"andrea mitchell reports." >> and right now on "andrea mitchell reports," taking heat. president trump gets an earful from some governors on gun laws, including from florida governor rick scott, a former republican ally. we'll hear from the president coming up. and keeping the dream alive. the supreme court dealing a blow to the trump administration's push to end the dreamers programs. democratic leaders are calling this a victory for now. >> the trump administration tried to skirt the law here and go straight to the supreme court. the supreme court told them no, go through the regular process. so we're ready, and we'll go to court and we hope to prevail on all the merits in this case to keep the daca program going. and charm offensive. ivanka trump closing out the winter olympic, standing where the vice president would not and delivering a message in an exclusive interview with nbc news' peter alexander. >> i think that when there are cases of north korea so

affirming the u.s. position and our joint position of maximum pressure with our south korean partners is very important. president trump said that gun policy would be the top issue on his agenda in his meeting today with the nation's governors, and it was. he discussed banning bump stocks, meeting with nra leaders, and reiterating his call for bonuses to teachers who carry weapons in schools. democratic governor from washington informs that meeting. we're waiting for the tape to be played back. he's been speaking for more than an hour. tell me your headlines because i understand that you challenged the president on some of his gun recommendations. >> i did do that. i think more importantly, the educators of america are challenging him and rejecting his ill-conceived notion to turn first grade teachers into sort of pistol-packing first grade teachers. the educators, the counselors,

the principals, they've rejected this idea, as many law enforcement folks have said, because if you were going to do this, you'd have to train people to be a fully enabled police officer. this takes a lot of training to deal with stressful situations. look, i'm a grandparent. i'm a son of a teacher. i'm a brother and brother-in-law of a teacher. i know one thing about teachers. we want them to teach, not to be carried firearms and weapons. so this idea of sort of paying bonuses to people who have dedicated their lives to teaching, they don't want to have this interference of a firearm between them and their students, and they don't want other teachers to have firearms. we want these folks to teach. so yes, i push back on that fairly vigorously, but i think more importantly, teachers -- i asked the president to tweet a little less and listen a little more here to the educators of america who want to educate and not carry firearms into their schools. >> now, i don't want to put a

reporter's hat on you, but we're still waiting for this tape to be played back. it was not a live broadcast from the governor's meeting. rick scott, florida's governor, where did he stand on this? >> well, i'm not sure that i really recall him addressing this specifically, so you'll have to ask governor scott. he had some other things he had said. we had other ideas as well. i commended to the president our washington state model of the extreme risk protection orders, which allow family members to have law enforcement is remove firearms from people who are dangerous to themselves or others. it's been extremely successful in my state. you know, the president has backed off some of his ideas. he now says, well, i don't want to arm every teacher, just some of them. but all of them, at least in my state, want to be educator, not firearms experts. >> what about bump stocks and the other things that the president has moved beyond where the nra is? are you at all encouraged by

more flexibility coming from the president after he's heard from victims that he's willing to stand up to the nra? >> yes, that would be great. and we have passed a law in my state to have a state protection against bump stocks. we'll have a state law that bans bump stocks. that's a no brainer. it's the first thing that should happen. we clearly need to raise the age limit. it makes no sense for a person, an 18-year-old to leave their birthday party and be able to go buy an assault weapon. so that needs to be raised. we need to have a better background check situation. all of those things need to happen. i am concerned about this, though. we do need more -- not just rhetorical flourishes from the president. we have seen this before with dreamers, where he said he was going to have a big heart for dreamers, but then really used them as bargaining chips. we don't want to see that happen in a situation where you never get legislation passed. if he's going to be serious

about this, he needs to be true to his commitment. we have concerns about that, given his recent history. >> and you brought the dreamers up. while you wered in t in the mee with the president, the supreme court has declined to hear the appeals case. we'll have more extensive reporting from pete williams coming up, but the president apparently did refer to the dreamer situation. he created this deadline of march 5th. that was his action. and now, at least as far as the supreme court decision, that march 5th deadline is no longer a hard and fast deadline for the ability of the executive branch to start deporting kids. >> well, thank goodness we have a judicial system that will rein in an inhumane president who told us he had a big heart for dreamers. and last year at this very meeting, his now chief of staff, john kelly, told me to my face that we governors had nothing to worry about with the dreamers. they would be protected. that has not been the case. so i'm glad we have a judicial system to enforce the law.

