dennis murphy: one murder, so many victims. that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm craig melvin. thanks for watching. [theme music]

focused on issues with real life consequences. >> tax breaks. >> tax plan. >> tax reform. >> let's talk about taxes. >> i call it tax cuts. >> let's talk about former trump adviser steve bannon. >> your friend, steve bannon, he declared war on you. >> these are intraparty skirmishes. >> do you worry this bickering and feuding gets in the way of your agenda? >> no, and sometimes it helps to be honest with you. >> i don't think president trump has been given nearly enough credit. president trump, i think doesn't get nearly enough credit. i think the president ought to give himself a little more credit. >> late saturday, trump tweets a string of compliments to himself. >> welcome to the second hour of "kasie dc." back with me now, msnbc political analyst and republican strategist rick tyler, national political reporter jonathan swan, the d.c. bureau chief of vice news tonight on hbo, shawna thomas, jeremy peters and former adviser to senator rand paul elise jordan. everybody, welcome back. there's a lot to unpack there. i just want to start very briefly by focusing in on mitch mcconnell, who got a lot of

laughter from the panel when he was talking about president trump. what's your sense of where are things right now between the president and mitch mcconnell? clearly he's had some impact. one of the things we haven't touched on this week was him going -- the president rather calling a trio of incumbent senators to basically say, don't worry. i'll be with you if you face a primary. at the same time, he is on the phone all the time with steve bannon. >> so it's not as bad as it was. that's the basic thing to say, which is to say that it's not as bad as when they were shouting at each other on the phone over the summer. they either have to work together, they have to get this budget done, tax reform done. trump needs to get some momentum. there was a phone call, i think

it was last weekend, and there was i think a lunch or meeting together last monday. they're working together. do they get along? is there chemistry? will there ever be chemistry? no, of course they won't. >> they seem to me like oil and water. >> it's like they -- it's chemically impossible that they work together. >> jeremy peters, you have a big piece on the front page of "the new york times" today talking about chris mcdaniel, who of course tried to defeat thad cochran in 2014. cochran ultimately hung on. that wasn't true in alabama this year. what did you find about chris mcdaniel? do you think he could actually pull it off this time? >> i think the dynamics are there for an upset, absolutely. look at what happened next door as you just alluded to. the circumstances are strikingly similar in mississippi to what they were in alabama when we saw roy moore unexpectedly topple senator luther strange. you have an incumbent who is going to be easily tied to a very unpopular senate majority leader. you have a restless base that

believes that the republican leadership has failed to defend and enact donald trump's policies adequately enough. and that's a toxic brew for a sitting incumbent establishment republican right now. >> what is your sense, though, rick tyler of the argument is essentially, the one that mcconnell made, is, look, there were five republicans who lost in 2010 and 2012. so my majority is only, you know, razor thin when it could be much wider. that's the problem. is that argument -- i guess it's getting traction with president trump. >> he's right about that except -- so mcconnell engages in 2010. he says never again is the nrsc going to be involved in primaries. so he got involved in primaries and he performed a little bitter. the republican base, particularly the conservative base, not necessarily the trump voter because a lot of them are a different group, right?

but they buy into the same thing, which is we've got a republican house. you said you were going to get things done. we got a republican senate. you said you were going to get things done. the argument was get us a white house and we'll control everything and have a conservative agenda. so far, that has not worked. like nothing has happened. >> nothing at all. >> if you went to alabama, and i know, you know, our reporters are down there, and you ask people who mitch mcconnell was, normally people would say, oh, mitch mcconnell, i can't really place him. they were like, oh, yeah. no. he's with luther strange. therefore we're voting against him. that was luther strange's biggest negative. >> the same is true in mississippi. when i interviewed people, i was not expecting to hear mitch mcconnell's name come up, but it did almost every time when i talked to tea party-type conservatives, who said if mitch mcconnell thinks he can send a bunch of money down here and defend this seat, he better think again. that's something that i think republicans are only now starting to really realize. >> here's what you can't do in alabama and mississippi. you can only spend so much money. how much mail can you put in someone's mailbox?

