>> hello, everybody. it's 4:00 here in washington. i'm peter alexander in for my friend nicolle wallace. it is clearer than ever before bob mueller is backing the president into a corner and the president is now lashing out as donald trump's legal team prepares for what seems like an inevitable sit down between mueller and trump. trump is attacking mueller by name. the mueller probe should never have been started and there was no collusion and there was no crime. trump adding later, why does the mueller team have 13 hardened democrats, some big crooked hillary supporters, and zero republicans? then this morning, just to punctuate the point, a total witch hunt he writes in all caps, with massive conflicts of interest. and if the president's state of mind wasn't clear from those tweets alone, the associated press issing in recent days, trump has fumed to confidants the mueller probe is going to choke the life out of his

presidency if allowed to continue unabated indefinitely. if he is concerned the investigation is moving to the west l wing, he has cause to worry. mueller has focused on events since the election, not during the campaign, in his conversations with trump's lawyer, suggesting that mueller is zeroing in on the president's potential efforts to obstruct justice. all this just days after we learned that mueller has crossed what the president has said was his red line, subpoenaing his private business. the trump organization. now nbc news confirming "the new york times" reporting that the president has added an attorney known to pushing the conspiracy theory the fbi and justice department are out to frame the president. that's where we begin this afternoon and joining us now from the washington post, white house reporter ashley parker. with me here on set, betsy woodruff daily beast reporter. chuck rosenberg, former u.s. attorney and former senior

official at the fbi now fortunately for our benefit an msnbc contributor. joining us as well former u.s. attorney barbara mcquade, also an msnbc contributor. ashley, let me start with you if i can quickly. the one real triumph seems all he has done in the course of lashing out the last several weeks and months frankly most of the last year, the president's attorneys for most of that time convinced him to back off robert mueller, not go directly at robert mueller himself. obviously that changed. what led to it? >> well, they sure had. and a lot of that was to his credit, at least until recently, was ty cobb, reassuring the president saying, i agree with you, this probe is a witch hunt, but it will be over soon. it will be over. we all remember he said by thanksgiving. then by the holidays. then by the first of the year. and then when it wasn't over, the president grew increasingly frustrated, increasingly enraged and you have a legal team that is often at times sort of at war

with itself in feuding. and you have a lawyer, the president's personal attorney john dowd, who it was explained to me recently, feeds the president's worst impulses. while you have ty cobb saying don't train your fire on mueller, hold steady, let it g it won't help you, you have john dowd sort of doing exactly what the president did on a different tract this weekend, going out and attacking the investigation, calling for its conclusion and in some ways people told me encouraging the president or certainly not urging him to hold back from doing the same. >> yeah, we're going to break down the sort of divide among the president's lawyers in a moment. betsy, i want to get you into the conversation you have a little more information inside the president's thinking now. >> that's right. one thing i can tell you based on a conversation this morning with a source familiar with the situation is that mueller appears to be building a case against the president, specifically focused on comey and michael flynn. you will recall that famous meeting in the oval office we've now heard so much about when president trump reportedly told comey, i wish you could layoff

flynn. nothing happened there. that was the central part of comey's testimony. i can now tell you that that seems to be a central focus for the mueller investigation. that is part of -- >> the reason that is important is because that is after the president took office. those conversations took place, which gets to, chuck, this conversation i want to have with you is the obstruction of justice interesting to see the reporting that suggests a lot of the focus has been, questions addressed to the lawyers privately so far. does this effort undermine, does this only add to this obstruction of justice effort by robert mueller? >> potentially, peter. right. so, everything the president does is weighs and evaluated by prosecutors and agents. each time he says or does something that looks like he's trying to interfere, it's another brick in the wall. so, no one of these things is conclusive. no one tweet is going to lead to an impeachment or put him in jail.

