reports." right now on a special edition of "andrea mitchell reports" live from a north korea crisis summit in vancouver, canada, high stakes. world powers meeting here this hour in a desperate attempt to find a diplomatic solution to the korean crisis as kim jong-un's propaganda machine today calls president trump's twitter taunts the spasm of a lunatic. moments from now we will hear from the president, meeting today with the president of kazahkstan back at the white house even as his secretary of state here is trying to press north korea to give up its nuclear weapons at a meeting with 18 countries. shutdown showdown. a potential government shutdown appears more likely days from now, after talks over a dreamer compromise and that wall break down following the president's controversial remarks about immigration and immigrants from africa and haiti. just moments ago, the homeland security secretary, who was in the oval office that day, was

pressed on why she cannot recall the president's off-color comments even though she was right there. >> apologies, i don't remember specific word. what i was struck with frankly as i'm sure you were as well was just the general profanity that was used in the room by almost everyone. >> did you hear me use profanity? >> no, sir. neither did i. >> did you hear senator graham use profanity? >> i did hear tough language from senator graham. yes, sir. >> what did he say? >> he used tough language. he was impassioned. i think he was feeling very strongly about the issue as was everyone in the room, and to underscore a point, i think he was using some strong language. >> do you recall that the strong language he used repeated exactly what the president had said prior to that? >> i remember specific cusswords being used. >> and the insider steve bannon recently thrown off the trump train, answering questions behind closed doors this hour at the house intelligence

committee, as the president's closest aide hope hicks and his former campaign manager corey lewandowski both get ready for their turns in a few days. >> i have nothing to hide. i didn't collude or cooperate or coordinate with any russians, russian agency or russian government or anybody else to try to impact this election. good day. i'm andrea mitchell in vancouver, where the united states and canada are hosting a high stakes summit trying to find a diplomatic way out of this north korean nuclear crisis. secretary rex tillerson and his canadian counterpart have brought ministers from 20 countries including the u.s. and canada here to this west coast seaport. but the international meeting does not include two key players, china and russia. two critical players for any sanction crackdown or diplomatic agreement. all this while washington is only days away from a possible government shutdown after a

dreamer compromise collapsed in the wake of the president's blowup with democrats, who are furious about his comments about africa and haiti. joining me is leon panetta, former secretary of defense, former director of the cia under the obama administration, now chairman of the panetta institute for public policy in california. i should point out also a former member of congress and former white house chief of staff. so you certainly have the resume and the experience to talk about all of this. let's talk about this north korea meeting. secretary, first of all, having a meeting without china and russia when you are trying to crack down on cheating, smuggling, which is in their hands primarily, what's the point? >> well, there's no question that it would have been far better for the efforts to bring this whole issue to some kind of resolution to have had china and russia at the table, because they are key players and can

determine whether or not the sanctions are, in fact, going to work. but at the same time, i commend secretary tillerson and the canadians for pulling this group together. if 20 nations can sit down and come to an agreement as to what steps need to be taken and what positions need to be taken, i think that's an important alliance in the effort to ultimately reach some kind of resolution with north korea. >> secretary, defense secretary mattis was here last night for dinner to brief them on military preparations. there's a lot of reporting in the "new york times" and elsewhere that there have been military preps, that there is a real training imperative now to make sure that the u.s. is ready in case the worst happens. we see two b-52s landing in guam overnight. what is the status of american military preparation if there were a nuclear attack?

>> well, i think that is obviously a question that needs to be addressed with regard to our readiness for dealing with any contingency in north korea. look, we are a strong and powerful nation, but we have had serious budget problems in this country, it has impacted on the readiness of our force and so there are legitimate steps that have to be taken here to improve the training, the maintenance, our ability to be able to react to any kind of danger from north korea. i think one of the problems, frankly, is that we talk about a missile shield to protect our country, but the reality is that there is a high failure rate on many of those missiles and that we need to do much more if we are going to provide the kind of missile shield in order to protect the united states.

