that's our broadcast for tonight. we hope to see you at 4 p.m. eastern tomorrow. good night from nbc news headquarters in new york. cnbc had two big scoops today. cnbc had two big scoops today. the first one is that they were the first u.s. news outlet to translate the list of american-made products that is about to get smacked by china. this is something i said we were anticipating today. it has now happened. this is response to our own president's efforts to start as much of a trade war as he can with china. he said america has nothing to lose by picking this kind of fight with china, where we try to make it harder for them to export stuff to us, and they try to make it harder for us to export stuff to them.

the president thinks we cannot lose in a fight like this, but now, thanks to cnbc translating this list, we have a pretty good sense of who in the u.s. does have a lot to lose in this fight even if the president himself doesn't see it. anybody in the u.s. involved in the production of this very long but very specific list of american-made things might beg to differ with the president's assertion that there's nothing to lose. the chinese government announced today they're going to go after people in the united states involved in the production and exports of this whole big long list of things -- uncombed cotton, soy bones black or yellow, fresh and cold boneless beef, frozen beef with bones, frozen boneless beef, dried cranberries, frozen orange juice, non-frozen orange juice.

hookah, tobacco, other tobacco for smoking. also whiskeys, and interestingly, there's no modifier on whiskey, just which is -- whiskeys. if you know anyone who's involved in the production of any whiskey, if it involves export to the chinese market, today was a very bad day for your friend in that business. i mean, this list the chinese government put out today was bad news for anybody involved in the production and export of american cars. diesel powered vehicles. gasoline powered vehicles. hybrids, trucks, so it's a big, big, big, big long list. it's very specific. liquefied propane. self-adhesive plates, shields. aircraft that weigh between 15,000 and 45,000 kilograms when they're empty, which i think is designed to stick a fork in the

eye of boeing, although i'm not totally sure. but all these american products are being singled out by china as of today for punishment, for economic punishment in response to what president trump is trying to do to china. so cnbc was first to translate that list. there's 106 very specific american-made items on that list. but that was their first scoop today. cnbc's second scoop today was about the national security adviser. not the outgoing one, h.r. mcmaster, although he made news himself in the last 24 hours, h.r. mcmaster, the now-fired national security adviser is winding down his last few days in office in what we expect to be his final public remarks as national security adviser. mr. mcmaster contradicted the president directly and criticized the weakness of the american government's current stance toward russia. this farewell speech was fairly blistering. we have a little bit more of that coming up. we have the tape of that speech.

but cnbc's scoop about the national security adviser today wasn't about h.r. mcmaster but the incoming appointee, set to replace him in the job, controversial former u.n. ambassador and high-profile fox news contributor john bolton who's supposed to start the job monday. cnbc reported exclusively today ahead of his expected first day on the job, he has been meeting exclusively with white house attorneys about potential conflicts of interest for his new national security adviser job. now we don't know exactly what the substance of those discussions has been. but cnbc suggests that it may have had something to do with bolton's political operations, his pac and super-pac. now we've been reporting on this as a potential problem for bolton as national security adviser since he was first

announced as president trump's pick for that job. it was clear from the beginning that bolton's political action committees were going to be an issue for this kind of appointment. the problem appears to be getting more acute as we get closer to what is supposed to be his start date on monday. a couple days ago we got word that bolton would be shutting down his pac and his super pac. cnbc suggests that the wind down itself may be a problem. these committees that bolton controls have already been active in this year's mid-term elections, taken in money for the mid-term elections, sitting on millions of dollars, so the wind-down may be complicated according to cnbc, but in addition to the way they're being wound down, the way they came into existence in the first place, the origin story of these bolton organizations, may ultimately be an even bigger problem. here's what i mean. two weeks ago, a whistleblower

with pink hair and a very avant-garde fashion sense came forward to explain the core operations of the data firm that was hired and used by the trump campaign in 2016. this was this company cambridge analytica, funded by trump mega donor robert mercer. it was run in part by trump's campaign chief steve bannon. he came forward in britain, eventually to parliament, but first to british news organizations to lay out for the public how exactly cambridge analytica does its work. he has now provided documentation and extensive testimony about how cambridge analytica does its work. how it has done work in africa, in the caribbean, in the uk brexit vote where they voted to leave the european union. cambridge analytica supported the "leave" vote in the brexit campaign but also in american elections in support of republican candidates, particularly in 2014.

