"morning joe" starts right now. how do you forget when the president of the united states uses that word? >> senators cotton and perdue have disputed what you've said about this. >> well, they're wrong and they know they're wrong. >> i saw what senator durbin said that he stood by every word he said. so let me be clear. i stand by every word i said. the difference is i'm right. >> oh wow, we've seen plenty of this from the white house, but now a united states senator is looking directly at the american people and lying. good morning, everyone, it is wednesday, january 17th. welcome to "morning joe." with us, we have political writer for "the new york times" nick compasori. former treasury official and "morning joe" economic analyst steve rattner, nbc news capitol hill correspondent and host of kasie d.c. on msnbc. we will do that even in the

darkest days. and joe, we have breaking nbc reporting about steve bannon this morning. planning to cooperate with a special counsel robert mueller and the russia probe. we have reporters standing by on that huge story. i would like to you frame out what we saw yesterday. we had lindsey graham being lindsey graham again speaking out against the president's staff. we've got the shutdown looming in three days. it feels like, like something is happening. >> well, we've seen the president's attempt to corrode basic constitutional norms over the past year. that's been a concern. but now we're actually seeing again, the united states senator who i've always liked and had great respect for, actually denying something that all of washington knows happened. fox news even said it happened. you know why? because the president of the united states, according to

conservatives, was calling around after it happened, bragging about using the words that senator cotton now denies that he used. white house officials even said that the word or variation of the word was used. and so -- that's, that's bad. obviously that's concerning. but then you have the secretary of the department of homeland security testifying that she remembers everything in the meeting except for this one thing that everybody remembers in the meeting and she even remembers lindsey graham using that word. but he used the word in telling the president of the united states why he shouldn't use the word in deny graigrating these countries. and on top of that you had the very trumpian scene this is how it's happening. you have the department of homeland security secretary saying -- that she didn't even

know if norway was predominantly white. as a country. it's, it's -- you've seen it before. where people with reputations throw those reputations out the window. for 15 minutes with a president who will show absolutely no loyalty back. there is i think, mika, this is the take-away, we're at a point where we can't believe anything that comes out of the white house. as an objective fact. you just can't. and you can't believe anything unfortunately, that trump defenders on capitol hill are saying. and -- it's very depressing. it's very sad. because there are a lot of good people that seem all too willing to throw their reputations away for a president who is not worth it. and will show no loyalty back. >> yeah. i think it's depressing and sad. it also could have devastating

long-term consequences. i don't think, because we've never seen something like this in our lifetimes to this extent. i don't think anyone knows where this could lead. but i think we have to start looking at history. we'll talk about all of this in just a moment. and break down exactly where this is going. but first, breaking news in the russia investigation. after his unfiltered comments created a firestorm for the trump administration, former chief strategist steve bannon told congressional investigators that the white house told him he could not answer their questions in the russia probe, leading congress to subpoena his testimony along with another reported subpoena from the mueller investigation. bannon was behind closed doors at the house intelligence committee, for nine and a half hours, where lawmakers say he told them that he was willing to answer, but could not at the direction of the white house.

the committee immediately issued a subpoena to compel his testimony. but bannon attorney william burke conferred with white house officials who continued to insist that the bannon still should not answer the committee's questions. yesterday the white house said this about bannon's testimony. >> no one has encouraged him to be anything but transparent but there is a process of what that looks like and what that process should go through. we've been completely cooperative throughout this entire process. we're going to continue to be cooperative. but we're also going to maintain some of the executive privileges here at the white house that have been practiced for decades. and that need to be maintained. >> the subpoena remains in effect. there are questions that we asked that were not answered. and we're going to resolve those issues to get the answers to our questions. we're going to get the answers from mr. bannon that we did not get answered today.

>> the scope of this assertion of privilege if that's what it is, is breathtaking. if the white house is permitted to maintain that kind of a gag rule on a witness no congressional investigation could ever be effective. so this obviously can't stand. we expect to have mr. bannon back in. we hope very soon. with a different position by the white house speaker. this position is completely unsustainable. >> let's bring in nbc news chief correspondent hallie jackson and "new york times" reporter michael schmidt. who broke the story. and hallie, let's begin with you. new reporting on how it went down, what's next for bannon. on what authority exactly was the white house telling steve bannon not to testify yesterday? >> so this was a discussion that the white house, i'm told had been having with the house intelligence committee about what exactly bannon might or might not be able to say and

apparently instructed bannon to avoid certain questions related to his time at the white house. that's one of the subpoenas, the congressional subpoena. there's also the grand jury subpoena from the special counsel arguably and potentially more impactful here. we have new reporting on how exactly all of this went down. a source familiar with the proceedings says fbi agents actually showed up to bannon's house last tuesday intending to talk to him serve him with the subpoena. unaware that he had just retained counsel. william burke, who represents two other people related to all of this, white house counsel don mcgann and former white house chief of staff, reince priebus. bannon said i have a lawyer, you got to go through him. the subpoena was served to burke. the subpoena does compel bannon as michael schmidt broke and reported and we'll talk about, it compels him to speak before a grand jury. but bob mueller could still give bannon potentially an option, to

voluntarily interview just like we've seen so many other people connected to this trump administration do. i'm told by a source close to bannon that if that option is offered, bannon will take that and do this interview and the timing of that is very soon. likely sometime before the end of the month. the question of course is, why did bannon get the subpoena? so far as we know, bannon is the only person actually served a subpoena by the grand jury. what is that about? three people with knowledge of the case have raised the possibility that perhaps it is because mueller is in essence attempting to thwart any possibility of potential intimidation for example or pressure by the white house to get bannon not to comply or not to answer certain questions. so that may in their view, these people's view, be the reason for this. although it's still not clear. so there's a lot of sort of back and forth as to how this went down. the bottom line is, bannon is going to have to talk with bob mueller's staff. bob mueller himself one way or the other. in front of the grand jury or voluntarily in an interview. >> a couple of option there is.

good reporting this morning, hallie jackson, thank you very much. >> michael schmidt, to you on this. it appears the white house is exerting influence still on steve bannon, not allowing him to testify before the house intel mitty. not showing up or giving answers to questions. on what authority is that executive privilege? how is the white house exerting that authority? >> when it comes to mueller, the white house has said they're not exerting any type of privilege. they're going to give mueller everything that he wants. and in the hopes that the sooner they give him this stuff, the sooner that the president will be cleared. in terms of capital hill, the white house has had a different posture and they've tried to exert many more privileges on testimony. that's what it looked like came up yesterday. the white house was saying that they didn't want bannon to answer certain questions, to speak about certain things. at the end of the day it doesn't really matter that much. because mueller is going to get whatever he wants, regardless of what the white house tries to do and i don't even anticipate them trying to stop bannon. eventually the hill may get

stuff from bannon. at the end of the day it comes down to what mueller is going to do. the house intelligence committee investigation, which obviously gets a lot of attention in the press, has been marred by bitter partisan fighting that has gone on and has crippled it. the senate has its investigation going on. it's gotten a little bit less attention. but at the end of the day, mueller will get from bannon what he wants. and bannon will have to cooperate. so all of these questions about privilege will ultimately i don't think matter a ton. >> michael schmidt. thank you. we're going to be bringing you back at the half hour for the story of the former c.i.a. officer arrested, suspected of spying for china. you've got reporting on that, we look forward to it. right now to yesterday's hearing with the secretary of homeland security, kristen nielson. she was in the room last thursday when the president is said to have made the racist comments about haiti. and african nations. but yesterday she could recall only portions of that meeting.

>> madam secretary, you were in the room. you're under oath. did president trump use this word? or a substantially similar word to describe certain countries? >> i did not hear that word used, no, sir. >> that's not the question. did he use anything similar 0 to that describing certain countries? >> the conversation was very impassioned. i don't dispute that the president was using tough language. >> you testified under oath that you did not hear the president use that word at the meeting, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> is it possible he said the word at the meeting and you didn't hear it? >> anything is possible, yes, ma'am. >> and did you hear him say the word s-house? >> no, i did not. >> so is it possible he also said that word and you didn't hear it? >> again, it's possible. it was a meeting of 12 people, there was cross-talk. i unfortunately was not the meeting as you know is unscheduled. so last-minute, when i was

notified, i had to clear my schedule. i came in a bit late. so anything is possible. >> you said on fox news that the president used strong language. what was that strong language? >> let's see. strong language. there was -- apologies, i don't specific word. what i was struck with frankly as i'm sure you were as well, was 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 to underscore a point. i think he was using strong language. >> do you recall that the strong language he used repeated exactly what the president had said prior to that? >> i remember specific cuss words being used by a variety of members. >> in defense of senator graham his strong words repeated

exactly by the president, which you cannot remember. >> 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 the 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. i will say i don't think the president was well served by his staff. i think the president that we saw tuesday is 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 in. >> pretty much missed the mark

here. i think general kelly is a fine man, but he's also part of the staff. >> loaded. okay. is it the staff? it's good to see lindsey again. i missed him. and -- it just, it doesn't -- i feel like the secretary of homeland security's testimony was pained and painful to watch. and kind of depressing at this point. just tell us what happened. you know? >> and we're sitting here obsessing over what words were used. >> this is a sad state. >> there's a bigger issue here and that is let's go back to michael wolff's book that -- i've never seen anything like it before. where everybody says this is the worst thing in the world. the worst journalism. but basically everything in the book is correct.

except for this fact or that fact. and oh, my god, he had three misspellings on this page and -- at the heart of michael wolff's book is a portrait of a president in over his head. who is incompetent when it came to issues. led around by the nose, by staff members on issues that the last person in front of this president, would be the person who would be persuading him. here we see a week later, evidence of that. where donald trump says to lindsey graham and, and, come on over, yeah. let's have that bipartisan deal. and then his staff gets to him and says no, mr. president, you don't want to do that bipartisan deal and he becomes belligerent. the same thing happened on health care. when he was going to work with lam lamar alexander on the compromise to health care. he said that sounds like a great idea. he made a fool of himself because he was spun by his

staff. 12 hours later. there was no deal there. time and again, he just proved michael wolff right again. it seems to me. >> it's the portrait painted by hundreds of pages of reporting in major newspapers for a year. this is not a revelation, the president is kind of inconsistent. he bounces around from different ideas. he picks them up. he throws them down. he is the worst enemy of his own staff. of any president i can think of. it's hard to make policy and make deals, if you're constantly changing your mind. but look on this one, i think it's very clear it's not the language that he used. which is bad. and offensive. but his basic frame on this is that some countries are full of good people and some countries are full of bad people. and that's as basic view. and totally contrary to the american theme and principle of immigration.

