well, that's it for us. i'm david gura. the news continues right now with yasmin vossoughian. >> thank you, david. let's get started, everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian. a blame game. president trump back on a tweetstorm this sunday, taking aim at the fbi while his personal lawyer says he's the one who drafted that controversial tweet suggesting trump knew flynn lied to the fbi at the time of his firing. and as robert mueller's investigation inches closer to trump's inner circle, new details raise new questions. was trump's transition team running a rogue foreign policy operation? and double standard. why are the rules different when it comes to sexual harassment, powerful men, and politics? here we go, everybody. >> i would just say this to the president, there's an ongoing criminal investigation, comey may be part of it.

you tweeting a comment regarding ongoing criminal investigations at your own peril. i'd be careful, if i were you, mr. president. >> now the president somehow saying he didn't -- he fired flynn because he knew flynn was lying to pence? well, if he knew that then, why didn't he act on it earlier? >> what we're beginning to see is the putting together of a case of obstruction of justice. >> the president should have no comment whatsoever on either of these investigations. >> it's very clear that flynn was not the only person during the transition who was aware that they were going to be talking policy with russian officials. >> you don't lie unless you have something to hide, and obviously, michael flynn has admitted now that he lied. >> all right, a lot happening today. we begin with president trump's latest twitter storm this morning, a series of tweets attacking the fbi and its former director, jim comey, writing "i never asked comey to stop investigating flynn. just more fake news covering

another comey lie!" democratic senator mark warner, the vice chair of the senate intelligence committee, weighing in earlier today. take a listen to this. >> -- director comey. i think he was very credible in his testimony and his private meetings with us. >> and now trump appears to be pushing back against scrutiny of his explosive tweet yesterday, claiming he fired mike flynn for lying to mike pence and the fbi. the tweet implies trump knew flynn had lied to investigators, not just the vice president, as he had earlier indicated, and raises more questions about his firing of fbi director jim comey. now his attorney, john dowd, taking credit himself, telling nbc news he drafted the tweet in a "sloppy" manner. joining me, cnbc editor at large john harwood, pete baker, correspondent with "the new york times," nbc political analyst and author of "obama: the call of history," and amanda turkel, washington bureau chief for "the huffington post." welcome to all of you this sunday evening.

very much appreciate you joining me. john, i want to start with you. john dowd taking the blame for that tweet. most lawyers don't necessarily comment on ongoing investigations, but dowd obviously weighing in. do you buy it? do you buy that he drafted this trump tweet? >> this is an extraordinary claim by john dowd for two reasons. one, this was a tweet that went out under president trump's twitter handle, and it appeared to have some of the cadence that we're familiar with from him. secondly, this tweet, which appears to be damning from a point of view of acknowledging potential obstruction of justice, would be extraordinary if a lawyer for the president was the author of that tweet. >> right. >> so, not only do we have president trump putting himself in a bad position through his twitter handle, but then we have his attorney claiming that he did it, which is even more

unfoth yu unfathomable, so on the bottom-line question, do you buy it, no, i don't really buy it but you know, stranger things have happened, i suppose. >> but also the explanation being unfathomable as you said. that was really the question i was asking. why would the lawyer of the president be drafting a tweet that the president is really supposed to be putting out there? i think a lot of people were asking that question. peter, on top of this tweet, trump firing off a series of tweets critical of the fbi as well, including a mention of the report from your paper that mueller replaced an experience agent because the agent wrote anti-trump texts that he wrote this morning, "after years of comey with the phony and dishonest clinton investigation and more running the fbi, its reputation is in tatters, worst in history." but then he goes on to say, "fear not, we will bring it back to greatness." former attorney general eric holder firing back on twitter, saying "the fbi's rep shasion is not in tatters. in fact, it is composed of the same dedicated men and women who have always worked there and who do a great apolitical job.