today we had a meeting. it was interesting. it was with some of the white house trump administration officials on work force development. i told them, look, we're developing this young talent. they're in our colleges. they're in our apprenticeship programs. now you want to kick them out of the country. we want them to help to build our country. this is some of the most ambitious, vibrant, inspirational people in my state right now. so we're going to fight tooth and nail to keep their ambitions alive and those dreams alive in my state. >> well, governor, thank you so much for rushing out of that meeting. we're going to jump into the meeting and show all of our audience what the president said today to the governors, those who were there for this annual meeting. when they're in washington, they obviously go to the white house. they were at a ball last night. that was social with a couple substantive comments. here's the president addressing the governors in his opening remarks today. >> i want to thank our vice

president for that really lovely introduction. that was very nice, mike, and i appreciate it. this is a time of great opportunity for our country. we've created nearly 3 million jobs since the election, a number that nobody would have thought possible. you go back and take a look at what they were saying just prior to the election. nobody thought it was even possible. and we've done many other things, as you know, and i won't go over them because i want to be hearing from you today. but many other things that frankly nobody thought possible. gdp, 3.2, 3, 3. i think we're going to have another really big one coming up this current quarter. maybe a number that nobody would have thought would ever be had. but i think we're going to have a very good number because of the stimulus, because of the massive tax cuts that we're all benefits, whether you're a democrat or republican, you're benefitting tremendously from those tax cuts. apple is investing $350 billion

in the united states. you look at what's going on, it's really quite something. you just read a week ago exxon is now coming in with $50 billion. and many, many companies -- also, something that nobody expected, they're also coming in with massive bonuses for their workers. nobody thought in terms of that. we know that everybody's going to get a lot more income, and we've seen that as of february 1st. everyone's saying, wow, i have an extra $250 in my paycheck. and that's pretty good stuff. so we knew that was going to happen. we didn't know that hundreds and hundreds of companies, millions and millions of people were going to be getting large bonuses because of what we did. and one of the things we're working on is fair and reciprocal trade deals. we're not being treated fairly. you as governors are not being treated fairly. when i get too tough with a country, you're always going, oh, gee, don't do that. but as more senators in

congress, men and women that call, you haven't been calling so much. you want to see great deals. but we have to make the deals fair. you know, with mexico as an example, we probably lose $130 billion a year. now, for years i've been saying -- for the last year and a half, i've been saying 71 billion, but it's really not. they have a v.a.t. tax of 16% and we don't. at some point, we have to get stronger and smarter because we cannot continue to lose that kind of money with one country. we lose a lot with canada. people don't know it. canada's very smooth. they have you believe that it's wonderful, and it is for them. not wonderful for us. it's wonderful for them. so we have to start showing that we know what we're doing. world trade organization, a catastrophe. china became strong. you look at it.

it was going like this for years and years, hundreds of years, going just like this. i'm a great -- i have great respect for president xi, by the way. so i'm not blaming them. i'm not blaming mexico. i'm not blaming anybody. i'm blaming us because we did such a poor job for so many years. i'm not just talking about president obama. i'm talking about many, many, many presidents. for 30 years, 35 years. but world trade organization makes it almost impossible for us to do good business. we lose the cases. we don't have the judges. we have a minority of judges. it's almost as bad as the ninth circuit. nothing's as bad as the ninth circuit. it's almost as bad. speaking of that, daca is going to be put back into the ninth circuit. we tried to get it moved quickly because we'd like to help daca. i think everybody in this room wants to help with daca, but the supreme court just ruled it has to go through the normal channels. so it's going back in.

there won't be any surprise. it's really sad when every single case filed against us is in the ninth circuit, we lose, we lose, we lose, then we do fine in the supreme court. but what does that tell you about our court system? it's a very, very sad thing. so daca is going back, and we'll see what happens from there. so we want fair trade deals. we want reciprocal trade deals. scott walker has a wonderful company called harley davidson in wisconsin, right? great. so when they send a motorcycle to india, as an example, they have to pay 100% tax. 100%. now, the prime minister, who i think is a fantastic man, called me the other day. he said, we are lowering it to 50%. i said, okay, but so far we're getting nothing. we get nothing. he gets 50, and they think they're doing us a favor. that's not a favor. you know what i'm talking about.

it's a great company. when i spoke with your chairman or the president of harley, they weren't even asking for it because they've been ripped off with trade so long that they were surprised that i brought it up. i'm the one that's pushing it more than they are. but it's unfair. and india sells us a lot of motorbikes. when they have a motorbike, a big number by the way, a company that does a lot of business, so they have a motorcycle or motorbike that comes into our country, the number is zero. we get zero. they get 100%. brought down to 75, brought down now to 50. okay. i wasn't sure. he said it so beautifully. he's a beautiful man. and he said, i just want to inform you that we have reduced it to 75, but we have further reduced it to 50. i said, huh, what do i say? am i supposed to be thrilled? that's not good for you people,

especially as governors. it's just not right. and we have many deals like that. now, with all of that being said, let's talk china. china, we probably lost $504 billion last year on trade. 504 billion. i think that president xi is unique. he's helping us with north korea, who by the way wants to talk as of last night. you heard that. they want to talk. and we want to talk also, only under the right conditions. otherwise, we're not talking. you know, they've been talking for 25 years. other presidents should have solved this problem long before i got here. and they've been talking for 25 years. you know what happened? nothing. the clinton administration spent billions and billions of dollars. they gave them billions. they built things for them. they went out of their way, and the day after the agreement was

signed, they continued with nuclear research. it was horrible. the bush administration did nothing, both. the obama administration wanted to do something. he told me it's the single biggest problem this country has, but they didn't do anything. and it would have been much easier in those days than i think now. i think most people understand that. but we've been very tough with them. china's been good, but they haven't been great. china has really done more probably than they've ever done because of my relationship with -- we have a very good relationship. but president xi is for china. i'm for the united states. and russia is behaving badly because russia is sending in what china is taking out. so china is doing pretty good numbers, but russia is now sending a lot of stuff in. but i think they want to see it come to an end also.

