it doesn't make sense that i have to wait until i'm 21 to get a handgun, but i can get this weapon at 18. i don't know. so i'm just curious as to what you did. >> he we didn't address it, mr. president. >> you know why? because you're afraid of the nra. they do have great power, i agree with that. they have great power over you people. they have less power over me. >> an extraordinary hour at the white house, leaving lawmakers stunned as president trump sides with the democrats on a number of key gun control issues. this morning, republicans are still trying to figure out what hit them. and jeff sessions gets

another public shaming from the president. now new reports bob mueller might be watching this very closely. and jared kushner is back in the headlines, this time for multi million dollar loans. his family business received after holding meetings inside at the white house. >> and the president now looking for his fifth communications trekt her after long time aide hope hicks also quits. good morning, everyone. in an extraordinary on-camera discussion on school safety, president trump, leaving lawmakers on both sides of the aisle pretty stunned as he unleashed his negotiating tactics in in realtime on how to reform gun laws in this country. at several points, the president not only sided against his

republican colleagues, but the nra, as well. >> under pressure after parkland, president trump taking on his own party and the national rifle association. >> and i'm a fan of the nr are a, but that doesn't mean we have to agree on everything. >> mr. trump, at a free wheeling hour-long meeting trying to get something, anything done, appeared to embrace nearly everything he heard in the meeting from confiscating guns to those dangerous. >> go you through due process. >> and embracing long held democratic ideas like increasing the minimum age to 21 to buy some weapons, even taking on red state democrat joe manchin and pat toomey for not including an age limit in the bill.

>> at times, wheeling and dealing. >> you can add domestic violence paragraphs, pages into this bill. i'm all for it. but can you add what amy and diane have -- >> even pushing back against fellow republican steve scalise, shot and nearly killed during a baseball practice last summer when scalise suggested adding a measure involve ago concealed weapons permit to a bill aimed at strengthening background checks. >> look at the population -- >> we're talking about a whole new ball game. >> if you add concealed carry to this, you'll never get it passed. >> the president reaffirming his commitment to pass an executive order banning bump stocks, those devices that turn weapons into assault-style firearms. his message to lawmakers, the time so act is now. >> you see some whoex who don't say nice things about me. that's okay. if you turn that into this energy, i'll love you. >> despite all of the

bargaining, one white house official acknowledges any new gun legislation still faces very steep odds. gun reform, after all, has beal these decades. meanwhile, more polls find wide support for tougher gun measures. 88% of registered voters support universal background checks. 70% support a ban on high capacity magazines while 68% want a ban on assault-style rifles. and this morning, there are new questions about the president's inner circle. jared kushner received huge loans after meeting with lenders

in the white house. $325 million he received from citigroup to finance office buildings in brooklyn. when kushner stepped down as ceo to work at the white house, he told a small portion of his stake in the country but he retained the vast majority of his interests. the times reports that joshua harris was advising the trump administrationing on policy last year the two men discussed a possible white house job for harris. citigroup's $325 million came in the spring of 2017 short lfr a kushner met in the white house with michael corbat. the two men talked about trade.

kushner's spokesman said he has met with hundreds of business people and that he has taken no part of any business loans or products with or for kushner since joining the white house and he has followed the ethics advice. attorney general jeff sessions is pushing back against trump's criticism. on tuesday, sessions announced that the inspector general would look into congressman devin nunes's issues but sessions' decision to trust michael harowitz was met by some skepticism yesterday morning on fox & friends. watch this. >> i have a few questions about him, though. doj and fbi highest standards, right? highest power in the land as far as law enforcement is concerned, this guy, he worked for the doj

and he's going to be investigating the doj? >> he does. >> should we be worried about that? >> he apparently is a man of integrity. >> so later trump tweeted why is a.g. jeff sessions asking the inspector general to investigate potentially massive fisa abuse. will take forever, has no prosecutorial power and already late with reports on comey. we have an appropriate process that will ensure complaints against this department will be fully and fairley acted upon if necessary. he goes on, as long as i am the attorney general, i will continue to discharge my duties with integrity and honor and this department will continue to do its work in a fair and impartial manner according to the law and the constitution. and then this.