you'll find integrity and honesty at fbi headquarters and not at 1600 pennsylvania avenue right now." what effect, peter, does think on an organization like the fbi when the president attacks them? >> well, it is rather striking. we've seen this now for several months where he has basically called into question the very law enforcement agencies that have traditionally had, you know, strong credible across the board in this country in the most recent decades. you know, the fbi had, of course, early in the last century been used and abused by politicians, but basically since watergate, it had built a reputation of being apolitical, as eric holder said in that tweet, an agency that was not playing politics on behalf of or against a president. and now we've got president trump basically calling that essential reputation into question. it's surprising in part because the fbi, if you had to put them under polygraphs, more of them would probably be republican than democrat, but they are, in fact, professionals. and i think that this is going to have, you know, a real

demoralizing effect on at least some of those in the agency who are going to read this and say, well, why are they attacking us? >> but peter, with trump's point here, could that report about that fired fbi agent writing anti-trump texts muddy the waters when it comes to the integrity of the mueller investigation? >> it certainly gives ammunition to the president to say this is a partisan investigation, full of partisan people. earlier in the summer, he went after some of the people mueller had hired because they had given campaign contributions to hillary clinton or things like that. he mostly has laid off mueller's operation since then because his lawyers, ty cobb in the white house in particular, have said don't attack robert mueller, don't attack his operation because we can work with him and we can convince him that you're innocent. and if you attack him, you cause real premdz. so most of these tweets have been about the fbi or about hillary clinton. this one did sort of venture across that line. his lawyers had tried to get him to abide by, which is don't attack robert mueller's operation. >> but as you say, they do give the trump administration

ammunition here, and a lot of ammunition, at that. obviously, also sort of getting into the base, trump's base there and giving them ammunition as well. >> certainly. >> amanda, i want to talk about kushner for a second. flynn's plea deal putting kushner in the crosshairs of the mueller probe, of course -- what did he know when? was he part of orchestrating talks with kislyak? kushner spoke earlier today at the forum for middle east peace. he is not address any direct questions about that matter, but he was asked about media pressure and here's what he had to say. let's take a listen. >> i don't let it bother me. i mean, there are people who are good at dealing with the media. my focus is on the objectives and we'll stay focused on the different missions. and you know, we're here to serve the country and we'll just keep going. and you know, what i am confident is that when our service is done, we'll look back and we won't say, oh, there was a bad story on this, there was a bad story on that. we'll look back and say did we spend every minute as we could to push as hard as we could on the issues we cared about to make as big of an impact as

possible. >> to wrap this up, if flynn was acting at the behest of kushner, what does that mean big picturewise? >> it's not good for jared kushner. it seems -- we've seen that it seems like, you know, michael flynn has more information to share and he might have more information about people who are even closer to trump than he was, and so now a lot of the focus is on jared kushner. was he directing flynn to do these things, such as lobby the russian ambassador and have these discussions that he probably shouldn't have? and that will obviously hit home very close to trump because he's his son-in-law. and so, i think that is why, you know, kushner can say that he's not nervous about this, he's ignoring the media attention, but i think that's probably not true, that people in the white house are getting very, very nervous about this, including jared and ivanka. >> john harwood, peter baker and amanda turkel, thank you for joining me. coming up, what the intelligence community is saying about everything we learned this week. and medical school. it's no wonder he said, "you don't have to pick me up."

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what flynn lied about is not a crime. i don't think it's wrong for a transition person to talk to a foreign government as far as change in policy. i don't think the logan act is worth the paper it's written on. so i'm not worried about communications with the russians. >> what we do know is there were conversations during the transition period. during the transition period, there's still only one president, and that was president obama, so those conversations should not have been taking place, but that does not confirm collusion.

