i'm in for brian williams and 11:00 a.m. eastern with stephanie ruhle and at 3:00 p.m. again tomorrow. thank you for watching. "deadline: white house" with nicolle wallace starts right now. >> hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york. donald trump may have hurt the case that prosecutors will bring against the terror suspect who took the lives of eight innocent people on a new york city bike path this week by suggesting in a late-night tweet last night and a morning chaser that the attacker should get the death penalty. the white house also seemingly forcing the president to walk back comments made yesterday about being open to sending the suspected terrorist to guantanamo bay. here are those tweets. new york city terrorist was happy as he asked to hang isis flag in hospital room. he killed eight people, badly injured 12. should get death penalty. and here's the gitmo never mind tweet from this morning. would love to send the nyc

terrorist to gitmo but statistically, that process takes much longer than going through the federal system. there's also something of keepikeep ing him in the hole of the horrible crime he committed. "the new york times" reports that yesterday's original comment about guantanamo bay was according to white house aids. mr. trump's call for capital punishment for mr. saipov, however, introduced a surprise complication that may burden prosecutors and help defense attorneys. let's get right to nbc news justice correspondent pete williams. pete, you told me right here yesterday that the idea of sending the suspect to guantanamo was likely a nonstarter. now the white house has come around to the same conclusion. but if we can start, tell me first how a defense attorney or suspected terrorist might argue something the president tweeted about the death penalty could impact the case? >> mostly it would come into effect in the jury selection

process, and they might argue they should have a change of venue that it would poison the mind of new yorkers. the legal experts think it could be overcome -- all the voir dire process is intended to do is find people who haven't heard what the president said or don't know the facts about the case or if they have are willing to put them aside. that's the standard the supreme court has set and it's a pretty hard one for the defense to overcome. if a juror says, yes, they heard the president's statement. are you willing to put it aside? yes. then, you know, that's pretty hard for the defense to overcome. it's a subtle point here, really, because the government at some point is required under federal law if it intends to seek the death penalty. it says at a reasonable time before the trial, give notice and say why. say what -- how it would meet the standard for the death penalty and federal law. one of the counts filed against him is death eligible. you may ask, if the government

is going to say at some point we think he ought to get the death penalty and hope the jury opposes it, what's the difference between that and the president? i guess the answer is it's very subtle. it's the government urging the jury saying, we believe you should decide this. it's different than the president saying i want the death penalty. as one law professor said, prosecutors don't have a following. presidents do. so it's inconvenient for the prosecutors, but i don't think it could be said to be a showstopper for the trial. >> you know, that is the legal analysis. i think on the political side, it's relatively surprising to see a president who ran on defeating and prosecuting and taking out isis complicate things for prosecutors who will be people that he -- i don't think he's nominated a u.s. attorney for the southern district yet but they're all in the same side. so some of the analysis is that he's making things more

difficult for the government, and he runs the government. >> well, i do think the tweets from yesterday to today do show some evolution in his thinking or understanding of how the process works. and i must say that lindsey graham, the senator who has pushed this the hardest is saying, i'm not saying you shouldn't get a trial in civilian court. i want to take it into military custody and give it back to the civilian authorities. of course, that train has now left the station. we know how this is going to go. and i will say that talking to people at justice and the fbi yesterday, they did find the president's comments puzzling. and they were a little bit concerned about them but i think that concern has passed now. this thing does tend to be on the regular track. >> i was on this bike path today. i live on the west side. and it just gave me a chill to be back on this path which farther down the city was where eight people lost their lives. can you bring us up to speed on where the investigation stands

at this hour? >> i think the big question now is, was anybody else involved? and by that, i think what the investigators mean is -- at the -- starting at the most serious level and working your way down, did anybody directly attack? was he directly inspired by some person? did some person egg him on or at the least concerning level, was somebody aware and just didn't do anything about it. didn't raise a hand or try to talk him out of it or tell the authorities. any of those are potential crimes. that's what they want to know. the big question is, could there be somebody out there thinking about doing something different? could that be a threat? having said that, i have to say that while they are running down leads and there are people they are interested in, that they're trying to pursue, as far as we know at this point, they say there's no indication that anybody else was involved. that person that 23 hours ago, the fbi said they were looking for a friend of his who had been in touch with saipov electronically, e-mails and

