you're there saying i lost everything. i've lost everything and then the thing that matters comes forward. >> thanks for your great reporting on that in santa rosa, california. >> thank you for watching this hour of "velshi and ruhle." great to be back with you. >> sorry i got here late. i'm ali velshi. >> i'm stephanie rhule. check you theous on social media and right now, right here in new york city, here she will is, andrea mitchell. >> thank you. and right now on "andrea mitchell reports," fully intact. the trump cabinet gets together after the secretary of state reacts to bob corker complaining that the president has castrated his top diplomat by undercutting him on the world stage. >> it's not anything that bothers you? >> i checked. i'm fully intact. awkward party of two after feuding for months, the president and senate majority leader mitch mcconnell breaking bread there hour. will they keep the knives on the table? >> i said mitch, get to work.

as you know, mitch is not polling-wise, the most popular guy in this country. >> i'm very disappointed in mitch. >> and half-court press. president trump predicting he'll be able to replace four supreme court justices in his first term. he's training his sights on two of the court's four women. >> i will remain in this good job as long as i can do it. full steam. >> and good day. i'm andrea mitchell in new york. president trump huddling with his cabinet this hour after weeks of punting. several kedo mess tick and key policy problems from his administration to congress. then sharing a meal later this hour with one of his favorite political punching bags, republican senate majority leader mitch mcconnell. joining me now is white house correspondent kristen welker. msnbc cricketer david ignatius

and "new york times" white house correspondent mark landler. we understand he's spoken on a number of domestic issues, kristin as well as the iran nuclear deal. we'll have the tape coming out of the cabinet room we hope momentarily. highlights as far as you know? >> first to the domestic issues on health care. president trump effectively weighing in on those two executive orders that he issued last week which were aimed at gutting parts of obamacare. the president saying that he, democrats are now looking to at least hoping to work on some type of short-term fix. that's significant because remember, he said over the weekend he wants to work with democrats on a short-term fix. that was the key question all along. did he make those executive orders last week to try to force democrats to the table? he also weighed in on his relationship with republicans saying that he does have a good relationship with republicans but at the same time, they aren't getting enough done. now, that comes on the heels of

this weekend, one of his former top strategists steve bannon saying it's time to declare war on the republican establishment. so the president taking a very different tactic reaching out to the republican establishment, having lunch with senate majority leader mitch mcconnell, facing the reality that he needs the establishment in order to get things done in congress. weighing in on the importance of passing a budget and then on the opioid crisis effectively saying that the drug companies are getting away with murder in terms of how they are failing to seriously regulate some of the drugs that have been issued and that are prescription drugs. of course, that. coming on the heels of the bombshell by "60 minutes" and "the washington post." finally on iran, the president saying that he will still very much stands behind this two-stage approach to dealing with iran. last week, he announced that he was not going to recertify it which kicked it to congress for a 60-day review period. but today, the president any

this cabinet meeting being very clear that he ultimately, if there is no resolution would be open to pulling out of the deal all together. so a number of headlines as we await the actual playout of his remarks from his cabinet meeting, andrea. >> and kristin, stand by as we wait for the tape. david ignatius, you and i have kofrtd the iran deal for many years and secret negotiations to the negotiations that secretary kerry conducted around the world. the reaction to what the president decided on friday, you had three nato allies almost instantly germany, france and great britain coming out and making it very clear that they do not agree with what he did and they're willing to talk about the separate issues but not if it means jeopardizing the iran deal. >> reporter: andrea, i think our european allies are genuinely upset and feel this deal is important in security terms. they are used to looking at the united states as the leader of

the system that they're part of. so i think the anger was genuine. i also think they were sending a signal to iran that they will intend to stick with the deal that iran can look forward to continuing building an economic trade relations with germany, france, uk, et cetera. so i think there were two messages. what i keep hearing from the iranian side is, they're likely to stay with the deal unless there's significant new sanctions. >> and what are about what the president is signaling? we understand mark landler, that he has just spoke in the cabinet room and saying he's really serious about this and feels taken advantage by the iranians in this negotiation and i think implicitly by some of his own cabinet secretaries. >> i think that's right, andrea. i mean recall this is a president who ran constantly deriding this deal saying it was a terrible deal, a one-sided deal. i think it was very important for him to publicly disavow it

