that's a bad day by any measure. the west wing, new plot twists in the white house drama as nbc learned the tussle over tariffs has economic adviser gary cohn considering a way out. a national security adviser h.r. mcmaster is preparing for exit as early as next month. >> general mcmaster is not going anywhere. as the president said yesterday in the oval office to a number of the people, he thinks he's doing a great job and glad he's here. and live from new york, it's friday morning and the president is picking a fight with alec baldwin over his "snl" impersonation. the actor says he's just getting warmed up. >> it's all part of the plan. the more chaos i cause, the less people can focus. they are all getting tired, so tired. how long ago did i declare war on north korea and little rocket man? >> four months? >> wrong. it was last friday. see? i'm bending time. let's keep the chaos coming and shake things up around here.

good day. happy friday. i'm kristen welker in for andrea mitchell. i join you at a flashpoint for the trump presidency. the commander in chief capitalizing on the chaos within his administration by promising unilateral action on tariffs, an announcement met with overwhelming concern by leading republican lawmakers on capitol hill. president trump doubling down this morning tweeting that trade wars are good, making a protectionist argument for a policy that could hurt american industry and spark a backlash from u.s. allies. the markets are reacting to the president following thursday's 420 point loss with another drop. you can see it right there, down 156 points. joining me now, msnbc political analyst josh earnest, former press secretary to former president obama, and nbc news chief white house correspondent ha hallie jackson. what a great panel.

hallie, i have to start with you. this unexpected announcement yesterday on trade and tariffs coming on the heels of all of this chaos we witnessed this week, and the announcement that hope hicks is leaving. >> now you look ahead to what is coming today. you have the president who has just landed in north carolina for billy graham's funeral amidst this storm, this literal storm happening in washington, a storm happening in the west wing, the markets are dropping, the president is being pushed by republicans, by business leaders, not in the steel industry, to do something different to change his mind and here he comes out this morning saying basically, heck, no to everybody who wants him to reconsider this. he's doubling down, i hate to use that word because it's the ultimate political cliche, but he is. he's saying we will have this. he says trade wars are good and easy to win. find me an economist who says that's true. there's real concern about the policy impact of this moving forward but at the same time, this should surprise not a lot of folks, because the president promised, he talked tough on the campaign trail. gary cohn, steve mnuchin wanted

sort of less punishing tariffs on our allies. wilbur ross was on cnbc this morning talking about how this is not a big deal, the markets are overreacting. peter navarro on the other side pushing him towards this more protectionist policy. here's the thing. he doesn't sign this until next week. plenty of time. >> he may be making that key point. josh, pick up on that point. sarah sanders, who has your old job, said today the president's pretty committed to following through with this despite the fact there's some wiggle room, but never say never. did you ever have to say that? >> no. when president obama made an announcement, you knew policy had been set. you knew it was the result of a long process of policy making, evaluating the pros and cons of a decision. you also knew there would be a cogent argument that would be made to the public about the wisdom of this approach. we don't see any of that in the trump administration. as a result, it is having a very negative effect on the markets and it's having a negative effect on the business community that for years has been saying to washington, we would like

certainty and predictability. that's the best way to make business decisions. having the president make this controversial announcement, then indicate right away they may or may not be committed to it is not the kind of certainty corporate america is looking for. >> those are some of the broader impacts. what's the potential impact inside his own administration, and for his own press secretary who has to go out and defend a policy she's not sure is etched in stone? >> obviously she's in an impossible situation. i think what it does inside the white house, it's corrosive to any effort to put in place a process to make decisions. because people know that the decision making process is precarious at best, that there's never a final decision that's made and there's an opportunity to influence it at a variety of junctures or to go in and intervene with the president at the last minute. it means there's no coherent process in place and the result is you have decisions that are half-baked at best. this has a negative impact on the markets and negative impact on the broader economy and it also encourages people who would otherwise be supportive of the

