ago. the s&p 500 is trading just above its correction territory just as the market closes now. the bell ringing, trading stopped at exactly 5 seconds, that's the end of it for me. i'm going hand it over to nicolle wallace and deadline white house right now. >> hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york as white house communications director had to fire a brilliant accomplished young white house staffer who didn't pass the fbi background check. i was made aware of the reason why and told by the white house counsel to inform him immediately. his violation isn't something that is illegal in most states any more, but that's how most white house's function when they receive information from the fbi someone hasn't vetted out. it isn't to check the character. the purpose of an fbi background check, one of the key questions put to all potential white house staffers in writing and in person, could you be a target for blackmail? so, the burning questions this hour, who was made aware of the

fact that one of the president's most senior advisors, staff secretary rob porter, had not passed his fbi background check ostensibly because of the in-person testimony from two former spouses who accused him of abuse. and knowing that he did not and was likely never receive a security clearance, why did they leave him in the post? if if the abuse allegations hadn't made the report, was the plan to leave them therein definitely? here's the second statement on the matter released hours after his initial statement of support for porter's character. quote, i was shocked by the new allegations released against rob porter. there is no place for domestic violence in our society. i stand by my previous comments of the rob porter that i have come to know since becoming chief of staff, and believe every individual deserves the right to defend their reputation. i accepted his resignation and will ensure a swift and orderly transition. but being shocked doesn't

hold up in light of reporting from multiple news organizations that contend that kelly and at least a few other senior aides likely knew of the abuse allegations. here is one of rob porter's ex-wives. >> i also am not at all surprised that people who work with him in a professional capacity see him as a model of discretion, integrity and character. i believed that he is, and i think professionally he is intelligent and he is measured and he is certainly someone that i would trust in that professional position, and in his personal life he is also abusive and angry. >> the washington post reporting another detail of her account. she said when the fbi asked her whether porter was vulnerable to blackmail, she answered affirmatively, because of the number of people aware of his abusive behavior. quote, i thought by sharing my story with the fbi he wouldn't be put in that post, she said.

i'm telling the fbi this is what he's done. and another ex-wife jenny willoughby is telling them what he has done. this is okay? sure, i was let down by that. >> it is important to remember that rob porter has repeatedly denied these allegations and done so publicly. that doesn't change how serious and disturbing these allegations are. they are upsetting. and the background check investigates both the allegations and the denials. the investigation does not stop when allegations come to light. it continues to determine the truth. we should not short circuit an investigation just because allegations are made unless they could compromise national security or interfere with operations at the white house. the truth must be determined. >> so, he has to make sense what that truth is. from "the new york times" peter baker, mika for third ways

national security program and former staffer for the house intel committee. and with us at the table, jim messina, white house deputy chief of staff for president obama, also campaign manager in 2012. msnbc political analyst eli sokel and michael steele, former rnc chairman also an msnbc analyst. peter baker, let me start with you. i was listening to that briefing. i saw deputy press secretary raj shah get pressed more about who knew what and when they knew t. the bottom line is when the fbi comes to the white house after finding something troubling, it's not the white house's job to tell you what to do about it, but every white house, and i'm going to press jim mussina on this in a minute. there is a standard that most modern white house's have and domestic abuse would certainly not meet the standard for staying on board in such a high-profile and sensitive job particularly if you're not going to be able tomorrow a clearance that would permit you to see classified material.

>> no, that is exactly right. there is probably no job in the white house, but a few, that are more, you know, involved with sensitive documents than the staff secretary. it's a job that doesn't sound very important, but it super is. as you know, obviously, nicolle, better than anybody. that's the person who controls all the paper that goes to the president. that is the person who controls the information. the person who takes the decisions made by the president and enact them, puts them in the process that they turn into actual, you know, action. so, for that person not to have a full clearance, that person not to be trusted, not to have, you know, a clean bill of health, if you will, is a big deal. what's interesting about what raj shah was saying at the briefing right now was they did know about this, but they didn't really focus on it until they saw the pictures. that's what you read between the lines of what he was saying. until they saw the pictures, they didn't take it seriously. they only saw the pictures because it came out in the media. when the fbi told them there were these allegations out there, that wasn't enough to trigger enough alarms to make them change their mind about having him in this sensitive position. >> peter baker, i'm picking up a