more likely sthan nthan not, bu accumulation of all these things becomes important and telling. what's hard to prove in an obstruction case? intent. how do you prove intent? with little bits and pieces of information. >> so that creates a pattern, right. one alone is not sufficient, but if you can demonstrate a pattern, you might have that -- >> that is exactly right. >> betsy, let me ask you if i can, the facts of the president's tweets have been all over the map. we don't have time to fact check every sentence there. let me start for a little bit. among some of the tweets over the weekend he talks about the fact there are all these 13 hardened democrats to say nothing of the fact that bob mueller himself is a republican, right? the so-called witch hunt as he describes it now has 19 witches, as it were, right, 13 russian nationals have been charged so far. paul manafort, his former chairman has been charged. three individuals have pleaded guilty. michael flynn, george papadopoulos, rick gates so far. but clearly that is not enough to sort of convince, you know, the president and it certainly

may not be enough to convince the people in the president's orbit. the base still stick with him on this. >> it's a really interesting question. we are seeing an increased and heightened attack on the mueller probe those affiliated with the mueller probe. over the weekend there was a story that i've heard, people in sort of trump's orbit bringing up a relationship between the judge who oversaw flynn's plea deal and i believe a member of mueller's team if that's right. not something that would have had any bearing on flynn's decision to plead guilty but a story now being tout the as evidence here is troubling. what is an interesting counter point is john dowd, the president's lawyer actually pointed out importantly, someone in some ways has fueled his impulses on this. dowd himself told me the day that the 13 russians were indicted that he thought it was fantastic. tlae thought it was great news and mueller had a huge success. >> to say nothing of the fact the president, this administration just within the last several days, imposed sanctions on the russians based on the information that came out

of the mueller investigation. so, if it's a witch hunt, it certainly found one of the sources of the problem right there. >> exactly. the president's own treasury secretary is essentially cosigning the findings of mueller's investigation. >> let me ask you specifically about your conversation with john dowd. i want to drill down on that. let's put up on the screen part of what he said to you initially. there's been a back and forth in the lawyer's role. i pray acting attorney general rosenstein will follow the brilliant and courageous example of the fbi office of professional responsibility and attorney general jeff sessions and bring an end to alleged russia collusion investigation manufactured by mccabe's boss james comey based upon a fraudulent and corrupt dossier. for one we know it wasn't based upon the dossier. it was based on information that started with george papadopoulos. we'll start there in terms of the facts that are wrong with the assessment that's been made by the president and his attorney here. dowd would later say this was him speaking, he wasn't speaking on behalf of the president. it is important because it does sort of demonstrate the thinking that he shares, as you indicate, with the president on this issue.

>> and to be clear, when i was first communicating with dowd on saturday morning shortly after mccabe was fired by attorney general jeff sessions, he e-mailed me that statement. i e-mailed back and said is this on behalf of the president? dowd replied to me yes, speaking as his counsel. i wrote my story, after it came out, he called and said he was walking it back, not on behalf of the president. when i reported on that information, he was scleclear a straightforward it reflected the president's view. >> barbara, can i bring you in? ty cobb, as we divvy it up, attorneys representing the president now, said the following after that statement came out, the tweets from the president, the statement from john dowd. here's what he wrote. in response to media speculation and related questions being posed the administration, the white house yet again confirms that the president is not considering or discussing the

firing of the special counsel robert mueller. but to be clear, barbara, the president can't fire mueller himself. he would require rod rosenstein to do that or a new attorney general if he would replace jeff sessions right now. so, what do you make of these comments? because the fact of the matter is the president at any time could begin the dominos that help go toward that conclusion. >> yeah, i think the president has the authority to issue the order to rod rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, to fire robert mueller. he could certainly effectuate his firing. he's using these two lawyers pretty strategically as yin and yang on the one hand saying we're going to cooperate fully, we're not going to fire mueller. john dowd on the other hand is throwing out these bombs to discredit robert mueller and james comey and andy mccabe. you see this a lot with defendants on trial, especially when they start getting worried that the evidence is mounting against them, a common strategy is to put the police on trial,

put the prosecutors on trial, try to undermine confidence in the very people who are presenting the case against you in an effort to undermine the credibility of the case. it seems like he's using these two lawyers juxtaposing on one hand, i'm fully cooperating, on the other the message you shouldn't trust this process. >> chuck, let me ask you specifically. would rod rosenstein follow the messages he's getting from the boss in the west wing, from the president himself and perhaps from his attorneys and fire robert mueller? >> this is a guy i know and worked with over the years. i take him at his word, peter, when when he says only for cause and that he, rod rosenstein has seen no cause whatsoever. by the way, that shouldn't surprise us because i also had the privilege of working with with and for bob mueller. this is a man that does stuff by the book. so, the notion that he's going to trip or stumble or do something that gives rod rosenstein cause is crazy. >> so is it possible shall -- we know jeff sessions recuse himself, his original sin in the relationship with the president