texting before the attack, he's now been located. he's been questioned. he's not under arrest. >> pete williams, it's always a privilege to have you. thank you for spend something time with us. let's bring in white house bureau chief phil rucker and steve schmidt. eli stokels joins me at the table, eugene robin son. phil rucker, let me start with you and ask you just straight up, how did the white house and the president screw this up? >> well, it actually -- this whole discussion about punishment started in a cabinet meeting yesterday where a reporter asked president trump whether the suspect should be sent to gitmo and the president in unscripted remarks just said send him to gitmo. that became a news headline which sarah sanders had to walk

back. overnight we've seen the president evolve his thinking to now advocate for the death penalty and, regardless, both of these statements are somewhat inappropriate and unprecedented just in terms of what a president traditionally would say, which is to restrain from offering this sort of commentary. it is in keep with the kind of public persona that donald trump has cultivated over many, many years in public life of trying to show himself to be strong and tough and have this steely resolve. but he's not a commentator anymore. he's the president of the united states. so there's a different standard, and his words carry a different weight. >> there's an obliviousness to the fact that he sits atop the federal government. a federal government whose justice system he described yesterday as a laughing stock and a joke. >> well, the comment to -- first it just shows his total lack of rigor in making any

pronouncements. this is someone who revels in his unpreparedness. it's an improvisational act. there's no thought that goes into anything that comes out of his mouth from the callousness displayed towards puerto ricans, la david johnson's widow, across the board. secondly it shows a real contempt, a real ignorance for the concept of the rule of law. and you see it over and over again. his denigration of the federal judiciary. the comey firing. we're a nation of laws. and we've never had a situation where the president of the united states has such pronounced and profound indifference to the concept of the rule of law. so his comments, though not surprising, are inappropriate as they almost always are. >> eli, i guess i'm always surprised, and i probably shouldn't be anymore, but i'm always surprised when a new norm is obliterated. and i asked jeremy bash the

question yesterday, is this response to the attack a norm that was violated but that his supporters would love or is this one where he's actually jeopardized the case? >> i think it's both. and i think when you look at what he's doing there is a consistency in his response to these kind of situations. to terrorism when the terrorism appears to be carried out by somebody who is from an arab country, muslim country, not from the united states. this is the rhetoric we heard all throughout the campaign. the blood thirst. the aggression. the retribution. those are things his supporters really like. now that he's president, it is problematic. as pete pointed out. the fact these are subtle legalities, basically tells you that this never once occurred to the president because he was just answering a question. and everything is done kind of rapid fire in the moment, just read and react. that's all improvisational. but it does -- the unifying

thread is the sort of broader politics of donald trump. the ethnocentric nationalism. he didn't react this way when a white person shot dozens of people in las vegas. he did not come and say, we have to do an immediate policy change. we need to give this guy the death penalty. he did not call for this after charlottesville when the criminal here did the exact same thing as the person in this case, driving a vehicle into a crowd. you step back from all of this and you view it in the context of his broader political appeal, it's not surprising at all. >> exactly. you shouldn't be surprised. norm after norm after norm. i thought we had progressed a little bit. we've just been set back. this is who he is as steve said. he's improvisational as eli said. he is obsessed with projecting this image of strength. now people who are obsessed with projecting an image of strength

are generally insecure and feel inadequate in some way. but that may be as it may, that is who he is and he's president of the united states right now. so he says totally inappropriate things. and for the president to jump into the middle of a criminal prosecution is not done, but, yeah it is. >> and i guess my point about being surprised is that -- we've sort of become accustomed to that which is inappropriate. this is the first time he's jeopardized a prosecution of a terrorist on his watch. >> right, right. exactly. and, you know, the idea of somehow transferring this guy to military custody and transferring him back. it's insane. and that's never going to work. it was a bad idea, but to him, it wasn't even an idea. it was almost a reflex. must be tough. therefore, must have death penalty. >> phil rucker, nothing tough about openly pondering and looking so unsure of himself. i think what he projected was