i think everybody does, talking about tremendous potential loss of lives. numbers that nobody's ever even con tell fl contemplated, never thought of. so they want to talk, first time. they want to talk. we'll see what happens. that's my attitude. we'll see what happens. but something has to be done. today i want to hear your ideas on a number of critical issues. but most importantly, we want to discuss the public safety in schools and public safety generally. but school safety. we can't have this go on. i'm grateful that governor rick scott is here, and we thank him for his leadership in the aftermath of the terrible tragedy in parkland, florida. horrible. our nation is heartbroken. we continue to mourn the loss of so many precious innocent young lives. these are incredible people. i visited a lot of them.

but we'll turn our grief into action. we have to have action. we don't have any action. it happens, a week goes by, let's keep talking, another week goes by, we keep talking. two months go by, all the sudden everybody is off to the next subject. then when it happens again, everybody is angry and let's start talking again. we got to stop. by the way, bump stocks, we're writing that out. i'm writing that out myself. i don't care if congress does it or not. i'm writing it out myself. [ applause ] you put it into the machine gun category, which is what it is. it becomes essentially a machine gun, and nobody's going to be able -- it's going to be very hard to get them. so we're writing out bump stocks. we have to take steps to harden our schools so they're less vulnerable to attack. this includes allowing well-trained and certified school personnel to carry concealed firearms. at some point, you need volume. i don't know that a school is going to be able to hire 100

security guards that are armed. plus, you know, i got to watch some deputy sheriffs performing this weekend. they weren't exactly medal of honor winners, all right. the way they performed was frankly disgusting. they were listening to what was going on. the one in particular, he was early. then you had three others. probably a similar deal a little later, but a similar kind of a thing. you know, i really believe you don't know until you test it, but i think i'd run in there even if i didn't have a weapon. i think most of the people in this room would have done that too. i know most of you. but the way they performed was really a disgrace. second, we must confront the issue of mental health. and here's the best example of mental health. this kid had 39 red flags. they should have known. they did know. they didn't do anything about

it. that was really a bad time, i have to tell you. nobody bigger for law enforcement than i am, but between the people that didn't go into that school and protect those lives and the fact that this should have been solved long before it happened, pretty sad. so we have to confront the issue, and we have to discuss mental health and we have to do something about it. you know, in the old days, we had mental institutions. you had a lot of them. you could nab somebody like this because they did, they knew he was -- something was off. you had to know that. people were calling all over the place. but you used to be able to bring them into a mental institution. hopefully he gets help or whatever. but he's off the streets. you can't arrest him, i guess, because he hasn't done anything, but you know he's like a boiler ready to explode, right. so he just -- you have to do something. but you can't put him in jail, i guess, because he hasn't done

anything. but in the old day, you'd put him into a mental institution. we had them in new york, and our government started closing them because of cost. we're going to have to start talking about mental institutions because a lot of the folks in this room closed their mental institutions also. so we have no halfway. we have nothing between a prison and leaving him in his house, which we can't do anymore. so i think you folks have to start thinking about that. third, we have to improve our early warning response systems so that when friends, family, and neighbors do warn the authorities about a violent or dangerous individual, action is taken quickly and decisively. look, you had the one mother, if you remember, in connecticut, how horrible that was. she was begging, begging to take her son in and help him, do something, anything. he's so dangerous and nobody really listened to her. and he ended up killing her and then the rest, you know what happened. it was a horror.

but she was begging to do something about her own son. recently, you had a grandmother that got to see the notes of her grandchild, and she reported him and they nabbed him. he was ready to go in to a school, it looked like. she reported him. and there, the law enforcement did a very good job. fourth, we must pursue common sense measures that protect the constitutional rights of law-abiding americans while keeping guns out of the hands of those who pose a threat to themselves and to others. and fifth, we must strive to create a culture in our country that cherishes life and condemns violence and embraces dignity. now, with all of that, over the weekend i cannot believe the press didn't find this out. i can't believe it. i think they're getting a little bit -- i could never use the

