full half a percent today. $242 24,646. i'll see you tomorrow for velshi and ruhle. have a great weekend. "deadline white house" with nicolle wallace starts right now. >> hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york. donald trump is living in his own world. that's the assessment given to me today from one of the president's allies. and when it comes to the question of russia, we now know that one of the reasons he's in his own world is because there are serious questions about whether the stream of recent intel on russia even gets to him. but we do know that vladimir putin's flattering of donald trump gets to him because donald trump called him to thank him and talked about it today on the south lawn. >> how was your call with vladimir putin? >> it's great. he said very nice things about what i've done for this country in terms of the economy. >> donald trump today also

returning to one of his favorite topics, collusion. this against the backdrop of deep suspicion from democrats on the house intel committee who believe the republicans leading the committee are trying to end the investigation by year's end. >> let's put it this way. there is absolutely no collusion. that has been proven. when you look at the committees, whether it's the senate or house, everybody -- my worst enemies, they walk out and say there is no collusion, but we'll continue to look. they are spending millions and millions of dollars. there is absolutely no collusion. i didn't make a phone call to russia. i have nothing to do with russia. everybody knows it. that was a democrat hoax. it was an excuse for losing the election. and it should have never been this way where they spend all these millions of dollars. so now even the democrats admit there's no collusion. there is no collusion. that's it. and we've got to get back to running a country. >> funny how donald trump and vladimir putin have an easier

time staying on the same message than donald trump and his cabinet. joining us is democratic congressman adam schiff. thank you for being with us. i wanted to ask you today about whether or not anything in this really bombshell reporting from "the washington post" about how there are serious questions that the stream of recent intel on russia, whether or not it even gets to donald trump. and i worked in the white house after 9/11 where there were serious questions about what the president knew and when he knew it about bin laden and his plans for an attack on this country. i wonder if you think the same kind of accountability from donald trump's appointees at the heads of coates and pompeo and rogers, if you'd like to hear from all of them and know exactly what the president is briefed on when it comes to russia. >> we have had an opportunity to talk with some of the president's cabinet members, close advisers. and, to me, that report in "the

washington post" rings all too true. it is very consistent with the character of this president that he cannot be told things that don't reflect well on him. so we have a situation as "the post" reported where they have to structure his daily brief in a way that will not upset him like he's a child. on the other hand, putin is more than capable of playing to the same insecurities that prevent our own cabinet from informing him of what russia is doing. so putin flatters him and says, why would they suggest, mr. president, you didn't win this election legitimately? that we in russia helped when that isn't true. these are talking points that could have been written by the white house and are coming from vladimir putin. i will say this in terms of the president's repeated claims that everybody admits there's no collusion. sorry, mr. president, that is far from accurate. when your son took a meeting with russians with the promise of getting dirt on your

opponent, that is very good evidence of an intent to collude with russia. when your national security adviser met secretly or spoke secretly with the ambassador to try to conspire and undermine the bipartisan sanctions over their interference on your behalf, that's a form of collusion. hate to set the president straight but that's the reality. >> and just to what you're saying, i talked to someone today who made the same point but perhaps the reason he keeps repeating things like there's no collusion is, in addition to self-soot self-soothing, he's being spun by his own briefers. the career folks we now know have been told to put in writing intel on russia because it may upset him. do you think the political appointees at the intelligence agencies should make clear what they have told the president about russia? i have talked to folks who think we are more exposed than we should be for the 2018 and 2020 elections because there are not a lot of profiles in courage in

that room with the president. >> unfortunately, i think that's exactly right. the role of our intelligence representatives, the heads of these agencies, as well as his cabinet is to speak truth to power, not tell the president what he wants to hear but what the president needs to hear. and he needs to hear that russia interfered in our election, that russia continues to interfere in our affairs. that russia is violating some of the nuclear treaties with us. that russia is propping up a dictator in syria. that russia did invade its neighbor. that these sanctions are an important deterrent and you shouldn't undermine them. these are all things the president's advisers should be telling him. we can see from some of the public statements of some of these top people that, far from telling him these things in the way they should, they are seeking even publicly to basically toe the white house line. and you see this -- the election by the russians. if he's saying that publicly,

