earthquake, a tsunami, and god knows what else. >> yeah. yeah. yeah. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm natalie morales. thank you for watching. > tonight, who are the true patriots? a clash plays out on the national stage, and also it's the super bowl. this is kasie d.c. ♪ ♪ welcome to kasie d.c. i'm kasie hunt. we are on tonight and every sunday from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. eastern time. tonight on the show, take a memo. i'm joined by congressman denny heck of the intelligence committee and chris collins who sits on oversight about what's to come.

plus, i talked to the man in charge of holding the republican majority in the house. congressman steve stivers. and later tragedy on the tracks. congressman roger marshall tried to revive the driver of a trash truck after the terrible accident with the train carrying house republicans. congressman marshall is joining me as well. but tonight we want to start with a little game. it's called who said it. we're going to start with some easy ones. it will get a little harder as we go along. here is the first one. i bet you can guess. quote, this memo totally vind indicates trump in the probe. but the russian witch hunt goes on and on. there was no collusion. there was no obstruction. the word used now used because after one year of looking endlessly and finding nothing collusion is dead. this is an american disgrace. did you guess? president trump? if so, you win. that was an easy one. he tweeted that saturday morning. now it gets a little harder. here's the next one. quote, i have great confidence in the men and women of this department, but no department is perfect. that was from attorney general

jeff sessions. probably the most note worthy part of his statement on all of this. now here's what's probably our toughest one. quote, as i have said repeatedly, this person said, i remain 100% confident in special counsel robert mueller. the contents of this memo do not -- in any way -- discredit his investigation. that comes from trey gowdy, the republican oversight chair who actually has seen the fisa material that went into the so-called nunes memo. remember, devin nunes has not. >> i don't think it has any impact on the russia probe for this reason. >> the memo has no impact on the russia probe? >> not to me it doesn't. and i was pretty integrally involved in the drafting of it. >> if you are watching our show tonight, instet of the super bowl, i suspect you have seen some coverage recently of this memo, and there is plenty of object truce legal precedent and procedure surrounding it. but there are major consequence in both the short and the long run.

in the short run, can the president use this to cast enough doubt on the investigation that it becomes irrelevant no matter what is found to be true? early evidence suggests that's possible. a new axios poll shows fewer than 38% of republicans led by this, quote, law and order president, have a favorable opinion of the fbi. and in the long run, can the president fundamentally reshape the norms of our government? he promised he would on the campaign trail and at this moment we are watching it happen. in the congress, some of the people who could be the strongest defenders of our nation's institutions are shrugging. joining me this hour, reuters white house correspondent jeff mason, washington post congressional reporter erica warner, and former acting cia director and msnbc national security analyst john mclaughlin. thank you all for joining me tonight. i really appreciate it. this has been, john mclaughlin, i want to start with you, an incredibly complicated story

with a lot of threads and a lot of people arguing about the minutiae and details of this. but in the big picture this seems like a potentially very significant turning point for our government and our trust in its institutions from an intelligence community perspective, what does this -- how this has unfolded, what does it mean? >> it's a really big deal, kasie. it's in a fundamental way how we manage ourselves. it's how we manage secret organizations like fbi, cia, other intelligence organizations in an open and free society. that's what it's about. that's the bigger picture. >> are you surprised it's the republicans casting this doubt? it's a reversal of the narrative in recent decades. >> i am surprised. the other bigger part of this story is that none of this needed to happen.

if someone like me who's been overseen by intelligence committees for 30 years and watched them operate the last ten, if someone had a problem like the one described in this memo, the way to deal with it is to go to the judge who heard this warrant request, write to the i.g. of the justice department, and to the attorney general. that's the way it's always been done. and the only thing that's wrong with breaking from that precedent -- because as you say, people can get all caught up in process here. >> yes. you're saying that there is a remedy already in the process for that. >> there is a remedy. and by breaking from it, it has turned what was intended to be a nonpartisan issue into a highly partisan issue on issues of national security and that affect the american people. it's a big deal. >> jeff mason, there's been a lot of discussion about just how involved the white house was or wasn't in the crafting of this. it seems clear that there were at least people in the white