word lazy. you don't want to say that. we don't want to give them any more enthusiasm than they already have. i had lunch with wayne lapierre, chris cox, and david lehman of the nra. i said, fellas, we got to do something. it's too long now. we got to do something. we're going to do very strong background checks. very strong. we got to do background checks. if we see a sicko, i don't want him having a gun. i know there was a time when anybody could have -- i mean, even if they were sick, they were fighting. i said, fellas, we can't do it anymore. there's no bigger fan of the second amendment than me, and there's no bigger fan of the nra. these guys are great patriots. they're great people. and they want to do something. they're going to do something. they're going to do it, i think, quickly. i think they want to see it. but we don't want to have sick people having the right to have a gun. plus, when we see somebody as sick like this guy, when the police went to see him, they didn't do a good job, but they

have restrictions on what they can do. we got to give them immediate access to taking those guns away so that they don't just leave and he sits there with seven different weapons. got to give them immediate access. don't worry about the nra. they're on our side. half of you are so afraid of the nra. there's nothing to be afraid of. and you know what, if they're not with you, we have to fight them every once in a while. that's okay. they're doing what they think is right. i will tell you they are doing what they think is right. but sometimes we're going to have to be very tough and fight them. but we need strong background checks. for a long period of time, people resisted that. but now people, i think, are really into it. and john cornyn, great guy, senator, mitch mcconnell, paul ryan, and kevin mccarthy hopefully are going to work on some legislation. i hope you guys -- they started already. in fact, john has legislation in. we're going to strengthen it. we're going to make it more

pertinent to what we're discussing. but he's already started the process. we've already started it. and the other thing, we need hardened sites. so just in concluding, we have tremendous things happening. the country is doing well. then we have a setback like this that's so heart wrenching. so heart wrenching. and we have to -- we have to clean it up. we have to straighten it out. it's wonderful that we're setting records on the economy. we're setting records. black unemployment at an all-time historical low. hispanic unemployment at a historical low. women unemployment at an 18-year low. 18 years. actually, i did very well with women during the election. nobody wants to give me credit for that, as you know. but -- and i'm very proud of that. to me, these are incredible statistics. and very importantly, we're

doing -- our companies are doing well. the fundamentals are beyond -- literally beyond what anybody's ever seen. this isn't a bubble. there was bubbles in the past because these companies were valued and nobody understood, where's their money. these are strong companies we're building now. we have tremendous underlying value. i want to bring the steel industry back into our country. if that takes tariffs, let them take tariffs, okay. maybe it'll cost a little bit more, but we'll have jobs. let it take tariffs. i want to bring aluminum back into our country. these plants are all closing or closed. recently, we put a tariff on washing machines because we were getting killed, believe it or not, on washing machines and solar panels. that was two months ago. you have to see the activity on new plants being built for washing machines and for solar panels. we had 32 solar panel plants. of the 32, 30 were closed and

two were on life to life resuscitation. they were dead. now they're talking about opening up many of them, reopening plants that have been closed for a long time. we make better solar panels than china. one of the knocks were that the solar panels were lousy. they weren't good. we make a much higher quality solar panel. so after two months, we're opening up at least five plants and other plants are expanding on the washing machines, which by the way sounds a little hokey. it's a big business. it's a very big business. but then you look and see -- i won't mention countries. i would never do that. but how many chevrolets are in the middle of berlin? how many fords are in the middle of tokyo?

not too many. in fact, ford sort of closed up their operation in japan because they couldn't get cars in there. i spoke to prime minister abe, another great friend of mine. he's a great person. i said, listen, you're sending us millions of cars, and if we send you one and make it so perfect -- they actually told me a case where they made this car so good. they spent a fortune. they had the best environmental, the best this, the best skins, the best everything you could have in a car. best safety. they brought it in, and after inspections that lasted forever, it was rejected. you see, that's a form of tariff too. maybe that's a more deadly form of tariff. that, to me is just as deadly as 50% and 25% and 100% in many cases. so we're going to straighten it out. we've already started. the first year is just -- we laid the seeds. a lot of it is statutory.

you can't do anything unless you go through a process. well, now through our great team, we've gone through that process. many of -- in other words, you'll do a rule, you have to wait 90 days. that's what's happening with the bump stocks. i'm waiting for the next process, but it's gone. just don't worry about it. it's gone. essentially gone because we're going to make it so tough that you're not going to be able to get them. nobody is going to want them anyway. bump stocks, you shoot rapidly, but not accurately. i don't know if you've ever heard what a bump stock does. the bullets come out fast, but you don't know where the hell they're going. that's why nobody even really too much came to its defense. but he used it in las vegas. he was using bump stocks in las vegas, as you know. so we're getting rid of them. so you're going to ask questions. i'm going to help you folks. we're going to get all of the things that we want to do, whether it's transportation, whether it's safety, whether it's law and order. one of the things that the past administration would not do is