you might remember that once this whole scandal started, the company suspended its ceo, alexander nix after footage like this was broadcast on their channel 4. >> it's a dreadful thing to say but they need to be true. >> the brand was defeat crooked hillary. you remember. crooked hillary and the "oo" of crooked was with handcuffs and it was all that she belonged behind bars. >> we have lots of history. >> yes, they are very beautiful.

i find that works very well. so among the services apparently being offered by the trump campaign's data firm is that they will offer to deposit some lovely ukrainian girls at the home of your opponent. that might be considered a nice thing to do for a friend, but cambridge analytica is not offering to do that in a nice way. that undercover footage, where they're making those kinds of offers in terms of what their service menu is like, that showed executives from cambridge analytica, from the trump campaign's data firm. they're pitching these kind of services in this undercover footage. since then, cambridge analytica has suspended their ceo. that footage and related reporting also led to a raid on the offices of cambridge analytica in london by british authorities. but what has emerged as the bigger scandal involving the firm is that this whistle blower who came forward has provided documents and testimony showing that the core business of cambridge analytica, their bread and butter work as an organization was based on data that was effectively ripped off from facebook.

this whistle blower, christopher wylie testified that these people had all of their data and all of their online behavior on facebook taken without permission by this company, and that's the data used to build their business. today facebook published a new blog post that acknowledged quietly in the 11th paragraph of a 12-paragraph blog post that in fact it wasn't 50 million americans who had their information stolen, it was more like 87 million. starting on monday facebook says those 87 million people are going to start receiving notifications that cambridge analytica improperly took their information and records of their online behavior. i think that's going to make this scandal less of an abstract story about privacy and make it more of a personal affront to

tens of millions of americans who are about to start getting personal notifications within the next few days that, yeah, your data was taken by them, your online behavior was monitored and stolen and used for profit by that company, run at the time by steve bannon. alongside this, there appears to be some serious, potential legal jeopardy for cambridge analytica, particularly in britain where there are very strong privacy laws, but also for facebook. in 2011, the federal trade commission told facebook they had deceived american consumers when they said hey, if you want to, you can keep your information on facebook private, when in fact nobody on facebook was keeping their information private. facebook was not protecting that information at all. they already got in trouble for

that. they came to a settlement in 2011. that they would stop giving away people's data. the records wouldn't be given away or left for the taking unless they got people's individual permission. but clearly, this kept on happening. there's potential legal liability here for facebook as well, which could be a significant financial matter. we can look forward to testimony by mark zuckerberg and lots of members of congress on both sides of the aisle will pound their chests and now noxious this is for facebook to have done this. i will say, even though we know that's going to continue to unfold for at least the next few weeks, if this still-evolving scandal is going to be more helpful, if it's going to be more than huffing and puffing, if it's going to help us understand and fix these problems, there are provocative

questions about this how this heist happened and why, including some questions that affect the incoming national security adviser. the professor whose software program was used by cambridge analytica to grab all this data, he has a joint appointment at cambridge university in the uk, he's also attached to a university in st. petersburg. and why would a russian oil company be interested in that in advance of the 2016 presidential election? the whistleblower has raised questions about why they met with top officials from a russian oil company. in terms of the use of the data, it's clear that cambridge analytica was at least advertising itself as having

and utilizing this data in the 2014 elections when the company was operating on behalf of multiple candidates, including thom tillis. the implication from the whistleblower's testimony is that this would be the same data set that the trump campaign benefited from in 2016. this allegation, those are allegations that cambridge analytica is vehemently denying today. but we've got more information to go on more than just what they say. thanks to these documents that this whistleblower has handed over, we have some concrete evidence about the operations of cambridge analytica. we have concrete information for example about who was definitely using this stolen data, happily. at least according to these leaked and now stolen and now leaked cambridge analytica