then it raises profound concern about whether he and others have the courage to tell the president the truth privately. >> cocaingressman, you know bet than i do the kinds of reforms made to the congressional intelligence committees in terms of oversight after 9/11. i believe term limits were eliminated so expertise could be built up and the idea was to have truly nonpartisan activities taking place in the house and senate intelligence communities. i understood that to be the case for a good many of the years of sort of post-9/11 counter terror policy. and when i worked in the white house under george w. bush, the committees were always briefed and often were in more agreement around those policies than the right and left debates that ensued in this country. is that the case right now when it comes to policy making, when it comes to sharing with the two committees equally with the

democrats and the republicans from cia director mike pompeo? >> well, you know, i'll say this. the 9/11 commission made a lot of recommendations about how to structure our government to better protect the country. the department of homeland security among the most significant results of that. the restructure of the intelligence communities was probably the leefast implemente. we do still have term limits and different people working on the appropriation of money for the intelligence agencies than those that are working on the authorization. and we still have term limits for committee members. so a lot of those reforms in fact, did not go into effect. at the same time, the committee has been among the least partisan in the house. and it is very distressing to see now so many of my colleagues on the committee adopt uncritically the talking points from the white house. you'll see many of our committee members say the same thing on the gop side that the president

is saying. and you see many of the republicans on the judiciary committee echo the attacks on bob mueller and the fbi coming out of the white house. and from my point of view, it's a terrible capitulation to the power of the president and very much at odds with the historical nonpartisan role of our committee but also the obligation to the country to put the country first. >> do you believe republicans on your committee have promised the white house that the investigation into potential collusion with russia will be done by the end of the year? >> it seems they are acting on the president and steve bannon's injunction. they need to shut us down, shut the committee down. now the republican senators were urged by the president to shut down the senate investigation, and republican senators pushed back. the republican house members on our committee, though, have not spoken out about whether the president reached out to the house committee to shut it down, but they are taking steps to shut us down. >> what kind of steps? they've scheduled two interviews in new york next week.

one with the president's personal assistant on days when you all have other responsibilities. is that the kind of -- is that can example of what you're talking about? >> it is an example. i can't go into the specific witnesses. but they are scheduling them out of state in a time we'll be voting on the tax bill. they are doing that so the members can't be present for these critical interviews. and these are witnesses we've been asking to come into the committee for months and have been willing to come in. but they're making this last effort to get in a few key people before the end of the year, and they are refusing to schedule any of the witnesses to come in in january. and there are literally dozens of witnesses that need to come before our committee who may never come before the committee if they shut this down. so i think they're on the verge of reneging on a commitment they made to the public to fall on the facts where they lead because these are rel vent and important to the russia investigation, and they are

signaling we may never hear from them. >> do you worry they're trying to shut down the investigation by year's end to lay the foundation for donald trump to fire bob mueller? >> that's exactly what i'm worried about. i think that the sort of bannon and his allies and the white house, are making the argument we can't shut down bannon while there's still congressional investigations going on. you need to shut those down first so we can put pressure on mueller. this is an effort to deprive the country of getting to the bottom of what the russians did and what help they might have had from the trump committee? >> is it a coincidence it would be the house intel committee if bannon and trump have their way, say their investigation is over, they didn't find anything, wash their hands of it, permit donald trump then to wave something in front of the american people as an excuse to fire bob mueller? do you think it's a quince den then that the cia director mike pompeo hails from the house and

we now know from "the washington post" that the president is not briefed on the latest intel on russia? does this feel fishy to you? >> well, you know, what seems fishy to me is there are unquestionably a lot more witnesses and a lot more work we need to do. it's not as if the witnesses we're bringing in have not born fruit. we found out an enormous amount among the trump campaign and russians and maybe from some of my gop colleagues we found out too much. look what's in the public record already? the russians approached the trump campaign as early as april and told them we have stolen clinton dnc e-mails that we're offering to you. they approached the president's son and son-in-law and campaign manager and said we've got dirt on hillary clinton. will you play ball? and the campaign says, we would love to. then the president trumpeting all of of the information the russians stole from the democratic party.

