rightly just absolutely excoriated us for using funny numbers because it would have needed funny numbers. >> all right. the house speaker wanted nothing more than to balance the budget he's now facing a white house spending plan that does anything but as acknowledged by the president's own budget director himself. welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, february 13th. with us here in washington, we have politics editor bill stein. >> the joy is all mine. >> it's so good to have you here. nbc correspondent and host of casey dc on msnbc. >> oh, wow. >> it's awesome. former white house press secretary now nbc news political correspondent josh ernst and

jeremy mash is with us as well. great group this morning. we'll jump right into the news. not a lot going on again. trump administration officials continue to offer tangled explanations about the departure of a high level aide who is accused by two former ex-wives of domestic abuse. the trump white house has veered from outright praise of former white house staff secretary rob porter to the chief-of-staff john kelly calling the allegations true to definitive to no definitive statement on who knew what and when. here's a brief recap of just the past six days. >> why would the president accept his resignation if the president thinks he did nothing wrong? >> that was a personal decision that rob made and one that he was not pressured to do but one that he made on his own. >> would rob porter still be on the job today had he not decided to resign? >> he was terminated yesterday

and his last day -- his last day was yesterday. >> would he still be on the job? >> he offered his resignation and it was accepted. >> we wish him well. he worked very hard. i found out about it recently and i was surprised by it as you probably know, he says, he's innocent and i think you have to remember that. >> the accusations were true. 40 minutes later he was gone. >> we learned of the situation involving rob porter last tuesday evening and within 24 hours his resignation had been accepted and announced. i can tell you that a conversation took place within 40 minutes and beyond that i don't have anything else to add. >> josh ernst, this is -- we're going to go to sarah huckabee sanders deflecting on this but this by all accounts should have been a one day story. you did what? what? okay, listen, i need you to pack

your stuff and go out and we're going to do a statement and you're going to keep quiet or agree on it and that's it. they've taken this to six days. this is now the seventh days because they bunningled it yesterday. they're changing timelines or the president's going he's a wonderful guy and wonderful this and that and they just can't let it go, the president can't let it go. >> there are two areas essentially of malpractice here. we have certainly a communications practice malpractice where they have bunningled this story by changing this story. >> they did it again yesterday, again moving it forward another day. >> there is a substantive problems here. i was trying to think through my eight years of the obama white house. if there's anything even similar to this and the truth is there's not. the most high profile personnel departure was president obama's decision to fire general stanley

mccrystal. he had not engaged in the kind of behavior that obviously rob porter has. his transgression about showing insubordination up the chain of command that's different than domestic abuse. what the president did do was stand on principal. he was confronted with a decision about how he was going to handle this personnel decision and he stood on principal. he made clear to everybody below him on the chain of command that people will be held to a high standard and if they weren't going to meet they would be held accountable in not doing that. he came forward. he was decisive and he came forward and explained the decision he made. when you make a decision on principal that makes it a lot easier to defend. there certainly is no explaining away the malpractice we've seen on the communications fron. when you make a substantive decisions for the right reasons it's a whole lot he's where are to defend. >> i was just thinking about the mccrystal thing and it seems

quaint now as a scandal. trump built this howhole person as a decisive tv guy who has no trouble firing you and weirdly enough he has been anything but that in the white house. he encourages people to see both sides. he has clear problems firing people. and it's just very odd to see that they can't get around the idea that someone accused of spousal abuse deserves to be fired right away. the one person who handled this from the communication standpoint well would be raj shah saying, we could've done better. it's not a sign of weakness to acknowledge you could've done better. >> we haven't heard from him. the president was unhappy. >> he was unhappy because mika

and i saw raj shah and five minutes in to it, we just stopped and say professionalism is breaking out behind that podium. that guy has delivered the best press briefing. again, forget about the substance, he answered the questions. he didn't let them ask 1,200 questions, answered it and moved on, moved on. so now they've moved him to an undisclosed location in virginia because he was a virginia. >> what should have been a one or maybe two day story has been a drawn out discussion as to whether this white house takes domestic abuse seriously, whether or not this white house takes women seriously and it makes you question where the women of this white house are who pretend to be such champions of women, where are they? they are literally silent, which makes it worse. >> you're talking again about spousal abuse.

>> spousal abuse. >> punching and you do wonder where melania trump is here. if that's a fair question -- >> or any women who work in the white house are. >> you talk about people getting beaten up and a president who is defending the guy and has ten, 11, 12 positive things about the guy. i'm ondering what's going on behind capitol hill. >> yeah. >> donald trump has -- if i'm in one of those seats that's going to determine whether nancy pelosi is speaker of the house next year or paul ryan or another republican speaker of the house next year, i'm terrified by what donald trump's doing and the message he's sending to women. you talk about a gender gap. this is -- it's a gender gap the

size of the grand canyon now. >> it's bigger than that. there are certain republicans that are wondering whether there's a permanent shift around this because the basic nature of this -- i just -- every time i have to sit down and think about how to have this conversation i go back to this idea that can you believe that in 2018 this is the conversation that we are having and that the white house is suddenly has us questioning whether or not this is the right kind of behavior and was it handled correctly and john kelly trying to maneuver to say, i knew 40 minutes and then i fired him which is clearly somebody some where is lying about how this all unfolded -- >> what this shows is, we all know, they don't have an infrastructure in there. they don't have somebody to call everybody around the table and say, guys, women, this is what we need to do, this is our message, spousal abuse is horrific. we will condemn it in its strongest terms and we will send him on his way.

and there's no need for any follow-up questions because we condemn this and we condemn him. >> and then the question about systems, the fact that rob porter as handling classified information despite serious questions about his background has refocused attention on the senior white house officials like jared kushner who are operating on temporary clearances more than 15 months after trump won the presidency. nbc news and other outlets have been told that there are dozens of them working with classified information. the white house says the process is being handled by law enforcement. democrats say that congressman trey gowdy, chairman of the house oversight committee has refused to ask the white house for any information about security clearances or for formal briefing on the matter and that gowdy is also refused to allow the committee to vote on three subpoenas proposed by democrats including one on interim clearances. >> why would trey gowdy drag his

feet on something this important? i'm asking you political questions then we need to get to jeremy on the impact of national security. i'm curious of what you heard of why trey gowdy would stand in the way of finding out who's running around the white house, who's incapable of getting full security clearances? >> i have not got an answer to that to be honest and it's crazy considering the main thrust of the 2016 election was the mishandling or botched handling or just plain old handling of classified information and security and i just think that and trey gowdy -- >> yes! >> what did hillary clinton do again? >> e-mails, e-mails, e-mails. if you had intellectual consistency you would rush to get to the bottom of this. on top of that tray gowdy's not running for reelection. >> it's not just that kasie, congressman on capitol hill get this. i was armed services committee.

i had several staff members that had security clearance. if one with of those two staff members after six months condition have security clearance, i'd say what's wrong with tom? well, the fbi's -- why are they not clearing tom? this has happened. if tom can't do his job we're getting rid of tom. get me -- and if he can't get a security clearance then he doesn't belong working in the federal government. that's in a little congressional office. we've got ten, 15 people running around the white house. >> let me give you another example. in the obama white house you couldn't get anything done because they were so careful. that's an exaggeration. it was difficult. they wanted to do things so correctly. i tried to send my sister-in-law shoes. it was a no. okay. fine. that's fine. when you're talking about interim clearances and you have jared kushner and ivanka trump members of the family working in the white house, wouldn't you

work for the appearance of making sure these people are clear to work for the president of the united states given they have these unbelievy improper bonds to him. >> we have a double standard. if you're professional, diplomatic or military positions, if you were to have an interim security clearance after a year of investigation, you'd be out. you'd be fired. yet, if you are a political pointee in the white house, you can handle the most sensitive classified information in our government. basically what the president has done is he's washed away the security clearance requirement and he's basically said, my guys, my people can bend the rules. >> this isn't a safe white house. >> my question is actually about jared kushner and when you raise trey gowdy and paul ryan, kushner is somebody who had worked to build a relationship with paul ryan for a while. he was somebody that paul ryan could call to figure out, how do i deal with your father in law exactly, give me some advice on that and gowdy and ryan are very

close and so, i do think jeremy absolutely hit it, which is where is the balance here and how much are these family members urging, if any, are there any back door communications between -- i think that is potentially problematic. >> the thing is, if it's jared kushner, obviously he's in the middle of an investigation right now. i think we can understand that one. i'm not justifying it. i'm saying that if it were just jared kushner then you could say, okay, well, obviously there's a russia investigation going on. this is going to be complicated until it's cleared up. that doesn't account for the other dozen or so that are in there. this is not just a problem with a son-in-law, this is a widespread systematic problem and again it goes to the heart of national security. it goes to people that may be seeing classified information that don't have the right to see classified information and it is a hell of a lot more dangerous to america's national security, the possibilities the secretary of state e-mailing other people with national security

clearances a couple of documents that may have a "c" written on it, which, by the way, i said for a year and a half was pretty serious stuff. >> i said. >> you don't mishandle classified documents. what is it about baby boomers who are president? i don't get it or secretaries of state, they don't play by the rules. and it is a baby boomer thing. they don't play by the rules. >> time to go to the millennials. >> if a millennial runs, i'm voting for. we can't get baby boomer president behind us fast enough. this is widespread now. >> this is by all accounts quite widespread. the thing that gives me pause about the jared kushner thing is not just about the ongoing russia investigation, we know that there are at least two other situations in which there is an obvious source of concern one is dealings with the saudis at the same time trying to raise money to bail his company out of some debt in lower manhattan or midtown.

we know his sister has been dealing with a chinese in the way they're promising visas in exchange for investments in the company. there are a couple of situations in which it's pretty obvious that there is a conflict that at least needs to be examined. that is the real double standard. you cannot imagine a diplomat or officer with that kind of obvious financial conflict continuing to be in the situation where they're reading the president's daily briefings. >> jeremy, help me out here, the fbi warns the white house. these are your problems. we have these problems. this guy has beaten up his ex-wife and abused the other ex-wife as well. they pass that information on to the white house and the white house does nothing about it. now we'll play a clip in a second. the white house is blaming the fbi. isn't it incumbent on the white house then to look at the things that are stopping the security clearance and either clarifying

them, rectifying the problem or sending them on the way? >> we can't clear these people. over to you if you want to have an exception or waiver but it's got to come from the top. we need to hear directly from him through you and that's essentially what happened. basically, it's not an interim clearance. it's a denial. they were denied a permanent security clearance and the only -- >> you can't get a security clearance but if the president of the united states wants to give you a waiver and put his name on it, then we'll give it to you but trump wouldn't do that. >> why do you think trump didn't do that? >> i think basically what he did, let's keep them in this interim status, that will let them quote, handle the documents but keep the investigation ongoing. it is a way too bend without breaking the rules. >> and it also, if donald trump signs the waivers, then donald trump is then responsible for absolutely everything that goes wrong. >> and if he thinks someone is good-looking he'll sign the waiver, i know that sounds crazy but he likes to cast his office.