documents. we may not know whether or not the trump campaign ended up using the stolen facebook data in 2016. there are implications that they did, the company denies it. but we do know about people who happily used it before then. quote, hi, jeff. hope this finds you well. i'm just wondering what the status is on the bolton data. i.e. data for north carolina, arkansas and new hampshire, how much of it have you received and to what extent is it loaded into the platform? here's another e-mail to a bunch of redacted name and ceo alexander nix. subject, bolton data. quote, have been in communication with bolton's chief of staff, and she confirmed a meeting, tomorrow, 9:00 a.m. eastern time. the chief of staff also confirmed a meeting with all the

major media partners the bolton pac is using. they expect to see what we have for the three target states, north carolina, new hampshire, arkansas. please advise exactly what is currently available for those states. my understanding is that the following has been done and is/should be available. p and t scores for arkansas and north carolina. i don't know what p & t scores are. personality cluster information for the target voter segments. modeled for all voters of interest shall not just the kogan sample/seders. k o o -- kogan is a reference to the professor who developed the program that stole all of these documents. so among the internal documents that were taken by this whistle blower and handed over to the british parliament, among those

documents is a whole big section of communications at cambridge analytica about the bolton project and the bolton data and meetings with the bolton people. that's all about john bolton, whose super pac was megafunded to the tune of multi-million donations from trump donor robert mercer. and what bolton's pac did with mercer's donations is in large part he spent those dollars with robert mercer's company, cambridge analytica, who was, at the time, testing out its new techniques about how they were going to use all these tens of millions of stolen data files from facebook users and turn them around and use them in an election on we behalf of republican candidates.

and you can see in these documents from the whistle blower, cambridge analytica, hustling to get john bolton exactly what he needs. at one point they are worried that he quote, seemed a little bit pissed off, which does fit with his reputation. it's pretty well documented history of him screaming his lungs out at people and chasing them down hallways. so john bolton is now, according to cnbc today, reportedly in conversations with white house lawyers about potential conflicts of interest, about whether his pac and super pac might be a problem with him taking up the national security adviser job which he is expected to start on monday. one of the things to know about his super pac is that it got in on the ground floor with cambridge analytica and the u.s. midterm elections in 2014, paying hand over fist hundreds of thousands of dollars to help republican candidates in arkansas, north carolina and new hampshire. paying for this data that we now know was stolen from facebook and for which both facebook and cambridge analytica are starting to get into a lot of trouble, including potentially legal trouble.

and one of the things we know about the current legal woes for cambridge analytica on this matter is that the special council office, they are reportedly looking at cambridge analytica and its work for the trump campaign in 2016 as part of their investigation into russia's interference in our election and whether or not the trump campaign helped with that. john bolton's pac and super pac are a central part of the story and they are the center of the story of cambridge analytica operating in the united states. john bolton, as we previously reported, he has also turned up in the middle of another reported area of focus for mueller's investigators, that question about whether the nra may have been used as a funnel for russian money to be funneled into the u.s. election. and the russian gun rights group. now, "rolling stone magazine" has published photos of bolton

stumping for this russian gun rights group under investigation for potentially funneling money into gun rights efforts. you'll notice, i think we can show this, at the bottom of the screen there. all the place namcards for thth, it's in cyrillic alphabet. it was a big freakin' deal when bolton came to the white house. it's a very awkward thing. turns out to be an unsustainable thing for somebody in as sensitive a job as national security adviser. john bolton, with the bolton project at cambridge analytica and bolton data at cambridge analytica and his link with the nra and russian politicians, john bolton is right in the middle of this stuff, too. and maybe that's what he's talking with the white house

lawyers about, ahead of his start date on monday. but this is starting to get weird. h.r. mcmaster is going out with a bang. john bolton does appear to be on his way in, but i think that is becoming a more complicated prospect than might be broadly appreciated. all right, got lots more to get to tonight, including, i'm very happy to tell you, we have an exclusive interview with someone who has made no public comments since leaving government service months ago. he's going to give his first exclusive tv interview to us tonight. it's a surprise. that's next. stay with us. -if you told me a year ago where i'd be right now... aah! ...i would have said you were crazy. but so began the year of me. i discovered the true meaning of paperless discounts... and the indescribable rush of saving drivers an average of $620. why does fear feel so good? i fell in love three times -- once with a woman,