how many commercials are you going to run? the efficiency of the dollar after 2 million or 3 million -- >> quickly, the people in the republican party who were willing to vote for george w. bush don't seem to be president trump's voters. i'm not necessarily sure. maybe they used to be democrats. i'm not sure they're owned by either party. they seem to be trump voters, and that's the beginning, middle, and the end of it. >> it seems to be a real odd inflection point where democrats in 2016 really used donald trump and stressing his personality deficiencies as a political weapon and, you know, you kind of see where that got him just by stressing that, you know, one point about all of the president's character deficiencies. going into 2018, i don't think that that seems like the smartest tack, and i think that president trump also was very well aware that attacking republican leadership can really

play to his benefit. so you've got an interesting position in kind of a triangle where you look at who's probably going to be getting most of the heat going into 2018 and it's the republican leadership in congress. >> i want to go to our other top story, the ambush attack that killed four u.s. soldiers in niger. right now a massive intelligence failure is being blamed for the attack, but not much else is known about what really happened. that's what has lawmakers concerned and pressing the white house for more answers as the pentagon conducts an investigation. the big question, what exactly were american troops doing there? the armed services committee will be briefed this week, and for the latest, i want to go to

nbc's mike viqueira, who is live at the white house. it is great to see you. thank you for taking the time tonight. >> reporter: it is an honor and a privilege, kasie. >> can you fill us in on the latest that you're hearing from the white house? how worried are they about what may unfold? the congresswoman, frederica wilson, who has been at the center of this has labeled this president trump's benghazi. that seems to politicize it, but on the other hand, it does seem there are very really questions here that we don't have answers to. >> reporter: in particular, it's the day after sergeant la david johnson has been buried, some two weeks after the encounter that left him and three of his special operations soldiers dead in that patrol in niger. obviously there are major questions here about the preparation, about the intelligence, about the mission in general. obviously they are fighting isis elements within mali, on the border with niger, in that corner of nigeria where boko haram is also operating. this has been going on for quite some time. president trump has communicated with congress in kind of a pro forma way. you see these letters that go back and forth that are dictated by legislation. mentioned in june to president trump or at least over his signature about the mission that was going on in africa there. so, yes, a question about how

much the white house is involved, how much the national security apparatus and the president's advisers here in the west wing and the national security council knew about this operation, oversaw this operation. and of course frederica wilson raising the specter of benghazi, and what many democrats, of course, as we all know, you and all the members of the panel, many people considered a witch hunt that went on for far too long and consumed far too much energy in congress. this has obviously devolved into a political issue. name-calling back and forth. the president in another tweet this morning calling her wacky, calling frederica wilson, the congresswoman from florida, wacky. frederica wilson firing back, calling general john kelly the chief of staff, the retired general, a puppet of president trump, who is merely trying to divert attention from the failed agenda of the president, and on it goes. it wouldn't be a political issue if both sides didn't see a

political advantage in it. i think that's quite obvious. the fundamental and essential questions about the mission and how these four soldiers died standing out there in the balance, kasie. >> thank you so much for that. really appreciate it. and you raise the question of the tone in which all of this plays out, and that raises the question in my mind of statesmanship, and the cause of decency and whether or not it's dead, a question some sought to answer for themselves this week. >> we have been the light for the world is not just what we said, but we built the institutions that guarantee it. >> freedom is not merely a

political menu option or a foreign policy fad. >> the guarantees that are in that constitution are ones that people are walking away from now. >> we will not thrive in a world where our leadership and ideals are absent. we wouldn't deserve to. >> bigotry seems emboldened. >> you see these demagogues talking about how it's just about whatever the majority thinks. >> by soil or blood. >> you can't define an america based on ethnicity, race, religion, culture, background. >> we've seen nationalism distorted into nativism. >> for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems. >> in all these ways, we need to recall and recover our own identity. >> the world still looks to the example and leadership of america to become another better place. what greater cause could anyone ever serve? >> a spokesman for president george w. bush tells nbc news that bush was not criticizing president trump with those remarks. quote, these are the same things president bush has spoken on for the last two decades. >> give me a break.