lot of discontent with chief of staff john kelly and the close aides around him that may have known about this, hearing about some discontent about at least one of his deputies and the small circle that might have known. and i don't know for a fact the white house counsel knew, but a white house counsel would be the kind of person that might know. so, i'm hearing that a lot of staffers who didn't know, lower level staffers, very, very unhappy with john kelly and his handling of this incident. >> well, it's surprising i think to a lot of people because the impression they had general kelly was a no nonsense type of leader. whatever else you thought of him, whatever you thought of maybe his idea logical beliefs he's been sharing lately on immigration, a lot of people did have the impression he was a no nonsense kind of fella, and he wouldn't put up with is this sort of thing. either it got passed him or didn't disturb him. it disturbs a lot of people

inside the white house and outside the white house. you add that to comments when he said some immigrants were too lazy to apply for the daca program that protects them from deportation, a comment that aside from being offensive also is disruptive to a negotiation that the president is in the midd middle of on a highly important issue. you have a lot of questions being raised now about general kelly. >> mi can, a you want to review something written in the washington post, a normal white house, either party in modern history, does not attack the fbi based on ill conceived conspiracy theories nor the electoral system because it might make the president insecure, or because of substantial evidence of spousal abuse. the photo of one of the staffer's ex-wives with a badly bruised eye and protective order granted to another ex-wife takes this far out of the realm of he

said she said. yet in this white house is not horror and revulsion, but a determination to protect the abuser, rob porter. >> it is surprising what's been happening in this white house. frankly, the white house's claim that he is denying the allegations therefore he should have his day in court. if you're the fbi, the denial itself is actually more troubling given the amount of substantiation you have of this domestic violence. what it suggests is he's trying to deceive about what actually happened there. and in a position of trust and confidence and in an fbi background investigation, you want to know that that individual is going to be forthcoming and truthful with your investigators. and he wasn't doing that. that is a big security red flag. >> do you think that this is enough of a security threat that the committees should want to ensure that someone without clearances with something that could certainly be lorded over him, like i said at the top, the background check isn't for the fbi to weigh in on the character of potential staffers. it's to see if there is 234anytg

that could be used to blackmail the u.s. government. do you think there is any security concern about the person who has that file with the eyes on the intel, who has any materials that need to go to the president and you can explain it to our viewers better than me. is there a security concern here, let alone sort of the lack of any moral compass in deciding who can be inside the oval office with the president all day? >> yes. if you're the person who is putting those documents in front of the president, sensitive intelligence reports, you're putting in front of him his briefing if his reading it. you are having access to a lot of very sensitive information and you want to make sure that you can trust the person who is handling the paper. you don't want to think that that person has any vulnerability, where they might try and do something to prevent secrets from getting out and you don't want someone who is dishonest about their character and what happens in their lives. you need people to confess their sins even if it's just to the investigators. but what this suggests to me is that john kelly is so desperate for anyone who is perceived as

competent, able to do his job, he's having a very hard time letting go of this given the cast of characters he's had to deal with in this white house. >> i want to bring in the conversation nbc news peter alexander who is in that briefing who challenged deputy press secretary raj shah and i want know how that wrapped up. if you got any answers to your questions. >> to be clear, there are a lot of questions i think are not clear at this time, exactly how it is that after a year of background check hadn't been completed, that john kelly could, as the white house insisted, could have been so caught off guard by what he learned just basically within the last 48 hours about rob porter. i was pressing raj shah specifically about the first statement that he posted, that said that he viewed rob porter as a man of honor, and of integrity. and hours later after the photograph came out all of a sudden he said there were new allegations that he was shocked by. that's one thing they were focused on. we did learn new details in the course of the briefing.