you really do have to wonder at this point -- >> i don't think he would say it's good-looking. they've got that hollywood look. >> i like that look. >> central casting. >> he literally -- i remember conversations with him about major positions, like secretary of state and he literally would say, no, i don't like the look. >> it's a smart word to use. >> swear to god that happened. >> tillerson, central casting. >> but there are ethical questions. at this point where you have people who are clearly at this point -- you have hope hicks. wasn't she on the plane helping draft that e-mail and now she's in the middle of all of this personally aligned with this man who is accuse the of hurting his wives and the fbi trying to approach the white house with this information and she's in the middle of drafting some sort of statement that might protect him. at some point, isn't somebody supposed to step down when

they're in a position like that? >> a senior pentagon official who was part of the transition team could not get passed the white house vet for permanent job at the pentagon, why, because he had once retweeted something that was less than complimentary of the president during the republican convention. they bounced him out of a permanent job. they do have a vetting operation but it's all about who says what about the president, it's not about character or judgment, or about trustworthiness to handle sensitive documents. >> we were watching the first episode of homeland. we don't watch it all the time. >> i actually watched it. >> i actually got mika to watch it and it is -- it's about loyalty oaths. it's not about national security. it's about, you know, how much are you willing to obow down to donald trump. it's not about again being able to pass the most basic security

clearances, and when they don't, what does the white house do they blame the fbi. >> sarah huckabee sanders was adamant that they aren't the ones compromising the nation's secrets. it's us. >> can you guarantee that you are protecting classified information if you have someone like rob porter who didn't have a permanent security clearance -- >> i think we're doing and taking every step we can to protect classified information. if you have such concerned with classified information there's plenty of it that's leaked out of the hill or leaked out of other communities well beyond the white house walls. if you have real concerns about leaking out classified information, look around this room. you guys are the ones that publish classified information and put national security at risk. >> wow. i don't know where to begin. so i think we should just roll about 30 minutes of what he said about hillary clinton during the campaign, but that is such a preposterous attack on the media. sometimes the media publishes things that upset me that i

don't think they should be publishing. i'm sure there were plenty of times the media published things when you were in the white house that bothered you, but we have a first amendment, perhaps sarah huckabee sanders should go see "the post" perhaps she should actually read a google article on the first amendment and she wouldn't say something quite that ignorant. but this is the white house that deals in the most sensitive classified information day in and day out and they have people running around that are not supposed to be looking at it. >> after working in the white house for eight years and having plenty of conversations with reporters who obtained national security information, i'm sympathic to the frustration that she is expressing but not at all sympathic to the sentiment. even in those conversations where a journalist comes to you with sensitive information related to our national security or in some cases even classified information related to our national security, there is no denying the responsibility that those journalists have to

determine whether or not that information can be published without posing an undo threat to our national security but also providing information and insight to the american people about what's happening in their government. that is the responsibility of journalists in a high functioning democracy and it's important for people in senior positions at the white house to acknowledge that. the other thing about this that is so disingenuous is the suggestion is not that journalists are obtaining this information and secretly passing it to the chinese or russians. that is the concern -- rob porter who's conflicted is that the chinese come to him and say, we've obtained a copy of your divorce case, tell me about your job or we'll go public. >> but in this case, where is the press getting that information, sarah huckabee sanders? i'll give you a hint. most of the time -- >> walk down the hall. >> it's the white house. it's somebody in your administration that's leaking this information.

that is -- that is, sam, the most preposterous thing about donald trump running and going fake news, fake media, fake news, fake media and all the leakers are in the west wing, all the leakers are in the administration and he's -- >> and they're nervous. >> and sarah huckabee sanders are blaming the press for listening to the white house? >> this is nuts. >> we aren't getting this information walking across the mall. i had four people this weekend call me up. >> i don't know who your source it. the hot dog guy. >> very close to the president call me up, given me the background on the story. i wasn't -- i wasn't like calling them up, i was watching vietnam for the second time and watching liverpool win. liverpool's actually wingning a

match. leave me alone. >> i had an identical weekend. this administration leaks a ton. i love it. i'm grateful for it. it provides this show with a lot of -- >> i think it shows how nervous people are. >> yeah. it also shows that despite trump's loyalty test he's surrounded by people that really aren't that loyal to him. if you looked at sarah huckabee sanders argument it's so silly. it's a very childish argument. what with she's saying is you guys are doing a really bad thing therefore you shouldn't get mad at us for doing a semi-bad thing. but it is pernicious in a way to say that everything is deep state motivated or the news is all fake because in the end, what they're doing is they're eroding trust in people who cover them. >> every single day. >> mika, so i've been really involved in washington over four administrations. >> yep. >> about 25 years. >> um-hum. >> and i'm just looking at the

administration's, clinton, bush, obama, trump, it's not a close call. >> i know. >> on who leaks the most, who's constantly calling people around. you get that a little bit in the clinton administration when things weren't going well in '93, '94. you didn't get that a lot in the obama administration or bush administration but in this administration, sarah huckabee sanders needs to put a big mirror up to everybody in the west wing and look at everybody in the we have wing. they're the ones leaking these stories. >> usually what generates that is fear and distrust and dysfunction. still ahead on "morning joe," senators claire mccaskill, chris murray and angus king. immigration, infrastructure and a budget proposal collide on capitol hill that balloons on the deficit. we'll crunch the numbers to see which, if any, stands the best

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to me this is a very, very sexy subject. the media doesn't find it sexy. i find it sexy. because i was always a builder. i always knew how to build on time, on budget and that's what we want here. >> on budget. >> or bankrupt. it's what you decide. you could be on budget or you could decide not to pay people because you've decided not to pay them even though they've worked. there's that too. just saying. >> there's a great parallel here if you talk to anybody who worked with him in new york whether it was subcontractors or partners, he never paid. so he only would have to pay 50 cents on the dollar and he thought that was actually being a great businessman. >> sexy. >> that's what he's doing here where he said, i've got this

huge, beautiful infrastructure plan and he's not paying for it. you're going to love this but you're going to pay for it. it's going to be like trump told bridges -- if you -- the states would have to put trump tolls on absolutely everything. so i want to bring up a couple things. you saw the president and the first lady's portraits unveiled yesterday and josh, i was not supposed to ask but i will ask you, what is -- this is -- i know this is very symbolic of something, i just -- i'm a simple country guy, the only thing i can think of he's at the fence at wrigley field. mika said you're going to sound like a dumb red neck if you don't get it. >> it's beautiful. >> i don't -- it's that scene in big, i don't get it. >> i did go to the portrait unveiling and it's a dramatic

image. it's huge and the green pops to the naked eye in a different way the way it does on news print there. the artist kehinde wiley who did the president's portrait gave a speech after it was unveiled describing the situation. the flowers evoke the variety of president obama's background. there are the national flower of kenya on there, the flower of chicago, there's some greenery from hawaii on there and the idea is that you have these diverse backgrounds trying to claim him. >> it is growing around him and i'm hoping again that some of that, at least is some ivy from wrigley field. >> oh, my lord. >> i like the obama one and i know i'm going to get killed on twitter for saying this, the michelle obama one doesn't look like her, i don't think. am i crazy? >> you're crazy.

>> i like it -- >> you're just not an artist. >> here's what's striking about this one. >> in some ways mrs. obama is such a beautiful person, just sort of -- even to somebody that's without an artist eye, any way that you portray her on the canvas is going to be controversial because of the her natural beauty. >> look at josh. >> it's true. >> thank you, josh. >> thank you, josh. >> my mother's an artist. >> it's going to detract from the most obvious, physical characteristics that she has. >> and one of the many things these are supposed to do is evoke a conversation like this, like your picture joe would have ribs behind it and a couple of beer pans. >> i would be lying down and passed out in dreamland ribs would be all over me. i'm looking forward to that one. i want to go back to raj and his press conference who i've never met before but again mika and i

were, we watched him for five minutes. the dow was collapsing, this porter story was just going out, he should have been destroyed and mika and i looked at each other and we're like, are we allow pedestrian ed -- allowed o say this guy's really good at this. >> sarah huckabee sanders was out of town. >> you all are telling me the most fascinating thing that the first highly competent person could go up and answer questions in a professional way without being conden scending to the press but also being very direct and not taking their you know what -- that guy got hammered by the white house for bad performance? that's like going four for four in the world series. >> we -- we could have done a better job. >> which obviously -- if anybody

at the white house is thinking that is a mistake they're idiots. that's letting a little steam out. let a little steam out. give them a little bit. they can go with that and it doesn't kill us. >> that's the classic obama administration handled many a crisis in that regard. if something goes awry you try and make a course correction and move forward and that's the opposite of how this white house handles anything. doubling, tribling down -- it's become such a cliche to even say that. the idea that this president would watch somebody try and back away. i think there's now this reporting is as well that the president himself behind closed doors is saying something different about rob porter's actions than he is in public. >> that's just spinning. >> he won't admit it in public and that's what matters. what he says in public. >> he can't -- he can't leak to people or have all of his staff members leak that he's saying something that he's not saying. do we have the clip asking sarah huckabee sanders time and time again, you're saying it and

everybody's leaking behind closed doors but about the president saying it but every time we asked the president on camera, he's saying it's a wonderful guy, it's a sad, sad day. >> what about for the women that spoke out? >> he goes on and on in the most glowing terms about porter and never says a negative thing about him and never once talks about the women who were beaten up by this guy. >> why is there moral ambiguity around this guy's conduct. it is reprehensible. he has no business working in the white house. if he were an executive in corporate america he would have been hired for the same reason. this is conduct we don't tolerate in our society. the very least they were trying to hide it that they're unwilling to take that stand. >> what is our criteria for who is a good guy? isn't the thing that makes you not a good guy?

>> here's the exchange with chip reid that joe was talking about. >> why does he have to speak through you? >> the president has been clear multiple times through myself and others within the administration that we condemned domestic violence in all forms. >> he has not said it. why has he not said it? >> i'm the spokesperson for the white house and for the president i'm saying it to you right now. >> why didn't he say it? >> i'm not sure how i can be any more clear. i think the president has espoused his views on this and i certainly have echoed lions. >> he wishes porter well and that he believes that people should have due process but he hasn't addressed the victims of domestic violence at all. >> that's not true. if you were paying attention to what i just read to you, you ounderstand the opposite. he literally dictated that statement to me. >> so, jeremy, is what she's saying is the president of the united states is too cowardly to come out and say it himself or to say it on the camera himself?