give this incredible equipment that we have, excess military equipment, wouldn't give it to your police, would not give it to your law enforcement. they didn't like the idea, the administration of armored vehicles. i guess maybe they'd rather have -- look, why wouldn't they want that? people were in danger. people were being killed. people were being shot. people were being hit with rocks during some bad times in some rough places. and we've given out hundreds of millions of dollars worth of our excess military equipment to your police forces, and i will tell you, every time i go to one of your cities, they come up to me, the police, and they say, thank you so much for that equipment. we feel so much safer, where they can go in an armored van up to a site and not worry about being shot or hit in the head with a rock. to me, it's common sense. but you know, what can i tell you. i will say this, your group

really appreciate it. with that, i'm going to ask fwrooin s brian to say a couple words. then we'll go around, take some questions. maybe we'll have rick scott come up second. i'm here as long as you need me. let's get it all out. we want to help the governors. we want to help our states. and we want to make our schools safe. brian, please. >> and that, of course, the president, his opening statement to the governors there. q&a went on for a while. we already heard from governor insley of washington state, his objection to arming teachers. fred guttenberg lost his daughter jamie in the parkland shooting. first of all, how are you doing? how are you holding up? >> well, we had a rough weekend. this was supposed to be my daughter's first dance competition of the season. it's what my daughter lived her life for.

honestly, it was more for my wife, something that was a major part of what used to go on in our house. my wife and i today, this weekend we didn't go to dance competition. we instead went to a cemetery. i can tell you she's struggling. we still are having a hard time coming to grips that this is our new life going forward. you know, my rabbi said it best at my daughter's funeral. we keep going forward, and that's how life returns to normal, but it's hard. i thank you for asking though. >> i've been thinking about you all. we've gotten to know you a little bit and some of the young people. thinking about the continued trauma of what they're experiencing, the shock, the ptsd, it doesn't end. it ends perhaps for some of us

in the news media. it doesn't end ever for you so i've been thinking about that. now you listen to these politicians, the president, i don't know if anything makes you feel better. the president said now he's moving on bump stocks. he has this proposal which is controversial about arming teachers. i guess, first, how do you feel about that? >> i'll say a couple things. first, on bump stocks, mazel tov, congratulations. if he means it. to just say they're gone, they're gone, that's not policy. that's just a hope. i'm hoping with him. there were a few other things he said in there that i liked. the arming of teachers is a horrifically bad idea, and honestly, it is in most policy related to guns, it's a diversionary poison pill. i hope people don't take that pill. it will not make our children safer. it would have killed more kids.

i also need to say something about the speech because i listened in my ear. it's one of those things where i start off feeling okay, and i end up pissed off. i apologize for my language. the talk listed a lot of nice ideas, but it was wrapped up in something that was horribly scary. this idea that we should embrace the nra and take the nra in as our friends in this policy. that, to me, sounds like somebody who doesn't understand what we need to do. that, to me, sounds like somebody who does not want to do what we need to do to keep the kids of this country safe. that to me does not sounds like somebody who wants me to send my kid back to school and know he's going to be safe. the nra does not have my kid's best interest at heart. i'm certain of that. andrea, last week after the town hall, and i'll be honest, i'm like 12 days into this new life of mine. i wasn't an nra expert or an

expert on any of this. i listened to what happened on thursday after the town hall where the head guy of the nra, lapierre, and his spokesperson, spoke. what they said, and i couldn't figure out why. it bothered me all weekend. it hit me this weekend. what you need to know about me is about 15 to 20 years ago, i used to worked in the world of pharmaceuticals, specifically in the area of mental health. i called on doctors with an antipsychotic. i used to listen to patients talk about their delusions, their hallucinations, and their paranoid behavior. the language -- and i'm not a doctor here and i'm not diagnosing anybody, but the language that was used and is used by this group sounds an awful lot like those patients that i used to listen to. they speak some scary language. i will not embrace them. and please don't ask me to. we need to stop them.

we need to stop their role in policy. we need to reach out to every single company that gives them the money to have power over our elected officials. i spent my entire weekend sending tweets and facebook posts, my new life, out to amazon and apple, two really large companies who have a strong business relationship with the nra. i stand here today immediately saying that i need to stop. they need to stop. we cannot allow this organization to become the poster child of good behavior in this debate. they are not. and i'm sorry for getting worked up. >> no, you have -- you are more entitled to get worked up than anybody else. so you are a victim of all of this. your family has been devastated by all of this. i want to ask you about scott pooe peterson, the broward deputy who quit and has been rebuked. the president today said he choked. he's been vilified, some would say appropriately.