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in march of last year, president trump abruptly fired all the u.s. attorneys in the country, including the head of a very powerful prosecutor's office in the southern district of new york. preet bharara had been told by the president before then that he'd be keeping him on on that job, but unexpectedly he fired preet bharara as well. and this all happened, as i say,

abruptly with no notice. well, in the southern district of new york, a man named june kim had been preet bharara's deputy. when preet bharara got unexpectedly fired, june kim took over that office on a temporary basis, fort ten month until president trump's new nominee came on in. june kim has not done any t vv interviews since leaving new york. and he joins us here tonight. thanks very much for being here. >> happy to be here. >> first of all, let me say i'm appreciative of the fact that you have not done other tv interviews, and i know that you are not going to discuss ongoing

cases. i'm not going to ask you to do that. i do want to ask you to help us understand a little bit about what happened last march, and i'd like to ask your help in understanding a little bit about some of the stuff going on with the mueller investigation. does that sound like comfortable territory? >> so far. >> do you know why preet bharara was fired? >> i do not know. >> at the time it was a surprise to everybody in the office? >> yes, it was sudden, and it was a surprise. >> it seemed like from the outside looking in last march, that although previous presidents, some of them had decided to get rid of all u.s. attorneys, it seemed like it had never happened quite like that. a, no notice, b, you're all fired, and c, get out now. it felt like it was one executed without much time for a clean handover. did it seem like that inside the office as well? >> i'm not an historian of how u.s. attorneys have changed over the years.

and certainly, and preet has said this, it's the president's right to put in the u.s. attorney of his choice, and that was our expectation when, after the election. but, as you pointed out, preet was asked to stay by the president. so when he was asked to leave again on that day in march, that did come as a bit of a surprise and it was somewhat sudden. >> and was he told to leave so quickly that there was a compromise in terms of handing over ongoing investigations, oversight responsibilities. one of the things that regular americans looking at that process worried about is that some stuff might get handed over awkwardly or there might be glitches, particularly, big ones like southern district that handles so many big and high-profile cases. >> i believe it's been reported that the decision was made and then the u.s. attorneys were asked to leave pretty soon after that decision. you referenced our office and the need to make sure that the ongoing cases are handled properly. we were lucky enough that we

have an office full of incredibly dedicated, capable, career prosecutors who are really driving the cases and the investigations, and we had a leadership team that had been working closely with preet throughout that process, so we were able to ensure that the good work of the prosecutors in the southern district of new york continued in the manner that it had, and i think it did. >> the nature of those firings across the country, and the unusual nature of mr. bharara being fired, led to a lot of if not conspiracy theories but speculation that there might have been something going on in some prosecutor's office somewhere maybe in the southern district, that the white house was looking to either pressure or interfere with. has your, in your time in southern district, have you ever felt pressured by the white

house? by any administration? in terms of any ongoing cases or prosecutions? >> i don't know the reason why preet was asked to leave and the other u.s. attorneys were asked to leave. i can say in the southern district of new york, as i said earlier, we were lucky enough, the cases continued, the career prosecutors continued to do the cases, and during the time i was there i personally did not experience any inappropriate or political pressure. >> can i ask you for a little help in understanding some of what's going on in the mueller investigation? >> sure, i mean, i have no personal insights. >> right. >> into specifics of anything there, but in terms of giving you a perspective of what certain terms mean or how investigations generally are conducted, i'd be happy to do that. >> let me ask you, did anybody go from, did anybody go from the southern district of new york