>> yes. it's not as if the president doesn't have ample opportunity through twitter and his followers to say the actual fundamental truth which is that spousal abuse is abhorrent and has no place in his administration. there's another issue here which we've danced around which is this has been the c. team from the beginning. they came into office with a less than optimal team. people like michael flynn who washed out. i shudder to think what's going to happen in year two and three of this administration when they look around and try to find the replacement for the c team. >> who's going to want to go in there? >> it's part of the reason they stuck by rob porter so long because he was competent. the president has another phone call with putin. once again, it was russia media who first reported and sent us

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how can you say coming to america was awful?

it was wonderful. it was one of the greats of all time. >> i'm trying. >> you stack that up with -- >> i like the vietnam series, conce ken burns. >> beverly hills cop" plus citizen cain". >> we're going to louis now for an olympic update. i'm just going to give you a little advice here. don't do that sports caster voice. that cheesy voice, just talk, like louis. >> i'll do my best. >> we love you, louis. i don't like that voice. >> thank you, guys. >> that's his voice. >> that's his normal voice. >> when he does sports, he gets into this mode where he feels like he needs to talk like a sports caster and be all smooth. don't be smooth. give me louis. >> it's been an exciting olympic games. team u.s. added two medals to its hardware. 17-year-old kim scored a 98.25

in her final run. crowning her with the gold medal becoming the youngest female medallist in snow boarding history. she executed back-to-back 1080s. a feat no other woman has landed in competition. aerial gold finished in third giving team u.s. a bronze for that one. so far team u.s. has earned three gold medals with all of them coming from snow boarding competitio competitions. the man who's name is synonymous with snow boarding, shaun white tops the halfpipe, he'll go for gold later on today. but in the men's' combined alpine skiing event, ted liggity was finishing in tenth. the olympic athletes from russia have won the bronze medals

defeating norway 8-4. canada and switzerland face-off for the gold today. finally the olympics lost its further athlete to doping suspension after speed skater was found to have tested positive for a chemical used to mask the presence of banned drugs. he was scheduled to take part in the 5000 meter event. he was ordered to leave the olympic village. back to you guys. >> i thought that was great. >> i did like that. >> you crushed it. that is this is football louis vergdorf. thank you so much. >> this is the first time this has ever happened to me. i got into a fight on twitter about curling. >> oh, no. >> it seems that jazz shaw. >> i took your phone away. what happened? >> jazz shaw was like screw the

swiss, who says that about the swiss? who says that about the swiss? i love the swiss. the sound of music" what is their not to like about the swiss but jazz shaw is in to curling and says it's big in utica. >> i would like to curl. if you give me a month, just every day i go out there and curl, i could be an olympian. i feel like i could do this. >> i think it's very, very difficult sport but i think you and i, i think we should try to be in the '22 games. >> if we just devote ourselves to it, there's nothing we can't do. we could be gold medallists. >> no doping. >> that's tough. i got to dope a little bit. north korea is trying to use the olympics to paint a picture of that country that looks a lot different from the prison camps and dictator rule that really define it. >> you know those cheerleaders

all going, and everybody was like, they're hostages. they are apparently a few of them talked about they're time in south korea the last time they went down to south korea and they were sent to prison camps. this is sick. how stupid are some people in the press? how stupid? this is a tease, the former commander of nato about the future of the allied opposition to that nuclear armed regime coming up next on "morning joe."

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>> ah, liverpool. [ laughter ] so we were talking about what story we'd like to discuss after north korea. >> we have the admiral. >> and i think everybody around the table -- we all think we should be talking about omarosa, jesus, and mike pence and how those three stories, eternal stories, come together and so

we'll bo that at the top of the hour. let's bring in former nato supreme allied commander and dean of the fletcher school of law and diplomacy at tufts university, retired four star navy admiral james trevitas, he's the chief diplomacy and security analyst for nbc news and msnbc with a minor on commenting on omarosa reality shows. >> that's important. >> we'll put that aside for now. >> good. >> good. i want to ask you about north korea. there have been hopes raised about our relationship with north korea, how short an attention span we have, vladimir putin was on his best behavior during the sochi olympics four years ago and then, of course, all hell broke loose after that. what's your read on what's happened over the past week in north korea? >> i wish i had a better assessment, joe and mika, but to flip the old cliche on the head, i think it's going to get better before it gets worse again.

the fundamentals are bad here and they're not improving. having said that, we should not ignore this kind of sliver of hope that's been proffered by the olympics. we could think of this as two party talks that are happening with propaganda and nonsense around it but could we expand those to four-party talks, get the u.s. and china involved? i think all roads to pyongyang lead through beijing so can we expand this and move into more talks? fundamentals not so good. >> jim, it's jeremy bash. if mike pence has this standing offer to engage in talks with the north koreans, is that something you think the united states should be doing? is that the right formation going forward? >> it's controversial, jeremy, but i think so. i think at the end of the day churchill said jaw, jaw, jaw --

talking -- is better than war, war, war. i think that's right. even a sliver of hope we ought to pull on it and see if we can unravel this tapestry of an impending war that seems to be ahead of us yet. >> admiral tell us about your thoughts. give us insights on what's happening in the rising conflict between israel and iran not only to a peace process that has been put to the side, at least for now and what does it do two the region? >> this is the right question to be asking, joe. the uber movement in the region is that rising tension between iran, shi'a and the sunni world led by saudi arabia. israel has an opportunity here in that as the shi'a world rises, iran pushing on five different states all around the region from yemen to syria to iraq to lebanon, israel could

begin to have a conversation with sunni neighbors. they're already pretty good with egypt and jordan. could that be expanded to saudi arabia and the gulf states? that's the interesting strategic move at this point. you're absolutely right. it further pushes the peace process to one side. >> admiral, doesn't the sunni/shi'a divide in the middle east, doesn't that define our era right now in terms of middle east peace just like after israel's statehood in '48 you could look at what happened in '67, what happened in 73, what happened with the peace accords. all these big events that have happened but right now doesn't it seem that at least what goes on in the middle east is going to be framed more by this sunni shi'a divide than any divide between arabs and israel? >> i completely agree and sometimes people ask me, joe, how long will this go on, the sunni shi'a conflicts which effectively a religious conflict

with a geopolitical overlay. and i say well, we've seen this movie before in the christian world between the protestants and the catholics and the wars of the reformation. how long did they last? about 150 years. buckle up there the middle east. >> admiral james stavridis, thank you. jeremy, what should we expect this morning when we're having the administration come to hill and talk about the threat assessments across the globe. >> it's an annual event. i think the phrase you'll hear is near peer competitor. they'll warn about china and russia and their advanced capabilities in cyber and space. and the question is will this administration be prepared to say that russia is a significant threat that they're engaging in cyber hacking and meddling not just in our democracy but elections around the world. >> far different, though, the power dynamic, china and russia

really are on two different levels, though aren't they? one is building an empire for 21st century, at least an economic empire, the other is a disrupter. >> you could argue russia is on the decline and that makes them dangerous. you could argue that china is on the rise and that makes them dangerous but also potentially an opportunity. >> this is the briefing you hated more than any other? >> every year the late winter and early spring would roll around and they'd organize this briefing on capitol hill and you have two to three hours of the senior members of the president's national security team testifying before congress about all of the threats around the world and that would regularly lead to questions in the briefing about whether or not we're doing enough to protect the country, about whether or not the president adequately factored in all of these challenges. not a fun day to be in the briefing. >> maybe bring raj out. time to break the glass in case of emergency, here's raj. >> jeremy, thank you very much.

coming up, the rob porter scandal drags on for another day with the white house still struggling to get its story straight. "hardball's" chris matthews joins the table. >> and they were having roerb porter teaalk to reporters. >> and also, "forbes" magazine talks about who's paying trent the president of the united states. some include law firms that lobby the federal government and banks controlled by foreign states. we'll have the reporter beiend that sto that story. also claire mccaskell, chris murphy and angus king join us on a very busy morning in washington. "morning joe" is back in a moment. your insurance company won't

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this is the story of green mountain coffee roasters dark magic told in the time it takes to brew your cup. first, we head to vermont. and go to our coffee shop. and meet dave. hey. why is dark magic so spell-bindingly good, he asks? let me show you. let's go. so we climb. hike. see a bear. woah. reach the top. dave says dark magic is a bold blend of coffee with rich flavors of uganda, sumatra, colombia and other parts of south america. like these mountains, each amazing on their own. but together? magical. all, for a smoother tasting cup of coffee. green mountain coffee roasters packed with goodness. what can a president [ do in thirty seconds? he can fire an fbi director who won't pledge his loyalty. he can order the deportation of a million immigrant children. he can threaten an unstable dictator armed with nuclear weapons. he can go into a rage and enter the nuclear launch codes. how bad does it have to get before congress does something?

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i think it's fair to say that we all could have done better over the last few hours, last few days in dealing with this situation but -- >> well, that was late last week. that was raj shah. >> isn't it interesting how this is just happening. raj-mania is sweeping the set here. >> i think raj rocks. >> i feel badly because i know it's hurting him inside the white house but you'll remember this. remember riddick bowe? >> one of the great heavyweight champions. >> he was great but crazy and he would go into the ring and do

bizarre things during the olympics and the fight doctor when he would have a good round he would say "riddick had spasms of lucidity." when i saw raj there i thought to myself the white house is having spasms of lucidity and i like it. this guy looks competent. but then they tell me raj is in trouble because he did such a good job. >> you're beyond me. this is beyond me. >> spasms of lucidity. i think about lucidity all the time lately with trump, the president. we've seen in our history the person of the president, not the party or the place in history drives the events. w took us into iraq. harry truman dropped the bomb. these are personal decisions made by one human being. >> what has trump done? >> he's there. >> what is the big -- the first year? define it. you just said bush took us into iraq. nixon gave us watergate. >> well, yeah. >> what has trump done in the

first year? break it down. >> politically going into this next election in november, the tax cut. that's what the republicans will beat the drum on everyday till then and possibly save the house with that strategy. so that was his big decision. >> what about the mobilization of women? that's extraordinary. >> i'm looking at the numbers we did last night and clearly the passion factor i think it's there if the democrats get the rallies going and resistance going, freshen that up to the election day, this could be a big shocker. >> i have a prediction and much to the chagrin of nerve 2015 mika said donald trump could win the republican primary, february 13, 2018, i predict women are going to win the house and possibly the senate back for the

democratic party. >> the senate? where? where would they win? >> arizona. >> tennessee, you think? >> they can win arizona, they can win in tennessee, that's a stretch but they can win there. claire mccaskell will win in missouri. >> you think she'll pull it out? >> everybody's been looking at it saying -- well, of course they can win the house. the house should be easy for them. if they don't win the house they're in big trouble. as you know, the senate it's statewide races so these universal demographics that may not touch people in conservative house districts, if you're in missouri and college-educated women break against you by 30%, 35%, 40%, you're going to lose, it doesn't matter what year it is. >> well, that may be the big difference between '16 and '18 because we thought what you said was going to happen last time in the 'burbs and the big cities.

the women didn't bring it in. every time i said the white angry guy is going to win this election in pennsylvania, everybody convinced me no, there's too many sophisticated "new york times" readers in the suburbs who think alike, sensitive on these gender issues and it won't happen. guess what? there are more angry white guys out there. >> here's the difference, though, there were a lot of angry white guys who had a lot of reasons to be angry that went out and voted for donald trump and a lot of their wives went out and voted for donald trump, too. i talked to a friend who's been in politics for 25 years. his family is blue carl from rural america, they are trump voters, i said how is your dad voting, what does he think of trump right now? he goes, well, he thinks he's a joke, he hates the tweets but he's still a trump guy, he thinks we need anymore there. i said what about your mom? he started laughing, she voted for trump and she hates that she did, she hates him and will do

anything she can to vote against him. >> another fact you haven't mentioned is the hillary factor. there won't be a negative factor on the other side. >> they won't cancel each other out. >> bob costa is here, republicans have told me that their only chance of beating democrats -- and you can go to the special in western pennsylvania coming up -- their only chance is to tie nancy pelosi around the neck of every democratic candidate. is that going to work? >> western pennsylvania will be a major test. where are those voters that chris was talking about? >> lamb. >> connor lamb, a former prosecutor, are they happy with the trump administration's trade agenda? has enough gotten done? is that tax deal going to be enough? one of the big stories of 2018 based on my conversations is not just going to be the wave of the democratic side that's on the horizon but the republican

voters who choose to stay home because of disappointment with the way the agenda unfolded. they make like neil gorsuch and aspects of the tax deal but they want to see washington ripped apart and it hasn't been. >> and that blue-collar family that i was telling you about, my friend's family. you know the wife is going to vote because she "hates trump." what about the husband that says yeah, i'm glad he's in there, i think he's a joke, his tweets drive me crazy and i don't understand why he can't shut his mouth. which of those are more likely to vote then project that a million times as you get into the turnout around the country. >> i think that's a woman problem that the president has. >> i agree because the passion factor is with the women and the men are a little ambiguous because they see the problem

with the guy and they worry about him. >> it takes the women to make the call. trump administration officials continue to offer different explanations about the departure of a high-level aide who was accused of two former ex-wives of domestic abuse. >> reporter: why would the president accept his resignation if the president thinks he did nothing wrong? >> i think that was a personal decision that rob made and one he was not pressured to do but one he made on his own. >> reporter: would rob porter still be on the job had he not decided to resign? >> he was terminated yesterday -- >> reporter: resigned? >> his last day was yesterday. >> reporter: would he still be on the job? sarah huckabee sanders made it clear -- >> well, he offered his resignation and it was accepted. >> we wish him well. he worked very hard. i found out about it recently and i was surprised by it. as you probably know, he says he's innocent and i think you have to remember that.