then when the russians are caught and punished for it, you have the president's national security adviser conspifrg with the russians to undermine the sanctions that were penalizing them for their very intervention on mr. trump's behalf. all this has come out with multiple indictments, some very recent guilty pleas, and the republicans want to shut it down in midstream. plainly, they're not interested, if they do so, in getting to the truth. >> it's not like they are shutting out something that isn't yielding fruit. excellent point as always. thank you for spending time with us. we appreciate it. >> let's bring in our friends and reporters. peter baker. also an msnbc analyst, former u.s. ambassador to russia, michael mcfall. our panel is here. steve schmidt, zerlina maxwell. john heilemann, nbc news and msnbc national affairs annual of the and evan mcmullin, chief policy director for the house of

representatives who previously ran for president as an independent candidate. steve schmidt, i wonder your thoughts about congressman schiff's responses. he's obviously a careful speaker, and there are things everyone on the intelligence committees of both parties can't say, but what i heard loud and clear is that he certainly believes, as many democrats and republicans believe, that the white house has called in a request to the house to shut down their investigation so that donald trump has something to wave around and lay the groundwork for firing bob mueller. >> i think adam schiff as the ranking member has proven himself over the course of this year to be smart, sober, serious, but when it comes to the integrity of this investigation from the majority side, from the republican side, it's corrupted. it's shattered. and what's clearly going on here is an abdication of duty, of responsibility to get to the bottom, not of an attack on the hillary clinton campaign but an attack on the united states of america. our sovereignty, our elections

process, there is not one thing that's been done to secure the elections process for 2018 looking ahead to 2020. i'm not naive about politics. but this isn't politicization. this is around the national security of the country. it's quite remarkable. >> what i find so stunning, it took me back reading this post article yesterday. you all talked about it yesterday, but it took me back to my time in the white house, where there was an investigation into how 9/11 could possibly happen. general hayden describes in that article, michael hayden stribs the russian interference as the political equivulent of the september 11th attacks that exposed a previously unimagined vulnerability and required unified american response. i am dismayed that no one wants to know what the president is briefed on. this is a massive intelligence

failure, and i was part of the effort that worked to declassify the pdb because it wasn't enough to show congress what the president knew about 9/11. the public needed to see what the president knew. so to steve's point, you can't even begin a policy-making process until you know what the intel is. >> yes. there's so much to say about this. >> am i that crazy lady shouting the news on the corner? >> the -- no, you are shouting the news on the corner, but you're not a crazy lady. yes, the whole thing, steve made the point that the minority or the majority here on the intel committee, on the house side particularly, has been corrupted. this entire thing from the very first day that donald trump became president of the united states until today, there has never been a serious attempt to address, confront, get to the bottom of the most serious

direct assault on our national security of the past five years. go back to 9/11. since 9/11. the country was attacked. we've talked about this a million times. within the white house, at the very top and, therefore, as you know, when the top, the president of the united states is not interested in getting to the bottom of something, others may or may not be interested but no one really works on getting to the bottom of it, especially if it's hard to get to the bottom of it. what the president has done from day one is sent the signal to anyone around him who has any political connection to him that he does not -- he's not just not interested but he's actively saying to them, stay as far away from this as possible. so everyone there who is of good heart, of good spirit, who cares about the national interest, who genuinely thinks this san attack on the country and is trying to get to the bottom of it and how to not have it happen again, those people are like church mice scurrying around trying to figure out work-arounds.

that's not how you get this kind of situation understood or dealt with. you have to address it head-on. and we're doing the opposite of that in the white house. >> peter baker, this is where the analogy gets tortured but because you covered the post-9/11 bush white house and i was communications director for the post-9/11 bush white house, i want to go through this with you. so if people wanted to know how much the bush administration knew about what bin laden was planning, and that's what you guys wanted to know, we went through a painstaking process of declassifying the pdb. there was never a situation where the george tenet or any of the intelligence officials had to say, ooh i'm scared to tell the president something bad about bin laden. but here, russia is bin laden, and there is an intelligence community and a political appointee at the top of the intelligence agency in mike

pompeo who this fall seemed to -- i don't want to use the word lie, but misstate russia's role in 2016 election meddling. the head of the cia does, in fact, still agree with the january 5th intel assessment. but i wonder, just take me inside the lunacy of this white house. of course they're not doing anything to protect the 2018 or 2020 elections because they can't tell the president to his face that russia attacked us. >> well, that's right. the president sees every discussion about russian involvement in last year's election as an attack on his legitimacy. if you bring it up, whether you're an intelligence analyst or white house aide, it means you are challenging his very existence as president. that's the way it has been perceived. and so, of course, it's not surprising then that there might be reluctance to do that. i'm struck by another parallel or historical example. you mentioned the 9/11 commission. i'm struck also by the moment