this is the problem with the republican party right now. if they are so outraged by donald trump, then they need to say that. but so few of them actually are, and the moral leadership in the party right now that so many seem to be clamoring for is never going to materialize if people are denying, like george bush is, what is so obviously a criticism of the sitting president. >> and even if you want to say that bush has had some of those same themes over the years, and he has, especially when you talk about immigration and a couple of other things, we are living in a different word now, so his words have a different context. and it's crazy to think that people would not connect what he said to president trump. >> i think that -- i mean it seems obvious to me, and i was struck by watching the three of those men clearly positioning themselves or acting as elder statesmen in this kind of discourse we've been dealing with for the last six months, sounding so alike. they've all run against each other in some way in the past.

>> there's a cosmic coincidence they all came out in the same week and the two ex-presidents the same day. i agree with jeremy's point, but what point i do disagree with is i think that trump -- the culture elected trump. i mean politicians only get elected to the point that the culture will tolerate them. so the culture has said okay to trump. not everybody. i'm not saying everybody. so in a sense, trump is more of a symptom of the culture than hg

it's just the sense that politicians say one thing, and i hear this over and over and over again when i interview voters, conservative voters, the base, whatever we want to call them. they just think that the people they elect say one thing to get into office and then completely disregard that once they get to washington. >> there's also just a bunch of assumptions that people had about what you needed to say to be elected president. you needed to talk about america in these terms as the beacon of democracy, and in these lofty terms that we heard just then, and trump didn't say any of that on the campaign trail. he didn't say any of that. and i think these people are like, you know, they've heard this their whole lives and they're now watching the public's fear, and there is none of this rhetoric anymore.

they're not hearing about america being talked about in this way anymore. >> it's like the more eloquent you were -- >> your guy cruz. >> cruz was speaking at a sophomore to junior college level, and trump was speaking at third grade level according to "the new york times." and by the time cruz was done with the campaign, we had him down to the seventh grade. >> on purpose. you dumbed him down on purpose. speaking of issues that people seem to care about once upon a time but that have not been as front and center or caused as many political problems as maybe they did before, this is something. senator john mccain seems to be finding a new way to mock president donald trump without mentioning his name. during an interview on c-span 3 about the vietnam war, which i would characterize as one of those things we were just talking about, used to be a litmus test. mccain said this. >> one aspect of the conflict, by the way, that i will never, ever countenance is that we drafted the lowest income level of america, and the highest income level found a doctor that would say they had a bone spur. that is wrong. that is wrong. if we're going to ask every

american to serve, every american should serve. >> and some context for that. job mccain did not mention president trump by name. however, president trump did receive a deferment from the draft in vietnam, citing bone spurs in his feet. and this is something, of course -- this was -- bill clinton, when he was running for office, this was an issue. it doesn't seem to be something that people necessarily care about anymore. >> i think especially if you're going to have a president who is speaking to gold star families and this kind of thing is going to come up, it makes sense senator john mccain would talk about this. i don't know when this interview was shot, but if john mccain seems to feel very free to say whatever he wants. and he felt that way, let's say, back in 2000, straight talk express, that whole thing. he's a political guy, but he is doing whatever he wants, and he's saying whatever he wants. it will be interesting to watch, but i don't know how much that is going to affect what president trump does in the white house. >> "the new york times" wrote a story today and i noticed and he felt that way, let's say, back in 2000, straight talk express, that whole thing.

he's a political guy, but he is doing whatever he wants, and he's saying whatever he wants. it will be interesting to watch, but i don't know how much that is going to affect what president trump does in the white house. >> "the new york times" wrote a story today and i noticed senator mccain's office tweeted it, calling him, mccain, in twilight. can i get your take, jordan? you worked inside the bush administration as somebody who was kind of on the inside of that. and listening to those words, he has stepped back out of the public eye until now. but as our panel has sort of pointed out, he then didn't want to actually go there and say, yes, i'm talking about this president. i mean what does giving a speech like that accomplish if you're not willing to say you're talking about what's going on? >> well, he was giving the speech just to give context to a new bush institute initiative that promotes free markets and democracy promotion, and he -- i think it would have been just very odd had he said nothing.