onto the mueller team? i know in some cases, prosecutors were brought from other offices around the country to join the special prosecutor's office. >> there was one. >> in terms of the makeup of that team, do you feel like they're proceeding along a path and by means that you recognize as good practice as a prosecutor? >> yeah, i mean, the one prosecutor that did go from our office was a -- is a terrific prosecutor. >> who's that? >> andrew goldstein. a lawyer and person of great integrity, as someone who will follow the facts and the evidence and follow the law, wherever that leads, and that will be, that has been his only concern, and i expect that's the way he will conduct himself. so i don't know everyone on that team. the people i do know are people of that mold, who are, who are

in the business of prosecuting for the right reasons. they are public servants who could be out in the private sector making a ton more money, but who believe in the mission of justice. so, again, i'm an outsider. i don't know everyone there, and when i see, i have confidence in the people that i know that are part of that team. >> if you wouldn't mind staying with us, there are two matters that have arisen recently in reporting about mueller's investigation, one about telling the president that he is a subject but not a target of the investigation. and mueller's agents stopping subjects in airports and searching their electronic devices. i'd like to ask you about those things if you would stick around with us. >> i'll stick around. >> he'll be right back with us after this. and if i'd been caring for tom's dad,

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and when we have an emergency situation we are going to be much more skilled and prepared to mitigate that emergency for all concerned. the things we do every single day that puts ourselves in harm's way, and to have a partner that is so skilled at what they do is indispensable, and i couldn't ask for a better partner. his first tv interview is joon kim. he was the acting u.s. attorney in the southern district of new york. he took over when preet bharara was unexpectedly fired by president trump last year. thank you again for sticking with us. >> sure. >> we learned from "the washington post" recently that the president's lawyers have been advised by mueller's prosecutors that the president is, as of last month, is a

subject but not a target of the investigation. now everybody's doing amateur law school trying to figure out what that means. my question is, did they have to tell the president's lawyers that? why would you tell somebody that they're a subject? >> again, i don't have any personal insight into the status of any individuals in the special counsel's investigation. but to answer your question, it, if someone asks, is my client, in a federal investigation a target, subject or witness, you do need to tell them. because they, they should know and have a right to know. in terms of what those terms mean, they are a bit of a term of art that is used in federal criminal investigations. it's not a mystery or secret among people who practice in the area. it's actually pretty clearly set forth and defined in the u.s. attorney manual that is available to the public. >> okay. >> and it's one of the things that a junior prosecutor will learn very early on. because someone will ask them, well, you want to talk to my client. what is he? and so people, prosecutors, experienced prosecutors are very familiar with the concept, but it's pretty simple.

i mean, someone who a prosecutor wants to talk to will fit in a wide range of categories. and one extreme will be a pure witness, a witness, and that's someone who has relevant information about the investigation but to the best of the prosecutor's and investigator's knowledge, they have no criminal exposure. an example is someone's walking down the street, they see someone get shot. obviously, they have relevant information about the investigation. the prosecutor's going to want to talk to him or her. but to the best of the prosecutor's knowledge, he or she has no relationship to the victim or the shooter they just happened to be there. on the other extreme is the target and the u.s. attorney manual defines a target as someone who, where there's substantial evidence linking that person to the commission of an offense. another way the u.s. attorney manual describes the target category is a quote, putative

defendant. closed quote. and that means, basically, you're a defendant. >> mm-hm. >> that means you basically are about to be charged. >> mm-hm. >> and everyone else in the middle is a subject. >> okay. >> so you can be a subject that's closer to a witness, a subject closer to a target. it's a fluid thing. the gathering of evidence is a fluid thing. you're learning more and more. some evidence will lead you to believe that someone's more of on the target side of that spectrum, then you might learn something more that exculpates them. >> if a person moves from subject to target, you would then have to advise the person's attorney that that changes. >> not necessarily. it sort of depends on when they inquire.

and, if you're not communicating at all at any point with a subject and they're not asking, you don't have to call up and say, by the way, they just crossed that line. >> very sober in the way you explained these very exciting things. joon kim, thank you very much for coming in tonight. it's a pleasure to meet you. stay with us. ♪ ♪ ♪ raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens ♪ ♪ bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens ♪ ♪ brown paper packages tied up with strings ♪ ♪ these are a few of my favorite things ♪ ♪ ♪