sessions was spotted at a restaurant. a source close to sessions says the meeting was not meant as a message and the dinner was planned some time ago. amid these new tensions between the president and his ag, "the washington post" is reported that special counsel bob mueller is investigating the the period of time last summer when president trump seemed determined to drive sessions from his job. people familiar with the matter tell the post that a key area of interest for the investigation is whether those efforts were parts of a months' long pattern of obstruction of justice. all parties declined to comment. trump has dericively referred to sessions as mr. mcgoo, a cartoon character who is elderly, myopic

and bumbling. trump has told us that he has hired the best lawyers for his entire life, but is stuck with sessions who is not defending him and is not sufficiently loyal. the report depicts solidarity, quote, on the anniversary of sessions comments earlier this month, senior aides decided to buy sessions a bullet proof vest with his name emblazoned on it as a gift. and white house communications director hope hicks has resigned. hicks is the fourth communications director to resign from the trump administration after showing spicer and others. she was a model before joining the trump organization three years ago and had no prior political experience. she's president trump the's longest serving aide and one of his closest. hicks says she is resigning so she can explore opportunities outside of the white house. and in a statement says, quote,

there are no words to adequately express my gratitude to president trump. i wish the president and his administration the very best as he continues to lead our country. now, white house official tells nbc news that trump was, quote, sad to hear the news and in a statement trump says, quote, hope is outstanding and has done great work for the last three years. she is a smart and thoughtful as they come. a truly great person. i will miss having her by my side, but when she approached me about pursuing other opportunities, i totally understood. and i'm sure we will work together again in the future. the announcement comes one day after hicks testified before the house intelligence committee saying, among other things, that in her role she has occasionally been required to tell white lies, although she claims to have never lied about anything connected to the russia investigation. however, the "new york times" maggie hayman reports her departure is not related to her had testimony and white house press secretary sarah huckabee sanders says it has been in the

works for, quote, several weeks. it didn't happen overnight. still, a white house with official says hicks told trump about her decision yesterday and several sources in and out of the white house tell nbc news they were shocked. >> back with us, a reporter for "the washington post," eugene scott. eugene, good to talk to you this morning. thanks for joining us so early. we appreciate it. let's a talk about hope hicks. what's the word in washington as to why she decided to step down? >> reporting suggests it really was the amount of public attention shown to her personal life and the whole rob porter scandal. you have to remember, this is not just someone that she was dating. this is someone she was accused of being involved in the alleged cover-up or at least not the transparency concerning why he himself had not received a permanent security clearance, which kicked off the whole

revelation that dozens of people in this administration handling various bits of information had not had a permanent security clearance. so her personal life became public news. there were paparazzi waiting outside her building constantly. the this is not someone who comes from a political background and just got caught up in all of this and perhaps did some reflecting and said this is not what i want for my life. >> what about a replacement here. who do we think is going to fill her role? >> some reports suggest mercedes schlapp, a bush alum. she's currently senior adviser of strategic communications, the wife of matt schlapp where the president spoke last week and was well received. i imagine the direction the white house would want to go in would be someone with significant experience who could handle what is going to be clearly an administration that is constantly dealing withen scandals and someone who can

rise above these really difficult times. and anyone who is working in the bush administration usually can relate to that with having some information and scandal themselves. >> as i was talking about earlier, president trump went after sessions on twitter. but this time, it was a little bit different because sessions actually surprisingly pushed back. in a statement. eugene, what does this say about the relationship between the president and sessions and could he feasibly be the next guy to go as we've been talking about, really, since basically the time in which he was appointed attorney general? >> i think it's highly possible that jeff sessions decides that he will fought want to stay in this administration. but that's not clear as of now. what we can tell from the president's interactions with sessions via social media and, therefore, the world, is that the there's not a lot of respect for privacy and 589 of confidence in what he is doing

in his position. i think if you look at the names of people who left the administration, very few people are fired by trump in politics. he makes life just so unbearable and so difficult that you choose to leave on your own. and this is consistent with that. >> yeah, all right. talk to you again in a little bit. thank you, gene. some news that could prove an unwelcome distraction for republicans this fall. the trial for former trump campaign chief paul manafort is now scheduled to begin around the same time as the midterm elections. hearing yesterday in washington, a u.s. district court judge set a date for september 17th on charges that included money laundering and manafort has

pleaded not guilty to all of these dharnlgs. rick gates pleaded guilty to the conspiracy as part of a deal against the special counsel's office. manafort has another court appearance scheduled this week, this one in virginia where he faces charges accusing him of tax evasion and bank fraud. still ahead, another major retailer in joining dick's sporting goods in changing its policy in the wake of the parkland massacre. and developing news from russia and ahead of the u.s. midterms, you're looking at a live look right now coming out of moscow. which u.s. officials expect he's going to try and disrupt. plus bill karins is tracking two major storms.