>> should they or shouldn't they? two republican senators this morning with opposing views on whether mike flynn and possibly other members of the trump team should have been communicating with russian officials at all during the transition period. it is the key issue, flynn was caught lying to fbi officials about. and when it comes to bob mueller's investigation, the bigger question now is what does flynn know about that period and possibly before the election that makes him such a valuable asset to the russia investigation? let's bring in daniel hoffman, former moscow station chief for the cia and jamil jaffar, director of the law program at george mason university and former adviser to senator bob corker. welcome to you both this sunday afternoon. should flynn had been talking with russian officials at all during the transition period? >> look, i think it's a matter of some debate. clearly as a matter of policy, probably not a great idea because you've got one president. at the same time, logan act, there's been one indictment ever under the logan act in 1903, and that was never prosecuted. by the way, these are members of

the presidential transition team. they have official government accounts and official government positions, so not clear they don't have the authority of the united states to speak. whether they should or not is another matter. it's not necessarily a legal problem. >> can you explain what the logan act is? >> it prohibits private citizens from engaging with foreign governments in matters of controversy. >> and the question is does that apply to the transition team, obviously, versus a private citizen. daniel, "the new york times" obtaining e-mails between members of trump's transition team in which k.t. mcfarland and others in the team discuss how to negotiate with russia around the obama sanctions. is there, daniel, you think, a smoking gun there? >> i don't see any evidence of collusion, if that's what you mean, but i would make two important points, first that general flynn, based on his long experience in the intelligence community, should have been well aware that the russian with whom he was in contact, ambassador kislyak, was a target himself

for collection. and so, general flynn should have had every expectation that any discussion he had with the ambassador about whether israeli settlements or the sanctions, would have come to the attention of the obama administration. and the second point i would make is that the decision to png 35 russian diplomats, implode two russian facilities, would impact the trump administration, and so there probably was some good reason for the trump campaign, for the president-elect, for the national security adviser designate to have some outreach to the russians similar to the way secretary kissinger did when he led the transition team for the nixon administration in '68, but what secretary kissinger did was -- >> but daniel, if they were advised by the obama administration to stay out of it until they actually took office -- >> well, that's the key. absolutely, there should have been coordination. i was going to say, secretary kissinger contacted the direct you of the fbi before he did that. he said he would like to meet with the soviet ambassador and

the director of the fbi gave him con kurnsicurrence to do so, an think that coordination was lacking. >> and all reporting is pointing to the fact that there was not coordination between the trump transition team and the obama administration. what about "the new york times" reports saying russians were using the nra and christian and gun groups? is that the m.i.a. for the russians? >> it certainly is. the russians have a lot of soft power. odd to say, but their weapons industry is one element. so is the russian orthodox church. there are lots of american citizens who enjoy shooting weapons and would be excited about shooting a drag nof sniper rifle and others who have an affinity with the russian church. and russian intelligence has used that soft power to make contact with individuals and develop relationships, yes. >> daniel, why do you think that flynn was so attractive to the russians, it seems, and who else do you think was attractive to them? >> well, i think that general flynn saw some potential for

work together, for partnership together, counterterrorism work in particular, even though i think that's extraordinarily challenging. i think he saw that as something we might be able to do together when he was director of dia. and also -- >> go ahead. >> it's probably hard to speculate on others, but i would say that, look, successive administrations, the bush administration, the obama administration, have tried to reset our relationship with the russians, thus far without any success. >> i want to get back to sort of the legal side of things. at this point, mueller has conducted hours of interviews, as we know and as we're learning, with trump officials. the "washington post" has a lengthy report on all this, on "the secretive nerve center of his investigation." in the past two months, they say mueller and his disputes have received private debriefs from two dozen current and former trump advisers, each of whom has made the trek to the special counsel's secure office suite. what sort of jez, jamil, are being asked of these individuals in these interviews and what do

you think mueller might no know that's not become public yet? >> good question. it's hard to know, because what mueller's there to investigate is potential collusion between the campaign and the russians. as pointed out, though, what's oftentimes worse than the crime is the cover-up, and this attempt to not tell the truth when you know it's likely the russian ambassador's under collection, it's a very odd thing to have happened. now they've got flynn dead rights, he's pled, and so now he's talking about everything he knows, and he was fairly close in to the entire campaign, transyirks and in the white house. so, we don't know what exactly is being asked, but what's clearly the case is that now they have people high up that have answers to some of those questions, so we'll find out down the road. >> who do you think is next? >> boy, that is a tough one. i think that you've -- >> and also, i want you to tag this on to it. if they're asking flynn for a plea deal here, what do you think they're looking for? what kind of big fish do they actually have to fry above flynn? because that's pretty close. >> look, as you know when you make a plea deal, you have to