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try directv now for $10/mo for 3 months. more for your thing. that's our thing. visit directvnow dot com it was like an airbnb situation. when i was not there, the landlord, they had access to the entirety of the facility. when i was there, i only had access to a room. there were common areas. they used the facility at the same time i was there. >> so you only paid for the nights you were there. >> that's exactly right. >> if i pay rent in washington -- over $2,000 a month on half -- average. >> there were comps done by officials here. there were comps done. you could go on craigslist today and it's been done -- shows rentals for one bedroom of less than $1,000. on capitol hill. >> i've never heard of an apartment like that. i've lived in washington over 25 years. >> well. >> yeah, well. head of the environmental

protection agency and a fox news reporter, ed henry, getting into an on-air scuffle tonight about what the rent is really like in washington, d.c. this is just the kind of week it has been for scott pruitt. a drum beat of reports starting thursday when it was reported he'd been living in an energy lobbyist's condo near the capitol for $50 a night and was only paying for the nights he was actually sleeping there. then "the washington post" and abc news reported on a strange incident that took place at that lobbyist's condo in which scott pruitt's security detail -- he has a security detail -- thinking that he was at home and in need of rescue, they broke down the front door of the lobbyist's townhouse to rescue him. turns out he was reportedly inside that apartment but just

there taking a nap. and then he decided he would charge the epa to fix the door that his security team broke down through his nap. then on monday, there's report in the post that pruitt's staffers made plans to spend $100,000 a month, taxpayer money, to lease a private jet just for scott pruitt's use, that is not a normal thing anyone gets when they run the epa. apparently his staff looked into it for him. but on monday night, the "new york times" reported on a energy company called enbridge. they were fined more than $60 million for a pipeline spill that spilled oil into the kalamazoo river. it was second only to the deep waeter horizon spill. less than a year later, march 2017, two months after scott pruitt took over at the epa, his agency signed off on a major

pipeline expansion by enbridge, allowing more oil to flow through the tar sands. its washington lobbyist was, say it with me now, the guy whose condo scott pruitt was living in for $50 a night. but the hits just keep coming. the "atlantic" magazine reports that he gave huge raises to staffers he brought with him. using an obscure provision in the safe drinking water act to get them the money out of the epa budget, even though the white house -- this white house -- wouldn't approve it. now the "washington post" adds that one of those staffers who got a $30,000 pay bump, one of her duties was to help scott pruitt shop for housing in d.c. and now we've learned about another way pruitt used power granted to him through the safe drinking water act to get around the rules. that's next, including its particular resonance for people for whom the safe drinking water act is life and death. stay with us. ♪

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if you're committed to the trump agenda why did you go around the president and give raises to two staffers? >> i did not. my staff did and i found about it yesterday and changed it. >> should someone be fired for that? who did it? a career person or political person. >> i don't know. >> you run the agency, you don't know who did this?

i'm sure it was terrible people. >> i found out about it yesterday. >> you run the agency, you don't know who did this? i don't know. i just. there has been this onslaught of reporting for the past week about scott pruitt including the reporting that he used a provision in the safe drinking water act to give 30, 40, $50,000 raises to two staffers who he brought to d.c. with him from oklahoma. and now the post reports that was allowed to hire senior management and scientific personnel during times of critical need. pruitt instead used his hiring power differently. not only relying on that to give raises, also relying on it to bring former lobbyists and schedulers and spokesmen into the agency. so he's used this law, which is used for scientists into times of crisis, to give raises to his oklahoma peeps and give it to lobbyists.

