they would ever get involved in politics have done just that. they've gone to their first protest march or made their first call to a member of congress, or maybe even taken the leap and put their names on a ballot for the first time. it can be such a rush to look around a room full of people ready to fight alongside you. to feel that energy, to imagine that better things are possible. but you, too, will experience setbacks and defeats and disappointments. there will be days when you will wonder whether it's worth it. what i want you to know is that even today, even on the worst

day of my political life, i feel like it's all been worth it. politics, paul wellstone told us, is about the improvement of people's lives. i know that the work i've been able to do has improved people's lives. i would do it all over again in a heartbeat. for a decade now, every time i would get tired or discouraged or frustrated, i would think about the people i was doing this for and it would get me back up on my feet. i know the same will be true for everyone who decides to pursue a politics that is about improving people's lives. and i hope you know that i will be fighting alongside you every step of the way.

with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. >> and good day. i am andrea mitchell in washington. minnesota senator al franken just yielding the floor and yielding to overwhelming pressure from his fellow democrats after announcing he is resigning from the senate effective the end of this year, three weeks from now. joining me now is msnbc's gator haake on capitol hill, tom brokaw, jeremy peters, political reporter of the "new york times" and michael steele, former senior adviser to jeb bush, and house speaker and editor of the national post. first, garrett, to you. an emotional speech he came to reluctanting, admittedly after hours and hours with his wife frannie overnight having been told by chuck schumer there was no way out.

over 30 of his colleagues were asking him to resign, led by the new york senator, the women in a coordinated effort yesterday morning. garrett? >> reporter: that's right. he's a professional communicator, andrea. he spent his life in front of a camera, and al franken couldn't hide how devastating this moment was for him, to have to give up this seat. as you said, from the face of so much pressure from his own colleagues. when he opened his speech, the first thing he said was when this conversation we're having nationally now about sexual harrassment and about how men behave began, he was excited to be part of it, and then horrified when the conversation became about him. so this was, in one sense, a deeply personal speech, a goodbye, an apology to his own staff and to the people in minnesota who believed in him, but it was also very much a political speech. he said, in the middle of it, it's not without irony that he is stepping down in the face of

these allegations while the president of the united states stands with very serious allegations against him of a similar nature, as does a republican candidate for a senate seat in alabama who may very well win. so you see this angst and this incredible depression of senator franken having to take this step at the behest of his colleagues, but also trying to push this very important conversation we're having forward even as he hangs it up and leaves the floor for the last time. at least the last time speak. he will be staying until the end of the year, as he said. >> garrett, i want to play that moment in an emotional, very carefully crafted speech by senator franken. he was a writer and an entertainer before he was a politician, having first been elected by a recount that took eight months. the margin was 312 votes that ended up being decided by the state supreme court. but this is what he said in

reference to both the president and roy moore. >> today i am announcing that in the coming weeks, i will be resigning as a member of the united states senate. i, of all people, am aware that there is some irony in the fact that i am leaving while a man who has bragged on tape about his history of sexual assault sits in the oval office, and a man who has previously preyed on young girls campaigns for the senate with the full support of his party. but this decision is not about me. it's about the people of minnesota. >> and kasie hunt now joining us as well from capitol hill. kasie, you were there with

senator gillenbrand and the rest of the senators in a coordinated way. they said enough is enough. you heard al franken saying he was sensitive to women speaking out and he didn't want to refute their allegation, but he vigorously rejected the allegations of this eighth accuser who was the one who was a step too far for his women colleagues. and he also said he had not done any of these misconduct accusations. they did not take place while he was in the senate. he also said he was not really acknowledging misbehavior of which he was accused. >> reporter: he did say all of those things, andrea. he said he felt that his initial statements that he says were aimed at showing respect for the women who had come forward may have created a mistaken impression, that this is how he had acted. so that is a little bit of a different tact than he took earlier on, and you're right, when that seventh accuser came

out yesterday and it was released in that politico story, he adamantly denied it. he said these allegations are absolutely not true. now, one of the allegations in that report was that she had said he told her it was his right as an entertainer as he tried to kiss her against her will when she didn't want him to. and there are echoes, of course, of that in what president trump has said on that "access hollywood" tape that some people have pointed out to me privately, and senator franken very forcefully said that is not something that i would say, and of course franken himself made reference on the floor today to the president, president trump, now in the oval office despite the allegations leveled against him, and to roy moore, the republican senate candidate in alabama who is accused of sexual misconduct with teenage girls. so clearly there are some layers of politics to this. but i do think -- you could tell watching senator franken this was a deeply difficult,