house if not the president himself who wanted this out there because of the impact it was going to have on the russia investigation despite what congressional republicans trey gowdy say. >> he wanted it out there, he gave the thumbs up to the committee to release it. in his tweet that you played at the top of your show from saturday, the outcome, the way he sees it, is exactly what he what he was looking for. he sees this as vindication. despite the fact the investigation is still going on, robert mueller is still proceeding with his probe, and there are still investigations going on in congress. but this was for him a smoking gun of some kind, and he wanted it out. >> erica, paul ryan, we'll talk more about him in a minute, but there is a democratic memo that purports to kind of tell a different story here, that we think the committee is going to vote on on monday to potentially release that. what's, from your reporting, going on behind the scenes in congress to push back what we've seen so far from republicans? >> well, i think as you were

starting to say, paul ryan has said publicly that he wants that democratic memo out. and i think it's inevitable that it will come out. what's been interesting is that there is a divide among republicans in how they are talking about this memo. trey gowdy, as the clip you played indicated and the speaker ryan himself continue to say, that they support robert mueller and that this memo does not undermine the credibility of mueller's investigation. but the comments from devin nunes himself and from other republicans, both on the intel committee and those who aren't, clearly suggest that this memo does undermine the mueller investigation. >> i don't want to cut you off. i want you to pickup that thought. i want to show viewers i asked paul ryan about this memo before it was released. let's take a look. >> mr. speaker, do you really believe that this memo has nothing at all to do and no impact on -- >> what i'm trying to say is

people should not draw lines. people should not implicate -- >> you are drawing lines. >> that's what i'm suggesting. people should not be drawing lines, people should not be implicating independent issues. this does not implicate the mueller investigation, this does not implicate the dag. this is about us holding the system accountable and reviewing whether or not fisa abuses occur. the government has been given extraordinary power over citizens' civil liberties. it is our job to make sure that the process is followed properly. >> and earlier we were talking about the tweet from the president in which he said that the memo, quote, totally vind indicates him in the russia probe. we realized it's not the first time the president has prematurely claimed vindication after james comey testified before the senate intelligence committee in june, the president tweeted that his testimony proved, quote, total and complete vindication. here's what comey said during that hearing about whether or not the president obstructed

justice by asking him to drop the investigation into michael flynn. >> i don't think it's for me to say whether the conversation i had with the president was an effort to obstruct. i took it as a very disturbing thing, very concerning. but that's a conclusion i'm sure the special counsel will work towards to try and understand what the intention was there and whether that's an offense. >> and then there was the president's claim that president obama had his wires tapped during the 2016 campaign. after devin nunes came out last march and revealed that members of the trump transition team had their communications swept up in legal surveillance. the president again claimed vindication. >> mr. president, do you feel vindicated by chairman nunes? >> i somewhat do, i must tell you i somewhat do. i very much appreciated the fact that they found what they found. but i somewhat do. >> and, of course, both james comey and nsa chief mike rogers testified they never saw any evidence to support the president's wiretapping claim. so, erica, i'm kind of hung

up on this. paul ryan was a key force in this memo coming out. i think it's safe to say that this would not have come out without his kind of blessing and work behind the scenes. >> absolutely. >> i was a little bit surprised by that having covered ryan so long. considering he's out there saying this has absolutely nothing at all to do with the mueller investigation, it shouldn't cast any doubt when in reality that is how the president himself is viewing it. that's how thousands of americans are looking at this. >> right, yeah. i agree that ryan's position is a little bit contradictory. and despite what he says, as you're saying, clearly the memo coming out is affecting the public view of law enforcement at large, and therefore of the mueller investigation. and the result inevitably will be that when mueller comes out with his findings there will be substantial doubt about them. >> i think ryan bears really a large responsibility for this. think about it. this is a select committee,

meaning he chooses the members. he's annex owe -- an ex-officio member. he's on shaky ground. >> you pointed out people were drawing lines. he said they shouldn't be. that message hasn't reached the white house. you can see clearly from the way the president is reacting. he's drawing lines. >> i was going to ask you, jeff, what do we know about any communication that might be happening between the speaker and the president about this? i pushed the speaker on it and haven't gotten very far. from your reporting do you know anything? >> i don't have anything to add to that either. i'm sure there is something there. if we can get some questions answered about t it would be interesting to find out. >> i think the interplay between devin nunes and trey gowdy. they were on the same page. i want to touch on another piece of information we have now.

