, asking the question in april t. poll find that 55% of voters believe trump is not fit to serve as president. >> but four in ten americans do think the commander-in-chief is fit to serve as president. >> that's a good one. >> that number is a little changed from a poll done two weeks ago in which 56% said he was unfit. but when it comes to the state of the u.s. economy, 61% say it's an excellent or good shape,

that's close to an all time high. >> so trump not getting credit for good economic numbers. >> he's too frightening to people. >> nbc learned that president trump has capped long-time aid to general john kelly, kirsten nielsen to be the next secretary of homeland security. nielsen joined in september after the president named then dhs secretary john kelly as his chief of staff. "vanity fair" said the appointment could be a sign that kelly is on the way out. the report claims kelly is miserable and remaining out of a sense of duty and that republicans think he wanted to give his long-time mate a soft landing before his departure. the "vanity fair" piece cites a half a dozen trump advisers describing a white house in crisis as they contain a president who seems to be increasingly unfocused, consumed

by dark moods, unstable and unraveling. sherman also reports on a conversation several months ago, where former chief of staff steve bannon told trump that the risk to his president wasn't impeachment but the 25th amendment the provision by which a majority of the cabinet can vote to remove the president. when bannon mentioned the 25th amendment, trump said, what's that? according to a source. bannon also reportedly told the president that he thinks he has a 30% chance of completing his term. this as trump's long-term friend in the washington post. >> this is what is so concerning. >> he is disappointed in the president's job performance. baric told the post he has been quote shocked an stunned by some of trump's rhetoric and tweets. quote, he thinks he has to be loyal to his base. i keep on saying, but who is your base? you don't have a natural base. your base is now the world and

america. you have all these constituency itself, show them who you are, in my opinion, he's better than this. >> tom baric has been a long-time friend, longer than most arc long-time loyal friend, somebody that donald trump has depended on since he's gotten into the white house. but now even tom baric is saying, this guy's changed. i'm shocked. we're hearing more people saying he's unstable in the white house, he has dark moods, they don't recognize him, tom baric saying the same thing, he's better than this, i'm shocked and i am stunned by his behavior. >> tom baric is something that doesn't need anything from the president. one of the things people have pointed to of late and one of the changes kelly has made is he's cut the president off from the easy access he used to have from people passing through the white house. and that has cut the president off from a lot of people who kept him calmer. and so he is, ironically the discipline is making him more isolated and more prone some

people around him believe to acting erratically, because he does not have the human contact. >> that makes a lot of sense, when he had his office in trump tower, that's what he did all day, he sat there and had people come in, talk to him. they talked to him on the phone, he fed off that energy, gossip and the whole -- he's now isolated. he is probably going crazy. >> when he wasn't isolated, he had people reportedly like amorosa getting him spinned up and making him act erratically. so what we have found through this analysis is, when the president is isolated from people, he's erratic. when the president is surrounded by people, he's erratic. >> yeah. and john kelly hasn't actually managed to change the white house very much in terms of its levels of chaos. right? there is still clearly a lot of confusion coming out of the white house. it's not the tight ship he hoped

it would be when he implemented these changes. tom baric still speaks to him one once a week, having people around the president who describes his subpoena as subservient. i have never needed anything from him but i am subservient. >> that may be making the president's moods bleeker. i'm not sure that on the positive side that the changes that kelly has made. they haven't stopped the tweeting. they have managed to make things less chaotic. >> you want to step back as you read this piece the president of the united states being contained, being bubble wrapped by people around him so he's not a harm to himself and others. >> and the country. >> we've gotten so deep into the trump thing the trump years already that this feels like a story that we've seen a few different times, a different version of it. again, there is not normal. this is crazy that we're talking about putting the right people in place to contain the man

sitting in the oval office right now. i would just add the 25th amendment, still a lot of people tweet about it. shout about the 25th amendment, remains a long shot. it's the clause that would have to be invoked by the vice president and the cabinet. that's a long way to go to ask the vice president and the president's own cabinet to remove the president of the united states. >> even then it goes to vote of the house and senate. and i haven't seen any much courage at all coming from republicans. butpy bit; have you bob corker saying in this guy is basically unfit. you have 55, 56% of americans saying the guy is unfit. we're talking about world war iii from leaders. you got one of his oldest and most trusted and subservient friend saying he is shocked and stumped by donald trump's behavior. you hear it from republicans behind the scenes.

the conclusion is, objectively, from a lot of these sources, especially, will you hear it even more after yesterday, the president seemed even incapable of understanding the oath of office that he took to protect and defend the constitution of the united states. he is not well in the traditional sense of what you want your presidents to be more and more people are finally playing that conversation. >> you play back these conversations and conversations elsewhere and conversations privately conducted in the senate or among congress peopl?. my lifetime we have never spoken about a sitting president in the united states this way. this is a sitting president of the united states.

we have never spoken of any major cabinet officer that they are not well. >> yeah. >> there is a disconnect. can you name one? >> nixon. he didn't have the same type of media. a lot of dynamics occurring now in terms of trying to protect the president from himself of trying to have a chief of staff. >> maybe nixon in the final days. maybe nixon in august of 1974 they would sigh mr. president and they won't do them. >> ten months. >> you have to think of the transformation that's taken place because of the office and the investigations swirling around this president that probably keep him up all night and already his obsession with himself keeps him up all night. this is a man that hasn't slept

much. he came into the white house obsessing about the pictures and walked us around the crowd size. this is a guy that's so obsessed with himself. that's how it started. think about the months in office and the toll on his brain. i could see how he would have a complete breakdown, also the dhs position. that's cabinet level. right? yeah. i don't think he is leaving. he se getting his troops in place. >> the other piece when presidents are in crisis, is the family. where are his adult children? his wife to step in and say you need -- maybe that's happening behind the scenes, you don't hear much talk amongst the staff. >> his wife? his wife who jumps on a throw-away phrase. >> yeah. >> and issues of public condemnation that's gaining condemnation. the ex-wife? >> unprecedented. >> that, you are saying that person is going to be a voice of

reason to donald trump? >> let's be real. >> give me a break. >> his daughter is supposed to be a muttering forces on stage at some fortune women's summit, actually, which is an important event talking about everything she is not getting done. she does not seem to be very interested to being a moderating force to her father as well. let's be real. the party is over would you have me reporting on where the adult kids are? >> what i'm saying is the staff that i've talked to wonder, where are they? because that's what past presidents have had. >> they're under investigation and maybe they're thinking, we're safer under investigation, connected to a president -- >> and modeling. honestly. it's sad. >> jared looks pretty good. you look at the thin tie. >> a little pale.

coming up, president trump has yet to explain his cryptic calm before the storm remark. but our next guest has an idea of what he was talking about saying it's just the president acting like a reality tv star. senator chris coons of the foreign relations committee joins us next. directv has been rated #1 in customer satisfaction over cable for 17 years running. but some people still like cable. just like some people like banging their head on a low ceiling. drinking spoiled milk. camping in poison ivy. getting a papercut. and having their arm trapped in a vending machine.

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i think i have a little bit different attitude on north korea than other people might have. and i listen to everybody, but ultimately, my attitude is the one that matters, isn't it? that's the way it works. that's the way the system is. but i think i might have a somewhat different attitude and a different way than other people. i think perhaps i feel stronger and tougher on that subject than other people. but i listen to everybody. >> joining us now, a member of both the foreign relations and judiciary committee, democratic senator chris coons. we are all very concerned. >> let's talk about his

feelings. let's talk about your feelings on north korea and the fact that we have a president that the chairman of the foreign relations committee says may be leading us to world war iii. >> well, this is a very concerning time. one of the things that i have said consistently since president trump became president was he needs to put the phone down. he needs to stop conducting foreign policy and national security by tweet. it's not a well-honed tool for a complex international negotiations. and i deeply respect chairman bob corker. he has led the foreign relations committee in a responsible and constructive way and i know many of my colleagues, both democrat and republican share concerns that this is a moment when we need to be letting our diplomats focus on marshalling the world to confront north korea, engaging china successfully and these sort of casual throw away lines by the president, which strike me as a more reality tv

star than world leader, are destabilizeing at a time when we need his focused leadership. >> senator coons, catty kay here. we hear a lot about the idea we are sleep walking towards a confrontation, that the war talk is being ratcheted up. but what are you seeing specifically is there anything that you see is on the military side with north korea that is happening now that is particularly concerned, we are getting closest to a military conflict? anything concrete? >> catty, that's what makes it possible for me to sleep at night is that i don't see us taking military steps to prepare with a major confrontation with north korea. we have not pulled out the tens of thousands of american independents on the u.s. troops in the peninsula, we haven't

pre-positioned fuel and mobilized significant numbers of jet fighters and bombers and ships, which our military would, if we were beginning serious planning stages for an imminent confrontation. so most of what i see so far is there is a fair amount of muster and threatening and war talk between the leaders of north korea and the united states, what concerns me about that is it does increase the misunderstanding. we don't have it will help with other adversaries in the past. so if there is an incident, where a spy plane or a spy ship is shot down or intercepted as has happened before with north korea, with china, i think the risk of a misunderstanding and a rapid escalation is getting greater with the bellicose rhetoric we are hearing out of