emotional day for him. and as i know you have been doing reporting on this as well, as i have been talking to people speaking with franken, this was a very difficult decision for him to come to with his family. he walked into the capitol today hand in hand with his wife frannie. they've been together quite a long time through all of franken's ups and downs as a comedian. many of those he had to apologize for or try to re-explain when he did try to enter public life as a senator. i think there had been a sense in the last year that he had successfully made the transition from comic who had said and made inappropriate jokes in the past to a politician, and for many years here on the hill, he would not engage with national reporters, he didn't crack jokes in public, and that had started to change. he put out a new book, he had started to be funny in public again, and then a couple of weeks ago, this came out and clearly has ended his career

here in the united states senate. now, many of his staff members were on the floor for that speech. he acknowledged them in his speech, and he said he would be leaving, of course, at the end of the year. andrea? >> thanks to you, ka sirks arkk you've been covering this throughout. tom brokaw joins us. i remember you and i were in the coverage, you were at the senate after a long night of hearings, and you asked me, what have we learned? i thought it was a turning point. it wasn't. i was wrong then, i was wrong years later after bob packwood was forced to quit under threats of expulsion, bob packwood, the republican from oregon. is this the change that many men and women have been waiting for? >> it's hard to say, andrea, but you and i have been through atr.

clearly they were not. i was struck by this one because there was quite a rush, if you will, by having the senator resign so they didn't have the burden of trying to defend him going forward. but at the same time there were people who were making accusations against him who did not come forward and identify themselves, and we don't even know what their objections were. it does not mean that al franken wasn't guilty of abusing his place, especially with the first woman who came forward with whom he was on a ufo tour. and there was that very damning picture that we saw. but i do think that the senate and the institutions of governance and those of us in this business as well have to agree to a kind of caudification of what is objectionable and how people should be held responsible for it. when you stop and think about it, as he raised with the senator moore case, the senator candidate moore case in alabama,

the president of the united states, those are entirely different and unavoided kinds of charges of abuse. but in al franken's case, there was still enough murkiness that a lot of people couldn't make up their mind. in fact, he was defended on fox news last night for his behavior. i think the public deserves to have it kacaudified, have it shaped up so we know the standard to which they're being judged. finally, the people who were sent to washington were left out of this decision. the voters in minnesota really had no role in it. he was driven out by members of his own party and by his own conscience. there are a lot of stuff we still need to work on here, in my judgment, in our political culture. we are in a transformation, not just in this case, but the kinds of people we elect to office, the man we have in the oval office right now, and an era the likes of which i have not seen

before, and neither have you, and few people have been around longer than the two of us, andrea. >> and tom, there does seem to be a rush to judgment in this case, but immediately people jump on you and say any kind of harassment is too much to handle, it is a power relationship that's been abused. but as you point out, anonymous accusations. it was newt gingrich who was defending him on fox news, which is pretty remarkable given how he had to step down as speaker in the light of the clinton impeachment. at what point do you say this is okay, and what is the intent? this has become a really difficult workplace, and beyond the workplace question for everyone. >> this is not third-degree everyone. >> this is not third-degree murder, this is not a stick-up of some kind in which you can clearly identify a crime.

this is a subjective judgment about inappropriate behavior on the part of the first woman who came forward, and it took her a while to do that, and he also acknowledged that. at the same time, i do think that the country, and especially the people who sent him to washington, deserve to have a clearer idea of what is objectionable. and if you will, a system in which people who feel violated can respond very quickly to the violation and bring it to the attention of appropriate people. and that may mean that congress will have to change its own rules and its procedures. he did not get a chance to go before the senate ethics committee because he thought it would detract from his role as a senator. but there has got to be a way you would get the same kind of hearing in the united states congress as you would if you were a dope peddlar in some kind in the united states. there are more consequences dealing with that than there are

