here on earth, thank you so very much for being here with us and good night from nbc news headquarters here in new york. this morning, president trump defends his congratulatory call with president putin. plus, another shutdown many looms. it could keep the government funded through september as long as it's passed by tomorrow night's deadline. and another round of heavy snow as the east coast gets hit with its fourth nor'easter in less than a month. slippery roadways have caused at least three deadly accidents. good morning, everyone.

it's thursday, march 22nd. we begin with the very latest on relations with russia. yesterday, president trump spent the snow day tweeting his defense of his congratulatory call to russian leader vladimir putin writing, quote, i called president putin to congratulate him on his victory. in the past, obama called him, also. the fake news media is crazed because they want me to excoriate him. they are wrong. getting along with russia and others is a good thing, not a bad thing. they can help solve problems with syria, ukraine, isis, iran and even the coming arms race. bush tried to get along but didn't have the smarts. obama and clinton tried, but didn't have the energy or chemistry. remember reset. peace through strength. this comes as trump included in his briefing details a section says do not congratulate in all

caps. if this story is accurate, that means someone leaked the president's briefing papers. leaking some information is likely illegal. john kelly is frustrated and deeply disappointed that the president's briefing notes for the president's call were putin were leaked. president trump's tweeted defense comes as more top republicans on capitol hill are speaking out about the congratulatory call. sfw >> what he did in ukraine, what he did in the baltics, what he's done in london, poisoning people with nerve gas, that's a criminal activity. i wouldn't have a conversation with a criminal. >> i'm not sure why the president felt like he needed to call and congratulate vladimir putin on what was a fake election. i think most of us don't see that as necessary. >> vladimir putin is not a friend. vladimir putin is a despite.

the president of the united states was wrong to congratulate him and the white house press secretary was wrong to duck a simple question about whether or not putin's re-election was free and fair. and yesterday, when the white house refused to speak directly and clearly about this matter, we were weakened as a nation and a tyrant was strengthened. >> senator sasse was among several lawmakers of whomever was behind the leak of the president's notes with putin. >> the president's call, congratulatory call was terribly ill advised, but that doesn't change the fact that the leaking of the confidential briefing materials for his call were also wrong. it shouldn't be difficult to say both of these things. they're both true, so we should be able to say both of them at once. a president's staff shouldn't leak. in cases of principal, y may ne

to resign, so resign. >> on the i'm not sure his notes are classified. i just don't understand. if you work for the guy and you're trying to undermine him in the public, why are you working there? only a handful of people in the white house could have known both about the call and what was said and the notes that were prepared for him. my view of it is if you're leaking stuff, it's to hurt him. if you're trying to hurt him, it's because you don't like him or you don't support him. why are you still there. cbs has conits interview with stormy daniels on "60 minutes" will air this weekend. there are two major movements from women in our lawsuits. he he denies the claims of sexual misconduct. >> let's talk a little bit about that. joining us here on set, legal analyst dan fee sovalis.

great to have you with us bright and early. first, let's talk about the "60 minutes" interview. we generally have an idea of what the interview is about, obviously, her relationship. is there anything that could be gleamed from it that could potentially be problematic or the president? >> there are many things that can be prop problemattic for the president. on the one hand, just the story alone of this relationship, which by now most people are accepting as true. but people will be scrutinizing this for its factual accuracy. they'll be checking it against the history, what she said. but her lawsuit is more important because now that this case is in federal court, the defendants in the case will try to get it back into arbitration. but the problem for donald trump and his team is every step this case takes towards being more public and less private in arbitration is bad for the trump

team. >> is the fact that she's doing "60 minutes" interview is the nondisclosure agreement has been broken? is that the case that the president is going to try to make? >> the interesting thing about contract law is depending on whatever side you ask. stormy daniels team would say we didn't breach it because there was never a contract to breach. david dennison, aka donald trump, never signed it and this contract is so flawed that it never existed and it's unenforceable. the trump team, on the other hand, would very much disagree with that. they would say of course she breached the agreement. >> she got the money. >> whether or not david dennison, whoever signed it, it was a valid contract. she absolutely signed it and she agreed to an arbitration clause. she also agreed not to reveal her story. she is in material breach is what the with trump team would say. >> he know you have a article