truly alarming to his supporters and his detractors. in the hours after a terrorist attack, the most deadly terror attack in this city since 9/11, he attacked chuck schumer. he over pondered whether to send the suspect to gitmo or prosecute in our federal courts. tweeted twice about the death penalty. a powerful leader simply does these things. they don't tweet about them or talk about them in pool sprays. >> that's right. he's trying to seize the political advantage here. he sees an issue that galvanizes his supporters and that's why you saw him politicizing the issue immediately yesterday morning with those tweets about chuck schumer and the democrats. it's a real contrast to his hand ling of the las vegas shooting where he and the white house actually said it was too early after a tragedy to have any debate about policy or politics when it comes to the gun laws. but here he is wanting to rewrite our immigration laws and change our criminal justice system. he sees an opportunity here to

galvanize the country to play off people's fears about terrorism, to solidify the support behind him. >> phil, you were on the beat of donald trump as a pressure cooker. i wonder if you read anything into the fact that he dialed up two reporters with "the new york times" to simply assert that he was calm. >> yeah, one of the things he told "the new york times" was the story that my colleagues and i had on monday night was not the right depiction of his feelings after those indictments came down that he, in fact, was very calm and not angry at all. that does conflict with the reporting that we have which is that he stayed up in the residence for several hours into that morning, was late getting to the oval office because he was so busy watching all of this news and feeling frustrated about it. but nonetheless, he doesn't want there to be a narrative of him fearing mueller. he wants everybody to think that everything is good, that he is -- one white house official

used that word. said the president is zen. so -- >> that person should go to spin doctor jail. let me give you the last quick word here. i talk to people who were in contact with the president on sunday before the news was even known and he was anything but zen. what do you make of the elaborate spin effort over his state of mind? >> it's not going to work because there's nothing that kills your narrative that this is a hoax like a real indictment. and charging documents that actually lay out what i think is a road map to collusion. when you put everything in the timeline together, you put the facts that mueller presented in those documents together, it looks a lot like the campaign was willing and able and had the access to collude. >> able is up in the air but willing for sure. all right. phil rucker, thank you so much for starting us off today. when we come back, connecting the dots. jeff sessions, low level george, and his plan for donald trump to meet with russians.

a clearer picture coming into view. also ahead, paul manafort is back in court today where his lawyer is trying to make the case that a man who has applied for ten passports isn't a flight risk. and will anyone apologize to the 400-pound man in his basement that donald trump blamed for election hacking. new reporting today about the extent of russian meddling. i don't want to sound paranoid, but d'ya think our recent online sales success seems a little... strange? na. ever since we switched to fedex ground business has been great. they're affordable and fast... maybe "too affordable and fast." what if... "people" aren't buying these books online, but "they" are buying them to protect their secrets?!?! hi bill. if that is your real name. it's william actually. hmph! affordable, fast fedex ground.

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nbc news has now learn that low-level george's plan for donald trump to meet with vladimir putin was nixed by then

senator jeff sessions, although a source close to sessions says the attorney general does not recall nixing papadopoulos propos proposal. papadopoulos has been cooperate with bob mueller's investigators since at least july, according to documents unsealed this week and possibly even wearing a wire. nbc news is reporting that, quote, attorney general jeff sessions rejected a proposal by a junior campaign aide who offered to use his russian contacts to try to set up a meeting between donald trump and vladimir putin. the problem for sessions on june 13th of this year, he was adamant that he had no knowledge of any conversations by anyone connected to the trump campaign and russians. this was his testimony when asked about contacts with russians on behalf of the trump campaign. >> i have never met with or had any conversation with any russians or any foreign officials concerning any type of interference with any campaign or election in the united

states. further, i have no knowledge of any such conversations by anyone connected to the trump campaign. i was your colleague in this body for 20 years, at least some of you. and the suggestion that i participated in any collusion, that i was aware of any collusion with the russian government to hurt this country, which i have served with honor for 35 years or to undermine the integrity of our democratic process is an appalling and detestable lie. >> let's get right to ken dilanian who broke the story. >> a source close to jeff sessions is telling us that he did nix this papadopoulos idea of having a meeting between donald trump and vladimir putin at a march 31st meeting of the

