p.m. right now we hand you off to our friend and colleague andrea mitchell for "andrea mitchell reports." right now on "andrea mitchell reports," fire and frenzy. a renewal of the fisa with a tweeting storm in both directions, upending his white house. and pushback from members of congress. >> 702 is a very important content collection program. it's important that it be done right. >> the president seems to be echoing the latest message that he's heard from a commentator on fox news. >> i love this twitch generally, but not always. >> the president is support issing what's on the floor today. >> but you don't think the tweets are helpful. >> it wasn't helpful at first. hopefully it's been corrected. in another case of the president going off script, he's

now wavering as to whether he would submit to an interview with the special counsel in the russia investigation. >> we'll see what happens, certainly we'll see what happens, but when they haven't found any collusion on any level, it seems unlikely you would even have an interview. and under the mud. rescues digging through a river of mud in search of rsurvivors n the santa barbara coast. families are hoping a miracle will happen. it's now been more than 48 hours since this mudslide ripped through, and the devastation here, the cleanup is going to take months. and good day, everyone. i'm andrea mitchell in washington. the house of representatives has just passed the reauthorization of a controversial key foreign intelligence surveillance priority, strong the supported by the white house only hours after president trump almost killed the bill by tweeting against it.

the trump administration's official statement sunday night urging house members to support the authority, known as section 702, allowing the nsa to collect phone numbers of u.s. citizens. president trump muddied the waters shortly after this aired on fox news. >> mr. president, this is not the way to go. spying is valid to find the foreign agents among us, but it's got to be based on suspicion and not an area code. >> all eyes on the controversial vote today by the house to renew the nsa's relentless spy program. >> a tweet from the president just 30 minutes later. quote, house votes on controversial fisa act today. this is the act that may have been used with the discredited and phony dossier to so badly surveil and abuse the trump campaign by the previous administration and others?

>> i think the president's tweet speaks for itself. he's concerned that the intelligence community doesn't have enough oversight. i think we need more oversight, not less. >> the house scrambled to save the bill. house speaker paul ryan called the president, apparently getting him to relent on twitter, adding, with that being said, i have personally directed the fix to the unmasking process since taking office and today's vote is about foreign surveillance of foreign bad guys on foreign land. we need it. get smart. joining me now, correspondent kristen welker and security analyst john mclaughlin, former acting director at the cia. kristen, the ci ara admiral joh kelly had to bustle to the floor and try to tell them the president did support what they said, what was necessary, what the national security adviser wanted, even as the president

was watching fox news and tweeting on the other side of the issue. >> reporter: i think that is the right assumption to make on what john kelly was doing on capitol hill. adding to that picture, andrea, we know the president spoke to house speaker paul ryan after that initial tweet, and you heard some of the reaction from congressman king, saying essentially that tweet didn't help. then you had that second tweet that came out, essentially trying to clarify the one that you just read. look, this speaks to the fact that president trump for a second day has muddled his message. we saw this yesterday when he was asked whether or not he would speak with counsel member robert mueller. he said it seemed unlikely there would be need for an interview. that ran counter to what he had said previously. again, andrea, really putting the focus on himself rather than the broader policy, and i think that's a concern for some republicans. but this administration is moving forward.

the muddled message, they argue, did not help. >> when he first referred to john mclaughlin of unmasking, there is intelligence trying to get at what really didn't exist, but it was the criticism of susan rice, former national security adviser and others, which involved how michael flynn got caught up, swept up with his conversations with the russian ambassador. that's how they found out that he was talking to the russian ambassador. they were suvveiling the russian ambassador, found out about michael flynn and the investigation began. the president still seemed so angry about this. he was tweeting about this again today. they somehow limited the number of people who can be involved in it, though susan rice was cleared by both parties when she testified. >> let me be clear at the outset to say i don't think there's been any abuse of this unmasking authority, which is the process by which a national security official can ask to know the identity of an american whose