of this. >> lucas is here. he was discussed as a 2020 candidate. his best-selling book had come out. he was in the prime of his political life after a very cautious start making that transition, in this case, he was saying from entertainer to political figure. he evoked paul wellstone an icon, the late minnesota senator who, of course, died in that horrific airplane crash. what are the guidelines here going forward? it's very clear to me this would not have happened absent the alabama race, that what happened here is that the democrats wanted to, after nancy pelosi's performance on "meet the press," wanted to get rid of conyers, wanted to force franken out because they wanted to draw a bright line between the way they handle these issues and what is, you know, apparently happening with the endorsement by the president now of roy moore and the support of the republican

national committee. >> so there are so many things to unpack here, and tom made a lot of really important points. we are in the middle of this revolution, and in every revolution there are moments of excess. and i have some real serious concerns about whether this is one of them here. i have very little doubt that for the democratic party, this is the right outcome. as you say, it puts what-aboutism off the table for the democrats. they had representative conyers, senator franken, they dealt with them. so for democrats, in terms of short-term political benefit, this is a good outcome. for senator franken, for justice, and in some way maybe for women, i'm not so confident that this is a good outcome. because tom raised the question of what -- he doesn't have as

much of a process as a dope peddlar. we have senator menendez who is in an indictment, is in a criminal trial, who may be retried. he's going to get the benefit of a senator ethics process which senator franken isn't getting. i feel like we're tip-toeing through this minefield, trying to sort out what the proper response is. we say zero tolerance. does that mean every act deserves the death penalty which is what we saw for senator franken here, which is the political death penalty. >> republicans, the tribalism involved, jeff flake was the only republican on the floor for this speech. the democratic women, who were his judges and jury, they were all out in force, and of course amy klobuchar, the only democratic senate woman who did not call for him to resign, his colleague from minnesota, who is clearly so close to him and is really going through this with

him and heartbroken. but what about congressman ferenthal, what about roy moore, the fact that the president will be campaigning in florida if not going to alabama himself in the closing days, and the fact that mitch mcconnell has completely backed away from his harsh criticism of roy moore. >> i think the overriding lesson here is that while we see everything through a partisan lens in washington, d.c., respect for women should not be a partisan issue and attempts for either party to use it as political gain. i thought the saving grace of his speech was that moore has the full support of his party. he does not. he has the support of his party and the rnc. he does not have support of a great majority of republicans across the country. >> republicans seem less

concerned about this issue than democrats. jeremy? >> i think that's absolutely right, because there are enough republicans out there who are willing to turn a blind eye and be indifferent about these allegations as long as it means that they can cling to political power. that's what happened with donald trump, you see it happening now with roy moore in alabama. i think that one thing that, from the democratic point of view, we really need to keep in mind, and you touched on this earlier, andrea, is they are clearing the decks. they want to make sure that nobody who has any type of allegation against them of sexually inappropriate behavior is going to muddy their message against the republicans next year, which is that they are the party of donald trump and roy moore, two sexual predators. but where does this end? we don't know and they don't know that, because there could be many more democrats who have serious allegations against them that just haven't come out yet. >> let's talk about the the process for a moment. jump in here, all of you. as we understand it, the

lieutenant governor, is going to be appointed governor by the governor mike dayton who is a democrat. what you're seeing now, of course, is the crowd of photographers around al franken, smiling with his wife frannie, and surrounded by aides and also, of course, a crush of reporters as he leaves. and he will be involved and will be able to vote and he'll be back on the floor because he will be voting. but jeremy, once she's appointed, we understand, maybe as a caretaker and there will be a special election in 2018. >> that's exactly right. now, let's not forget, donald trump only lost minnesota by a few thousand votes. it was very close. so is this going to be a toss-up race? i think it's too early to say democrats clearly have an advantage, especially in a year, 2018. but it's too unpredictable of a

time to know what happens there. >> it does, at least potentially, create another opportunity for republicans to pick up a senate seat next year. >> ruth? >> democrats already have a kind of daunting landscape ahead of them in the senate. need a lot of money if they're going to make that landscape a little more favorable to them. look at senator franken's first race, and you mentioned, andrea, how it took eight months to get that race resolved. this is a purple state, and keeping that seat in democratic hands even in a midterm election that might go against republicans generally is in no way a lock. >> lou ann tweeden, who is abc radio in l.a. has been on a radio show saying she never called for his resignation, that she accepted his apology, she didn't want him to resign. he apologized a bunch of times. she accepted that. he made an honest mistake. people are human, people make mistakes. i thought, if i came forward at