to sort of repudiate it. the reason that's so problematic even for his own administration is that they recognize the threat that the u.s. winds up diplomatically isolated. given the reaction of the europeans, given what looks like an iranian unwillingness at the moment to negotiate and so they have been basically pushing back and trying to figure out a solution that would allow the president to walk away from the deal publicly while preserving the deal. that's what last week's rather confusing announcement was all about. but each time the president as he did this morning says he's willing to walk away, willing to terminate the agreement, it casts more of a shadow over the deal. so that even if it stays in place, the one danger that i see is that companies that might be interested in investing in iran, european companies in particular, might worry that if they do that, they're going to face the possibility of american sanctions down the road. so something you hear is that

the deal doesn't necessarily get blown up. it sort of gets starved, that companies start steering clear of iran. iran starts becoming frustrated that it feels it's not getting its side of the deal. so you don't necessarily have to rip it up to do a lot of damage to it. that's what i think these repeated statements by president trump have the effect of doing. >> and there's a lot of concerns among the allies, as well about the iranian reaction. we heard strong comments from president rouhani. president rouhani on friday embracing the relief russianry guard declared supporters of terrorism. they also have a big economic and political impact. i believe we've got that tape from the cabinet. let's hear the president. >> okay. thank you very much. and today we're here to discuss at the cabinet meeting critical domestic policy issues.

i'd like to basically provide you with an update as to how we're doing for the american people. and we're doing a lot of great things. the unemployment straight at a almost 17-year low. the stock market is soaring to record levels. we just hit a new high on friday. i think we're hitting another new high today. because there's tremendous optimism having to do with business in our country. gdp growth has reached more than 3% last quarter and other than the hurricanes would have done phenomenally this. i think we'll still doll very well but something will have to be taken off because of the tremendous problems of the massive hurricanes we've had to endure. now i guess you could probably add the wildfires in california. but the economy cannot take off like it really has the potential to do unless we reduce the tax burden on the families, businesses, workers of our country. and we'll be able to do that i think we're getting tremendous

receipt activity from the people. i hope we get the same receptivity from congress. we are getting tremendous accolades for what we're doing having to do with both reform and the massive tax cuts, it will be it the largest tax cuts in the history of our country. we're one of the highest taxed nations in the world. right now costing us millions of jobs and trillions and trillions of dollars. it's time to restore america's competitive edge and pass historic tax cuts to the american people. one point in gdp would be $2.5 trillion. think of that revenues. 1 point we go up from 3 to 4 and when i began, we were in the ones. and now the last quarter 3.2%. and we're going up higher. but if we went as an example from 2 to 3 or from 3 to 4, talking about $2.5 trillion and we're also talking about many millions of jobs. so we want to also reduce

excessive government spending and that's what we're working on at our cabinet meeting today. as we head into next year's budget season, i've asked direct ker mulvaney to come up and find various savings in all of the departments that are gathered around the table which is everybody. i need my cabinet to work with director mulvaney to fight these spending cuts, fight for them and make sure that they happen. and we want to make the departments as lean and efficient as possible, at the same time, we're going to be departments with loss of heart. lots of heart. one thing we're going to be looking at very strongly is welfare reform. that's becoming a very, very big subject. and people are taking advantage of the system and then other people aren't receiving what they really need to live. and we think it's very unfair to them. but some people are really taking advantage of our system from that standpoint. and we are going to be looking very, very strongly therefore at welfare reform. it's going to be a very big

topic under this administration and it started already. and we have a lot of recommendations that we're going to be making and you'll be hearing about them very shortly. the other thing we're doing that relates to people's lives is the prescription drug prices are out of control. the drug prices have gone through the roof. if you look at the same exact drug by the same exact company made in the same exact box and sold to some place else, sometimes it's a fraction of what we pay in this country. meaning as usual, the world is taking advantage of the united states. they're setting prices in other countries and we're not. the drug companies frankly are getting away with murder. and we want to brick our prices down to what other countries are paying. or at least close and let the other countries pay more because they're setting such low prices that we're actually subsidizing other countries. that's just not going to happen anymore. this has been going on for years