the leaders of both countries. >> mark halperin. >> senator, what itself the role of congress in dealing with the north korea situation beyond talking about it? >> well, it's a great question, we have been pressing for, more recently, demanding a strategy out of the administration. there is a number of i think destabilizing steps that the administration is taking. i'm very concerned about the president moving to dessertfy that the iran nuclear deal is in the best interest of the united states and in both cases, confrontation with north korea and a path forward on a run. we need to be demanding a strategy that we can get behind. i have said privately to senior leaders of this administration, that they would find bipartisan support for a clearly articulated travel for iran's destabilizing behavior and to press forward on putting the screws to china to being a better partner. the administration was making great progress at the security

council and in getting dozens of our allie toss expel north korean diplomats and earning income through foreign workers and through exports. we need to focus on that. the president is distracting our top diplomats and congress from focusing on that strategy. >> good to see you. i want to ask you on a different topic about the president's tweet about the news media, specifically nbc news yesterday, he talked about perhaps revoking the licenses of media outlets with which he disagrees or the ones he thinks are confrontational or hostile towards him, in his opinion, obviously, that's not something that can be done readily by the president thanks to the constitution, do you view that as a threat to the first amendment or the president popping off on twitter? >> well, it's both. the president is poping off on twitter in a way that is normalizing unconstitutional statements. first, just to be clear, as you said the president can't pull a

license for nbc, the federal communications commission, which is an independent agency licenses individual stations, not whole networks so there is no risk that the president is about to pull the license of a networks with which he disagrees. but the idea that the president would repeatedly engage in public statements that are just obviously undermining the first amendment is an alarming development. i agree with senator ben sass, that we all have to stands up in common, those of us who are elected. those of us in the media. those of us who care about our constitutional values in civil society and push back on this, this is not normal behavior. it's not acceptable. >> all right. senator chris coons. thank you very much. >> thank you. still ahead the ranking member of the foreign relations committee, senator ben cardin and the top house committee adam schiff will both join us.

plus, more women come forward to accuse harvey weinstein of sexual harassment. does hillary clinton explain whether she considered the democratic donor a friend. "morning joe" is coming right back. how do we say that this fall,

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what was your reaction when you heard news about harvey weinstein? >> i was just sick. i was shocked. i was appalled. it was something that was just intolerable in every way, and, you know, like so many people who have come forward and spoken out, this was a different side of a person who i and many others had known in the past. >> would you have called him a friend? >> yes. i probably would have. and so would so many others. and people in democratic politics for a couple of decades appreciated his help and

support. >> that's hillary clinton with her first on camera statement on harvey weinstein in an interview as part of her ongoing book tour. she had released a written statement condemning the long-time democratic donor days after the revelations. clinton says it's too much to return his donations but she plans to give the money to charity. it comes as more women are coming forward with accusations of sexual harassment by harvey weinstein. in one instance a model and actress says she was invited to his hotel room. she declined and then decided to go saying she felt, quote, powerless after his assistant said she should go. she said there was another woman in the room, and that weinstein asked them to kiss. when she tried to leave, she says weinstein walked to the door and tried to kiss her. she said she stopped him and managed to leave the room.

ben affleck is issuing an apology after video surfaced of him groaning hillary burton. after being called out he tweeted acted i acted inappropriately toward miss burton and i sincerely apologize. >> we're reading the statements harvey weinstein is putting out about going to rehab, and then he's going to be better in a year. he's given a time line. he knows exactly how long it's going to take to recover from his sickness. how many things are wrong with the statement? where do we begin? >> the idea that you can somehow blame serial harassment and groping on a sickness that you have just doesn't quite ring true to me. maybe there is such a thing sex addiction. i don't know. i'm not a qualified psychologist, but i don't think that's an excuse for harassing people and abusing them. that's what he did.

if he wanted to, he could come out and say i'm addicted to abusing women. that would perhaps be more accurate than i'm addicted to sex. and the idea that well, i can pass this off as an illness and then i'll get better, that somehow exonerates me from taking responsibility from this thing because it was an illness. >> and i am sort of deeply disturbed that he thinks he can come back in a year recovered. i'd like to just go on the record that we will be here talking about it. >> i mean, willie, there is -- >> there is -- >> i mean -- >> that's beyond arrogant. >> there is no second act here. is there? >> it's hard to see how you come back from this. this is not -- the story is not ending here. we're going to hear more and more of the stories. you listen to the story who is a well known actress and model, and they all have some version of the same story. they were cornered. they physically had to find a way out of the room. >> in oh a hotel.

>> he's a physically imposing man. they all had a reason, whether it was fear for their career or one saying i was worried about his family. i knew he had a wife and kids. i want want to blow up his life. he put these women in this position. none of this is any of their fault. he put these women in a position. and i don't know as the stories continue to come out, how you recover. >> you get the feeling there isn't one interaction he has with a female in a negotiation that wasn't inappropriate. you've heard a few people come out and say he's never been inappropriate with me. i think julianne moore said that. in terms of people trying to get deals from him starting out, this appears to be the way he operates. >> and he chose women carefully on the cusp of something so they felt they had something to gain by meeting him but not enough power to pushback. >> any potential legal peril and raising money. who is part of investing in his future endeavors at this point? >> it was so bad that the nypd

was getting involved. the nypd actually had him. the nypd, and i think, again, i have to say it again, the nypd had him. cy vance got a campaign donat n donation. his prosecuters had ivanka and don junior, and then kasowitz -- he dropped the charges, and then gave him an even more money after the charges were dropped. >> it's coincidental. >> harvey's biggest problem is the inability to cope with his own truth by saying publicly i'm a pig, i'm a bully. i did this. >> and i'm done. >> even if he did, that wouldn't change anything. >> yeah. >> not for the women. still ahead, as facebook answers questions about russia's

use of the social network to influence the last election, we'll talk to mike allen as he prepares to sit down with sheyrl sandberg this morning. plus andrea mitchel joins us with her reporting that the president is planning to announce tomorrow that he will not recertify the iran nuclear deal. "morning joe" is coming right back. mom, i just saved a lot of money on my car insurance by switching to geico. i should take a closer look at geico... you know, geico can help you save money on your homeowners insurance too? great! geico can help insure our mountain chalet! how long have we been sawing this log? um, one hundred and fourteen years. man i thought my arm would be a lot more jacked by now. i'm not even sure this is real wood. there's no butter in this churn. do my tris look okay? take a closer look at geico. great savings. and a whole lot more.

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the b.e.t. awards there was a free style wrap criticizing president trump. today trump clapped back with a free style rap of his own. it's a clap back. check this out. >> boom, boom, boom boom knock knock rar china kkkb a. bing bong baa baa baa? >> wow. he's good at that. >> welcome back to "morning joe." it's thursday, october 12th. with us mark halperin, john hileman. sam stein. sam is here. my daughter found that park. nbc news foreign affairs

correspondent andrea mitchel is with us as well. good to have you. >> thank you for your random praises. >> there's a back story. >> president trump reacted to yesterday's nbc news exclusive report about what happened during a meeting at the pentagon last july by attacking the press and seemingly freedom of the press. he tweeted yesterday morning, quote, with all the fake news coming out of nbc and the networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their license? bad for country. and again last night. network news has become so partisan distort and fake that licenses must be challenged and if appropriate, revoked. not fair to public. to be clear, the network us themselves do not hold federal licenses. their individual stations do. right? i mean, only a moron would think -- in the president said more in a rally style interview held in pennsylvania and also

earlier in the day in the oval office. >> if i was just watching television, you don't know whether or not because you are just watching a report. when you're the one being written about, you know if it's good or bad, and it's always, they try to make it negative. the media, i call it fake. it's fake. so much fake news. and we have to -- >> do you agree with that, fake news? >> it's frankly disgusting the way the prez is able to write whatever they want to write, and people should look into it. >> do you think there should be limits on what the prez should write? >> no, the press should speak more honestly. it's not eve an question of distortion like the question before, about ten times the nuclear capability. i know the capability we have. believe me, and it is awesome. it is massive. and so when they make up stories like that, that's just made up. and the generals will tell you

that. and then they have their sources that don't exist in my opinion, they don't exist. they make up the sources. there are no sources. >> they don't exist, joe, or they're in the room with him. >> exactly. >> they're right there next to you. the nbc report does source three unidentified officials who were in the room at the pentagon when the president reportedly made his comments and now at least one member of the president's party is taking exception with trump's rhetoric against the press. republican senator ben sass of nebraska put out this statement last night. mr. president, words spoken by the president of the united states matter. are you tonight recanting of the oath you took on january 20th to preserve, protect, and defend the first amendment? >> john, the president is saying they don't exist, they don't exist. it's kind of like frayto. he's out of it. and here the president who