a time now when people are honestly having this conversation of sexual harrassment in the workplace of people holding power over people it would be a helpful thing, but she's clearly not celebrating his decision. >> it shows the velocity of this moment where allegations come forward, in particular, the major problem, one of the major problems that senator franken had was that photo. nobody could look at that photo and not flinch and not understand whether -- you know, whether there was a shadow or not, it didn't matter. it was totally inappropriate. and from the moment democrats saw it, they knew that was going to be ammunition for republicans to try to equalize the problem. >> and tom, as we assess the political and the human and all the rest of it, not to lose sight of the fact that every industry, including ours, has been affected. obviously matt lauer and another high-level firing, separation in our own family, charlie rose,

people we all know and worked alongside of in other networks. and the "new york times," the expose of harvey weinstein's incredible behavior, the way that he went after his accusers for decades as outlined in yesterday's "new york times" story, which was page after page of citation from some of these victims, is just beyond belief. things that i never knew were going on. >> andrea, the cases that you cited, those were indisputable violations and they went on for a period of time. they shocked so many of us who knew all three of those people that you just referred to. what's happened now in the political arena, even with mr. moore, judge moore, roy moore in alabama denying he had anything to do with it, when al franken said today that many of the charges against him were not

true, though he did refer to that violation that lucas marcus just referred to, that alone was enough to get rid of him. but my issue is we've got to decide as an institution of governing and an institution of justice and as a culture about where are the lines about all this? because it's not going away. i have believed for a long time that as we move into the 21st century, it will be the century of women. women are going to make more progress in this century than they have in a long, long history of this place on earth. but what we need to do, as it moves along, is not to have more of a fractured, if you will, a fractured universe between men and women and what's acceptable and what's not. not easy to arrive at these conclusions. because so many of them are subjective. it's in the minds of the violator or the recipient or even the people who are on the left and the right. but i do think we need to have a healthier, well-defined

dialogue, if you will, and i'm not quite sure how we launch into it. >> well, i think the first steps already are being taken on the heel in that there are legislations to avoid some of the agreements thavt have been made, the confidentiality agreements, and the process where the victims were victimized in congress where they had to go through a waiting period and couldn't complain. that is all going to be a thing of the past. if it doesn't take three years for the senate ethics committee to slowly plod its way toward a conclusion, that would also be a very good thing. the senate and house ethics committee. kasie, before we leave the conversation, i want to give you a chance to sum up what you're feeling and seeing and learning around you up there. >> reporter: well, andrea, i think, you know, you did a very nice job of capturing, i think, the push and pull for the democratic women who, as you pointed out, were the judge and jury here for senator franken.

and they were the ones on the floor today as he made this speech saying that he was going to step down. i think there were a lot of conflicted feelings among some of those women about a person that they have come to know who is, quite frankly, very well liked here. that is not true of every member of the u.s. senate, but senator franken has been somebody who has been very well liked by his colleagues and peers in both parties, quite frankly. and i think, you know, you saw that conflict play out on the floor, but i think at the end of the day, this was a private, ongoing conversation among the women of the senate as there were these allegations coming out. as kirsten gillenbrand put it yesterday, it was difficult to have the conversations of the nuances of harassment and assault, and if you had that, you were having the wrong conversation. there is a very clear line drawn in the sand here, and that's led

us to where we are today and the end of franken's somewhat difficult career in the senate. let's not forget when he came here in 2009 was the recount decision that was made. he was the 60th senator, and democrats went on to pass the affordable care act, president obama's landmark achievement. because they had that 60th vote in the senate, he won by 312 votes. he spent the first years of his career with his head down, not being funny in public, not talking to reporters. that had started to change in the last year or so with his new book. but now, of course, he is swept up into what really is, as tom sa said, a very dramatic sea change which is being felt here in the marble halls of the capitol as intensely as it is everywhere else in america. >> it should not go without noting that he played a very

important role in the senate with jeffers. thank you to my panel. >> andrea, i want to say another thing about you. no other reporter in washington has been through a greater evolution in that city and in how women are treated than uyou have been. you were a lonely, brilliant voice early on, and i know it wasn't easy for you. but at the same time you kept plowing ahead and doing your job in a way that no one could any way denigrate the work that you were doing. but i also know that it wasn't easy for you and people have to be appreciative now of, despite all the issues that i raised here today, that we have gone to a different era. it should be welcomed and everybody should be involved in the discussion about how we use this as an example to go on from here. and i include everybody in that. me, the people that work at nbc and the people that work across this great business we're

involved in. it is an opportunity for the country to kind of come together at a time when more than any other time in my lifetime people are saying, are we going to be okay? it's up to us, quite honestly. andrea. >> thank you for that. and all of our women colleagues make everything worthwhile. thank you very much, tom brokaw. senator franken, as you know, has just announced he will resign at the end of this year. more on this breaking news straight ahead. stay with us. for your heart...