right now. that's why the president calls his beleaguered and whatever else the last several months. is it possible rod rosenstein has privately recused himself not so much to the russia portion but the obstruction of justice portion in this case? and we wouldn't even know it, is that a possibility? >> i guess it's a possibility. but we would see some sign of someone else making decisions. >> how would we see is that? what should we be looking for? >> it's not clear too me he has recused himself. let me start with that premise, peter. there's been some concern rod might be a witness to certain events because, of course, he wrote the memo that originally justified the firing of jim comey. >> right. >> some people have wondered and i'm one of them why he hasn't recused him seflt. but i do trust his judgment. i imagine he has a pretty good reason for staying in the case. >> ashley, let me ask you if i can. there are some of the president's tweets reported in "the new york times". the tweets came as mr. mueller is said to have sent questions to mr. trump's legal team as part of negotiations over an interview with the president.

how much of the president's recent spiral do we think is associated with the potential, now it appears to be closer and closer for some form of an interview between robert mueller's team and the president? could end up just being questions sent to him and he answers them on paper? that would seem likely from bob mueller's interest. there is not potential for a follow-up here. what do you sort of attribute this recent outburst to? >> sure. well, another thing the president was frustrated over was that you'll remember the times also reported that mueller had issued a subpoena to the trump organization and the president had said previously that he had a red line, if the investigation ever got into his businesses, his financial dealings, really his family in that same way, that would be a red line. and it is unclear exactly if he's drawing the line here. that was one thing i was told agitated him. and the other thing that has agitated him just generally again is the sense that he did believe at the beginning that he thought it was an unfair witch

hunt, but he thought it was going to wrap up and it has just become very clear to everyone involved, including now finally the president himself and his lawyers, that this is not wrapping up. and so as it got closer, as this gets closer to him, to the oval office, to his family, to potentially sitting down with mueller, everything that makes this feel more real basically, he is incredibly frustrated because he correctly understands this is a shadow over his presidency. it is preventing him from governing and leading the way he would want to. and to be certain, some of that is his fault. he's allowing it to become a distraction. but all of these things sort of created the perfect storm that when he went into this weekend with a lot of down time, he let his private thoughts and the things he's mused to friends go public on twitter. >> let me ask, barbara, the news breaking this afternoon on this deal is the fact joe de jen ova is another attorney on the president's legal team. another arsenal to back him up.

he is someone who has spouted conspiracy theories about how the d.o.j., department of justice and the fbi are trying to frame the president. here's part of what he has said in the not too distant past. take a listen. >> the attorney general needs to appoint a special counsel and if he doesn't want to do that he needs to make sure the criminal division of the justice department impanels a grand jury immediately and starts putting in that grand jury under oath comey, strzok, page, baker, mccabe, everybody. we have long since passed the time when we need to have just congressional investigations for this. make no mistake about it. a group of fbi and d.o.j. people were trying to frame donald trump of a falsely created crime. >> so, earlier, barbara, you were talking about the yin and yang that exists between some of the president's attorneys now. seems like one scale is getting heaven ire than the other in te terms of what the president is looking for.

does he have the idea he needs to double down in terms of the firing? >> a defense attorney may act as an attack dog for you in the media. in his prior statements maybe that is the strategy here. it also could be the strategy to negotiate with robert mueller for the terms of grand jury testimony as well. he is a former u.s. attorney and so he also would be very savvy in the ways of grand jury testimony. so, it may be for strategic reasons like that, but based on his statements, it could be that he does want to use him in that attack dog mode. >> can i pin you down, it would be in terms of strategy. what is the added value this attorney will bring in to give us a look ahead in terms of strategy we can anticipate? >> that's for me? >> yes, please, yes, barbara. >> i think it could relate to the grand jury testimony. does he want to put up roadblocks in terms of having donald trump appear before the grand jury, does he want to negotiate a more favorable situation with an informal interview, in an office where he

can sit right next to donald trump. i think those are the kind of things -- i think it's clear at the end of the day robert mueller is going to get his shot at donald trump. but how aggressive does trump want to be in trying to resist that or dictate the terms. so, that might be some of the strategic role that he will play here. >> betsy, just to punctuate this thought, on march 11 we heard from the president, he was dying in a north county times report i'm happy with my attorney, i have everybody i want. eight days later they make the announcement he's hiring a new attorney. >> is it possible to be surprised by the trump administration? >> this is just a pattern as chuck would say. thank you very much for that. betsy, ashley, parker, thank you very much. coming up andrew mccabe kept memos of his interactions with the president just like james comey did. so, how useful will they be to robert mueller? also, as the president tries to discredit the special counsel, the question for republicans, how far are they