trump national security team. and we see a picture there on the screen of sessions in the meeting. papadopoulos is on his left. but the source is saying he has no specific recollection of doing so because papadopoulos was such a low-level guy. he didn't leave a big impression. this is obviously causing great waves, particularly among senate democrats. initially jeff sessions said he never met with any russians and then sessions had to amend that testimony and say he met twice with the russian ambassador. frank has sent sessions a stinging letter accusing him of misrepresenting his contacts with russians and asking them to come become to congress and clarify what exactly he remembers about this meeting, what he knew about papadopoulos' interactions with russians. >> i'm not a lawyer but is someone's rank on a campaign a legal defense for not remembering telling them to do something when it comes to russia? >> i wouldn't think so.

it's really mystifying because, you know, this is a pretty dramatic thing. you are proposing a meeting between the candidate and head of an adversary nation. and the story is jeff sessions nixed it and said we're going to move on. but to me, the real question is who within the trump campaign knew that george papadopoulos had been offered dirt on hillary clinton and thousands of e-mails. did sam clovis, the campaign supervisor know who is not going forward as agriculture chief scientist? did jeff sessions, the head of this national security committee know? that's what presumably members of congress are going to ask him. >> ken, stay with us for the rest of the conversation. let me bring in mike lotter, mike pence's press secretary, a post he left in september, just in time. what do you know or are hearing from your former colleagues about the ripple effect that ken dilanian described upon learning that papadopoulos plead guilty to lying to the fbi this summer

and has been cooperating with them ever since? >> i was in the white house last night meeting with -- >> let me guess. everyone was really zen. >> i wouldn't describe it as zen. that's not a word i would use. this didn't come up. >> why would it come up if they think people might be wearing a wire. >> there are no concerns like that. this is a -- >> there are no concerns that anyone is wearing a wire? >> this is a 30-year-old kid if you look at all the reporting from this. people who have been trying to bring up his own credentials, trying to build a portfolio for himself. kept getting shot down. attorney general, then senator sessions apparently shot this down and says according to "the new york times," i hope this is never discussed again. so they continue to go out there and do this. at the end of the day, the only collusion we have in the campaign with russians is the clintons. >> i just want to get your position clear in my mind. so your explanation is that he was too low level or that he was too incompetent? i don't understand your position? >> i wasn't in the meeting.

>> jeff sessions, who was neither incompetent nor low level. it got all the way to jeff sessions, this pitch, this idea that he'd use his russian contacts to put donald trump in the room -- >> i'm not sure if that's the way it was phrased. i wasn't in that meeting. no one is denying jeff sessions nixed a meeting. >> what i've read in public reporting is that his story has varied between setting up a meeting to establish better contacts, discussions of dirt, discussions of all of these things. we don't know what was pitched in the meeting. i've had contact with somebody who would like to set up a meeting with the -- with mr. putin and mr. trump going forward. i don't know -- it was immediately killed. i was not in that -- >> you don't know if it was -- >> no, what was reported by "the new york times" was that jeff sessions said -- >> you just said he was low level. would you agree that jeff sessions was pretty high level.

>> jeff sessions was high level. >> and george was pretty low level. so you don't know who it was bounced off before it got to jeff sessions, do you? >> we're talking about that meeting. >> you just asserted the first time it was bounced off it -- >> i don't know that. he could have pitched it to jared -- >> it was immediately shut down according to what the -- >> you don't know if it was the first time it was suggested -- >> neerths do you. >> we know bob mueller knows. >> we don't know what bob mueller knows. so far there has been no evidence of any kind of collusion between the trump campaign -- >> how do you know? >> has there been any evidence? >> bob mueller is -- >> why are you so eager to -- do you trust bob mueller. >> i'm not going to make a judgment on bob mueller. former fbi director. >> former fbi director after 9/11. yes or no. do you trust bob mueller? >> i would trust the process to play out the way it's meant to be played out. >> why can't you say you trust a