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>> joining me now, congressman debra wasserman schultz of the republican party. has the party lost something important here by losing senator franken to democratic criticism? you may end up losing the seat and, arguably, what he did was not as severe as what roy moore did, he's now denying some of the allegations against him, in fact. >> the bottom line is partisanship has nothing to do with this. our party believes that we should have the utmost respect for women, that women should be treated equitably, fairly and justly, and when you don't do that, when you abuse the public trust, when you abuse the trust of the people who you work with or work side by side with, then,

you know, you forfeit that trust and the right to be able to hold the position of trust to which you've been elected. and that's what i think happened here. >> president trump has made it clear he's supporting roy moore. he was reluctant at first but has since come on board. take a look at this. >> i think he's going to do very well. we don't want to have a liberal democrat in alabama, believe me. we want strong borders, we want to stop crime, we want to have the things we represent, and we certainly don't want to have a liberal democrat that's controlled by nancy pelosi and controlled by chuck schumer. we don't want to have that for alabama. >> is that a brand, the liberal democrats, that the president campaigned against hillary clinton on successfully, is that a brand that is worse than having, you know,en accused s x

sexual molester elected to the senate, roy moore? >> it is important that he is a child molester and the republican party has embraced roy moore. if roy moore comes to the united states senate, and i sincerely hope he doesn't, i suspect he would swiftly be put through an ethics committee process and the senate would vote to not elect him. the republican party and every candidate in the united states of america will have to own that, and we will make sure we do. the women in america will judge those candidates on how they believe it's appropriate to treat women and whether the republican party should believe there are consequences when people -- women republicans abuse their power. by the way, blake feinhold, one

of my republican colleagues, who had a million-dollar settlement on him should resign immediately. >> this is the anniversary of your diagnosis. ten years. congratulations. that's a very important mark. you didn't even discuss it. you were under treatment, surgery, chemo, the whole range of treatment, and you didn't discuss it for two years. you just plowed ahead. why? >> you know, i had young children then. they were four and nearly nine years old, and cancer is a very scary thing for little kids, so i wanted to protect them from the fear that their mother having cancer would be. but any cancer patient knows that you lose control of almost everything in your life, and i wanted to be able to make decisions about what i was capable of doing and not have very well-meaning people try to make those decisions for me knowing i had cancer. i knew i would use my platform

to help other women once i had dealt with it and survived and thrived. >> and how do you feel now? >> you know, it's exhilerating. we've passed the early act legislation to help educate young women to diagnose the gene to detect breast cancer, knowing when they feel something different so they can catch breast cancer early the way i did. >> debra wasserman schultz, thank you for being here. it's a club none of us ever wanted to join. coming up, a clip of donald trump jr. to the intel committee to avoid questions asked about his father. really? you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc.

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donald trump jr. refused to tell the house intel committee during eight hours yesterday that he and his father discussed during a controversial meeting with russians in the campaign, citing lawyer-client privilege, even though neither he or his father are lawyers. joining me is gerald bash, who is a lawyer, at the cia and department of defense, and i believe once the general counsel

to the house of intelligence. do i have that right? >> you have that right. as a lawyer there is a technical legal term for don jr.'s position. it's called hutzpah. he is not a lawyer, his father is not a lawyer. the fact that a lawyer may have been at trump tower on the island of manhattan does not mean he can withhold information from congress. first of all, in most cases, and when i was chief counsel of the congressional committee overseeing intelligence activities, we did not deny attorne -- allow attorney-client privilege, meaning they had to answer the questions. what if he went to trump tower and said, we're here to help your father's campaign, and the payoff has to be about the nitzki act and sanctions, and i think the public needs to know the answer to that very critical question. >> the whole thing about sanctions keeps coming up. according to elijah cummings, a