>> so kasie hunt, in order to believe tom cotton that the president didn't say these things, you have to think that dick durbin and lindsey graham are in a conspiracy. senator graham has been an ally to donald trump on many issues. i know you talked to senator durbin yesterday. what's your feeling about the language used? because to me it's not just about the language, we want to get the word right. but as nick said, it's about the larger point. whether he said house or hole or whatever else he may have said, he was effectively saying these are places from which we don't want people to come to america. >> willie, i think the reality is that a lot of, and dick durbin among them, these members were ready to move beyond this debate about what words were used and to try and refocus the conversation on the policy at hand and what really matters here, which are the 800,000 plus kids who are sitting here, you know, waiting to find out if they're going to be able to stay in their homes or families or if something else more dramatic is going to happen.

i was talking to sources before the hearing, dick durbin fully intended to go in and have that conversation. with the dhs secretary. her sort of repeated denials and insistence that she wasn't exactly sure what was said, i think caused some anger. i talked to dick durbin after that hearing and asked him a little bit about some of these details. take a look. >> their defense is, it's not a hole, it's a house. but make no mistake, i don't know exactly what he said. and after he said it, my colleague senator graham who was sitting next to him, answered him directly. using the same word. telling the story of his family, which he said, my family came, mr. president, from one of those s-hole countries. with no skills and no resources. and they just want to be part of what we call america. and they made a life and made a business and i'm here today. >> did the president use the word s-hole that's been splashed

across the papers? >> definitely. >> there's no question in your mind that anybody sitting in that meeting would have heard that word and remembered it? >> no question. how do you forget when the president of the united states uses that word? >> senators cotton and perdue have disputed what you've said about this. >> well, they're wrong and they know they're wrong. >> and mika, to your point. this lindsey graham that dick durbin was talking about there, is the one that showed up to the hearing today. we were waiting i think through the weekend, to see what he was going to come out and say, was he going to defend the president, be the president's golfing buddy. and the senator graham we heard from publicly yesterday, he sounded like the person who would have said to the president at that meeting -- hey, my family came from countries like that, they didn't know anything, they didn't have any skills, and look where i am today. >> you know, that along with the fact that the president appears to be according to the doctor, healthy, worries me.

because if he wasn't healthy, that would be a great excuse for this behavior. now he has none. which you can then deduce other things that are far more nefarious and frightening. steve rattner, i want to ask you to answer to that, but i think it's worth saying, i wonder how you look at all this, given the fact that there's a shutdown looming. >> i had a similar thought about the president, which is i wasn't sure whether i was rooting for him to turn outing to cognitively healthy or cognitively not healthy. if you're cognitively healthy and do all this stuff, it's pretty bad. >> i think the word "evil" comes to mind. >> i think we should step back from this a little bit and look at it. in the sense if the president used the word or not, obviously he inflamed, immigration is a very tense emotional issue for a lot of people. his behavior, whether he used the word or didn't, obviously conflated the situation. conflated two pieces of the immigration issue that should be

separated. you've got daca that needs to be extended and the broader question of what should the immigration policy be, where should it come from. skills based, chain migration. i think we were on track for a deal that could happen. you trade daca for some money from homeland security. that the republicans, the president called a wall if he wants. the democrats will make sure that the word wall isn't in the legislation and you avoid a government shutdown. i think there was progress being made in that direction until the president threw this monkey wrench into it and now it's complete chaos and now we have three days to go before the government shuts down and nobody knows what's going to happen next and everybody is debating about a word. >> we're also debating about racism at the very highest office in the land. >> there's no question. >> and it is a really sad time for this country. >> there's no question. but i think at the moment we need to keep the government open and should try to get back to a simpler place and then deal with the president's obvious imperfections, shall we say.

coming up on "morning joe," retiring senator jeff flake joins the conversation ahead of his planned speech about the president's attacks on the press. also, the mayor of new york city, democrat bill de blasio is here on set. plus, governor scott walker, calls it a wake-up call for republicans in wisconsin. a democrat wins a seat in the state senate after nearly two decades of gop control. what it says about the upcoming mid-terms, straight ahead. but first, bill karins and a check on the forecast. >> so many areas have seen snow and ice overnight for the first time in ten years, the french quarter in new orleans with a dusting of snow. it snowed overnight for the third time in the panhandle of florida. here's pictures from just outside of new orleans, reports of two inches of snow in atlanta. you know what atlanta does with two inches of snow. and now that's moving into the carolinas. so a lot of school cancellations, a lot of school delays and a lot of messy commute for millions of people. right now 65 million people are under alerts from winter weather

advisories, winter storm warnings, including houston, because what fell yesterday in the deep south is so cold it hasn't melted. so the roads are still icy. look at the wind chill, it's negative 2 in jackson, mississippi. we're at 8 in new orleans. it is as cold as it gets right now this morning from texas all the way through the gulf coast and the cold air is heading down into florida. so here's the radar showing the snow in central georgia, and now the snow filling in through areas of north carolina, virginia. we do expect three to four inches in and around charlotte to raleigh that will be high impacts throughout the day. we've also had about two to three inches of snow interior new england. new york city, philly and d.c., it looks like so far, so good. d.c., a coating of snow, it's been too warm in philly and new york. one to two inches throughout much of new england. areas of the south, it's been a rough night and this morning's commute will be as bad as it gets. washington, d.c., just a dusting of snow out there and there's some snowflakes still flying, an

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now you can get it, too. welcome to the party. with the clock ticking until the friday deadline to avoid a government shutdown republicans appear to have a plan in place to potentially keep the lights on for the federal government. house republican leaders presented their rank and file with the continuing resolution yesterday. the house rules committee is set to meet today to consider the plan before voting on it. and sending it to the full house. the plan would fund the government through february 16th. just about one month. it would also offer a six-year extension of the popular health care program for children known as c.h.i.p. it would suspend the main revenue sources in obamacare, which would likely further cripple the health law. that includes two-year suspensions of the medical device tax and the cadillac tax on high-cost health plans.

the health insurance tax, meanwhile, would be suspended one year. numerous rank-and-file republicans quickly endorsed the bill, despite frustrations with another short-term fix but some in the house, the conservative house freedom caucus have expressed concerns over the measure. potentially creating a roadblock for this bill. and the short-term spending plan does not address democrats' demands for a legislative fix to protect young undocumented immigrants, potentially further complicating negotiations to keep the government up and running. joe? >> yeah, kasie, what's the possibility that members of the house freedom caucus would take the bait and vote to increase, to keep the government open, even for a month? does it look like this is going to do the deal? and if it does, what's going to happen in the senate? would they go along with that plan?

>> i think there's still a tightrope to walk in the house, joe. there were some earlier indications late last night that there is a significant discontent in the freedom caucus about this plan. and i know mark meadows was talking through the weekend with his members to try to figure out if they were going to take a stand here. but the challenge is, you hit it squarely. the incentives in the house are completely different than the incentives in the senate. and i think that's why you're hearing louder conversation about the possibility of a government shutdown. because paul ryan is going to have to do this with just 218 republican votes, he's written a bill that i find it hard to believe that senate democrats would be willing to go along with, ending these obamacare revenue sources as part of a quote-unquote continuing resolution, designed to keep the status quo. and then you have senate democrats who have drawn a hard line on an immigration fix. and it sounds like the number two republican in the senate, john cornyn, was tweeting that

they're not going to put this daca compromise on the floor at any point. want to restart those negotiations. so i think that puts chuck schumer in a really difficult and interesting position. and it's, they need nine democrats in the senate to keep this open. and it's just not clear that the votes are there. >> kasie, such an interesting divide. you have people like booker, harris, gillibrand saying we've got to protect the daca immigrants. but then you have others saying i'm going to vote to keep the government open. even within the senate democrats there seems to be a split over whether daca should be a part of keeping the government open. >> there is. and the question is, are there nine red state democrats who are thinking along those lines? and what is chuck schumer going to do as far as putting pressure here? because you have to remember this is becoming increasingly a hot-button issue for the activist left.

you've seen obviously immigration activists have been focused on this for a long time. progressive activists as well. senate offerses are hearing from those people, if you vote to just keep this going, you're making a big mistake as far as our priorities are concerned. that is directly at odds with the incentives for claire mccaskill, joe manchin, john tester. democrats from red states facing re-election in 2018. so far, chuck schumer has walked right up to that line, but he has not gone over it. i think he's the one to watch this week as far as whether or not this ultimately is going to shut down. i think it's more likely that we see a government shutdown at the end of this week than i would have told you sitting here in december before christmas. >> it's a very clever employ by the republicans. you put a bunch of stuff in there that's appealing to people of both parties, which is to say things like repealing obamacare, it wouldn't hurt obamacare, it would get rid of taxes that are highly unpopular. extending the c.h.i.p. program, which is budget-positive.

it keeps people out of medicaid, things like that a lot of goodies so to speak to try to tempt people to vote for it the question will be in the house whether the freedom caucus buys it or not. they've traditionally voted against this kind of stuff. that would increase the deficit. and as kasie said in the senate, it will be a tough choice, not just because of the red state democrats, but i think what's been learned by government shutdowns is the party perceived to have caused the shutdown tends to get blamed. if the republicans are successful from a pr point of view saying we've put a reasonable plan to keep the government open and the crazy democrats wouldn't let us do it that's what the republicans are trying to do it will be a big game of chicken for the next three days. coming up, a former c.i.a. officer has been arrested, suspected of spying for china. but he may never be charged with ex-peenage. we'll explain that. straight ahead on "morning joe."

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a former c.i.a. officer who was suspected of spying for china has been arrested. 53-year-old jerry chun shing lee, who worked for the c.i.a. from 1994-2007 has been charged with one charge of unlawfully possessing defense information.

based on a 2012 search that found he had two notebooks containing true names and phone numbers of c.i.a. assets and covert facilities in addition to other operational notes. however sources familiar with the case lee is also suspected of being the point person who gave information to beijing, that helped cripple the american intelligence operations in china and which led to the impris imprisonment or deaths of about 20 american agents since 2010. it's considered the worst intelligence collapse since two men funneled secrets to moscow, in the 1990s. let's bring back in "new york times" reporter michael schmidt. michael, back in may you had original reporting on china killing informants and now we potentially have some answers to why. >> yeah, this was an incredibly big deal for the c.i.a. over the span of several years, around 2012, they lost a number of assets, chinese sources that they had. they couldn't really figure out what was going on. the fbi launched this massive investigation that looked into

this issue. and a lot of folks within the bureau became convinced that jerry lee, the person who was charged just a few days ago, was a mole within the c.i.a. and if you talk to intelligence officials, current and former, what they will tell you is that this was very devastating to the agency. this was at the same levels of hanson, where basically there was a mole there was someone within the united states who was giving up this incredibly important information that really hurt our ability to get good intelligence out of china. >> it didn't just hurt our ability to get good intelligence out of china, not just embarrassing to the c.i.a. but deadly, perhaps. if you look at what happened in china because of them. >> over a dozen deaths are believed to have occurred because of this. and obviously that is, you know, the worst thing that can happen to an intelligence agency, when it's losing sources like this. it didn't it took some time for the c.i.a. to figure out what was going on. because they were slowly losing

these sources over a long period of time. the bureau didn't think that doj would go along with charging jerry lee many years ago. this is something that changed in may. we wrote about this story. we wrote about the difficulties that there was in trying to find this mole. and identify him. and today, they've gone in and charged him. jerry lee came in to jfk airport over the weekend. and that's where he was arrested. >> arrested as he stepped off a plane. amazing story. michael schmidt. thanks so much as always. still ahead, on line they're calling it the girther conspiracy. the doctor to president trump released his physical examine findings. how do you win at business?