but also perhaps at this time, does it really help to call out president trump directly by name? and i think by trying to keep it more -- the debate more at a philosophical level, you know, the president was hoping to elevate the conversation that we're having about what's happening in our country right now, what has led to this deep division, and what can we do to make things better. so i think what president bush was trying to do is be part of the solution and start a broader dialogue rather than, you know, lowering himself to the level of donald trump and starting a twitter spat. >> elise jordan, the panel is staying with me. next, coming up, we're going to talk to democratic governor terry mcauliffe of vir could he be gearing up for a run of his own in 2020? plus the flint water crisis. a big deadline is fast approaching that could usher in major change for the city of flint. the city's mayor will join me a

little bit later in the show. but as we go to break, we've been talking about the state of statesmen in america. it was nine years ago nearly to the day that john mccain spoke at the al smith dinner in new york. down in the polls, he was running for president at the time, he left the crowd in tears of laughter and said this to the man who would eventually win the white house. >> in the military they work pretty hard to impress the chain of command on your way of thinking. and one way or another on the 4th of november, word will come down from the top of the chain, and senator obama and i will both receive our orders. political opponents can have a little trouble seeing the best in each other, but i've had a few glimpses of this man at his best, and i admire his great skill, energy, and determination. senator obama talks about making history, and he's made quite a bit of it already. i can't wish my opponent luck, but i do wish him well. ♪

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welcome back. joining us now is the virginia governor, terry mcauliffe. governor, so great to see you. >> congratulations on the new show. >> thank you. very much appreciate it. >> you bet. >> you are in a little bit of a unique position because of the term limits associated with your office. your lieutenant governor is in a tight race with ed gillespie for your seat coming up in a couple of weeks. ed gillespie, the republican, is in polls very, very close to ralph northam, the democrat, in a way that's kind of unexpected for your purple state. >> yep. >> why is it so close? >> well, first off, you look at the history of virginia. this is an off year. turnout generally drops by half from the presidential year last year. when i ran four years ago, i got turnout up to 43%. we spent a lot of money to do it. we really leaned in on the issues. but we have elections every year in virginia, and to get those what they call federal voters out in a non-federal year is the

challenge. but, you know, i feel very good about where ralph is. we have three statewides up. when i won three years ago, republicans controlled all three statewides. we now control all three statewides. people are very happy with the state. over 60% think the state is going in the right direction. i just announced friday our unemployment rate dropped to 3.7 to 5.4 when i took office. that's the lowest level we've had in nine years, second lowest of any state in america. our economy is booming. ed really doesn't have much of a message. things are going great. let's keep the train going the way it's going. >> your approval ratings are higher than president trump's in the state. >> no offense, that's not -- i was 56 in the last poll. he was 31. much higher. >> this begs the question. what does ralph northam need to be doing differently? >> it just goes to the turnout factor. >> that's not what's being

picked up in the polling. what should he be doing differently right now? >> i don't think anything. my best guesstimate, ralph is probably up somewhere from 3 percent to 6 percentage points. i broke a 40-year trend when i won the governorship. if you're a democrat, you're out watching today, you want to help, you want to send a message to donald trump and the white house, this is the first test. we have all three statewides up. i've got the house of delegates up. but ralph is going to win. i mean he went to vmi. he was an army doctor. he served our nation with distinction, was a state senator, was my lieutenant governor, and everybody loves where the state's going. we had a record turnout during the primaries. 200,000 more voters came out in the democratic primary than came out in the republican primary. i think you're going to see this again coming up. ed gillespie won't have trump come into the state. he's treating trump like he has a communicable disease. trump comes into virginia every weekend. i think he was in twice this weekend golfing. so the president's not doing events for the republican candidate for governor. it's a little embarrassing, i think, on both sides.