i you found out tuesday night. >> that the accusations were true, 40 minutes later he was gone. >> reporter: was that just the picture? >> i didn't even know about that. >> we learned of the situation involving rob porter last tuesday evening and within 24 hours his resignation had been accepted and announced. i can tell you a conversation took place within 40 minutes and beyond that i don't have anything else to add. >> so sam, we have all ofexplan kelly having a seemingly different story everyday. the president staying as far away as he can on this unless it's to praise the guy that's charged of abuse and you were talking about a politico story. >> the current statement is that within 40 minutes of knowing this they got him out or they pushed to get him out. politico reports this morning that, in fact, hours after the "daily mail" published their

story the white house itself arranged for a briefing with four reporters in d.c. with rob porter himself so that he could walk through his own version and timeline of the events. that completely undercuts the idea that they were so disgusted and repulsed by what they read in these stories that 40 minutes later he was gone. >> so they let him brief reporters -- >> this is according to politico and i have not talked to any of the reporters here. i trust politico's work but if in fact it's true, hours after that story happened they were saying to rob porter why don't we get reporters in front of you. >> why don't you go out and spin. and john kelly talking about what a great guy he was. >> this was after the "daily mail" published -- i think it was the pictures. >> because the pictures seem to me -- >> it was hours after the "daily mail" published a photograph of porter's first ex-wife with a black eye. >> and they seem to be saying -- the white house seems to be saying the main reason why this became unacceptable is there

were images, i think was the quote from the podium so they had this image, this image was out there in public and they put rob porter behind closed doors according to politico. >> and this is kind of quibbling. if any of us were told that there were two credible accusations against a top aide that he was abusive to his wives, would we need photos at that juncture to make sure that we were comfortable with him? i think we would all handle this differently. >> i think everybody would have to. every fortune 500 company would have to handle it differently but bob costa, this is a one day story that's moved into six and now with the politico story seven days because how in the world does the press walk away from a story when you have the white house and chief of staff saying yes, within 40 minutes of seeing the pictures we ran them out. when, in fact, they were sending him out to brief reporters. >> it's so revealing of porter's

place. this wasn't priebus at the end of his line or bannon on the rocks, this was the insider's insider, close with kelly, close with kushner, close with hicks, the whole group inside the white house that sees itself as the moderating force. the people bringing order to a chaotic administration. and he was the fulcrum and suddenly he was at the center of the news and if you talk to people inside that west wing they felt paralyzed, they didn't know what to do. that's a question of judgment for this administration when one of your friends, the insider's insider gets scrutiny, how do you respond? >> i hear stories inside the white house that after this story broke and he finally left that they were all just sitting around a table paralyzed and said what do we do to get this off the front pageover the newspapers and then after not really having an answer donald trump starts tweeting defending the guy. >> so donald trump, the president of the united states,

tweeting, he speaks in front of the cameras on the white house on the world stage practically defending this guy and his character, never mentioning the women. we're hearing a politico report of potentially even giving this guy the microphone basically to defend himself, no mention of these women. i believe in due process but this is ridiculous. this is a white house that at this point was making it very clear that domestic abuse is not something they take seriously and chris matthews, does the question come to your mind where are -- i mean, what's going on with the men of the white house and where are the women? >> well, you know, it's assault. whoever he slugged, he slugged his wife, he slugged somebody, i want to know and there's a great scene the godfather where the guy says "my boss insists on getting bad news immediately." how come the chief of staff didn't get it immediately?

how come the president didn't get it immediately? why were they keeping back this bad news from the president? you know why i think? part of it is they don't have a bench. no progressive can work for this president. no democrat can work for the president. no one who had anything against the campaign can work for him. no one who's been quoted anywhere can work for him. there's a small number of people to work for this guy to replace these people. where will they get the replacement? >> if you get the bench -- >> there is no bench. >> what about the people in there? what else is there? >> there's not much to this operation. the number of people there is a small number. >> they have lost people that they just haven't filled positions for. they lost a communications director, they've lost steve bannon, deena powell is gone, there hasn't been a replacement for her. there are people leaving the administration and their jobs are either vacant or being placed from within. this is not just from a short

bench, it's a non-existent bench. >> and part of the problem, chris, is like for instance if kelly left who would want to become chief of staff right as mueller's investigation -- >> the names are coming up -- >> mike meadows. >> they're coming around -- he's a good guy but you're going to pull him out of leadership because you're so desperate? are they going to bring bob corker? >> would those guys want to get in the middle? you have to bring four lawyers with you. this is like being nixon's chief of staff in december of '73. >> somebody on the show said last night "you don't want to get cooties" using a nice new jersey term. >> that's been the problem. we talk about all the spaces that the trump administration hasn't filled but part of the problem is so many people in this town know donald trump will be an ex-president one day but

they will still be here trying to get a job and i don't want to pick on the guy but the -- the classic morality tale is sean spicer, a guy who left and people were expecting to get big book deals and big speech contracts and deals with cnn or fox or msnbc, it's just not happening and it's not happening in part because everything trump touches he contaminates. >> reporter: when you call around to people on the list for chief of staff or people who will come in for top jobs in this administration, they have two things on their mind. one, what do you do if you go inside and the president says week one "i'd like to fire rod rosenstein and i'm going to take on mueller." that that's an immediate crisis, a potential constitutional crisis. >> is that why they have number three at justice left? did she want to get out before that happens?

>> because the decision goes to the solicitor general and that person has been appointed by the trump administration, a different kind of person than rachel brand. people are concerned about the midterms. if you take a job right now in february of 2018, that job maybe only lasts until november if it's a bloodbath for the gop because who is president trump going to blame? >> is he lonely? you can identify with him. do you think it's like -- he gets up in the morning, "i'm president." that's still a shock, he's president of the united states. who can i rely on if something goes berserk today? who can i call in the room to help me? >> again, if people that have known him for 20 years, 30 years, they all say the same thing, he's so isolated in there, he doesn't trust anybody in there. he thinks everybody in there is stupid, he's called some of his billionaire friends about the possibility of them becoming chief of staff -- >> like zblom right. nobody's going to come in and be his chief of staff because they

know when they go in there he won't listen to them and there has been -- you talked about the midterms. there has been this calculation, chris, that many people who would be chief of staff say we won't go in until the day after the midterms when the republicans get wiped out because maybe then he will start listening to us. >> we know a number of people in this town, a lot of them are lobbyists. that's another prescription he put up there. no lobbyists. if you say no lobbyists when you didn't give them a job, they become lobbyists. all these people you know in washington, all kinds of smart people in this town who are lobbyists but they're verboten, too. >> you have to free raj shah. >> free raj shah. >> hashtag. >> my favorite part of has "hardball" is the very first moment. >> she goes crazy about that. >> this is amazing. >> a great book. >> i always have to rush to the tv to make sure i have it on

before 7:00 so i can see like what your first three words are going to be. so you could have a woman problem, that would be good, raj mania. >> yeah, who are you going to call? >> the passion factor. >> who you gonna call was mine last night. >> i like that. you had one after the "access hollywood" and it was just "uh-oh." let's play "hardball." >> tina always says we need a cult. it's always like i'm walking down the hall and one of the producers says "we need a cult." it's the most fun, though. >> what's it going to be tonight? >> he doesn't know yet, mika! >> can i send you ideas? >> we're always open. >> if you use mine, i'll freak out. >> seriously, chris -- >> you understand. >> around 6:40, everything -- we

don't have time to watch a lot of tv. around 6:40 all the wheels start moving. where are we? when's dinner going to be over. she's got to be there at 6:59 because she wants to know what you do at 7:00. >> let me ask you to the home making thing. do you cook. >> wait, what? >> she cooks. >> what? >> no, i never -- >> do you clean up? >> here's the thing -- >> are you the cleanup guy. >> yes. can we talk here? this is men's talk. >> this is a great book. >> here's the funny thing chris. i'm sort of -- i know this will surprise people but i'm sort of ocd on cleaning up, i don't like things on the floor. so i'm the one that cleans up. mika is very confident, she can just throw things everywhere. >> what about unmade beds, do they drive you crazy? >> yes. >> okay so -- >> my parents had a rule that we could never go to school when we

were in first grade, even, if everything wasn't off the floor and our beds weren't made. it stuck with me, it hasn't stuck with mika. >> chris matthews, thank you very much. >> alex is going "we're done." what about you? are you messy? >> i'm going to pass on this conversation. >> i don't think you're messing. >> are you ocd like me? >> i'm not ocd. >> but you don't throw stuff around? >> i do the cooking. >> do you keep the peas away from the mashed potatoes? >> i'm not that obsessed, no. i want to ask you about bobby kennedy. what is the one thing -- because i'm sure i'm like you, i've read every single bobby kennedy biograp biography. what's been your take away in writing this book? >> this is what i started with and this is what i began with. here's a dirt poor white -- they could be any ethnic group but they're a white family.

this guy has obviously been in the military, he's got the crisp salute. we used to look like that as kids but you took your shirt off, it's a hot day. the wife is dirt poor and they're salute and this affectionate patriotic deep belief in a democratic politician. this is gone trump has stolen this crowd away whether in appalachia or anywhere in the big city. but that patriotic, they connected teddy with the love of country -- bobby with the love of country as they did with jack. the democrats have to get this back. they may get it back by default because trump blows it but they don't deserve to get it back until they get this patriotic affection. >> stay on that picture. to tell you a personal story -- >> this was at a train ride. >> i was seven or eight years old playing basketball in rural mississippi, outside of

meridien, mississippi, northeast high school and they actually had -- noble believes this, but the basketball courts withes were packed clay. i was playing basketball with a kid who was from the most rural part of mississippi as white working classes and halfway through the basketball game he zipped out, i saw him run across the field and we road our bikes past this house and knocked on the door, he was like what's up? he opened the door and he was in a little coat and tie and it was like a -- i don't know, a friday or something like that. i said what's up? he said president truman died. we're watching the funeral. but the parents called him home, i'm sure this same story there. that is a democratic party. that's fdr's democratic party that beat republicans for 30, 40 years. >> it has nothing to do with party but it's what the

democrats have lost, you want the american the white house, man or woman, to have that gut love of country because that's the foundation of all -- out of that comes the dynamic of what to do next. >> all right, chris matthews, thank you very much. that was all over the place. >> it goes to the heart. >> it goes to the heart. >> no, i loved the last conversation and i love the book. everyone should read the book. >> what conversation did you not like. >> oh, just -- yo know. >> mika a cook very well. >> oh, my god, you don't want to say that on television. >> do you listen to music when you cook? >> i promise, nobody wants to hear this. >> i'm going to try to learn to cook, i'm just not good at it. >> pork chops and apple sauce. >> pork chops and apple sauce. senate democrats claire mccaskell and chris murphy are here on set. but first, their independent colleague angus king joins the conversation. you're watching "morning joe." >> we can "ask him about what he cooks for dinner maine. >> that was outrageous.