what happened in hawaii and the false alarm that went on should be a real wake-up call that we have an awful lot more to do in order to be prepared to deal with north korea. >> and while you were talking i want to point out to our viewers, that was the leader of kazahkstan arriving for a meeting with the president. they will be having a meeting, we will see a photo opportunity and joint statements coming up in this hour from the oval office. obviously some questions may well be asked, so that, too. following up on hawaii, one of the problems we now learn is that there was no procedure for a state, when there is a mistake such as this, to unilaterally issue the all-clear. they have to coordinate that with homeland and the fcc. there were no procedures for that. for 38 minutes the people of hawaii were terrified, people who we knew in washington that this was not a real missile threat, but a lot of people did not have that word. cell phones were blocked, communications were down,

mothers were huddling with their children in bathrooms and people were putting their children in manholes, into sewers, out of fear. how could we be this ill-prepared? this system was put in place in 2012. >> well, as i said, this was a wake-up call that indicates that we are not fully prepared to deal with every contingency, and it also, i think, stressed the point that the biggest danger in dealing with north korea is the danger of miscalculation and misjudgment. the tensions are so high that people may do things that will create some kind of backlash that could ultimately lead to war. take the example of this false alarm. if a false alarm goes out and the north koreans are not sure what's happening and may react to it, our military does not know what's happening and our

military may react, we could find ourselves in the middle of a nuclear war as the result of somebody pushing the wrong button. that's a reality. that's what we have to pay attention to and prepare ourselves with better procedures, better process and much better ability to be able to react should we face that kind of danger. >> in fact, best of our knowledge, officials say that that newly reinstituted hotline between north and south korea was not used in this emergency. that said, the pope, pope francis, was flying to chile overnight and he told reporters on his plane he distributed, his staff distributed pictures of nagasaki and he said i think we are at the very limit, i'm really afraid of this, one accident is enough to precipitate things. only yesterday, secretary munez said that we are closer to a nuclear incident than at any

stien time since the cuban missile crisis. what do you think? >> i think all of these warnings by individuals that are familiar with this kind of danger, i know mike mullen, the former chief of staff, said we are as close to war with north korea than we have ever been. all of these concerns are real. but we are living at a time when somehow part of this is just the fact that a lot of what people say and particularly what the president says is just not trusting, not trustworthy, and so we kind of casually live from day to day with this kind of threat, when in fact, we ought to be fully preparing ourselves in order to defend and protect this country. that's the first order of business. yes, we need to negotiate with the north koreans.

yes, we need to build alliances. but in order to be strong at the table, whatever table we're at, we have to make very sure to the north koreans that the united states, south korea, japan and our allies, are fully prepared to deal with any contingency from north korea, and right now, we can't say that. >> i want to ask you about some of the domestic issues which you dealt with so often in your other roles. i also want to ask you about something that came out of the regime today, saying the president's tweet on january 2nd about having a bigger nuclear button than kim jong-un's nuclear button was the quote, spasm of a lunatic. so that's the rhetoric we have got back and forth. >> i think it's that kind of rhetoric from both sides that is increasing the tensions between the united states and north korea.

that kind of language very frankly has no place in what is a very dangerous situation. this ought to be a moment of seriousness. it ought to be a moment where the united states and the rest of the world seriously tries to deal with this threat from north korea. when the president uses that kind of language and when the north korean leader responds to that kind of language, all that does, very frankly, is increase the tensions between both countries. >> speaking of language, the president's language the other day in the oval office with a bipartisan group, at least one democrat, senator durbin, on the dreamers. you are the son of immigrants, the proud son of italian americans. i want to ask you about the dreamers, the human stories that we are hearing, the fear that these young people are living with, and the fact that there is no deal now and it is completely overshadowed by real anger over

the president's comments, his denials, who said what to whom, and the racist remarks that were made. >> andrea, i think this country is suffering from a very serious vacuum of leadership. i often tell the students at our institute that in a democracy, we govern either by leadership or by crisis, and if leadership is not there, then we will govern by crisis. unfortunately, that's what's happening right now. in dealing with these daca students who both parties recognize have to be protected, they want to be part of the american dream, they want to be able to establish themselves, whether they are students, whether they are in the military. these are innocent children who are trying to become part of america, and we need to protect

them. the same thing is true frankly for the c.h.i.p. program. this is a program that deals with the health care of children, that needs to be funded, and you've got parents that are very worried about whether or not those funds are going to be available. these are serious issues affecting the american people, and the congress and the president at the same time are fighting over what was said or not said in the oval office. frankly, that is not what the discussion ought to be. it ought to be on what do we do in order to fix the problem, in order to be able to help these daca students, in order to be able to help the families of c.h.i.p. children, in order to basically fund the government so that social security checks and veterans benefits go out. that's what the leadership in the congress ought to be focused on. instead, they are focused on the politics of the moment and that

makes this a very dangerous moment not only internationally, but it makes it dangerous in terms of our domestic politics. >> secretary panetta, thank you very much for being with us from the panetta institute. thank you. >> thank you. joining me now, nbc's kristen welker at the white house. robert costa, national political reporter for "the washington post." moderator of "washington week" on pbs and "the washington post" columnist david ignatius. lots to unpack there. what's the latest from the white house on whether or not there is going to be any kind of possible deal? i know republicans are talking about a short-term continuing resolution. are democrats going to hold out for some dreamer relief? >> reporter: the strategy here at the white house right now is to try to turn up the heat on democrats, to effectively say that if there is any type of a shutdown, that democrats would be to blame. earlier today, sarah huckabee