nicolle, rob porter no longer works for this white house, that he resigned yesterday, terminated, not that he was fired, but that was the end of his time working for the white house. he came back to the white house as we understand to clear out his desk. as i understand it from aides behind the scenes he was told quickly to do that before geneva convention home. the bottom line, the question that remains unanswered is how it got to this place, how a year into this administration, a man who worked effectively right beside the president had this background that nobody seemed to be sufficiently aware of and how they allowed that to be the case in spite of having only that interim clearance. another thing that was sort of striking to me, nicolle, from this conversation was the way the white house sort of pushed back on the fact that the photos came out. they said, we have to consider all allegations seriously, but we also have to review all denials seriously. remember, this president has for months received, in effect, the benefit of the doubt from fiercely denying all allegations of any kind against him, those

of collusion, of obstruction of justice, and even misconduct against women. that is sort of the default position for this white house and specifically today they said, you know, we have to take those denials seriously and take the allegations seriously as well. >> peter alexander, grateful you're in the room pressing on those questions. come back if you pickup anything new. i want to bring margaret in the conversation as well. your story, your piece this morning stopped me in my tracks. i'm going to read a piece of it. you write, explain the rob porter story, any of it. the trump administration suffers from the singularly morally bankrupt strain of tribalism in which loyalty to the president trump is prized above all else and failings are ignored, especially failings that echo those of the president himself. you wrote the best piece i've seen all day. everybody should get on the washington post website and read it. i want to ask you, because you posted with your piece the pictures of one of his ex-wives' bruises on her face, and you i

am ploe-- implored your readersk at those pictures, look at the socket. we have been judicious in not airing the picture. what struck me about this press briefing that wrapped up moments ago was that they used the publication of pictures in the media as some sort of turning point in their internal deliberations. >> well, that just doesn't fly. i mean, these pictures, i believe, were available to the white house for months and, you know, usually the question is what did the white house know and when did it know it, or the president. that's a question here, but the other question that is harder and more painful to answer is why didn't they care. why didn't they care enough to find out? why did they simply assume that rob porter was telling them some sanitized version of the truth? why didn't they take a look at

the facts underlying this, because whatever the facts are, they are not facts that support somebody like this working in the white house as far as i can tell. and if you hear me being a little bit more energetic than usual, it's because i'm really livid. as a woman, as a taxpayer. we do not want people like that working in public office. you know, you worked in that white house, nicolle, you know that. >> but i guess -- let me just press you. do you really want to know why corey lewandowski physically harmed the arm of michelle fields? and there were no immediate condemnations of his conduct? donald trump stands accused of sexual misconduct, not abuse that we know of, by more than a dozen women. roy moore was someone who had the president's enthusiastic vigorous defense because he, quote, denied the allegations. do you really not know why? >> well, i think it's actually

simply important to ask why and to expect an answer, because in his very belated statement last night, the white house chief of staff said that domestic abuse has no place in society and that he was shocked to discover this. well, come on. we need to not treat this white house like it's going to respond to a different and lower standard of behavior than we expect of our public officials. and if we sort of -- if we simply just give up and let our sense of outrage be diminished by this white house's constant failure to live up to what i think are proper standards, then we're complicit with them, too. that's why i ask why. >> i'm glad you ask why. i'm asking why with you. i want to know, peter baker, what happened between the two statements from the chief of staff yesterday. if you have any reporting on

whether someone had to go to him and say general kelly, we need to get on the record that we're against domestic violence, because it was oddly timed. i think it came out around the same time that an interview posted on the washington post website with one of mr. porter's former wives describing in, i thought a very generous thoughtful way, she could see how general kelly could see mr. porter professional, but he was also an angry and abusive man. >> yeah, there is definitely a two sides to rob porter here. one that people saw in the white house, the one that general kelly saw in the white house was a competent professional, a calm person, a person who seemed able to handle the stress of a chaotic white house, who seemed to be able to help bring order to a chaotic white house. and that's who general kelly saw. he didn't see the side these ex-wives saw, obviously a person as they describe, a person of anger, a person of violence, a

person of abuse. so, he was unwilling to credit those accounts until he saw this photograph in which it was very hard to dismiss. now, to be honest, we should make sure to repeat that rob porter has denied these allegations and says the picture is misleading, that he was the one who took it. but he doesn't explain how his ex-wife got a black eye through anything other than what she said. once general kelly sees this photographs, it's pretty hard not to put out a second statement trying to clean up the first one. >> peter, let me press you a little bit. this happens a lot when we're talking about abuse. it's happening more and more. we're not talking about sending him to prison. we're talking about whether or not he met the standard to serve as one of the most senior advisors to the president. certainly two former wives who accused him of domestic violence and had photographic evidence and sat for interviews with the fbi attesting to that, but have never been rebutted. it would seem like enough evidence not to send him to jail, that's not what i'm contending, but to remove him