name has been masked in an intercept that's been collected in order to understand the context. that's what unmasking is. i don't think there's been any abuse of this, and we have only sketchy details at this point on what the director of national intelligence has just done. looking at it, it strikes me as something designed more to make the president feel good than to really substantially change the process. it is significant in that it's the first time the whole intelligence community has, on one piece of paper, guidance on how to do this. the significant element that jumps out at you is a requirement for the general counsel, that is, the chief lawyer in each of these agencies to approve any requests to unmask the identity of transition officials. that puts an additional complicated step in this. frankly, i don't think it's a big deal in implementation, but we'll have to wait and see. >> kristen welker, paul ryan, the speaker, was just asked about the whole tweet storm

about the fisa reauthorization today. let's listen to it. >> it's well known that he has concerns about the domestic fisa law. that's not what we're doing today. >> did he not understand what bill you were voting on today? >> he just has concerns about other parts of fisa. >> and the president has concerns that mirror, echo libertarian concerns that rand paul and others and liberals as well as libertarians have concerns about this fisa law. the fact that his own intelligence community were strongly in favor of it, and they had worked for months to get this reauthorization through, kristen, it really calls into question how the leaders -- not just paul ryan -- but other viewers in his own party will view the president going forward. it resurrects doubts about his grasp of the issues they're dealing with day by day. >> reporter: and it's yet another moment, andrea, where he's at odds with his

intelligence committee, auz rig -- as you rightfully point out. they think this is critical to the work that they do. it's also striking that initial tweet does line up with some of the policy views of rand paul. that, i think, is something to watch moving forward. but again, this very muddled messaging on an issue that pits him against key members of his intelligence community, within his own administration. we're going to see the president today. he's hosting a listening session to talk about criminal justice reform. he's also going to be holding a national security meeting. it is likely this issue will be revisited within those contexts. certainly journalists will try to get some questions to him about this, andrea. >> rex tillerson has said today he'll be making a decision on that iran deal at that meeting this afternoon. john mclaughlin, quickly, on the fisa law. it was a key issue after 9/11. there were some protections put in, but president obama went

along with this warrantless surveillance, renewing it, last time around. >> oh, yes. this was renewed in 2008 -- >> and also in 2013. >> in 2013 it was amended again, but it's now up for renewal. the senate still has to vote. the key thing here is about 25% of what national security agency gets on counterterrorism comes from this process. there have been numerous instances in which it has prevented terrorist attacks, including a subway-attempted attack on the new york city subway. so it's an effective tool. the procedures the intelligence community must use in order to implement this have to be approved by the foreign intelligence surveillance court. it's not entirely warrantless. it's that you don't have to get a warrant on every specific case you're looking at. you have to submit procedures by which you're going to look at a category of cases. it's complicated, but there are legal provisions in here that

protect americans. and i would say one other thing, if i can, and that is that working with nsa for a long period of time, i can give you many instances, but fundamentally, the people who do this at nsa are extraordinarily sensitive not to get near u.s. person's data if they don't have to. they can be punished by overstepping the bounds with what they're able to do with a person's status. >> john mclaughlin, someone who has had experience in the community. thank you kristen welker as well. senator, i want to ask you about your investigation into what has or has not been done, i should say, to protect the midterms and future flexes. do you support it? >> andrea, first, it's good to be with you. yes, i do believe this party is needed. we need to make sure there is

proper. this issue is not new. it should have been on the floor well before now, these deadlines, but it's important. >> what do you think the president sending tweets this morning, going against his own policy, and then reversing after paul ryan called, general kelly rushing to the hill. how does that undermine his authority with democrats as well as republicans? >> andrea, this is not the first time we've received tweets from the president that is totally against what his administration was doing. it's hard to understand how the president can be so uncontrolled on this use of media communication and where every word he says is important. here, obviously, he was trying to make political points and undermined the ability to get through important legislation in the house of representatives. >> he also said during a joint news conference with the prime