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44 past the hour. the results of the president's physical are in. dr. ronnie jackson says donald trump is in excellent health and

quote very sharp mentally. in fact the doctor told reporters that the president requested a cognitive test himself. and that he earned a perfect score. >> if he had some type of mental cognitive issue that this test is sensitive enough it would pick up on it. he would not have got 30 out of 30 on the test so i'm very confident at this particular stage that he has nothing like that going on. and like i said, my personal experience has been that he, that he, that he is, he has absolutely no, you know cognitive or mental issues whatsoever that he is very sharp. >> dr. jackson says the president has a lot of energy and stamina. but that he could benefit from diet and exercise. he claims the president is 6'3". and weighs 239 pounds. however, the internet self-proclaimed girthers aren't really buying that weight claim.

girther is an obviously play on the birther conspiracy. some are putting the president side by side compare him to athletes of similar height and weight. and -- yeah. i'm not sure -- anybody want to comment? i'm not sure if it makes me feel better that this doctor says that he has no cognitive issues. it makes me feel worse. and more worried for the country. >> well it's just the way he is. i think when we learn here is that it's not any kind of an illness, that -- >> a bad guy. >> it's his personality. >> he bullies people. he accuses them of giving sexual favors. if he maligns people, if he lies if he calls countries s-holes, this is not due to some toype o mental deficiencies, this is who he is. fantastic. >> some numbers are hard to

believe. dr. jackson has a great reputation, he was president obama's doctor. you had person from person from the obama white house coming on social media saying dr. jackson is a great doctor. give the conspiracy theories a rest. so some of the numbers did stop us in our tracks. >> me, too. >> listen, i saw david axelrod yesterday saying that he had great respect for the doctor and he was a straight shooter. that means an awful lot. so we won't question the doctor. i will say on his, his mental sharpness, if that is in fact the case, medically perhaps that is. he has shocked and surprised a lot of people who have worked around him for the past several years. so have been saying that he is not. and secondly, i've just got to say on the weight, i know somebody who is 6'3" and weighs close to 239 pounds. and all i can tell you is this -- if that's what 239

pounds looked like -- i would weigh 170 pounds. so, yes, i have great respect for people who have great respect for this doctor. but if that's what 6'3", 239 pounds looks like -- that's a shock to me. only because people i know very well, that are 6'3" and weigh close to 239 pounds look like they weigh about 30 or 40 pounds less than that. >> take the doctor at his word in terms of the testing and stuff. that is -- actually truly frightening. it leaves the options as to what's going on, in a very bad category. so let's talk about wisconsin last night. we've had, we've had some pretty unmistakable trends. alabama caught most people by surprise. but at the same time, that grabbed the headlines. the virginia race, grabbed the headlines. what happened in the state legislature grabbed the

headlines. but under that. this is really just a reverse of what we just, the drum that i beat incessantly. i knew it was driving democrats crazy. after donald trump's victory and the republicans' victory last fall. i kept saying -- okay, yes. we are focusing on donald trump and hillary clinton. but you need to look at the state legislative races. 1,000 lost while barack obama was president of the united states. that's really what showed the weakness of the democratic party. over the past year, since donald trump's election, it's completely flipped. and it's flipped in a dramatic fashion. where it's now the republican party that seems to be in big trouble. not because of the marquee races. but you look at the grassroots level and even scott walker admitted last night -- that walloping that the democrats took, that's spells trouble for the future for the republican party. >> well, the democrat has won a

previously republican-leaning state senate seat in western wisconsin in a special election yesterday, democrat patty shackner beat out a republican state state representative to take a seat that has been held by the gop for the past 17 years. in a district that voted heavily for trump and mitt romney in the past two presidential elections. the seat was vacated by a republican sheila horsdorf who stepped down after being appointed the state agricultural. while democrats remain the minority in wisconsin state senate, the win has fueled concern among republicans of a larger democratic wave to come reflected by governor walker who tweeted senate district 10 special election win by a democrat is a wake up call for republicans in wisconsin. and nick, what are they supposed

to wake up to, the fact that they shouldn't walk the plank for trump or they need to do more to sort of solidify whatever is going on with trump? >> a looming disaster for republicans on the stage of their biggest successes in american politics in a generation. these state capitals are the bread basket of republican politics and power and for donald trump in the midwest. these states like michigan and wisconsin are the places where he flipped a lot of these voters who were democrats. if there's weakening in those places, sit is a bad sign for te party and the president for 2018. joe? >> it's not just this wisconsin race. erin booth at the decision desk, democrats outperformed their past performance plus 13. in wisconsin, plus 24 in the house race. in the senate race plus 27.

in iowa race plus 20, that's an average democratic overperformance last night of 21%. casey, republicans have to see this coming. i just wonder in the house are they just frozen in place and incapable of saving themselves? are they going to hold on while the train goes over the cliff? >> they nay be incapable of it, joe. this is one situation where the national leadership may be disconnected from -- we'll have to see if there's enough competitive districts for this to be true, but i know i hear from members of the house who are watching these kinds of hyperlocal elections that they normally wouldn't pay attention to that only hit our radar once in a while and really being concerned. but one thing that stood out to me, joe, about this particular race in wisconsin, this democrat, she told the associated press she was asked why did you win this seat? she says, quote, my message has always been to be kind, be

considerate and we need to help people when they're down. we just need to be kind to people who are less fortunate and just help. and it's not a partisan message, but it's an anti-trump message in its own way. and i continue to believe that this is going to be a theme in the mid-term elections. there is a huge contrast here not on ideology, not on policy but on tone and basic treatment of other human beings. and i think it's something that is really going to be a theme that resonates here. >> kasie hunt, thank you so much. and still ahead on "way too early," did the secretary of homeland security open herself up to accusations of perjury to protect the president? we'll play her testimony. plus. >> do you think a shutdown is more likely than not? >> i do. i think as we get closer and closer to this deadline and as the rhetoric is amped up on both sides and given the president's

strikingly unhelpful comments in the immigration meeting last week, i think it's more likely than not. but no one should want a shutdown. >> we will discuss more about the possibility of a government shutdown with senate chris coons. and senator jeff flake joins us today to compare president trump's language to soviet dictator joseph stalin. "morning joe" will be right back. ♪ so, that goal you've been saving for,

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green mountain coffee roasters. he said he wanted more people from norway. being from norway is not a skill. what does he mean when he says he wants more immigrants from norway? >> i don't believe he said that specifically. what he was saying was he was using norway as an example of a country that is, what he was specifically referring to the prime minister telling him that the people of norway work very hard. and so what he was referencing is from a merit-based perspective, we would like to have those with skills who can assimilate and contribute to the united states. >> norway is a predominantly white country, isn't it? >> i actually do not know that, sir, but i imagine that is the case. >> senators then questioned why the president expressed preference for immigrants from

norway during the meeting. >> norway is a predominantly white country, isn't it? >> i actually do not know that, sir, but i imagine that is the case. >> really? you don't know about norway? what the fjord are you talking about? i will remind you, i will remind you, your name is kirstjen nielsen with a silent j. >> my god. welcome back to "morning joe." it's wednesday, january 17th. it's hard to laugh. i'm going to try. with us now we have the political writer of the new york times, nick, former treasury official steve ratner join the conversation. peter baker and white house correspondent for pbs news hour yemisha allison.

joe, it didn't feel like she was very comfortable with her story. >> yeah. >> this is john kelly's propete or pick for homeland security secretary. we were supposed to be hopeful about her and john kelly. are we hopeful today about the people in the white house being able to moderate this president? >> well, we've seen time and again and frank writes about it "the new york times" this morning the way that donald trump uses people and then throws them out and destroys their reputation. there is no positive end game for doing that dance. but what we saw yesterday and what we've been seeing over the past year but especially over the past week is what a corrosive effect that donald trump has had on constitutional norms, what a corrosive effect donald trump has had on basic

societal norms, on human decency. there was a reason why a wisconsin state senate seat went democratic for the first time in a couple of decades. >> yeah. >> on the strength of a be kind message. which perhaps is the best way for opponents of donald trump to resist in the coming year. and we've seen a corrosive impact that donald trump has had on the truth. we saw it yesterday in that hearing as somebody did what before we were only used to donald trump doing. and that is lying about facts that are objectively not under dispute in washington, d.c. and america. she did it and then tom cotton did it yesterday saying -- denying that donald trump said something that donald trump said he said? that fox news said he said?

that donald trump bragged about saying. that people in the meeting said. it's -- i would say it's mind boggling that people would do that, but unfortunately we are learning everyday at the white house that more and more people are willing to ruin their reputations in service of donald trump. and there is no end game that's good for them. >> is this about donald trump? for kirstjen nielsen or these senators cotton and perdue, are they doing this for trump? i don't understand why the dhs secretary couldn't sit there and say by all estimations he said it. i was there. i didn't hear it. but everyone else in the room seemed to hear it. lindsey graham seemed to hear it. so there's no argument from me. what was the careful little dance there? was trump promising her something? did trump make her take an oath? did he scare her? >> mika --

>> where does her responsibility to this country stand with her testifying under oath yesterday, dancing around the truth for trump? what did you just do, madame secretary, with your reputation and the trust that we're supposed to have in you as the secretary of homeland security? because i think she did immeasurable damage. joe? >> well, i think what -- i think what she did yesterday is a cruder version of what many people have done in white houses in the past, where they have been willing to compromise, to be close to power. and we have seen that in the past. we certainly saw that with let's say if we went and saw the posts. robert mcnamara comes to mind on vietnam.