from one of the most senior positions on the white house staff. does the white house have an answer for that? >> no, certainly i think you have due process, but you don't have the right to a job in the oval office with the president of the united states. and, you know, most white houses anyway, take that seriously enough you have to be completely clean, if not completely clean, completely honest about what mistakes you've made in the past and they don't sit there and say, well, you might have had this. we'll let it go for a while until we learn otherwise. it's pretty striking. i can't think of a parallel in recent times on that kind of thing. you have to put -- to understand the context of this white house, there are so many problems in this white house, so many issues that they are dealing with, and from the point of view of chief of staff is not to say this is the right -- this is not his part, but he what he was probably thinking, here was somebody i can rely on, i'm going to give him the benefit of the doubts. that was obviously a mistake given the evidence that has turned up. and to turn a blind eye to the

evidence of the fbi presented long before the photograph, you know, just is asking for the kind of, you know, problems that they've had this week where eventually it becomes public and embarrassing. what you've seen with this white house again and again, they know about certain problems and they don't act until it's exposed in the media. mike flynn being another example, the national security advisor. they knew had not told a truthful story to the fbi, didn't fire him until it was exposed in the press. >> i'm glad that peter ended with mike flynn because i actually -- i asked the same question today. when we find out, and we will, when the white house found out from the fbi. i remember when i couldn't bring over one of my favorite and most brilliant -- he's gone on to make a zillion dollars. his life turned out just fine. but it was for a transgression that isn't even illegal any more since he's been in college. the bush white house, obama white house, you couldn't -- the

standard was so high. it wasn't set by the fbi. but if the white house was made aware of any conduct that could reflect badly on the president or the country, the office, they were dismissed immediately. and it is certainly a working theory that more than just general kelly were made aware of this and they had known about it for a bit of time. >> look, they absolutely knew. let me tell you three things. i ran this process inside the white house. the fbi would have come to me and the white house counsel with information. >> so, the people -- and i don't know if they were -- general ha hagen, rob mcgahn, following your structure and mine. >> right. staff secretary is one of the two positions that is the most important position -- >> change the name, because it's got a bad name, right? like most important person of everything important. >> they see every single thing that exists in the white house. every document to the president,

intelligence report, they see it all. that and white house chief of staff are the two that are the most secure. three, there is no possible way the background check on that position would take a year. there just is not possibly -- you get those done in a month or two. what i'm sure happened is that there's no question the white house -- the fbi found this out. there is also no question in a million years they would never give him a permanent security clearance. and so the trump white house decided to sit there and let him have an interim clearance which leads us to the next thing. there is no chance that john kelly, the chief of staff, didn't know that his staff secretary couldn't see some documents, didn't have a full security clearance, and any guy who runs a process which is what he says he does, would have known why that was. and, you know, you guys had great reporting. they knew in november and they sit there and did nothing on it until they were called on it. the other question i have people haven't talk about, you know this, when you first go in your first day, you have to fill out an s-86 which has everything

you've ever done. the one thing white house counsel tells you is don't lie. if you smoked pot in college, tell them you smoked pot in college. do whatever it is. you cannot -- >> sweating again, you're retraur retrauma advertising me. >> if you don't tell them you've twice been accused in police reports filed for domestic abuse, you are gone. the fbi would finish you in a second. any rational white house the moment they heard about this, it wouldn't have gotten to the chief of staff. they would have been fired immediately. so, the fact that kelly said he's shocked is just a lie. it's just not true. there is no possible way that is true. >> eli? >> well, i mean, you see raj shah changing the story today in real time. that's sort of what you see at the podium every day. but i think what's fascinate building this, it is shocking, but it also, as ruth talked about in her piece, the tribalism here. that is the unifying -- that's what makes this not all that shocking. think about this administration over the last 13 months. first there was mike flynn. warned about him repeatedly. now he's one of us.