president, people who a month or two ago were praising the republicans and the president for signing this tax reform bill into law, are now trashing the president because of this ill-advised trade policy. >> one of the people who is infuriated by this, as you and i have been talking to our sources about, gary cohn. jim cramer said earlier today if gary cohn walked away, that would have an even larger impact on the markets than the president's sort of announcement we saw yesterday. >> there are reports that he is thinking about it, he threatened to resign if the president went through with this. >> he's done this in the past. >> listen, that is also true. that is certainly fair. i hope he doesn't do it when the markets are open. wall street does watch what gary cohn does, whether or not you like it. i think back to moments, for example, in the fall before tax reform was done or right after tax reform was done and i saw cohn, is he leaving yet, what's going on, what's happening. all the reporting was he was

supposed to be gone well before this time. he's stuck around. the tax cut plan was a big boost for him in the internal political world but he and steve mnuchin can't be happy about this. they are getting a lot of heat from business buddies that they left behind in new york and i think that you will see this play out. i'm curious when the president's at mar-a-lago he will be talking to those friends of his down there. >> lot of feedback, no doubt. >> they have a lot of money in the stock market. what will that influence be. >> again, we started off talking about the chaos inside the white house, the fact that hope hicks, who is considered his gatekeeper, really, is leaving. we woke up this morning to these tweets, made a number of people giggle but there's a serious side to this. let me remind everyone, 5:30 a.m. the president tweeted this. alex baldwin, who is dieing, mediocre career was saved by his impersonation of me on snl. now saying playing djt was agony for him. alex, it was also agony for

those who were forced to watch. you were terrible. bring darrell hammond. much funnier and far greater talent. now alec baldwin responded with this. agony though it may be i would like to hang in there for the impeachment hearings, the resignation speech, the farewell helicopter ride to mar-a-lago, you know, the good stuff we have all been waiting for. josh, we are all giggling about this but we haven't seen him tweet at snl for some time. a lot of people are saying this is hope hicks leaving. this is what it's going to look like. >> presumably there is somebody digging into what exactly prompted this twitter eruption from the president. >> wasn't it fox news? i think so. i haven't looked at the tape but i have seen fox & friends reported on some of the baldwin stuff and the president later tweeted about it. i don't know that it's hicks leaving. i think the president was up, he had to get up early to go to dulles to fly out for this thing, was watching the news and does what he does occasionally. tweet in the morning. >> not in a way that actually defends anything he's doing.

there are plenty of people under fire in his administration, they would love a supportive tweet from him. there are plenty of policies he's issued in the last couple days in need of public defense. that's not what he's focused on. >> final point -- >> not exactly in a way particularly substantive. not in a way i think many people will find all that persuasive. >> final point before i let you guys go. josh, you have pointed to the fact that in addition to all of this, it's not just the staff inside the west wing. it's also his cabinet secretaries who have come under scrutiny for questions about ethics, whether it be pruitt or ben carson, who just announced he's returning a new furniture -- >> hopefully they kept the receipt. >> hopefully they did. what do you make of that? how does this fit into the broader discussion? >> one of the things that's so interesting about this, i think there's a lack of appreciation for how -- this kind of culture really does start at the top. in some ways, people who have been looking at this situation with regard to the cabinet

secretaries have indicated that maybe david shulkin is not a particularly good example for democrats to cite because mr. shulkin had obviously served at the va under president obama. he's an obama holdover. the fact of the matter is, actually david shulkin is the perfect example, because there is no way that david shulkin would have tried to take his wife on a ten-day european vacation on the taxpayer dime if president obama were sitting in the oval office. he never would have sought permission to do that and if he had he would have been turned down. if he tried to do it without permission he would have been gone by the end of the day. >> it sets the stage for another very busy friday. hallie jackson, josh earnest, thank you. great to have you here. great conversation. new york republican congressman peter king serves on the financial services and intelligence committee, and he joins me now. congressman, thanks so much for being here. really appreciate it. >> thank you, kristen. my pleasure. >> i have to start with this news that we have been talking about, the president's announcement yesterday on tariffs. house speaker paul ryan warned through his spokesman yesterday about the quote unquote, unintended consequences.