doesn't understand that these stories come from all around him. he does, because he's actually conducting investigations on the leaks. so you can't be conducting investigations on leaks and telling your fbi director to investigate leaks and say they're made up quotes. that said, talk about just how extraordinary it was yesterday the president was actually saying it was disgusting that the media and newspapers had the right to actually publish what they wanted to publish. >> well, extraordinary except in the sense that there's not been in the totality of the time that donald trump ran for president and the time he's been president, there's not an issue on which he's exhibited a real understanding of -- it's not unique. he doesn't -- he doesn't really understand the complexities of a lot of policies and constitutional norms. this is kind of par for the course, except for the fact that it's so pernicious. >> except the stakes are so much

higher. >> it's so pernicious -- i heard willie talking this morning, this is as he said a classic authoritarian move. we've seen it for serchg ris f. it's one of the first things you do when you're weak and losing power and things are spinning out of control, you try to attack the bedrock foundations of things that are meant to constrain you. the press is meant to constrain the presidency. the president lashes out. the thing about this report yesterday from nbc news is that it's connected to the moron story. right? that's the -- the other piece of that story, and i can't help but think that part of what's making the president so crazy on this matter is that his secretary of state has yet to in a convincing way come out and try to knock that story down. he's at a spokesman do it. the spokesman was in the room. it has to be eating away at him that he knows this story and everything around it we are reporters here, carol lee,

others, have that story nailed and so he's lashing out in a classic trump way. >> it's also about his deep, deep insecurity about his intellect or his lack of intellect. we showed the clip yesterday of him talking about how smart he was, how high his i.q. was. obviously you don't say -- i mean, i'm just a dumb country lawyer, so i wouldn't know, but smart people tell me that if you say that all the time, you obviously are extraordinarily insecure about your intelligence, and that story yesterday got to him because his own aides, people close to him once again, were talking act his complete and utter ignorance of u.s. foreign policy and nuclear strategy over the past 60 years. >> he may be revealed as ignora ignorant, but i have seen much smaller things set him off. there's a big problem there. >> big problem. >> andrea mitchel, i guess your

take on the latest here. in terms of this report? >> well, just that, of course it is well-reported. it has sub tanstanchuated. and he seems to be vulnerable. if you look at what he's said about nuclear weapons through the campaign and even as recently as august when he said he had already as one of his achievements in office, modernized the nuclear arsenal. yes, he signed a nuclear review on january 27th as one of his executive orders, but it takes decades to modernize the nuclear arsenal, snag president obama started and that is reviewed my incoming presidents. it costs trillions of dollars. and in six months, nothing had been accomplished as he claimed. so he did not have a grasp of this, and the fact is that what they were doing in the tank in

that room in the pentagon was giving him the kind of briefing they felt he needed because of among other things, the way he reacted the day before about the afghanistan review. that's the day when in the situation room, he compared rebuilding afghanistan who renovating a restaurant or the kitchen. so he indicated to his closest national security advisers a level of shall we say incompetence, that alarmed them enough to want to continually review him. and this was during a period of time when a lot was going on. this was july 20th. it was the same day that he sat in the oval office with maggie haberman and suggested that he never should have had sessions. the next day sean spicer was forced out. a very critical period that a ten or 15-day period in his presidency. >> wow. and the story on afghanistan and the 21-club, of course the punch line to that is it never

happened. so he compared it to the 21 club, insulted them, and he made up the story. you know, several months ago the people at "morning joe" decided that because trump's tweets were so critical, we were going to make a huge investment and set up a trump tweets desk, and, in fact, we did it in hong kong -- >> i thought it was -- >> it reaches hong kong first. so it's -- we're always a nano second ahead. there will be a slight delay. i promise it's worth it. let's go to our hong kong trump tweet desk and our own willie gei geist. >> first, we'll stay on the story about the first men. the president has spent the last 20 minutes tweeting about puerto rico. what he's saying essentially is puerto rico is a complete mess before there were hurricanes there. >> oh, my god. >> and there's only so much we

can do. the electric was a disaster before the hurricanes. we can't keep fema, and the military who has been amazing in puerto rico forever. he says don't criticize the response, puerto rico was already a mess. not my fault. >> i'm glad we went to hong kong. >> please go away now, willie. >> and the nikkei is up. >> and the nikkei is up. >> so -- donald trump sam stein, tweeting out this morning blaming puerto rico. remaining oblivious to the pain happening in puerto rico. the fact that 80%, 85%, 90% of puerto ricans still don't have power there. >> more people are dying. i think we're up to 45 or 50 dead in light of the disaster there. >> and they're dying because they don't have clean water at this point. >> correct. >> not just blaming puerto rico but threatening puerto rico. saying fema will not be there for you in the long run.

these are u.s. citizens. >> this is not american. >> i think it gets back to a fragile psyche. he's being widely criticized for this response. it's weird because in the prior hurricane response he earned fairly good prize for his ability to get down there and handle it, seem empathetic. and puerto rico he botched it from the beginning. >> i don't think he understand, and i'm serious, that puerto rico was part of the united states. >> i wouldn't be surprised. it's interesting, because most people when faced with this type of criticism would try to remedy it. they would go down there and seem compassionate. they would do what they could to make the situation better for them politically. trump is unique. when he's criticized, he lashes back. in this case puerto rico gets more threats. >> and the problem is this is a humanitarian crisis which will only expand exponentially. this is -- you've seen this before. we've all seen this before. you have a situation like they

have down there, and there's no response or reaction to it. it's predictable this spins out of control and more people die and more disease spreads. >> no one had power. no one had water because it is an island, so it's hard tore get there. this would require a lot more sustained effort than some of the other disasters he's dealt with, and it's at a time when he only wants credit for things. he doesn't want to deal with hard things. this is a really hard thing. >> on the day the hurricane hit, i and everyone else was watching this on television, and the governor of puerto rico was saying we might not have power for six months. that was the day the hurricane arrived. okay? it was clear that this was going to be a huge -- decimated and a huge challenge, a huge crisis. it took the president as you remember, spent that weekend focussed on the nfl and doing other things. it wasn't until the following tuesday, a week later, that

someone finally criticized him enough that he shifted his focus. it was a week. >> the president was -- >> this is not confidential information. >> and the president was golfing while the mayor of san juan was up to her neck in water trying to rescue people. >> and then to pick a fight with her and go down there and act the way he did. the question i have, i don't know the answer, doesn't he want to have less crises on his docket? i mean, in the midst of a puerto rico crisis, a nuclear standoff with north korea, all the domestic stuff, to then go and do the decertification with iran, why does he feel the need -- and then employee up the daca deal you have with pelosi. what is it he feels like he needs more crises on his docket as opposed to maybe calming the water. >> this is what his long time friend and long time confidant,

a guy so loyal he said he was subservient to him, said in the washington post article, he keeps trying to tell him. you don't need to antagonize. >> yeah. >> 70 % of americans every day, and -- >> why do we think he does? that's my question. >> because he's so obsessed with his 30%. that was the base that got him elected in the primary, and because he's new to politics he never really understood, he's never grasped the fact that the people that vote for you in primaries are not the people that get you the 50% and reelect you. and he's never understood that. and he also is ir rational. >> very. >> and i think somebody that continues doing things that are against his best interest -- let's just talk politically, what he's been doing for the past 8 months are so clearly

beyond his best interest that no reasonable, no rational political actor would do that. which, again, feeds into the question of what is his state of mind? how is he emotionally? how are his mental faculties? why does he continue doing things that everybody close to him are now saying suggests in gabe sherman's piece quotes people suggesting he's not well. tom barrack saying he's shocked and stunned by his behavior and he's known him for decades. >> it's a hard job, and when he confronts adversity in this job he's reacted to make things worse. and there's no one offering a different course except for kelly which is not to his liking. the deadline is approaching

for president trump to make a decision regarding the future of the u.s. involvement in the iran nuclear agreement. yesterday he discussed his options while updating the american people on his plans. >> what's your thinking on the iran deal? >> you're going to see very soon. we'll be announcing that very shortly. >> why decertify and not just scrap it? >> you can do both, to be honest. i know exactly what i'm going to do it, but i can't give it away tonight. but i'll be announcing it shortly. we'll see what happens soon. a lot of people are guessing. maybe there's not so much guessing. it's a horrible em barbarrassmeo our country. >> it comes as ed roy says, quote, as flawed as the deal is, i believe we must now enforce the hell out of it. adding whatever he decides, the president should explain what his decision means and what it doesn't. meanwhile "the washington post" reports that according to one person familiar with the

meeting, the president, quote, threw a fit and was really furious after top members of his team including secretary of state rex tillerson and defense secretary jim mattis argued that while flawed, the iran nuclear deal offers stability and other benefits. andrea? >> well -- >> what are the ramifications of pulling out of the deal? >> the ramifications are global. imagine how this is being interpreted in pyongyang where the regime there is looking at what happened with the last nuclear agreement done by the united states. what he is projecting, he will, i am told, he will announce on friday, they are decertifying but not throwing it out completely. throwing it over to congress. it's being widely reported. interestingly, this will be the third time he faces this deadline under legislation passed by congress to try under obama initially resisted by the obama white house, legislation