whistle blower came to cummings at the oversight committee, and at the request of mueller, cummings withheld that until mueller gave him the green light to release this. this whistle blower said that mike flynn, on the day of inauguration, and i think we have the picture, 11 minutes into the president's speech, and pu if you can see mike flynn there in the stands in the isolated picture in the box, he's looking down at his phone. 11 minutes into the speech, instead of celebrating the moment, being in the moment, listening to the speech, looking at the crowd, what was he doing? according to this whistle blower's account to elijah cummings, he was texting a former business partner, saying, now you can go ahead with this russian deal for nuclear construction, nuclear power construction in the middle east. obviously a very lucrative deals for his former business associates if not for himself, and saying they would be ripping

up the russian sanctions, the ukraine sanctions and/or the election sanctions. >> now, if mike flynn were involved in promoting this deal overseas to build nuclear power plants with russian backing, if he were doing that in private, in his private life, and then he goes into government and works on it, that's an offense. he has to recuse himself -- >> what kind of offense would that be, arguablarguably? >> you have to look at whether or not it would violate certain ethics restrictions and certain conflict of interest restrictions, but normally you recuse yourself when you're in government for things you were working on 10 minutes prior in the private sector. so the fact the president was just sworn in, you saw the photo, and potentially he's involving himself in providing information to his former business associates saying, we're good to go, the cash register is going to start to ring, that's a huge problem for him. >> it could also explain why he acknowledges lying to the fbi about the russian connection and sanctions and the conversations with ambassador kislyak.

because now surely mueller knows already in their questioning all of what he discussed with the russian ambassador. >> yeah, and i think it's significant, andrea, that last friday, a week ago tomorrow, mike flynn pled guilty to a single count of lying, but there were a number of other issues including failure to register as a foreign agent, including failure to engage in legal lobbying, but now mike flynn is testifying, in effect, against people higher up in the chain of command. >> finally, christopher wray testifying to the judiciary committee today and saying the fbi is not in tatters, as the president tweeted. >> it was an important moment for the bureau to push back in a respectful manner against the president of the united states' unjustifiable claim that the bureau is in tatters. he is standing up for his people and his work force and the country. the president should do that as well, andrea.

coming up, international outrage. violent clashes in the west bank following the president's announcement of israel being the capital of jerusalem. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc.

we have breaking news from the west bank where palestinians are clashing with israeli soldiers following president trump's decision to recognize

israel as jerusalem's capital. ayman is on the west bank. ayman, how is it going? >> reporter: andrea, the situation has certainly calmed down a little bit following what was a very tense day with clashes taking place in several palestinian cities across the west bank. you saw clashes here on the outskirts of romalia. we've gotten a number of casualties saying the number stands at 106 palestinians that were injured in those clashes. protests started across various cities and towns. it was a day of anger among the palestinian population, part of three days of protests. there was a general strike where stores and shops shut down, and a mounting pressure on the palestinians as to what are they going to do next. there was anger on the street. increasingly enough, increased pressure on the palestinian authority to end its diplomatic

negotiations with israel and the united states, and there has been growing criticism to the united states, including from the palestinian prime minister, that said the u.s. was no longer seen as an impartial broker, an honest broker in the the palestinian chief negotiator sigh yet erekat who himself said yesterday's decision was a death blow to the two-state solution and a one-state solution is all that remains for palestinians to ensure their rights. so mounting pressure on the palestinian authority with growing tension here on the street as well. andrea. >> ayman mohyeldin in ramallah, thank you. across the globe, universal condemning president trump's decision. some world leaders calling the move irresponsible and dangerous. joining me is ambassador ron dermer, welcome. >> good to be with you. >> good to have you here. the u.s. is isolated, roundly criticized for, according to the argument, of many of our allies

and the arab world, giving up something, the reward, if you will, of recognition, which has been withheld by previous presidents, given that up in return for nothing. no promise from israel to permit a palestinian capital in east jerusalem. no promise to stop building settlements in palestinian areas. what is israel willing to do in negotiations if there were any? >> we'd like to get into negotiations. we'll figure out how to figure out an historic compromise. doesn't have to do with the peace process. that's been going on, the oslo process, since 1993. why did another president, anyone of those earlier presidents, why didn't they do that? think it was long overdue. jerusalem is our capital. it's been our capital for 70 years. it's been the eternal capital of the skroouish people for 3,000 years. president trump made a courageous decision. he's not undermined the