are you concerned about unintended consequences, that it could ultimately hurt industries in this country? >> yeah, basically i am not a protectionist and i believe that the small amount of steel workers and aluminum workers it's going to help, is going to be more than offset by damage done to the other industries that rely on steel. no, i think it will increase prices, hurt jobs but again, this is what the president has been saying for 30 years. that's one area where i have not agreed with president trump on. that's on the issue of tariffs. >> you think it could potentially spark a trade war, congressman? would you go that far? >> well, it can, but again, somehow these things do manage to resolve themselves. other presidents have raised tariffs and it sort of dies down after awhile. i think this -- don't ask me exactly how, but i'm sure there will be some ways made to cushion this and again, there's still time and also, congress may take some action. again, i don't support it. i never have. i think that this is -- the economy was going along well.

i voted against the tax cut because of an impact, it was definitely helping the country overall. i thought it was a plus for the economy. this could unfortunately take us in the opposite direction. >> congressman, very quickly before we move to other topics, you say there's still time. have you reached out to the president, lobbied him to change his mind before next week, when he says this is ultimately coming out? >> no. this came last night but i do intend to reach out to other members of congress today. >> okay. i want to turn now to what has been described as the chaos inside the white house this week. we know that the president is losing the person who's been described as his gate keeper, hope hicks. you were in a committee meeting with her the day before she announced her resignation, that day she acknowledged she did tell some white lies for president trump. you have downplayed that. you said hey, she was talking about business meetings, it wasn't a big deal. but how did she seem to you that day? did you have any indication that announcement was coming? >> no. i think she did an excellent job of testifying.

she was being vilified, she was being attacked. she never lost her composure. she was articulate. she answered every question about the campaign. the fact that at the end of the day, to me it shows how weak the democratic case was, after nine hours of testimony, attempting to find russian collusion, all they could get was hope hicks being as honest as anyone could be, as anyone should be, when they asked her have you ever told a lie, she said only a white lie, for instance, saying donald trump was not in when people maybe wanted to meet with him but she made a point of saying that her testimony was entirely truthful. >> congressman, let me press you on that point. let me press you on that point, though, because critics have said yes, she did use the term white lie. she couched it. but she really becomes the first trump official to acknowledge saying something that's not the truth. that's significant politically potentially for the president, is it not? >> politically, maybe politically but it was a stupid question. if i asked you, if you asked me,

if you asked anybody in the world have you ever told a white lie, of course you have. it's a matter of courtesy. you are going to tell someone he doesn't want to meet with you because you're a jerk, you say no, he's busy right now. that's what she was talking about. the fact swalwell and schiff had to rely on that shows how -- >> does it take on new meaning, though, when you serve the president of the united states? >> first, her testimony did not involve, that part of the testimony did not involve when he was president. to be honest with you, if somebody calls the white house, i have called the white house a number of times. not president trump, by the way. certainly other presidents. they say no, he's busy right now. for all i know, he's not. he doesn't want to talk to me. i don't take that as a personal offense. when she says she never told untruth in anything involving policy, involving the investigation, involving russia, to me there's nobody in the world, anyone who doesn't tell a white lie at some time, who denies that is not being truthful. that shows how honest she was

being. >> couple more topics. jared kushner's security clearance was downgraded this week. there have been mounting questions about some of his business dealings while he was in the white house. are you concerned that he's becoming a liability not only to this president but potentially to national security, congressman? >> not to national security but again, we have to see what comes out. my dealings with jared kushner, he's been totally honest, totally above board and anyone in today's world, when you have complicated international dealings, it's going to take awhile to get a security check because there's so many different involvements you could have, all of which probably are entirely legal. but again, when you have international financial commitments and are dealing with foreign countries, that's going to be an issue i think more and more as we have a worldwide economy. >> and just finally, i want to ask you about the other big issue that we have been talking about for the past several weeks, and this week again, the issue of gun reform. the president had that