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interactions with donald trump. a handful of memos with his direct engagement with the president and comey's leading to this tweet from president trump who writes, spent very little time with andrew mccabe, but he never took notes when he was with me. i don't believe he made memos except to help his own agenda probably at a later date. same with lying james comey. he writes, can we call them fake memos? joining us on set now, eli stokols, journalist, msnbc analyst. let me ask you about this. we know comey confided to mccabe about his interactions with mccabe. how possible is this for an obstruction case? >> i'm going to become an evidence nerd. in terms of corroborating comey for investigators, what mccabe heard and knows and saw is helpful. but mccabe could never get on the stand at trial, for instance, and tell the jury what comey told him. that would be hearsay.

so, mccabe's recollection of his own conversations with the president, more direct evidence, he could tell that at trial. mccabe's recollections of what comey told him the president told comey, that's hearsay. so, is it helpful? that was your question. yes, it's helpful. it helps the agents -- the investigators, the prosecutors chart the path, but it's not evidence. >> those who were suspicious of this idea of memos, the president calls them fake memos. you know this community well. this is what law enforcement does. >> all the time. >> you don't go back and say a year and a half ago, this is what happened, it's in my head. you write it down at the conclusion of the conversation so the facts stick. >> all the time. in fact, peter, you're a journalist. what do you do after you talk to somebody? you write it down. why do you write it down? because that's the best recollection of that conversation. i've done it myself -- >> so the fact the president said i didn't see him taking notes when he was with me, that's not the issue here. >> of course not. it would be rude to take notes sitting in the oval office with the president of the united states. when you get in your car on the

way back to the fbi -- >> type away. >> you're darn sure you write it down. >> barbara, let me ask you, the president asked andrew mccabe who he voted for then gave a denial about it. this is a rare exchange with the president and audio in side the west wing. take a listen. >> did you ask mccabe who he voted for? did you ask him that? >> i don't think so. >> you don't think you did? >> i don't know what's the big deal with that because i would ask you, who did you vote for? i don't think it's a big deal. but i don't remember that -- i saw that this morning. i don't remember asking him that question. >> is it possible you did? is it a possibility -- >> i don't remember asking him the question. >> this is kind af striking moment. you remember this is when the president marched in on reporters initially off the record with chief of staff john kelly. the quell for you is what is your take on how valuable, excuse me, mccabe is for mueller? >> oh, i think he could be very valuable. i think he could help bolster whatever jim comey says if he can tell a similar story.

and so this question about who did you vote for, what is the significance of that, it's not really the answer. it suggests similar to what jim comey said, that he's questioning his loyalty. are you on my team? and so president trump says, i don't think i did. if andy mccabe can testify that he did, and that at the time he wrote it down shortly after leaving the meeting that he wrote that down and so it does refresh his recollection as to what was said, i think it is consistent with what jim comey has said which is the president is acting in a way that is trying to intimidate me, and trying to demand loyalty which could suggest an obstruction of justice. >> eli, what strikes me here about these tweets from the president you and i have been witness thing from the start, he sort of test drives, test markets his slogans as it were. fake news, that one stuck. fake memos it appears is the next one he's going to go with right now. what do you make of that and what's the sort of significance to this moment? >> well, the president often tries to -- he often lives in his own sort of reality, the reality he wants to inhabit.