to try to force an inflection point every 90 days where the cia, the white house, and all would have to recertify that yes, they were complying. the cia says they're complying. the u.n. weapons inspectors say they are complying. all of his advisers wanted him to simply recertify and then do other things on the side. they've come up with a compromise as it was reported in the washington post, he threw a fit. almost 90 days ago. three days before that meeting in the tank, by the way. see how things were building. this was the point where he and tillerson really broke with each other, because he basically resisted the recertification, it would be the second time. he had to do it in april. he had to do it reluctantly. he said okay, but let's drill down on this. he always said the drill was terrible, wanted to get rid of it right away. on july 17th, he had to

recertify or scrap it or come up with another solution, and he was really angry, and they rewrote the talking points, did it late in the day. it's a midnight deadline. it's always been a state department function since the deal was agreed to, and he basically said we're taking it away. then this compromise was come up with reluctantly. they're going to throw it up to congress. congress does not want to deal with this other than tom cotton and a few others. they will have 60 days to do something. the british prime minister called him the other day and they basically are pleading with him not to do this, but this is what he's going to do. >> andrea mitchel, thank you. we'll be watching andrea mitchel reports to do at noon on msnbc. coming up, two of the top ranking democrats ben cardin and congressman adam schiff, and we

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do you have any plans to release the ads that you received from facebook? >> my we'll go do it as quick as we can. >> it will be released by our committee. >> those are the top members of the house intel committee following their meeting yet with the facebook chief operating officer. facebook agreed to turn over new

information related to the probe after providing investigators with 3400 ads believed to be linked to russia. joining us now, mike allen. he will be interviewing facebook sheyrl sandberg later this morning on her heels of the meeting with congress. what do you want to know from sheyrl sandberg? ? >> when you think about it, this is one of the massive stories of our time. an enemy of the united states plots to infiltrate our unregulated social media system and succeeds. on the hill yesterday, trying to explain all this. but lawmakers tell me they want to know a lot more that there's more for facebook to discover, more for facebook to reveal. they want to know what did facebook know, when, and why didn't they know it sooner. >> what's the significance of the ads? what more do we need to know in terms of who they targeted, who

put them up? >> it will probably be about a month before they come out, the committee saying that probably after a november 1st hearing where we'll hear from officials have facebook, twitter, and google, and people want to see them and can learn from them looking ahead to 2018 that campaigns are already gearing up making digital plans for 2018. this is one of the big questions for facebook. could this happen again? what are they doing to stop it? how could you possibly stop it? why are foreign actors allowed to pay in rubles to buy an ad to influence an election when they couldn't make a contribution to that? we'll be asking sheyrl sandberg all that at 9:00 a.m. on the facebook page on axias.com. >> mike, it's sam stein here. i should disclose my wife just recently started a job at

facebook. >> she speak russian now? >> that was part of the job requirement, yes. curious for you going broader here. facebook wasn't the only social media platform that was used by the russians, i could say. >> looking -- >> what's your understanding of where the congressional investigators are looking as the next thing to unearth? are there other social media platforms? are we talking about other places? where do you think the next stone will be overturned? >> the lawmakers think that all these companies need to do a lot more to stop this and figure out what happened. if these companies know anything, it's data. and so that's one of the questions one of the reasons that they're so anxious to know why it took so long. google as your viewers know, a massive part of this. huge part of any campaign, media plan, and there's been some data

out there that the russians actually used twitter more than they used facebook. so all these companies have vulnerability, and it's at the exact time that these companies which had a hialo are now a target. republicans and democrats, something that unifies them, they think that these companies should be reigned in. that's one of the huge battles of 2018. >> all right. mike allen, thank you. we'll be watching mike's interview with sheyrl sandberg. 9:00 a.m. eastern time live on facebook at axios.com and dipping into the entrier live as well. >> joining us now, "vanity fair" special correspondent and nbc news contributor, gabriel sherman whose new reporting raises red flags about the president's state of mind inside the white house. also with us, washington bureau chief for usa today, susan page, and new york times reporter jeremy peters writing about a new conservative effort to make

mitch mcconnell the symbol of a toxic washington. a lot to get to. >> gabe, what's your take away from your reporting? a lot to talk about there. >> yeah. really these are the people closest to the president who are concerned about his stability at this moment as his legislative agenda is stalled. getting nothing through congress. he's picking fights through nuclear brinksmanship with north korea. and what's troubling is sources inside and outside the white house are talking to reporters, not just me, nbc news and others about this president really seeming to come apart at the seams. i think all eyes are on general kelly. his relationship with the president is becoming what most people say is untenable. he may be eyeing the exits. >> and after reading your piece, i was reminded tom barrack who, of course, is a long-time friend, a con iffidant, talking

about how he's been shocked and stunned by the president's recent behavior. this is, again, coming from somebody that's been around him for 30, 40, 50 years. it's very telling. >> yeah. i was stunned by that interview going in the pages of washington post to talk about really this president doesn't seem to be listening to anybody. and i reported how general kelly has looked to try to sequester the president. he's going to be returning to mar-a-lago later this month. as we all know, trump loves to hold court in the dining room soliciting policy from dining members and guest. it's inappropriate and what the president should be doing. general kelly wants to keep him out of the dining room. but senior official said you can't do that. donald trump and mar-a-lago is one in the same. you can't keep him sequestered in his bedroom. i think we'll be seeing a flash

point down there. >> susan, it appears i don't see any change. do you since kelly has arrived and taken on the position of chief of staff? and i'm wondering, i know gabe, you think that the new department of homeland security position filled by kiersten kneelson is maybe a sign he's leaving. she's close with kelly. maybe she's shoring up the president around the cabinet for what might happen next? >> i think general kelly has made a big difference in the white house when you look at the staff. he's the chief of the staff. he's not the chief of the president, and even -- the chief of staff trying to keep the president from going a place he wants to go, that's new territory. presidents are in charge of their chief of staff. general kelly has made a big difference looking down, but it's unrealistic thinking he'll be able to change the way the

white house operates. you've seen it in the previous story on the congressional investigation and the house intelligence committee. he's isolated even from republican members of congress who are inclined to try to protect him. >> gabe, i want to ask you about a detail in the story. that is the steve bannon has told people he believes donald trump has only a 30% chance of finishing the full term. this first term. what is he basing that on? >> how did he get to 30? this is very precise. >> this is the guy who defended donald trump at all turns. why does he believe he won't finish the term? >> people close to bannon say one is the russia investigation. steve bannon told people he believes jared kushner is wrapped up in this. it was jared kushner's decision among others he was part of the decision to fire james comey. that's something bannon has been vocal about. he's worried about where this may lead.

the other thing is bannon feels that trump is abandoning the nationalist base, and is picking fights with everyone including mitch mcconnell. has basically no friends in washington. and he's a very isolated president. i think that is the thinking behind how he thinks he might not make it a full term. >> and jeremy peters, i was saying last block about how it's very telling while all these people are questioning donald trump's mind set, his stability, that he continues doing things no rational actor, no rational politician would do. he is -- he's screaming about needing 50 votes, and yet, he continues to insult and attack the very people that would help him get to 50 votes, and it's -- you know, it's continued. he's picked a new fight this week. so how are the republicans on the hill other than ben sass responding to a president who is now talking about stripping the press of their first amendment rights and freedoms? >> exactly how they've been

responding all along to various controversial and unbelievable statements the president has made in the past. with deafening silence. you know this. they're not going to break with the president unless they suddenly realize that he no longer has 80, 90% approval ratings in their district. it's just not going to happen. and there will be a select few like corker. >> like the harvey weinstein thing. the most powerful actresses in hollywood didn't start talking until they found out he was going to be fired from his own company. >> that's exactly right. and you not only have the president picking a fight with mitch mcconnell and his allies on the hill. you have steve bannon doing it from the outside. this is a major reason why steve bannon left the white house. i mean, the situation for him was untenable inside the white house to begin with, but he knew once he got on the outside, he would be freer to wage war with the consolation of other conservative groups against the republican establish. . and as steve bannon interviews

candidates and tries to figure out who he's going to endorse in the senate primaries, he sits them down and says i want you to make a pledge to me. will you pledge not to support mitch mcconnell for republican leader. that's an extraordinary thing. at the same time that's going on, you have other groups who -- these conservative movement leaders in politics for a long time and have always picked fights with the republican establishment, they're calling not only for mitch mcconnell to step down, but trying to make him like nancy pelosi was. they're making him the face of the toxicity of washington leadership. think about that for a second. they are using the same strategy that they used against a member of the opposing party, against a leader of their own party. and what's unclear to me is whether or not this works and these republican primary challengers kind of barrel through the primaries here like suicide bombers or whether or not something is really