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welcome back, everybody. we're tracking two major storms right now. a rain storm in the south and then a nor'easter tomorrow. for the latest, we bring in bill karins. where do we start from here? >> we'll start with the life threatening weather now. overnight, heavy rain, torre torrential rains over arkansas and southern tennessee. rivers are very high and now with its additional 2 to 4 inches of rain, we have numerous areas that have been flooding and roads closed. it's very difficult travel. everywhere that is a balloon color here, that's flash flood warnings. from texarcana to little rock, heading towards nashville and northern portions of mississippi, 2 million people right now have to try to get to work or to school with a lot of flooded roads. that's going to extend today areas to the east. as far as the additional rainfall, when you get to the blue, that's an additional inch.

from north to jackson, central mississippi, northern alabama, watch out around knoxville. possibly 2 inches. now the northeast. this is going to be late today the rain moves in and all day tomorrow, the rainfall forecast, the blue is 1 inch. red is 2 inches. i think a bigger issue will be the winds. we could see gusts in new york city 55. boston, 355. cape cod and long island could have gusts up to 70 miles per hour. so we will get some tree damage and power outages and we're going to deal with significant costal flooding at the high tide. when the storm is all over, the destruction will be because of areas of high tide in eastern new england, the jersey shore is looking for major flooding, too. a lot of aspects to this. there will be snow with it, too. coming up, i'll break down who is going to get how much. >> thanks, bill.

students at marjory stoneman douglas high school returned to class yesterday. it was their first time back on catchus since a gunman attacked the school. the more than 3,000 students, they were greeted by grief counselors, therapy dogs and heavily armed miss. the building where the shootings took place remains closed. some of the students shared their feelings on being back with reporters covering the emotional return. here is one of them, rachel taylor. >> i feel better that we're all going back to school. there's no right time to get back to school. but we're all with our friends and we're all united as comment and it feels better to be back in the community. >> it's going to take a little while, but if we're all here with each other, it will be much easier. >> it has to be tough for those students to go back and to find some comfort and solace and the friends they haven't seen since the shooting occurred. certainly hoping that things can get back to normal there at that school. still ahead, everybody, an

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wiret wiretap discussing a $100,000 payment to assure the recruitment of a wildcats freshman. miller has not commented and said he will be vindicated. another espn reports the board of regents has called a special closed session regarding the school's basketball program and miller's contract. miller reportedly makes $2.6 million a year and his contract ends in 2022. turn to go college hoops and the ncaa dweers up for march madness. to cincinnati where xavier never trailed in its ten-point win over providence last night. the victory gets the musketeers at least a share of their big east title. a win against depaul on saturday will earn them the crowd outright and will deny villanova a fifth regular season title. good luck to them. meanwhile, the fallout from

larry nassar's title continues with scott blackman. blackman has headed the committee since 2010 and in january demanded the 21 usa gymnastics board members to resign or face decertification and the members then complied. even with that, blackmun has been scrutinized, accused of not doing enough to protect athletes. the usoc chairman larry probe cited blackmun's agreement for prostate cancer as the reason for his resignation. however, they stated that the organization and blackmun identified new leadership in order to address the initiatives. ahead, a lot of changes coming there. >> good to see people being held accountable, that's for sure. >> for sure. still ahead, washington is buzzing after another packed day. the white house set to lose its fourth communications director and the president leaves lawmakers dazed and confused after that televised meeting on

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♪ welcome back, everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian alongside louisbu lewis burgdorf. white house communications director hope hicks has announced she's leaving her post. the announcement comes a day after she appeared before the house intel committee as a part the of its russia probe.

hallie jackson has more on this. >> where is hope spp? where is hope? hope, get up here, hope. >> another dramatic departure in the west wing. this time to someone who might as well be family to donald trump. hope hicks, his communications director and long time aide resigning. >> hope hicks is a tremendously talented person. >> nbc news has learned hicks told the president personally, according to a white house source, and said her good-byes to staff in an emotional meeting, the president saying hope is outstanding and has done great work for the last three years. she is as smart and thoughtful as they come, a truly great person. adding he totally understood when she said she would leave. often seen, but rarely heard on cameras or in interviews, hicks is a fierce defender of her boss, by his side for nearly every critical campaign moment. >> merry christmas, everyone, and thank you, donald trump.