about tee women with legal actions against trust. who poses the greatest danger. so who does? wake us through your analysis. >> of these three cases, each of the three women have different kinds of claims. but we can group stormy daniels and mcgoogal's lawsuit as similar. stormy daniels is dealing with a settlement agreement with a nondisclosure agreement. karen dugal income dougall gave exclusive rights to her company called ami. now she says that it was illegal, that it was against public policy and she was defrauded into entering into the agreement. but both of these situations involve arbitration clauses and arbitration is where lawsuits go to die. the one woman who does not have an arbitration clause or even a

contract to contend with is summer svervos. and that case, as of this week, is going forward in new york supreme court and it will be subjected to the rules of discovery which is devastating. so the answer to your question is, summer zervos' case poses the clearest and most present danger to trump and his team. attorney general jeff sessions fired former fbi acting director andrew mccabe. but three sources tell nbc news that as the fbi's deputy director, mccabe authorized an investigation into whether sessions lied to congress. when sessions tied to the senate judiciary committee about the trump campaign's contacts with russians in this exchange with then senator al franken. >> if there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the trump

campaign communicated with the russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do? >> senator franken, i'm not aware of any of those activities. i have been called a surrogate a time or two in that campaign and i did not have communications with the russians. >> but news report later revealed that sessions had multiple contacts with the then russian ambassador. the investigation was not known to sessions when he made the decision to fire mccabe, according to a justice department official. mccabe and deputy attorney general rod rosenstein privately informed lawmakers about the matter last year. now, the inquiry eventually went to special counsel robert mueller in his investigation of possible collusion between the trump campaign and russia. in a statement, sessions' lawyer said the special counsel's office has informed me that after interviewing the attorney general and conducting additional investigation, the attorney general is not under

investigation for false statements or perjury in his confirmation hearing testimony and related written submissions to congress. still ahead, we're taking a look at robert mueller's interview with president trump. we'll talk to one reporter who has new reporting on that. plus, the latest on the nor'easter that continues to bring heavy, wet snow to parts of the east coast. this morning, we're going to get a full check on the forecast, coming up next.

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welcome back, everybody. joining me here on set is sonam s chef. i want to start with you on what we're seeing with the president calling the russian president putin o congratulating him on what many considered to be a sham election. but at the same time, you have the president going after bob

mueller, really upping the criticism against the special counsel there. dissect that for us. >> so, yeah, we've definitely seen an increased aggression come from trump toward the special counsel over the last week, particularly after we saw developments in the russia investigation, whether it was felix confirming last week that the trump organization was negotiating with a sanctioned russian bank during the election. we've seen a ton of new developments. we saw trump's own personal defense lawyer for the first time speak out against bob mueller and the russia investigation. suggesting it should be shut down, right? yeah, exactly. that was the first time we saw that. trump has been calling directly for muellerer to be shut down. that was the first time we saw that, too. we've definitely seen parallel developments as far as trump's coziness toward putin and his increased aggression towards the probe. >> what was the triggering point that we have seen after months or maybe close to a year of

president trump and his legal team walk ago fine line, not criticizing the mueller counsel, the special counsel by fame, i should say, but kind of criticizing the investigation, calling it a witch-hunt, to suddenly shifting gears and going after the special counsel personally? >> so this actually came shortly after the special counsel sent trump's legal team a list of questions that they wanted to ask him about. a lot of those were said to have centered around obstruction of justice, which indicates that the special counsel is deaf nasly closing in on the would you say when it comes to that question, the firing of former feb director james comey, the firing of former security adviser mike equal flynn. we also saw that trump's frustration came after mueller subpoenaed the organization breaching that ready line that mueller crossed when he investigated his family business. >> what do you think that the special counsel can wants to try and learn from president trump