don't worry about it. there is a sense if you're loyal to us, it doesn't matter. it's fine. we will determine who can and can't be part of this administration. and there was a great question asked during the briefing today, raj shah was asked if there aren't pictures, do women who make these allegations and accusations, they still need to be believed? he didn't know what to say. it was a great question for a white house that has denied the women accusers who have all accused donald trump of similar behavior, of sexual harassment. they did not believe donald trump said, you have to believe roy moore, did, too, basically denying his accusers, their right to sort of say -- to be believed. and with rob porter it was the same reaction. it was john kelly saying, well, he has a right to defend his reputation. there was no consideration for the two ex-wives who are out there publicly, even after there were pictures out. and that is sort of -- it's shocking, especially given that

it's coming in a moment, a cultural moment when there is this great awakening to things women have had to endure and still have to endure. there are a lot of people who are realizing that and yet you have the white house a symbol of our government that sort of refuses to recognize that and take it serious. >> it's not that they refuse to recognize it. they try to brush it under the rug. so, there's no question about whether or not they thought this was a fireable offense. they didn't. they knew and they didn't fire him. >> well, you have to ask yourself why that is. it's because the guy at the top didn't want him fired. this was his boy. and so -- >> talking about kelly or trump? >> well, porter is his boy. given the level of access the president has to this young man, i mean, he spends as much time with him as he does with anyone else in the white house. >> right. >> and so it becomes a sort of insular environment in which people are afraid to do what their natural gut instincts would tell them to do. that is, we're not going to play on this playground.

but when the guy who is the king on the playground wants everybody to play there, that's where they are. and kelly is stuck in that space. everyone else is stuck in this space. how does he sit there for a year, you ask the question? because donald trump wanted him there. i mean, at the end of the day, you don't get fired unless trump wants you to go. he's the guy, remember the show. you're fired. and this was not on his mind because this was his guy. >> we're letting kelly off too easy. he released this statement saying the guy was a man of integrity. the white house is known for the best and brightest staffers in the world, right? here the best and the brightest, you got there because you're great at what you do. you are not a man of integrity where you spousal abuse two separate women and they defend him. they begged him to stay. i don't know kelly said, go fix this. >> right. and we have that great reporting in t in the washington post. i want to give you the last word. your piece so moved me. i want to know, do you throw your hands up and say, this is

what we've got? this will always be the only way to purge the white house of men who abuse women, if they're uncovered? and do you wonder what else might be in the investigations of other people? are there other people there who never receive security clearances because there were things that were problematic for them? >> well, the flynn story tells us, rob porter story tells us there is every reason to not trust this white house. but i guess i want to go back to general kelly and say he told us he longed a few months ago when women were held sacred. now we know how much he values women. and let me just say, it's not just that he saw this picture and then he was alarmed. it was about a dozen hours after that picture first surfaced, after they got up at the podium and reaffirmed their commitment to rob porter, that he finally said he was shocked.

that is not okay. that's what we should all be shocked by. >> ruth marcus, everyone should go read your piece, explain the rob porter story, any of it. best thing i've read all day. thank you for spending some time with us. when we come back, i will show you the single best political interview of the trump era, i swear to you, it is the most insightful questioning and the most authentic responses from a trump staffer that i have ever seen. you will not want to miss this. stay where you are. whoooo.

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when the tape i'm about to show you was sent to me today, i thought twice about watching it as i always do. once i opened it and listened to the questioning of former white house advisor omarosa by ross mathews, i was riveted. keep in mind i was fired from the view for not knowing much about pop culture. this is called celebrity big brother. let's watch. >> and on the outside, i thought

as a voter, a citizen, i never got it. >> why you went to the white house with him? >> it was like a call to duty. i felt like i was serving my country, not serving him. whenever i'm accepting a protocol, appointment, it was always about the country. like, i was haunted by tweets every single day. why is he tweeting? does anybody say to him, what are you doing? i tried to be that person and all the people around him attacked me. keep her away. don't give her access. don't let her. who had that? i wanted to say, what is pap going on? not there. it's not my circus, not my monkeys. i'd like to say not my problem,

but i can't say that. it's bad. >> should we be worried? ah. >> don't say that, because we are worried, but i need you to say, no, it's going to be okay, and it's not going to be okay. it's not. >> i was riveted. he asked -- he asked the best questions and got the best answers. i know she's in show business, but i mean, i think it's as bad as he described it. >> that may be. that whole thing is about as real as the white house photo that they sent out during the shutdown of the president sitting at the desk staring at the camera. we're supposed to believe he's working. omarosa knows there's a camera there. this is the woman who took her