>> and with no prior political experience, rocketing to a top job in the white house. word of her departure comes less than 24 hours after she appeared on capitol hill to testify about the russia investigation. apparently acknowledging she's occasionally told white lies as part of her job. >> the whole talk about a white lie is such a bad wrap and so unfair to hope hicks. she was asked did donald trump ever ask her to lie. and her answer was that she never told an untruth about about anything of substance. >> white house officials insist that system timing has nothing to do with hicks' resignation, nor does the rob porter scandal, they say, the former staff secretary who resigned amid accusations he abused his ex-wives and who had been reportedly romantically linked to hicks. the white house will now serve for its fifth communications director, more turnover in a west wing that's seen plenty. hicks' official departure date

has not been set yet. while she may be as close as a daughter to president trump, i am told she is looking forward to spending more time with her family back home. yasmin, back to you. president trump posted a free wheeling and lengthy bipartisan exchange on gun policy yesterday, seeming to embrace a wide array of potential new restrictions in blunt and unexpected comments to lawmakers. take a listen. >> focus is literally give families and give local law enforcement additional tools if an individual is reported to be if a potential danger to themselves or others. allow due process so that no one's rights are trampled, but the ability to go to court, obtain an order, and collect not only the farlirearms or any weapons. >> or might take the firearms first and then go to court. that's another system. a lot of times, by the time you go to court, it takes so long to go to court, to get the due

process procedures, i like taking the guns early, like in this crazy man's case. so you could do exactly what you're saying, but take the guns first, go through due process second. >> the house did pass a bill, the bill dealing with fixing problems with our background checks system. we also combined with it a bill that advanced concealed carry reciprocity. >> if you're going to put concealed carry between states into this bill, we're talking about a whole new ball game. i'm with you, but let be a separate bill. you'll never get this passed. if you add concealed carry to this, you'll never get it passed. >> this is the number of incidents before and -- of incidents and of deaths. this is when the ten-year assault weapon ban was in. how incidents and deaths dropped. when it ended, you see it goes up. >> and dianne, what you have also, and i think you can, into

the bill -- >> yeah. >> can you do that? swroe, can you do that? can you add some of the things -- you're not going to -- will you help? >> i'll help. >> pretty interesting meeting there, to say the least. >> bob mueller looking into when and how donald trump learned that e-mail from a democratic party had been hacked by russian operatives during the 2016 presidential election. in an exclusive new report, multiple people familiar with the investigation tell nbc news that mueller's team is asking witnesses pointed questions about whether trump was aware that the e-mails had been stolen and also whether he was involved with their release. now, last january, u.s. intel officials concluded vladimir putin himself ordered the operation that ultimately hacked the e-mail accounts of the democratic national committee and clinton campaign chair john podesta. those e-mails were disseminated to the public starting in july

of 2016. mueller is said to be asking specifically about the following public overture that trump made to russia just days after wikileaks began publishing these e-mails. >> if you are listening, i hope you are able to find the 30,000 e-mails that are missing. i think you will probably be rewarded mightily. >> remember that moment well. so after the election, former white house spokesman sean spicer said that then candidate trump was only joking when he called on russia to hack his opponents' e-mails. investigators are looking into actions by roger stone. private messages show stone and wikileaks communicating directly on october 13th of 2016. in addition, as part of a plea agreement with the special counsel's office, foreign policy adviser george papadopoulos revealed that he was told in april of 2016 about with, quote,

dirt on headquarter had headquarter in the form of thousands of e-mails by a contact with ties to russia. trump has repeatedly denied any collusion with russia, recently tweeting that the special coup's investigation was a, quote, witch-hunt and, quote, an illegal disgrace. back with us, reporter for "the washington post" eugene scott. eugene, good to talk to you again. bob mueller's team is looking into what trump knew and when he knew it about the dnc e-mail hack during the campaign. what is this line of questioning tell you? are they honing in on the president in their investigation? >> absolutely. there's quite a bit of attention being paid to trump associates who have been in communications with wikileaks. you may recall long time gop strategist roger stone had been in communications with the julian assange and there were other efforts from wikileaks to contact donald trump jr. and so there's just a desire to know how much of this went all the way up to the top, what type