prospects of peace. what's interesting to me, when you see a lot of the discussion around this issue, six years a the obama administration took a position on one of the final status issues when they said that the palestinian state will be '67. that's putting your thumb on a scale and taking a position against the position of israel at the time, but now on jerusalem, this administration has not taken a position. the palestinians have their position. we have our position that it should be united under israeli sovereignty. but both of those positions have one thing in common, that jerusalem will remain the capital of israel. so the president has not in anyway undermined peace negotiation. >> let me read you part of what tom friedman wrote in his column. he wrote, in nearly 30 years of covering u.s. foreign policy, i've never seen a president give up so much to so many for so little starting with china and israel. in both the middle kingdom and the land of israel, christmas came early this year. the chinese and the jews are

whispering to their kids, there really is a santa claus. is israel now willing to say yes, there can be a palestinian capital in east jerusalem, the holy sits will be protected, if we continue, where the knesset is, the supreme court, everything else. are they willing to acknowledge it could be future of a palestinian state? >> that's not israel's position. but let me explain what donald trump -- >> but why not? let me just get an answer to why, why wow you not concede that east jerusalem, where mostly populated by palestinians, could not be the capital. where could they have the capital of the state? >> that is not the position of the government of israel. frankly, it's not the position of the people of israel. obviously the palestinians will come to negotiations with all of their views. we'll have to negotiate. >> why should they negotiate if they can never get any land, any territory for even a capital? >> first of all, understand that

17 years ago, the palestinians were offered a proposal with east jerusalem as the capital. >> let's take the -- >> wait -- >> what's the situation on the ground right now? >> with the palestinian state almost the entire west bank, that was rejected, and they turned to violence and over 1,000 people were killed. that happened 17 years ago. the thing that president trump got is he enhanced his credibility dramatically throughout the region. >> with whom? >> both with israel and with arab leaders. >> that is not what they're telling me. >> i have no doubt that arab leaders are just looking at an american president who said that he was going to do something and then he did it in the face of pressure. now, that's going to be very important for any president who wants to keep peace -- >> let me just quote you the king of saudi arabia in a statement e-mailed to me overnight to reiterate that there were no secret deals. that the king was clear in his conversation with the president that this was a dangerous and unjustifiable move. >> i believe that that reflects

the position, the public position of the saudi king. that's what he told. i'm sure he doesn't like this move. but that's a separate question, whether he thinks that the president of the united states is a strong leader who will keep his word. in the middle east, that's the most important currency. those arab leaders now know they're dealing with an american president who will keep his word even in the face of international opposition. that's going to be very important to them. and the message he sent to the public and israel is that this is a president who strongly stands with israel and has done something that no previous presidents, 12 previous presidents refused to do. i think that helps him advance peace. >> we're going to have to leave it there. can you come back on a day when we don't have the senate -- >> maybe when we finally get the peace agreement. it's an historic day yesterday. >> thank you very much. >> thank you. >> always a pleasure. coming up, extreme threat near hurricane force winds today spreading the southern california wildfires out of control. you're watching andrea mitchell

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and we're following breaking news out of southern california, raging wildfires, four fast-moving blazes now burning out of control with no end in sight. powerful near hurricane force winds fanning those flames. threatening more homes and prompting new evacuations. the largest is the thomas fire in ventura county, which has already scorched about 90,000 acres carving a path of

destruction stretching more than 10 miles. nearly 30,000 people are under evacuation orders. more than 260 schools have been closed in the l.a. area. that does it for us. a lot more coming up with chris jansing up next right here on msnbc. chris. >> hi there, andrea, good afternoon all. i am chris jansing at msnbc headquarters in new york. i'll resign. al franken announces he'll step down after a flood of democrats call on him to quit as the number of sexual harassment accusations against him grows. day of rage. president trump's recognition of jerusalem as israel's capital sparks israeli and palestinian clashes today. will we see more violence? and something to hide? the president' son don jr. refuses to answer a congressional committee's questions about a phone conversation he had with his dad about a meeting with a russian lawyer. is don jr.'s claim of attorney/client privilege valid? but we start with the fallout from