the "wall street journal" reports carter page was on the radar of u.s. counter intelligence since at least 2013, and now there is this. time magazine reports it's obtained a letter from august 2013 which -- in which page apparently touted being an informal advisor to the kremlin. in the letter page writes, quote, over the past half year, i have had the privilege to serve as an informal advisor to the staff of the kremlin in preparation for their presidency of the g-20 summit next month where energy issues will be a prominent point on the agenda. according to time, carter page told the magazine after the nunes memo was released the first nine months of 2013 he sat in on and contributed to a few round table discussions with people from around the world. saying that they were really plain vanilla stuff. page goes on to ask time, quote, does that make me an evil villain as some of your sources would like to have you think? it is important to note page has not been charged with any crimes.

john mclaughlin, can you just explain to our viewers who are not as familiar as you are with the cultivation of sources and methods, et cetera? what about carter page would land him on the radar for the cia, for the fbi, for the people that were looking at him all the way back at this point? i mean, he clearly had business dealings with russia. caught up in a lot of energy money. >> yeah. >> it seems. what do you as an intelligence operative see there? >> when you're recruiting a source to be an agent, to be a spy, there's about five steps you go through. you spot. you assess. you develop. you recruit. and then they report. i would say they spotted carter page quite early here. they assessed him as someone who had relations with the energy business in this country, and

russia is all about energy. and you also invest in a source. you don't know quite where that's going to go, but you say maybe in the future this person might be useful to us in some way. i think with carter page they got at least through spot, assess, and they were in the middle of develop, that stage, where develop is basically establish a relationship, begin to provide favors, seek some things in return. and you may recall that i think it was in 2015 that carter page more or less acknowledged that he had been in touch with an intelligence operative from russia and actually provided some help to the fbi. so, there's a lot of reasons why carter page would get on the fbi's screen for a counter intelligence purpose. >> right. so, jeff mason, the larger point here. the fisa warrant we're talking about is against carter page. it's issued in october of 2016, close to the presidential election. the reality is there are other reasons why u.s. intelligence, the fbi might be looking at carter page that have nothing to do with the president. >> absolutely. and dating back for a few years before then. so, he was clearly on the fbi's radar for sometime, and for a

good reason, because of the ties that he apparently had. >> all right. well, we're going to leave this here. but we are going to have much more ahead this hour. congressman chris collins of new york, he says that the abuse at the highest levels of the d.o.j. is the stuff of hollywood and that the fisa warrant should never have been issued for carter page. plus, the state of play for mid terms changing rapidly, we're going to talk about whether democrats are starting to lose their polling advantage and therefore their hopes of retaking the house. kasie d.c. back right after this.

it really underscores just how partisan mr. nunes has been. he has abused the office of the chairmanship of hpse. i don't say that lightly. i think over the past year he has demonstrated he has engaged in these tactics purely to defend -- >> has he brought up a legitimate issue? >> he put out publicly one side and a very selective cherry-picked memo. >> that was john brennan on "meet the press" talking about what he sees as the partisan motivations of devin nunes. joining me to talk about all this, republican congressman chris collins of new york who was the first member of congress to endorse then candidate trump for president. congressman, thanks very much for being here. i really appreciate it. >> kasie, it's always good to be with you. >> first and foremost, the house intelligence committee is set to consider a democratic memo on this topic. do you believe that the democratic memo in the interest of transparency should be released? >> oh, absolutely.

and we're going to follow the same process for releasing their memo that we used to release devin nunes's memo. in other words, all of us next week will have an opportunity to review the memo in the skiff, in the basement of the capital, at which point in time we would then vote to move that to be released and i suspect the president again would have five days to concur or not. i suspect he will. we're all about transparency, and we're following the same procedure on releasing the democrat memo that we did our own memo. >> are you convinced that the president is going to be willing to declassify this memo the same way he declassified the republican memo? and would you urge him to do that? >> i would certainly urge him to do that. i can't speak for the president, but i believe all of us do

believe in transparency. and i should point out oversight of the administration is something, main job in a democracy that we take. and as oversight of the d.o.j., oversight of the fbi, the cia, but also all the other departments, from hhs to department of commerce, the fda and so forth, and this is what makes america special, is that we do have congress having oversight of all these agencies, asking the tough questions, demanding answers, and that's in this case what happened in discovering what's obviously a political bias and abuse by the d.o.j. and the fbi and it's something we should take very seriously. >> congressman, do you believe that the fbi was trying to help hillary clinton when they issued this fisa warrant? >> well, i can't speak -- >> or when they asked for it? >> i can't speak for what they were trying to do. the fact is they used a salacious and unverified report. the case that's important here, kasie, is they did not disclose to the judge that that was the basis of some of this information to get a fisa