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. >> what this is all about is further evidence of corruption, more than bias but corruption at the highest levels of the fbi. secret society. we have an informant talking about a group that were holding secret meetings off sight. there's so much smoke here, there's so much suspicion. >> let's stop there. a secret society? secret meetings off site of the justice department? >> correct. >> and you have an informant saying that? >> yes. >> is there anything more about that? >> no, we have to dig into it, that's -- this is not a distraction. >> after reading those transcripts with the text messages, do you think it was made as a joke? >> it's entirely possible. >> reporter: any further sign of the secret society in the latest batch of texts? >> listen, all i ever talked about was it was true we had an informant talking about off-site meetings. that was somebody else's term. >> reporter: did you backtrack on the secret society thing? you admitted it might have been a joke? >> it might have been but what's

not a joke is an informant saying there were meetings held by fbi offices. >> reporter: so you stand by what that informant said? >> i've got that informant. >> harry potter secret society. ron and hermoine and harry would go meet off site with their secret society. >> as you just heard, he continued this yesterday. >> hello, harry! what is -- no, seriously, what is that? >> he's a mess. >> he is a hot mess. he's a chairman. he's a chairman of the homeland security committee. this is a committee, mika, where past chairman would talk to the fbi to try to figure out when the next terror attack was going to be launched against the united states of america. now he's going around with deep state conspiracy theories. he's attacking the fbi. the guy that's supported to coordinate with the fbi and

intel agencies to figure out when the the next attacks are coming that guy is going around talking about secret societies. >> let's bring in a member of the senate -- i'm just trying to get you to stop. senator angus king is next on "morning joe." >> okay. you can't predict the market, but through good times and bad at t. rowe price we've helped our investors stay confident for over 80 years. call us or your advisor. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. 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 start winning today. this is the story of green mountain coffee roasters dark magic told in the time it takes to brew your cup. first, we head to vermont. and go to our coffee shop. and meet dave. hey. why is dark magic so spell-bindingly good, he asks? let me show you. let's go. so we climb. hike.

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what can a president [ do in thirty seconds? he can fire an fbi director who won't pledge his loyalty. he can order the deportation of a million immigrant children. he can threaten an unstable dictator armed with nuclear weapons. he can go into a rage and enter the nuclear launch codes. how bad does it have to get before congress does something?

all right, we'll be talking about that in the next hour, joe. >> let's bring in the member of the arms services and budget committees, independent senator angus king of maine who now you just write in emojis. you sign your name with a cow. >> that's right. >> and you get a lobster emoji from maine. >> there they are right there. always selling, always selling. >> so we were just talking about an article we're going to discuss next hour, a "wired" story on facebook and obviously fake news is a real concern but this article uncovers that actually the fake stories, the false stories, the stories that russia was pushing, the stories that others were pushing, pizza

gate, those stories got more traffic than real news. when is the senate -- when is the house -- i know the white house won't do it. when are people going to stand up and tell facebook you have a responsibility to take those stories down if you know they're lies. >> we had a hearing with facebook, twitter, and google about a couple of months ago talking about that. unfortunately, they sent their lawyers, the witnesses were their lawyers instead of their ceos. >> where was mark zuckerberg? he's going to have dinner with people in ohio that voted for obama and trump. why can't he come talk to you? >> they've got to. i think it's one of the most important areas that we've sort of developed as this russia investigation has gone on. that may be the most powerful thing the russians did in 2016. and by the way, they're still doing it. >> i was going to say, what about in 2018? one of the thins that drives me crazy about these republicans, the russians didn't have anything do with the last election. they are still engaged.

the russian bots were driving the "release the memo" hashtag. they're doing devin nunes's work. >> they're going to keep doing it and there's no question the national security people -- we're having a briefing today at the intelligence committee from head of national intelligence and in his pre-file testimony he says they are likely to do in the 2018, almost for sure to do it in 2020. they just elected a president in the czech republic. their guy won and they are very effective at this. we have to work with facebook and twitter but we have to think about how to educate our public to distinguish when they're being fed fake news. >> senator, the presence of big tech in american society is growing and growing and you see on the right and left growing populism against big technology companies. as an independent senator which party is poised to own that rising populism about the

omnipresence of these companies in this technology? >> well, i think either one somebody has to start talking about it, my suggestion -- and it's simple minded -- but when you write a story, the first thing it says is the dataline, washington, d.c., albany new york, boston, massachusetts. how about if on facebook when a story comes up it says "moscow" or st. petersburg? where did it come from? >> who's the source. >> is the technology there to identify the source so people can be alerted to the fact that they're being conned? i can tell you as a person, i'm running for office in 2018, it used to be you're worried about skeletons in your closet coming out, now they can make it up. they can write a story that has no relevance to anything and by the time you can rebut it, it's already gone viral. >> senator, do you think silicon valley is at the point where they have any sense of the

changing winds around that? i'm having trouble figuring out if they understand the graty g and depth of going on and that they believe they have to do anything to fix it? >> i think they're becoming aware but i don't think they've grasped the power of it. zuckerberg created this amazing platform for people to share ideas and it was incredible, billions of people on it but the potential for ill use, for fake news, for misleading people i don't think people were fully aware of but again i don't want to sensor it, i don't think we want the government telling twitter or facebook what they can do, that would be a big mistake. the companies have to be more responsible and at least allow people to know the source of the information but we as consumers have to be better about separating -- see, we haven't caught up. in a newspaper you pick it up and say well, in the back of your mind they're editors, they're fact checkers, and we've

applied that same mentality to the internet when it isn't there. >> it's not the case at all. >> speaking of fake news, let's talk about the devin nunes memo and the divide right now between republican, independents and democrats in the senate on the intel committee and those in the house. >> in the senate we don't have it. >> it seems like you don't have that problem in the senate, that you still have a chairman and a ranking member in senate or burr and -- >> mark warner. >> senator warner that are still working together. is that right? >> that's absolutely right. and we've worked at that. we began with the premise a year ago when this started that if what we were doing was going to have any credibility it had to be bipartisan. >> how reckless was the nunes memo? i know chairman burr said it shouldn't have been released. >> it shouldn't have been and here's the problem that i don't think has gotten enough publicity.

these two committees are the only watchdogs on the intelligence community. there aren't interest groups and a lot of what they do is secret so we're the watchdogs and what the nunes memo did was compromise the relationship between the fbi and the intel kbhens committee in the house. what worries me is that the fbi will be reluctant to share information or the cia. they'll say we can't trust capitol hill, we won't release this stuff, then nobody is watching and that's what worried me about it is we depend -- for example on the russia investigation, we have unprecedented access to documents in the cia and the nsa. they could have stonewalled us, they could have made it much more difficult, subpoenas and all that stuff. that depends on trust and the nunes memo breached that trust in my view. >> senator angus king, thank you for being on the show, good luck with trying to be at thee

hearings at the same time. let us know which one you pick. still ahead, why won't the trump administration provide a definitive list of its tenants. according to "forbes," maybe it's because one of them is china's largest state-owned bank and 36 others have ties to the federal government. more on what may be the biggest conflict of interest of the trump presidency. plus, a follow-up to his "new york times" best-seller that forced steve bannon out of the president's good graces, it includes new details of bannon's plan if donald trump resigned or was impeached. josh green joins the table next on "morning joe."

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joining us now, a reporter for "forbes" magazine, dan alexander, the co-author of a new piece detailing how the trump organization continues to receive millions in rent at their buildings from foreign governments and big banks without the public knowing who they are.

dan and his colleague write in part this, "the largest american office of china's largest bank sits on the 20th floor of trump tour, six levels below the desk where donald trump built an empire and rested a presidency. it's hard to get a glimpse inside. there does not appear to be any public photos of the office. the bank doesn't welcome visitors and a man guards the elevators down stairs, one of the perks of forking over an estimated $2 million a year for the space. trump tower officially lists the tenant as the industrial and commercial bank of china. but make no mistake who's paying the rent, the chinese government which owns the majority of the company. and while the landlord is technically the trump organization, make no mistake who's cashing those millions -- the president of the united states." dan, you go on to say basically the trump organization is more a collection of deals than an

operating business. who is he making these deals with besides the one i just mentioned? >> it's sort of the who's who of companies across the world. you have major banks in the united states, you have major companies overseas. his biggest tenant is gucci, they pay him an estimated $21 million a year. but there are dozens of companies that have big business before the federal government. we're talking about federal contractors, even a federal agency. we're all renting space in buildings in which he has an interest and therefore paying him rent. >> so "forbes" reached out to the white house for comment, did not hear back, the trump organization did provide "forbes" this response "following the election, the trump organization implemented a rigorous vetting process for all transactions, including leases, which includes a detailed review and approval by our chief compliance officer and outside ethics adviser." josh earnest, i will just let that sit with you. just take it. >> this is a remarkable

departure from the way previous presidents have handled their basic responsibilityings in terms of putting the country's interest ahead of their own financial interest and this is a pretty troubling revelation from some of these details. dana, i'm interested in understanding if you guys were able to glean some insight into what extent the president's children, who are nominally responsible for running the country, are actually continuing to go out and solicit additional business in this way. are they looking for additional clients from overseas that would be similarly troubling? >> of course, yeah. and this cuts to the core of the issue that people saw coming a year ago. their major business is their own serious real estate assets, primarily in new york city, and to rent them out. so if they can't go solicit new businesses when a place opens up then they basically aren't in business anymore. so on the one hand, if they want to continue doing business, they basically have to invite new questions of conflicts of interest. so to your point, you know, you

ask about foreign deals. so they promised right at the start that they weren't going to do any foreign deals. well, apparently they're defining that as no deals outside of u.s. soil. two of the new tenants that they just are bringing in now are, in fact, bringing in now are in fact foreign companies but they're renting office space in new york, so perhaps people are okay with that, but it just shows that these promises they were making early on were in some ways a slighter hand. >> thank you once again. and now let's bring in author and reporter john green. he's outs today with an updated edition of his updated book "devil's bargain." it includes previously unreported detail about bannon, his relationship with trump and his departure from the white house and josh joins us now. so what are some of those details about the relationship between trump and bannon? >> well, it wasn't very good. it's know secret now. but at the time he left the

white house he tried to put a positive spin, privately though, he was seething oefrg the fact that he'd been pushed out. he was initially refusing to take trump's phone calls and like almost everybody around trump had grown utterly frustrated with trump's inability to concentrate. >> you're reporting that he's also talked about starting a new party, possibly running as a third party candidate if donald trump is impeached or doesn't run again. >> every time i was on the show for about a year, he stuck knives, saying president bannon and i think he listened to you. >> maybe they weren't knives. >> just realities. >> well, okay, he was listening or he was listening to somebody and had given some thought to if trump decided not to run for eelection or if he were

impeached or couldn't be on the ticket in 2020 -- >> what about now? what about now that donald trump has thrown him out and steve bannon is the one person he will not allow back in. >> so far he won't be allowed back in. >> what if bannon decided to run in the republican primaries and split off a nationalist third of the base then he would open up main stream against running against trump. >> two things that make that tough. you need money, you need a platform and when trump smashed him to smith renos, he lost his platforms in brietbart news so he doesn't have the vehicle to launch a presidential campaign. the other thing too though is as much as bannon would like to believe he is the leader of this nationalist movement voters seem to think it's donald trump. >> bannon's view of the midterm when you think about his comments to you about oprah winfrey and the rising women's movement across the country. >> that's when i described him

in the golden globes, the rise of the me too movement and even oprah winfrey who thinks he could lead this resolution in the fall to tilt this to democrats. >> he says here, the anti patriot movement, i find bannon to be a little rich, but i mean, does he really believe this? >> you know, bannon is big into hyper bole. i think it's a sign of how bad things are in the white house right now with women that steve bannon is the guy making the most sense warning about me too, kind of the voice of reason in the trump universe on women's issues and domestic violence. >> he does believe though what we were just talking about this morning that 2018 more likely than not is going to be looked back upon as, you know, we've always talked every two years is the year of women but this is going to be the year of women that could be defined as such and could actually bring down

the president's ruling majority in the house and senate. >> and if you look at volunteers on the ground, the composition of the actual resistance it is overwhelmingly female. and you can see with episodes like this rob porter spousal abuse scandal that everything that's happening from the white house is firing up and encouraging this opposition which at least at this point looks like it's going to sweep across the country in a wave in november. >> okay. the book is "devil's bargain." josh green, thank you. >> was your mother watching today? >> the whole town is watching. >> oh, that is so good. >> still ahead, six days and counting a lack of clarity from the white house gives the rob porter scandal another day in the news. when will anyone get straight answers on who knew what and when? >> and chris murphy joins us on set and as we mentioned we'll dig into that new report from

wired magazine and to mark zuckerberg's struggle to contain facebook's fake news problem. one employee compared the 33-year-old ceo to of mice and men. morning joe is coming right back. this new day. looks nothing like yesterday. roads nowhere to be found. and it's exactly what you're looking for.