different this time, and the anger among the base the disappointment that republicans haven't gotten anything done is enough to really shake up leadership. >> yeah. i watched the sean hannity interview with donald trump last night. amazing. amazing that you can get an hour with the president and make literally zero news. >> wait a second. you did that instead of watching -- >> i had both going on. i was really routing against the yankees. >> that's a misspent youth. >> most important, i'm getting a very important point. the most important part of that sean hannity interview with trump was not when trump was on. it was what happened right after. he took his mike, went through the crowd, asked them what they felt about trump and then the republicans in congress. everyone praised trump. everyone very much opposed j upset with the republicans in congress. that goes to jeremy's point, all the an mouimosity is being raist

the people on the hill. >> susan, this is what i've been calling from the beginning, the 30% solution. democrats hate when i say this. you can go back to 2004, 2005, and you can find a third or 40 % of democrats who believe george w. bush blew up the twin towers. we've got the polls, politico reported. ben smith wrote an article about it. you can find the crazies on both sides. but donald trump, he's just focusing on the hard core right, and doing hannity and having the crowd out there. >> and you talk about his isolation. you see that now, i think even in his aspirations. because the idea -- he is now focusing on the things he can do by executive action like action on north korea or throwing the iran nuclear deal or the health care executive order that we believe he's going to sign that's going to undercut some of the fundamentals of the

affordable care act. it's as though he's given up on the idea of forming alliances effective enough to get through big legislation. it's possible he'll go into the midterms with no major legislative achievement. >> and at the end of the day, is that what disturbs the people on the inside the most? that he just is incapable mentally and emotionally of piecing together a majority to pass legislation? >> yeah. flailing and part of the reason we mentioned hannity, he's sitting down with friendly venues because he does not and his handlers do not want him in an adversarial interview. >> you said something about when he decided not to do "60 minutes". >> people were relieved inside the white house. >> they said, quote, he's lost the step. >> people were relieved that interview did not happen inside the white house. in a live tv interview, they can't control him on twitter, but they can keep him from

embarrassing himself sitting down with a real journalist. >> and republicans walking the plank for him might want to watch the interview. >> i wouldn't really call it an interview so much as a conversation. >> gabe, thank you. your story about the president -- >> like a scene when itchy and scratchy for nice to each other. >> at one point he told trump he is proud of him. >> what is wrong -- >> i have to go. >> "vanity fair." jeremy peters thank you as well. we'll check out our reporting in the new york times. coming up, ben cardin is one of the few democrats who voted against the iran nuclear deal. we'll get his thoughts now that the president is set to decertify. plus chris hill joins us after the president suggested military action was the only way to deal with pyongyang. "morning joe" is coming right back. magic...is pretty amazing.

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joining us now the ranking member of the senate foreign relations committee, ben cardin of maryland and dean of the school of international studies at the university of denver

former u.s. ambassador of south korea and former assistance secretary of state for east asia. >> the university of dinner. that sounds good. >> denver. >> very good. >> we go from offhanded remarks to the talk of nuclear war. ben cardin, obviously bob corker the most powerful republican on capitol hill when it comes to foreign policy says the president may be leading us down a path to world war iii. do you agree with that assessment? >> let me tell you what the president is doing is reckless and danger. what will happen is unclear. we don't know what the international community's response will be. but we know he's putting america at much greater risk. we're close now to a military confrontation in north korea. what he's planning to do in iran, the results of that are very unclear. i agree with senator corker that the president's comments are reckless and dangerous. >> senator, what can you do? what can members of congress do

on one of the most concerning issues if he is leading us to world war iii? a year ago when mika and i were talking about how the president asked a policy adviser three times why we couldn't use nuclear weapons. a general was on the show saying unfortunately the system is built for speed, not safety. is there something with donald trump being more president with more people talking about him being irrational, is there perhaps legislative solutions to this on the president being able to launch a first strike? >> well, it's going to be extremely difficult. as you know, the president has inherent powers and it's difficult for congress to prevent the congress from exercising his immediate authority as commander in chief. but we can set up guardrails that could be helpful. we have said before the use of force should be controlled by congress. we have not authorized the use

of military force in korea. it would be good if congress was pretty directive as to how that power should be exercised. i think it would be very difficult to get congress to act, but yes, we could take some action, and it could have some impact. >> ambassador hill, we've had some dark and sobering assessments on the show this week about the situation in north korea both from experts on the subject and from nick christoff who got back from five days there and said he didn't see a country or leadership that was going to be deterred by sanctions. in fact, was energized by having been elevated to the level of the united states by president trump on the world stage. where are you right now on this crisis? how concerned are you as a former ambassador to south korea? >> well, i'm very concerned. i mean, there are a lot of reasons to be concerned coming out of the region. first of all, the president's bellicosity on this is not helpful. i mean, i don't know where he got a north korean speech writer, but he sounds just like the north koreans.

and for them, it's kind of music to their ears. >> i think west coast, but go ahead. >> from the north korean perspective, they have the perfect foil. they're always telling their people, look, we're in danger, we need to pull together. we need to prepare for war. this is perfect for them. if you remember the south korean public, you're living a few miles away from north korea. they have 14,000 ar till ri tubes. this is worry some. if you're china, unsure which way you're going to go. are we more worried about u.s. troops than we are about north korea's behavior? there's a lot of reasons for the chinese not to resolve that issue. and to be kind of less focussed on really putting the energy we need to be put on north korea. so we have a president who at the end of the day doesn't understand any of these -- any of these things. he has a kind of vague idea. he wants to help shinzo abe in

japan nmpl. he doesn't seem to understand -- i think as a general proposition, we have to understand the u.s. is not exerting adult leadership here. and it's very worrysometo everybody. >> ambassador, i want to ask you a range outside i don't have your area of specific expertise. we have a series of stories here. the president talking about wanting to at least contemplate the increase of the nuclear arsenal. we have the president talking about decertifying the iran deal, and cyber rattling on north korea. all corrected to nuclear weapons. i'm curious as you look at the pattern of behavior whether it indicates in your mind some degree of a lack of -- not fully grasping one of the kind of underlying premises of american foreign policy and national security over the past -- since we dropped the atomic bomb on

world war ii. which is nuclear weapons should not be used and we should do everything to reduce the likelihood that they will be used. >> you got it. we and the russians have far more nuclear weapons than we need. nuclear weapons to destroy the world many times over. so the notion that the president sitting and watching a briefing and doesn't like one of the charts he's shown because they can't show him verbiage because he won't read, so he looks at that time chart and says, oh, we need more nuclear weapons, i don't take it all that seriously. i think it speaks to the fact that we have a president who simply refuses to analyze things and only looks at things in terms of being tough. i think it's also important to understand that we can, to use the president's term, destroy north korea many times over and we don't need nuclear weapons for that. we have plenty of assets. we have the world's most powerful military, more powerful than the next ten countries. we don't need nuclear weapons to deal with north korea. i think the u.s. military knows that very well.

>> senator cardin, susan page here, we think the president trump is about to turn over the iran nuclear deal to congress. what do you think congress will do about the island nuclear deal when we see this action by the president? >> first, let me say what the president is doing is certainly against our national security interest. he's doing it because he wants to do it, not because it's in the best interest of our country. the question you asked is a critical question. we don't know what congress will do. we do know we have 60 days to exercise an expedited process that would back us out of the iran nuclear agreement. the pressure may build on congress to take a vote on that, and the outcome is certainly not clear. so there is a big question mark as to what happens next. i think the president is going the suggest that we can somehow change parts of the nuclear agreement. congress can't do that. that's something nah is not

going to happen. we need to enforce the nuclear agreement and we need to take action against iran in regards to its non-nuclear activities and the president is going to make that more challenging. >> ranking member of the foreign relations committee, senator ben cardin, thank you. former u.s. ambassador christopher hill, thank you as well. still ahead this morning, we'll go live to the white house. the president starting with tweets about pulling fema out of still struggling puerto rico where 36% of americans still don't have clean drinking water. we'll be right back.

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it's frankly disgusting the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write, and people should look into it. >> president trump threatens to use the federal government to try and shut down news organizations over the reporting that he says is fake. >> wow. >> we'll get a live report from nbc's kristen welker --

>> that's something you don't hear every day from the white house. actually, never have heard that from the white house. >> hard, hard to keep a straight face. we'll be right back.