remarkable hour-long open session televised live, bargaining meeting with a bipartisan group of law makers. a lot of people thought he was actually getting on board with a number of the policies that democrats embrace like universal background checks, like increasing the age to purchase some weapons, and then last night, in a closed door meeting, he met with the nra and the two seem to be on the same page. so what do you make of that, where do you think the president stands now? >> well, i give the president credit for having these open discussions. i actually am one of those who does support universal background checks. i do support a ban on assault weapons. and i think the fact the president opened these issues up, raising the age to 21 and also the fact he did put the nra on the defensive a bit, this is more than president obama did. hopefully it will amount to something. >> do you think president trump is really prepared to take on the nra, congressman? >> you have to see. he certainly did the other day at the open meeting he had.

he met with the nra last night. the nra, like it or not, is a player in all this, and having said that, i think he's gone further than anyone expected him to go and certainly further than most republicans are willing to go right now. >> congressman peter king, always enjoy our conversations and appreciate your joining us. thank you so much. coming up, job insecurity. where national security adviser h.r. mcmaster may be the next top white house staffer pushed out the door. we'll take a look at that. ♪ hey, sir lose-a-lot! thou hast the patchy beard of a pre-pubescent squire! thy armor was forged by a feeble-fingered peasant woman... your mom! as long as hecklers love to heckle, you can count on geico saving folks money. boring! fifteen minutes could save you

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another possible staff shakeup at the white house. nbc news has learned that national security adviser h.r. mcmaster could be replaced as early as the end of this month, but this morning, white house press secretary sarah sanders disputed there was any plan for mcmaster's departure. joining me now, nbc news senior national security analyst, michael lighter, former director of the national counterterrorism center. thank you so much. great to see you. >> great to be here. >> let's just talk about this and the implications of it. we know that there have been some tensions simmering between mcmaster and the president, some of them have spilled out into the public. what is the significance of a potential departure and why now, do you think? >> it's really huge. the only position that this is sort of subservient to is the chief of staff.

the national security adviser in my experience, that's one of the people who really can and has to walk into the oval office at any time and say mr. president, we have an issue, whether it's north korea, iran. you have to have a degree of trust between that national security adviser and the president. you also need to have that trust between the national security adviser and the key members of the national security council, and that's jim mattis of defense, rex tillerson at state. that's where that trust has to be. breaking that up can be very hard. >> it's our understanding this move is actually being orchestrated by the chief of staff and defense secretary james mattis. significant, or is that what you would expect in this type of departure? >> it varies. sometimes it's just the relationship with the president that's broken. in this case, there has always been a bit of tension between defense department, state department and h.r. mcmaster. h.r. has a very different style than jim mattis and rex tillerson. as key members of that national security cabinet, they have to trust that the national security adviser is being an honest

broker with whom they can work. i'm not sure that that degree of trust has always existed. >> let me remind our viewers of some of the tensions that really spilled out into the public. this was at the munich security conference when h.r. mcmaster called the russian cybermeddling, quote unquote, incontrovertible. the president fired back with this tweet. general mcmaster forgot to say that the results of the 2016 election were not impacted or changed by the russians and that the only collusion was between russia and crooked h. the dnc and the dems, remember the dirty dossier, uranium speeches, e-mails and the podesta company. how tough is it when you say something publicly and the president calls you out like that? >> this piece on russia makes it frankly almost impossible to be an honest broker as national security adviser. the fact is the entire national security apparatus inside the government, we saw it when you had the director of the cia and

director of national intelligence saying russia is doing this. when you have an occupant in the oval office that refuses to admit that and see it, it's really hard to be his adviser. >> i have had so many conversations about the fact the messages on russia coming out of the white house and other branches of government are so different. that undercuts their efforts. let me ask about the other big piece of news. jared kushner has come under a microscope this week. his security clearance has been significantly downgraded. we learned there's a lot of scrutiny over some companies profiting after they actually had meetings at the white house with jared kushner. has he became a liability and could that actually threaten national security? >> whether he's a political liability, i won't touch that one, but i think the two pieces that he's really started to run afoul of, security and standard ethics. on the ethics piece, it's exactly why we ask people to separate themselves from business interests coming in. on the security piece, in my view, once you don't have a top