minister of finland yesterday that he no longer is willing to automatically have an interview with robert mueller. do you think he'll have a choice on that? >> if mr. mueller needs the interview, i think the interview should take place and it will take place. i think the president is being rather flip responding to these questions without getting the proper advice from his advisers. >> a 200-page highly documented report is the minority report. it's democrats only. is there buy-in from anyone on the republican side, senator corker or anyone else on foreign relations, about the failure of the administration to respond to what you have documented is a serious threat from russia to attack our elections? >> this report is a bipartisan report in that i had to make a decision early in 2017 to devote the staff resources necessary to make sure this report was completed within a year. it is an effort for the american

public and the international community to understand the extent of mr. putin's involvement in the use of the tools to try to undermine democratic institutions. involved in o involvement in our election was just a small part of it. we've had strong bipartisan support from the senate and congress on much of what's in this report. many of the recommendations are moving forward on a bipartisan manner. i commented yesterday that bipartisan under senator corker and myself have had meetings on this. no, i understand this is a report issued by the democratic members, but it truly represents, i think, a nonpartisan-bipartisan effort to alert the international community of the maligned attacks by president putin. >> why did you call the president uncontrolled? >> he still hasn't acknowledged russia's engagement in our

elections. he's failed to contact the nsa group in this attack. he doesn't acknowledge russia's propaganda, russia's -- mr. putin's corruption in support of corrupt regimes, his use of cyber tax against us, his interference not only in the u.s. election but in the european elections. the president has been missing providing the serious attention this national security threat deserves. >> without the president's leadership on this, is it clear to you that homeland security and other agencies are not going to respond to the threat? >> well, we've had members of the trump administration who have done the right thing. we had people in political appointments as well as career people trying to implement as many of the policies as we can to prevent russia from doing what it's sdpoog to present future attack. you do need a cover.

the president needs to authorize leadership, and how policy will be implemented. we wanted congress to take a better role, working with our international partners particularly in nato to look at what is a cyber attack and how article 5 of nato applies. there is a lot that can be done, but it does start with the president of the united states. >> quickly, i know you need to go, but i have to ask you about iran. secretary jeff tillerson said the president will be making a decision told on whether he deals with to solve some of the problems he's had with the deal. >> i would urge the president to sign this waiver. everybody is telling him that it's in our national security

britney spears. there are other ways we can deal particularly with the nonl. we can be very tough working with our european allies on their ballistic missiles, their support of terrorism. but if they're in compliance with the agreement, we don't want to be the one to blow it up and allow ron to move forward on t the right program. president trump revives his all-out attacks on secretary clinton. today we're bringing you america's number one shave at lower prices every day. putting money back in the pockets of millions of americans. as one of those workers, i'm proud to bring you gillette quality for less, because nobody can beat the men and women of gillette. gillette - the best a man can get.

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when you talk about interviews, hillary clinton had an interview where she wasn't sworn in, she wasn't given the oath, they didn't take notes, they didn't record, and it was done on the fourth of july weekend. that's perhaps ridiculous. i am for the strongest military that the united states ever had. putin can't love that. but hillary was not for a strong military, and hillary, my opponent, was for windmills. >> president trump just can't seem to let it go. he continues to attack hillary clinton as though he were still in the middle of the 2016 campaign. following those remarks, the president tweeted this morning with another call for an investigation into clinton's e-mails, even as kellyanne conway was insisting that no one

at the white house ever talks about clinton. >> people are still stuck in last year's election and about that woman who will never be president. no one at the white house -- i said last night no one at the white house talks about hillary clinton, only when we're forced to and only with the requisite eye roll. >> joining me now is charlie sykes, veteran radio show host, and jennifer palmeri, white house communications director for president obama and for hillary clinton's campaign. jen, i have to go to you first. i haven't heard this much about hillary clinton in months. >> what happened? >> you know, i don't know what you think is going on there, but there was a lot about hillary clinton at that news conference with the finnish leader yesterday. >> i think our experience in the last year is whenever he feels pressure or vulnerable that he starts going after her. so i find that it's like a moment of projection. i don't know -- you know, you saw that last week with a lot of