and he does everything he can to move public perceptions to align with his reality. and so this is another case where he's trying to discredit the entire investigation. he deeply believes, all my sources close to him say this is not a gambit. he really believes that people inside the intelligence community are against him. and he sees mccabe and comey as sort of obvious instances of that. he's been fixated on the fact that mccabe's wife ran for state legislature seat in virginia and got donations from a hillary clinton ally terry mcauliffe. he's fixated on that. the idea that the memos -- to him the memos are evidence of disloyal at this. they are not evidence as comey and mccabe say they were unnevd by their conversations with the president they felt compelled to write this down for later. trump said -- this was the case after comey testified on the hill about this. the republican talking point, the white house talking point was he's a leaker. he's leaking this information. he's writing this down to do me harm. in the realm of public opinion

that is where mccabe and comey sort of lineup with what the president is trying to do in pushing the public opinion to not really believe that this investigation, the entire special counsel's operation is on the up and up. >> barbara, let me ask you if i can. the former fbi special agent, this is striking, she had a threat on twitter this weekend that went viral in some circles. it was discussing the bar for misconduct by the office of professional responsibility. suggesting that it's extremely low right now. we still don't know what is in the report at this time. but the bottom line is a sha writes, if you consider this barbing so low, no agent at the fbi is beyond reproach, they must be held to this higher standard, she says there would be nobody left working in the west wing. what make of seeing this report and before mccabe became eligible for retirement -- he was eligible, and would have retired and become eligible for his full pension, that the

justice department act just like that? >> she seems to be pointing out the double standard of the lack of condor that we see from the white house with this incredibly high standard of the fbi. i don't know what the merits say about the mccabe investigation and we'll have to wait for that report to come out. to fire him before that report is ready to come out really seems extraordinary and unfair. it seems like the better result would be to -- if the report is not ready, then wait until the report is ready before you fire him. it seemed instead that they were racing the clock to beat his 50th birthday, the day on which he could retire with full pension in an effort to be vindictive, to undermine him. it seems like the ordinary course would have been to wait until you could publicly share with the world what were the reasons that he was fired. instead we're left with this statement by the attorney general and the reason to come later. >> chuck, let me read for you if i can what john brennan, the former cia chief tweeted over this weekend. he writes, when the full extent of your moral turpitude and

political corruption becomes known you will take your rightful place as a disgraced democr demagogue in the dust bin of history. those are strong words. >> extremely. i think what it gets at, peter is an important concept. the institutions of government are holding, the judiciary, within the executive branch. the state department is doing its job around the world every day as is the intelligence community, as is the defense department, as is the justice department. >> maybe congress not doing as well as the institutions, but i hear you >> i'll leave that branch for others to discuss. i truly believe these institutions of government are doing what they are is supposed to do. the president can say what he wants about the people who work in these places. he can call them the deep state or question their motives. i can tell you as a long-time prosecutor, i never knew the politics of anyone i worked with because politics didn't matter. it was mission, it was facts and it was law. that's what these folks are going to continue to do. >> chuck rosenberg, i appreciate

you being here. thank you for your insights today. coming up next, the president appears to be testing the limits in how far he can go in attacking the special counsel. so far only a handful of republicans are speaking out. so, how far will they let president trump go? when this bell rings... ...it starts a chain reaction... ...that's heard throughout the connected business world. at&t network security helps protect business, from the largest financial markets to the smallest transactions, by sensing cyber-attacks in near real time and automatically deploying countermeasures. keeping the world of business connected and protected. that's the power of and.

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once he goes after mueller, then we'll take action. i think that people see that as a massive red line that can't be crossed. >> if he tried to do that, that would be the beginning of the end of his presidency. >> republican senators jeff flake and lindsey graham there among the few republicans willing to issue any kind of warning to the president after his attacks this weekend on the justice department. and on federal law enforcement, conservative blog ergen ifr ruben, the response from the right proves republicans are not up to the tact of confronting president trump. ruben writing, quote, voters

should pay close attention to republicans lack of candor, curiosity and spine defending the constitution and upholding their oversight obligations. in the mid terms, democrats will have a strong case that republicans are not up to the task of governing at a time they should be restraining and not enabling an unfit president. those are the words of jennifer ruben. joining us now from the washington post opinion writer jonathan cape heart. nice to see you in person. no legislation protecting robert mull earn. no real push back against the threats on the fbi, the firing of james comey or even against the firing of andrew mccabe right now. what reason have republicans given the president or frankly any americans to believe they are going to stop him anywhere? >> they've given no reason to believe that they're going to stop him. and there have been plenty of opportunities for them to do so. the bill to protect mueller is sitting there in congress right now. they could do something right now to protect him.