after the iraq war began and it was discovered there was no weapons of mass destruction. what did the push white house do. it wasn't happy about it or going out of its way to talk about the mistake but it did appoint a commission by chuck robb, a democratic seniority i lawrence silverman. this wasn't a comfortable commission for the bush white house and there were questions that they were not as fully independent as they could have been. but there was an effort at accountability to figure out how not to let it happen again. that's what we haven't seen from this white house. they don't want to figure out what might have happened last year. it's all a political attack in their view othe president. >> we have to sneak in a break. you and i may be the only people sitting here sad enough to have read every word of the wmd report but what it revealed was it was another -- that is the correct parallel. that was another massive intelligence failure. i remember reading the

classified version which had all the covert names and we were able to show congress in a declassified report showed the public, how we were attacked and policies were made to make sure it didn't happen again. peter baker, any theorys on why there isn't any interest from the republican-led members of congress to protect america from russia? that seems very un-republican to be putin's lap dogs. >> yeah, i think the republican party is in an awkward position. its dna is to be suspicious of russia and now they have a president who seems to be closer to vladimir putin than he is to many of the members of the republican caucus on the hill. president trump has attached mitch mcconnell more often than he's attacked vladimir putin. why is that? people don't real know. a lot of theories out there but it makes the republican party, puts it in an uncomfortable position. >> we're just hitting pause. when we come back, we're going to keep going on this topic. also, the law and order

president who is at war with the fbi. we'll take you inside his smear campaign against the nation's top cops. also, bob mueller's investigation on the line as we've been discussing concerns about the special counsel's job security divide the gop. i am totally blind. and non-24 can make me show up too early... or too late. or make me feel like i'm not really "there." talk to your doctor, and call 844-234-2424.

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i want to bring in ambassador mcfalland ask you what you think when you see president trump so easily played by vladimir putin.

donald trump wakes up this morning, doesn't check on john mccain's health or the tax bill or anything else. he calls vladimir to thank him for the attaboy on the economy. what is going on? >> just exactly what you just said. vladimir putin knows that saying nice things about trump elicits these kind of responses. it's shocking to me that that phone call gets to go through, and we've been talking a lot about the briefers and the intelligence folks coming in for the pdb but there's also something called the national security council and the national security adviser. i worked at that nsc for three years. you tee up a call, do a call package. h.r. mcmaster briefs the president on the wisdom or not of making such a call. and to me, this does not serve america's national interest to make that call, at least the way it has been read out so far.

and so i -- they need to focus on that, too, as well as, by the way, what the president reads in that pdb. he also, after all, is responsible for how the president is briefed about national threats to the united states of america. >> let me draw ow out on that a little bit. what is happening? we know who they are. h.m. mcmaster is the national security adviser. dana powell doesn't leave another later this year. they either share the president's putin fetish or aren't the kind of people who can stand up to him and say not only does it make you look like a fool but it makes you look weak in the eyes of vladimir putin who is not acting in this country's security interests. >> correct. obviously, i agree with that. and to go back to the earlier conversation, remember, after september 11th, we had a bipartisan independent commission, which is exactly what i've been advocating for a year and a half now because we

knew this was going to be politicized. we knew we weren't going to be able to have a full investigation. remember, this is not just about collusion. this is about what the russians did with wikileaks. this is about what the russians probed in terms of our electoral machinery. and a commission would also investigate what the obama administration did, including what the fbi did or did not do during this situation. that's the kind of investigation we need, and we're not getting it because the president has decided that his interest as he perceives them, are more important than the national interest. that is a huge mistake that we're going to pay for down the road. >> evan mcmullin, you are, i believe, that we know of, the only former cia operative in our conversation right now. can you talk to me about the sort of ethos at the cia when you have an intelligence product that during the transition, donald trump disparages that the