sanders, the press secretary, was asked about all of this and she said look, it is up to democrats to come to the table on this. the reason why is because republicans need democrat support in order to get that spending legislation passed on friday. of course, the government runs out of money on friday. democrats are saying that they won't agree to any deal unless it includes a fix to daca. so that's their strategy right now. they of course want to avoid a government shutdown so they are playing a bit of hardball in that regard. but that controversy over whether the president essentially spoke ill and used vulgarities in terms of talking about african nations is weighing heavily over all of this, making democrats less likely to come back to the table and negotiate with the president and with republicans. we have to see how this plays out. sarah sanders was asked if president trump was still open to negotiating with durbin, with the democrats. she indicated that yes, in fact he is. so they want to avoid this

government shutdown but again, turning up the heat on democrats to try to get that done. >> robert costa, help us with some of your exclusive reporting about what the president said to some of his close friends when he was calling around, what the white house is reporting internally about the events and what led into that development. i wanted to also play what dick durbin did in questioning at the judiciary committee today secretary of homeland security nielsen, because she was in the room and is trying not to say what the president said. let's play that and talk to you on the other side. >> -- strong language, there was -- apologieapologies, i don remember specific word. what i was struck with frankly as i'm sure you were as well, is just the general profanity that was used in the room by almost everyone. >> did you hear me use profanity? >> no, sir. neither did i. >> did you hear senator graham use profanity? >> i did hear tough language from senator graham, yes, sir.

>> what did he say? >> he used tough language. he was impassioned. i think he was feeling very strongly about the issue, as was everyone in the room. and to underscore a point, i think he was using some strong language. >> do you recall that the strong language he used repeated exactly what the president had said prior to that? >> i remember specific cusswords being used by a variety of members. >> i'm not going to ask you to say those words here, but i will just say for the record senator graham spoke up in a way that i respect very much, countering what the president had said about countries in africa, reminding the president that his family did not come to america with great skills or wealth, but they came here as most families do, looking for a chance to prove themselves and make this a better nation, and a defensive senator graham, his strong words repeated the exact words used by the president which you cannot remember. >> robert costa, tell us the

background there, your exclusive reporting today in "the washington post." >> we pieced together a portrait of the white house in the hours after that entire episode and the president did call some of his advisers, his friends outside of the white house, and gauged their reaction to his reported vulgarity, the story "the washington post" stands by and that's been reported elsewhere. he was speaking aloud in some of these conversations we are told about how it could play with his conservative base. he's since denied actually saying that tough language, as the secretary said during her testimony, but he was certainly thinking about it and talking about it in the hours after that exchange. >> and when we look at all of this, david, how does it affect not just obviously the shutdown and the dreamers most immediately, but the president's ability to work with other countries, other leaders, certainly there was a very

strong reaction in london, we saw how quickly he canceled the trip that had been scheduled for him to not announce but scheduled for him to go to london? >> i think it's a very unusual and potentially difficult situation for the u.s. i can never remember britain, traditionally our closest ally, people rejoicing at the president not visiting. i noted with interest, as you probably did, that the state department under secretary for public affairs said that ambassadors had been instructed to tell representatives of countries in africa, presumably also haiti, not to pay attention to the president's remarks they didn't reflect the views of the united states, almost an official disavowal of the president's statements. finally, i think the world is watching the dysfunction of our political system. last week, what began on tuesday was an effort to get bipartisan

compromise on this key dreamers legislation. by thursday and friday, it had completely collapsed and we are again in the situation of paralysis, cliffhanger, will the government shut down. that's what people see and it's a government that isn't working. >> david, thank you. robert and kristen, of course at the white house. coming up, misfire, just days after the accidental missile alert that sent hawaii into a tailspin, another false alarm today, this time in japan. you're watching a special edition of "andrea mitchell reports" live from vancouver, canada. the nuclear summit. this is frank. sup! this is frank's favorite record. this is frank's dog. and this is frank's record shop. frank knowns northern soul, but how to set up a limited liability company... what's that mean? not so much. so he turned to his friends at legalzoom. yup! they hooked me up. we helped with his llc, contracts, and some other stuff that's part of running a business.