we have, as you know, president obama in richmond this week. joe biden was in the weekend before. i mean we're bringing everybody in. >> but for give me for noticing. hillary clinton came in but only for a fund-raiser. she didn't do an open event. do you think it would be helpful for the lieutenant governor northam if hillary clinton did an open event. >> if it worked for her schedule. we'd love to have hillary clinton come in. we let all of our folks come in. i mean the other side is like tied up in pretzels. they don't know what to do. he won't mention trump's name, but he's leaned in on the same issues that donald trump has. i mean horrible travel ban, horrible immigration ban, what they've done on health care has really hurt virginia. ed's policies would be the same thing as donald trump's, and they're bad for virginia. the bottom line, people want elected officials to focus on jobs. we have had a record amount of jobs, record amount of capital investment under the last 3 1/2

years. people are happy. we're moving in the right direction, and that's why ralph will continue that path. i also, i should tell you, vetoed 120 bills, the most of any virginia governor. horrible bills, kasie, anti-women, anti-lgbt, anti-environment, pro-gun, and anti-voting. i vetoed that. i was never overridden. i'm 120-0. we need ralph there to continue to veto because if i have a bill that defunds planned parenthood, which passed my assembly and i vetoed it, you're not going to get the companies of the 21st century, the googles, facebooks, amazons. i just got a billion dollars investment from facebook. we are open and welcome to everybody. you need to focus on the value set of jobs and treating people with dignity. >> i know this has something you have focused about in your election, the transpacific partnership. president trump withdrew from it. did that help your state? >> it hurt us badly. i was different than many of the democrats.

i actually supported tpp. 61% of our exports, kasie, go to those states, and exactly when i said would happen has happened. china has now gone in and done one-off deals with every one of these countries. guess who is left out? the united states of america. i am not scared of trade deals. you give me a trade deal -- >> your base is kind of scared of them. >> i'm the guy who is actually the one out there negotiating these deals, and i'm the one selling our products around the globe. i've been on 33 trade missions as governor. i'm the one out there negotiating, selling. we've done $18.5 billion of investment since i've been governor. a record of $6 billion more than any governor in virginia history. i know this business. you give me a fair trade deal, i am going to beat anybody. let me go for my state around the globe. i am going to -- >> i'm going to beat anybody? it sounds like you're talking about 2020. >> i'm going to beat anybody on trade. this is what drives me wild. i just announced last month, kasie, $91 billion. $91 billion ag and forestry

sales in virginia. it's up 32% since i took office. you know what that translates into? thousands of jobs. >> is that a, no, you're not running for president in 2020? >> i'm going to finish strong as governor. i've got about two months to go. ralph will be inaugurated january 13th, and i'm going to work my heart out every day. i've got another trade mission to europe coming up. i'm going to be the big environmental global summit in europe. i'm going to close a couple more deals. i'm going to get to $20 billion by the time i leave office. >> i'm going to put you down as a hard maybe. >> we've got to finish the governorship strong. >> do you think bernie sanders could win a general election in 2020? >> i think anybody can win a general election. i would also tell you this, no one should ever take trump lightly. people he's got his base, and as we know he'll say anything. i clearly think the democrats are going to beat him, but this is a long way off. what i'm trying to get democrats to focus on, we have 36 governors up next year, and those governors are critical to the redistricting effort in

2021. so let's focus on the governors. let's win control of the congress. 2020 will take care of itself. why people need to be concerned, there's only 15 democratic governors left in america. we've lost a lot of state chambers. so when redistricting comes up in 2021 the only person who can stop a republican drawn map is a democratic governor. if we don't win a lot of these seats next year because all of this is happening at the state level, that is happening through state chambers. we spend too much time focusing on presidential, and then we don't focus on state and local. the dnc, i'm happy they just gave us a million and a half for the virginia's governor race. i'm very excited about that. we've got to focus more on that's local races. governors are the future. >> i want to ask you this is becoming a litmus test not just for national elections but for state and local elections over impeachment. as we head into the midterm season, there will be reverberations. here's part of an add from tom