where our people are paying so much more. i don't mean they're pay 2g% more. they're paying double, triple, quadruple, paying so much more that it's very unfair to the united states as usual. last week, i also sent a letter to congress outlining my administration's top priorities for immigration reform. this was a bottom up effort driven by dedicated law enforcement professionals. and they took a big oath to protect our nations, the justice department is doing a fantastic job on border and with regard to immigration. more than anyone's ever seen before from a justice department. thank you very much, jeff. it's really had an impact and a very positive impact. now we're going to take it to go five steps further. our proposal closes dangerous hoop locals and vulnerabilities that enable illegal immigration asylum fraud, and visa

overstays. the visa overstays are just you're talking about numbers that nobody even knows what they are. they're so out of control. and we're going to take care of that. when you look at what's going on in mexico, in x cois having a tough time right now in terms of crime. more than ever, we need the wall. we have drugs pouring through. on the southern border, they're literally pouring through. we have to have the wall. we're going to have the wall. but if you look at just what's happening on the other side of the border with the tremendous crime and the tremendous problems going on, we have a very good relationship with mexico. but there are a lot of problems and we don't want the drugs. and we don't want the crime. we need the wall. we've asked congress to ensure any proposed immigration reform ends chain migration. one person comes in and then brings everybody in his family in with him or her. and we have to end chain migration which it's critical

for creating a system that puts american workers and the american taxpayer first. last thursday, i proudly nominated kirstjen nielsen to be as secretary of department of homeland security. i urged the senate to quickly confirm this really tremendously qualified nominee. and i also asked for my other nominees. we have approximately half the number of nominees confirmed by the senate because frankly, the democrats have terrible policy. terrible. and they're very good of obstruction. one thing they do well, their policy is no good. i'm not sure they're very good politicians because they don't seem to be doing too well. that could be because of their bad policy. but they're great at obstruction. and we have half the nominees that president obama had at this time. it's very unfair. they're taking everybody right after the final moment. in many cases confirming them

with tremendous majorities. but they're bringing them out purposely. they're bringing them right down to the final. we have people totally qualify but they have to wait a long time because it's total obstruction. i can say the same thing with our judicial nominees our judges. we have some of the most qualified people "the wall street journal" wrote a story about it the other day that this is some of the most qualified people ever. and they're waiting forever online. and it shouldn't happen that way. it's not right and it's not fair. i want to thank acting secretary elaine duke for her leadership in responding to the catastrophic storms that have struck our nation and our territories. we've also issued a disaster declaration in california in response to the devastating wildfires like we've never seen. and we mourn the terrible loss of life we very fema and first responders there. we have our military helping. it's very sad to watch how fast,

how rapidly they move and how move are caught in their houses. it's an incredible thing. caught in their houses. so we have a lot of people helping government in california. and made a lot of progress in the last couple of days. but we're a little subject to winds and what happens with nature. but it's been a -- it's a very sad thing to watch. we also continue to pray for the victims of the mass shooting in las vegas. we cannot erase the pain of those who lost their loved ones but we pledge to never leave their side. we're working with them very much so with the fbi and law enforcement. department of justice. and it's -- i guess a lot of people think they understand what happened but he's -- he was a dementioned sick individual. the wires were crossed pretty badly in his brain. extremely badly in his brain.

and it's a very sad event. in each of these tradition we've witnesses, however, tremendous strength and heroism of our people. each one of these tradition we've had we've witnessed strength and heroism. when americans are unified no destructive forcing on earth can come close to breaking us apart. we have a lot of work to do on behalf of our magnificent country and our extraordinary citizens. a great trust has been placed upon each member of our cabinet. we have a cabinet that there are those that are saying it's one of the finest group of people ever assembled as a cabinet and i happen to agree with that. of course, i should agree with that. but i think we have an extraordinary group of people around this table. this is a tremendous amount of talent. and i wouldn't say i was necessarily looking to be politically correct although i

ended up being politically correct because that was the right thing to do in every sense of the word. however, we have -- we have just gotten really, really great people. i'm very proud of them. so we're going to work on all of those things i just outlined and many more. you know, we have the iran deal. but right now is being studied and i think a lot of people agreed with what i did. i feel strongly about what i did. i'm tired of being taken advantage of as a nation. this nation has been taken advantage of for many, many years. for many decades frankly. i'm tired of watching it. but the iran deal was something that i felt had to be done and we'll see what phase two is it it might be positive and might be very negative. might be a total termination. some would say that's a greater possibility. it also could turn out to be very positive. we'll see what happens. i thought the tone of the

iranian leaders was very modified and i was happy to see that, but i don't know if that means anything. they're great negotiators. they negotiated a phenomenal deal for themselves but a horrible deal for the united states. and we're going to see what happens. the health care as you know is moving along. i knocked out the csrs. that was a subsidy to the insurance companies. that was a gift that was frankly, what they gave the insurance companies just take a look at their stocks. take a look where their stock was when obamacare was originally approved and what it is today. you'll see numbers that anybody if you invested in those stocks, you'd be extremely happy. and they have given them a total gift. they have given them you could almost call it a payoff. it's a disgrace. and that money goes to the insurance companies. we want to take care of poor people. we want to take care of people that need help with health care.