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president trump in the oval office today with the president of kazahkstan. let's listen. >> -- and it's really terrific what you've done. thank you for being here. [ speaking a foreign language ] [ speaking a foreign language ]

>> translator: first of all, mr. president, thank you very much for your invitation. it's a great honor to be here. i would like to start with congratulating you with your first anniversary in the office. that year was very productive and you achieved a lot for your country. >> thank you. [ speaking a foreign language ] >> translator: and i'm the first president from my part of the world to be received in the white house. it's a great honor and kazahkstan has always enjoyed a

very good political relations and we appreciate american support for our independence and territorial integrity and for the 26 years of our independence, we enjoyed a very good, strong partnership with the country. we appreciate that very much. today's visit is witness to that friendship and partnership. and i'm looking to the fruitful discussion with you on the topics that are of mutual interest to our both countries. and i do believe that after this visit, the economic cooperation between the two countries will grow even further. and once again, thank you for your hospitality and i wish you success. >> thank you very much. we have been talking a little bit about the economies and our economy and as the president has

already said and has said again and will say again, we have broken a lot of records, we are breaking another one today. the stock market is way up, jobs are back, black unemployment is the best it's ever been in recorded history. it's been fantastic. and it's the best number we've had with respect to black unemployment. we've never seen anything even close so we are very honored by that. our country's doing very well. economically we have never had anything like it. i don't believe we have ever been in a position, and the president was so saying, we have never been in a position like we have. many countries, many companies are moving back from other countries, where they left the united states and they're now moving back into the united states. we had some big announcement recently with chrysler going back to michigan. we had toyota coming in and is going to build a massive plant. we have many, many companies coming in and they're building in the united states and that means jobs.

so i appreciate all the nice things you've said, and i look forward to our lunch and i look forward to our discussions. with that, i just want to thank everybody for being here. >> thank you, everyone. thanks, everyone. >> thank you very much. thank you very much. i want them to come in from everywhere. everywhere. thank you very much, everybody. >> thank you, everyone. jim, thank you. thanks, everyone. >> reporter: mr. president -- >> thank you, everyone. >> no idea. really no idea. >> thanks, everyone. time to exit. >> reporter: what about steve bannon -- >> jim, thank you. everyone please exit. thank you. >> with a question about whether he wanted countries, immigrants from norway but not from africa and haiti, he said he wants everyone and then he was asked a question about steve bannon, i believe that was the question to which he said i have no idea.

steve bannon of course is testifying or talking to members of the house intelligence committee today. joining me now, stephen hadley, former national security adviser to president george w. bush, senior adviser for international affairs, and ambassador chris hill, former u.s. ambassador to south korea and former secretary of state for each asian and pacific affairs. you are very familiar with these oval office situations but here we are, having a summit on north korea on the threat a few days after there was an accidental alert state-wide in hawaii, and today, another accidental alert on the japanese broadcast system, nhk, for which they have apologized. there is obviously a great deal of nervousness in the asia pacific region as well as here. secretary tillerson said today in the opening of this summit that we have to get north korea to de-nuclearize before we can have any progress. is that the right threshold?

>> well, it's the right threshold for secretary tillerson to take. that is the position of the administration. that is the position of the u.n. security council, variety of resolutions. it's been the position of the last two, actually three u.s. administrations. so we are not even at the table, the negotiations have not even begun at this point. this is an effort to try to increase the pressure on north korea so they will come to the table and so that we can get an agreement that they will actually stick to. we have had agreements to denuclearize north korea twice now, once during the clinton administration, once during the bush administration. we couldn't keep north korea in either of them. so as a statement of the goal, that's exactly right. that's what secretary tillerson should be saying and we'll see whether the kinds of pressure he's trying to get the international community to put on north korea will result in some kind of negotiation. >> chris hill, can they do this without china and russia?

china holds the keys and they have not been invited and they said today in their foreign ministry they are very angry about this meeting. russia blasted it yesterday. >> well, i'm sure the chinese and russians are not happy with the meeting and i'm sure they will do all they can to say the meeting is somehow counterproductive. i think it's very useful to get together the countries that all fought on the side of south korea. i think it's especially important, although the timing is a bit of a coincidence, that just last week, the south koreans began to talk to the north koreans. obviously the north koreans are, in addition to sending some olympians to south korea, which was very positive from the point of view of the south koreans, i think the north koreans are probably going to be looking for some sanctions relief or humanitarian assistance or something from the south. they seldom do anything without giving someone a bill. but i think it was very useful, actually, to have all these countries meeting at a time and reaffirming their commitment to sanctions, because if this is going to be solved, it's going to be solved on several