warrant. >> democrats say that's not the case. there is contradictory reporting about whether that fundamental claim in the nunes memo is true. my question is do you believe that the fbi is biased in favor of hillary clinton or was biased in favor of hillary clinton when they asked for this warrant? >> i won't say the entire fbi, but i will say certain officials at the fbi. i don't think it's any surprise that mccabe resigned abruptly a week ago. he was front and center in this -- mccabe himself is the one that stated they would not have been able to get the warrant without using the salacious and unverified opposition research report, and then lo and behold, he sees the memo and he resigns abruptly. so, i do believe, kasie, there was bias at the highest levels of the fbi. >> do you agree with the president that this memo vindicates him from any probe of potential collusion with russia or obstruction of justice? >> no, i really think this memo speaks to our oversight of the

department of justice and the fbi. what we believe was political bias. and when it comes to spying on americans, there's got to be a line that we draw. and i would agree with trey gowdy, this really doesn't have anything directly to do with the mueller investigation of russia. we're going to let that play its own course over the next month or so. i think it is winding down. this was oversight, which is the intelligence committee's job, oversight of the fbi and the d.o.j. that's what this memo is about and the democrats are certainly going to have their opportunity in releasing their memo to disagree and we'll let americans make their own minds up. >> some of your republican colleagues have drawn this connection. you would say that you're in the camp with trey gowdy and speaker ryan in saying you don't believe this memo has any bearing whatsoever on mueller's investigation? >> that's correct. i think they are two stand alone issues.

but when you do see apparent bias, direct bias in the d.o.j. and the fbi, that is of concern to all of us, especially with something as important as spying on americans, big brother eavesdropping on your phone conversations. so, i don't want to mix the two issues and overstate in this case the repercussions of the memo and taken down another path. this is a stand-alone issue speaking of our oversight of the d.o.j. and the fbi. >> should americans trust the federal bureau of investigation? do you trust them? >> overall i do, but i have to say it's very disturbing to see folks like mccabe who did resign abruptly abusing what i believe, abusing his authority. and i think we're going to have to have the fbi take a look at themselves and just be a little more certain in crossing the ts and dotting the is especially in a fisa court that the information given to the judge has been verified and any and all aspects of where it came

from would be disclosed to the judge. so the judge who is making this decision to spy on an american is doing so with all of the information fully disclosed. and i do think that will be a positive outcome of this memo being released in the future. >> and you don't see any danger there's one person who has stepped down, written an opinion column saying that he has stepped down from the fbi because it's essentially being attacked and that's bad for the country. do you see any danger along those lines? >> no, this isn't an attack. it is oversight. and clearly someone who has been, you know, found out to be having this kind of bias is going to say what they can to defend themselves. but this is direct oversight by congress. it is our job. it's what makes america great. again, whether it's the d.o.j. or fbi and medicare and medicaid folks, we keep an eye. we ask tough questions. we try to get to the bottom of things. make sure things are being done properly, taxpayer dollars spent correctly.

in this case, spying on american citizens has to be something we take extraordinarily seriously. >> congressman chris collins, thanks very much for your time tonight. really appreciate it. >> good to be with you, kasie. >> just ahead, republicans hope their historic middle class tax reform will help them hold the house and the senate in the midterms. speaker ryan tried to explain how well it's working over the weekend on twitter writing, quote, a secretary at a public high school in lancaster, pennsylvania said she was pleasantly surprised. her pay went up $1.50 a week. she said that will more than cover her costco membership for a year. that tweet apparently did not age well. a couple hours later it was deleted. states of play up next. building a website in under an hour is easy with gocentral...