he's put out a statement just in the last 20 minutes or so through his lawyer, i believe. he says through his lawyer that he feels terrible about what happened but he says that he wishes he could have prevented the untimely passing of the 17 victims. his heart goes out to the families. he goes on to point by point try to rebut the criticisms. i guess more broadly, how do you feel about these criticisms of him, of all of the missed signals? this was raised by the president as well. all the red flags ignored bit fbi, acknowledging that. by the broward deputies, the accusations, in fact, against sheriff israel. >> listen, i think everybody's right to be enraged. i think everybody is right to call them out. they failed. they failed my kid. they failed the other 16 people. had people done their job and done it appropriately, it is possible the incident could have been prevented. it is possible the incident

could have been lessened. that said, and i want to be clear here, let's not be diverted. there's two factors here in this. there is these incidents. they happen. even when the police do everything right, unfortunately crime still does happen and incidents will lahappen. we need to lessen the incidents. i plan to be as aggressive on those failures as i am on the gun side of this debate. that's the other part of this. without these guns and without these weapons available to those who get through the cracks of human behavior, who can take advantage of the fact that they're going to pull off one of these incidents, we wouldn't have these mass casualties. we can't lose sight of that. there's the incident. it happened. and those need to be held accountable. i did not know about scott. i can't remember his last name. his statement. i'm sorry, i'm not feeling sympathy for you.

that said, okay, there should be investigations into those failures, and everyone should be held accountable. i'm right on with anyone who is saying that. but i can think through this big picture. we can't lose sight of the fact that if these weapons of war were not available, those incidents and those people who can take advantage of the failures of human behavior, the casualties would be less. >> fred guttenberg, thank you so much for being with us today and for your passion. >> thank you, andrea. >> our hearts are with you. >> thank you, andrea. and this morning, maddi willford, a student who survived the stoneman douglas high school shooting but then had to undergo three surgeries from wounds suffered during the shooting, spoke alongside her parents at the hospital, thanking the medical team that saved her life. >> i'm madeline wilford.

and i'd just like to say that i'm so grateful to be here, and it wouldn't be possible without those officers and first responders and these amazing doctors and especially all the love that everyone has sent. i was sitting on my couch today just thinking about all the letters and gifts everyone has given and just all the love that's been passed around. i definitely wouldn't be here without it. >> joining me now is michael waldman, author of "the second amendment: a biography," a new book about the second amendment and its role in our society. michael, we've been listening to fred guttenberg and now to maddi, survivors, but it really does, as mr. guttenberg said, all come down to the role of

guns. >> yes, and mr. guttenberg and so many of the other survivors and their families have been so sensible about all of this. there were signals missed, cracks in the system. but the reason our country has this problem is that we allow weapons of war such as assault weapons to be sold freely. it's quite a remarkable moment to have the public's attention and maybe policymakers' attention turned, as it has, to this unacceptable situation. >> and michael, in your book, as you talk about the history of the second amendment, how do you try to correct the record, if you will, about what the second amendment permits and what it doesn't permit? >> well, the second amendment was written at a time when people were worried about the state militias being crushed by the central government under the new constitution. those militias did involve

everybody who was a white man, who was an adult having a weapon by law. it's a very, very different time. the u.s. supreme court did not rule that that second amendment reflects an individual right to gun ownership until less than a decade ago in 2008. and even since then, courts all over the country have said the second amendment still allows strong regulation and laws about guns. overwhelmingly strong gun laws have been upheld, and just about all of the proposals of which i'm aware that have been made in the wake of this shooting would be pretty clearly constitutional under the current doctrine as the supreme court has allowed it to develop. >> michael waldman, thank you so much. the book is "the second amendment." we will continue these conversations surely in the days and weeks to come. >> thank you. and over the weekend, the house intelligence committee releasing a heavily redacted democratic memo refuting

republican claims that federal officials abused the process when they got that court permission to eavesdrop on former trump campaign aide carter page. joining me now is msnbc contributor, former u.s. attorney, and nbc national security analyst jeremy bash, former chief of staff at the cia and pentagon. barbara, when you see this memo, as heavily redacted as it was and three weeks later and not in the same news cycle at all and released on a saturday afternoon when very few people were watching, does this have any impact in rebutting the nunes memo, or is it all becoming white noise and not really taken in by people, even those who care about the probe? >> yeah, i think you make a very good point that it has been lost a little bit in the news cycle, but i think the memo itself is really extraordinary. i think it completely debunks the main premise of the nunes memo, which is that the fbi abused the fisa process by

making material omissions. in fact, they included the very things they were accused of not including, the potential bias of the steele dossier. i think this is a much bigger news story than it's getting credit for. and i think it really shows that the nunes memo was really just a deliberate attempt to undermine the fbi's investigation without any merit whatsoever. >> and jeremy, if adam schiff and the democratic minority on house intelligence, which is a committee you once staffed as the top lawyer on it, if they're unable to get their word out, where does this debate go in the broader sense of the support for the mueller investigation? >> first of all, i agree with barbara. the memo was very compelling, very effective. it showed the doj and fbi acted appropriately. in some ways, it was overtaken by events because the whole nunes effort was to undermine bob mueller. bob mueller did four things last week that really bolstered his position. he won a guilty plea from alex vanzant, the lawyer working on