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news america" katty kay. president trump reacted to yesterday's nbc news exclusive report about what happened during a meeting at the pentagon last july by attacking the press. the seemingly freedom of the press. he tweeted yesterday morning, quote, with all of the fake news coming out of nbc and the networks, at what point is it appropriate to challenge their license? bad for the country. and again last night, network news has become so partisan, distorted and faelk that licenses must be challenge d an not fair to public. to be clear, the networks themselves do not hold federal licenses. their individual television stations do. the president said more in a rally style round of news in harrisburg and earlier in the day in the oval office. >>s if i was watching television, you don't know whether or not -- you're

watching the report. when you're the one being written about, you know whether it's good or bad. they try to make it negative. i call it fake media, so much fake news. >> do you agree with that, fake news? >> it's frankly disgusting the way the press can write whatever they want to write and people should look into it. >> [ inaudible question ]. >> no, the press should speak more honestly. i've seen tremendously dishonest press. like the question asked before about ten times the nuclear capability. i know the capability we have, believe me, and it is awesome. it is massive. so when they make up stories like that, that's just made up and the generals will tell you that. then they have their sources that don't exist, in my opinion, they don't exist.

they make up the sources. there are no sources. >> the nbc report is sourced, three unidentified officials in the room at the pentagon when the president reportedly made his comments. now at least one member of his party is taking exception. republican senator ben sasse of northbound north korea put out this statement, quote, mr. president, words spoken by the president of the united states matter. are you tonight recanting the oath that you took on january 20th to preserve, protect and defend the first amendment. >> he's said so many shocking thin things, channelling joseph stalin by calling the media enemy of the people. saying that first amendment rights, saying the ability of

newspapers to write what they want to write is, quote, disgusting and someone should look into it. may be the most frightening of a all. we're starting to hear more and more people talking about the 25th amendment, steve bannon warning the president that's what will remove him from office. tom barrack, his long-time friend saying he's shocked and stunned by what he sees seeing from donald trump and bob corker saying we can add all this up. now you have a president who is actually dismissing the right of free speech. >> it's an attack on the media to be sure. more profoundly an attack on the first amendment. the president should be aware -- perhaps he is -- we've reached a new phase amongst people around

him that the whispers you hear on the left about he should be removed or there's a presidency in crisis, that is now said by people who are friends to the president, advisers to the president, their concern about his state of mind and ability to do the job is higher than it has been since he got sworn in. comments that he made yesterday only feed that. >> katty, he said it several tim times. he can't take away nbc's license. it's not how it's done. but then saying it's disgusting that newspapers could write what they want to right, ignores the fact that since 1787 the supreme court recognized that political speech is the most, the most valuable, the most unassailable speech that americans have.

there is no more challenging speech as free speech and the press's ability to report on it. >> i don't know if the president understands how news organizations work, but obviously nbc, the bbc, every news organization that we have worked for has strict protocols in place that mean they cannot write whatever they want to write. you have to do your reporting. bbc we have to have two sources. this story had three unidentified separate sources before it was reported. news organizations are very careful about what they put out in the public. i don't know if the president understands what those editorial protocols are in place, but somebody around him ought to inform him of them. for somebody who watches an awful lot of television, you think he might be more curious about the way news organizations actually gather -- >> willie, what, again, profts for his friends and advisers who say the president e's out of toh

and growing more and more worried, he does need to know those sources are people who work for him. this has been -- he screams about leaks inside the white house all the time. well, they're the sources. they're the people talking, and he looks completely clueless when he goes out and says things like that. >> this has been happening since the beginning of his administration, this kind of reporting that comes from inside the room. he had three people inside this meeting that allegedly led to rex tillerson calling the president of the united states a moron. it's because they're concerned. you could go -- this is authoritarianism 101, delegitimize the press, delegitimize your opponents and try to destroy them. luckily in the yants we have a constitution that stands in the way of the president doing that. he's saying don't believe your eyes and ears when it comes to

things that criticize me. don't believe it, fake news, fake news, fake news. there's no license to be revoked. nothing he can do, thank goodness, because we have such a strong system. any authoritarian in history has done this early and often, delegitimize the press and try to destroy it. >> it's to be dealt with. anyone in there, if they feel they don't have a responsibility at this point to deal with what is clearly an unraveling at the very least of this man's personality. >> the great unraveling. mike, these are words that you would expect from turkey, out of turkey. these are words you would expect out of russia. these are words you would expect out of the philippines. the president of the united states actually all day yesterday, not self correcting himself because it's impossible for anyone to correct him. he certainly can't correct himself, continuing to say that

he wants to trample first amendment rights. to mark's point, this seems to me in conversations with a sfu people in the white house in the past, there seems to have been a change in attitude over the past three or four weeks where now you have people working in the white house talking about the president's emotional stability on a day-to-day basis. what he's doing, he seems intent on further dividing ta country that is already pretty well divided. and he's injected a fever within certain elements of this country, his followers -- i don't know what it is -- 25%, 35%, we don't know -- but a fever in them about the press, and it's taken hold. it's taken hold. while he's done this, you have other disruptive elements going on in the white house. he has chosen to try and destroy health care. he has chosen to try and destroy

environmental regulations. he has chosen to try and destroy the iran accord, tpp, nafta, all of this is going on. it's incredibly dangerous. >> let me say the three things that have focused the minds of people around the president. one is the north korea face-off where people are feeling skittish about how it's being handled. two is the mueller investigation which is putting a lot of pressure on people in the white house, and three is the reality that they may end this year in not passing a single major piece of legislation. those three things have combined to create a lot of awareness that's what's happening, the way the president is conducting himself in office is not working. what he did yesterday is only alienating people because they know it's a reality show distraction. >> bob corker's statement questioning the president's fatness, questioning whether the president's actions were leading us towards nuclear war, towards world war iii, one of the most powerful republicans on capitol hill, words that have not been

challenged by his fellow republicans on the hill. >> no, and from somebody he needs that if he's going to do any of the things that the white house is so worried he's not doing. i did wonder about the press thing, whether this is trump's deliberate attempt to get us all talking about the press and you put out that shiny object which he feels has worked, chuck out fake news, it's red meat to his base and the more we make this a story, the more we talk about it, the more we are actually enabling his ability about something, that nafta is about to fall apart, we may be about to pull out of the iran nuclear deal, major cuts in environmental protection, women's rights rolled back. throw out fake news, we'll all talk about it. we have to be careful how we approach the story. >> more than fake news, it's a challenge to the first amendment. >> it's wrapped up as a challenge to the first

amendment, but it's not going to happen. >> we hope not. >> i want to go back to what senator sasse said, saying something that should be easy and obvious, whether democratic or republican, i think what he's saying is we can't accept this as normal, accept and roll our eyes at what the president says and say, oh, there he goes again. you have to step forward and remind people, remind the american public that this is not acceptable, this is not normal. i'll be interested to see if other senators, democrats and republicans alive come forward and challenge what the president said yesterday. >> people, mika, need to stop, senators need to stop, they need to listen and they need to understand that the president of the united states said he was going to look into undermining and actually destroying the most sacred right, constitutional right that americans have had, again, since 1787. and the fact that he's talking

that way, in a way no other president has ever spoken in american history, showing complete ignorance of the constitution, the law, 240 years of precedent shows again that he's disconnected. >> not fit, and i think we're at the point that the conversation has changed. >> easily not fit. >> i know. but i think the conversation has changed where there are people beginning to show that even those close to him perhaps might feel that way as well. still ahead on "morning joe," a new piece in "vanity fair" sums up the president's mood inside the white house with three words. quote, i hate everyone. >> oh, that's good. >> we'll broke down the latest reporting of a commander in chief who is, quote, increasingly unfocused and consumed by dark moods. first bill karins with a check of the forecast and the deadly wildfires in forecast. >> the fire situation very grim still. we still have active fires that

are burning, we're not seeing towns engulfed and threatened like the pictures we've shown you. still new evacuations in areas threatened in central california, especially areas north of napa. the tubs fire that burned all the houses you saw in the pictures, near the sonoma area, that fire still burns further to the north now. still pictures of active blazes, structures threatened and people evacuated and unable to return to their homes. in all, 23 fatalities since the weekend and over about 2,000 structures and homes have been burned. here is the map. still red flag warnings, the wind picked up overnight. we'll watch them subsiding a little bit. by 5:00 p.m., these red flag warnings. so much vegetation grew so fast and now it's all drying up. this is the fire season. the air is extremely unhealthy, too. we have the smoke coming down from the santa rosa area and napa into san francisco. these are some of the worst air

quality readings we've ever had in this region. you have people with breathing issues and asthma, very difficult. the wind forecast, here is the fires burning near snab santa rosa and napa. the winds blowing the poor air quality in san francisco. a half marathon has been canceled for this weekend. they don't want people running in air like this. some air flights were canceled or delayed because of the smoke and haze. even if the fires die down, some of the embers can blow over fire lines, reignite new fires on the other sides of roads and fire lines. that's the greatest concern. we have read flag warnings now. as we go friday night into saturday, another wind event is supposed to happen during the evenings hours. a difficult time for firefighters. they need the rainy season to come which is usually in november. still have to wait a while. today's forecast, no wet weather at all. it's not like it's really hot, like the santa ana wind where

temperatures get to 90 and 100. the rest of the country pretty nice. watch out, florida, wet weather for you over the next two days. new york city, going to be about 80 degrees on sunday. didn't stop them from putting the ice rink up. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. helen: for the holidays, we get a gift for mom and dad. and every year, we split it equally. except for one of us. i write them a poem instead. and one for each of you too. and one for each of you too. helen: cool. that actually yours... that one. yeah. regardless, we're stuck with the bill. to many, words are the most valuable currency. last i checked, stores don't take words. man: some do. oh. (alert beeps) not everyone can be the poetic voice of a generation. i know, right? such a burden. pay back a friend day is october 17th. get the bank of america mobile banking app today.