and that's what i'm here to do. and i'm never going to get campaign contributions i guarantee you that from the insurance companies but a lot of other people got them. you look at the dras. take a look at how much money has been spent by the democrats and by the health companies on politicians generally. but take a look at the coffers of the democrats. so the csr payments has actually brought republicans and democrats together. because we got calls emergency calls from the democrats and i think probably the republicans were also calling them. saying let's come up with at least a short-term fix of health care in this country. and the grave train ended the day i knocked out the insurance companies' money which was last week. hundreds of millions of dollars a month handed to the insurance companies for very little reason. believe me. i want the money to go to the people. i want the money to go to poor

people that need it. i want the money to go to people that need proper health care. not to insurance companies which is where it's going as of last week. i ended that. so we have a lot of interesting things to do. i'm meeting with mitch mcconnell in a little while for lunch. i think we're going to say a few words on the steps after nap i know you won't have any questions. and pretty much that's it. enjoy yourselves, folks. i'll see you how the there with mitch mcconnell. thank you very much. >> reporter: steve bannon's war on mitch mcconnell. >> steve is very committed. he's a friend of mine and he's very committed to getting things passed. i mean look, i have despite what the press writes, i have great relationships with actually many senators but in particular with most republican senators. but we're not getting the job done. and i'm not going to blame myself. i'll be honest. they are not getting the job done. we've had health care approved and then you had a surprise vote

by john mccain. we've had other things happen. and they're not getting the job done. i can understand where steve bannon is coming from and i can understand, to be honest with you, john, i can understand where a lot of people are copping from because i'm not happy about it and a lot of people aren't happy about it. we need tax cuts. we need health care. we're going to get the health care done in my opinion, what's happening is as we meet, republicans are meeting with democrats because of what i did with the csrs because i cut off the gravy train. if i didn't cut the csrs, they wouldn't be meeting they'd be having lunch and enjoying themselves. they're having emergency meetings to get a short-term fix of health care where premiums don't have to double and triple every year like they've been doing under obamacare because obamacare is finished, it's dead, gone. you shouldn't even mention it. it's gone. there is no such thing as obamacare anymore. it is and i said this years ago, it's a concept that couldn't

have worked. in its best days it couldn't have worked. war working on some kind of a short-term fix prior to the republicans getting -- maybe with some democrats. again, it's obstruction. maybe with some democrats to fix health care permanently. so i think we'll have a short-term fix with republicans and democrats getting together. and after that, we're going to have a successful vote because as you know, we were one vote short and i think we have the votes right now. whether it's through block grant or something else, block granting the money back to the states, which does seem to make sense where the states run it because it's a smaller form of government that can be more individually sensitive. so that will happen. fairly shortly. as soon as we have the next reconciliation, i think we'll get the vote for health care. i think we already have the vote for health care. sadly, the democrats can't join us on that which will be the long-term fix. but do i believe we'll have a

short-term fix because i think the democrats will be blamed for the mess. this is an obamacare mess. when the premiums go up that has nothing to do with anything other than the fact that we had poor health care delivered poorly. written poorly. approved by the democrats. it was called obamacare. but i think we'll have a short-term fix and then we'll have a long-term fix and that will take place probably in march or april. we have a very solid vote. it will be probably 100% republican. no democrats. but most people know that's going to be a very good form of health insurance. so that will be it. okay? any other questions? no, thank you. i'll see new a little while. >> reporter: republicans running for re-election. >> i know how he feels. depending who you're talking about. there are some republicans, frankly that should be ashamed of themselves but most of them, i'll tell you what, i know the republican senators. most of them are really, really great people that want to work