of response there was, and if there was support for the hacking of these e-mails and any type of collusion in terms of interacting with wikileaks. there are just questions that remain to be figured out regarding trump and also those who worked on the campaign. >> let's turn to the gun control debate here. as we've been showing sort of that stunning meeting from yesterday with president trump with lawmakers signaling that he would be in favor of stronger gun control restrictions, as well as urging congress to send him a bill. do you think that trump's comments, eugene, are going to push republicans to act more quickly on guns because of this turn of events and this turn of language? >> well, he's certainly hoping so. the majority of americans, including republics, have suggested support for more strict gun laws. in response to the most recent shooting in florida. and the reality is, what's proposed from many conservatives

did not meet that desire to see just tougher laws making it more difficult to get guns in the hands of the wrong people. also, i think it's worth mentioning that trump is paying attention to his base and he's paying attention to the electorate and he's paying attention to his approval ratings. and the majority of americans do not approve of how he has responded to parkland so far. so he's someone would has campaigned on someone getting tough on, quote, the bad guys. i think what he will have to do is figure out how to do that without losing his support from the nra and its supporters. he, of course, said lawmakers were more relying upon the nra than he is, but it's worth remembering that the nra endorsed trump during the prime minister and spent about $30 million making sure that hillary clinton lost. >> but you can see that if changes aren't made, the fault will lie directly with trump,

along with congressmen. and it seems to me as if with the momentum after parkland and all those voices that we've been hearing left and right, that something does need to happen and these legislators recognize that. eugene scott, thank you. speaking at an investment summit, steve mnuchin talked about what he thought it would take for the u.s. to join the tpp talks. according to the "new york times," if president trump is serious about rejoining tpp, which he once described as a rape of our country, it may be too late for negotiations. the remaining countries have already moved on spending months renegotiating a new deal and

agreeing to terms without the u.s. that was earlier this year. the new partnership allows for all interested countries to join, the conditions upon entry would be set. now, the new finalized partnership is scheduled to be ratified on march 8th. let's turn to business, the world's biggest music streaming service, spotfy, filed to go public. jomana, what can you tell us about this ipo? >> so spotify has announced they will be looking for that listing and to do it on the new york stock exchange. they haven't said what the listing price is going to be, but it's estimated that they will get valuation of about $23 billion. the irony is they have never posted a net profit. if you look at their numbers for last year, they posted a net loss of $1.2 billion. so something to think about there. elsewhere, in the u.s.,

walmart and dick's sporting goods said they will no longer be selling guns to customers under the age of 21. walmart has said they will be removing items from its website that resemble rifles, including nonlethal air soft guns and toys, as well. and dick's announced the decision yesterday and said prior to his keeping children safe because the children are the future of america and that their decision is permanent. and after ending its deal with papa john's, the nfl has a new favorite pizza. what can you tell us about the new company involved and what it means for the nfl? >> yes. their new favorite pizza would be pizza hut. they've announced that they will be partnering up with pizza hut going forward for somewhat of a falling out with papa john's. papa john's had blamed the nfl for their response, the players to take the knee as a reason for their slumping sales. so both parties agreed that they will go their separate ways. in the future, it's a mutual agreement. going forward, pizza hut will be the sponsor and we should start seeing this spring of this year.

>> thanks so much. still ahead, everybody, john mccain's family speaks out on president trump's latest attack against the senator amid his why battle. plus, president trump and lawmakers come together to remember billy graham, his personal story. and bill karins tracking a major storm system set to bring potentially damaging winds and costal flooding to the east coast.

concept for one senator who came into a room at 3:00 in the morning and went like that, we would have had health care, too. we would have had health care, too. and everyone said, what happened? what was that all about? boy, oh, boy. who was that? i don't know. i don't know. i don't know. i don't want to be controversial, so i won't use his name, okay. what a mess. >> i think we know who he's talking about. welcome back, everybody. president trump, that was last week at cpac, attacking senator

john mccain who is being treated for a severe form of brain cancer over health care which incited boos from the crowd. yesterday, several members of mccain's family, they hit back. >> i understand the argument is he is talking about policy and that's the attack, but it's still incredibly hurtful, especially after i've had this conversation with him on the phone, to have this moment of booing at cpac, which is supposed to be the mothership of conservatism and the republican party and just sort of see booing at this specific moment in time is incredibly hurtful. >> we need more compassion. we need more empathy. we need more togetherness in terms of working together. we don't need more bullying. and i'm tired of it. >> mccain is hitting back there. the body of billy graham is set to be part the u.s. capital later this morning.