which is fine, it's not like there's any needs related to drinking water, right? we have the congressman from michigan whose district includes flint, michigan. i wanted to talk to you because you put out a fairly outraged statement criticizing the use of the epa's use of the protection laws in order to do this at the epa. what's your main criticism of scott pruitt here? how do you feel about this scandal? >> this is outrageous. i know what the safe drinking water act is supposed to be used for, to hire scientists and health professionals to go into places like my hometown of flint, to bring resources and expertise to help deal with problems with drinking water. not to add, basically, bonuses to the payroll of top people he brings in that are essentially his political friends and allies. this is really frustrating. i have a lot of difficulties

with what mr. pruitt has done. his ethical lapses notwithstanding. the fact that his priorities for the epa are to roll back protections for people like the people in my hometown of flint. to actually increase the likelihood that there will be more drinking water problems in this country. and in the meantime take money that could be used for those purposes and give 25 and $30,000 pay raises over the policy objections of the white house. i mean, if you can breech the ethical standards of the trump white house, you have set a new record for breaching ethical standards, and he ought to go. >> is there anything congress can do? it's been remarkable to see this rising tide, forgive me, of bad press and ethical revelations about scott pruitt while the white house at least thus far seems to be standing by him.

we've seen others pushed out for left. scott pruitt is still there. do you think there's any appetite in congress to take this on or at least make him answer questions about this stuff? >> that's a legitimate question. the way i look at it is this gives us tangible evidence of the extent to which this white house, and for that matter, almost all the republicans in congress, are willing to overlook unethical behavior in order to accommodate the anti-environmental pro-polluter policies of scott pruitt. the reason they overlook his ethical lapses is they like what he's doing. he's putting profits ahead of public health. and it's the same philosophy that led to the flint water crisis and water problems all over the country. i have a community in this northern part of my district that has contaminated water, they can't drink their water. one of the residents yesterday

asked me where is the epa? and the answer is this is where the epa sits right now. it's pathetic. >> appreciate your time tonight. >> thank you, rachel. >> stay with us. we'll be right back. we're finally back out in our yard, but so are they. the triple threat of dandelions, lurking crabgrass and weak, thin grass! introducing the all new scotts turf builder triple action. this single-step breakthrough changes everything. it kills weeds, prevents crabgrass for up to 4 months,

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>> russia has used old and new forms of aggression to undermine our open societies and the foundations of international peace and stability. we must recognize the need for all of us to do more to respond to and deter russian aggression. for too long some nations have looked the other way in the face of these threats. russia brazenly and implausibly denies its actions, and we have failed to impose sufficient costs. >> outgoing national security adviser h.r. mcmaster giving what are believed to be his final remarks as national security adviser. come monday morning he's supposed to be replaced by john bolton. we'll see. but mcmaster's outgoing message is that the u.s. -- i shouldn't say the u.s., some countries have looked the other way in the

face of russia while russia has brazenly and implausibly denied their actions and we have failed to impose sufficient costs. >> mr. putin may believe that he is winning in this new form of warfare, he may believe his aggressive actions in the parks of salisbury, in cyber space, in the air and on the high seas can undermine our confidence, our institutions and our values. perhaps he believes that our free nations are weak and will not respond. will not respond to his provocations. he is wrong. >> h.r. mcmaster made similarly strident remarks criticizing russia as his last remarks before the president fired him. we then found out his last acts as national security advisor before he got word he was being fired were to recommend at a national security meeting that

the united states take further action against russia. he has now taken the opportunity for his last public remarks before leaving office to again pretty stridently criticize russia. there's a theme. we are supposed to get a new national security advisor monday morning, but cnbc is reporting that john bolton is in talks with the white house lawyers about possible conflict of interest related to that new job. we shall see. we'll see you tomorrow. >> on tuesday, who will the national security adviser be? will john bolton get the ethics clearance and take the job or will h.r. mcmaster sit there until bolton clears or never clears? what's next? >> if it were any job other than

national security adviser or any other context than, hey, you're in the middle of the mueller investigation, they'd just clear whoever it is through. i think the fact you're going sentencing. i think the john bolton situation is a real question. we'll see. >> and there's always the possibility of a pardon discussion in the white house for donald trump's first national security advisor, and would the current national security advisor be part of that discussion? >> yeah. >> the things to imagine. >> and who clears the security clearance? >> thank you, rachel. >> thank you, lawrence. >> in the mini series about