>> yeah. >> the generals during the '60s and early '70s come to mind. >> it sure does. >> lying about vietnam. you've had people in administrations, democratic and republican in the past that have lied or shaded the truth but have usually had some fact to hold on to, some reason to believe that they could bend the truth in a way that could help their side. but this is just overt, outright lying, again, about issues that aren't even under debate, not on fox news. as erick ericson said, not along conservatives because donald trump called around bragging that he had used this language. not among participants in the room. it seems that people that are secretaries, cabinet secretaries or people who want to be cabinet secretaries for donald trump are

the only ones lying about this. >> yeah. and why? let's hear more from yesterday's hearing with the secretary of homeland security kirstjen with a silent j. she was in the room when the president made his racist comments about haiti and the african nations, but yesterday, if it's possible, she could only recall portions of that meeting. >> you said on fox news that the president used strong language. what was that strong language? >> let's see, strong language there was -- apologies, i don't remember specific word. what i was struck with frankly as i'm sure you were as well 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.

i think he was using strong language. >> do you recall that the strong language he used repeated exactly what the president had said prior to that? >> i remember specific cuss words being used by a variety of members. >> in defense of senator graham, his strong words repeated exactly the words used by the president which you cannot remember. >> 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 the 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. >> i will say i don't think the president was well served by his staff. i think the president that we saw tuesday is -- that that donald trump exists.

and somehow by 12:00 p.m. 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 is a fine man but he's also part of the staff. >> so peter baker, first of all, that's interesting. general kelly has been for the most part beyond reproach, especially from conservatives and conservative media, but yesterday lindsey graham blaming a lot of this debacle on the staff and said that includes general kelly. also the testimony yesterday pretty remarkable that the secretary for the department of homeland security could testify that she remembered the profanity lindsey graham used as he repeated it back to the

president saying don't use that sort of profanity speaking about these other countries. but couldn't remember the actual profanity that the president had just stated that actually enlisted that response. i don't know. what sort of impact does this have when you have a secretary of department of homeland security who is responsible for warning us when we are under imminent threat? >> well, you see in the clips you've been showing this morning, just how awkward the position people who are allies or advisers to the president of the united states when he puts them in this position. he put his secretary of homeland security, his newfound ally senator graham in the position of either contradicting him in public or trying to find some way to dance around it. and it's painful to see i think for anybody experienced in washington how people are trying

to figure out where to fall on this without violating what they see is the loyalty that they owe, if any, to the president. the president as we know, values loyalty, demands loyalty, insists on it. it was something he asked his fbi director before firing him last year, he wanted loyalty from him. if you're his cabinet secretary or ally on the hill, you're caught in this very, very uncomfortable position. >> so, peter, let me ask you this. one of the mistakes i think a lot of us make, political analysts, i'm not talking about you, but political analysts make and have made it for as long adds there's been political analysts. we act like this is the first time this has ever happened before. donald trump has broken so many constitutional norms, political norms as president of the united states. but you've been around the town quite a while. you saw people in the clinton administration lying for bill clinton. you saw people in the bush administration lying for george

w. bush talking about wmds and the iraq war. is what you saw yesterday, is that something that is new to washington, d.c.? is it just a bit more amplified because it's donald trump? put it in context for our viewers. >> yeah. that's a great question. in fact, 20 years ago this week that the first story about the monica lewinsky investigation, the investigation into whether bill clinton had purgered himself to cover up his affair with the white house intern. i remember that vividly all sorts of aides and advisers were sent to testify on the president's behalf saying the president says it's not true and i believe him. many of whom were then -- either they knew at the time that they were passing along a falsehood or they were later shocked to learn that they were and felt quite betrayed by him. you're right. presidents have put their own

people, their own allies, their own advisers in a bad position on multiple occasions, many different administrations over the years. what's different here is we see a president who is willing to say things that are flatly untrue as the fact checkers have documented repeatedly over the last year in such numbers, in such routine that it goes what we've seen in previous administrations, i think. the washington, d.c. post fact checker tallied it all up and determined the first year in office the president had said 2,000 things that weren't true, which is a pretty striking number. and it's not just on the big things, it's on so many small things. just yesterday he tweeted out that his support among african-americans, approval rating among african-americans had doubles which is not the case as our own fact checker documents in the paper this morning.

there's so much inaccuracy coming out of the white house at times it muddies the water and gives a lot of viewers back home i think reasons to question what they're seeing. >> and he's putting many otherwise honorable people to defend those lies. lest people think we're having a semantic argument house versus hole for a week now, really what this is about immigration is and how the president views immigration to america, who ought to be here, who ought not be here and how he views people from africa and haiti, for example. so what has his comments done to this conversation over daca and immigration and perhaps its attachment to anything to keep the government open by friday? >> well, essentially the secretary's statements and testimony yesterday was the embodiment of trumpism and really steve miller's ideas i think seeping into other parts of the government. you have someone there that is essentially not just sent out to be -- to say the president is a good guy and that he's someone whose policies will make america

great, but really someone who is there to counter all narratives about him using derogatory and most cases what people think racist language towards these african nations. so there's this idea that essentially immigration talks which were going pretty well. yes, they didn't meet the deadline to get it done by 2017, but most of my sources say that republicans and democrats are -- were inching toward a deal both sides had really been ready to make some large concessions with democrats understanding that they were going to have to vote for border securities even though d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s were very upset with that. on the republican side, they were saying this is the most sympathetic group of immigrants who were brought here as children, we should be able to protect these americans essentially. what we have now is a real breakdown in that conversation. yes, they're still going on, but now they're really tinged in the cloud that's hanging over them is the fact that the president essentially said that norway, which is a country that is

objectively whiter than africa and haiti, those are the people that he wants to fill america with and that has really left a bad taste in the mouth of both republicans and democrats. >> yeah. we want to bring in now a member of the judiciary and foreign relations committees, democratic senator chris coons of delaware. obviously want to talk about the looming potential government shutdown coming up, but first what do you make of the homeland security secretary's testimony yesterday? how did you perceive it? >> well, mika, that was a remarkable hearing yesterday, one in which a secretary, a cabinet member who was actually in the room kept saying that she didn't know things that we all know to be true. the idea that secretary kirsten nelson couldn't confirm that norway is majority white. couldn't confirm she knew what sort of obscenities the president had used and what they meant suggested that part of being a loyal cabinet member is not being truthful, even in sworn testimony before a senate

committee. it was a divisive and difficult hearing. it had initially been scheduled for us to do oversight on some very important matters, disaster relief to puerto rico, the wall and what we should do, immigration policy. i'm encouraged that senator lindsey graham and senator dick durbin presented a really strong bipartisan compromise to the president and gravely concerned that the president who welcomed them last tuesday threw this out the door and created such a mess last thursday. and this hearing was just one of the pieces of wreckage. >> so, i'm trying -- i might be putting you in -- i think you can do this, but why? what would the motive be to lie about what happened in that room -- i think you get it behind you president said some horrible words, the president used profanity. it's too bad the president feels this way. but we could still do --

couldn't -- if you get it behind you, couldn't you move forward on the policy? what would be the motive to roll around in this mess? i won't use the president's words. but what i felt i saw in that testimony was someone dancing around the truth desperately. and then two senators blatantly lying. am i wrong? >> mika, i think you're right. what's disheartening is that we have really important work we should be doing together. i think there's millions of americans who voted for donald trump thinking based on his business experience, based on his long record of getting big projects done in new york city and elsewhere, from his early days fixing the rink to his accomplishments in business, at least as they perceive them, they thought he would be able to bring folks together and move us past some of these long, difficult divisive issues. that's who we saw last tuesday when he chose to bring a big bipartisan group into the white house and say bring me a deal. i'll sign it. i'll take the heat.

and as senator graham said yesterday, who knows where that guy went. the meeting on thursday where other senators were present was divisive and difficult. it wasn't the first time and sadly probably not the last time our president will use racially insensitive or racist language and that's blown this whole thing up, making it far more difficult for us to keep the government funded, to find a resolution, to disaster funding, to chip, to community health centers and to d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s and daca. that's what we got hired to do here. and the folks who are being let down are the american people. >> yeah. >> this hurts our reputation globally and it makes it hard for us to work together on anything. >> on many levels because one could take away, steve ratner from that hearing yesterday that the department -- first of all, we have a state department that the jobs aren't even filled. we have posts around the world that aren't being filled. that causes foreign policy problems and dangers. then we have the dhs secretary appearing to sort of protect the

president and maybe even lie for him and then quickly revealing that she might not even be up for the job of homeland security secretary if she does not know the demographic makeup of norway. is that what we've got? is that what we learned yesterday? >> i think that is the essence of what we learned yesterday. the tragedy of this and then i'll turn to the senator is that we were close to -- they were close to a deal that would have solved a number of these problems and then it got completely sub soomed with what was said and really unnecessary errors and mistakes on the part of the administration. so senator, let me turn to you. as you noted, there was essentially a deal that had been reached between durbin and graham and various other senators and then it seemed to have gotten torpedoed by a combination of opposition of the right party, tom cotton, perdue and so on as well as these

atmospherics. but the question is, we got three days to go, is it possible to put the jeannie back in the bottle? you essentially had a deal that worked for both sides, accomplished a number of things can that deal still happen? >> steve, that can only happen with presidential leadership. once again, we face a moment where the president is sort of jerking the wheel of the bus of our nation left and right, left and right. he could say i've thought about it, i've looked at it and frankly this deal with one little tweak is something i can sign off on and we need to keep the government open. it's his job. he is the president of the united states. he and his party control the congress. if this government shuts down because the republican majority in the house can't get enough votes to pass their proposal or because the president can't accept the very deal he asked for and was brought back to him having met the four criteria he

laid out, then it's clearly the president's responsibility then he couldn't hear yes when a strong bipartisan set of senators made tough compromises and delivered the deal that he was looking for. >> all right, senator chris coons thank you very much. nick. >> the current plan for the republicans right now is to put out a bill that has both some money for the c.h.i.p. program, child's health insurance and possibly a bill that has nothing for the d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s. how many democrats can support or oppose a bill that does have the c.h.i.p. insurance and doesn't have a d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s fix? >> if it's a short-term bill, that's what it is supposed to go which goes until president's day in february, democrats will probably make the same case they made at the end of 2017 which is they said they didn't want to have a government shutdown. they didn't want to be the party that was blamed for that and were also making the case to d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s who are terrified and wanted a settlement as soon as possible that they need to wait just a little bit longer.

i think, though, that that message that they're sending to d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s essentially is that you know what, you're important but you're not the priority. and i think that they're going to run into the risk of actually really getting their base very, very angry at them because d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s essentially are saying the democrats who also failed to pass immigration reform that they also essentially are doing what the republicans are doing which is playing with their lives and using d.r.e.a.m.e.r.s as kind of bargaining tools. >> peter baker, you heard sort of between the lines in chris coons comments there what a lot of democrats said explicitly that daca has to be a part of the larger government bill to keep the government open by friday night. if it's not, you have a republican president, republican senate and house who shut down the government over an issue of keeping 800,000 young people out of this country, throwing them out of this country effectively. this is a good position of leverage for democrats, isn't it? >> they think it is. but the truth is if we have a government shutdown it is because both sides really just

headed into waters they didn't want to head into. neither side wants a shutdown. unlike some of the times in the past where we've seen a logger heads sort of situation result in a partial shutdown, this situation where neither side is having that intention or desire or thinking that's a good thing politically. it would be because the president's meeting last week broke down with immigration. the answer here, the solution here or the compromise here is pretty obvious. both sides laid it out and yet they can't get there, can't get to the relatively simpler deals compared to the more complicated deals that are out there still to be had. i think it doesn't speak well from where the rest of this year is going to go as we get closer and closer to election it will get more complicate and not less. if we are to get to a shutdown this week, it's probably unlikely, it will be because washington can't get the most basic things done. >> pethank you so much to both you. still ahead on "morning

joe," in a politico op-ed over the senator, republican senator jeff flake claimed his party was in denial about donald trump. in the fall, he announced his retirement from the senate floor claiming, quote, we must risk our careers in favor of our principles. today the senator is set for another highly-anticipated speech. the arizona republican joins us with a preview next on "morning joe." ♪ [ click, keyboard clacking ] [ click, keyboard clacking ] [ keyboard clacking ] [ click, keyboard clacking ] ♪ good questions lead to good answers. our advisors can help you find both. talk to one today and see why we're bullish on the future. yours.