the tweeting, you saw that with looking to do the interview with the "new york times" during the holidays followed up by the "fire and fury" release. i feel that having worked in white houses before, if you see unusual things happening on the outside, particularly with trump, but you can't explain, like, why he's agitated, why he's going after hillary, assume that on the inside he's probably learning some things that are coming down the pike, whether it's mueller wanting to interview him or concerns about indictments coming down. that's making him anxious and hillary is always his favorite go-to person to attack because he loves being in a one 1-on-on fight with someone. if he got interviewed by the fbi, if you're under oath or not, lying to the fbi is in fact a crime, so he should be aware of that if he goes into an interview himself. >> i should correct myself,

because it was the norwegian prime minister. i think i've twice said from finland. my regrets for that. but charlie sykes, let's talk about the other part of that news conference with the foreign leader yesterday from norway where he was also walking back his prior commitment to do an interview with robert mueller. does he have a choice here? >> well, i don't know. he is the president of the united states, and i think there is a recognition that when he sits down with robert mueller, that is going to be the most dangerous threat to his presidency because, as jen just mentioned, whether you're under oath or not, lying to the fbi is a serious matter. and look, if you're one of donald trump's lawyers, you're going to do everything possible not to put donald trump in a room with fbi investigators and asking him questions that he's going to have to freestyle on. because this is a man who can't really go for more than a couple of minutes without exaggerating,

without saying something sththas o outlandish. that may be the new normal in politics dealing with the media, but it is not the new normal with the fbi. his obsession with hillary is more personal. number one, he gets to relive his hits. number two, clump versus clinton will remind people it's not just whether they like him or not, but to continue to stress the difference between the way hillary was treated by the fbi. he's going to try to create that sense of a double standard and that strikes me as a very purposeful strategy on his part. >> that's a good point. then again, as a former communications director at the white house, how would you deal with a situation like today when the president watches fox news

and tweets something that contradicts the statement his own administration had put out last night endorsing a key priority of the intelligence community, which was on the floor for a vote today? >> some things are no longer communication problems than just problems. this white house has a big problem with when the president is violating policy, administration policy. you know, there are times, particularly when i worked for president clinton, that there might have been a script and he took it in a different direction, and we were all on board that whatever president clinton said was policy was policy, and there was certainly never going back to have him do a redo. when you read the tweets from the president today, tried to thread the needle to say, having said that, we should still pass this.

yes, fox news, he watches that and that triggers that. maybe that's the reason why early put this on our door. none of us like that fisa either, and how many of this is linked back to i probea probe a. he does continue to go back to a probing agenda when it comes to policy. >> he was endorsing reopening the system of earmarks, which john mccain has at least attacked. it was reformed and gotten rid of and led to so much corruption. this is what he was suggesting was the solution to reinstitute bipartisanship, by having earmarks. this was in his meeting the other day with congressional

leaders. >> our system lends itself to not getting things done. i hear so much about earmarks, the old earmark system. of course, they had other problems with earmarks, but maybe all of you should think about going back to a form of earmarks, because this system -- you should do it. >> charlie? >> as i mentioned, i think that's the swampiest thing you could possibly do to bring back pork barrel spending. this was a reform the conservatives had been pushing for decades. it would be an extraordinary moment for republicans to say, yeah, forget about that, let's go back to buying congressional votes with pork barrel spending.

i can't imagine it's going to go anywhere. >> charlie sykes, jen palmeri, thank you both so much. meanwhile out west a terrible tragedy continuing in california. the desperate search there for eight missing california residents after days of devastating mudslides, leaving at least 17 people dead. krcrippled communities along th santa barbara coast trying to recover. gadi schwartz joining us with the latest from there. >> andrea, we know that 20 to 25% of the affected were homes that were buried and crushed under boulders. half of that home has been taken down the wash. this boulder field stretches for about a mile. we know the debris has been washed all the way clear down to

the pacific ocean, which is about two or three miles away from where we're at right now. search and rescue crews are looking for anybody that may have survived. we are now well past 48 hours since this mudslide ripped through. right now we know that there are still eight people missing and 17 people have lost their lives. andrea, back to you. >> gadi schwartz, thank you so much for that. coming up, state of confusion. i'll talk to a house republican, a veteran marine about the president's mixed messages about the surveillance program. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. you won't believe how much is new at red lobster... ...that is, until you taste our new menu. discover more ways to enjoy seafood with new tasting plates small plates, with big flavor- like yucatan shrimp in chili-lime butter and caramelized pineapple. and if you like hot, buttery maine lobster, check out this petite red lobster roll. for new entrees, explore globally-inspired dishes like spicy dragon shrimp. and now, when you order any two new or classic entrees,