steyer calling the president a clear and present danger. >> he's brought us to the brink of nuclear war, obstructed justice at the fbi and in direct violation of the constitution, he's taken money from foreign governments and threatened to shut down news organizations that report the truth. if that isn't a case for impeaching and removing a dangerous president, then what has our government become? tell your member of congress >> he's brought us to the brink of nuclear war, obstructed justice at the fbi and in direct violation of the constitution, he's taken money from foreign governments and threatened to shut down news organizations that report the truth. if that isn't a case for impeaching and removing a dangerous president, then what has our government become? tell your member of congress they have a moral responsibility to stop doing what's political and start doing what's right. our country depends on it. >> do you think president trump should be impeached? >> i'm not willing to go there. >> i think in order to impeach i believe in the rule of law and in due process. >> sounds like a not quite. >> it's hard for me to want --

>> i know there's a lot of people out there fighting and throwing around the stuff impeachment, but read the constitution. it starts in the house, and right now it's controlled by republicans. >> so do you think the president should be impeached? >> i think we have to wait until what bob mueller comes up with. i think we have a process in place. i think tom steyer is a great guy, but i don't agree with him on this. i'm agnostic on this until we find out exactly whether the president broke the law. >> i think you can anticipate my question to you now. do you think president trump has committed an impeachable offense as of now? >> i haven't seen that sitting here today. a agree with the folk who's said we have a process that investigates and goes through this. that's going on in the house and the senate as well as bob mueller. let the investigations go. we need to hold trump accountable, but kasie, the big issue i can tell you as a governor here today, this congress, we have not reauthorized the chip program. our childhood program for young children to get health care. our health care premiums are going up on average 53% in virginia.

i've got real challenges and people are talking about these issues over there. so my point as a governor is -- >> but that's what's animating democrats right now and the base. >> tom steyer is entitled to do anything he wants to do but i can tell you as a governor, i want congress to begin to get their act together and do something. the actions they are not taking or taking are doing nothing but hurting us at the local level. i'm trying to create jobs, but i can't have it with thousands and tens of thousands of my children who now have health care at the end of the year may not have health care, and i speak for every governor. premiums are all going up, and the insanity that trump keeps putting out there on health care and getting rid of the subsidies, i mean he is creating chaos. i don't need chaos as a governor. i need jobs, and i need a federal government that's going to work with me in a bipartisan way. i don't care what your political party is. i need jobs, and i'll work with anyone to do it. what's happening today in washington has done nothing but affect us at the states, and we can't create the jobs that we should be doing. what do voters want? they want jobs, quality education for their children.

they want health care. they want to get on roads and get on them. >> we have to leave it there, but i will put you down as a maybe running for president as the person who is running against washington. >> put me down as a guy focused on the 18 governor races. >> i appreciate you taking the time. coming up, warfare. that's what u.n. ambassador nikki haley called russia's election meddling. officials from facebook, google, and twitter are set to testify before the senate intelligence committee coming up this week. we'll have a preview as congress looks to put the clampdown on russian interference. my advice for looking younger, longer? get your beauty sleep. and use aveeno® absolutely ageless® night cream with active naturals® blackberry complex. younger looking skin can start today. absolutely ageless® from aveeno®.

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you know what's easy? building your website with godaddy. get your domain today and get a free trial of gocentral. build a better website in under an hour. alright, looks like we've got chips, ppretzels!retzels? plain, sourdough, spicy, sesame, chocolate covered, peanut butter filled, plain. great. so what are we gonna watch? oh! show me fall tv. only xfinity x1 brings you the best hand selected picks this fall. the russians, god bless them, they are saying why are americans anti-russian and why have we done the sanctions? well, don't interfere in our elections, and we won't be anti-russian. i will tell you that when a country can come interfere in another country's elections, that is warfare. >> u.n. ambassador nikki haley on thursday calling russia's election med ling warfare.