make a proffer about the things you know about and things you're willing to talk about. and so, clearly, he has something they want to know about. now, maybe it has to do with the senior official he talked to in mar-a-lago or the senior official he talked to about the israeli sitlements, maybe jared kushner. we'll find out further down the road. it could be anybody, but what we've found out about mueller, he's got a seasoned team of prosecutors, they'll try to work up the chain and get more information. at the end of the day, though, a lot of these special counsel investigations what you see is indictments that don't tie to the underlying investigation, but extraneous ones. we're not clear on that yet. >> daniel, i want you to hone in on this for us. there's a difference between trying to muscle your way into the trump administration, the trump transition team, by the russians, versus actual outright collusion, and the muscling your way into a transition team or an administration has happened before by the russians. this is not the first time.

>> right, and i think in this case, one of the things i think the russians certainly tried to do was to create the impression of some conspiracy, the impression of some collaboration between the campaign and the russian government. they did that with the june 2016 meeting at trump tower, all that just to soil our democratic process. and i think right now in the kremlin, vladimir putin and his team are probably popping over some vodka bottles because this strategy has probably succeeded well beyond their wildest imagination. >> quickly, because we don't have any time left, are transition teams and administrations warned about this? are they warned about countries like russia trying to infiltrate them? >> well, i believe that the transition team would have received intelligence briefings from our intelligence community and counterintelligence, and the threat from nefarious state actors like the russians and chinese and others would have been part of the briefing, yes. >> it's whorpt they choose to listen. thank you both. appreciate it. still ahead, elected

politicians accused of misconduct. should voters have a say in how they're punished? plus, new numbers reveal what alabama republicans really think of the roy moore allegations. and as we've reported, michael flynn's guilty plea for lying to the fbi could have wide-reaching implications. if you want to know more about this three-star lieutenant general considered to be one of the best security officers of his generation and is now known for his role in an international scandal, tune in to "headliners: michael flynn" tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern.

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i think with sexual harassment, i think there's something that definitely needs to be talked about. i think right now it's good that we're having the conversation. i think if you kind of really pay attention to it, you'll notice there's a lot of people who have power who think they can do whatever they want, you know, whether it be with staff, different women in the workplace, younger folks. and it seems like it's kind of a superiority thing, but i think it's definitely something that needs to be talked about right now. >> i love your take. now is the time to be having this conversation now, for sure. nine days until alabama's special election, and a new poll finds 71% of alabama republicans say the allegations against roy

moore are just not true, and the majority believe democrats in the media are fueling these allegations. the same poll shows moore taking a slight lead over democratic challenger doug jones, 49% to jones' 43%. meanwhile, all this is happening, more sexual harassment allegations surfacing this week. here at nbc, longtime "today" show affecter matt lauer fired. meanwhile, al franken returned to capitol hill this week. the fate of michigan congressman conyers undecided, and now blake farenthold. it was revealed that he used taxpayer money to settle a sexual harassment claim made by a former aide. and a new nbc news/"wall street journal" poll finds seven in ten americans believe sexual harassment happens in almost all or most workplaces. joining me is the former director of progressive media for the clinton campaign, carrie sheffield, founder of bold global media and catina cost graves, president and ceo of the national women's law center.

wow, a lot to talk about ladies, and i appreciate you joining me this afternoon. >> thanks for having me. >> thanks. >> talk about the alabama poll. is that shocking to you? >> it's interesting. i think it shouldn't be shocking in the sense that in our country we've basically separated virtue or character from the office that one is seeking, and that's something that has been a bipartisan, sadly, a bipartisan approach, where we didn't care about the character of a person. and i think the character -- we need to start talking about that again. so i'm glad we're having this conversation to say this is a post-partisan issue, character matters. how you treat women, it matters, absolutely. and to the discrepancy, looking at the private sector versus public sector, we actually see this like with the teachers unions as well. when a teacher's been accused of sexual assault, they will still stay on the payroll because of the public sector unions who's basically shielding that teacher. so, this isn't something that's new and i think it's really great that we're talking about it now. >> but you have alabama republicans saying they think this is made up. these accusers are making up their stories, these women that we have heard from firsthand that seem very believable.