political appointee mike pompeo has said as recently as october that he didn't agree with, and then the cia had to walk that back. how do you, if your number one client doesn't want to receive your product, how do you go out and continue to create the best product possible? and is it possible -- and i understand i know the answers are always that they're the consummate professionals, they're patrioted. but at some point, do the best and the brightest say, to hell with this. if the president won't put national security policy behind the intelligence i'm giving him, what am i doing this for? >> i think, yes, they are patriots and the consummate professionals, as you said. that's absolutely true. and i think maybe they may have the reaction you just described over time. but i think in the end, they are still going to do what they need to do to get the information into donald trump's head because donald trump has authorities and powers over what they do, their

activities at the agency, and they need him to know certain things so he can make certain decisions and authorize certain things they need to do. they just have to do it. what you see happening now is the same thing that a parent might do with a child. the parent is trying to get the child to take his or her medicine. it tastes terrible so they break it up in little bits and put it in the apple sauce and spoon it into the baby's mouth smoothly. it works something like that. >> evan, i've done it a lot, but i guess it's more dire than that because what we learned from "the washington post" yesterday is that u.s. officials declined to discuss whether the stream of intel on russia has been shared with trump. we don't even know that massed in -- chocolate syrup works better than apple sauce if you're ever in need of a trick -- we don't know if the medicine is going down with the chocolate syrup. >> we don't, and that's true. i have read that what's

happening is that we're putting information in written form, not in oral form and apparently the president isn't reading it. yes, there's a serious problem. but the reality is you'll not change the man. the agency -- i see it maneuvering here and working as it can to try to work within the president's personality and inserting his name into briefings and things more often. they're doing what they can to work with the man in front of them. but the reality is that the man is deeply flawed and deeply unfit. when people like me, before he was elected, warned against his unfitness, this is exactly why. this is a tangible reason why that unfitness is dangerous, and we're seeing it now play out. >> it's not just a matter of stewing in this story for two days by being shocked again and the crazy lady shouting the news on the corner. >> not crazy. >> but here's the things we

should be doing. instead of trying to get the president to take his medicine or accept the unanimous assessment of the intelligence community, we should be trying to figure out, should be pounding facebook and twitter and social media platforms to get their russia garbage off their platforms. we should not just be trying to convince the president of something that happened now over two years ago. do you worry not just about the inordinate effort it takes to convince the president of that which has already happened but of all that we're not doing to protect ourselves from a known adversary. >> i've been afraid of this particular kind of story coming out since the beginning. i think that donald trump poses a national security threat because of the reasons outlined in this story. if we're not telling him the appropriate intelligence, he's not able to have adequate information to have the necessary decisions to protect america. and the bottom line here is he thinks the russia investigation is something that has to do with him personally. it's impacting his ego, which is

not what's at stake here. we're talking about the national security and infrastructure of our election processes. and so donald trump, instead of looking at the questions around whether his election was legitimate is not a question about his ego. it's a question about the processes in which american people are casting their ballots and that process has to have a certain level of integrity. that's the core of our democracy, and it should be protected going forward. it's not about him. >> peter baker, let me give you the last word here and ask you if there's anything about this conversation that you've picked up. not the one we're having, but this conversation that's taking place in the intelligence community that is concerning to anyone at any level in this white house or are they all now suffering from stockholm syndrome? >> no, there's definitely a bifurcation within this white house when it comes to russia and the russia threat. you hear people in this white house speak very candidly, very,

you know, with a great deal of concern about what they perceive russia to have tried to do last year in this country. what they still think that russia is still trying to do in this country. they say things that wouldn't be very different from what ambassador mcfaul has just said in terms of their concern. but it's not mirrored by what the president of the united states says. there's such a disparity between what he's saying and the people who work for him say. it's hard to understand who speaks for the government? what is the point of view of the united states government under president trump? >> peter bake ear. >> if i could just jump in. >> so here's one. i dodged your first question. let me -- >> at least you admit it. >> one hypothesis given what you said. one hypothesis that i hear is that donald trump, president trump, calls, reacts to putin, but it has no practical effect on the actual policy toward

russia. if you look at the actual policy toward russia with the one exception being how to respond to the attack in 2016, but sanctions, nato, support for ukraine, it's all the obama policy. they haven't changed anything. and that suggests he's not involved and maybe it's just let him do his thing at the top. we'll run policy at the bottom. the one noticeable exception, as many of your guests have said, is when it comes to him personally, and that's about 2016, he intervenes, and that's incredibly dangerous for the future with respect to elections to come. >> you would know better than me. the concern that i picked up today from folks in the intelligence community is that, yes, everything you say is likely true. and, but, you can't make the sorts of policy changes and you can't fortify and sort of -- fortify our systems to prevent something like that from happening again without some changes in our posture. >> correct.