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mr. president, did you say you wanted more people to come in from norway? did you say you wanted more people coming in from norway? is that true, mr. president? >> i want them to come in from everywhere, everywhere. thank you very much. >> just caucasian and white countries or people to come in from other parts of the world, other color?

>> ouch. president trump sent reporters packing from his meeting at the white house yesterday with the leader of kazakhstan in a column for the washington post, senator john mccain appealed directly to the president to stop attacking the press. saying his words are being used as cover for foreign leaders to, quote, silence and shutter one of the key pillars of our democracy. it's a message being echoed today from the senate floor as republican senator jeff flake calls out the president for using the phrase -- enemy of the people to describe the free press and senator flake joins us now from capitol hill. good to have you on the show, senator. joe has the first question for you. joe, take it away. >> yeah. always great to have you with us, senator. i've been surprised over the past few days people expressing shock that you're comparing his language to stalin's when it's just a well-known fact that stalin used the phrase and used

it so much that actually after stalin died the use was banned because it was so destructive even in the soviet union. what are the dangers inherent in the united states in 2018 of the president doing that? >> well, right. that's been most of the focus when i released just an excerpt pointing that out that an american president shouldn't be using a term so associated with a maniacal killer like stalin. i don't make comparisons between trump and stalin. i'm just saying an american president shouldn't be using that language because it is so fraught with malice, as you mentioned. its use was banned. our president shouldn't use enemy of the people. it leads with a type of relationship with the press that has led to this fake news charge that is now picked up by

authoritarians globally. they're now using fake news as justification for jailing journalists, 262 jailed just this past year. that's a record. >> there are few moments that stand out in the first year for donald trump as far as violating constitutional norms or pushing boundaries in a terrible direction. one is enemies of the press. the other is when he's questioned the legitimacy of the judiciary. for you, what are some of the gravest dangers you've seen over the past year, not just using the term enemies of the press but what are some of the things that cause you the gravest concern? >> some of the things the president says talking about the crowd size or whatnot whether it is true is relatively trivial, but some things are not as trivial. to talk about our elections

being rigged or, you know, widespread abuse in our election system. that has real consequences. talking about the federal judiciary in the way that he has. that's not good either. so, these kind of things do make a difference. they do have consequences that will outlast the presidency when you erode trust in our institutions. one of the biggest problems over the past year is the president referring to anything russian as a hoax. and it wasn't. russia did try to intervene in our elections. it was pointed out the other day in the pres that there was not one cabinet level meeting on the entire year how to deal with that issue and make sure our elections in the future are sound. so, i think that that is a big, big problem. >> senator flake, it's willie geist. it's good to see you this morning. you've been one of the few republican voices to step out, granted you're not seeking re-election in arizona and speak

out against the president. have you been surprised or concerned at all for other republicans, people like tom cotton this week. we saw the secretary of homeland security yesterday testifying before congress, willing to go out act as though they've not heard things that they likely have heard or to go out and defend some of the lies that president trump has told. why do you think they do it? >> well, i just speak for myself. i think that we ought to stand up when we know something is not right. and if anything approximating that language was used, that's a problem. i chair the african sub committee. we deal with 54 countries in africa we need to have security arrangements with, intelligence sharing with. it makes it very difficult to do so after language like that is reported. so, i can't speak for anyone else, but for myself i'll speak out. >> what do you think when you hear something that you know to be true and hear the opposite, a lie, and hear that lie defended

by people you work with in the senate. what do you think when you hear that? >> well, we have to have shared facts. the constitution was based on truth. and our acceptance of truth. we hold these truths to be self evident. if a nation doesn't have shared facts that we all rely on, then democracy won't last long. so it is troubling that this kind of language is used and believed or the president is backed up by those who know that he probably said what he said. so all i can say is i just speak for myself here. >> nick? >> senator, it's nick with the new york times. as a reporter, i appreciate your words in defense of the free press, but i want to ask you. you've been critical of the president. but you've also voted with him most of the time and voted his advancement of judgeship. is the dispute with him about

his rhetoric and his character or about his policies and ideas in your mind? >> i'm a conservative and i vote conservative. take, for example, health care. i voted some 30 times to repeal and replace obamacare. if people expect me to change my vote simply because i have disagreements with the president on an issue like that, they'll be disappointed. same is true with tax reform. i do think that a president ought to get his or her nominees by and large unless they're unqualified. i think the president with regard to the judiciary named a good supreme court justice. there are issues that i diagree with the president on policy, certainly on trade and nafta. we shouldn't get out of it. on the travel ban, i think that the current iteration is constitutional, just not wise. so, some of these things just don't come to a vote in the senate. but i'll disagree with the president when i think he's wrong and support him when i think he's right. but a lot of these things are congressional initiatives.

we dealt with tax reform for a long time, but all of a sudden it becomes the president's agenda or the president's issues. >> steve? >> senator, it's steve ratner. i understand that on policies you're mostly with him but the difference is when they exist are legitimate. but on character, on fitness, on the way he handled himself in office, you seem to have very deep and grave concerns. so let me ask you a fairly direct question which is if a bill of impeachment were to reach the senate, unlikely as that may be while you're still there, how would you vote on it? >> i would vote no. i don't think that the president has committed impeachable offenses. i don't like some of his behavior and i'll talk about some of that today with regard to his treatment of the press. but i don't think he's committed impeachable offenses and i never have. >> what about your call on just the president overall on some of the deep concerns you have? what about your republican colleagues? it almost feels that there's a

compliance here? obviously i'm on the other side of the aisle but i've been very outspoken and it's made fun of on "snl" and twitter or wherever, but i feel that when you talk about violating constitutional norms or if you talk about threatening democratic norms, you're talking about violating our country, threatening our country every single day and that if we let it go and we're not shocked by this behavior, that's actually part of the process of slipping away and our country being deeply damaged. >> i agree with you. that's why i'm speaking out today. that's why i gave the speech they did in october. but the president's treatment of the press and his use of the term fake news has tremendous damage. we're seeing that globally. and i think we're seeing it domestically as well where people simply don't trust their institutions and are more

willing to allow the pg congress or the president to crack down on free speech. i think we simply have to stand up for the first amendment and that's what i'm trying to do today. >> senator jeff flake, i wish more stood with you, speaking exclusively with us this morning. we look forward to your speech. thank you very much. >> thank you. coming up, the mayor of new york city bill de blasio is standing by. he joins the table next on "morning joe." ♪ ( ♪ ) ♪ one is the only number ♪ that you'll ever need ♪ staying ahead isn't about waiting for a chance. it's about the one bold choice you make, that moves you forward. ( ♪ ) the one and only cadillac escalade. come in now for this exceptional offer

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the next guy the doctor might want to look at is utah senator orrin hatch. this is what happened today. here he is at a congressional hearing today. he's about to read something today which he takes off his glasses which he's not wearing. i like this part. i like this part. he does this. he reaches for them. very quickly realizes there's nothing in his hand but keeps going to put them down. >> it's a habit, right? you have glasses you're used to them being there, sometimes they're not now. joining us now the mayor of new york city, mayor bill de blasio. >> how tall are you? >> almost 6'6". >> 6'6". really, tall guy. >> how much do you weigh?

>> 210. >> 6'6", 210. >> compared to the president. >> that's weird. okay. thank you. willie, carry on. >> svelt 210. >> i don't mind his numbers. go ahead. >> we're all new yorkers but there are national issues at play here. i want to talk about something that's happening in the city, extraordinary, combination of city hall and the new york police department and the record low crime numbers that came in at the end of 2017. how in a city of 8 .5 million people you have that few murders, you have that few -- that little violent crime, what is happening with the new york city police that has allowed for those historically low numbers. >> so to put it in context, our overall crime levels you have to go back to the 1950s to see crime this low, specifically with murder. the last time was 1951 when the dodgers were still playing in brooklyn. when you think about how we got there, it is one part evolution and improvement of strategies,

com stat that bill bratton innovated. it's one part of what we call precision policing. actually sending police where the most violent crime is happening, pinpointing, surging in those areas and knocking out gangs in particular that were causing so much of the violence. but the other big piece is neighborhood policing, which is a systematic effort to create new relationships between police and community and heal some of the problems, some of the pain that occurred in the past. it's very much a matter of training our police to build those community relationships, to deescalate tensions. and the payoff is not only a human or moral one, it's also a practical one. the more that communities feel close to their police, the more they share information and help police to stop crimes or to find people who committed crimes. it's amazing. when i talk to our officers who were involved in this neighborhood policing initiative, they go chapter and verse about all the community residents who now have their cell phone number, e-mail address. personally, they know first name

basis people in the community who will give them the information without even asking, telling them where someone has a gang, about to be a gang problem and the police get there first. >> the nypd cracked the code on something here. why do you think it's been so difficult for other cities, chicago, baltimore both jump to mind to figure out what you all have figured out in new york? >> you have to be honest about the interplay of crime and other issues. baltimore has a horrible income inequality gap and lack of opportunity in poorer communities. chicago has had legendary segregation and a sense of unfairness affecting communities of color for decades. these are underlying problems. new york was able to move past more, not perfectly. but at the same time it was what we learned about both strategic policing and neighborhood policing. i think you have to create that trust again. it doesn't happen by itself. you have to actually train the officers in having a deep sense of building the community

relationship and you have to give communities a sense to air their concerns and grievances and show you're responding. we had a horrible and broken policy of stop and frisk where parents and grandparents felt their good law-abiding children were being treated like suspects. it created a real rift with police. we ended that broken policy and helped to regenerate trust. again, the irony is when police and community get closer together crime goes down. there was an assumption a stereotype somehow it was a liberal affectation to think police and community relations was just a nice thing. no, it's also a very practical high-impact thing because that communication when the police know the community is on their side, it's better for the police in every way, but when the community thinks that's my police officer. >> right. >> he or she is here to protect me. it changes the whole dynamic. >> ratner? >> mr. mayor, that's all good news. nobody can disagree and lots of good news in the city, but

probably the thing that may be most upsetting the city resident is the state of the mta, the subways and the buses. >> yeah. >> how did we get in this mess on the subways? there are estimates now it would cost over $100 billion to really bring the subways to something that approximate mates state of the art. is there any real prospect of getting out of this mess within a reasonable time frame and what's going on with the subways? >> look, i think we can move forward. the state of new york controls the mta. but we are going to all work together to try to address this. i think in the end we need a reliable revenue source that bluntly politically there has not been a commitment to achieving in past years. i believe tax on millionaires and billionaires is the best way to do it. i think that gives us a renewable, reliable source to put into the core needs. look, here is something that smig did better than new york. chicago invested in the most unsexy, fundamental elements of running their subways in ways that new york did not. and for decades we're -- we did not make the kind of investments

we should have. okay. we're going to have to recoup that now. but there's revenue out there if we can agree to have the political will to go get it and make that change. >> nick? >> mr. mayor, the pension fund for new york will divest from fossil fuels a big move of yours. fossil fuel stocks are doing quite well and will probably go further with this tax bill. the job of the pension bill is to provide pensions. at what point are you taking away from the ability of the pension bill to actually do well for the pensioners by making it a tool of political activism for values that you support and many new yorkers support obviously? >> nick, a fundamental question when ever you look at pensions you have to think about the people we're here to protect, our retirees and our fiduciary responsibility comes up front. playing the long game in investments, fossil fuels doesn't make a lot of sense.