hard and they want to do a great thing for the american public. but had you a few people that disappointed us. they really, really disappointed us. so i can understand fully how steve bannon feels. okay? thank you very much. thank you. >> and that was the president of course, speaking at his cabinet meeting. i believe his fifth cabinet meeting and speaking on every subject, domestic, political and, of course, foreign, the iran nuclear deal. nbc news white house correspondent kristen welker is still with me, mark landler, heidi przybyla joins us, msnbc political analyst and nick confess sorry another msnbc contributor. set the table here, kristin. health care predicting a larger deal this spring but a short-term fix with republican votes only coming up this fall, this winter. >> i thought that was one of the big headlines. you effectively heard the president acknowledge that he

cut off those csr payments, those subsidy payments that went to insurance companies to help pay for low income americans to basically bring people to the table to try to get a fix on premiums that have been increasing. so that he seems to be his strategy. will it work? will there be a short-term fix? that remains to be seen. i thought that that was certainly notable. in addition to that, andrea, you herd him say very definitively he is frustrated with members of his own party. he says i'm not even going to blame myself. they are not getting things done, meaning republicans. members of his own party and effective lili echoing some of what we heard over the weekend from steve ban on whom he defended. bannon effectively declared war on the republican establishment over the weekend. president trump saying i understand where he's coming from. those were very significant headlines particularly as you think about his strategy moving forward in terms of not only dealing with health care but tax

reform, as well. >> to mark, what he said about the iran nuclear deal certainly ominous to those allies and others who support the deal because he was certainly signaling he's ready to walk away from it. >> yeah, he said not only that he would terminate the deal if he had to but then said some might think that's more likely than not which is probably the most negative thing he said. i was also struck by the fact that he took note of what he called a moderate reaction in tehran by the iranian government. so you know it, makes me think more than ever that with this president, there's a pattern of him coming into any negotiation with a really maximalist position. i think in this case as in many others he's come in really strong but there is still a sense that you get from him that he views it as a negotiation. the fact that the iranians reacted the way they did suggests to him there's wiggle room here and there might be an outcome short of him ripping up the agreement.

if you're a defender of the agreement, those observations on his part were probably some cause for optimism. >> and heidi, what did you take away from his comments about steve bannon and about republicans as he heads into lunch with mitch mcconnell? i don't know about the indigestion of the senate majority leader going into this lunch. >> just the juxtaposition of him saying how frustrated he's been at times with congress against effectively all of the grenades that he personally has rolled down pennsylvania avenue in their direction to make it harder for them to make progress on the things that everybody agrees are their priorities like tax reform. if you look within the past several weeks in the president repriced them there, you have the manufactured daca crisis, now this health care you be sid crisis and the iran deal. i this i from the perspective of republican and i this for a fact because i talked with susan collins last night that fixing this health care subsidy crisis

is going to have to be a priority for republicans despite what the president says, it's not the democrats who will be blamed for this. he himself says at the same time that obamacare is over, right in the this is now trumpcare. his party recognizes that and they have to do something to fix these subsidies which another irony here, he says he stopped the gravy train. fixing the situationing is basically for congress to reinstate those same subsidies. that's what they're going to have to do. >> and in fact, without the subsidies, tax credits kick in, automatic tax credits which according to the cbo will come out of the federal budget so it's going to cost. >> increases the deficit. >> exactly. he's speaking about deficit reduction. the first time i've heard him speak about deficit reduction in awhile. that's certainly not the way his budget is constructed as far as what we've heard from other cabinet members. >> not just his budget but his

tax reform proposal will add billions to the budget over the long-term. it weighs largely in favor of the rich. i'm struck by the obamacare part of it. how mixed up his comments were on that. what he's talking about is a gravy train. he said we shouldn't give money to insurers. it's important to clarify this. we're talking about subsidies the government gives to subsidize the health care plans of for people. if you take away those it, someone's going to pay more and you can either have the government pay for health care or have the insurers provide health care. if you're going to go on the attack of subsidies against insurers you're saying i want it paid more by the consumers or taxpayers. >> thanks to all of you. we'll have another photo opportunity within the next hour at least from the mitch mcconnell/trump luch break so stay with msnbc c for that. new allegations. harvey weinstein's troubles

going global as he faces accusations on both sides of the atlantic. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on ms nbc.