different avenues. i think sanctions is one of them. and certainly it's a long-standing, no kidding relentless diplomatic dialogue with the chinese is essential, and my criticism is not that somehow china was not invited to vancouver today, but we have not had that kind of sustained discussion with the chinese. >> chris -- steve hadley, sorry, steve hadley, what about the fact that the president, both leaders, the president with his january 2nd tweet about his nuclear button is bigger than kim jong-un's and the regime today responding calling that a spasm of a lunatic, the tweets back and forth are not helping anyone. >> look, i think that is right. i think, though, we are spending too much time focusing on the tweets and not enough time focusing on the diplomacy and not enough time focusing on what

secretary panetta was talking about earlier on your show, which is we don't know whether there's a diplomatic solution. north korea's capability poses a risk to our friends and allies and to us, and we need to be focusing now on what we need to do to deter north korea, if there is not a diplomatic solution, and to defend and protect our allies and ourselves against this capability. i think the tweets are not helpful, in my view, but i think we are spending too much time covering the tweets, not enough time covering the realities of the situation and what needs to be done about it. >> with all due respect, the tweets can affect the reality if it prompts a response from the regime. >> no question. >> one other question is whether or not we have the intelligence capability to fully understand what north korea is doing in cyber as well as the nuclear arena. the "new york times" reported we have underestimated repeatedly the intelligence community

denies that. you were a consumer of the intelligence. do you think we are on top of this issue? >> is this for me? >> steve hadley, i'm sorry. >> look, north korea's a very difficult intelligence target. it's kind of a bit of a black box. we know some things. do we know as much as we would like to know, obviously not. but we know enough to know about the seriousness of this threat and we know enough to have a policy and strategy for dealing with it. certainly we need to sort of work the intelligence issues, but you know, there's no surprise here. this capability that north korea has has been widely demonstrated. it's there for all to see. the challenge is clear. we need a strategy to deal with it. i agree with you, the language is not helpful, but i think we're spending too much time focusing on the language, not

enough time on the threat and what we are going to do about it. >> steve hadley, chris hill, can't get you guys confused. thank you both very much. thanks for being with us today. meanwhile, back in washington, steve bannon facing questions today from the house intelligence committee. closed door meeting. president trump's former top strategist likely being grilled on don junior's meeting with the kremlin-linked russian lawyer which bannon called treasonous in "fire and fury." betsy woodruff joins us, along with jeremy peters, "new york times" political reporter and msnbc contributor. jeremy, the "new york times" is now reporting bannon has also been subpoenaed to testify to mueller and his team. what can you tell us about that? >> the significance of that subpoena is that bannon is the first person that we know of inside the trump inner circle to receive a subpoena. the others who have been called to answer questions by mueller and his investigators have done

so voluntarily and in informal settings. this would seem to be a game changer, because it represents possibly an escalation in robert mueller's hardball tactics. you saw him raid, of course, the apartment of paul manafort and these acts may be, we think, designed to pressure steve bannon into cooperating. it's sending a signal to him look, we expect you to tell us what you know. now, what we don't know is, of course, what steve bannon knows. he was there during key moments of planning during the trump campaign. however, he didn't join the campaign until mid-august, two and a half months before election day, and he was not around during the two most significant events that mueller is known to be looking at, that

is the firing of james comey which steve bannon advised against, and the involvement of russian investigators in the campaign. so we are not really quite sure what steve bannon is going to be able to tell mueller at this point. >> betsy, one other aspect of bannon's knowledge, though, might well be his connection to cambridge analytica and whether or not that data group, the data mining group during the campaign that was under jared's leadership, whether that group was working or getting any kind of targeting information from the russians. >> exactly. i reported several months ago that alexander nix, who heads cambridge analytica, offered the services of that company to julian assange to try to help disperse e-mails wikileaks may or may not have obtained. wikileaks of course as an institution is deeply troubling

to the american intelligence community. mike pompeo has described it as a hostile non-state actor and additionally, the fact that it reached out to wikileaks is really important for bannon, because he worked hand in glove with that data analytics firm during the campaign, going as far back as the republican primaries. so he absolutely has an insider's view of how that firm works, what it could have been doing and undoubtedly, that's of interest -- >> i'm going to jump in for just a second because lindsey graham is now questioning the secretary at judiciary. >> -- and have the discussion, but there are some immediate needs i think -- >> i agreed with that. but he said he wanted to do comprehensive. >> he said he was open to it. absolutely. >> i think he said he wanted to. do you remember him saying we need to be bipartisan when it comes to immigration reform? >> very important. >> okay. he still believes that? >> yes. >> do you remember him saying the word love?