secret security clearance there's no way for him to be effective in the tasks he's been given, middle east peace, engagement with mexico. if you can't see the intelligence about what the u.s. government sees and knows about these parties, you can't lead those efforts. >> we also know that according to "the washington post" at least, some countries, there is concern, were looking at ways to try to manipulate him. how could this happen? how could one of the president's senior advisers be in that role when that's happening at the same time? >> this is how all the ethics issues, business interests and security interests are intertwined. they are not independent of one another. when you have these potential business ties, foreign governments or adversaries or prospective friends see that and say this is how we can pressure that individual. that's why someone may or may not get that security clearance. that's why this process of disentanglement and coming into government and making sure that everyone knows who you are meeting with, where your business interests are, are so

critical. i'm not sure that that's been done very effectively here. >> thank you so much. great to see you, as always. coming up, revolver. the president's abrupt about-face on gun control. beyond is a natural pet food that goes beyond assuming ingredients are safe... to knowing they are. going beyond expectations... because our pets deserve it. beyond. natural pet food.

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less than 24 hours after publicly embracing new gun restrictions which stunned nra allies and law makers on both sides of the aisle, president trump has reportedly changed his tune after what he called a great late night meeting in the oval office with nra officials. one of the top lobbyists who was in the room tweeted in part quote, potus and v-poet us support the second aemendment, strong due process and don't want gun control. the president's reported about-face seemingly undercuts that wheeling and dealing negotiating session he had with law makers wednesday afternoon. joining me is former democratic congresswoman donna edwards and michael steel, republican adviser and former spokesman for house speaker john boehner. thanks for being here to both of you. i want to start with you, congresswoman. what do you make of this negotiating style that we have seen from the president and the fact that he told everyone one thing in that open session and

behind closed doors, seemed to have a very different message. which donald trump do you believe? >> i'm not really sure. in fact, it reminds me of his negotiating style around daca and immigration. so i think that a lot of democrats are hopeful, but very skeptical, precisely because the president has been all over the map. >> let me read you what chris murphy tweeted. he tweeted fascinating, since i assume the president told them, meaning the nra, about the support for universal background checks, raising age for rifle purchases and protective orders he announced on tv yesterday. do you think the president's prepared to take on the nra? >> no. this is one of the really large conservative organizations that stuck with him throughout the worst times in the general election campaign. these are guys he will not walk away from. remember the president doesn't come to this debate with fixed principles. he's not had a long, consistent record on this issue. it's sort of like trailing to nail jello to the wall.

he has this position today for this audience, this position tomorrow for that audience. we have seen it on a number of issues. other than trade and a few other things, he really only has a few strongly held personally held views and so when we get to these issues that he doesn't have one, you get this sort of weathe weathervane effect and he's all over the place. >> what specifically do you think a piece of legislation might look like that passes through both chambers? >> well, i think we have seen some things that have really universal support across the country. universal background checks, fixing the information system, the data base, and this issue of bump stocks. those things at least seem to have some more broad support even among republicans, even among nra members, and so that may be a place that democrats and republicans getting 60 votes in the senate can go. >> the nra has said we don't want to legislate on bump stocks. we do support banning them

through restrictions. would they support a piece of legislation that included a ban on bump stocks? >> i think they would at least remain silent on it. you don't necessarily need a bill that has the blessing of the nra but you need a bill that the nra is not going to go after members for supporting. i think the package that the congresswoman outlined gets very much in that direction. it's something that can get done and i hope that gun control advocates don't make the perfect the enemy of the good. this is a package that can improve gun safety without alienating the nra. >> all right. i want to talk about the other big headline, yesterday the president surprised a lot of people again when he said he was planning to announce new tariffs on steel. this is what john mccain had to say. as we know, a lot of republicans were upset by this announcement. he says the president's sweeping tariffs will only serve to hurt american workers and consumers, and alienate us from our most important allies and trading partners. it's not a surprise the president wanted these tariffs. he talked about it on the campaign trail. at the same time, he sort of had