directly, that he may not have already learned from other sources or other documents that he's obtained? and then with all of the potential shake-up of president trump's legal team, now that we know he's hired digenova as an attorney whab does that mean for his defense strategy? >> so as far as what what mueller wants to know, he's focused on two questions. one, what did trump do? what was he thinking when he did it? and what was his reasoning behind doing that? that deals specifically with the fearing of comey and with the firing of flynn last year, those two events to be connected, also. because comey was fired after repeatedly declining trump's request to quote/unquote let go of the investigation into flynn. as far as the shake-up to his legal team goes, it seems pretty clear that with dgenova hiring, trump is close to he be done cooperating with the special counsel. ty cobb has largely advocated for a very cooperative approach with the rush uria probe, but it

seems like trump is done following that. >> and of course there was that swru with president trump and lester holt where he suggested he fired james comey because of the russia investigation. >> exactly. >> thank you for being with us. so the east coast has been -- sorry, excuse me, louis. go ahead. >> no problem. the east coast has been hit with a fourth nor'easter in a month. slippery roadways and poor visibility caused at least three deadly accidents in new york and new jersey yesterday. smoke snow is expected to continue in parts of the northeast until this afternoon. more than 150 school districts have announced delays or closures today. airports in the region are trying to get back on track after more than 4,000 cancellations. there are already more than 2,400 delays today, not a good day to travel if you're in the northeast. for more on today's forecast, let's bring in nbc meteorologist bill karins. bill, i know you're just starting to get in some of those

snow totals. a patch on long island? >> some areas did get this big nor'easter, but i'd say out of our four nor'easters that we've had recently, this was the runt of the litter. later in the month of march, temperatures were borderline, happened during the daylight hours. a lot of the roads held up pretty fine during this storm. these snow totals, remember, are on grassy surfaces or in some cases on the snowboard. central park got eight, philadelphia with 7, d.c. with 4. louisville, kentucky, ended up higher than any of the big cities in the east. so the storm is not that far away from cape cod and the radar looks impressive. it's snow coming down in hartford and worcester and providence. here is the deal and it's been this the way all night long. 37 montauk, 34 nantucket. right now, the roads are just wet and they're considering a

huge bust of a forecast because you're not going to get your 4 to 6 inches or your 4208 inches. you're probably going to get zero. good news for people that don't want to do shoveling. kids at home today with just wet roads. sometimes it happened like this, unfortunately. the other story we're going to watch as we go throughout the day today is in california. we don't want to forget about our friends there. up to this point, this heavy plume of rain has been just to the west of the burn area near ventura and santa barbara counties here. it is tremendous amounts of rain. during the day today, this shifts over the burn area. so if we're going to get the rockslides, the mudslides, the debris flows, it will be as we go through youout our day here and we're going to get those 2 to 4 feet of snow, too, at the high elevations. we can deal with that. the biggest issue is going to be what happened to those burn scar areas, ayman, later today. >> bycoastal weather stories. that's exactly why i was trying

to get in on that action and bring it in. my favorite. thanks for that, bill. still ahead, a historic night in the nba where dwight howard pulls off a feat only seen twice in the last 36 years. while the bidding war for one nfl franchise is now in the billions of dollars. details next in sports. this is something that i'm really passionate about- i really want to help. i was on my way out of this life. there are patients out there that don't have a lot of time. finally, it was like the sun rose again and i was going to start fighting back now. when those patients come to me and say, "you saved my life...." my life was saved by a two week old targeted therapy drug. that's what really drives me to- to save lives.