>> i don't remember him saying the word love. i remember him saying care. i have heard him use that before, compassion. >> we will get the tape. he said love. we should do this with love. and so what i heard tuesday was a president who seemed to understand it had to be bipartisan, phase one is just a down payment, it needs to be comprehensive, we need to go to merit-based immigration, we need to secure our border, we need to be fair to the illegal immigrants and we need to emphasize security but he said love. thursday, are you aware that senator durbin and the president talked at 10:00 around that time thursday morning? >> only through news reporting after the fact. >> okay. are you aware of the fact that dick durbin called me and said i had the best conversation ever with the president, we should follow up on it? >> i am now. >> okay. so is everybody else.

are you aware of the fact i said great, dick, i'll call the white house and see if we can set up a meeting? you are now? >> yes, sir. >> so what happened between 10:00 and 12:00? >> i don't know. since i didn't -- >> i don't, either. i'm going to find out and i'm not going to ask you, because between 10:00 and 12:00, we went from having conversations between senator durbin which i believe every word, and the president that was very hopeful and by the time we got there, something had happened, so tuesday, we had a president that i was proud to golf with, call my friend, who understood immigration had to be bipartisan, you had to have border security as essential, you have border security with a wall, but he also understood the idea that we had to do it with compassion. now, i don't know where that guy went. i want him back. as we go forward, how does this

movie end? what's going to happen? >> i hope that we can find a legislative package that addresses those four pillars that it appeared to me -- >> let's go through those. border security. do you expect that the democrats will give the president everything he wants for border security in phase one? >> no, sir. that's why we took the priority he issued in the fall and pulled them down. >> merit-based immigration. do you believe we will move to merit-based immigration system in phase one? >> completely and fully, no. >> okay. do you agree with me that the reason we walked is the democrats give us everything we want on bothered and merrder an immigration and go to nuclear family, they won't have any leverage when it comes to the rest of the 11 million? >> i have not seen any proposal where they give us everything we need. >> understand i deal with them a

lot, they're not. i'm going to tell you, i'm not going to give the 11 million legal status and hope one day y'all deal with us on border and merit-based immigration. do you understand leverage? >> yes, sir. >> you think the president understands leverage? >> yes, sir. >> so here's what i would suggest to you. in phase one, to expect my friends on the other side to go comprehensive for us and daca for them, it's not going to happen. i'm telling my friends on the other side, daca and nothing else is not going to happen. the sweet spot is daca plus more than the daca kids and making down payments on border security, moving slowly but surely toward a merit-based immigration system to be followed by phase two. can i describe phase two as i see it. >> yes, sir. please. >> thank you very much. phase two as i see it is we move further toward border security

in its full sense, that we begin to find a pathway forward for the 11 million not included in phase one who are not crooks, drug dealers, rapists, felons, which is the overwhelming majority of the 11 million, that once we get a glide path for them, i expect in return that when they are through the system will have a merit-based immigration system based on the economic needs of the country, that we will have a secure border and we will increase legal immigration so people in the future don't have to cheat. does that sound pretty reasonable? >> it sounds like a phase two. >> okay. so i'm going to try to get you through phase one, that the president watching, i'm still in the phone book. don't give my number out but call me. this has turned into an s-show and we need to get back to being a great country, where democrats

and republicans will work together to do something that we should have done years ago. to the 700,000 young people, some young, some older, we are not going to leave you behind. i don't know how this movie ends, but you're going to be taken care of. to those who wanted again to fix a broken immigration system, you are going to get something, too. i don't know how we right the ship. dr. king said something pretty poignant about us. he said we came on different ships, we're all in the same boat now. so here's my hope. that we can find through phase one a reasonable down payment on border security, begin to correct some of the problems when it comes to chain migration, deal with the daca population fairly and with a sense of compassion, and set up phase two and all i would say,

madam secretary, we need your help. >> sir, i have been ready. i have offered to meet with anybody who would loik ike to m with me to further this discussion. we need to do it. >> i will take you up on that offer. to the country at large, things are going to get better. it's not going to end this way. the president ran hot, i think i know why. something happened between tuesday and thursday and we'll get to the bottom of that. quite frankly, i got pretty passionate and i ran a little hot, too. somebody needs to fix this problem. obama couldn't do it. bush couldn't do it. both of them to their great credit, tried. you think president trump can do this? >> i think he wants to do it. yes, sir. >> i think dick durbin has been one of the best people you could ever hope to work with, that he's a decent, honest man, a liberal democrat, yeah, he said yeah, and i'm a conservative

republican, but on this and other things, we can find a way forward. so mr. president, i'm going to end today where i ended tuesday. close this deal. thank you, madam secretary. >> thank you, sir, for your leadership on this. >> i call on secretary harris. >> i don't know if that's a demotion or promotion. >> dramatic moment as you can see. lindsey graham praising dick durbin, appealing to the president to go back to where they were on tuesday with a bipartisan negotiation and actually revealing that he and dick durbin had talked at 10:00 that morning, that they had a deal and we're going to the white house, then got blindsided as you just saw. they want the to try and get ba and put it back on the table. as you can see, this was a very emotional hearing. part of this was also senator cory booker from new jersey speaking out against the president's comments.