president trump, vice president pence and congressional leaders gathered in the rotunda of the kil capital yesterday morning to pay their respects to graham who died last week at the age of 99. graham is the first religious leader to lie in honor at the capital. in his brief remarks yesterday, the president spoke about seeing graham preach with his father. >> the north carolina farm boy walked out of those fields into a great and beautiful history. he soon led a nationwide revival from a large tent in los angeles to 100,000 people in a single day at yankee stadium. and i remember that because my father said to me, come on, son, and by the way, he said come on, mom, let's go see billy graham at yankees stadium. and it was something very special. >> graham's funeral will take

place at his library in charlotte tomorrow. we're tracking some weather this morning and good thing we have bill karins to break it all down for us. bill, what can you tell us about the nor'easter on its way? >> let's start with the concerns for the nor'easter and then we'll get to the flooding in arkansas. so there's many aspects to the storm. depending on the elevation, it will be rain or snow. the coast, high winds, lower winds inland. flood watches for 35 million to boston, all of rhode island, all of connecticut, down to new york city, all of long island and a good chunk of new jersey into philadelphia. it's been very wet the last month. now we're going to get an additional 1 to 3 inches on top of that. isolated areas could get up to 4 or 5 inches. that could cause problems for some of those smaller streams and rivers. 1 inches is in blue and 2 to 3 inches in the red. so that's the rain aspect of it. a lot of this, though, will actually fall as snow in areas of western new york. so we have winter weather advisories from detroit back to

grand rapids, saginaw included. now winter storm warnings, buffalo, rochester, binghamton. earlier around scranton, still under a winter storm watch. it's questionable where the winter storm line will and then as far as the winds are going to go, it will be the thing that will cause the worst problems at the airport. as we go throughout friday afternoon these winds will kick up to 50 to 60 miles an hour. look at boston. we could get some power outages of this and the airports may be at a stand still friday afternoon. >> hoping everybody is preparing for this weather ahead. >> still ahead. plans for a fourth term. we're going to go live overseas for the latest on the state of the nation address and whether that has his comments on moscow's meddling in our election.

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skroo welcome back, everybody. as you can see right there, a russian president vladimir putin is currently giving his annual state of the nation address to both chambers of russia's parliament of people there. it comes less than three weeks before russia's presidential election which putin is overwhelmingly expected to win his fourth term. joining us now live from london,

good to talk to you this morning. talk to us about what putin has said so far. a lot of us wondering if he's going to mention russian meddling in the 2016 election. >> well, good morning. it's been an epic speech so far. speaking for almost two hours now. as you said, just three weeks before the elections in russia which incidentally falls on the fourth anniversary of the annexation of crimea. russia's economy was very high on the agenda, talked about raising gdp and announcing large scale projects, providing people with jobs, creating high paying jobs and sustainable growth for the russian people, which is obviously very important for them as the economy there is suffering as they're heading into elections quite soon. he acknowledges 20 million russians are living below the poverty line and he said that's

unacceptable and russia has one of the top five economies in the world but security played a very high part in this speech as well. he's been talking about it a lot now. he says russia needs to invest a lot more on its security and military to counter america. he said russia -- russian military will build up eventually and rendered useless on the day they counter america's military so a lot about the military and the economy and he's still speaking and we'll bring you whatever else he says. >> very interesting, russia investing in its security amongst everything that's happening here as well. thank you so much. appreciate it. >> the new questions about potential conflicts of interest involving jared kushner. the offer of the new york times report on the huge loans made to his family's business following white house visits by the lender's executives joining the conversation. plus president trump leaving lawmakers on both sides of the

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welcome back, everybody. let's get a check on the stories you're going to be hearing about in the day ahead. the florida state senate expected to take up a bill today in the wake of that deadly school shooting. it prohibits anyone under the age of 21 from purchasing a firearm, bans the sale of bump stocks and requires school boards to formulate procedures for active shooter situations. meanwhile, the body of the late reverend billy graham is set to depart the u.s. capitol later this morning. ahead of his funeral he's the fourth private citizen to lie in honor of the capitol graham's

funeral is tomorrow morning. morning joe, starts right now. the news gods must be crazy. all in the course of one day. we saw former trump campaign chairm chairman paul manafort arraigned on charges of money laundering and conspiracy. the president also attacked his own attorney general yesterday calling him disgraceful and calling jeff sessions reportedly mr. mcgoo. nbc news came out yesterday with an exclusive report that bob mueller is now asking the question, did donald trump know about the hacked democratic e-mails before they were released? that's a lot of news. but then, in the afternoon, a bomb shell, news breaking that hope hicks, one of the people closest to the president is resigning from her