that as u.s. social media giants face increasing scrutiny over how their sites may have been exploited by the russians during the 2016 campaign. the top lawyers for facebook, twitter, and google will testify before the house and senate intelligence committees about russian-linked ads and fake news that was spread on their platforms. president trump weighing in yesterday on twitter, saying, quote, keep hearing about tiny amount of money spent on facebook ads. what about the billions of dollars of fake news on cnn, abc, nbc, and cbs? crooked hillary clinton spent hundreds of millions of dollars more on the presidential election than i did. facebook was on her side, not mine. joining me now, alexis madrigal, a senior editor at the atlantic, and matt fuller, congressional reporter at "the huffington post." alexis, i want to start with you because of those tweets from the president, because you have written a very long, and i commend it to everybody watching tonight, story called "what facebook did to american democracy" in the atlantic.

you essentially argue the opposite of what the president has said, which is that the assumption going into our earlier elections, 2012, for example, was that any higher engagement on social media would benefit the democrat because it would inherently engage young people. but you walk through a lot of research that argues that a very small amount of money can have a very large impact and conservatives are doing a better job of it. >> yeah, it's been a fascinating five years to watch, you know. i mean it seemed for a time as if democrats had basically a structural advantage in social media, but as time has gone on, it seems that whoever is best able to exploit those tools, no matter what part of the political spectrum they're on, they're the ones who get higher engagement. and from very, very early on in the 2016 election, even in republican primaries, it was pretty clear that donald trump as well as the emerging sort of constellation of right-wing

media properties were very, very, very good at spreading their messages across facebook. >> and one of the things that you write here is an obscure facebook produced case study where they used a very small amount of money, a budget that would have allowed you to send one mailer to 150,000 homes, but that basically allowed them to perform in an election 20 points better. it doesn't seem that it takes that much money to have a disproportionate impact. >> and one of the reasons is that unlike television where you need to make fairly sizeable buys that cost kind of a lot of money or, you know, with direct mail, which just costs a lot on a sort of per piece of mail basis, you know, with facebook you can target really specific areas for not very much money. and that's really what you hear out of the trump campaign, you know. traditionally whoever wins, their digital director goes around the country and says like, hey, this is what we did. this is why we're so great. and the word out of the trump campaign is that they focused really heavily on very small

groups of people, targeting ahead of the election and bloomberg business week, there was a great report basically looking at how the trump campaign was trying to reduce voter turnout among certain key groups including african-americans, what they called idealistic democrats and also women by running ads to them with anti-hillary clinton messaging. >> matt fuller, i want to talk about this hearing coming up on capitol hill what is your sense of what we could arin the course of this hearing from -- we're not going to see mark zuckerberg, sheryl sandberg or any of these big names but we are going to hear from the lawyers of these companies. >> i think we'll have a better sense of the scope of how far this went. right now we're looking at a small amount but that doesn't seem to be convincing. a lot of people think it's a lot more money than what we know. clearly we have a sense of what

facebook was doing. we don't actually know the extent of the russian bots on twitter. i think there's still a lot of questions out there about how much this did affect things. but as you said at the top, this is coming at a pivotal time where people are starting to question how much data they're collecting, how is the media sort of getting out there. those questions are being colored by the russia stuff, right? and it's kind of breaking through the sort of traditional partisan lines. i don't think this is going to align so neatly anymore where you have democrats who are now voicing some uncertainty about what facebook and twitter, those things are doing. you have republicans, i think, who have been sort of naturally a little skeptical of those things too. >> at the same time, they could find themselves very easily on the reverse of this if the election were breaking a different way, it seems. >> sure. that may be the saving grace for them is that if this does just devolve into a partisan food fight, that might be the best case scenario for these tech giants because then it's just republicans defending on this thing and democrats attacking for that. i also think it's interesting to see how democrats themselves are going to address this because there's an internal fight, i think, and this is an easy issue with 2020 coming up. you might have elizabeth warren