>> will the occasion demand speaking out like lindsey graham did, and acting accordingly. this idea that the commander in chief of this country can, with broad brushes, talk about certain nations and thus cast a shadow over the millions of americans who are from those communities, and that you can even say in your testimony the norwegians were preferred by him because they're so hard-working -- >> i didn't -- >> excuse me, let me finish. let me draw a connection of why that matters. i'm sure you remember the six words from our president, the six words that he said after charleston, virginia last summer. people marching with tiki torches and hate, when he said they are very fine people on both sides. >> kasie hunt is outside the hearing room with lindsey

graham. let's listen. >> i wanted to do security and i want to do the daca kids with love. security and compassion, i want to do comprehensive in phase two. lt let's get started in phase one, not get tangled up and move through and get comprehensive bipartisan immigration reform. 10:00 in the morning he was very much in that mindset according to senator durbin, and i believe every word of it. he said the president, had a great meeting with the president, wanted to know if lindsey was on board with the agreement and i was, because we had reached agreement among ourselves. by 12:00, things had changed. i'm not going to talk about the meeting. i know what i heard and i know what i said. and i will try to figure out the best i can what happened between 10:00 and 12:00. i will say i don't think the president was well served by his staff. i think the president that we saw tuesday, that that donald trump exists and somehow, by 12:00 on thursday, something

happened and i don't think he was well served by his staff, but he's responsible for the way he conducts himself and so am i. can't blame that on the staff. but i do believe his staff was -- >> would that be general kelly? >> pretty much missed the mark here. i think general kelly's a fine man but he's also part of the staff. so now, where do we go? i think there's a chance to reconstruct this, to find a way to get phase one done. senator grassley asked me about deporting people who are criminals. fine. i think we are doing that as we speak. that's something to consider. now, the young man who got deported yesterday, 39 years old apparently wasn't a felon, is something we need to look at. so to the 700,000 plus daca kids, we are not going to leave you behind, we are not going to let this end like it is and to those who have been desirous of a more secure border, you will

get something, too, because it has to be done together. i don't think you can do daca without border security. i don't think you should. i think we should be making a down payment on merit-based immigration. >> in this setting -- >> between tuesday and thursday, do you mean the president got bad advice from someone on his staff? >> i think somebody on his staff gave him really bad advice between 10:00 to 12:00 on thursday. i think the president i saw on tuesday is the guy i play golf with. i actually like the guy. he's actually funny. i thought he commanded the room. and the conversation at 10:00 was pretty consistent. something happened between 10:00 and 12:00. i like nielsen, she's a nice person. but here's what's going to matter. how does it end? does it end with the government shutting down? does it end with the 700,000 kids being thrown to the wolves?

no. does it end without any effort to secure the border? no. so it's not going to end poorly, it's going to end well. let me tell you why it well. 80% of the people would like to see these kids have a better life. 80% of the people like to begin to fix a broken immigration system. they're going to demand we do better. what we need to do better is a reliable partner at the white house. somebody like the president who showed up on tuesday. we cannot do this with people who have an irrational view of immigration. >> is steven milnler in that category, sir? >> kacie hunt is -- i know -- if you can hear me, just to quickly wrap this up, obviously we know what happened because there's been a lot of reporting. steven miller and all the others

including the chief of staff. but the bottom line is, between now and friday night, will democrats insist on some protection for the dreamers? will the republicans give in? will there be a government shutdown or a continuing resolution to kick this down until february 19th as republicans are now asking for? >> andrea, you have highlighted all of the critical questions there. and i have to say, what senator graham just had to say i think is a significant turn of events here. and i think, you know, senator graham knows how to talk to trump. i think what senator graham just did there, coming out to these cameras san s and sending a cle message. i think the question now, what does the president do with that? it's pretty clear. we try to ask if he was referring to steven miller in those tough comments he made about the president's staff. he refused to say that specifically. he did include general kelly as part of the comments that he made there. but clearly senator graham making the decision to go out