>> yeah. >> on all accounts. >> right. >> it's shocking. >> it is shocking. and i think that, you know, i do agree that it's a bipartisan issue. the great joy reid said to me many months ago, republican voters -- >> i think she would love to be called that. we all think that. >> republican voters tend to not care about the character of the republican that they're voting for. >> huh. >> so, the argument that you shouldn't vote for that particular republican because they're a bad person is not waning argument. we saw that in the election with donald trump. there were plenty of people who after the "access hollywood" tape were perfectly fine voting for him, despite what he said. so, i think with the case of roy moore, this is mirroring similar to what happened after the "access hollywood" tape. you saw a lot of republicans distance themselves and then eventually gone on in support -- >> he's been in the president's defense. >> now you see republicans circling back. mitch mcconnell's back-tracking. polling is showing that they're supporting roy moore, despite these allegations, which are very credible. >> all right, fatima, carrie brings up the point of the

public sector versus the private sector. matt lauer getting fired, charlie rose, harvey weinstein. yet the president and party members still have their jobs. is there a private versus public issue here? >> i think the double standard is just the standard. the longtime standard has been that abusers, if they're really, really powerful, they don't get held to account, and that was true whether you're talking about politics or the entertainment industry or the military or the tech sector, and you could name industry after industry where that has been the case. what is different now over what has only been a couple of months is that the sunshine that has been provided largely through the media has made it a bit easier for people to come out and actually watch in realtime how employers are going to handle this conduct. we're talking about really egregious incidents, and employers have an obligation under the law to address it, to prevent it, and to make sure

that they take care of this problem in a going-forward way. >> so, as we know, the president is also sort of continuing to deal with allegations of sexual misconduct as well. one of the reasons many people were saying he sort of said let's let the voters decide in alabama when it comes to roy moore. trump accuser summer zirvos is suing him now because he called her and others liars. >> i feel this little grab. it's, like, you know, you're feeling like a little cheek, like a little cheek lift almost, and i stand up really tall. i'm shocked in a moment, and i look, and i turn around and i look at him and he doesn't look at me, he doesn't want to make eye contact with me. >> he then walked up to me and reached his right arm and grabbed my right arm. then his hand touched the right inside of my breast. >> somehow or another, the arm rest in the seat disappeared,

and it was a real shock when all of a sudden his hands were all over me. but it's when he started putting his hand up my skirt, and that was it. >> why hasn't the president been held responsible yet? >> sure. well, i absolutely want him to be held responsible, and i was one of many conservatives who chose not to vote for him in part because of these very character questions which are important, and clearly, the voters in america said that, you know, people are flawed and they make terrible decisions and do terrible things, like bill clinton, and yet, we're still going to look at the bigger picture here at a public policy level and -- >> and many democrats came out and said if what happened to bill clinton and monica lewinsky today happened, there would have been much different results than what actually took place. >> right, and i think that bill clinton, it wasn't just monica as well. it was many, many, many women over a period of decades of harassment and sexual allegations and big payouts to

paula jones. so, it was more than that. so, this question of character is something that we have been grappling with as a country i think for the last 20, 30 years now, and we're finally, i think, hilting this watershed moment where we can say, you know what, character should matter, and let's talk about this. and you know, there is also the question of legal versus immoral. so, looking at roy moore. like, this has past the statute of limitations. i personally believe that the republican party of alabama should get a new candidate. they should say, we should get someone with a character that is unquestionable at this point. i personally believe that but at the same time, i know that a lot of people disagree on the left and the right when it comes to their candidate. >> i feel like you're wanting to react to what carrie just said. >> i want to focus on the now. i think it's an important conversation about how we reacted to president clinton -- >> but it is important to look at the past and how we reacted to things and how it shapes how we're reacting to things now, but i will say -- >> and normalized it. >> but i will say that i've had these conversations with my friends and said did this happen to you? was there an experience like