former fbi director who worked for democrats and republicans who kept this country safe -- >> you can't say you trust bob mueller? >> you can't say that? i hope they're paying you a lot of money. what is sustainable that a trump surrogate can't say they trust bob mueller. >> i think one of the -- >> this isn't the white house's current position. sarah huckabee sanders took to the podium yesterday and said -- >> there are other folks putting bugs in the president's ear. if this goes forward it goes forward in a way the president doesn't like, he already is upset with sessions, upset reportedly with jared kushner for the way this has progressed and the fact it has progress at all. we know that from our reporting. if this goes further, you know, it's possible that he will regret that terminating mueller. there are people that he's listening to who enable those impulses from the outside who say things like, i don't know if i'd listen to those lawyers if i were you. you hear what bannon is trying to do. when bannon talks to this

president. and it is -- it seems very much aimed at undermining his trust in the people that he has around him. the president has a lot of things going on in his mind. but i think mark can come and say whatever he wants and i'll take him at his word. but when you talk about going back to these meetings that happen during the campaign, my reporting is that this was a campaign that was basically a cultive personality operation. donald trump is in the white house now because of it. but a lot of these things, and sarah sanders admitted as much when she says they met one time. the foreign policy team rolled out when they says george papadopoulos, the kid with model u.n. on his resume. sarah sanders says they just did this whole foreign policy team for the instagram to make it look -- they put the picture. the picture we have out there is from instagram. same with sam clovis being in a position of authority above papadopoulos to sign off on

these things. these were people put in those positions because of their loyalty to the president not because of expertise or experience deal with these thing and likely without much knowledge of the conversations they were having in that moment and seemingly very little consideration that they would now be a matter of huge importance to perhaps -- >> that someone would have plead guilty to lying to the fbi. steve schmidt, let me read you something. we've worked on a few campaigns. here's the description in "the new york times" about what eli is talking about. the donald trump foreign policy team. ongoing trump migraine. his initial foreign policy team. mr. trump surprise march to the nomination left the party's establish want openly questioning whether he had the foreign policy experience and was too much of a loose cannon to be entrusted with the presidency. his solution was to cobble together a list of men who were almost immediately written off as a collection of fringe thinkers and has-beens and unknowns in washington foreign policy circles. some from that group have created far deeper problems for

mr. trump providing federal and congressional investigators with evidence of suspicious interactions with russian officials and their emissaries. steve? >> well, i want to address something very directly that mark said that there's no evidence of collusion. of course, that's not true. the chairman of the cam. a now under indictment, paul manafort. >> for nothing that -- >> donald trump and -- >> don't interrupt me. i'm talking. >> donald trump junior met at the invitation of russian nationals in an e-mail that was titled, you know, essentially from the russian government to get dirt on the democratic nominee for president of the united states. >> and hillary clinton -- >> hang on. hang on, mark. we'll let you respond. >> in every instance, from the vice president to the attorney general to the press secretary, the press secretaries, every single person around this administration when asked a direct question about contacts with the russians on this issue

has lied about it. 100% of the time and the lie has unraveled. with regard to the uranium deal in the dossier, i think that what you are engaged and involved in here is an absolute premeditated misinformation campaign designed to mislead the american people. this whole charge of collusion with regard to the democrats is complete and total fantasy land nonsense talk that is propagated on fox news, propagated in the conservative media and you're not being honest about it in the representations that you're making. >> steve, here are the facts that we know that started with "the washington post." i think you've probably heard of them. not fox news. it started with the clinton campaign paying hundreds of thousands of dollars if not millions of dollars to fusion gps which went out and hired a foreign operative who brian fallon, hillary clinton's former spokesperson says, i would have gone out and helped him if i could have.