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a new poll shows americans are feeling better about the economy, but not the president. a national quinnipiac national poll shows 38% of voters approve of the job president trump is doing. that's marginally better than their polling two weeks ago. 70% of those polled said the president should stop tweeting from his personal account. that's a new high since they started asking the question in april. the poll also finds that 55% of vo voters believe 2ru8 is not fit to serve as president. >> but four in ten americans

think the commander in chief is fit to serve as president. >> that's a good one. the number a little change from a poll two weeks ago in which 56% said he was unfit. when it comes to the state of the u.s. economy, 61% say it's in excellent or good shape, close to an all-time high. >> trump not getting credit for good economic numbers. >> too frightening to people. nbc news learned that president trump has tapped long-time aide to general john kelly, kir stint nielsen to be the next secretary of homeland security. he joined the white house as deputy chief of staff after the president named dhs secretary john kelly as his chief of staff. "vanity fair" reports that nielsen's appointment could be a sign that kelly is on the way out. the report claims that kelly is miserable and remaining out of a sense of duty and republicans think he wanted to give his

long-time aide a soft landing before his departure. the piece cites a half dozen prom nept republicans describing a white house in crisis as advisers struggle to contain a president who seems to be increasingly unfocused, consumed by dark moods, unstable and unraveling. sherman also reports on a conversation several months ago where former chief of staff steve bannon said, quote -- told trump that the risk to his president wasn't impeachment but the 25th amendment, the pro viegs by which a mamma jort of the cabinet to vote to remove the president. when he mentioned the 25th amendment, prs said what's that, according to a source. bannon said he only thinks the president has a 30% chance of completing his term, this as longtime friend tom barrack tells "the washington post" that he is disappointed in the president's job performance.

barrick told the post he's been, quote, shocked and stunned by some of trump's rhetoric and tweets. he thinks he has to be loyal to his base, i keep on saying who is your base? you don't have a natural base. your base now is the world and america, so you have all these constituencies, show them who you really are in my opinion. he's better than this. >> tom barrack is someone that has been a long time friend, longer than most, long-time loyal friend, somebody that donald trump has depended on sen since he's gotten into the white house. now even tom barrack is saying this guy has changed. we're hearing more people say he's unstable in the white ho e house. he has dark moods. tom barrack saying the same thing,'s better than this. >> tom barrack, someone who doesn't need anything from the president, not interested in favors. one of the things people have pointed to of late, one of the changes kelly has made, he's cut

the president off from the easy access he used to have from people passing through the white house. that has cut the president off from a lot of people who kept him calmer. so he is ironically, the discipline is making him more isolated and more prone, some people around him believe, to acting erratically. >> that makes a lot of sense. that's what -- when he had his office in trump tower, that's what he did all day. he sat there and had people come in and talk to him, he talked on the phone and fed off that sort of energy, gossip, and now that he's isolated he's probably going crazy. >> the problem is, when he wasn't isolated he had people like omerosa giving him things that got him spined up and made him abilitier radically. what we have found through this analysis is when the president is isolated from people, he's erratic. when the president is surrounded

by people, he's erratic. >> yeah. and john kelly hasn't actually managed to change the white house very much in terms of its levels of chaos, right? there's still clearly a lot of confusion coming out of the white house. it's not the tight ship he hoped it was going to be. b barrack says he does still speak to him once a week. having people around the president like tom barrack who describes his relationship with the president as subservant. he said i've never needed anything from him, but i am sub servant to him, that may be making the president's moods bleaker. i'm not sure that on the positive side, joe, the changes kelly has made. they haven't stopped the tweeting. >> you've got to take a step back and think about what we're talking about. the president of the united states being contained, bubble-wrapped by people around him so he's not a harm to

himself and others. >> and the country. >> we've gotten so deep into the trump thing, the trump years already that this feels like a different story we've seen a few times. again, this is not normal. this is crazy, that we're talking about putting the right people in place to contain the man sitting in the oval office right now. i would just add the 25th amendment, still a lot of people tweet about it, remains a long shot. the clause that would be invoked by the vice president and the cabinet. that's a long way to go to ask the vice president and the president's own cabinet to remove the president of the united states. >> dhs is a cabinet, right? >> even then it goes to a vote of the house and senate. i haven't seen much courage at all coming from republicans. coming up on "morning joe," the house intel committee is poised to release some of the thousands of russian-linked facebook ads tied to the presidential election. we'll talk to the top democrat on the panel, congressman adam

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now what? well, after your first reaction, consider your choices. go it alone, against the irs and its massive resources. hire a law firm, where you're not a priority. call your cpa, who can be required to testify against you. or, call the tax law firm of moskowitz, llp. i went from being a cpa to a tax attorney because our clients needed more. call us, and let us put our 30 years of tax experience to work for you. we're back with mike barnicle, sam stein and john heilemann.

joining us now, white house correspondent kristen welker. kristen, the mayor of chicago is responding to claims by the president. what's the latest? >> reporter: he is, mika. good morning to you. president trump last night in an interview with fox news was asked about what he plans to do to help minorities, people of color. take a listen to what he said and we'll talk about rahm emanuel's response on the other side. >> minorities want police protection more than anybody. they need it more than anybody. what's going on is crazy. you look at some of these inner cities where it's just out of control, and remember i was saying things like what do you have to lose? we will fix it? we're going to fix it. i will never forget i was in chicago. a police officer -- there was a motorcycle deal to the plane and i was talking to the police, taking a picture. i said how do you stop it? we can stop it immediately. i said what do you mean? they said if they'd let us do our job, we could stop it immediately. >> reporter: mayor rahm emanuel

of chicago is firing back at president trump today. take a look at his response. he said, if the president has a name for this mystery person he continues to talk about, we're all ears, that police officer he referenced. in the meantime, we live in the world world and if the president wants to build on the reductions in violence our hard working officers are achieving, if he wants an immediate effect on gun violence, he could do something to stop guns from flowing into our city from indiana and wisconsin. 2,958 people have been shot in the city of chicago, that is very high, but down from last year which was over 3,000 people. now, the president also wading into a very thorny issue today, puerto rico, the hurricane response there, of course, has been widely criticized. the president effectively attacking puerto rico this morning in a tweet. take a look at this tweet. he says electric and all infrastructure was disaster before hurricanes, diswe can't p

the first responders who have been amazing in most circumstances in puerto rico forever. those come as latest statistics show that 84% of puerto rico still don't have electricity. the death toll is rising, now stands at 43. anticipated backlash from that twitter comment. obviously the president's response, something we have tracked very closely, particularly in the wake of his visit last week in which he was tossing paper towels as if they were basketballs and essentially joking about the fact that this crisis is going to add to the deficit. >> nbc's kristen welker, thank you for that disturbing report. mika, what do you think? >> rahm emanuel talked about living in a real world. i don't think this president is living in the real world. i think he's out of it. i really do. >> mike barnicle. >> the comments the president

made is part and parcel of his habit of trying to govern by anecdote. he bumped into a police officer who said we can stop it immediately. you can't stop it immediately. puerto rico, people are lacking for lack of medicines, available medicines. >> it's bad. this is bad. >> what is this instinct in puerto rico to attack vulnerable people? just on a human -- there's the role of thement and the role of a human being. what is the instinct to look at a crisis like that where people don't have power, water, food or medicine and say, you know what, i'm going to go after them and threaten that fema and the military can't stay forever. >> it's about blame shifting and lack of accountability. something else has to be at fault because he can never be at fault. >> that's what it is. >> obviously i think the media asks a question that many people believe answers itself, that you have hispanics in puerto rico,

you have a group of people that donald trump has attacked from the beginning of the campaign and he sees them as the others, not his white supporters. these are people that do not look like the overwhelming majority of his donors. these with people that do not look like the overwhelming majority at his country clubs, people that don't look like the overwhelming majority of people that even voted for him. >> to top it off, you have a mayor of san juan who is raising legitimate criticisms of him. >> actually there were pleas for help. >> and i think he took that personally in a way he should never have done because a true leader would not take that stuff personally. >> donald trump basically says, it's not me, it's them, about every issue, every problem. >> especially when them are a certain kind of them. if you think about, just do a compare and contrast of the kind of federal response to the floods in texas versus puerto rico and just try to imagine as

a thought experiment, can you imagine trump saying the kinds of things he's saying about puerto ricans, can you imagine him saying the same thing about the people of texas. >> it's tragic because people are literally dying now. 85% without power, many without water. >> it's sick. >> to keep think in proper perspective, donald trump suggesting if you look at the tweets, we cannot keep fema, the military and first responders who have been amazing, in puerto rico forever. as john heilemann brought up this morning, you have the governor saying we are going to be quite possibly out of power for the next six months. this was the predictable from the kay the cat 5 storm blew through puerto rico. still ahead, facebook executive sheryl sandberg just met with house leaders investigating russia, including the top democrat on the