and say look, we still need to return to this framework we have been working on. we'll see if that message is effective here. andrea. >> thanks so very much. so you heard it there. only days until the end of the fiscal budgeting and they have to do something before friday night or there will be a government shutdown. there could be another continuing resolution. the ball is now back on the president's table. back in his ballpark. president trump meanwhile talked yesterday to china's president xi about the north korean crisis. china is not here in vancouver. joining me now, the senior policy adviser to secretary of state rex tillerson and a number of senior positions in the administration. about to throw his hat in the ring for the senate. brian, a lot is in play here. can you get something done without china and russia? >> this is not an alternative to working with china and russia. we've been working pretty closely with china and russia in the run-up to this ministerial

in vancouver. everything we're doing here is to better implement the same sanctions regime that china and russia have supported in the u.n. security council. >> but they are cheating. we've seen ship to ship movements. >> we'll called them out when that's happened. we certainly want all u.n. member states to do a better job of implementing the security council sanctions they voted for. we're very pleased overall with the sanctions regime we've built. we've invited nations from every region, almost every region of the world here to vancouver to discuss how we can intensify this global campaign against north korea's nuclear missile program. >> how complicating -- how does it complicate all of this, the president's tweets and now the response today from the regime calling it the sbpasm of a lunatic, about the nuclear button being bigger than kim jong-un's. would you be a lot better off if the present weren't tweeting about kim jong-un? >> no, because i think the

president is signaling to the world and especially to north korea that we are serious about defending ourselves against the nuclear threat that north korea presents. the preferred option is always a diplomatic solution which is why we're here in vancouver today. i think the president has given the secretary of state a great deal of diplomatic latitude to achieve the kind of peaceful resolution to this. but that has to be backed upped by credible military options on the table and the president's done that. >> the briefing from secretary mattis last night, a rival of two b-52s in guam. there's certainly a military deterrent. at the same time, you've just had this terrible false alarm in hawaii. systems are not in place. there haven't been exercises from homeland security to other cabinet principals to even test some of these systems. >> that state system clearly had some problems that hawaii has owned up to and they're committed to resolving. we i think enjoy very good coordination inside the federal

government, with allies, partners, certainly with korea and japan to make sure we're in a state of readiness. the hawaii, i believe, it will be the last time something like that happens. >> japan had a false alarm today broadcast on their television network. >> well, i'm sure japan is going to address it very quickly in the same way hawaii did. we are all committed to making sure that we're in a state of readiness. we're doing our -- we're doing what we can to tweak the system to make sure we're ready. >> isn't the problem that there could be with tensions so high, that there could be a north korean reaction to an accidental announcement in hawaii? they could have made a move. we could have then made a move. there are real concerns that we are as close to a nuclear confrontation as we've ever been in decades. >> i think that when you look at the coordination that we have with heads of government, with foreign ministers, defense ministers, i'm not worried at all about a miscalculation. we've got a daily coordination

in the region, around the world. we've got 24 ministers here in vancouver to make sure something like that never happens. >> what do you want to company out of this meeting today? >> out of today's meeting, global solidarity in favor of the pressure campaign against north korea so that we can denuclearize the korean peninsula. and today they're going to be sharing ideas about how we can intensify the pressure, deepen north korea's financial, diplomatic and economic isolation. so that their risk calculus changes. and we can get to a point where north korea is no longer provoking the world. >> is that undercut by south korea having these talks again tomorrow with north korea on cultural exchanges and the olympics? >> well, those are -- those are appropriate to be discussing the olympics and some of the cultural exchanges around the olympics. we have seen no sign that north korea is ready to engage in any negotiations about its nuclear program.

it's confined to the olympics and also to cultural exchanges. >> could they be the first step toward sitting down with north korea? >> it's a positive step. we've seen north korea take advantage of goodwill gestures for decades. we have internalized a lot of the mistakes made over prior years. we will not fall again for these same sort of tricks. >> what do they have to do to prove it's worth sitting down with them? >> they need to earn their way back to the negotiating table. and they need to take very concrete steps to show that they have changed their approach about nuclear and missile programs. >> no test, no missile firings? >> there is a range of things i think north korea can do to show it has turned the corner. and we have not seen that yet.

>> how will you find out? >> we certainly have a diplomatic channel that remains open. we are always listening in that channel. if north korea wants to communicate to us, they know how to do that. talks are different than negotiations. we have learned a lot of the mistakes in the past about how north korea games negotiations. we're not going to fall for that again. >> the president speaking, joint statement with the president of kazakhstan. president trump. >> mr. president, thank you for visiting with us. we have very important discussions going on. for more than a quarter century, the united states has seen the strong sovereign and independent nation of kazakhstan as a valued

friended an a strategic partner in central asia. as we're honored and we are truly honored to be the first country to recognize kazakhstany independence on christmas day 1991. it's a long time ago but not that long. you've made incredible strides. since that time, the united states and kazakhstan have worked together to advance peace and security in the region and far beyond the region.