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toe drag. score! >> crosby deigs it out, tries t feed. unbelievable goal. >> there's a bat off the ice and a chip in behind kerry price leak he's done it a million times. >> what a goal by sidney crosby. start, a historic night for the hornets center divide howard, scoring 32 points and grabbing 30 rebounds to help his team steal a 111-105 win over the nets. hitting 12 out of 21 attempts for free throws helping erase a 23-point second half deficit howard's 30-30 performance is

just the third since 1982. wilt chamberlain holds the record of 30-30 games. the bidding for the carolina panthers has reportedly reached $2.5 billion. the escalation has prompted michael rubin to drop out of the process. diddy and curry were attempting to join rubin in his bid for the team. if sold at the current bidding price, it would set a record for a sport franchise and shalths the previous buffalo bills record. turning now to tennis and the miami open, serene if a williams makes an uncharacteristically early exit falling to squaw pan's osaka. it was williams' fourth match since returning to the attorney after giving birth to her daughter and the first time since the 2012 french open that

she's been eliminated in the first round, something that's only happened four times in her entire career. finally, in major league baseball, the indians aren't set to retire their controversial logo until the upcoming season, cooperstown is a step ahead. the baseball hall of fame announcing it will no longer use the logo for plaques of new members which includes that for jim tome. he will feature the block c logo when he is inducted in july. congratulations to him. >> a lot of impressive highlights there. i was fascinated by the carolina panthers being worth that much. >> 2.5 billion. >> they're a great team, but the value of the market doesn't necessarily seem it would be as high as it is. >> it's over a billion dollars more than the last deal. still ahead, park zuckerberg

weighs in on the cambridge analytica scandal. plus, new details about the suspected serial bomber whore terrorized those in austin, texas. police say they've uncovered a confession. we'll have the latest, coming up next had opinion i'm not a bigwig.

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. welcome back, everyone. it's the bottom of the hour. let's start with the morning's top stories for you. president trump is defending his controversial phone call to russia's vladimir putin congratulating him on his election win and the white house

is trying to crack down on information leaks following the revelation of the reported warnings trump's own advisers gave him over that phone call. nbc news chief white house correspondent hallie jackson has more. >> a congratulatory controversy escalating after trump's call to russian president vladimir putin on his re-election win. a voe derided by election observers with stuffed ballot boxes, virtually no competition. it's why the president was explicitly warned by his top advisers fought the to congratulate putin. a briefing note in all caps reading do not congratulate. so what happened? >> i had a call with president putin and congratulated him on the victory. >> the white house, now furious na this leaked. two sources familiar with the discussion tell nbc news chief of staff john kelly is frustrated and deep his disappointed with the

disclosure. the president blasting his press sessers for not being smart enough to have a relationship with putin. >> it would be like me calling fidel castro and saying, good job, you took 99%. >> critics argue the president pulled punches by not mentioning that poisoned british ex spy or moscow's election interference. even with new warnings the kremlin will try to interfere again. >> with we think the threat is high. >> i think mr. putin has flattered donald trump and it really has, i think, helped putin to skate by some of these issues. >> six years ago, then president obama at the did congratulate putin on his election win then. that is before moscow ramped up its attacks during the 2016 election. as for a potential meeting between presidents trump and putin, both countries are trying

to figure out when and where. switching gears for a moment, facebook's ceo mark zuckerberg has broken his silence in the wake of the revelation that a data analytics firm was able to collect the personal information of 50 million users of the social network giant. zuckerberg announced the scandal yesterday followed by a blitz of interviews is six days after this controversy broke. in his more than 900 word message, zuckerberg wrote in part, quote, we have a responsibility to protect your data and if we can't, then we don't deserve to serve you. i've been working to understand exactly what happened and how to make sure this doesn't happen again. it was a breach of trust between facebook and the people who share their data with us and expect us to protect it. we need to fix it. i started facebook and at the end of the day i'm responsible for what happens on our platform. in a series of interviews after posting that message, zuckerberg talked about what his company

plans to do to address this scandal. >> we're going to go now and investigate aft investigate every app that has access to a large amount of information from before we locked down our platform. this is going to be an intensive process, but this is important. this is something we should have done with cambridge analytica. we should not have trusted the certification they gave us. >> will you testify before congress? >> i'm happy to if it's the right thing to do. what we try to do is send the person at facebook who will have the most knowledge about what congress is trying to learn. if that's me, then i am happy to go. >> despite speaking out on this scandal, zuckerberg has draen criticism for not doing so sooner.