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given there are a lot of people resigning or not seeking reelection, could you comment on the joy factor and how you can make it a better place to work? >> joy would not be one of the top ten words i would use to describe it. >> that was chairman of the house armed services committee mac thornberry talking about the joy in congress, or lack

thereof. those comments after congressman trey gowdy became the 9th gop committee chair to decide to leave the congress after this term. gowdy's announcement means the total number of gop house members either retiring, resigning or running for higher office now stands at 37. but now some trend lines seem to be improving for republicans. a generic congressional ballot from monday mouth university had democrats ahead 15 points back in december, but a poll released last week has republicans down just two. the gop retreat in west virginia, i spoke with congressman steve stivers of ohio. the chair of the national republican committee. and i asked him about his party's chances of holding the house in 2018. >> well, i feel good about our chances to hold the house because we have the right candidates and we have the right message. so, i feel really good about our chances. things are getting better. general ballot is getting better because people are understanding

that tax reform is going to make a difference for them. it's starting to work. >> you're fighting history. >> we clearly are fighting history on average. the party loses somewhere between 29 and 43 seats. if we were going to let history decide and look backwards, we would lose the majority. but we get a chance to make our own history and we did that by reforming the tax code, growing the economy, giving people hope and opportunity. 3 million people have already gotten bonuses as a result of the tax reform. people are starting to understand tax reform is going to help the overall economy but it's going to help them individually, kasie. >> this president is incredibly polarizing. there are some places he could go and it would help you enormously. what are some places where the president could help your cause? >> the president, i think, can help us almost anywhere because -- >> there are clearly exception s to that. >> true, but we know how to use the president. let me give you an example.

georgia 6 is a place that the president only won by one point. we used the president there and we won by almost four points because we understood how to use the president to motivate our base. democrats are already excited. democrats are going to use the president to get democrats excited. but we need to use the president to get republicans excited. so, we know how to do that. we have a history of doing it. we got outspent by $10 million in georgia 6 and still won by bigger amount than the president won in the general election 2016. so, i think we know how to use the president. that's why we're 5-0 in special elections right now. >> one area where it's pretty tough to send the president is some suburbs, places like outside of philadelphia, perhaps outside of columbus, ohio. where is the president unhelpful and would you say to those members that potentially want to run against him and say, i don't stand with the president, to go ahead and do that? >> well, i never tell members what to do in their districts. they know their districts better than i do. >> so if they have to attack the president, go ahead?

>> but the president can be helpful to motivate our base he everywhere in the country including places where he might not be completely popular. there are people he can motivate in those places. so, it's about making sure that our voters come out and are motivated. there is a way to use the president almost everywhere. >> joining me now to talk more about this, house editor for the cook political report, dave wasser man. dave, thanks for being here. let's start with the big picture here. is it actually the case that the gap between democrats and republicans overall is currently tightening? and what do you see as the point on which this hinges? where is the point where democrats could potentially win back the house? >> there is no doubt it's closed in the past couple months. i think it's a product of the economy doing pretty well overall, but not this past friday. but i think the threshold is about 6%. >> okay.

>> if democrats have a 6% lead on the generic ballot, i think they have a pretty good chance at taking back the house. but that's probably the over/under. >> what in your view, and from people that you've talked to, is the game plan? do rub cans feel right now like they're more likely to lose and how do they try and narrow that gap? >> republicans i've talked to, even in-house leadership, admit that if the election were held, you know, next week, they would probably lose the house. and the key for them is going to be, number one, a strong economy going forward which i think is not exactly in their control. opposition research against democrats, and let's face it, a lot of these candidates on the democratic side are first timers. using nancy pelosi as they did in georgia 6 district, and national security. the real test will be enter 13 in pennsylvania's 18th district where we have a special election in the district trump won by 19 points. >> basically the trump swing area, right? >> right. and trump went there to campaign to stivers' point. if democrats managed to pull an

upset, that would say republicans are in trouble even in districts where trump is popular. >> erica, what is in your view the line here? stivers was essentially saying, look, if we don't turnout our base for our candidates, we're lost. but there are places where, if you go to chester county where i'm from originally, and say, i love president trump, it's not going to get you very far necessarily. >> right. yeah, there are definitely areas of the country as you were asking stivers about, though he didn't quite want to acknowledge it, where republican candidate is not going to want to talk a lot about trump and is going to deflect that issue. and some of those areas are places where there are a lot of contested seats. california, for example. there are a lot of seats where the parties are contesting. and even in the most republican areas of california, trump is not immensely popular as he is in other states, you know, redder states. >> sure. >> so, those republicans are going to want to talk more about nancy pelosi.