an industry will never be tapped, will never be utilized in large measure. it's not a great long-term investment because the world rightfully is more and more moving away from fossil fuels. look, our national government unfortunately is moving in the wrong direction. donald trump took us out of the paris agreement and is obviously encouraging further oil exploration at the very time when so much of the world is saying no we have to go the other way. that's why new york city acted, too. we need to show that the local level. we're going to go and address the challenge of climate change even if our national government isn't. this is what you're seeing around the country more and more. new york is trying to provide real leadership in this, we were definitive in a way bluntly few other jurisdictionings have been. we said we will be out of fossil fuels and divest fully in the next five years. we think it's bad for the earth. we think it's causing the climate change that afflicts coastal cities like new york. there's no question there are other quality investments we can make. but if we're going to jolt this dependence we have on fossil

fuel, we have to do something differently. and that's also why we're suing five of the biggest petroleum companies because like the tobacco companies some years ago, they understood this crisis. they tried very intently to cover up the information about climate change and to project a whole different -- a propaganda campaign suggesting that climate change wasn't real and go ahead and keep using your fossil fuels. they damaged our society. in a city like new york, that meant billions and billions of dollars for example from hurricane sandy. so the local level, we have to act now, especially because our national government is not. and in new york, we're doing -- look, we decided to be bold. we decided to double down on addressing climate change and on doing things like neighborhood policing because our federal government is not leading in these areas, so we have to take the lead. >> just want to ask you about president trump. i think we share some concerns. and he had the exam with the doctor who new york times here

after exam president is found to be of sound mind and body. i'm not sure the exam included a neuro psych, i don't know. but they say cognitively he's in order. is that good news or bad news to you? >> of course it's good news. >> i wondered, because it takes the behavior that concerns us and puts it in a different realm. i wasn't trying to be funny at all. >> i know you weren't. it's the same question of do you want -- even when you disagree with a party or leader, do you want them to succeed for the good of the country. obviously i hope he is sane. >> of course. everyone hopes one is well. >> i hope he is sane. his actions don't suggest it. >> i know. >> i don't know. i'm not a psychiatrist. i don't know where to separate a clinical issue from a judgment issue or ego issue. >> right. >> i do know that he's decisive

in a way we have no previous model for. it is increasingly repellent to the american people. we were just talking willie and i, i was out in iowa a while back, 60% of the voters in iowa according to des moines poll. this is a state he won. 60% disprove. if you know the political culture of iowa, which values civility. people look at this and say this is not the american way. this is not acceptable for leader and role model and not going to help society move forward. let's put aside whether there's a clinical problem or not, there is a leadership problem, judgment problem, ego problem, and it is inconsistent with american values. >> an illness can be treated, reality can't. >> thank you for the point you made. it can't be accepted as normal. we can't get numb to it.

it reminds me of mccarthy hearings. you certainly know your history. there's a certain point when the outrage consol dates. we have to work with that but we can never become comfortable with unacceptable. >> totally agree. new york lawyer bill de blasio, thank you for being on this morning. coming up, will the government go dark after friday. nbc's kasie hunt has fresh reporting on the threat of a shutdown plus an important look at me too movement in light of allegations against actor and comedian aziz ansari. we spoke yesterday and said he was guilty of not being a mind reader. she suggested the hashtag around her column would be too scared to share. now ashleigh banfield, my colleagues, has powerful thoughts on the topic. we're going to play for you what she said ahead on "morning joe."

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sh show, and we need to get back to a great country. >> did he just say that? >> s show. >> immigration talks stalled after the president's controversial remarks. now the secretary of homeland security is twisting herself into knots to protect him and causing people to question whether or not she has the ability to do her job. we'll have her testimony. plus steve bannon tells the house intelligence committee that the white house told them not to answer their questions in the russia probe, but they were ready. so apparently is bob mueller. that new reporting is straight ahead on "morning joe." to severe crohn's disease. then i realized something was missing... me. my symptoms were keeping me from being there. so, i talked to my doctor and learned humira is for people who still have symptoms of crohn's disease after trying other medications. and the majority of people on humira saw significant symptom relief and many achieved remission in as little as 4 weeks.

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green mountain coffee roasters. packed with goodness. how do you forget when the president of the united states uses that word. >> senators cotton and perdue have disputed what you have said about this. >> they are wrong. they know they are wrong. >> i heard what senator durbin said, he stood behind every word he said. let me be clear, i stand beside every word i said. the difference is, i'm right. >> we've seen plenty of this from the white house. now united states senator looking directly at the american people and lying. good morning, everyone. it is wednesday january 17th, welcome to "morning joe." with us we have political writer for "new york times," former treasury official and "morning joe" economic analyst steve rattner, nbc news capitol hill correspondent and host of

kasiedc. we'll do that even in the darkest days. joe, we have breaking news about steve bannon planning to cooperate with robert mueller. we have reporters standing by on that huge story. i'd like to you frame out what we saw yesterday. we had lindsey graham being lindsey graham again, speaking out against the president's staff. we've got the shutdown looming in three days. it just feels like something is happening. >> we've seen the president's attempt to corrode basic constitutional norms over the past year. that's been a concern. now we're seeing, again, a united states senator, who i've always liked and had great respect for actually denying something that all of washington knows happened. fox news even said it happened.

you know why? the president of the united states, according to conservatives who calling around after it happened bragging about using the words that senator cotton now denies that he used. white house officials even said that the word, or a variation of the word was used. so that's bad, obviously. that's concerning. when you have secretary of department of homeland security testifying that she remembers everything in the meeting except for one thing everyone remembers in the meeting. she even remembers lindsey graham using that word. he used the word in telling the president of the united states why he shouldn't use the word in denigrating these countries. on top of that you had the very trumpian scene, and this is, as you said, how it's happening, we had the department of homeland

security secretary saying that she didn't even know if norway was predominantly white as a country. you've seen it before where people with reputations throw those reputations out the window for 15 minutes with a president who will show absolutely no loyalty back. there is -- i think, mika, this is the takeaway. we're at a point now where we can't believe anything that comes out of the white house as an objective fact. you just can't. you can't believe anything, unfortunately, that trump defenders on capitol hill are saying. it's very depressing. it's very sad, because there are a lot of good people that seem all too willing to just throw their reputations away for a president who is not worth it and will show no loyalty back.

>> i think it's depressing and sad. it also could have devastating long-term consequences. because we've never seen something like this in our lifetime to this extent, i don't think anyone knows where this could lead but i think we have to start looking at history. we'll talk about all of this in just a moment and break down exactly where this is going. first, breaking news in the russia investigation. after his unfiltered comments created a firestorm for the trump administration, former chief strategist steve bannon told congressional investigators that the white house told him he could not answer their questions in the russia probe leading congress to subpoena his testimony along with another reported subpoena from the mueller investigation. bannon was behind closed doors at the house intelligence committee for 9 1/2 hours where lawmakers say he told them he was willing to answer but could

not at the direction of the white house. the committee immediately issued a subpoena to compel his testimony but bannon attorney william burk conferred with white house officials who continued to insist bannon should still not answer the committee's questions. yesterday the white house said this about bannon's testimony. >> no one has encouraged him to be anything but transparent, but there is a process of what that looks like and what that process should go through. we've been completely cooperative throughout this entire process. we're going to continue to be cooperative but we're also going to maintain some of the executive privileges at the white house that have been practiced for decades and need to be maintained. >> the subpoena remains in effect. there are questions that we ask that were not answered, and we're going to resolve those issues to get the answers to our

questions. we're going to get the answers from mr. bannon has we did not get answered today. >> the scope of this assertion of privilege, if that's what it is, is breathtaking. if the white house is permitted to maintain that kind of a gag rule on a witness, no congressional investigation could ever be effective. so this obviously can't stand. we expect to have mr. bannon back in, we hope very soon, with a different position by the white house because this position is completely unsustainable. >> let's bring in nbc correspondent hallie jackson and michael schmidt, broke the story of grand jury testify for special counsel robert mueller's investigation. you have new reporting on how it went down, what's next for bannon. on what authority was the white house telling steve bannon not to testify yesterday. >> so this was a discussion at the white house, i'm told with the house intelligence committee about what exactly bannon might

or might not be able to say and apparently instructed bannon to avoid certain questions related to his time at the white house. that is one subpoena, congressional subpoena. willie, also grand jury subpoena from special counsel arguably and potentially more impactful here. we have reporting how it went down. a source familiar with the proceedings said fbi agents actually showed up to bannon's house on tuesday, last tuesday, intending to talk with him, serve him the subpoena, unaware at that point according to two sources familiar that he had just retained counsel. william burk, two other people related to this, don mcgann and former chief of staff reince priebus. bannon said to them, i've got a lawyer. have you to go through him. the subpoena ended up being served to burk. there's a couple of pieces. the subpoena compels bannon as michael schmidt talked about and reported about, compels him to

speak before a grand jury but bob mueller could still give bannon an option to voluntarily interview just like we've seen so many people do. i'm told if that option is offered, bannon will take that and do this interview. the timing of that is likely very soon. likely before the end of the month. the question, of course, is why did bannon get the subpoena. so far as we know bannon is the only person who has been served a subpoena by the grand jury. what is that about? three people with knowledge of this case have raised the possibility that perhaps it is because mueller is, in essence, thwarting possibility of potential intimidation or pressure by the white house to get bannon not to comply or answer questions that may be the reason for this, although it's still not clear. a lot of back and forth how it went down. bottom line, bannon is going to have to talk with bob mueller's staff, in one way or the other,

either in front of the grand jury or voluntarily in an interview. >> couple of options there. good reporting there. hallie jackson. michael schmidt, let me go over to you on this. it appears white house is exerting influence still on steve bannon, for the allowing him to testify before house committee, showing up at least but not giving answers to questions. i'll ask you what i asked hallie. on what authority in is that executive privilege in how is the white house exerting that authority? >> well, when it comes to mueller, the white house has said they are not exerting any type of privilege. they are going to give mueller everything he wants in the hopes the sooner he gives this stuff, the sooner the president will be cleared. in terms of capitol hill, the white house has had a different posture and have tried to observe many more privileges on testimony. that's what it looked like came up yesterday. the white house was saying they didn't want bannon to answer certain questions, speak about certain things. at the end of the day it doesn't matter because mueller will get

what he wants regardless of what the white house tries to do. i don't anticipate them trying to stop him. at the end of the day, it comes down to what mueller is going to do anyway. the house investigation, which obviously gets a lot of attention, the press has been marred by partisan fighting that's gone on and has really crippled it. the senate has had its investigation going on, it has had less attention. at the end of the day mueller will get from bannon what he wants and you'll have to cooperate. all these questions about privilege don't matter a ton. >> michael schmidt, thank you. still ahead on "morning joe," secretary goes under oath and faces questions from the very same senator whose story she is calling into question. shed new details on the jarring exchange at the white house last week that she just can't seem to remember. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. .

welcome back to "morning joe." let's turn now to yesterday's hearing with secretary homeland security nielson. she was in the room when the president was said to have made racist comments about haiti. yesterday she said she could only recall portions of that meeting. >> madam secretary, you were in the room, you're under oath. did president trump use this word or a substantially similar word to describe certain countries? >> i did not hear that word u d used, no, sir. >> did he use anything similar to that to describe countries. >> it was impassioned. i don't dispute the president was using tough language. >> you testified under oath you did not hear the president use that word at the meeting. >> that's correct. >> is it possible he said the word at the meeting and you didn't hear it?