unified republicans. now this big divide again. >> right. he had a huge win with tax reform, with a unified republican party. this is an issue that splits him from the republican party, because of its pure economic illiteracy. you are already seeing trading partners including our allies threatening retaliation. i thought it was very interesting, the first thing the european union started talking about, going after kentucky bourbon and cheese from wisconsin. i don't think those states were chosen entirely at random. >> i don't think they were. pointed attacks. what do you make of the announcement and the ways in which democrats will try to capitalize on it? >> i think there are a lot of democrats including myself who actually embrace the idea of restructuring our trade agreements so they are fair to workers and fair to american consumers. here's the thing. the president may have just thrown up another trial balloon. he made an announcement to make an announcement. he didn't announce a plan and implementati implementation. >> you don't think he will

follow through with it? >> i don't know. what i do know is this shouldn't be taken as something that is in the absence of doing something real on trade to make sure that we have trade agreements that work. using it as a tool for leverage and really not punishing our allies, but going after the worst offenders like china. >> we all wait with baited breath to see what he actually announces next week. thanks so much. appreciate it. great to see you. funeral services are now under way for the reverend billy graham in his hometown of charlotte, north carolina. the president and first lady are among the 2,000 mourners in attendance for the private ceremony honoring graham's life and legacy as america's pastor. billy graham passed away last wednesday at his home in north carolina. he was 99 years old. that's my girl!

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president trump is spinning his push to impose steeper tariffs on steel and aluminum imports by saying trade wars are good. joining me is admiral james stavridis. admiral, thank you so much for joining me. really appreciate it. >> my pleasure, kristen. >> let me just get your reaction this morning. are trade wars good as the president says? >> i don't think so. my current job is i'm the dean of a graduate school of

international relations. we study international trade, international business, international finance. virtually any economist will tell you that there are no winners in trade wars. it is the ultimate non-zero sum game and the worst part is the way it bleeds over to your allies, partners and friends and shatters relationships. what else could we possibly do to get ourselves in a war with canada besides a move like this? >> okay. let me follow up with you on that point. what about china? obviously we have a very different relationship with china but the president needs china to deal with north korea, which is arguably the united states' largest foreign policy crisis right now. >> it absolutely is. and let's go back to the campaign for a moment where candidate trump was talking about 40% tariffs on china. there's an emotional kind of oh, i want to blame somebody for

problems, but that is just not good economics, and it's even worse geopolitics as you point out. look, we tried tariffs a hundred years ago after world war i. we imposed the hawley-smoot tariffs. that's what essentially cracked the global economy and created the great depression, blew apart our alliance system in the world. we need to have a measured approach using the world trade organization, there are mechanisms to address these imbalances. simply shooting from the hip with an out of the blue set of tariffs that would apply to allies, partners and friends, is bad economics and bad geopolitics. >> i want to get your take on some news we are just learning about. nbc and cnbc's investigative units are looking into a nearly one million share sale of a company that sells steel. it's the largest input cost of steel, i should say, and the sale was by a trump confidant,

carl icahn last week. it's been raising questions about potential insider trading. we want to stress icahn's filing seems to be standard operating procedure, follows s.e.c. rules. what should we make of that? >> we should be concerned any time there's even an appearance of a government official receiving some kind of benefit for himself or herself or their friends. i certainly hope that mr. icahn, who is a well-known global businessman and knows how to do his business, has dotted the is and crossed all the ts, but the appearance of this and the timing of it i would say is unfortunate. >> we want to stress there's no known connection to any type of ethical issues, but your point is it raises questions. >> it does indeed. it's all part of the fabric of our relationships both inside the country where we have less and less trust with each other, and really to this tariff point,

our relationships globally. as people see this kind of activity, it's very concerning and it's part of that concern we ought to have about how we appear overseas. >> i want to also get your reaction to what we heard from russia's president vladimir putin yesterday in his state of the nation address. he touted his nuclear weapons arsenal. he said that they have nuclear weapons that are difficult to detect. he boasted that he had a cruise missile that could essentially reach anywhere in the world. megyn kelly pressed him on that, whether or not this was bluster effectively. he stood by his claims. how concerned should the u.s. be? has the response been strong enough? >> the initial reaction, particularly when you see those hyped-up videos that look like something coming of an arcade is like this is q in the james bond movies showing you his arsenal.