might attack facebook and twitter, and what's kamala harris going to do in this situation? >> somebody that has them as a constituency is the point you're making. >> or nancy pelosi with tim ryan. there's all sorts of interesting factions within the democratic party. if i were elizabeth warren, i would certainly be going after these things and scoring points on the left with the russia stuff and a lot of people who are naturally skeptical of these tech companies. >> thank you so much for taking the time late on a sunday night to be with us. i really appreciate it. 1,277 days. that was the last time that people in flint, michigan, had clean tap water. can you imagine going 1,200 days without being able to drink water out of your faucet? all this time later the water crisis continues. flint mayor karen weaver sharply criticized the president and then got an invitation to meet with white house officials. she joins me live next as we continue our series on stories that have gone uncovered. "kasie dc" is back in just a moment.

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in flint, michigan, it's been 3 1/2 years since brown, lead poisoned water began flowing out of kitchen faucets and showers, the result of a cost-cutting switch from detroit's water system to the flint river. today residents of flint are still relying on filters and bottled water. a federal judge is ordering the city to decide by tomorrow on a long-term water source for the city. joining me now is the mayor of flint, karen weaver, who we hope will bring us up to speed on exactly what is going on. mayor, thank you so much for taking the time tonight. >> thank you. >> explain to us what's at stake here in this decision. my understanding is that essentially the flint city council has not signed off, and

judges in state government are trying to accelerate, push you to make a long-term decision on the future of the city's water. >> yes, that's correct. and we have made a long-term decision. i know i put forward a recommendation, and there's a lot at stake. the decision took months for us to come to. we had experts at the table, but we really wanted to make sure we were doing what was best for public health because we know and you know what happened in flint before was, you know, politics and money was put over the lives and the public health and well being of the people of flint. so we wanted to stay on detroit water, which is actually like huron. so that's in there. we wanted to make sure we were being fiscally responsible. we got out of a $7 million a year bond payment. we have access to a water relief assistance program. we also have water that we can sell to bring in a revenue source for the city. so this recommendation that we put forward is really based on public health and what's best for the people of flint and not having to go through another switch and have to suffer through that pain and anxiety

and actually that fear of what happens when you change water sources. and so we're waiting to see what happens tomorrow. you're absolutely right. >> you have been very outspoken in the wake of the hurricane maria that hit puerto rico and destroyed much of their water infrastructure. what have you learned about trying to solve your city's water crisis that you think can help those impacted by that. >> you know what, one of the things we learned is while we know there are other flints across this country, that's obvious, but we do feel like we have become the poster child for water quality and for infrastructure, and we know what it's like tow not have access to clean water.

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the mid term elections and beyond. what are you looking for? >> the widow of sergeant johnson is going to give her first interview tomorrow morning in the aftermath of what has become a political drama that should be about her loved one. and i'm watching for her and for her strength in this moment. >> as we all are. rick? >> u.s. coalition forces are wrapping up isis in the middle east. we see if the white house can get out of its way to get good coverage on it. >> the president is giving a speech thursday about the opioid epidemic. in august he called it a national emergency. it's been radio silence. >> still has yet to declare one. >> the undocumented immigrant

teenager who wants to have an abortion in texas and the back and forth about that that went to court this past week. there's a lot still there. we will be watching to see what happens with that. >> you've been doing fantastic work. >> having the governor of virginia here, refocused my mind around who the next governor is going to be. that will tell us two things as we see what we think looks like a tightening. it's going to tell us about whether or not the republican base is still motivated and it's going to tell us about the strength of the democratic party right now. whether or not they turn out. >> thank you all for joining us. we will see you next week. we leave you with this. >> clever accounting allows nearly anything imaginable to become a writeoff, including alpacas. a local and federal tax bill can be sheered by claiming exotic

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president trumps turns up the pressure. issued new warning to house republicans. pass tax cuts or lose in 2018. steve bannon's war on the gop establishment continues as he takes aim at a few top republicans. searching for a possible serial killer. residents in one florida neighborhood on edge after three murders that authorities believe are linked. good morning, everyone. on