there has been a call for people to delete their accounts with the site. joining us now, neals. it's good to have you with us this morning. the cambridge analytics facebook scandal has renewed calls for congress to regulate how technology companies are using our personal data. he's signaling that he's open to that. what would that legislation look like and do you think that it is likely to happen? >> well, it's good to be with you. the first thing that i think congress is going to need to do is sort of get its collective mind around what the problem is and what might actually need to happen. one thing that i think you might see increasing calls for is for facebook to have a better idea and fought just facebook, but other social media sites if there's legislation to have a better idea of who these people are who are actually getting access to the data. because it seems like some of

the concerns on capitol hill are -- as was in that clip with mark zuckerberg as to who these people are and what the certifications are that they're doing with the data and that they have in terms the of where their money was coming from. >> let's switch gears because i want to ask you about daca in particular protection for young immigrants from deportation to this spending bill. it actually fell apart. what is the likelihood do you think that we're going to see any action from congress on daca or are democrats do you think just byte biding their time hoping they can take control of the house after the midterms? well, i think right now with this omnibus spending bill coming up today that does not address the daca situation, the most likely situation right now is that democrats are biding their time to see what the

courts end up doing. they would much prefer, obviously, to take some sort of legislative action, but absent that, the next sort of theater for this debate is the legal system and whether or not federal court thus far effectively stopped the trump administration from start some sort of program ending the daca program. so as a result of that, that's kind of where it is right now and partly why i think we don't have a shutdown threat this go around over im investigation. >> yeah. it seems that's been the strategy the last couple of weeks. niels, thank you for joining us. >> thank you. and turning now to texas, we are learning more about the man suspected as the serial bomb whore terrorized austin all month long. officials identified him as 23-year-old mark anthony conditt adding they found a 25-minute recording on his cell phone in

which he admits to what he has done. he shared with the level of specificity how each of the bombs were made and differed which was never shared publicly, adding that he did not mention terrorism or hate as a motive but was, quote, the outcry of a very challenged young man, talking about challenges in his personal life. investigators say they found a, quote, treasure trove of evidence in conditt's home, likening his home to a bomb making factory. multiple law enforcement officials say that the components used in the explosives were fairley rudimentary and easily available. however, the batteries used were, quote, exotic and ordered online from asia and tracking those helped them lead to conditt. authorities say they do not believe more explosives are out in public, but urge people to remain vigilant. and we go to sacramento. police there released some body camera footage of two police officers fatally shooting an

unarmed man in his grandparents' backyard. he was killed after deputies approached the 23-year-old father of who after respond to go a 911 call of a man breaking into car windows in the area. he was found in the backyard that he was sharing with his grandparents. second later, officers fired 20 rounds after apparently mistaking his cell phone for a gun. clark died on the scene. at the no time can officers be heard identifying themselves as police. the officers involved in the shooting have not been identified. they have been placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation. >> what an absolutely heartbreaking tragedy in that story there. all right. still ahead, congressional leaders strike a deal to pay the government's bills. what top republicans are now trying to do to get the

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♪ otezla. show more of you. welcome back, everyone. congressional leaders finally reached an agreement on a $1.3 trillion spending bill to find the government through september. in an effort to reassure the president, house speaker paul ryan went to the white house yesterday to meet with president trump and vice president pence, legislative director mark short and chief of staff john kelly. after the meeting, a spokesman for trump said ryan was supportive of the bill and the two had a good conversation about the wins delivered for the president. the legislation includes a number of wins for republicans and democrats, including $1.6 billion in funding for physical