this in the office? and why didn't i react? why didn't i talk about it? because it was so normalized at the time. and had we reacted, i think we would be somewhere different now. >> i think feminists were reacting and some criticized bill clinton at the time. and i think we've actually transformed the conversation and mainstreamed the idea that this is unacceptable in the workplace. you saw that with what happened to juanita hill and clarence thomas, who still today sits on the supreme court, even though she was telling the truth and they were women who were also there, set to testify to say he did the same to them. so, i think that this is a bipartisan issue. it's not really a moment in which we should just throw out names of politicians, because i think it's a more universal experience. so, what do we do now in 2017? we make institutional changes to the review process in companies to ensure that women have a place to report and have accountability when they are harassed. >> and we talk about the culture that allows all this to take place. >> absolutely. >> because that is really the

big thing driving all this behavior. i'm sorry, fat miles an hoima, t to you at the end. thank you all. calls to the british parliament to cancel a state visit. we go beyond the divide next with a member of parliament. but first, your take on the issue. >> i am concerned that his public position weakens our stand. i do. i don't know that i would go so far as to say that one retweeting of a video threatens us directly. i just think it's the overall tone of the sloppiness of what's happening on his end that does that. a lot of water. medications seem to be the number one cause for dry mouth. dry mouth can cause increased cavities, bad breath, oral irritation. i like to recommend biotene. biotene has a full array of products that replenishes the moisture in your mouth.

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by sharing it, he is either a racist, incompetent, or unthinking, or all three. >> not just offensive to british people of muslim heritage, it is offensive to all decent british people. >> shooting of tweets by an extremist, offensive, and racist organization is not fitting of someone holding such high office and must be condemned unequivocally. >> donald trump is not actively sewing seeds of hatred in our country. >> the president was stupid in what he did. >> hear hear. >> wow, some really strong words there. members of the british parliament criticizing president trump and his retweets of the deputy leader of the self-proclaimed islamic hate group britain first. the tweets were first released by jayda fransen, and the

president's retweets did spark a strong rebuke from prime minister theresa may. >> the fact that we work together does not mean that we're afraid to say when we think the united states have got it wrong and be very clear with them, and i'm very clear that retweeting from britain first was the wrong thing to do. [ applause ] >> so, president trump responded at the prime minister tweeting, "don't focus on me, focus on the destructive radical islamic terrorism that is taking place within the uk. we are doing just fine." so, joining me, paul flynn is a british labor party politician and member of the parliament. paul, thanks so much for joining me on this sunday. let's begin with a piece from "the sunday times" that reports the president will visit the uk in february. the white house, though, has not confirmed that to nbc so far. you tweeted, president "trump should be arrested for inciting racial hatred" if he sets foot on uk soil.

an online petition to cancel the trump state visit to the uk back in february of 2017 received a lot of support as well. so obviously, you do not want the president visiting your country. >> i know we certainly don't. we don't want someone here who is going to incite racial and religious hatred. i mean, i've just come back from bangladesh, and i visited the rohingya camps there, and it's appalling somebody convinced the myanmar soldiers that these rohingya were less than human, and it's the greatest threat we have to peace in our countries is people believe that on racial grounds or religious grounds some people are worthless, and that's what trump has done, not just in your country, but he's put onto the world wide web pictures and propaganda that's unverified, and he's designed to make people hate muslims. i mean, that's a terrible thing

to do. and for the first time in years, i think every party in the house of commons, we're agreed, we're unanimous, that we have to condemn this. we're used to his behavior, extraordinary behavior as it is, but if he does step foot in this country, he will have the biggest demonstrate against him i believe of any political visitor. i will guarantee there will be a million people on the streets to protest their anger at the president who behaves like a child. he not only threatens his own country, he threatens us as well. we only have one world and today people are saying we're nearer to nuclear war than we've ever been. i mean -- >> is there pressure on your prime minister to rescind the invitation to the president? >> oh, very strong pressure. she's certainly hanging on to it. she made a terrible mistake. she gave him an invitation that no previous american president has ever had. that's to give him a state