stivers said that she's one of their weapons, and that's the case. we're seeing that in the pennsylvania special election. the republicans are running ads, trying to tie the candidate there, connor lamb to nancy pelosi and he's trying to distance himself from nancy pelosi. so there are similar dynamics there with republicans and trump and democrats and pelosi. >> jeff, do you think that there is a sense that the president is aware of his own impact on these election s? day to day, whether it's the tweets, any one of a number of things he might do in a day, and potentially what the implications are. does he understand if democrats take back the white house what that actually is going to mean especially in the context of all these other things we've been talking about? >> yes and no. i think that there is an understanding about the fact that in some ways he can be very valuable on the campaign trail, but in some areas of the country he's not. i had an interview with vice-president pence when he was in israel a couple weeks ago,

and he's planning, i think, on being out on the trail a lot. what i heard from another white house official is that the president will do a lot of political travel, but it will be more of some of those big rallies that he really excels at. so, i think it will be interesting to see how they sort of strategically put one person, be it pence, be it the president in areas of the country during this reelection. >> dave, i mean, if you are a suburban republican, how do you walk this line? >> well, i think you have to localize your race. what we mean by that is beating the crap out of your opponent. >> straight talk. >> it's really impossible, i think, to deflect the national environment and the level of anger among the democratic base. they're going to turnout no matter what. you need something to motivate your base. you need a reason for those few voters in the middle who are really non-ideal logical. >> you mentioned opposition research, you alluded to it when you said beat the crap out of your opponent.

the one thing i'm interested in, i'm curious what your take is, one complaint a lot of my sources that i talk to every day have about this trump media environment is that their opo hits seem to evaporate into thin air. is there a new standard in trump's america for what is a successful opposition -- is that a thing any more? >> look, the rules that did not seem to apply to donald trump -- look, i still think they apply -- >> the laws of political do apply to house candidates? >> yes. we're seeing in pennsylvania, for example, democrats may not be able to use donald trump against them, but they can use legislature in harrisburg on unions, for example. >> sure. >> there are specific ways democrats are making those cases. >> dave wasser man, thank you very much for your insight and wisdom tonight. kasie d.c. will be back right after this.

back with us is former acting cia director, msnbc national analyst john mclaughlin. john, i want to ask you, i was fascinated with what you were talking about earlier how spies essentially work. one of the key arguments in this memo is that christopher steele had political motivations for doing what he did, coming up with this information, that wasn't disclosed to the fisa court in the view of republicans. how does the fbi go about gathering information like this for a warrant?

would they be used to dealing with relatively, you know, shady characters, so to speak, as they try to figure out and solve these case s? how would they view steele as a credible or not credible person in this kind of context? >> yeah, they're accustomed to this and very frequently i used to sign these warrants and they're big thick things. sometimes i would sign them if they had a foreign intelligence dimension. >> okay. >> you use a lot of information. it may be of varying reliability. that's why you use a lot of it. you're trying to figure out, this information we have is of concern. we want to do this collection in order to find out if we should be concerned. is it real? it's entirely possible as a result of a warrant, granted, that the collection may show, no, this isn't what we thought it was. so, one of the ironies here is, i think carter page is pretty much solved as an issue. but the warrant could, you know,

in the end -- these warrants can show that, well, there is not as much there as we thought. that's something the republicans are missing in all of this. the warrant is isn't because you're absolutely sure someone is guilty. it's because you have enough probable cause to examine it to find out. and as we often said in my old business, you know, when you're looking for terrorists, you don't look for -- you don't consult mother theresa. you've got to look -- you've got to talk to people who have some credibility in that world and, you know, whatever political views steele might have had, he seems to have been motivated by a lot of other things, as human beings always are, complex motives. and also as you know, the democrats dispute the degree to which -- >> it was withheld? >> it was withheld. i think in the end the whole thing is regrettable.

in the end it will probably be important as i think erica said, for the democratic view to come out. had they been interested in transparency, as speaker ryan said, they would have done that at the beginning. the only thing transparent here is they weren't interested in was transparency. >> john mclaughlin, thank you. historic number of women are running for seats in congress. lauren bayer will join me live after the break to tell how she plans to help democrats win back the house. . from the very beginning ... it was always our singular focus, a distinct determination. to do whatever it takes, use every possible resource. to fight cancer. and never lose sight of the patients we're fighting for. our cancer treatment specialists share the same vision. experts from all over the world,