barriers and technology for the wall, increases funding to the military, fix tess national instant criminal background check system, puts $10 billion more towards infrastructure projects. allocates $2 billion for school safety, provides an additional $3 billion to fight the opioid epidemic and includes $541 million in funding to construct a rail tunnel between new york and new jersey. lawmakers will now rush to pass the bill through both chambers by midnight friday to avoid the third government shutdown of the year. and for an update on the fourth nor'easter of the year for us, let's bring in bill karins. you're starting to get some snow totals and assess where the worst damage was from the snow. >> i can't. i can't believe what you told me earlier that the boston public schools are all closed today and they have a quart wither inch of snow in boston and they're not supposed to get much more. you can imagine the complaints

coming in because of that, all the parents making and changing their plans. remember as a kid you want wake up in the morning and see how much snow there was and you would wait to see if it's canceled or delayed. some areas did get nailed. long island was an area hit the hardest. one spot picked up almost a foot of snow in two hours last night. central park was at 8, d.c. was at 4. philadelphia 7. hartford, providence, up through boston, there is not much in any snow. those two warm temperatures are still in the 30s. it's snowing, but it's melting as it comes down. it might as well be plain old rain. as far as the day goes, the only issues we're going to have, northern jersey, temperatures are below freezing. it snowed there yesterday. that's probably the only icy roads we're going to have any issues with. everybody else, the drive throughout southern new england, the drive is fine. the other story we're going to be watching is out in the west today and tomorrow.

heavy rain on the coast. the rain shifts to the north as we go throughout the day. so and also to the east. so we're starting off with very heavy rain this morning around san francisco, coastal areas just to the west of where the fires were in santa barbara and ventura counties. it will be moving through the fire zone today. we'll wait and see. we'll know by the end of today, ayman, just how bad these storms are going to be. we don't know if the mud and storms will be in residential areas or not. still ahead, the federal reserve decides it's time to hike interest rates once again. details on what the latest move will mean for your wallet and the other stories driving your business day. thing. your snapping pics all day, all night thing.

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welcome back. in his first news conference as head of the federal reserve, jerome powelled confirmed raising interest rates are coming. what does this small rate hike mean for the average investor, the average person on the street? >> louis, let's get back to basics. this is good news, okay? they've upped their estimates for the economy, downgraded their estimates for unemployment and mrs. inflation coming back, as well. if you're a saver, good news. you're going to get more on your

savings. most americans have big credit card debt out there. the average balance is 3,065 on credit cards, as well. rates will go up on that, with as well. mortgages will go up. the 30-year mortgage going up to currently around 4.5% up from its 2012 low of 3.5%. elsewhere, lewis, a lot of concern over tariffs and trade wars with china, as well. the white house set to announce tariffs, cracking down on clean ice theft of intellectual property. cnbc understands this will not include visa restrictions on chinese students and chinese investment into the u.s., as well. >> and probably the most important news of the day, steve, starbuck sess releasing its latest limited edition concoction. is this a recipe for social media magic? it's a frapiccino that is supposed to tell the future. >> apparently it's a crystal

ball tfrappichino. green means luck and purel means magic, wonder and enchancement. some people are wondering about timing. so something like the zombie coming out at halloween. >> looks like a lot of work to put that together. >> we're going to be off the air in a few minutes and we'll go down and try our luck. >> all right. thanks a lot. >> great to have you with us, steve. live from london. thanks so much. >> axios jonathan swan has a look at this one big thing and coming up, president trump lashes out over his phone call with vladimir putin. the president's defense of why he congratulated the russian leader despite warnings not to do so. plus, mark zuckerberg breaks his