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accept his resignation if the president thinks he did nothing wrong? >> i think that was a personal decision that rob made and one that he was not pressured to do but one that he made on his own. >> would rob porter be on the job today had he not decided to resign? >> he was peterminated yesterda. his last day was yesterday. >> would he still be on the job? >> we wish him well. he worked very hard. i found out about it recently and i was surprised by it as you probably know he says he's innocent. and i think you have to remember that. >> was that just the picture you found out about? >> i didn't know about that. >> we learned about the situation involving rob porter and within 24 hours his resignation has been accept and announced. the conversation took place within 40 minutes and beyond

that i don't have anything else to add. >> why does he have to speak through you? >> the president has been clear multiple times through myself and others within the administration that we condemn domestic violence. >> he has not said it. >> i'm the spokes person for the white house and for the president and i'm saying it to you right now. >> why didn't he say it? >> i'm not sure how i can be any more clear. i think president has expressed his views on this and -- >> he wishes porter well and that he believes that people should have due process, but he hasn't addressed the victims of do mostic violence at all. >> that es oonot tr's not true. if you were paying attention to what i just read to you you would understand the opposite. he literally dictated that statement to me. >> and with her briefing yesterday sarah sanders almost guaranteed the white house will be asked about rob porter again later today. >> you know -- >> how hard is this? >> so unbelievable is not only

do they keep lying, but they keep lying in a way that it is -- you just have to go back three or four days and match what they said before to now. it was an outrageous press conference yesterday, and you know, andrea mitchell is with us. andrea, what will also guarantee the 7th day of a one-day story is that politico is reporting this morning that contrary to what sarah huckabee sanders said and contrary to what john kelly said, that after the photos came out, after evidence of the abuse of his ex-wife came out, at that point they then sent porter out to fend for reporters. now, we were told as soon as we found out he was gone.

no, just the opposite. as soon as they found out about the ballerttered photos he was out to talk to the press. >> and this is fist of all disrupting and already disruptive chaotic white house, but the senior staff know it's a lie. you just have to read the first ex-wife's incredibly compelling column in today's washington post. >> or take a look at the restraining order or take a look at the picture, but the question i have is what were they going to have him doing? attacking these women again from his position in the white house? >> well, he went in again -- >> this is beyond -- >> they sent him -- >> they said it after the photos they sent him out to try to spin the press. >> they arranged an off the record spin session with four prominent reporters. >> again, why is that so significant now? it's significant because they've

been lying to us now for a week saying within 40 minutes he was gone, when we found out about this. we were shocked. it changed. no i didn't. you spent him out to spin four important reporters. >> they could have ended this -- this could have been a one-day story. this should have been a one-day story and it keeps going on and on because they won't tell the truth. >> and also with us columnist with the boston herald. what do you make of why this is taking so long and so difficult for the white house to deal with? >> the house should have dealt with this as some sort of crisis management. they found something awful about a member of their staff and they had to deal with it. instead they're dealing it with politically. they're trying to spin, they're making it seem as if the accusations that these women have made and the evidence of this really awful abuse is some sort of political attack, that they need to fight back on, that the president needs to defend his people, and i think there's

also the aspect of course that the president sort of sees himself in rob porter as one who himself has been been accused of things. the denial for him is enough to push back against this in a way that makes it seem like political. >> and the second -- the second he says i have sim that thi for the women, suddenly the next question is what about all the women who accused you? >> exactly. it's all out there. we have this consistent failure to understand where they are. they're in the white house. right? so when -- when something like this comes out, when you have this photograph, when you have these reports about a white house official, you -- you act and you act swiftly and you move on. i mean, that's what you do. this is -- this is not the trump organization. this is not some mom and pop development. >> you're not just playing the new york post and the daily news

and -- and your two or three friends at the new york times. >> exactly. you cannot come out and say, well, the president believes this when the president has not said this and you can't come out and say to the press, didn't you just hear what i said to you, the president told me to tell you this. this is a president who has not been restrained who knows how to communicate with the american people on twitter or at a foe toll opportunity. he can say this if he wants to. what he has said on camera is that this man has said he is innocent and that people should not be faced with false allegations. he said that in the face of everything that was in front of him. and what it is raising is a more fundamental question beyond all the rest of it about classification. about why people without security clearances and they keep throwing it back on the fbi where it's every previous white house in contrast to what sarah sanders has said, every previous general counsel, white house counsel has taken control of the

classification process with the fbi. the fbi reports, they don't determine. it's up to the white house lawyer to tell the president and his chief of staff to flag a red flag here that someone -- and the fact that jerry and others who have worked in the maryla administration, a white house fbi interim security clearance is denial of clearance. >> and you're holding up on op ed that women can be abused. >> this is written by the first wife who has not spoken out. >> a powerful piece. >> the one who you've seen her picture with a black eye. >> and strong women get abuse too of course in reference to kellyanne conway. let's bring in our connecticut senator chris murphy. you know, senator, it seems to me as if donald trump is always living in the 1970s where he thinks he can make friends with

reporters, play the tabloids in new york city, call up his -- what was his fake name when he was talking about -- >> john miller. >> that he can call up and be hey, that don miller, that donald trump is a sexy guy, everybody loves him, but really, it's that -- that haphazard short sided approach, that day trading has turned this into a 7-day story that reenforces voters preexisting prejudices against the republican party as a party that has contempt for women. >> well, and underlying that is also a national security scandal. right? which is not going away either. it's awful enough that the president is effectively endorsing and defending an abuser but you now have reports suggesting that 30 to 40 people working inside the white house have not gotten their security clearances. >> what does that mean for --

for americans watching this? talk about how that intersects with problems with classified material. >> well, remember, this is a president who ran his campaign against hillary clinton on the fact she couldn't handle classified information. he doesn't apparently read the classified briefings in the morning but he has people handling those believings that have not been cleared by the fbi and you have to think about somebody who would do things like rob porter did to his wife and ask yourself whether you would trust that person with classified information. so this is a story with multiple layers. i think the president has to be such stronger on taking care of people who have been accused of this kind of abuse inside his white house but he also has to answer why he's got people handling sensitive information that the fbi has said are not qualified to do that. >> and general kelly knowing that his main man inside the white house was handling classified information that he shouldn't have been handling. the question is, who -- who

cleans this mess up? again, it's a one-day story that'smorphed into a 7-day story but the chief of staff that's supposed to bring order to this place is in the middle of it and has told -- i don't know, any way you cut it he's -- he told two or three lies already about time lines. >> absolutely. and you know, this whole thing -- the lack of security clearances, the way they've handled this and the way they've handled everything speaks to the general immediate you ra-- we'v seen people much more experienced and much more capable working these white house jobs. people who know how to handle these situations. who is there in the white house who does know how to handle a situation like this, who can clean it up? you know, general kelly obviously has a lot of experience running things, but he -- he's not doing very well on this, and his -- you know,

his best sort of alternative was rob porter apparently who was competent in his view. >> at some things. >> at some things. right. and so there's just not a lot of people there who you can have a lot of confidence in. >> and kimberly, who would want to come in at this point to be chief of staff when you've got a president who may be on the cusp of firing rod rosenstein and watching republican allies on capitol hill run for the hills? >> right. even before the inauguration there was a problem with trying to recruit people to serve in this white house. it's much -- it's much worse now, but adding to the point about who comes in to clean up, it's impossible to clean up when you're inside this white house, when you have a president -- when you have someone at the top who is continuing to defend rob porter, who is continuing to in his statements and tweets put out a message here that is

contrary to what anybody inside the white house could possibly do or say to try to clean this up. we've seen this not just with this situation, but with crisis after crisis in the past. it's the president's at the top. how can you clean up? >> so senator murphy, this is obviously another massive distraction. who knows what tomorrow will hold. >> right. >> but the immigration debate on capitol hill, can you tell us where we are with that? >> well, listen, it's really hard to land -- >> i can imagine. >> to land an issue like this so controversial to ground with a white house that is not being helpful in trying to figure out how republicans get to yes. remember, republicans are going to be very reluctant to endorse anything that doesn't have the president's approval on it and while they are consumed with the porter scandal it's not giving republicans any guidance. there's a deal here to be done to protect dreamers. but the white house has to be involved in that because republicans are freaked out that they're going to get out on a limb, vote for something --

>> so did mitch mcconnell's plan go too far to the right? obviously it was a little tougher than what mitch mcconnell would usually do but le's not going to go out there and pass a bill that won't pass the house and get the president's signature. in fact, wasn't he just being realistic about some of the challenges? >> no, i think he is and i don't think it's absurd to think that republicans are going to put down their marker as mcconnell has and democrats are going to put down our marker to start this debate and we may end up somewhere in the middle but in order to do that mcconnell has to have a truly open floor process on which we vote on a number of proposals to see which one gets to 60. not vote on a few amendments today and tomorrow and only one vote on a comprehensive bill which is the president's bill. >> and is it also that he has to worry about what can get through the house and mark meadows and if the president agrees to something in the senate, it still has to have some kind of

buy in from the house which is so deeply divided. >> but there are a thumb ber nu ways to get by in from the house. there is absolutely a bill that can pass with the majority of democrats in the house and a smaller number of republicans, but right now it appears that ryan doesn't want to let that pathway be an option. >> so what is the president's role in this? i mean, we've seen time after time again, he was the major factor, whether in the beginning, bringing everybody together or in the end sort of like taking the ball away at the last minute like pelt just when lawmakers were ready to kick. how much buy in is the president -- how much is he participating right now and how much are you looking for him to participate? >> well, the most success that we've had, for instance, on the budget deal last week was when the president was less involved but supportive of the compromise

that republicans reached and so i think the best place for the president to be is in a mode of empow empowerment of republicans who can eventually cut a more reasonable deal. so i was criticizing him before for being distracted and not involved in the process, at the same time on overly involved president may not be helpful here either. >> so we've been talking all morning about a wired story that came out about facebook. we're going to be talking to the author later this hour, but the question is who is going to force facebook and twitter to show some accountability? the article points out that in many instances it was the fake news stories, the sort of stories promoted by russia that actually got more hits, that actually got more traffic than real news stories that actually were based in fact. and yet they're allowing that to go on. they're making billions and billions of dollars on this fake