but they're not. i mean, i was joking during the break, i'm calling it the silence of the lambs. they're just going along with this president and to what end? i mean, we know that president trump just has short-term thinking. he's living for the day. -- for today. he's living for the moment. republicans seem to have made the political calculation that in the short term it is beneficial to them to stick with this president, if only for fear of a primary challenge somewhere down the road from their right. at a certain point, the party that was supposed to be about god, flag and country is going to have to put flag and country first to deal with a president who as jennifer ruben i agree with says is an unfit president. >> you put 'finger on the key point. these guys are going to hear about it back at home. they're hearing about it from heap l who say, why aren't you giving better back up to the president. >> exactly. the people who you would expect to hear something from their constituents were sent to congress, one, to shrink

government or shut it down or keep it shut down if it's shutdown. but they were also sent there from the super safe republican districts to support this president. when we talk about the president's base and his approval rating being in the 30s, a majority of congress comes from those districts where everyone thinks that the president is doing just fine. >> so ashley, if i can, let's talk about the house intelligence committee's investigation that is now wrapped up. these are all the individuals the house intel committee failed to interview -- sorry, i forgot ashley is gone. let me bring you back in this. i got excited. ashley takes care of me from a distance on occasion. they failed to interview michael flynn, rick gates, george papadopoulos, and others. you are struck by the fact devin nunes and his team really were doing the president's bidding throughout the course of this time. why should we expect any differently? >> i don't think we should. as jonathan said, this is not --

this is sort of nakedly partisan and in many cases these politicians believe that is what their constitch webts wants. they want support for donald trump. chuck was talking in the last block about institutions of our democracy holding up. you mentioned congress not doing quite as well. i would agree with that. the constitution is a piece of paper. it doesn't defend itself. and if members of congress, whether they're cowardly, whether they're complicit, whatever the calculation is for them, if they do not decide that the institutions of this democracy actually matter and are worth standing up for, those institutions will continue to be weakened because donald trump is surrounding himself right now with a bunch of cable tv hosts, people who are enablers who tell him what he wants to hear. lindsey graham saying this will be the beginning of the end of his presidency on tv seemed to me like a guy trying to warn donald trump. but it also seemed like sort of a toothless warning. what has donald trump seen republicans in congress do to stop him? nothing so far, and i think you mentioned he puts these things out there, he tests as far as he can go.

so far he hasn't gotten much push back. >> mike conowe way said we didn't say there was no collusion, we said there was no evidence of collusion. there was some small, i guess, shining of light on some of the president's falsehoods in the course of what he has said right now. but, jonathan, specifically on the issue of obstruction of justice, understanding they found nothing in terms of collusion, but there is a whole 'nother story line, another thread we know robert mueller's team is reviewing now. why obstruction of justice if they had not been more clear? >> they meaning congress? >> yes. >> that goes back to your earlier question to me and it is about them holding the president accountable. when i interviewed former attorney general eric holder for my podcast, i asked him, is there a case for obstruction of justice? and he said yes, there is a technical case. and he ran through all of the things. the idea that congress, republicans -- just remind the viewers republicans are in the majority in the house and the senate. they have oversight responsibility.

the fact that they haven't followed through to hold the president accountable for all of these things that we know are true right now, from news reports, but also from the actions of bob mueller is really a dereliction of duty, of their constitutional responsibilities. and to pickup on something eli said about the constitution, we have to remember that the constitution is only as strong and as powerful as the men and women who swear to uphold it and protect it. >> you know there is thee bait this week about the possibility of taking that legislation to protect mueller and slapping it onto the spending bill the senate is considering. but it's hard know if that is actually going to happen. bob corker said today he doesn't see why they would do that. there are a lot of republicans who continue to keep their heads in the sand. james lang said i don't see why we need that now. that seems willfully blind the president has been tweeting about it months after not attacking mueller directly, the president is now doing that. his attorney over the weekend called for the investigation to come to a conclusion. and i think if you're not seeing the possibility this president