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we are continuing to bring you the stories of congressional candidates who are making 2018 a record year for women. according to "time" the number of democratic women is up 350%

from 2016. one of the districts preparing is florida's 18th district just north of the president's winter white house in mar-a-lago. while mr. trump beat hillary clinton there by nine points, two women have stepped forward to challenge incumbent republican congressman bryan mast in the upcoming election. democratic candidate lauren bear served as a senior policy desires to secretaries clinton and kerry in the state department. >> thank you for having me, kasie. >> i want to ask you broadly why did you decide to get involved in politics now? is this something you thought about doing? clearly you played a role on hillary clinton's campaign. so you've been involved but public policy. what is it about this moment in time that had you decide you wanted to make a run? >> i never actually played a role in hillary clinton's company. i was in the world of policy not politics.

i spent sex years as an official in the state department, but i had a daughter who was born two weeks before donald trump was elected president. and i think just about every day about her future and my responsibility to create the kind of world i want her to live n. i'm inspired also by my mother who's been chronically ill for more than two decades and was one of more than 70,000 people in my district who stood to lose health care when brian mass wanted to repeal the affordable care act. i was inspired by my own mother and daughter. but it's about all the mothers and fathers and daughters and sons in my district and the need to make sure washington work for them again. i feel like we have a crisis in washington and it's time we sent representatives who are going to vote in the interests of their own constituents. >> if you were elected to the congress, would you support nancy pelosi to lead the democratic party in the house? >> i'm interested in seeing a

diverse slate of candidates up for leadership of the party. i think that's important that we have some competition and i would assess any candidates that were put before me at such time. i can say that that's a decision to be made as i'm fortune enough to be leaked, but not now. >> would you want nancy pelosi to come campaign for you? >> when it comes to anyone, the question is do that i share my values? are they standing -- >> does she? >> i think broadly the democratic party does twloms any particular strategic decision about who might smout on the campaign trail, that's a decision to be made at a particular point in time. for me i'm a proud member. democratic party, who's there for everyone regardless of who they are or whether where we their parents might have come from. my kwrn is that we have republican leadership which seems to be interested in just the select few.

>> bernie sanders muntd strong challenge for hillary clinton for the democratic nomination 2016, and he did it by running on ideas such as medicare for all. you a supportive of that as a policy? >> what we need to do is shore up the affordable care act. we have a health care law on the books. and republicans seem intent on dismantling it limb by limb. that alone would cause approximately 31,400 people within my own district to lose health care. so i can certainly say my first priority in congress would be shoring up the law we already have, stabilizing insurance markets, and making sure we're working to keep premiums and deductibles down for people. beyond that, i believe health care is a fundamental human right. and i'm willing to entertain whatever pieces of legislation would be put before me to vote on. and i'm willing to entertain whatever pieces of legislation would be put before me to vote on. but i really think the first

matter of priority ought to be shoring up the existing health care law. >> do you support president trump's decision to move the u.s. embassy to jerusalem? >> it's dangerous. it threatens our national security and undermines the peace process to move the embassy there now. that's potentially quite destructive policy when it comes to looking to have a two-state solution. my concern is that it undermines peace process. >> i want to ask you quickly your own personal background. you would bring diversity to the congress with your background as for lgbt issues. what roll will that play in the course of your campaign, our own personal family background? >> as you point out, i'm proudly married to a woman. we have a daughter who's 15

months 'ol old. it's about equal rights for all americans regardless of their race, religious background. i happen to think when we send folks to congress who represent the diversity of america, we all benefit. that's really what the heart of my campaign is about, about really fighting for the broad range of people who live in my district and making clear they deserve a representative in washington who's going to fight for legislation that benefits all of them and not the select few. >> lauren bear, thank you very much for your time tonight. appreciate it. jeff mason and erica warner. you know, i used to be good at this.

then you turn 40 and everything goes. tell me about it. you know, it's made me think, i'm closer to my retirement days than i am my college days. hm. i'm thinking... will i have enough? should i change something? well, you're asking the right questions. i just want to know, am i gonna be okay? i know people who specialize in "am i going to be okay." i like that. you may need glasses though. yeah. schedule a complimentary goal planning session today with td ameritrade.

this morning, a growing rift within the republican party over the controversial gop memo. the president says it vindicates him in the russia probe. democrats push to release their own memo. plus, more to come following congressman devin nunes and his team have found other examples of wrongdoing within various government agencies. and the eagles win the super bowl and fans have been celebrating in the streets all night long. good morning,