news model. when is somebody going to get mark zuckerberg on capitol hill and get others on capitol hill and force them to be accountable? >> well, and this stands next to secretary tillerson's sort of wild defeatist admission that the republicans are attempting to influence the 2018 -- >> the russians. >> the russians are attempting to influence the election and the u.s. government can't really do anything about it. which is not true. the government can bring twitter and facebook in and demand account ability and if they don't then i think congress has to look at legislation which requires them to get serious about making sure that at the very least information put on people's news feeds that are pushed by foreign governments are careened. >> when is that going to happen? we've got a 2018 election that may be one of the most important midterms in our lifetime. we just have news out of the czech republic that the russians and fake news may have helped

elect an anti democratic president in the czech republic. are we going to be like the obama administration in 2016 and wait until the election is over? >> it should happen now and again, i think the right sequence is for the administration to get serious and then if you don't get the right response, move congress in, but i think the administration especially given tillerson's comments has made it clear they are not going to take this threat seriously. >> in fact i'm going over to cover the hearings, the annual intelligence briefings from all the agencies and my reporting is that they are going to focus on rush a ssia and cyber and these disruptions as a bigger threat to national security than terrorism. the problem is that is not what the white house is saying. only yesterday the president is chatting with putin. we learned about it first from the kremlin, not announced by the white house and then putin announces that the president had told him that he's authorized to

speak to the palestinian leader for the president of the united states? i mean, the disconnect between the house and his own secretary of state and everyone else about the threat of russia is so profound, i don't know what your colleagues on the intelligence committee is going to say. >> and we also are telegraphing with the administration decision not to impose sanctions so they were empowered to implement sanctions against the russians as punishment for their interference in the 2016 election. they have not done that and that's a signal to putin to keep it up. >> at some point it's going to happen. i hope it happens before more elections are influenced, but the wall street yournl isjourna publisher. the new york sometimes is a publisher. just because facebook gives billions of dollars and just

because people are scared of facebook and just because they're scared of google and just because they're scared of other tech companies does not mean they are not publishers. we all know they are publishers. senators, house members, the white house knows that facebook, they are publishers and they need to be held to the same standards as the wall street journal, the washington times, the new york times, the woug po -- washington post. what was the quote on pornography? i know it when i see it. guess what? we've seen it on facebook. over 55% of americans get their news from facebook and they are making billions of dollars publishing lies and they could stop it tomorrow if they wanted to. >> maybe that's why the lawyers showed up for the hearings instead of the actual ceo and the people at the top of the company. thank you very much. and andrea, we'll be watching

you another noon. >> thank you. >> that's going to be a fascinating hearing. >> especially the security issues. chris wray is going to be testifying. >> what a day on capitol hill. okay. >> you know, we criticize a lot of people in washington. chris wray, a plus. >> that guy has been a standup guy. >> i think you'll see that the democrats are not going to want to beat up on him because they know he's the last man standing. >> all right. still ahead this morning the conservative group backed by the koch brothers is pouring millions into the midterms and one of the top targets, she joins the conversation here on set next on morning joe. first, we head to vermont. and go to our coffee shop. and meet dave. hey. why is dark magic so spell-bindingly good, he asks? let me show you. let's go. so we climb. hike. see a bear. woah. reach the top. dave says dark magic is a bold blend of coffee with rich flavors of uganda, sumatra, colombia and other parts of south america. like these mountains, each amazing on their own.

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joining us now from capitol hill a member of senate finance and armed services. we are talking cardinals.

we've been talking about the st. louis cardinals. it's great to have you here. >> i was in kansas city over the weekend and legitimately there are people in kansas city that get really angry with me because i don't seem to ever mention the royals. so let me just say, you know, i love the royals except when they're playing the cardinals. >> that's fair. >> i mean, i'm not a pretend person that tries to be, you know, so i play both sides. i'm a real fan, but i love the royals and nothing was more fun than going with chuck schumer to the last game of the world series in mets stadium and listening to the people cuss him for bringing me after we won the world series. >> sounds like a good time. >> so why did you become a royals -- a cardinals fan instead of a royals fan? you're from kansas city. right? >> no i was growing up i had a great uncle he would come out in the backyard with his radio and make me sit on a blanket while

he sat this a lawn chair and make he listen to cardinals game and he was a huge cardinals fan so i have had it since childhood. >> that will do it. all right. so we are -- have been talking this morning a good bit about the changing stories inside the white house. you have one of the most important aides to the president battering a wife, an ex-wife and another one saying he was also abusive to her. you have the president of the united states going out praising this alleged abuser. i think we counted 11, 12 tames in one quick 30 second burst. >> never mentioning -- >> will not mention the women. he refuses to mention the women. he -- some of his staff members mention the women and the chief of staff has told four or five different stories. we have found this morning from politico that after the pictures of abuse came out they then sent him out to try spin four

reporters after kelly told us within 40 minutes he was gone. it's one lie after another. what do women in missouri, i don't care what the political party is, what do women think about a white house that keeps lying about a man who was abused two ex-wives? >> i think it's not just women, you know. you're talking to somebody who started a domestic violence unit in kansas city back in the 90s and i have seen firsthand this is a serious crime in our society. we're not talking about just one neighborhood. we're talking about -- i mean, rob porter is a good example. i mean, here is the guy with his stellar resume and his public profile that looks like he would never do anything wrong, but yet we have the pictures and we have the restraining order and we have the fbi. here's the thing that really kills me. the fbi tells the legal counsel iffer the white house that someone cannot get a security clearance and it's like oh,

well, put it on a different pile. >> can not get a security clearance. >> put it on a different pile. it's amazing to me. >> cannot get a security clearance because he -- there's evidence that he beat up his ex-wife. abused another ex-wife. how -- how do women -- how do men square this in missouri? >> here's the other thing that doesn't make sense to me. i mean, kelly is somebody who's used to being in a leadership position. once you find out that your most trusted aide, that you're giving security sensitive information to cannot clear a security clearance, it seems to me that the first thing you do is why? and then you want to get all the information. and then you want to see the fbi file and you want to get them in for an interrogation about it. why did none of that happen? >> do you believe there's any way and i'll tell you i don't, do you believe there's any way that john kelly was kept in the dark, that don mcgahn was told

this by one of his ex-wives, the fbi told them this and do you think that the chief of staff who is a control freak on access to the president, do you think this guy really was left out in the dark until a week or two ago? >> i do not know, but i know this. the john kelly that i thought i knew, the minute he heard somebody couldn't get a security clearance in his immediate circle, somebody who come prs the military, that would have been in my opinion a red siren to john kelly. >> for anybody. >> the fact that it wasn't is damning in and of itself. >> i want to ask you, senator because this is the debate that's opening up on immigration, senator flake has put forward and amendment that incorporates some of what the white house has proposed but doesn't go as far, doesn't limit legal immigration, is that something that a democrat like you could get on board with? >> first of all we haven't really -- i mean, there was a silver lining in the three-day closing of government, because

for the first time that i can remember since obama was elected president the middle muscled up and there were 25 moderates in a room. 12 republicans, 13 democrats met ongoing and we negotiated this empty shell bill that we are now on. and we are also continuing to work every day of trying to come up with a bill that we can all support that goes a little further than some in the democratic party want to go and it doesn't go quite as far as some of the republican party want to go. i am hopeful that through the amendment process we can susz out what proposals will debt more than 60 votes and that we can come with a bill at the end that would incorporate the things that the senate has supported and we would have a big enough number voting for it that would put extreme pressure on the white house and then paul ryan. >> one of the concerns that progressives have and including hispanics is that the party has essentially forfeited a lot of

the leverage pintoints. you did get an open process for this bill but there's nothing that can put significant amount of pressure on republicans at this point to get something passed. what happens march 5th let's say although the judge has stayed the daca program. but is there anything democrats can do other than try to it an issue during the election season? >> well, i think first of all, it's very important to remember that republicans have control of this government. and you know, this idea that us shutting down the government for a week, two weeks, what, a month, two months, that somehow that was going to make this issue more popular with the american people, what you are going to see and that's why i voted against the shutdown. you are going to see support for the dreamers beginning to go down in america if all of a sudden the wheels of government ground, you know, came to complete halt. and reminds me a little bit of

the iraq war. it sounded like it was a good idea going in but nobody had g figured out how to get out. it sounded like a good idea to go into the shutdown but nobody had a good plan on how we got out of it. >> if you were being realistic about this, i mean, i don't see a conceivable path to getting this done. what is the conceivable path? there are no guarantees that it gets picked up by the house. certainly no guarantees that president trump would sign such a measure. >> there is certainly a lot of support. the president said he supports citizenship for these dreamers and he has expanded the daca recipients to a larger pool of young people that would qualify. we are very close to a lot of people agreeing on both the border security piece and the dreamer piece. if we can do those two and leave the rest of it for another day i really believe that we can get this done and frankly, if -- really if paul ryan wants to do this, if he wants to deny the

senate again a vote on a bill on immigration, then the republicans are pay a high price. >> what the president wants is a change in the paradigm of legal immigration. he wants to get rid of family reunification and move to a different system. is the senate prepared to draw a line and say we're not going there now? >> i think it depends on the proposals. if they were to make adjustments to the diversity lottery which the president says he wants that would protect some immigrants that come from the -- the underpopulated places of our -- not underpopulated but -- >> underrepresented. >> underrepresented parts of our world like africa and other places, if we could use that diversity lottery in a way that would make sense in terms of clearing backlog or you know, rewarding people from those countries that have an education, i think possibly could get 60 votes on some of that. as to family reunification that gets more difficult depending on

how far they want to go. the president has misled the american people about how big a problem chain migration is. i would rather see us focus on the millions of people that are legally waiting in line right now. and by the way, can i just say this? this is very close to home. the notion that this white house thinks it's okay to go out of their way to arrest a chemistry professor who has liffed ved in country for 30 years and immediately puts him on a plane when a stay is dissolved yesterday, immediately puts him on a plane trying to get him out of the country and they had to go to extraordinary lengths to get a stay to stop him in hawaii. what are they doing? why is this a priority? why are we wasting taxpayer money on a chemistry professor sf. >> actually threatening -- by the way, chemistry professor who is a pillar of the community and who was driving his daughter to school, they pull him out of the car and they tell the daughter and kids age 7 to 14 that

they're going to arrest them if they try to hug their father good-bye. >> it's -- that's why i think this white house needs to realize and we've talked about maybe trying to codify the priorization of criminals. we've got lots of criminals that are here illegally. i want to go after them and lock them up, but let's do that and not go after tchemistry professors. >> always good to see you. >> good to see you guys. thanks for coming over and being close so i can see you up front. >> great to be here. >> i'll say to you what they always say to me when i they me out and about, you really look much younger and nicer in person than you do on tv. i want to say to people, how bad do i look on tv? especially when people say oh, you look so much thinner in person. >> people say that to me all the time and what i would say to

them you know, tv adds 800 pounds. still ahead on morning joe, the social media company that didn't relize it was a media company until it had a full blown crisis on its hands. we'll dig into mark zuckerberg's struggle to fix the disaster that he created. we'll be right back. time to bask... in low prices!

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okay. now, by most accounts, donald trump hit all the right notes at last friday's prayer breakfast, but the question remains, what do evangelicals see in this president? we're going to be talking policy versus personality with david brody of the christian broadcasting network, plus inside the two years that rocked facebook, with one former facebook executive admitting that he helped create tools that are quote, ripping apart the social fabric. boy, that's something to put on your wikipedia entry. we'll talk about that when morning joe returns. crohn's disease.