>> anything is possible, yes, ma'am. >> did you hear him says the word s house. >> no, i did not. >> is it possible he said that word and you didn't hear it. >> it was a meeting of 12 people. there was cross-talk. the meeting, as you know, was unscheduled. so last minute when i was notified, i had to clear my schedule. i came in a bit late. anything is possible. >> you said on fox news the president used strong language. what was that strong language? >> let's see. strong language. there was -- apologies, i don't remember specific word. what i was struck with frankly, as i'm sure you will as well, just the general profanity used in the room by everyone. >> did you hear me use profanity. >> no, sir. nor did i. >> did you hear senator graham use profanity. >> i did hear tough language from senator graham. >> what did he say. >> he used tough language. to underscore a point, i think he was using some strong

language. >> do you recall the strong language he used repeated exactly what the president had said prior to that? >> i remember specific cuss words being used by a variety of members. >> in defense of senator graham, his words repeated the exact words used by the president which you cannot remember. >> 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. it's essential you have border security with the wall, but he also understood the idea we had to do it with compassion. i don't know where that guy went. i want him back. >> i will say, i don't think the president was well served by his staff. i think the president we saw tuesday, that donald trump exists. somehow by 12:00 on thursday,

something happened. 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 pretty much missed the mark here. >> general kelly. >> i think general kelly is a fine man, but he's also part of the staff. >> loaded. okay. is it the staff? i'm not sure what lindsey was saying here but it's good to see lindsey again. i missed him. it doesn't -- i feel like the secretary of homeland security's testimony was pained and painful to watch and kind of depressing at this point. just tell us what happened, you know. >> you know. yeah, i know. we're sitting here obsessing what words were used. everybody knows what words were

used. it doesn't matter what tom cotton said. i think nick, there's a bigger issue here. let's go back to michael wolff's book. i've never seen anything like it before. the worst in the world, worst journalism -- basically everything in the book is correct except for this fact or that fact. oh, my god, he had three misspelling on this page. but at the heart of michael wolff's book is a president in over his head, led around by the nose by staff members on issues that the last person in front of this president would be the person who would be persuading him. here we see a week later evidence of that where donald trump says to lindsey graham,

come on over. let's have that bipartisan deal. his staff gets to him and says, no, mr. president, you don't want to do that bipartisan deal, and he becomes belligerent. the same thing happened in health care when he was going to work with a compromise for health care. he says that sounds like a great idea and made a fool of himself because he was spun by his staff. and 12 hours later, there was no deal there. it even left some staff members scratching their head. he just proved michael wolff right. >> aside from -- i can think it's hard to make policy and deals if you're constantly changing your mind. on this one, i think it's clear, it's not the language he used,

which is bad and offensive. his basic frame on this is some countries are full of good people and some countries are full of bad people. that's his view. it's totally contrary to the american theme and principle of immigration. >> so kasie hunt, in order to believe tom cotton, believe the people who said the president didn't say these things, you have to believe dick durbin and lindsey graham are engaged in some kind of a conspiracy and got together and made up a story. senator graham has been an ally to trump on many issues. i know you talked to senator durbin yesterday. what's your feeling about the language used? we want to get the word right but really what nick said, it's about the larger point. whether he said house or hole or whatever he said, he was effectively saying these are places we don't want the people to come to america. >> i think the reality i guess dick durbin and others were

ready to move beyond the debate of what words were used and refocus the conversation on the policy at hand and what really matters here, which are the 800,000 plus kids who are sitting here waiting to find out essentially if they are going to be able to stay in their homes and families or if something else more dramatic is going to happen. i know i was talking to sources before the hearing, dick durbin intended to have that conversation with dhs secretary. her repeated denials and insistence that she wasn't exactly sure what was said caused some anger. i talked to dick durbin after that hearing and asked him a little bit about some of these details. take a look. >> their defense is it's not a hole, it's a house. but make no mistake, i know exactly what he said. after he said it, my colleague senator graham, who was sitting next to him answered him directly using the same word and telling the story of his family, which he said my family came,

mr. president, came from one of those s hole countries with no skills and no resources. they just want to be part of what we call america. they made a life and business and i'm here today. >> did the president use the word s hole that's been splashed across the papers? >> definitely. >> there's no question in your mind that anybody sitting in the meeting would have heard it. >> no question whatsoever. how do you forget when the president of the united states uses that word. >> snort cotton and purdue have disputed what they said about that. >> they are wrong. they know they are wrong. >> the lindsey graham dick durbin was talking about there was the one who showed up at the hearing today. we were waiting through the weekend to see what he was going to come out and say. was he going to defend the president, be the president's golfing buddy. the senator graham we talked to and heard from publicly yesterday he sounded like the

person who would have said to the president in the meeting, hey, my family came from one of those countries. they didn't know anything, have any skills and look where i am today. >> coming up on "morning joe," congress has just hours left to figure out how or if they are going to shut the government down. the friday deadline is fast approaching. right now neither side is giving any ground. the latest details from capitol hill are next on "morning joe." napoleon is duping us! all around louisiana... you're a nincompoop! (phone ping) gentlemen, i have just received word! the louisiana purchase, is complete! instant purchase notifications from capital one. so you won't miss a purchase large, small, or very large.

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what are some of the most important points that show trump is going to win. >> first of all, an open seat is hard to win, so we don't have the sitting president running. the democrats took a pasting in the midterms, always a bad sign. you've got a third party. third parties are bad news for the party in power. you don't have the obama administration matching anything like the affordable care act in the second term. you don't have a big foreign policy triumph that the democrats can campaign on like getting rid of bin laden. and in hillary clinton you don't have a john f. kennedy. so that's six factors. >> that's the money known as american university's prediction professor, allen lichtman on

"morning joe" in 2016 adding to a streak of correctly predicting the winner of every presidential election since 1984. in an updated version of his boom, book, "the case for impeachment." he predicts an impeachment proceeding will begin this spring. mr. lichtman joins us now and also from bloomberg news shannon. good to have you on as well. you predict an investigation. when did this fall upon your mind? >> this fell upon my mind first of all adventure the appointment of special counsel, which hadn't happened. there's as strong a case of obstruction of justice as there was against bill clinton on a vastly more important matter than blue dress. voted for obstruction article

against bill clinton. secondly, i believe with respect to -- and i will not use the word collusion -- because that's kind of like bursitis. it's a catchall. it's a conspiracy. i believe we have the tip of the iceberg of what the special counsel knows about the relationship between trump and the trump team and the russians. there's a fair chance that the reason they were covering up all of those calls from then national security adviser or to be national security adviser with the russians was to cover up a possible quid pro quo. the russians will help us and in turn we'll ease those sanctions. why else make those calls and why else lie about them. >> professor, you're making your prediction on what's a matter of public record. no one knows what bob hurl has. he's surprised us with plea deals and indictments when he's come out with them. isn't it premature to make a prediction like this when he could, in fact, go through his investigation and say you know

what there wasn't collusion, conspiracy. >> i've made my living on making predictions when other people think they are premature and unreasonable. as i said, from what we know publicly, i think there is a solid case for obstruction. certainly there is already a lot of smoke, and i would say some flame, with respect to a conspiracy with the russians. there are a host of crimes involved here. i wouldn't keep saying collusion isn't a crime. of course not. but taking things of value from foreign nationals is a crime. aiding and abetting illegal computer hacking is a crime. negotiating as a private citizen with a hostile foreign power with which there is disputes is a crime. if this is serious enough, and i've taken a lot of flack for that, i think there even could be charges of treason. after all, russia was waging war against us. not a war with bombs and bullets, but a cyber attack, an online attack designed to

destroy democracy. >> do you agree, professor, this republican house or republican senate would not vote to convict president trump? we have jeff flake on a few minutes ago, a guy who has no warm feelings for president trump who said flatly i would not vote to impeach him. >> talk about premature, how could he know whether or not he would vote to impeach when a case hasn't been made yet. he hasn't been impeached and there hasn't been a trial in the senate. i think mueller -- this is -- my prediction is going to come up with findings that will shock the country, not only involve conspiracy with russia but could involve serious financial crimes. >> and shannon, why don't you jump in when we look into the latest with the russia investigation. so far at least it seems republicans are quite compliant with the erratic behavior of this president. >> it certainly does. you can see the reaction from this meeting, not only russia investigation but congressional meeting, who said who came out against the president and who

didn't. i'm not as good as making predictions as the professor certainly, but i will agree with him that on the mueller investigation we're seeing tiny pieces of a bigger picture that mueller has. of course to your point making an assessment whether you would vote for impeachment now over the president is impossible to do since we by no means have all of the facts and all of the pieces of this investigation. nick. >> shannon, you and i watch republicans in congress kind of grapple with the revelations so far with president trump. what you and i have seen, i think, often found ways to deflect even to the point of alleging there's a partisan leftist conspiracy in the fbi. is there any reason in your opinion, your reporting something that would shake republicans really, really hard

of the president out of that perspective? >> i think very early on from this administration republicans made a decision there were certain things they wanted. there was legislation they wanted passed. they wanted obamacare repealed. they wanted tax reform. they wanted immigration done. they were willing to make compromises to get certain things done. they also want to get re-elected. so they are willing to do certain things and make certain compromises to get elected, depending on which district you're in. of course there's always been this issue hanging over this question around impeachment. again, to this point it is odd to talk about when we don't have any clear case for impeachment that's been made in front of us but just a disruption that that would do to the country. if you do go down that path, what do you get at the end? what do you get out of it? what is the end result? i think those are the three things i've heard republican grapple with. >> jump in. >> i've made a couple of points in the updated case for impeachment. one thing is we tend to have

apocalyptic view of impeachment, which isn't true. if you count richard nixon who resigned because he would certainly be impeached, one of 14 americans before frump was impeached. gamblers have gotten rich betting on odds against that. secondly, the framers put impeachment into the constitution as a legal, peaceful means of dealing with a rogue president instead of blood shed, assassination, revolution. if you look at passed impeachme impeachme impeachments, they have been good not bad for the country. impeachment of andrew jackson moderated reconstruction. resignation of richard nixon removed a danger to our democracy. people said, oh, my gosh, the impeachment of bill clinton is going to weaken the presidency. in fact, the presidency emerged stronger than ever. we need to rethink impeachment as i point out in my book. >> the book, "the case for

impeachment." thank you very much. shannon, quick landfall before we go, is there a government shutdown friday. >> there's real brinkmanship especially in the house. they are still trying to thread the needle between house freedom an moderate democrats in the senate and how you get to a deal. we've seen it meltdown on obamacare. nobody has an appetite for a government shutdown. again, it's a tough needle to thread. rear really hours away from there having to be some sort of collusion. >> up next, the white house is quick to note president trump isn't the first commander in chief to throw around curse words. while that is true there's no shortage of other aspects that set this administration apart. author neil ferguson joins us next. how do you win at business?