visit, a red carpet visit in the first month of his office. many of your presidents, distinguished presidents, have never been invited here for a state visit. but she did that because of the panic about the fact that we got brexit and we're losing our friends in europe, so she was groveling before the president in order to try a new friend there, and it's rebounded on her because each story we have about the president, his rejection of global warming, his way that he has, dangerously framed every frozen situation in the world that he's addressed, including israel now by suggesting that he intervened by moving your embassy to jerusalem. this is a provocative act. why is he doing this? why is he causing trouble throughout the world? and we are very worried that he will threaten us as much as he threatens your country. >> mr. foote, i have 20 seconds

left, but london mayor sadiq khan asking the president to apologize for the retweets. would that help? >> i think he should apologize, but he's not that sort of man. he doesn't apologize for anything. he has to win every battle. you've got a child as president. you've got an apprentice president. for goodness sake, impeach him. >> wow. certainly some strong words there. paul flynn for us. thank you. i want to go beyond the headlines, everybody. brock turner, a big story happening now. the former stanford university student found guilty in 2016 sexually assaulting an unconscious woman on campus is appealing his conviction. they argue character witnesses were excluded from testifying. his six-year jail sentence plus three years probation sparked an outcry. and could it be a nod to 2020? vice president joe biden has launched the biden forum, an online space to talk about strengthening the middle class, increasing opportunity and expanding opportunity for all.

and mystery solved. the website tech crunch has found the man who deactivated the president's twitter account. two reporters tracked down the 20-something to a small town in germany where he told them on his last day at twitter, someone reported trump's account for bad behavior, and as a final throwaway gesture, he put the wheels in motion to deactivate the president's account. wow. we'll be right back. it's what this country is made of. but right now, our bond is fraying. how do we get back to "us"? the y fills the gaps. and bridges our divides. donate to your local y today. because where there's a y, there's an us.

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i think there are some other nations that are looking at us around are laughing at us right now. but at the end of the day, you've got to realize, trump was an entertainer, you know, trump likes attention, so he's been that way. he's going to probably continue to be that way. and so, you know, he's just doing what he's always done. >> all right, so, one thing that we learned this week, president trump knows how to dominate a news cycle, but is that a good thing? while the senate has been working away on a tax reform bill, "the new york times" this week reported that trump is raising questions about the authenticity of the "access hollywood" tape that captured his voice on a hot mike, bragging about groping women. also being reported that trump is still not convinced barack obama's birth certificate is real and brings up things, the subject in privacy conversations with his aides. adding to an already chaotic

week, there is retweeting of a series of anti-muslim videos from a british fringe group and his pocahontas comment and his tweets on the flynn plea deal and the fbi. a lot that went on this past week. joining me are john harwood, chief washington correspondent, cnbc, john morrison, assistant professor of philosophy at barnard college and vandy lee, forensic psychiatrist at yale school of medicine, editor of "the dangerous case of donald trump: 21 psychiatrists and mental health experts assess a president." a fascinating read there. john morrison, i'm going to start with you. really, really busy week, as i just mentioned. "the new york times" reporting that trump is sort of questioning again where barack obama was born, former president barack obama was born. we know he was born in the united states. questioning the validity of the "access hollywood" tape. we know that was real. trump himself admitting that it was real and apologizing for it but now sort of back-stepping it, why? why sort of sew this doubt in

people when we know these things to be true? >> all of us have limited time and expertise. as a result, we have to rely on what other people tell us. just to give you an example. so, i believe that vaccines are safe. i've never read a journal article that demonstrates their to respond to all of the antivaccine arguments on the internet. nonetheless i believe because that's what my doctor tells me. like-wise, about nuclear power or tax policy. unfortunately, if you put your trust in the wrong person, you can end up in a pretty deep hole without necessarily being irrational, stupid or indifferent to the facts. >> because you just want to believe that person no matter what. >> it would be incredibly hard to climb out of that hole if you put your trust in the wrong relevant jesus leader, politician or news source because they have the power not to trust anyone else. >> is he testing people? >> he knows how people are going to respond. he's just taking advantage of people's willingness to trust in