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russia was an excuse used by the democrats when they lost the election. they said why did you lose the election? they said, ah, it was russia, russia. it wasn't russia. it was a bad candidate. then they say, ah, it was trump that colluded with russia. i'm saying, i did? so look, here is the story. this was an excuse by the democrats and people got carried away. >> president trump in a hard hitting interview with -- >> that was a big laugh line. >> i like it. >> as for the investigation itself, yesterday facebook chief operating officer sheryl sandberg met with congressional investigators and house leaders.

facebook agreed to turn over new information related to the probe after providing investigators with 3,400 ads believed to be linked to russia. joining us now, ranking member of the house select committee on intelligence, democratic congressman adam schiff of california. what are you hoping to hear today from facebook? >> we had a good meeting with sheryl sandberg yesterday. we have agreement that we'll publish these ads. they'll help us scrub them, make sure any personal information about people -- for example, there may be people pictured in some of these ads that were not knowing their images were appropriated by the russians. we want the american people to see these ads and see how cynical they are, how the russians meant to turn american against american and divide us. it's also like to see the twitter ads published, too. the twitter ads were focused much more on attacking hillary clinton. but not that we expect to

persuade the president. as you saw from the clip, he's in complete denial about the russian voft in the election, but the american people need to see it. >> rt you involved in working together on the facebook -- >> mike conway and i have been working together. it hasn't been easy. our chairman has embarked on his own unmasking that's unrelated to the russia investigation. we've worked together well. i won't say there haven't been hiccups along the way. we have differences about when certain witnesses ought to come in and there are many others that we want to bring in that still haven't come in, but we are making progress, and i think that's important. our goal remains to come up with a unified conclusion. >> congressman, it's willie geist. i think a lot of americans have been shocked by the extent to which russia played on facebook and twitter and across social media. did you talk at all with sheryl

sandberg or have you done any fact-finding in the process of how we stop this from happening in our next election? what can be done as a foreign actor getting so deeply into american social media and getting those kinds of ads in front of people who are deciding who to vote for? >> that was a lot of our conversation. it was both about how long it took facebook to realize it was going on and what steps is the company putting in place to ferret it out in the future. they would like help from the intelligence community when the intelligence community identifies bad actors using its platform, it will help them to get that information and take those pages down. but they also have to develop their own internal capacity to ferret out foreign interference. they're working on doing that. they want to, for example, make sure that a particular page has to demonstrate or publish all of the ads so people can look and see, okay, this same page, this

same person is putting out ads both for and against the same propositi proposition. plainly they have an elicit motive here. the key will be identifying these fake pages, fake accounts that are fronts for the russians. here i think they have a lot more work to do and we're going to have to work for closely with them in terms of intelligence community support. >> congressman, sam stein here. shifting gears a tiny bit. there's been recent revelations of top white house officials including jared kushner and ivanka trump using private e-mail accounts. to what extent is your committee concerning yourself with that and to what extent are you trying to gain access to those e-mails to see if there's anything pertinent to your investigation? >> we have demanded all the relevant documents pert nept to the investigation, whatever e-mail or platform they're using. obviously we'll look at revelations that there were additional e-mail accounts to

see whether we've gotten all the requisite materials, and our discussion with these witnesses hasn't come to an end. we made it clear with mr. kushner that if it was necessary to bring him back when we found out additional information or when we got additional document, we would do so. >> have you asked him for his ply vat e-mails? >> we asked for all the real vapt e-mails pertaining to our investigation. we haven't asked him for e-mails if they're in a different account unrelated to our investigative work. that may be the subject of other committees. government reform which made such hay over hillary clinton's separate e-mail account has said that they will investigate the use of these separate e-mail accounts by not just jared kushner and ivanka, but by others in the administration as we well. not all that falls in the purview of the russia investigation, only if they used it to convey information pert nept to russia's involvement in our affairs. >> congressman adam schiff,

thank you very much. >> thank you. >> the co-founder of axios will be interviewing facebook's sheryl sandberg following her meeting with congressional investigators. msnbc will be carrying some of that discussion live. up next, the battle against isis rages on as the terror group tries to cling to a fraction of the territory it once controlled. new reporting from vice next on "morning joe." we're on a mission to show drip coffee drinkers, it's time to wake up to keurig. wakey! wakey! rise and shine! oh my gosh! how are you? well watch this. i pop that in there. press brew. that's it. so rich.

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continues to gain ground in raqqah, syria. the terror group's capital and one of the last remaining strongholds. . but thousands of civilians remain trapped there and could become human shields, a tactic isis used in the battle for mosul. the fight for that city and in earlier this year and its dramatic call along with the child soldiers left behind are the focus of the season finale of "vice" on hb oshs. >> clearing one building at a time. terrified families fled.

>> a group of isis fighters stole his family's car. they kidnapped them and spent the next three in foster. >> how did you light up? >>. >> joining us is the host of two

reports of the correspondent for "vice." i have to start with the children. through the eyes of children, what did you find in your reporting? it looks incredible. >> it was traumatizing. some of these kids have been through horrific things. there are about 5,000 of the caliphate who lived, trained and worked under isis. these are vital acts and the fact that they are trying to rebuild their lives and there's no government rehabilitation program. it's a mess. it's extremely difficult. >> children as young as 8. some of these kids we spoke to were as young as 8. some of them were kidnapped. but some of them were cohearsed

and the security situation because ter seeking power and influence and money because there's an alternative to the mess that's in place since the iraq war. >> the young boy you spoke to had a smile on his face. what's his state right now. what does his life look like after isis. >> no one is mentally stable in that situation. when you have been living under isis, it's difficult to go back into normal iraqi society. we had to stop the interview half way through because there was an outburst of anger. that's a normal reaction given that people are trying to fit you into society that you've been away from for so long. different reactions in different ways. you have to stop because people were bursting out in tears. sometimes fits of giggles, which is a surprising reaction, but i think generally total denial is

to what they've been through is is common. >> so in that case as an 8-year-old that was kidnapped and coerce d, if there is an average isis soldier, what is the allegiance to? a a faith, money, an idea, what's the allegiance? >> it's ideology. most join tr pragmatic reasons. their loif was to miserable under the government and isis turned up promising to protect them and give them a chance for rejeng. and offer basic government services that weren't being delivered before. they didn't deliver those things, but that was the promise. that was the vacuum. >> how much does it change over the past six months to a year. even before barack obama was leaving office, we were starting

to see gains. but now it seems that isis is such retreat that their caliphate has crumbled. >> it's pretty much done. maybe an increase in policy. >> so what's happened? why are they losing? >> the iraqi forces were slowly retrained and backed up heavily by u.s. airstrikes. the battle would still be going on now. i have never seen so many airstrikes and shellings to soften up before the forces moved it. >> is that your experience being over there too that donald trump said himself that we have made great strides. that's the case. is that what you saw that isis

is losing ground. it seems like isis is a caliphate that's pretty much been defeated territorially. but what comes next is this huge, huge dilemma as to what happens to a severely traumatized population. when it comes to the youngest people, some of these kids are the most vulnerable situation and how they are dealt with is going to influence what happens next. >> what's the former isis fighters being captured other than the children? are they claiming that they were kidnapped and they were forced to do this and they had to do it against their will. >> a lot of them, we have seen a lot of reports in the last couple weeks. these kids are sort of relegated to either something e we saw in prison who are are in the most appalling of situations, some of

the worst human conditions i have seen people living crunched up against other suspected isis fighters. obviously prisons are breeding grounds for recruitment, which are pretty worrying. and on top of that, they are either sent to refugee camps and relegated specific areas or a lot of them are in hiding because revenge attacks on isis-afailuated people are becoming more common in iraq sadly. >> we're getting reports that five western hostages held by the taliban for years have been released in pakistan. a u.s. official says they are now in custody of officials from the u.s. embassy in pakistan. two army officials said they are canadian joshua boil, his american wife, and their children kidnapped in afghanistan in 2012. the associated press reports that the military worked with u.s. intelligence officials to track down the hostages and free

them after discovering they had been brought into pakistan. >> we were here a couple days ago. >> in terms of the threat to the u.s., the situation is worse. >> they are watching all the mistakes in learning and they are the ones we'll be talking about in a few years time. >> the isis affiliate where special forces were kill last week. >> one of the interviews says you now have a new model of terrorism. inspired by and not directed by

groups by isis or al qaeda. >> the season finale of "vice" airs tomorrow night. thank you both very much for being on the show. thank you for your work. that does it for us this morning. stephanie rule picks up the coverage right now. >> hi there. any minute now, facebook ceo sheryl sandberg speaks out on her company's role in the 2016 election. a day after meeting with congressional investigators behind closed doors. we're going to bring that to you live as soon as it begins. while president trump uses his freedom of speech to attack the freedom of the press. >> discussing the way the press is able to write whatever they want to write. >> weinstein