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good to see you. we'll talk about the book in a moment. we want to talk about a piece in the globe recurrent theme of 1993 book the agenda is bill clinton's explosively bad temper. others called them purple fits or earthquakes. my point is not that clinton is like trump, of course, my point is the president will infuriate the best of men. each presidential biography makes the mistake of presenting ir rascible. i cannot guarantee trump's fate. some people will say, this is normal, part of the presidency. would you agree donald trump is something new and different? >> he personally is clearly different from other presidents and also policy issues he's

differed rather clear. you've talked about this endlessly. part of the point writing a book about networks, sometimes what really matters is the structure of power. if you look at the network that forms around any president, it has the quality of a court in the time of shakespeare. steve bannon's comments in michael wolff this is shakers perrian is right. the white house is a royal court. it doesn't matter so much what the personality of the president is, certain things will always happen. number one, the people who were great in the campaign will turn out to be not so great in government. so in both clinton and trump's cases there was a big shift of personalities in year one. the other thing that always happens is that the new team finds it difficult to deal with congress, which is where the sausage gets made. so both trump and clinton failed on health care reform but they did succeed on fiscal reform. much of clinton's energies ended up going into raising taxes. much of trump's administration's

efforts went into cutting them. so structurally they are not that different. so you could, of course, say all you like and we talk endlessly about trump's personality but i don't think we should lose sight of structural similarities because that's what determines the outko let's remember the outcome of the clinton presidency was defeat in the midterms. that's quite probably coming trump's way this year, but re-election survival, impeachment. but again, it didn't destroy him. one key point i would make is that structurally this presidency is more like clinton's so far than like nixon's. >> structurally different but cannot that personality we've been talking about in donald trump begin to change the struck you're of the presidency in terms of changing norms that have been in place for so long? >> that was predicted. if you remember a year ago, a great many people, time snyder at yale, we're on the brink of tyranny, fundamental nature of the presidency because this man is so awful but it hasn't really

happened. in truth there hasn't been any big shift in the way the system of government works, the constitution hasn't changed. the people who predicted tyranny with egg on their faces. it can't happen here, this isn't by phillip roth but a rather familiar drama in which the personality of the president dominates news coverage, just as it did in kellyanne case. remember, sex scandals, also a feature of the trump's story increasingly. i don't think if historians point of view these are the things that really matter in terms of outcomes. what we're interested in, i think, is historians are the big changes in policy. at this point i don't see dramatic discontinuity in american history. i've said all along we can be as interested as we like in personalities but is the structure of politics that determines the outcomes. >> you think it's more noise than signal, tweets and rhetoric. >> absolutely.

the biggest problem and partly a consequence of social media for you guys in covering this story is there is such a huge amount of noise that the signal is almost undetectable. my job as historian is to say listen for the signal and see if there really is historic change happening here. i don't really think there is. >> unlike sex scandals of the past in white house's, i don't watch a lot of tv, but i don't see us covering this porn star. i can't believe this is not even news at this point because there's so much going on. i don't see a huge interest in that. i think what i see on a lot of news shows is the concern about the impact on history and the violation of norms. >> the point i'm making in the piece is not that trump is personally like clinton. >> right. >> it's clear i've said this all along, from the moment he announced he was running for

president there was a racist quality to trump quite different from bill clinton whose best buddy was vernon jordan in those days. the personalities are different. what really determines outcomes, this isn't a monarchy, a constitution, the constitution designed to separate powers. what happens in congress is less exciting generally but constitutionally as important and in some ways more important than what happens in the white house. >> you write in your book the presence of networks through history is an understanding of power. here we have social networks, the biggest networks of all. how has that changed how the trump white house is different from shakers perrian court. >> it changed in a lot of ways. for one thing he would not be president if facebook and twitter hadn't existed. i'm dwight sure the story of 2016 isn't that russians med he would in the election but social media created a new sphere and the trump campaign understood how to use that. they understood how to use

facebook and twitter and the clinton campaign debate. that's part one. number two, not only trump's own network he built up over the years on tv but also the network that interfered, russian network which successfully penetrated both the democratic party and the trump campaign. let's not forget the islamic state network which caused major terrorist incidents in the 12 months before the election which i think had a big effect on the way people responded to say trump's muslim ban, which polled very strongly during the election. he was the only candidate to use that kind of language. the language was very much shaped by networks and continues to be. trump has this direct relationship with his huge follower base on twitter. this is a new kind of politics which he got to before anybody else in american politics. he makes obama, who seemed like the pioneer of this kind of politics now look really like an amateur. >> the new book is "the square and tower networks from freemasons to facebook.

niall ferguson, thank you very much. an important subtext to me too movement. ashleigh banfield hits on a theme we've addressed on "morning joe." her searing monologue is straight ahead. (roaring of truck) yes and it was like the worst experience of my life. seven lanes of traffic and i was in the second lane. when i get into my car, i want to know that it's going to get me from point a to point b. well, then i have some good news. chevy is the only brand to receive j.d. power dependability awards for cars, trucks and suvs two years in a row. woman: wait! (laughing) i definitely feel like i'm in a dependable vehicle right now. woman 2: i want a chevy now. woman 3: i know!

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so we did a segment yesterday on the show about a woman who declined to use her real name. she was describing in a piece a date gone wrong with comedian

aziz ansari. ansari released a statement denying her version of events, saying he continues to support the movement affecting our culture. my colleague, ashleigh banfield, delivered a searing monologue against ansari's accuser. ashleigh and i experienced together some of the precious of being in television, some of those pressures being very close to what we're discussing today. she's a fiery communicator, she's talented. she throws her heart into the conversation often at her own peril. she's traveled the world. she's covered 9/11. i think this might be her most important moment on television. here it is in full. >> i would like to say something here, and maybe this is best done in the form of an open letter to aziz ansari's accuser.

ready? dear grace, not your real name, i'm sorry that you had a bad date. i have had a few myself. they stink. i'm sure it must be really weighing on you. it's hard being a victim, very painful. just ask anyone who has been on that end of crime and justice. i cover them every day. it's no picnic. but let's take a moment to reflect on what you claim was the worst night of your life, end quote. you had a bad date. your date got overly a.m. lly . after protesting his moves, you did not get up and leave. by your own description, this was not a rape nor a sexual assault. by your description, your sexual encounter was unpleasant. it did not send you to the police. it did not affect your workplace or your ability to get a job. so i have to ask you what exactly was your beef? that you had a bad date with

aziz ansari? is that what victimized you to the point of seeking a public conviction and a career-ending sentence against him? is that truly what you thought he deserved for your night out? let me be completely clear. if you were sexually assaulted, you should go to the police right now. if you were sexually harassed and your bad date because of his actions mitigated your ability to do your job, you should definitely speak up, and loud, because that's happened to me too, and it stinks. but if you just had an unpleasant sexual experience, you should have gone home, maybe told your friends to avoid him, tell the date himself that he's gross, that he's not the lover that he thinks he is. and without question, don't go on a second date with him, certainly do not marry a guy like that. but what you have done, in my opinion, is appalling. you went to the press with the

story of a bad date. and you have potentially destroyed this man's career over it. right after he received an award for which he was worthy. and now here is where i am going to claim victim. you have chiselled away at a movement that i, along with all of my sisters in the workplace, have been dreaming of for decades. a movement that has finally changed an oversexed professional environment that i too have struggled through at times over the last 30 years in broadcasting. if you're lucky, there's a really good chance you're not going to experience the toxic work environment that the rest of us have endured. that is because of the remarkable progress made against the harvey weinsteins and the kevin spaceys of the world. the "me too" movement has righted a lot of wrongs and made your career path a lot smoother. i'm guessing it will be a long career path. you're 23. what a gift. yet you look that gift horse in

the mouth and chiselled away at that powerful movement with your public accusation. and i'm going to repeat this because it's important. if you were sexually assaulted, go to the cops. if you were sexually harassed, jeopardizing your work, speak up and speak out loud. but by your own descriptions, that is not what happened. you had an unpleasant date. and you did not leave. that is on you. and all the gains that have been achieved on your behalf and mine are now being compromised with the allegations that you threw out there. and i'm going to call them reckless and hollow. i cannot name you publicly and sentence you to a similar career hit as ansari because you chose to remain anonymous. lucky you. but as you grow in your photography career, i really hope you remember what you did to someone else's career, all because of that bad date that was not a sexual assault, that was not sexual harassment by your description.

and i hope the next time you go on a bad date, you stand up sooner, you smooth out your dress, and you bloody well leave. because the only sentence that a guy like that deserves is a bad case of blue balls, not a hollywood blackball. at ameriprise financial, we can't predict what tomorrow will bring. but our comprehensive approach to financial planning can help make sure you're prepared for what's expected and even what's not. and that kind of financial confidence can help you sleep better at night. with the right financial advisor, life can be brilliant. these are the specialists we're proud to call our own. experts from all over the world, working closely together to deliver truly personalized cancer care. expert medicine works here. learn more at cancercenter.com

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hi there, i'm stephanie ruhle. this morning, much to cover, starting with a house call. an nbc news exclusive report, mueller's team subpoenas steve bannon, compelling him to speak, something he refused to do before the house intel committee. his silence, bannon says, commanded by the white house. >> this is the broadest effort to effectively gag a witness that we have seen. >> we'll say that word again. commanded. countdown on capitol hill. three days left to avert a government shutdown and house republicans are trying to go it alone, pushing a plan that would briefly fund the government but put dreamers on the back burner despite continued promises. >> to the 700,000 plus daca kids, we're not leaving you behind. >> with the freedom caucus pushing back hard, can republicans afford to ignore democrats any long