bridal party of nearly 40 people into the rose garden on the weekend to take her wedding photo who reportedly tried to break into the white house residence when she was getting fired to get the president to save her job. and so, you know, maybe what she's saying does align somewhat with reality, but she is not necessarily the most credible messenger at this point, a former reality tv star turned -- did something in the administration, now turned back into, what do you know, a reality tv star. >> but the window that i think is valuable is that this is donald trump's world. he doesn't come from our world. >> that's right. >> so, you're never going to get the best interview of omarosa from me or andrea mitchell or peter baker. you're going to get a window into these people, and i put omarosa and donald trump in the same category, from ross. and, ross, you're amazing. but i think this idea that as these people go back to their peer groups, it's interesting

what you said, jared and ivanka, they're like the original gang was there and we tried, but we couldn't get to him. that is sort of in line with the theory, that the deep state is taking over. this to me was at least revealing in that i think that omarosa is the canary in the mine. i think this is how donald trump would answer some of these questions. it's bad. it's really, really bad. you know, i got jared and ivanka there, but what do i do? >> he looks miserable. his wife does. you know, someone, your former chief of staffer, george bush said on the last day of the administration, all white houses are a reflection of the leader at the top. you can tell the way the white house acts because of the leader, right? so, you do have celebrity craziness like this and i actually think she was pretty honest. i think if i was -- >> we'll never know to eli's point, i'll concede that. it was revealing. >> it was revealing. and i think what is true is we've all worked in these places and waking up every day not knowing what your boss is going

to tweet would be a terrifying -- >> destabilizing. >> ridiculous, but it's ridiculous because of the context of the messenger. what she says does lineup with what we've heard privately from other people who worked in this administration and have left in terms of, you know, you don't know the half of it. i'll give you that. >> okay. so, this is a disapproval of about general kelly's stewardship of the trump west wing. of course he presided over omarosa's abrupt departure and a slew of others. we have a complete list of white house resignation and firings. some happened on the watch much his predecessor reince priebus. he was fired and we put him on the list, too. it's kelly's episode that has him under the harshest scrutiny. he left his critics as well as west wing subordinates questioning how much credibility he has left. terrence? >> i'm still stuck on the omarosa -- >> i can't believe i -- this is why we milk it. >> i can't believe how gullible

you were for that. >> i'm not there still -- this is what they see. this is what elites miss. >> this is so much schtick. running about this town bragging about her power inside the administration, blocking people and all of that. so, sitting on the couch crying crocodile tears with ross, okay, that's an easy interview, trust me. okay, moving on. so, what was your question again? >> her assessment of how bad it is in there, of just how bad it is, that the president -- i've heard this from other friends of the president who would have as hard a time as i would watching that on television, that he's out of control. former republican who was a high profile surrogate for the trump campaign and remains in contact, said nothing short of losing control of congress in 2018 will be that backstop against his current cycle of

self-destructive behavior. >> with kelly -- >> with trump. >> trump? yeah, that's the key thing. everybody else is an ancillary actor here. you've already made the point. you made it the best. that last day where, you know, you get that reflective moment and you go, hey, you know, the white house reflects the man or the woman who is sitting behind the desk. and the fact of the matter is whether it's kelly, whether it's any other staffer, they are staffers. and their job and their responsibility every day is going to be how much do i do to stay on this side of the president, the good side, as opposed to getting on the bad side. so, the house and all of that happening this fall, the president is not keyed into losing the house. for him that's an up side because now he can play off democrats a lot easier than he can his own party. so, i just don't buy this notion that everybody is such a hapless individual here. they're pulled and pushed by one

centrifugal force and that's the president. >> peter, are you picking up any sort of timing or rumors that general kelly may not be long for this white house? >> well, you certainly hear that question being asked. inside the white house as well as outside. the president has not always been happy with general kelly and this has been a bad week we pointed out, not just because of rob porter but the comment he made about lazy immigrants. at a certain point the president has bristled at the limitations general kelly has tried to place on information getting to him. he doesn't like being managed. he doesn't like being handled and general kelly is trying in at least a somewhat judicious way to manage and handle this president who is otherwise often very self-destructive. so, there's been tension there for a long time. this now brings it to a head. and, yeah, the question is being asked how long he'll last. >> mika, let me give you the