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the league problems are mounting for harvey weinstein today. a senior law enforcement official tells our nbc news investigations unit that the nypd is now investigate two credible allegations of sexual misconduct against him. a spokesman for weinstein has unequivocally denied any

allegation of nonconsensual sex made against the film producer. the company he built into a hollywood powerhouse is getting a boost from colony capital led by tom barak, a close personal friend of trump's. the president of france looking into withdrawing a rare honor that his government conferred on weinstein in 2012 under another french president. he potentially would longer be able to wear the legion de honor. >> he's getting bigger problems on that. it focuses on criminal investigations. two women here in new york have gone to the police and said look, harvey weinstein assaulted me and they happened at least ten years ago. we think that one of those women is lucia evans whose story was outlined in "the new yorker" who claims in 2004, harvey weinstein forced her to perform oral sex on him in the company's tribeca offices. the other problem he's facing is

over in england. there are now three women who are believed to have come forward saying that they have been sexually assaulted by harvey weinstein including lis set anthony, an actress who went public over the weekend telling the sunday times that he raped her in his house, claiming he raped her in his house in the 1980s and then today, there are two other women that the metropolitan police say have come forward to make similar complaints. however, the police over there don't identify the suspect in this case but given that it matches up with anthony's story, the belief is that it's weinstein. he's got some real trouble. >> over the weekend as you reported over the weekend, the academy award, the motion picture academy kicked him out. >> yeah, and the vote wasn't even close. i think that's really -- you see hollywood standing up and saying we're not going to take this anymore. one reason i understand is because apparently the academy is now 40% women.

and women have just had it. and this is -- this is if you've got women in this business, how can you pretend that this isn't going on and take a pass on it. they issued a very, very strong statement saying with this vote this he hope this begins the end of this kind of behavior. >> does this mean that they would also go back and look at polanski and others. >> or bill cosby. that's the question. why it's a slippery slope for the academy and the producers guild is meeting today and expected to do the same thing to weinstein. it really is and i think this is where you see the influence of women coming into that. that this behavior is not acceptable anymore. women saying we're not going to work in an industry where it is acceptable and you give it a wink and a nod and we all go on. >> anne thompson with a story that copies. thank you so much. >> you're welcome. >> for the first time since returning home, the canadian father who was held captive along with his american wife and their children for five years by account feared haqqani network

of the taliban is speaking out. joshua boyle talking how his family is coping after their harrowing ordeal. >> there's good news and bad news on the healing front. the oldest child jonah is doing remarkably well. he's proving a lot more resilient than i think anybody could be have expected given what he's been through. and the others at this point don't seem to be making much progress but at this point, it's only been a couple of days. they went something like 1500 days of hell. and now we've got three days of normalcy in the real world or four days. so it might not be fair to expect them to completely turn around yet but i'm impatient to try to get my family repaired. >> nbc's stephanie gosk joins me now from ontario where she's been following this incredible story. has he explained why he brought

his 7 month pregnant wife to backpack in the war deck province in the first place? >> andrea, you may remember at the time any 2012, family members said that they were adventurers, they had gone to that part of the world to backpack income kirk za stan, tajikistan and afghanistan. now that joshua boyle has been freed and released he is telling a different story. he says actually, their intention all along was to go to that part of afghanistan as a kind of humanitarian mission. he described the people in those taliban-held areas, controlled areas as some of the most neglected in the world. they are places where nongovernment organizations don't work, aid organizations don't work. and therefore, he went to that part with his wife to help people out there. you also know that the reason those organizations do not work in those parts of afghanistan is because they are incredibly

dangerous to westerners and werners in that part of the world are kidnapped. it's hard to imagine that they weren't aware of those dangers when they did that five years ago. >> and stephanie, also, i mean there is the fact that joshua boyle was previously married to the sister of a prisoner held in guantanamo from a very prominent pro-taliban family. a controversial family in canada. >> reporter: that's right. he was married to omar qatar's sister. omar was in guantanamo bay as a teenager. he was eventually released and the canadian government determined that he was held unjustifiably. we don't really fwlee boyle's position right now or his wife's position, she hasn't spoken publicly is towards the taliban. he has gone into great detail about the network that kidnapped him. you mentioned it, the haqqani network a notorious violent organization. he an cues them of raping his wife in addition to keeping them

captive for five years. >> stephanie, thank you so much. coming up, a bombshell report startling new information on the forces driving america's opioid crisis. we'll talk to one of the reporter who's broke that story coming up next. stay with us. he you wouldn't do only half of your daily routine, so why treat your mouth any differently? complete the job with listerine® help prevent plaque, early gum disease, bad breath and kill up to 99.9% of germs. listerine® bring out the bold™

people would ask me that we traveled,ntries what is your nationality and i would always answer hispanic. so when i got my ancestry dna results it was a shocker. i'm from all nations. it puts a hunger in your heart to want to know more.