>> so, yes, the sanctions was signed but the post report has an account of president trump fuming for four days before he did so. he's dragged to the right place on policies like that. but the ongoing concern i pick upped today from democrats and republicans is that we've not done anything to make sure the 2016 meddling doesn't happen again. thank you all. peter baker, ambassador mcfaul. when we come back, donald trump comes face-to-face with the very members of the very agency that he's been attacking. this holiday, the real gift isn't what's inside the box. it's what's inside the person who opens it. ♪ give ancestrydna, the only dna test that can trace your origins to over 150 ethnic regions... ♪ ...and open up a world of possibilities. ♪ save 20% for the holidays at ancestrydna.com.

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well, it's a shame what's happened with the fbi, but we're going to rebuild the fbi. it will be bigger and better than ever. but it is very sad when you look at those documents and how they've done that is really, really disgraceful. and you have a lot of very angry people that are seeing it. it's a very sad thing to watch,

i will tell you that. and i'm going today, on behalf of the fbi, their new building. and everybody -- not me, what everybody, the level of anger at what they've been witnessing with respect to the fbi is certainly very sad. >> i'm sorry. the level of anger is sean hannity and his panelists. . what's happening to the fbi is the commander in chief is attacking the bleep out of them. what is he talking about? >> he's upset about the -- about these texts. he's got something to hang his hat on now in these text messages between the two fbi people who have said negative things about him while working on the clinton investigation. he's been wlolooking for some evidence. one of the problems with trump is he has a crack pot theory or set of lies or set of propaganda he wants to address and somehow, something comes along that's a

small grain of -- not exactly truth but something that's actually tethered to reality which, in this case, involves the two fbi agents who did not like him and in their personal relation sent some nasty text messages saying he was an idiot. that's become the one scintilla of a reality-based fact on which his whole conspiracy theorys about the fbi are now hanging and there are enormous consequences for that which now we're going to talk about. >> ignore the hillary clinton text messages -- >> i'm fully aware of this. that's what he does. he's the ultimate cherry picker. he finds the tiny little thing. a giant conspiracy and if he can find not just the cherry but like the little -- the pit inside the cherry, he'll build an entire cathedral around that pit inside that cherry. >> there's a phrase that the russians use called useful idiot. >> god, no more russians! >> and a useful idiot was a western sympathizer to

communism. the phrase was coined by vladimir lenin. vladimir putin is looking at an american president thinking he has a useful idiot for useful purposes sitting in the oval office. as we watch the president of the united states attack the brave men and women of the world's premier law enforcement agency who put themselves in harm's way, who are obviously in the counterintelligence business as well. and it's astonishing to see. we have a president of the united states who is not welcome in the united kingdom. we have a president of the united states attacking the fbi, attacking the judicial system in this country. the release by the department of justice of these private text messages between these fbi agents is just plain disgusting. and clearly, what's happening right now is the preparations to fire mueller. the misinformation, disinformation propaganda campaign being carried out by

fox news, and this attack on the first amendment and the free media and on the integrity of the american justice system. >> and intelligence. >> and intelligence community. >> here's where the rubber will meet the road. what we've seen in the last couple of days. deputy director mccabe at the fbi who is supposed to be testifying next week on tuesday. we've now had trey gowdy on television suggesting that -- predicting that he may not be employed by the fbi by tuesday. billy house from bloomberg news reports another member of the house panel says we're expecting mccabe on tuesday, but if he shows up. he may not be there. essentially house republicans were already doing the business of carrying donald trump's waufrt on this situation are starting to hint at the notion that the deputy director of the fbi is going to be fired between now and tuesday and that would be another step in what -- in the direction steve is talking about. >> let me bring ken dilanian in, national security and