they went on and then worked with kremlin-tied connections to provide misinformation about then candidate, later president-elect of the united states and to make matters worse, the hillary clinton campaign through their operatives peddled this trash. >> mark, i will -- mark, hey, hey, i will call some friends at box and try to get you a booking but that's not true. we appreciate that you come here and speak on behalf of donald trump but why can't you say that we don't know -- we know there was attempted collusion. if it's not a crime, why your defense sniff. >> you are accusing me of -- >> you are about to jump through the camera and punch steve -- >> i get called -- >> why can't you say it's possible collusion took place? it's probably going to end up that they tried and were incompetent colluders. if it's not a crime, why is it such a raw nerve for you. >> here's the double standard. so you talk about these issues

here which you say amount to collusion, but the hillary clinton campaign and the democratic national committee go out and pay for this and peddle it and that's just -- >> you don't know that we haven't covered that story. >> it's considered opposition research and brushed away. >> i'll send an e-mail to friends at fox and you can peddle your propaganda there. are you aware of anybody, as anybody who covers the white house is, that is concern of what papadopoulos has shared since he plead guilty in july. >> no, i'm not aware of anybody. >> you're not aware of anybody that's concerned what george papadopoulos said? >> no. >> and you're telling the truth? i've heard four people that are worried this is a climb the ladder process. these are people that spoke privately and off the record. >> right now we have indictments that have nothing to do with the president of the united states and the white house. >> i'm not asking about the president. i am asking about your former colleagues. the six staffers he wants to investigate about a lie that was told, dictated by the president

from aboard air force one. have you not talked to anybody on -- >> that's a completely different question. >> i asked you if anybody was worried about their own legal liability. yes or no. i'm determining whether or not you're going to come on this show and tell the truth or lie. >> i'm insure that everyone that is taking the appropriate necessary steps they have to legally. that is not something we talk about in the white house. >> you don't know if any of your former friends are worried? some of your former colleagues are worried. we have to sneak in a break. don't go anywhere. we'll be right back. by taking money from foreign governments and threatening 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? i'm tom steyer, and like you, i'm a citizen who knows it's up to us to do something. it's why i'm funding this effort to raise our voices together and demand that elected officials take a stand on impeachment. a republican congress once impeached a president for far less. yet today people in congress and his own administration know

that this president is a clear and present danger who's mentally unstable and armed with nuclear weapons. and they do nothing. join us and tell your member of congress that they have a moral responsibility to stop doing what's political and start doing what's right. our country depends on it. when this guy got a flat tire in the middle of the night, so he got home safe. yeah, my dad says our insurance doesn't have that. what?! you can leave worry behind when liberty stands with you™. liberty mutual insurance. i wanted to know where i did my ancestrydna. the most shocking result was that i'm 26% native american. i had no idea. it's opened up a whole new world for me. ♪

paul manafort leaving court earlier this afternoon. manafort and rick gates will be under home confinement and gps monitoring until motions are heard by a judge next week. the judge citing concerns about flight risk. ken dilanian is still with us. our panel is still here. every last one of them. ken, does this tell you anything about the case mueller has against them? >> yes, nicolle. it's a very strong case. in the documents presented to

the judge today, mueller's office made the point a federal judge had already ruled that mueller could cite what's called the crime fraud exception to drag manafort and gates' former lawyer to testify about representations about foreign lobbying. there's other strong evidence throughout this indictment. look. the scope and breadth of this indictment surprise even those of us following this. it's called a paper case meaning it can be proven with just the paper documents. the bank accounts were the bank accounts. the lobbying was the lobbying. manafort took exception with some of the documents and argued their clients are not a flight risk but the judge today expressed some concern that they are a flight risk and so it remains to be seen whether they'll get home confinement or whether they'll be allowed free pending trial. >> gene, there was a report that paul manafort applied for ten

passports, traveled under three passports. even people that sort of travel for a living said that ten passport applications is -- >> i never heard of ten. i was a foreign correspondent for the post for six years and it was not uncommon for a correspondent who covered the middle east, for example, to have two passports because if you were going to some arab countries you didn't want the israel stamp in it and that sort of thing. >> that explains two or three, but not -- >> that would explain two. i never heard of more than two. the other reason is that if one passport is at some embassy getting a visa stamp and that's delayed you have a passport you can still travel. there's not the hassle. but that doesn't -- that doesn't get me past two at the most it gets you to three but that's -- i never heard of anyone with three. >> can you talk about, you know, my understanding is that in the president's mind, the relief of