turning now to the deadly opioid crisis and stunning new revelations uncovered by "the washington post" and 60 minutes, a report detailing lou members of the house and senate who received contributions from the drug industry pushed legislation last year limiting had the dea's ability to crack down on opioid distributors fueling a crisis that has already killed 200,000 people. they featured a dea whistleblower with the inside story. >> why are these people sponsoring bills when people in their backyards are dying from drugs that are coming from the same people that these bills are protecting? >> why do you think that is? >> because i think that the drug industry, the manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors and chain drugstores have an influence over congress that has

never been seen before. and these people came in with their influence and their money and got a whole statute changed. because they didn't like it. >> that was whistle bro are blower joe ranizizi with bill whitaker. the house sponsor of that bill is in line to become president trump's drug czar. joining me is part of the team that broke the story. scott this whole story is unbelievable. especially because this country has been in the grips of this opioid crisis for a couple years. it was a big issue for democrats at least, democrats i guess and some republicans during the 2015, 2016 campaign cycle. and no one paid attention to a law that was signed by president obama. >> yeah, it kind of takes your breath away, andrea. we began this investigation by kind of asking a very simple question. where were all these drugs coming from. and as we made phone calls, it

was my partner on the story, lenny bernstein, he came across this whistleblower named joe who ran something called the division of diversion control at dea. we had never heard of this division. i've been a reporter almost 30 years and didn't know it exists. it's the division that regulates the pharmaceutical industry. he had said that he had been forced out because he was a, fighting against the proposal to change this law. and that he was also cracking down on a lot of companies distributors wholesalers that were sending the drugs down stream from the manufacturers to the local pharmacies. and he was fighting these companies and he felt that he had lost that fight and he was forced to resign. and so lenny and i began digging in into this. began interviewing dea investigators across the country. we began filing freedom of information requests, began developing soushs who's started giving us documents. one of those documents showed this piece of legislation that

upended 40 years of dea law was written by an industry lobbyist who used to be a dea lawyer. and then we dug deeper and we found that a lot of the members of congress who sponsor this had received fairly lucrative campaign contribution interests niece very same companies that stood to benefit from the change in the law and that the industry overall spent about $106 million in lobbying on this bill and others on capitol hill. and the law, you know, language matters in law as we all know. and there was only a couple of word changes that were made to the statute. it used to be that the dea had to show that it was an imhadnent threat by their activities and the distribution of drugs in communities. and now it has to be immediate. now, if it's imminent, you can, that's pretty easy to show. that's not a very high standard of proof.

but to show that the activities of a company are posing an threat to a community is almost impossible because a lot of these companies are far, far away from the action. you can show that maybe a doctor or a pharmacist was overprescribing in a community is posing an threat to that community. but a drug distributor or a manufacturer located 500 miles away or 1 how miles away, it's impossible to show that that company is posing an threat. >> wow, and congressman tom merino, is up for the drug czar job. he was the house cosponsor of this and rye sip yent apparently of pharma money. >> yeah, he sponsored this in three different sessions of congress. and the first two times it was defeated. eric holder was still the attorney general. there were a number of people at dea who were fighting very, very hard against this law. we've obtained lots of internal memos and e-mail traffic saying that this completely undermine our efforts to go after drug

distributors and manufacturers. please don't do this. it got to the point where ag holder actually issued a press release saying do not pass this bill but when holder stepped down and they dropped their opposition. i think that they were, there was so much lobbying. so much pressure put on by mr. marion and other members of the congress at the behest of the industry to get this changed that the dea caved and told news a statement that this was the best they could do. there were worse provisions contained in earlier versions of this bill and this was the least worst bill that they could live with. but it still takes away their major enforcement tool against these companies. >> scott, this has everything in it. the revolving door, lobbying, the payoffs, and a lack of

attention by the people in charge, including the attorney general of the united states. including the obama administration. it's really a and scandal. i know you're going to stay on it. please come back and keep us apprised of all of this. >> absolutely. >> thank you. the bannon playbook. president trump's former right hand man planning to wage all out war against the establishment and the president says today he knows where he's coming from. stay with us. so that's the idea. what do you think? hate to play devil's advocate but... i kind of feel like it's a game changer. i wouldn't go that far. are you there?