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liberty stands with you™ liberty mutual insurance. breaking news from capitol hill, the house passing the fisa bill 266 to 264. it almost didn't pass when the president came out against it this morning. there is unflagging support from television officials. mike gallon lagher serves on th armed forces committee, served

on two terms in iraq and also afghanistan. >> yes, ma'am. >> you just voted, so how did you vote? >> i voted for underlying the bill and voted against the amendment. >> why do you support it? why do you not have the same concerns rand paul has? >> i certainly respect those concerns, but this is an absolutely critical program. it provides something like 25% of the intelligence we use. there is no evidence at all of any sort of systematic abuse. indeed, in the small cases where there might have been malfeasance, the intelligence committee has self-reported to fix the problem. i would just say as someone who spent a lot of time in uniform doing this work, while we had a very robust debate on it, i'm glad we finally landed on the reauthorization of the program, which is so critical. >> how did the president's -- his tweet today, watching fox news, echoing it, mimicking it,

how does that undermine his credibility with national security members of congress, and in fact, with our allies? >> i think it did create a little bit of temporary confusion on the hill, but i would say two things. one, they had already weighed in saying the official stance of the white house was against the amendment and in favor of the bill. i think it's fair to say the republican caucus was divided on this issue. just this morning we had over an hour-long debate about where proponents of the bill like myself and opponents went head to head. then we ultimately voted. that's how the process should ultimately work. i know that doesn't fit the narrative, but from my standpoint, it didn't throw a wrench in the whole thing. i did see general kelly in the cloakroom, and i just shook his hand. i didn't get the sense that he had changed things because we were already in the midst of voting. >> the president has, in the last couple days, sent mixed

signals on daca, he's switched his position on whether he would be willing to testify to mueller. does he have to drill down to counteract a growing impression fed by, of course, the book that he hates so much, that he's not on top of his game? >> i would say this. on numerous occasions i have not been shy to say i wish the white house would spend less time on twitter. i wish all of us would spend less time on twitter. i think it's petty and makes us more distracted from the real work. that being said, i try to pay attention to what's going on. as you referenced daca, i actually thought the meeting i saw earlier this week was quite remarkable and refreshing in a way. i'm new to this, but political theater that's choreographed, to see something that's genuine and honest. the president wanted to get to a deal. he was concerned about what the

broad elements of the bill would be, and i actually thought that was healthy in a weird way. >> as a freshman member, are you concerned about the now more than 30 members, including some key chairmen, admittedly term limited in terms of having the gavel, but these resignations, this is a really unprecedented number in the midterms. >> i was talking to someone earlier who asked me what has been the biggest surprise. i would say where there is a constant demand of fundraising, that's sort of the issue of a lot of our problems. back in wisconsin all i heard was, we want you guys to stop with the social media and yelling at each other, just work together and get some things done. maybe it creates a more competitive environment in 2018. that's out of my control. i just try to focus on doing a good job, doing good committee work and representing the people of wisconsin the best that i can.