intelligence reporter. i don't know if you heard congressman schiff at the top of the hour, but he did not really push back against this concern that i've picked up in the last really 36 hours among democrats that there was an effort from the republicans on the intel committee to sort of run a play on behalf of the white house. wrap up their investigation. give donald trump something to wave around. and do just what folks around this table are saying. fire bob mueller. i've heard that sessions is not safe. rosenstein is not safe and i hadn't heard the rumor about mccabe. but do you see a potential something that looks like the saturday night massacre? >> you have to consider that possibility, nicolle. adam schiff has been growing increasingly frustrated in his public comments in recent days, right? it's been, for some time, the house investigation has been sort of on the precipice and

democrats really haven't had a say about when they'd call witnesses. and now it really seems like the republicans are driving towards a potentially premature conclusion. in terms of firing mueller, obviously, rod rosenstein right now is the only person who can fire robert mueller. he says pretty clearly on the hill he doesn't see any reason to do that. if jeff sessions goes and donald trump brings in another attorney general, that person would presumably take back over the supervision of the russia investigation and could fire mueller. that person would have to be confirmed by the senate and you can imagine the senate would extract a promise not to fire robert mueller unless there was good cause. there are some rules here. we shouldn't get too carried away and there are institutions that are holding firm. rosenstein held firm on the hill. christopher rey at the fbi spoke in support of the fbi. but absolutely, no doubt the fbi is under attack by the president. it's okay for -- it's fine for the president to disagree with how the fbi handled the hillary clinton e-mail investigation.

but by using words like disgrace and in tatters, he is essentially casting aspersions on the entire law enforcement agency that he nominally leads. it's like he's forgotten that these people work for him in a sentence, although perhaps, thankfully, not directly. >> let me show you something that may have got me a little worked up. let me show you something from sean hannity last night comparing the fbi to watergate. >> bigger than watergate? >> in so many different ways, it is. >> sarah? >> it's more pervasive. >> sarah? >> yes. i think so. and i agree with greg. >> spying by the fbi, justice department intelligence agencies on the political opponents of the administration of barack obama -- >> yes, or no? >> bigger than watergate by far. by far. >> i say watergate on steroids. human growth hormone overdoses. >> crazier than my dog after her stroke? >> there is so much to say about

that, but i will -- i'm going to kick it to steve in a moment mean was talking about the notion of useful idiots. just watch that piece of tape again and think useless idiots. worse than useless. worse than useless. >> i totally disagree with you because sean hannity, you know, like in the tour de france, the bikers in the front and the guys behind them ride in their wind or whatever that's called? >> drafting. they're drafting. >> whatever that is. i can't even ride a bike. i don't know why i says that. hannity is the tip of the sphere in this smear campaign against the institutions. for anyone that missed that, we didn't want to show you too much of my friend sean hannity, but that was about these texts that ken dilanian talked about. i want to put another fact on the table. the texts that were anti-trump were sent around a time in the campaign when lindsey graham and marco rubio were saying far

worse things about donald trump than peter straak was. also among this fbi agent's texts were things that were just as -- "the wall street journal report"s fbi agent removed from russia probe held dim views of holder and sanders. a review of their correspondence shows trump wasn't their only target. they held dim views of other prominent figures from chelsea clinton to obam administration attorney general eric holder to their new boss jeff sessions. so fbi agents are at their core, if anything, if you want to give them a stereotype, it's that they lean right but they are at their core pretty skeptical men and women. so the idea that a single fbi agent was unimpressed with chelsea clinton, eric holder, jeff sessions and donald trump doesn't suggest he was biased. it just suggests he wasn't really a political fan of anyone in government which doesn't exactly put him on an island.

>> well, actually, you're absolutely right. fbi agents are very skeptical people as you mention, but they also don't like politicians in general. it's not to say that they have it out for politicians. they -- it's just not the kind of people they are. they operate in a world where they are looking to discover facts and to lead where the facts -- or to go where the facts lead. they don't often appreciate the rhetoric of politics. so that's just the way it is. but let's just take a step back here. mueller dealt with this situation. i don't think the situation is that serious at all. >> you don't think it's watergate? it's not watergate? >> no. but let's talk about why. the fbi agents are people, like all of us. they have opinions, all right? they also operate within a set of rules that govern what they can do and what they can't do. stroke wasn't operating. he wasn't making the decision about how everything played out