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i've always felt the need to pray, so i would say that the office is so powerful that you

need god even more. >> that is president trump last year in an interview with our next guest chief political correspondent for the christian broadcasting network. david cowrites the new book, the faith of donald j. trump, in it david writes about what he learned from his interview with the president. quote, trump was never going to pretend he's something that he's not even talking to the christian broadcasting network he wouldn't pretend to be a born again altar boy. trump knew the game but he wasn't going to play it but what you say in iowa should match what you say in new hampshire. what is the faith of donald trump? >> i asked him that specifically. we had an interview in the oval office for this book. he says he is a believer. mike pence two interviews with him, very strong talking about how this president is a believer and absolutely 100%. paula white, his spiritual

advisor, she said she has had indepth conversations with this president, very, very indepth conversations and saying i can tell you 100%, that's a quote, 100%, he is a believer in the lord jesus christ. from a journalistic perspective we go ahead and do that. >> but what do you say donald -- what has donald trump told you because of course you know certainly because of what you've done and certainly what i have heard growing up in southern baptist churches for four decades, the center of any faith is understanding that you are a broken person, that all have sinned and fallen short of god's glory and we must all ask forgiveness for our continued sins. donald trump has said i never ask god for forgiveness. if i do something wrong i try to leave him out of it. he's never asked for god's for goifness. that doesn't pass the sniff test

in any evan bjeligelical church it? >> he did say that in public one time in iowa. behind the scenes which is what this book is all about paints a different story. >> can i just -- >> can i just finish the point? i didn't even get to my point. >> but you're saying he's saying it behind closed doors. why does it -- why is it hard for donald trump to say i am a sinner, i have fallen short of god's glory and i depend on god's forgiveness for me to move more ward? >> okay. so i'd like to get back to my other point but i'll go to this point. sure, we'll do whatever you like. >> no i don't want to hear about what he whispers in closets. >> you're not giving me a chance to answer, joe. >> has he ever said it publicly, david? >> he has talked about god in public absolutely and i will also say as a main line

presbyterian, his faith he doesn't wear it on his sleeve like many others out there. now, having said that in the book what i definitely point to here is this idea that he's been around a lot of folks that have this jesus plus nothing biblical mentality which is what the bible commands and he is going ahead and hearing all of that and i'm telling you, there is a different story behind what you're seeing out there in public. he's been on a spiritual voyage especially these last five years and he's told me i have contacted or i've been in contact with people that have impacted me greatly and so remember, walter was the one that said in seeking truth you have to get both sides of the story. we've heard one side of the story. the other side is inside this book and i'm telling you there are stories to be told that show a much different side of donald trump than folks might expect. >> you talk about a spiritual voyage. just look at his twitter feed and tell me where has that taken

him over the past five years? what are we missing. >> i think we're kind of like doing this here because you're talking about in public but what's said about you or me or others in public can be much different than what with we really are about. so my point is there's stories, a time where james robeson, a tar mac in pensacola during the campaign trail they're praying inside this suv right there on the tar mac. after he hugs him and says i love you, i love you so much. literally this is the words coming out of donald trump's mouth. >> he says it to don king. >> that's why you take it any way you want. >> i'm not pulling it out of context. that's what donald trump does. >> you weren't there for the -- what i am being told is a tender moment that donald trump had as it relates to this conversation with james robeson. >> well, okay. so i'm -- it's going to be my

last pass at this. and i'm going to pass it around to everybody else because you're not stupid. >> thank you. >> you're not dumb. you have grown up, you know exactly what i'm talking about. you know exactly what you're doing. you're dis'emabling because you know there is no -- you talked about me. i say all the time i'm broken. i screw up every day. i'm a terrible person. if -- if i go to church i go to church begging god for forgiveness. you know why? because that is the center of the christian faith. all i am asking you is, has donald trump once said publicly that he has sinned, fallen short of the glory of god, and asked for god's forgiveness. >> yes, you can google it. i actually interviewed him on his golf course in california. he says yes, i do ask god for

forgiveness. i asked him a month later and he talked to me about. >> and he said it privately to you and that's the public statement you're talking about? >> that's what he said to me. >> privately. >> but i also want to say let's remember, the book is called the faith of donald trump. it's not called the saint hood of donald trump and this is also not the lamb's book of life. ultimately god is going to judge donald trump, he's going to judge me and everybody on the morning joe set. everybody in this world. so the bottom line is that's who he has to play to, not me, not you or anybody else. >> well, so my final question is this question. why do you believe that a guy like donald trump who -- let's just say has an unorthodox view of spirituality, based on the evangelicals that i've grown up with my entire life, why have

evangelicals flocked to donald trump in record numbers? >> so many different reasons, joe. it's spiritual, they believe he's been put there for a reason. they believe he's a culture warrior. they also have practical reasons. if you're going to tal about moral, a lot of folks say how in the world could you vote for donald trump because of everything that he's done. well, here's what christians realize and joe, you know this. that men are fallible. in other words, men are sinners, women are sinners, we're all sinners. you can't put your faith necessarily in a candidate but you can do the moral thing by going to the macro and that's what they've done, judges, the life issue, donald trump has represented all of this during the campaign. evangelicals said, you know what, he may be -- he may have a few issues but the bottom line is, in a macro, the moral right decision for them, that's the conclusion they came to. >> the only thing i have to say is he's a cultural warrior but i do know that at least up until

2016, everybody i grew up with in the southern baptist church for the first 40 years of my life would say he is coursening culture and taking us in the wrong direction. thank you for being with us. >> thanks, joe. >> thank you for your patience. anyway. >> that's just hard. >> no, listen. here's the deal. there is a blind spot that we have. there's obviously a blind spot that i have. there is a blind spot that a lot of people that aren't supporters of donald trump, that they have about why the people that i grew up with who would harshly judge a person who smoked cigarettes or harshly judge a 16-year-old girl who made a mistake and got

pregnant, or harshly judge a man who got divorced. i remember in my church, first baptist church, pensacola, i love it, i love the people there. that is my home. those are members of my family and were for 30 years. i remember a good man who had been divorced wanted to be a deacon. you would have thought that this man had gone to hitler in 1937 and said, hey, i've got a great idea, let's kill 6 million jews. let's wipe them all out. hitler, then you can take over all of europe and then maybe we can take over russia and kill all the jews there. you would have thought this man committed crimes on that level. and so here we are, poof, suddenly, and i'm not talking about the divorce, because guess what, i'm the last guy to talk about divorce. what i'm here talking about,

gene, and you know it too because you -- >> i grew up among the same people. >> we are all sinners. we are all fallible. our only hope as christians is understanding that we are unworthy of god's grace. and i'm not doing that to preach. i'm doing that to say that is the central tenet of what every evangelic evangelical's ever learned. they've placed their faith in this man who has said on the record repeatedly that he is too good to ask god to ever forgive him. >> right. and there's just no indication that he understands the way evangelicals see the world, the way the people you and i grew up with see the world, see god, see their duty and their role on earth. you just don't see that. >> one final thought. you've heard me say this before. in 1994 when i was running, young people wanted to work on

my campaign and all they wanted to talk about was pro-life issues. fine, i was pro-life, am pro-life. pro-life issues, family issues, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. by the time i left in 2001, every eadvantavanadvantagical k walked through the door was wearing birkenstocks. i want to talk about aids in africa. they were what i call matthew 25 christians. helping the least among us. giving hope to the hopeless. feeding the hungry. clothing the naked. visiting people in prison. visiting the sick in hospitals. doing -- all of these things, again, that donald trump has proven to be the antithesis of. not by my opinion, by his own words. by his own policies. >> every day of his presidency. i think that it's very easy to understand and to -- to connect

with people who still support trump. it's easy to understand. this, i don't understand. at all. >> we'll be right back. and we're going talking to the editor in chief of wired and we're going to be talking about his new cover story that's generated the kind of conversation. i got a feeling we're going to talk about this and then we're going to have to do a post-tape and get more of this for you tomorrow as well. because that conversation with david brody went way over. hopefully we've sold him a lot of books. because we were pretty pissed off. >> we'll be right back. (music) nathaniel: in moscow there's a program, nathaniel: they call them sparrows. trained to seduce and manipulate. nathaniel: that is what she is. she's out of your league. (music) you have a gift. (music) vanya: you see through people. take your life back. (music) i'll find a way. (music) vanya: you're always one step ahead. (music) dominika: you're right. (music) rated r.

he is co-author of the cover story, inside zuckerberg's struggle to fix it all. the slow realization of its impact on the 2016 presidential election. >> one of the most important stories we've read in some time, that is, if you care about america and democracy.

>> it is fascinating. >> what are they doing to -- what are they going to do now? they find themselves in the middle of the campaign and the fake news stories are getting more likes and more shares than the real news stories. >> so what they're trying to do now is they had a massive revelation after trump won and said, oh, my god, did we play a role in that. the first thing they did is they work hard to figure out algorithmically how you can figure out fake news. made a lot of algorithmic changes to try to stifle that. then they realized not only was there all that, there's the weaponization by the russians. so what they're doing there, that's a much harder problem, hiring a lot of people, trying to figure out what the russians are doing. they're trying to counter that. meanwhile, at the same time, they're trying to understand whether their algorithms drive people apart, put us into filter bubbles, and if that's the case, which many people argue that it is, how can they adjust the algorithms. so there are changes going on at

about ten levels of facebook right now to try to prevent what happened in 2016 happening again. but it's not clear it will be successful. >> and what are they doing? why won't they come to capitol hill? are they afraid -- what question i guess this is -- this is a question i ask. what question are they most afraid to answer in congressional testimony? >> why should you not be regulated? i mean, one of the fundamental issues for facebook is that they were basically offered immunity because they're seen as a platform and not a publisher. because of that, they had an incentive not to actually regulate fake news. not to go out. not to go out and say, this publisher is okay and this publisher is not okay. as long as they're seen as just an independent platform, then anything can happen on it and they're free from regulation. their concern is, okay, what can we do to try to stop this without doing so much that congress then regulates us and gives us less freedom, so that's

a really tricky thing for them right now. >> isn't the answer to that question, you have to admit what you are to yourself? >> publishers. >> and that's part of the process facebook is going through right now. what they would like to do i think is kind of admit that they're a publisher and so then they can take more actions to try to stop this stuff. because honestly like mark zuckerberg was not at all happy when he realized what facebook had done and that's been part of the story over the last year. what they would like to do is be able to work hard to stop it but not get regulated. so that's tough. >> work hard, not that hard. seems to be an almost -- >> elections get completely botched. >> that seems about as untenable a position as trying to sell a book on the faith of donald trump. listen, nicholas, thank you for being with us. >> our last segment went on too long. we're going to continue this after we say good-bye. and people watching, we're going to blow this out, have a big

segment tomorrow on it. that does it for us this morning. >> yes, ali velshi picks up the coverage right now, right here on msnbc. >> good morning mika and joe, thank you very much. i'm ali velshi in for stephanie ruhle. america's top spies are just moments away from testifying on capitol hill. the hearing is supposed to focus on global threats but we're expecting questions about the russia investigation and russian interference. >> i believe that president putin really feels and he feels strongly that he did not metddl in our election. >> the administration turnover rate at a record 34%, this as the ex-wife of trump's former speechwriter details her accusations to nbc news. >> he has thrown me into a wall. he has put a cigarette out on my hand. >> and a deadly flu season. at least 63 children have died. schools across the country closed. and health