the manafort and gates indictments were, as mark suggested, they didn't have anything to do with donald trump. now granted he had done all these things before donald trump named him the chairman of his campaign and he was obviously engaged in all of this allegedly criminal activity over the course of their decades long personal relationship but can you speak to sort of the difference between the third rail with papadopoulos. obviously it did insight deep passions among the people around our table. >> the manafort and gates indictment comes out about 80 minutes before the papadopoulos document was unsealed. it was clear mueller was saying -- >> he wants them to sigh with relief. here are the two indictments and let's see how they did react. they did react. they said it has nothing to do with russia. and then put out a fact pattern supported by e-mails and documentation about everything that george papadopoulos did over the course of the campaign. and what it does it lays out a compelling timeline because the timeline in the end of this will

be one of the most important things. some critical moments in the campaign. john podesta is hacked in march. that's the same time papadopoulos joins the foreign policy team. they have -- >> and pitches a meeting between putin and trump that sessions knocks down. >> on march 31st. and so over the course of april is also when paul manafort reaches out to his contact in the ukraine and says, how can we use this to make us whole? that is very interesting when looking at all of the other things happening. in june of 2016 is when don junior gets the e-mail. the russian government is going into this effort to help your father's campaign. yes, i love it. especially later in the summer. later in the summer is when the e-mails first dump out, and we now know that that was russia hacking the dnc and john podesta and releasing the e-mails via wikileaks. the other date that comes to mind is january 27th. january 27th is the day sally

yates goes to the white house, tells don mcgahn again, michael flynn is compromised. that's also the day papadopoulos first spoke to the fbi. that's also the night that comey goes to the white house and has the loyalty dinner. so that when you put everything on the timeline, the fact pattern that is presented in the papadopoulos document is the road map for collusion. >> steve schmidt, she just did a superb job laying out the timeline. we know bob mueller's timeline looks like the homeland version of that with little pieces of facts with witnesses, with other people that may have already -- the guilty plea was months ago. it was simply unsealed on monday. can you speak to bob muellerary our former colleague. i understand him to be widely respected in and out of law enforcement. i am surprised to hear mark not able to acknowledge that he's a deeply respected person of integrity. can you speak to where you understand this investigation to be and sort of where it goes from here and the stakes for

this white house? >> well, let's start with bob mueller. his unquestioned integrity. a marine combat officer. decorated for valor. has served his country honorably. his integrity has never been questioned until this slime campaign was launched by the trump white house. number one. number two, what we know about the investigation is that there's no leaks out of the mueller operation. we don't know, for example, is general flynn a cooperating witness? is general flynn going to be indicted? we don't know, and we won't know what bob mueller knows until bob mueller wants us all to know it. what's for sure about this investigation is that the russian government, a foreign adversary, launched and executed the most successful misinformation campaign in the history of the united states aimed directly at the american people to divide us. to undermine faith in our democratic institutions, to interfere in the election process. and before this is done, we will

know everything that happened. >> thank you for spending some time with us. we're going to let you go. we've kept you about 20 minutes longer than you had available for us. we appreciate your time. on the other side of the break, mark responds. give up, skeletor! you're finished! curse you, he-man, you interfering imbecile! give us one good reason we shouldn't vanquish you to another dimension! ok, guys, hear me out.

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charges with mr. manafort and others are a different scope. i can't speak with any knowledge on that with the exception i think there's a distinction there. >> do you think the white house is doing a good job on russia? we've got a new poll out today that says that more than half the country thinks that donald trump -- "the washington post" poll, more than half -- 58% approve of bob mueller's investigation and 49% of the american public believe it's likely that trump himself committed a crime. >> i heard earlier with a reporter on that that the number was not -- was a combined number in terms of -- >> i'll throw you ten points. let me shave ten points. say they are ten points wrong. the margin of error. do you think they're doing a good job if 48% of the public approves of the investigation and 49% thinks the president committed a crime? >> the white house is leaning in to say we're cooperating. >> you refuse to say that bob mueller is a man of integrity.