last word. i go back to sort of carelessness and the lack of thoughtfulness about the handling of classified information because the irony is never lost on me that that was the, you know, pan they beat his opponent over the head with for many months. we know the person closest to the president didn't have a security clearance. i wonder if you can just button all of this up for us with sort of your impressions from where you sit of how this white house is functioning under general kelly's regime. >> yeah, i think it's really troubling that we had a major departure from business as usual with security clearances and the rest of the handling. i think it's a sign of how poorly this white house is doing at attracting people with any sense of dignity and integrity. it suggests why that is kelly is trying to hold on into this person. kelly before he came to this job had some dignity and integrity. donald trump steals people's dignity like the devil steals

people's souls. >> donald trump steals people's dignity the way the devil steals people's souls. that was brilliant. when we come back, i former president and dpormer vice-president issuing back to back warnings about russia. i've gotta say, i love the new place. oh thanks. yeah, i took your advice and had geico help with renters insurance- it was really easy. easy. that'd be nice. phone: for help with chairs, say "chair."

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stay at la quinta. where we're changing with stylish make-overs. then at your next meeting, set your seat height to its maximum level. bravo, tall meeting man. start winning today. book now at lq.com at a summit in abu dhabi earlier today, former president george w6789 bubush refuted the denial that russia interfered in our election. >> you know there's pretty clear evidence that the russians meddled. whether they affected the out come is another question, but they meddled and that's dangerous. >> sounds like one heck of a boot leg. he's not alone in his worries. andrea mitchell spoke with former vice-president joe biden about how the trump administration isn't doing enough to stop russian

aggression from happening again. >> what i'm told is there has not been an inter agency, bringing all the relevant agencies together in one time in one meeting to focus on how do we stop them. the best of my knowledge is not even been an inter agency meeting to do something about this. >> the foreign relations committee democratic report said that's negligence. >> it is negligence. it is absolutely negligence. i mean, here you have -- you're talking about secretary of state saying we know they're still doing this and we can't stop them. what have you done? have you brought together the cia, the di, have you brought together all the agencies of the federal government that have the capacity, at least, to be able to stop and thwart what they're doing? haven't even done that. >> joining us now is daniel hoffman, a retired cia station chief who served in moscow. thank you for joining us. >> my pleasure. >> i want to understand the degree of alarm inside the intelligence community based on these two comments from former

president and former vice-president saying very publicly -- too many don't speak out all that often, especially the first. sounding some alarm bells about how focused and intent the russians remain on meddling and how we're doing, essentially, nothing. >> yeah, i can tell you it's a big deal when the president, past president and past vice-president from two different parties are both ringing the alarm bells frankly a lot louder than the administration is. that's certainly not lost on the intelligence community. i think certainly from my perspective, having served in moscow and tracked russian operations for many years, we're looking at it from the kremlin's optic, an extent to which vladimir putin is kind of injected a virus into our political system and we haven't done a whole lot about doing anything about it. either what has happened already or deterring future attacks against us. and part of that is educating our citizens, and that involves certainly someone senior in the administration if not the

president himself getting up on the bully pulpit and outlining where russia represents a threat and what we can do to handle it. >> but aren't we doing the op santa anita we have -- opposite? we have a president fanning the flames. the president is doing putin's work in the fight against the fbi and the fight he had a year ago by firing the top law enforcement official, jim comey. do you think we're even at the starting line or has he moved us backward in fighting that what you describe as the russian virus? >> yeah, i mean, look, the issue with the fbi is extremely serious. that has just become partisan fodder, which is very uncomfortable for those of us in the intelligence community. vladimir putin is going to use that to his advantage. you know, the fbi is responsible, it's our first line of defense against espionage, against terrorism and organized crime. and they rely on their

reputation. and that's really being sullied right now. i don't really worry so much about fbi morale internally nor at large in the ic, but i do worry about how we are perceived by foreign adversaries and friends alike who may be very concerned about working with us. and i think have operated with more impunity against us. >> what do you make of the public reporting that they don't brief the president on russia, they hand that over in writing to, i don't know, cover their rear end or to make sure the information has technically been delivered, but it's not briefed orally because it's a subject that gets his back up? >> yeah, you know, the briefings are very idiosyncratic. i never briefed a president in that forum myself. and i know that we brief presidents in very different ways, from president clinton to bush to obama. you know, it's hard to say.