but that would be a mistake. we ought to take it very seriously, because vladimir putin is a serious operator. he's smart about how he deploys information. we have known about this system coming along down the pike for five years, but this is the first time they are revealing them publicly. part of that is him throwing red meat to his base. march election coming up. but part of it is a very direct signal to us. we need to create counters and develop a strategy to deal with russia. >> admiral stavridis, thank you for your insights. have a wonderful weekend. president trump is usually quick to tweet about everything and anything. he hasn't said anything about vladimir putin flexing his military muscle yesterday. nbc's chief foreign correspondent richard engel is digging into the president's relationship with russia and also north korea. richard? >> reporter: it seems once again

we are all talking about nuclear weapons. we are talking in a cold war kind of language. not just with north korea, but now with russia, with that speech from vladimir putin. by the way, it's not just vladimir putin. we have heard from president trump talking about how he wants to revitalize and modernize the american nuclear program, and i think that is a lot of why we are seeing russia respond this way. so tonight, we have a one-hour special and it focuses on russia and north korea. it focuses a little bit about this blind spot that a lot of people have pointed out, why it is that the united states can't find itself, why it is that president trump and his administration can't come out, particularly president trump, and criticize russia. there were a series of sanctions that were just passed on north korea. they didn't mention russia. we went to russia to find out what we could about links, particularly smuggling links

between russia and north korea. we had been tracking a russian ship. in mid-october, according to logs we obtained, it started heading out to sea, then disappeared, probably by turning off its transponder. >> it is very likely this was a ship-to-ship transfer. similar ships, similar size, approximately same time, going to a very unusual area. >> reporter: a few days after it disappeared, the ship reappeared, in russia. we wanted to see if it was still here. we are looking for a ship. >> she will check. >> reporter: wonderful. the guard remembered seeing the ship coming into port. but when she checked the records, the ship's name wasn't on them. is there someone we can reach out to talk to who owns the ship? can we go in and see it? so we couldn't get in but at least we did confirm the ship

is, in fact, here. now we have to find a way to get to it. we did eventually find a way to get to the ship. and we captured these images. >> fascinating report. do not miss the return of the special series "on assignment with richard engel" tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. coming up, more charges coming. who special counsel robert mueller is building a case against now. this is "andrea mitchell reports." with expedia one click gives you access to

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and there are new developments in the special counsel's escalating russia investigation. nbc news has learned robert mueller is building a case against the russians who hacked and leaked private information of several key democrats during the 2016 election. mueller's team says former campaign chair paul manafort could be facing significant prison time if he's convicted of charges stemming from the special counsel's indictments, including the latest charges of bank and tax fraud. let's get the inside scoop from nbc news justice correspondent pete williams, jessica ainsley and jonathan lemire and msnbc

political analyst. pete, i have to start with you and this new information about paul manafort. what's the very latest? >> as you know, 45 minutes from now, he was to walk into the courthouse in alexandria, virginia, just across the river here to be arraigned on the new indictment that was filed there. this is the one that takes out richard gates who has pleaded guilty but it adds some new charges involving bank fraud. but because of all the high wind in washington and the fact that it's hard to get around because of all the trees blown down on the roads, that courthouse is closed today. so we don't know when that hearing will be. it will be rescheduled probably next week. in a filing precedesing the hearing, the government said if paul manafort is convicted on all the charges he'd face a guideline sentencing range, a likely sentence of 15 1/2 to 20 1/2 years. that's assuming the judge follows the sentencing guidelines and if convicted on all the charges in alexand riahe