that's not the white house's posture. >> i can say personally that i believe bob mueller is a person of integrity. i can't speak on behalf of the president on that. what i think is they are providing all the documents. the reason why all of those george papadopoulos e-mails are out there is because the campaign turned them over to the special counsel. they are fully cooperating and right now on all questions that result from russia, they are kicking it over to the special counsel or to the lawyers to handle it while they're focused on tax reform, immigration reform and the things that really matter to the american people. >> thank you for spending some time with us. it's spirited. i'm greek, though. this is just getting started. we'll sneak in one more break. it's time for "your business" of the week. danny cohen of seattle, washington, has taken a 100-year-old family tradition and turned it on its head. he's re-imagined the neighborhood corner store for the millennial generation. in just two years, her local

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i don't think anybody knows it was russia that broke into the dnc. she's saying russia, russia, russia, but i don't -- maybe it was. it could be russia but it could be also be china, could be lots of other people. it also could be somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds. okay? >> every 400-pound person sitting on their bed deserves an apology. don't laugh, gene. you ruined my concentration. prosecutors considering bringing charges in dnc hacking case. six officials part of an ongoing investigation. eli? >> it could have been a

400-pound person, six of them in russia. it is stunning. you have to step back -- we've seen donald trump be reflexively defensive even in the face of immense -- >> why not a fat guy? >> it's entertaining in the moment with him. step back from this and behavior we're analyzing. he's commander in chief, our president now. and to continue to show indifference and reject not just findings of the intelligence community, which we've known for months believed russia was involved in hacking this information, but now when he does it, he will be rejecting the findings of his own justice department, because prosecutors, we now know, thanks to my colleagues reporting at "the journal," we know that the justice department is preparing to potentially charge -- six russian folks. >> right. >> for carrying this out. it's not a joke or unknowable thing like he likes to say.

we don't really know. we'll never know. no. the justice department has been trying to nail this down and they have. >> from the "wall street journal report"ing, the justice identified more than six members of the russian government involved in hacking information that pertains to the 2016 presidential election. do you think that the president, anyone has tried to explain to him that the justice department that is prosecuting six individuals in the russian government involved in hacking the democratic national committee's computers, that those six work for him? >> i don't 234i think so. he looks at it as undermining his election and his win and the idea he won without the help of the russians is something he's very insecure about and no, i don't think he's made the connection and also the person who fired the fbi director, a little had him over prior to that and asked for his loyalty. i don't think he understand the distwininction between the two

entities. >> and friday night, i was with some legal scholars worrying about the obliteration of norms, worry about lurching towards autocracy. the thing they worry about most, though -- they feel the executive -- the presidency will be okay with a different person in the oval office, but they do worry about the deterioration of the government. >> yes. no, it's -- it's being made to rot in places, and let's hope it's not irreparable, but i think that's something seriously to worry about. not just in justice, in the epa, in other agencies that you really want to be functional. i mean, you know, we've been around government and everyone likes to dump on washington and this and that, but, you know, there are agencies are the government that do necessary and important work and do it very well, and very, you know, high

quality -- high quality people, as donald trump would say. and to the extent that these agencies get hollowed were, we're all the worst for it. >> and calmed the laughing stalk in a joke. everyone here is praying that that justice department prosecutes the hell out of the terrorists who killed six of our citizens. >> exactly. and if you've -- i've covered countries where justice departments are their equivalence were not functional. were corrupt, were not competent and you don't want to live there. >> all right. we're going to sneak in one more break but be right back. he's a nascar champion who's faced thousands of drivers. she's a world-class swimmer who's stared down the best in her sport. but for both of them, the most challenging opponent was... pe blood clots in my lung. it was really scary. a dvt in my leg. i had to learn all i could to help protect myself. my doctor and i choose xarelto® xarelto®... to help keep me protected.

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we are nothing without our guests. my deep thanks to eli, mark, and the others. nime nicolle wallace. senator elizabeth warren joins chuck todd right now. hi, chuck. >> if it's thursday, the tax plan cometh. tonight -- the new republican tax plan. >> it's going to be very special. >> but who wins and who loses? why this bill has a long way to go before it becomes law. >> this is the beginning of the end of this horrible tax code in america. >> we'll talk to one of the authors of the bill, congressman kevin brady. plus, the democrats respond. >> this is a shell game, a ponzi scheme that corporate america