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welcome back, everyone. joining us now from washington with a look at axios, jonathan swan. so what's axios's one big thing heading into this morning? >> well, donald trump's expected announcement today of as much as $50 billion a year worth of tariffs on hundreds of chinese products, this is a big deal on its face economically, but analysts fear it could lead to a trade war. chinese is threatening to retaliate. a little bit of inside dope on this which we reported last week in an oval office meeting on thursday, trump's team brought him about $30 billion worth of tariffs and trump turned to his

economic advisor and said, quote unquote, kevin, you've got to make the number bigger. so it's going to be bigger than 30 billion. i'm told it could be in the $50 billion ballpark. >> so let me ask you really quickly, what has axios learned regarding the most recent leak regarding trump's unhappiness with the spending bill? >> this was one of the remarkable -- you see this so often, the tension between the trump administration and capitol hill, but this played out in real time yesterday. i was getting calls from senior republicans both in the house and senate who were perplexed that they were finding out through the press in real time about trump's unhappiness with aspects of the spending bill. he was unhappy that it didn't have enough money for border wall funding and again, just very angry phone call from the hill saying who leaks this and why do they feel this is helpful to leak this when we're on the precipice of doing this deal and

obviously we've had to swallow a lot of stuff we don't like. in the end paul ryan went to the white house, trump agreed to it. you know, peace at last, but it was a very fraught process. >> and it seems that the word leaks is back in the headlines given some of the recent news about leaks coming out of the white house including that report about the president not supposed to congratulate president trump. he did that and that obviously upset a lot of people but how are these leaks being perceived on capitol hill, that one and the one you were just talking about? >> in the way that capitol hill views this trump administration is just with befuddlement. they still -- after more than a year they do not understand this administration. they don't understand the motivation for the leaks. one senior aide called me yesterday and said to me, why do we have this tick to be moment by moment account of his every mood and emotion? why? why do they -- it was like a plea for help to understand why

it happens. they really -- there really is a lack of understanding of how this white house works and how he as an individual works. and one of the reasons it's such a leaky place is he doesn't really care. he's very free and open. he talks to a loot v lot of people and the staff don't feel particularly loyal to him. >> and there's a point marco rubio brought up. he doesn't understand why someone working for the president could turn around and leak information that would be harmful to the president. let me ask you really quickly. could trump's lack of trust damage his relationship with lawmakers on the hill? >> well, he has a very fraught relationship with lawmakers on the hill and part of the reason is because he is -- his basin sti -- his base instinct is to be

private. they're trying to play you and one of trump's greatest fears is his fear of being played for a sucker, so when he hears from people outside the white house, including his son don jr., that they're all trying to play him reenforces his instincts and you get little moments like we had yesterday. >> are they taking their toll on the white house from what you're hearing from your sources? obviously we heard the chief of staff john kelly, but are they going after finding who may have been responsible for some of these leaks? >> to distinguish between them, the spending bill is not a huge deal, but the do not congratulate, the leak that one of his national security advisors gave him these briefing notes, that is being taken very seriously inside the white house. they are doing a process to try

and find out who leaked it. people are suspicious. i've spoken to senior officials who are suspicious of certain people on the national security council and what it has done is it has inflamed what is already a climate of mistrust and mutual suspicion inside the west wing. >> yeah, you can imagine what that atmosphere must be like given the fact that these leaks continue to happen. jonathan swan, live for us in washington, d.c. viewers can sign up for it at ox i don't say.com. that does it for us on this thursday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. >> vladimir putin is not a friend. vladimir putin is a despite. the white house secretary was wrong to duck a simple question about whether or not putin's re-election was free and fair. and yesterday when the white house refused to speak directly

and clearly about this matter, we were weakened as a nation and a tyrant was strerngngthened. >> he's among the republican voices sounding off on president trump's call with vladimir putin. this while president trump tweets his defense all day yesterday attacking the media while lashing out at his white house predecessors. meanwhile, the russia probe breaks new ground with reports that robert mueller is now offering immunity to at least one witness. all of that as stormy daniels sits down with 60 minutes with her claims of an affair with donald trump and being threatened to stay silent. what a week it's been. it's only thursday, everybody. good morning. it's march 22nd. welcome to morning joe. we're here in washington. with us we have politics senator and host of the pod cast candidate confessional. i love that. sam stein is with us. former chief of staff, are