i would really be more concerned about our lack of policy frankly than i would about the way the briefings are presented. i think there's questions about what is our policy towards russia, how are we holding them accountable, and how are we deterring future attacks, which are ongoing now and will have an impact, i think, in the 2018 midterms. >> well, on the policy front, does it give you any pause that we seem to not be enforcing the russia sanctions that were passed overwhelmingly by the congress, that were not aggressively pursuing a cyber strategy focus on russia, that we're not using the bully pulpit in the way you suggest? i mean, are there things that i'm missing that we're doing? >> nope. i think you hit on three right there. that's a good thing. i would say about the sanctions, the list was pretty long, and i personally think that some of the people on that list don't deserve to be there and i think we have to be really careful about targeting people on that list who are not necessarily

linked with vladimir putin. i think we cause ourselves more harm in the long run than we do help us. but at the end of the day we've got to take some action and we haven't done much. there were some sanctions over the summer that didn't have to do with the election meddling and then the pngs at the end of the obama administration. but really, vladimir putin has been able to operate without really having to take much in the way of any counter action from us. >> daniel hoffman, thank you so much. >> my pleasure. >> come back early and often. we're going to sneak in one more break. we'll be right back. thank you so much. thank you! so we're a go? yes!

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we are back with some breaking news, an interview that kristen welker just completed with one of rob porter's former wives, jennifer willoughby in her neighborhood near her home. let's watch. >> you told the fbi about your concerns about rob porter. what did you tell them? >> yeah, during the fbi background interview for security clearance i shared with the fbi all of the details that i have shared in previous articles, including access to protective order from june of 2010, and police calls that i had made to our home. >> so you told the fbi that rob porter was abusive toward you. >> yes. >> can you tell me a little bit about what specifically you told them? >> i shared with them the details of my marriage. the same as -- have been in the

interviews and articles that have come out. >> and one of the questions was could he potentially be blackmailed? how did you answer that question? >> i actually had difficulty answering that question because -- i believe that the people who had the power to blackmail him would be women who had been in personal relationships with him. so in short, the answer could be maybe. >> just stunning from where we began in conversation. we should remind viewers that lying to the fbi is a crime. so she has now testified -- obviously not under oath but given an account to the fbi with the same penalties for perjury as you and i had as staffers, and her story is consistent and it is not her job to worry about how he could be blackmailed but she makes a point, other women might have had the same experience. at least one other woman did. >> and the thing i didn't buy is the white house said we hadn't

completed the background check so we didn't know about this. you know that is not how it works. when the fbi knew something like this that could be used to blackmail a very, very senior member of the trump administration the very first thing they would do to call the chief of staff and say hey, we have a problem. what do you want to do about this? because we can't sit here and yet a year later they sat there. he sat there without a security clearance for a year. and it is just rep -- reprehensible this occurred. >> and why is the answer we might want to get rid of someone who is a threat to women. >> geez, i think it is the culture. the culture that is -- that is around the president at -- he sort of plays into that. he creates that atmosphere. this is just -- break this down. it is not complicated. you're inside of a culture in which the man in charge brags about grabbing women in their

private parts. so a restraining order, that is okay. that is not -- not as bad. if that is the mindset and people are approaching the stories beginning to come out or more importantly how they look at dealing with women, yeah, this is perpetuated over and over again and this is the loop that the chief of staff and others find themselves in they can't seem to get out of. >> and why is it always about fighting the media, fighting the enemies in the deep state and why isn't it ever for the public good or the gym of the women in the west wing, let's gid -- get rid of a man that beat up his former wives. >> you didn't hear that today. there is recognition of the seriousness of this but they say the media, you are sanctimonious talking about racism and sexual assault because there were photographs, the white house had to change its tune and acknowledge mistakes were made. but michael is right, this is a cultural thing. this is a campaign of a president who spoke to the anger

and the grievance of a lot of white men and there is just this tendency -- this bunker -- mentality to circle the wagons around the people who are part of the team, the loyal ones. >> i'll ask the question after charlottesville and i've asked it a few times, who resigns? one more break and we'll be right back.

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