could face 8 to 10 years. now the trial date we know has been set for the case in washington, d.c. september 17th. so what we're going to watch when the judge has the arraignment for the alexandria case is whether the judge sets a trial date and whether it's before the one in washington. the fact is the alexandria court prides itself on something they call the rocket docket. meaning they like to move cases through very quickly and the government already says, look, in terms of discovery which happens in these cases where you share evidence with the defense, they say we've already done that in the case in washington. >> and potentially facing significant jailtime there. we'll watch that closely, obviously. julia, what are we learning about the special counsel's potential, and we want to stress that word, potential case against russian hackers. >> that's right. it's potential because we know robert mueller has been collecting information from the intelligence community about

exactly how russians were able to hack into the democratic national committee and john podesta's e-mails and disseminate that damaging information about hillary clinton during the 2016 campaign. he's been gathering that. when and if he decides to issue criminal charges is really up to him. a lot of people haved so this could be like an ace in robert mueller's hands. he'll want to issue these criminal charges when he wants to pressure people, specifically any american co-conspirators to cooperate. this would be a way to be able to gain that cooperation. but we do know he's been able to gain things like the methods, the malware they used to hack into these accounts. and the special kind of tell-tail signatures they leave behind. he's got a lot of information, and he's been poking around. certainly asking about it. asking witnesses about donald trump's potential involvement in the hacking. and it seems like this could be a big feather in his cap when he gets it.

>> and we know that the special counsel likely paying very close attention to this remarkable public feud that we've seen between the president and his attorney general. how will that factor into, in the news that julia is talking about, into this broader investigation. jonathan -- >> it is a remarkable thing that the president time and time again has unleashed these broad sides against his attorney general who we all know is one of his earliest supporters in the campaign. jeff sessions committed the original sin, disloyalty when he recused himself from the russia probe last year. the president has quite honestly never gotten over it and periodically, the frustration that he feels with jeff sessions bubbles to the surface, and he takes it out on twitter or he uses the people around him about firing sessions. but, of course, that's not happened. it seems jeff sessions every so

often gets placed in the torture chamber where there's some belief hopefully the president's estimation, maybe jeff sessions would quit instead of being fired. sessions tells everyone around him that he has no desire to go anywhere. this is sort of the many ways his dream job, he really believes in the conservative principles he's put forth there at the department of justice. he has a lot of allies on the hill. a lot of allies in the right -- in the conservative media. he seems not inclined to go, and we saw this week, he had a very sort of public dinner with rod rosenstein and other justice officials just hours after the president's latest attack on him and the doj which can only be interpreted as a sign of confidence and suggesting the president like, hey, i'm not going anywhere. >> pete, final word to you. we did see a very confident, almost defined attorney general this week. why this week? why did he decide to dig his heels in, do you think, publicly at least? >> i think it was a combination of things. he finally decided to push back in the torture chamber a little

bit. partly because of the issue, partly because of, i think, the sheer numbers of them to lay down a marker. by the way, just a few minutes ooh rod rosenstein in his speech in a white collar confidenerenc white collar crime had words of praise for the attorney general following the rule of integrity at the justice department. >> comments that will no doubt get a lot of attention today. >> thank you for that great reporting. we'll have more ahead. this is "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. it's time for "your business" of the week. rover.com has one mission. ensure your pet gets walked and watched. and now with its acquisition of its biggest competitor, it has the largest network of dog sitters in the country. watch "iyour business" weekend mornings on msnbc to find out how they're growing the puppy love and their business.

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and that does it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." david gura is up next. good to see you. >> thank you. have a great afternoon. from msnbc headquarters in new york, i'm david gura in for craig melvin. trade wars. president trump defends his controversial plan to slap new tariffs on steel and aluminum imports tweeting trade wars are good. how will these tariffs impact ordinary americans and is the new policy pushing one white house insider out the door. plus, the headlines are stacking up about the president's anger after a tumultuous week for some of the president's closest allies. what it's like inside the white house right now. and a good -- great meeting is how president trump characterized a late night session with the nra after pressing lawmakers for new gun legislation just the day before. is it possible to know where the president really standsn