could take action to fire mueller you're simply not paying attention. >> let me put up poll numbers that would deliver information to the republicans. 50% support democrats, 40% support republicans. fbi 48% have a favorable view of the fbi despite the president's efforts to diswhy the fbi. only 20% unfavorable. robert mueller, a lot of americans have a lack of familiarity with, 28% a favorable view, 20% do not. those numbers, specifically the generic balance pot would resonate with the republicans. >> you would think so. but again, it could be short-term thinking that it's march. and the election is not until november. so, we really don't have to worry about this until maybe after 4th of july, maybe after labor day if these numbers are this way. then we can panic and run away from the president, pretend like

we don't know him. he's not with us. so, that's the only way i can possibly explain why republicans on capitol hill are not already running publicly with their hair on fire about the fact that they are saddled with a president and a leader of their party who is doing them long-term damage. >> jonathan cape heart, thank you. eli stokols, thank you. is mark zuckerberg in for a showdown on capitol hill? they are calling for the ceo of facebook to testify as a data debacle, how well protected is your private information online?

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back now. this afternoon nbc news has learned that jared kushner, paul manafort and former digital campaign director brad par skal who will be running the president's 2020 campaign were the primary figures involved in the trump campaign's hiring of a

british-based company named cambridge analytica. just this weekend we learned that company harvested, as they describe it, private information from more than 50 million facebook profiles without those individuals' permission. raising questions about how facebook protects user data and how that data was used during the last presidential election. nbc's chuck todd, my colleague, framed it this way on "meet the press." >> if facebook were a senator and we treated facebook as an individual, here's what senator facebook -- here's what we would put up in questioning senator facebook. senator facebook, in november of 2016 your founder says the idea that fake news on facebook won the election is pretty crazy. you admitted malicious actors did spread information on the election. russia baktd election content reached 126 million americans. then march 18, senator facebook, we found out 50 million users

had their data from facebook somehow ended up in the hands of a political consulting firm. facebook has a problem. >> let's bring in cara swisher, msnbc contributor. as you just heard from chuck a moment ago, facebook has a problem right now. how big is this problem for facebook at this moment? >> well, interestingly we've been banging on this drum at recoh about this lack of responsibility. the stark relief they don't have control of their platform and the platform is not benign and can be used by malevalent actors. facebook slow rolled us with all this information. now the stock is being affected and obviously regulators are now up in arms. i think this story, especially as it keeps rolling out, i think the cambridge analytica ceo,

there is an investigation where he's saying terrible things with a camera on him. >> yeah. >> as more and more information comes out about this, the worse and worse it is for facebook because it was the platform that was misused by all kinds of people it seems and they didn't protect their users and i think that's a bad message for them. >> to be clear, this isn't just bad for facebook stock today. the whole market tanked as a result of this today. and i think, kara, this gets to a fundamental thing. i was trying to explain this to folks today. this was a fundamental challenge that exists generationally. we're no longer just individuals. we're social media entities. if groups like cambridge analytica get access to your information, ultimate ma thely through facebook, they take that information and they alter the way that you view the world right now. they can tell you stuff if they think you're neurotic, they ply you with fear. i have to vote for this person or that person. that's the person that will keep me safe, for example. >> right. >> how satisfied are you with the reaction with what facebook has done since this information

has come out? because the bottom line is we don't know if that data is still out there. >> you know, i think mark zuckerberg has to talk somewhere. he's going to be talking in front of some of these political committees either europe or here or somewhere else. we invited him to code this year. he's got to trauk publicly and tough questioning, someone doing tough questioning of him obviously. i think they have to keep ahead of this. i thought they should have been ahead of cambridge analytica. this shouldn't have come out from the guardian in "the new york times." all of this stuff comes out in the press and not from them. and i think that's the issues. they're not ahead of this question and they need to be. and they need to know what's coming next because this is a massive platform. and what's being -- what it's being used for, peter is basically propaganda. someone is taking information that users put in and using it for propaganda purposes. whether it's facebook's fault or not, it's happening on the platform. >> you're right. let me read for a moment if i

can the statement from facebook on this issue of cambridge an lit cavity they write the following. we're in the process of conducting a comprehensive and external review as we work to determine the accuracy of the claims that the facebook data in question still exists. that's where our focus lies as we remain committed to vigorously enforcing our policies to protect people's information. brad parschal is one of the names floated in the conversation. he's going to be running the president's 2020 campaign. he was the digital director, the guy with the beard people recognize when we play a clip. this is what he said to 60 minutes a matter of months ago about what role facebook played in the trump campaign's success. >> i understood early that facebook was how donald trump was going to win. twitter is how he talked to the people. facebook was going to be how he won. >> and facebook is how he won? >> i think so. i mean, i think donald trump won, but i think facebook was the method. its was the highway in which his car drove on.