>> you're back from iraq, you're back from afghanistan, you've seen your fellow marines in the field. are you disillusioned also with the process in washington? especially when you see the front line? >> i would say it is inspiring to be with young men and women who are risking their lives in order to give us this opportunity here in washington, d.c. to solve our problems peacefully. so for me that trip was reinvigorating and served as a useful reminder to me to try to conduct myself in as much civility and honor as possible. to have served in iraq and saw all the gains we made go down the drain, and now we're back there. to see battle progress is inspiring, but there are a lot of choices that the afghans and iraqis have to make going forward, but our military is doing a good job, and i believe we sent a signal in not pulling out and ensuring the new afghanistan and south asia's strategy that we're going to be

there for the long term. that puts steel in the spine of allies on the ground who are the ones conducting the fight. i know i'm inflating iraq and afghanistan which are two different countries with different problems, but in mosul, that's some of the worst urban combat we've seen since way city in 1968. to the enormous credit of the iraq security forces and the counterterrorism forces in particular, their special operators, they were able to get the job done. now that gives the political leadership an opportunity to sustain those gains or translate them into a lasting compromise so that we're not doing this, repeating the cycle every few years. >> mike gallagher, congressman, thank you for your service. >> appreciate it. >> thank you for being with us today. coming up, a legacy lost. the obama white house's efforts. i'll talk to former policy leader ben rhodes about it next.

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you're thinking about things we worked on, cuba, iran, climate. what is going to happen to those things? >> what if you take a strike to kill somebody? you decide whether to start a war. the president has to make hundreds of those decisions. he will have to make hundreds of those decisions. that will happen every week here. and there's not anybody else who will make those decisions for him. >> former deputy national

security adviser ben rhodes after then-candidate trump was elected president. just one of many behind-the-scenes looks at the obama administration's foreign policy legacy. in a new documentary entitled "the following year" is ben rhodes and producer of the documentary "the following year." welcome both. ben, there is also that moment on election night when you're speechless. you're basically at clinton headquarters at the javitz center. and i think gregoi or someone o your team is trying to ask for your reaction. you were completely shocked. >> first of all, andrea, i'm wearing the same shirt i had on in that clip. i didn't realize that, i didn't plan it that way. also because it's a movie, i think i could lose the tie. you know me, i'm rarely speechless. i basically couldn't find a way to talk about what had happened that wouldn't sound like some rationalization or it's all

going to be okay. sometimes things are just bad. i think i was dealing with the weight of knowing that all the things we had worked on were going to be endangered, but also that we were heading into kind of an unknown. if jeb bush or mark rco rubio w elected president, it would be at least a known commodity for the outcome. the america we were trying to represent to the world for eight years was suddenly going to be replaced in the white house by kind of really the antithesis for a lot of the values and the approach that we took, and that was a lot to absorb in that moment. >> craig, one of the scenes that you shot was at samantha powers' residence in new york, the u.n. mission residence. and it was a gathering of women. samantha power, the then-u.n. ambassador welcoming one of her predecessors, allbright, to

watch the election. you had women going back decades, gloria steinem, the children, samantha powers' kids, saying we're going to watch a woman be elected president, an historic event. then after the votes come back from florida and california, they know. just the unraveling of that and you end up with samantha power with her son on her lap asleep and pjs and just the aftermath. what was that like? >> well, i mean, it was one of those moments where i had to keep my professional hat on and whatever i was feeling about the election just to focus on -- you know, clearly it was a remarkable scene unfolding before our eyes. as a documentary filmmaker, those are the moments you live for. my whole intention going into this was to make a film that's about the last year of the foreign policy team, but really, about the emotions at play, the ups and downs and triumphs and

setbacks. and clearly that was all unfolding before our eyes. me and my crew just focused on getting the job done, recording that kind of remarkable scene, and yeah, it was unforgettable. i clearly knew as it was happening that this is going to be at the core of the film, and indeed, changed the entire film itself and make it probably more important because we now had a window that we had captured into this way of interacting with the world that we had filmed the previous year. that was quickly called into question as a result of the election. >> and that last year, year and a half, was the opening to cuba which you helped engineer, the secret negotiations, the iran nuclear deal. which at this hour right now, they are gathering, and they'll be meeting at 2:45 this afternoon, and the president may well decide to blow it up. >> yeah, i mean, i think the movie had a twist, something we didn't foresee. the fact of the matter, what's