him. >> were you said the president was showing what you call, quote a pattern of decompensation. increasing loss of touch with reality. that's some pretty strong words there. what did you mean by that? >> well, what we're seeing is what is happening is serious, it is dangerous and we must act soon. much of what we as mental health professionals predicted in the book seven months ago is coming true. what we are now saying is that things will get worse and get worse more rapidly. >> do you think it's fair to question the competency and the mental health of the sitting president of the united states? >> we wouldn't be speaking out if it were very serious in terms of the manifestations. >> what was the impetus to speak out? >> what we're seeing is someone

mentally falling apart. this is what we mean when someone is coming unglued or unhinged. with stress, they will be less able to tell apart what is real from what is unreal, become more bizarre and in the case of mr. trump, will likely become violent. he will have thoughts and reasoning that will be hard for us to follow because he is pulled more by his internal processes, what's going on in his head, be they fantasies, conspiracy theories or imaginary threats than what is going on in the real world. >> harwood, i want to get you on this. how do i make sense of what to take of the president's word and what sort of stream of consciousness, not only the american public but those

overseas who use the president's word to shape their own policy? they are seeing these tweets go out one after the other as we sort of been covering them in the media and they see them first hand as we do. >> we -- >> there's really no filter to that. >> that's right. what we've seen for a long time that words don't mean that much to the president from one moment to the other. what he says at any given moment may be completely at odds with what he says subsequently. and remember, there's a long history of this. this is somebody who used to call up reporters under an assumed name and talk about himself and tell the reporter from "people" magazine that a beautiful model had dumped mick jagger for donald trump. this stuff is very bizarre. the most bizarre of all the things we've been talking about is the president's claim that the voice on the "access hollywood" tape was not him

since as you noted yasmin he acknowledged, apologized for that and it's perfectly obvious that it's his voice. how you judge between somebody who is deliberately saying things that are untrue for the purpose of misleading followers versus has somehow persuaded himself that some of these things are true, that's very difficult for a layman like me who's not a doctor to tell, but what we do know is that the president in many circumstances pretty constantly says things that simply aren't true. >> is there this veering away from the truth also enabling others governments along with the u.s. government and people in the u.s. to treat the press unfairly especially with this whole idea of fake news? >> i suppose we will hear that term and we have heard that term, fake news, that the president has popularized, but i don't know.

i have a little bit more confidence in human nature and the fact that people want to know what's true and want to act on what's true. yes, there's -- i'm more confident that ultimately the truth wins out. >> we were once seen this country as upholding the freedom of press, of being the pinnacle of upholding the freedom of press -- >> i think the country does. what the president -- one of the great things about this country is, the government doesn't define the country. and so if the united states favors freedom of the press, that will be true whether or not any given president does. >> it's a fantastic point. thank you all for joining us. we'll be right back. more people shop online for the holidays than ever before. (clapping) and the united states postal service delivers more of those purchases to homes than anyone else in the country.

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welcome back. on wednesday, person of the year is going to be announced, the question is who is that going to be? the president claimed he denied the invitation to be that person. the magazine says that's not how it worked. i have a suggestion. maybe it should be women. the sea of pink across the mall to brave acuser after coming out from harvey weinstein to matt lauer. women are leading a sea of change and it is incredible to see. person or persons of the year should be women. if i'm wrong, at least i made my opinion clear. with that i'll hand it over to my colleague. >> there's a lot to watch out

for. a lot of excitement building up to that announcement. a lot to break down this hour as well. a presidential tweet storm for the ages. donald trump lashing out in many directions today but it's one tweet in particular that has the white house scrambling. jared kushner makes his first appearance since the michael flynn guilty plea. talking about middle east peace but do the revelations from the flynn plea deal doom kushner's effort to broker a deal in the middle east. i'll talk to former israeli prime minister live on the program and disbelief in alabama. a new poll of republicans in the controversial senate race show they're standing by their man but polls show a down to the wire finish in that state. all of that coming up. but we begin with the president's busy fingers this sunday. it started in the predawn hours once again accusing fire fbi director james comey of lyi