>> the highway on which his car drove on. any evidence this isn't the same highway folks will be driving on 2018 into 2020 right now? >> you know, facebook and twitter and all the others promise they have things in place to stop this, but who knows. i mean that's the thing. they've got to be incredibly transparent about this and understand that their platform is right now in the middle of a push/pull. it's not just brad parschal. it's steve bannon, the mercers who back this company. anyone can use facebook. the question is whose are they guarding, the users and data or all these different firms that are pulling not just political, but advertising, all kinds of, you know, the data is being misused here obviously and they've got to have a stringent system not just about data, but about advertising and about content. it's the same fake news thing. it cannot be on the platform. they have to have values and stick to them. >> yeah, that's the irony of this whole conversation.

the median i can't is not where the information has been coming from the very beginning. he has to look at his own campaign. thanks very much. >> thanks a after the break, pr trump's disdain for leaks is documented but how far he is willing to go to stop them. thank you so much. thank you! so we're a go? yes! we got a yes! what does that mean for purchasing? purchase. let's do this. got it. book the flights! hai! si! si! ya! ya! ya! what does that mean for us?

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evening for the trump administration, known for the

unconventional way of doing things, this one is an eyebrow raiser. from ruth marcus in the washington post, an early months of the administration at the behest of now president trump who was furious over leaks within the white house, senior white house staff members were asked to, and did, sign nondisclosure agreements. vowing not to reveal confidential information and exposing them to damages for any violation. so that is where we begin. i'm joined by barbara mcquaid with us. and if you can, how out of the ordinary is this for a president of the united states to demand of staffers, the people who work for them, to sign a nondisclosure agreement, like he might have done at the trump organization but now as the head of the president of the united states, you don't have to sue them. you fire them if they leak information. >> it is unheard of. it is very different -- and maybe this is part of the culture clash between private sector and public sector. and in the private sector, can do what you want.

but in the public sector, you are the government of the united states and to tell people what they can't say is a prior restraint unconstitutional. there are certain areas you can carve out and prevent people from disclosing classified information or privileged information. but to say you can't discuss anything that happened -- during your time at the white house is unenforceable as violated the first amendment. >> and the bottom line is this is not constitutional and not enforceable and the fact he did it is more about him demanding it than what it actually means. >> i do. but i think it could have a bad effect in che-- in terms of the chilling effect. and if you signed, and you know it is unenforceable, you might want to push it because you might have to go through expensive litigation. so i think coco be a reflection on president trump's view point. >> why is he doing this? >> he's done this for years in the private sector to scare people out of coming after him,

people with defrauded contracts or damaging person information. this is something that he has done, somewhat effectively it seems like, to keep stories out of the press and to keep people from -- keeping to pay up on some outstanding bills. you just think about all of the people who said maybe trump will be different as president. he might change his behavior. hasn't happened. >> jonathan, our take on this. >> i wasn't expecting him to change. but i think that barbara put her finger on it. the difference between the private citizen trump and president trump, he's discovering or learning that he has not been behaving in a way that recognizes the fact that as a president of the united states, the tactics you used in manhattan and new york city are inappropriate and will not work when you are president of the united states. >> fellas. stay with us. we'll be right back. but now they know...

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capehart and barbara mcquaid. that is this hour. i'm peter alexander in for nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" started now with katy tur in for chuck. good afternoon. >> hey there, peter, it is quiet in the studio because normally nicolle is across from me and her panelists are fired up and we have to pretrend they are not here and now you are in d.c. so it feels lonely. so scream from d.c. if you can. >> we shall. have a good hour. >> thank you very much. and if it is monday, it's fired and fury. tonight andrew mccabe's firing and the president's new attacks on robert mueller. >> the special counsel will conduct a probe that is fair and thorough and arrive at the truth. plus demanding answers. lawmakers slam facebook's data breach of 50 million users. and how that data was used during the 2016 presidential election. >> i d