interesting to do, andrea, you watch it now and it's a bit like a time capsule. it feels like ten years ago that you're watching it because the approach is so different now. i do hope the iran deal survives. i think the president's own team wants it to survive. >> can cuba survive? >> they've rolled it back not all the way. we saw the embassy, we saw the relationship we didn't have. but what's almost more important that the movie shows is this is an approach to a world that we can come back to. i believe deeply that at some point the embargo on cuba is going to be lifted. it's the right thing to do. it's the evident thing to do for american interests. at some point welcome back into the paris agreement because that's the only way to deal with climate change. you do have to take a bit of a longer view of history and say, the pendulum swings. the iran deal, the paris accord, cuba, even if they're chipped away at or partially rolled

back, we can return to that approach to the world. >> i just want to share, as we go to break, the insights into barack obama. he's described clearly as your friend. you're still working with him. and we've got some footage from your film, greg, of barack obama as we haven't really seen him before. >> i think the key is what we call staying in the pocket. >> staying in the pocket. >> so you got to stay in the pocket. because i think everybody here knows dads who get out of the pocket and they're trying stuff they can't really pull off. ♪ [speaking french]

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but for you, one pill a day may provide symptom relief. ask your doctor about xeljanz xr. an "unjection™". nbc news has learned that several democratic house members are planning to invite sexual assault victims as guests to sit in the gallery during the president's state of the union address. let's get the inside scoop from "the new york times" writer at large and eugene scott, "washington post" political reporter. amy, this is a rather aggressive effort. it mirrors something that the trump team of course did in las vegas at that last debate with

bill clinton's accusers. but i gather that some of the democratic leaders are not that positive about this. >> exactly. i think they saw what happened at the golden globes and how you can bring awareness. there is a risk this could seem overly politicized. you don't want to roll out victims of sexual assault as political show ponies the way some people thought trump did when he brought bill clinton's accusers to the debate. if it's only democrats, you're right, it could backfire, and you'd hate to see that happen, give than these issues have been bubbling to the surface and desperately need the giant spotlight. >> in fact, eugene, nancy pelosi was asked about this today and said, quote, i don't think that would be helpful in terms of what we do for the american people. it's not always about donald trump, it's about what we do for

the american people. so there's obviously some nervousness about politizing the movement too much. >> we all realize sexual assault is an issue beyond donald trump and beyond capitol hill so if the desire is to get this conversation happening in newsrooms and then just working class environments and houses of faith, it's focusing too much on the partisan piece of it, could eclipse what they really want to happen across the country. >> amy, got to ask you, since you and i were on the campaign together in 2015 and 2016, what about the continual conversation from the president, when he had the leader from norway yesterday, about hillary clinton? >> well, it's just fascinating, this fixation on her. i think it gets back to a couple things. donald trump's whole mantra is he's winning. we're going to be tired of winning. he's winning so much. at the end of the day, you and i were there, i'll never forget that night, and hillary clinton won the popular vote, and i

think as long as he knows that, it's going to dog him. you know, you're seeing him bringing up whether it's huma's e-mails or the fbi investigation into hillary clinton's private server, and i feel like as long as donald trump wants to, you know, communicate that he is the winner, it's going to really dog him and his ego that hillary clinton won the popular vote. >> well, we're going to have to leave it there. more to come. thank you very much. amy chozick, thank you, eugene. more ahead. thank you so much. thank you! so we're a go? yes! we got a yes! what does that mean for purchasing?

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thanks for being with us. that does it for us. craig melvin picks it up next on msnbc. >> good afternoon to you. craig melvin here. at msnbc headquarters in new york. whiplash. with one tweet, president trump sends a house vote that was not expected to be dramatic into chaos. it is the most recent example of president trump leaving lawmakers in his own party confused. daca, the wall, and whether he'll talk to the special counsel. and that's just in the last 24 hours. and close the deal. optimism on capitol hill about getting a deal done on immigration, where the negotiations stand and whether the president may be bending on his demand for a wall. plus, back in the spotlight. jared kushner taking a seat at the table this hour with the president and the attorney general jeff sessions as well. the work they're hoping to get done on prison reform. we'll get to those stories. but