at the fbi. a plethora of people involved in this process. they all have opinions. they are entitled to have opinions. that's part of our government. that's part of our system of government. it's democracy. but there's also a set of rules, and as long as they operate in their official capacity within the context of those -- that set of rules, they are fine. but i understand that an abundance of caution, mueller let him go. that's probably what he should have done. i support that decision. he did that, and that's exactly what these yahoos in the republican conference in the house should want of the special counsel they claim to want. this is all politically motivated, obviously, and we need to be more vigilant than we've been in quite some time. >> steve? >> there's zero evidence that they acted inappropriately on the basis of those opinions. they're americans. they get to have political opinions. they didn't abuse their badge. they didn't abuse their office. that fox news panel, the

breathtaking dishonesty of it is beyond my ability to articulate. that is no longer a news organization. that is media looks like. that is what white house-controlled in the service of the president misinformation looks like. that is indistinct from propaganda in authoritarian countries aimed directly at weakening essential institutions and misinforming the american people. it is appalling. >> if you want to see the clarity of it. a tiny thing. that guy, one of the guys on fox news, tom fenton the other night said xerforget about shutting d mr. mueller. do we need to shut down the fbi because it was turned into a kgb-type operation by the obama

administration? think about that. do we need to shut down the fbi because it has been turned into a kgb-style operation by the obama administration. >> dishonest, pernicious nonsense. >> coordinated by design. >> premeditated. >> and as diplomats reminds me, when someone gets hurt, people will have blood on their hands. ken delanian, thank you for spurneding time with us. when we come back, donald trump is changing the face of the judiciary at a record pace. so fast it seems no one has time to interview this guy. how do you chase what you love

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was supposed to be a wake reup call for our government?sh people all across the country lost their savings, their pensions and their jobs. i'm tom steyer and it turned out that the system that had benefited people like me who are well off, was, in fact, stacked against everyone else. it's why i left my investment firm and resolved to use my savings for the public good. but here we are nine years later and this president and the republican congress are making a bad situation even worse.

they won't tell you that their so called "tax reform" plan is really for the wealthy and big corporations, while hurting the middle class. it blows up the deficit and that means fewer investments in education, health care and job creation. it's up to all of us to stand up to this president. not just for impeachable offenses, but also to demand a country where everyone has a real chance to succeed. join us. your voice matters. have any of you not tried a case to verdict in a courtroom? mr. petersen. have you ever tried a jury trial? >> i have not. >> civil? >> no. >> criminal? >> no. >> bench?

>> no. >> state or federal court? >> i have not. >> as a trial judge you're obviously going to have witnesses. can you tell me what the dobair standard is? >> senator kennedy, i don't have that readily at my disposal, but i would be happy to take a closer look at that. >> do you know what the younger abstention doctrine is? >> i've heard of it, but, again -- >> how about the pullman extension don trin. >> i -- >> yew see that a lot in federal court. okay. >> that was not -- petersen, the nominee, to serve a lifetime term as a federal judge. >> one of the things we have to focus on, a lifetime appointment in this particular appointment, he's remaking the judiciary, which has lasting consequences. while donald trump is dismantling institutions fon the one hand, on the other, really

effective in the area of confirming jumps to the court in a way obama was not. the reason this is important is because when policy is passed through congress, the judiciary as we saw with obamacare and other pieces of legislation, the obama administration passed it comes up, challenges come through the courts. and it's important to have a balanced judiciary. embarrassing about that particular clip, any two-year law student could answer that question. ask what that meant and i should have known. interesting to be mediocre, well connected, a white man and ap t appointed to a lifetime appointment on the judiciary when you're clearly unqualified. >> donald trump, we have to seek another break and be right back. don't go away. but my car broke n and i'd really appreciate a ride to the stadium. yes! ...but, no, i have to stay here and wait for a package. i thought anybody who rooted for me

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oop. that's me and brian williams. all glued to the year's ten most at 9:00 on msnbc. my thanks to my guests. that does it for our hour. "mtp daily" starts right now. hi, chuck. >> hi, nicolle. thank you. happy weekend. i'll be tuning in. if it's friday, the president campaigns against the -- fbi? good evening. i'm chuck todd here in washington. back in washington, i should say. welcome to "mtp daily." we begin tonight with the escalating campaign to destroy robert mueller's credibility and apparently destroy the fbi's