behalf of the pro-russian oligarch. he issued an indictment in alexandria, virginia, on new tax charges. he got a guilty plea from rick gates. fourth, he issued a new superseding indictment with additional charges about buying politicians in europe against paul manafort. if you take all the those four things together, i think they really render the democratic memo unnecessary because this was all in an effort by nunes to undermine bob mueller. bob mueller is doing just fine. >> and barbara, when we look at the -- all of the new indictments, the superseding indictment, the guilty pleas, is it still, you know, credible for the president and his allies to say this has nothing to do with russia, nothing to do with the campaign, it's all this other stuff that manafort and gates did separately in their ukraine business? >> well, the charges against gates and manafort, i think, are fair enough to say that they were unconnected to president trump. but there are enough connections to russia and ukraine in the allegations that i think it's

fair game for robert mueller to be looking at that. i also think that the indictment released about ten days ago against the russian individuals who are accused of interfering with our election provides a very important foundation that robert mueller may or may not build upon to add americans as co-conspirators. although there's still no evidence of president trump for colluding with russia, there's so much swirling around members of his campaign that it's absolutely not a witch hunt and is a worthy matter of investigation for our country to know what the truth was and what really happened in our election. >> the white house and its allies are trying to say, jeremy, that gates was, you know, minimally involved even though he was involved through the transition, which manafort was not. how important is rick gates, someone who most people had never heard of before he pleaded guilty? >> huge, because he can put pressure on manafort, who can put pressure on the president. i think the big question, andrea, in the coming days is will the president answer all of

bob mueller's questions. we have not yet heard from the legal team surrounding the president, whether he will sit for an interview with the speci special counsel. . >> what are the signals coming out on that? >> they're sort of negative. the president has said, i'll do it any time, anywhere. we've seen the president's lawyers are worried about it. i think the president has to answer the special counsel's questions, otherwise this is going to linger on. >> jeremy, barbara, thank you both so much. coming up, bad connections. why mexico's president canceled his visit to the white house after a phone call with president trump. stay with us. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. and at our factory in boston, more than a thousand workers are starting their day building on over a hundred years of heritage, craftsmanship and innovation. today we're bringing you america's number one shave at lower prices every day. putting money back in the pockets of millions of americans.

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looks like he hooked it. we'll do anything... takes after his grandad. seriously anything, to help you invest for the future. ally. do it right. and we're learning that mexico's president abruptly canceled a planned trip to the white house after president trump reportedly lost his temper during a phone call with the president, insisting he would not stop calling from mexico to pay for that wall, an issue that's roiling politics in mexico, which has presidential elections july 1st. joining me now is u.s. ambassador michael mcfall, rick

sta stangle, msnbc political analyst, and here with me, the former mexican ambassador to the united states. mr. ambassador, thank you. let's start with mexico. what the heck heck happened? as far as we know jared kushner was the point person on this and had to call pinieto, the president of mexico, and try to smooth it over afterwards. >> i think it's the attempt of both administration officials to try and ensure there's a strategic direction in this relationship. it's been derailed twice now by president trump. a year ago when president pinieto was going to come up to d.c. and again this time i think mexico continues sadly 10 show this relationship but it's a challenge. touches the daily lives of so many americans. >> on immigration, on nafta and other issues. >> on trade, water,

infrastructure, on environmental challenges. so you have two administrations, two cabinets trying to move this relationship forward. it's too important for both governments to sort of turn away from it. that's what they've been trying to do. and it's now twice that the president because of his own perm triggers and motivations decides to paint himself, paint president pinieto into a corner. >> president trump refused to promise he would not bring up mexico paying for the wall which is hugely humiliating to mexicans and it puts the mexican president in a real bind politically. >> i think it's a problem for both sides. it's a problem because mexico is heading to the polls on july 1st. so far the u.s. has not been a part of the campaign in mexico. but things like this could turn it into an issue. at the end of the day, andrea, what we've said here many times mexico and the united states can do a lot of stuff together. the one thing we're not going to be doing together is paying for

and building a wall. >> and turning to some of the other foreign policy challenges, let's talk about russia. we now know, first of all, about north korea and russia is that russia is apparently behind the hacking of south korean websites that were critical to what was going on in pyeongchang during the olympics. but trying to blame it on north korea. russia apparently not happy about the doping punishment they were enduring from the international olympics committee. >> yeah, just another illustration of them pushing back on international order. and the irony our president gets in a major fight with a close partner of the united states in mexico yet continues to purr 15sue a friendship and partnership with vladimir putin despite

these negative things calls into question his judgment on foreign policy and his definition of the american national interests. >> and, rick stengel, there's more evidence of the diminishing of the state department's role. reporting out of istanbul when secretary tillerson was meeting with erdogan and they continue to attack the kurds, the syrian kurds who are u.s. allies on the ground there that, in fact, he did not have a state department turkish speaker, interpreter there. he was using the foreign minister to interpret three hours of negotiations. your reaction to that from your experience at the state department? >> yes, it's really just extraordinary and an extraordinary mistake in judgment dealing with a country, even though they're a nato member, they're often an