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but there's a time and season for everything. and right now, it's a season of war against a gop establishment. this is not my war. this is our war. and y'all didn't start it. the establishment started it. but i will tell you one thing. you all are going to finish it. >> former white house chief strategist, steve bannon, declaring civil war against republicans this weekend president trump is having lunch with mr. establishment, the leader of the party, mitch mcconnell. on the menu, tax reform, the budget, iran nuclear deal and a lot more. the two have had a rocky relationship since an angry phone call last month and tweets about mcconnell. what does it mean for getting legislation passed and how are senate republicans reacting to

steve bannon's threats to defeat them? joining me now, chris from connecticut and michael steel, who served as press secretary to john boehner. so, as members of the establishment wing, i say that not majorityively, chris, how would you feel if you were a member of congress right now and steve bannon was threaten iing e defeat you and the president was sayi saying, i can relate to that. >> i wish we had 20 minutes. i was on your program one time when i sang praises for sao paulo's wonderful speech sarah palin's wonderful speech at the convention. sarah palin and bannon are the democrat's best friend. what did sarah do? knock out mike cassel. never would have had 60 votes, so thanks to her, we have obamacare. thanks to bannon, we're going to have a lot of democrats elected. >> are are you so sure about that? michael steele, so far, donald

trump has managed to run circles around his party. >> in some way, he also endorseder strange in alabama. i think you don't win power, the kind of results we're looking for, whether on tax reform, repealing and replacing obamacare or anything else on the legislative checklist by targeting safe republican votes, making them spend money to defend their seat, making them work for that in a way that is just counterproductive. you do it by expanding the playing field. going after democrats. particularly senate democrats in those states that were up for e re-election next year in states the president won with huge margins. those should be the targets for anyone trying to get conservative reforms done. >> and i also want to gring brink this medical update from the u.k. unfortunately, hillary clinton on book tour has had a minor accident. she was late p for a couple of interviews today with a bbc and turns out she broke her toe. tripped going down a staircase

carry iing a cup of coffee. she said not looking where she was going and turned up with her foot in a boot. some sort of surgical cast. not having had surgery, but she's experienced the national health service, chris, which is of course a model for what a lot of democrats wish we could have here. >> you know, you bring uphi up hillary. the bottom line is my party has become the party of o hate obama, hate hillary clinton, vote for us. what do we stand for? >> the president was tweeting against hillary clinton today. what's the sense of tweeting against hillary clinton? the last i checked, she had lost to him and he was the president. >> i think it reminds the base of the party, the base f truch support errs, why they were for him. and i disagree with the congressman. respectfully. i think we have an agenda, a positive agenda to make this country better. whether it's through tax reform,

repealing and replacing obamacare, eliminating regular laces to make it harder to create jobs. i think congressional republicans are absolutely focused on helping the american people, turning our economy around and getting us back to a better place, restoring the american dream. we fis face a lot of challenges in that effort. >> the problem is, the leader is the president of the united states and he's everything i want i said! we're going to have to leave it there and by the way, we talked about national health care, bill at 92nd street wide tonight because it is october. it is breast cancer awareness. we'll be 25talking about the la research. 7:30 tonight in new york. that does it for this edition of andrea mi"andrea mitchell repor" hey, chris. >> i'm chris jansing here in new york. meal and a deal. president trump meeting mitch mcconnell rig now after months

of tension. can the two make peace and pave the way for progress on the president's legislative agenda? democrat as divided. there's a large chunk of the base, both inspired to activism by trump's election, but also feeling ignored by party establishment. i'll talk you to america's heartland for a reality check with frustrated democrats. what needs to happen to get the party back on track for 2018? and could there be criminal charge sns investigators here and the u.k. looking into explosive allegations against harvey weinstein. will the probe continue to escalate? we begin with president trump at this hour breaking bread with mitch mcconnell and the stakes are high. the president, his party with ongoing and deep seeded policy divisions and clock is ticking with the senate considering a budget resolution this week. but the president and the majority leader have had a rocky relationship to say the least. "the new york times"ing