adversary. they think we're working with the kurds and occur the kurds of being a terrorist group. just a very big lapse in judgment. international diplomacy works on protocol. one of the things we've seen with countries like turkey and russia where we don't have note takers and we don't have translators, then they get their side of the discussion out before we do. in terms of our own messaging and communications that's not good, and in terms of having reliable policies that are based on notes, the fact we don't have a translator there, we don't have a note taker there is bad for american diplomacy. >> mike mcfaul, one of the other things out of the white house is again blaming president obama for not stopping the russian meddling in 2016, not speaking out more forcefully, something that i think hillary clinton and her team would privately agree with. but, at the same time, claiming they have been more aggressive -- he keeps saying he has done more to stop russia than president obama did, which

is just independently fact checkers say is patently false. >> well, andrea, i would say two things. one you can't have it both ways with regard to the first claim. you can't call this thing a hoax in one breath and then say president obama didn't do enough. that's just -- there's no logic to that. second, with respect to russia policy, the trump administration policy, i would argue, actually looks like a lot like obama's policy. if you look at more support for nato, increased assistance to ukraine, sanctioning russian officials, all the things candidate trump promised to roll back, they didn't do. and even one area they pledged, they haven't delivered, they pledged lethal assistance to the ukrainians. but president trump doesn't support the trump administration's policy towards russia. that's the real paradox. >> mike mcfaul, rick stengel, thank you for being with us. ivanka trump is speaking

out, standing by her father saying the president's denials about the accusations of sexual misconduct from more than a dozen women. here is what she told peter alexander in an exclusive new interview in south korea. >> reporter: 40 miles from the dmz in the heart of the world seems so divided in ways. what do you hope you accomplish? >> i am here to deliver a message with unity with one of our strongest allies, south korea. we have great cooperation and military and a strategic one. we are 50 miles away from north korea. so affirming the u.s. position and our joint position of maximum pressure with our south korean partners is very important. i spent time with president moon. >> and the inside scoop from "the washington post" deputy columnist. i don't know if i should read to

you what she also said about the accusations of her father. i think we can play that very quickly. >> reporter: your father's been accused of sexual misconduct by roughly 19 women. do you believe your father's accusers? >> i think it's a pretty inappropriate question to ask a daughter if she believes the accusers of her father when he has affirmatively stated that there's no truth to it. >> reporter: to be clear you think all the women are making it up, though? >> i believe my father. i know my father. i think i have that right as a daughter to believe my father. >> ruth, you've just been writing about this. >> she's in a very difficult position, right? any daughter is in a difficult position. daughters want to believe their fathers, you want to stand up for your family. that's all laudable.

the problem is she's not just a daughter. she's also an assistant to the president. she is his representative. i don't blame her for saying she believes her father, but to say the question is inappropriate when you put yourself out there as ivanka trump not just as an administration official but as an administration official whose main job is, her portfolio is to support women and girls, fair question. sorry if it's hard to answer. >> and she was there as the chief of the delegation representing the united states government. >> indeed. >> in a diplomatic role, really, and having dinner and meetings with the president of south korea. >> mixing family and official business, mixing family and white house staff, a bad idea and, yes, these are the perils. >> and on the subject of inappropriate male behavior, monica lewinsky in "vanity fair" is a contributing editor there, rethinking what she said -- what she wrote in 2015 saying the

bottom line was it was a consensual relationship. but now empowered by the me too and the larger movement of women, she's now saying and writing that it was an abusive relationship on its face because she never should have been placed in the situation of being tempted or whatever. >> i think we talked about her piece at the time. >> it's very interesting because this is a rethinking, and i can imagine her going through a lot of rethinking 20 years later. >> absolutely and she talks about it as fascinating in terms of suffering posttraumatic stress disorder. i have daughters that age now she was then and i can't imagine what it would be like to encounter this, and i think she's totally correct. she thought she consented but it was an inherently unequal relationship. >> she points out the most american man in the world.

>> indeed. should not have happened. >> we can all agree to that. i think the clintons themselves would agree to that. at least one of them. i don't know. i can't speak for anyone else. i shouldn't. very controversial and difficult subjects. thank you, as always, for being with us. that does it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." we have to go. thanks for being with us. eamonn is up next. good afternoon from here in new york. i am in for my good friend, craig melvin. we begin with guns in schools. president trump pushed for tougher security in schools with the nation's governors today telling them he would have run into the school during the shooting in florida even if he didn't have a weapon and compared shooting guns to golfing. plus, are republicans ready? lawmakers return with growing pressure to act to make schools safer after the parkland shooting. we'll talk to one republican congressman asking for a vote