/s >> hi, everyone, it's 4:00 in new york. we begin with breaking news. we learned in the last hour first lady melania trump is in the hospital at walter reed medical center. the white house telling us in a statement she's just undergone a surgical procedure to what we're told is a benign kidney condition. the white house says the procedure was successful but the first lady is expected to remain in the hospital through the rest of the week. joining us from the white house, nbc's kristen welker and in new york nbc news medical correspondent dr. john torres. kristen, what do we know about the first lady's condition and any plans for the president to be there with her as she recovers? >> well, i just spoke with the white house official, nicole who said the president is expected to visit her today. so, we are watching for when that will happen. i'm also told that president trump spoke with the first lady right before her surgery, and then spoke to her doctor immediately afterwards. an official saying she's been in good spirits throughout this entire process.

let me just read you the official statement, nicolle, from the white house, just so we're getting the medical language accurate. she said, the white house said this morning first lady melania trump underwent an embolization procedure to treat a benign kidney procedure. the procedure was success skpfl there were to complications. mrs. trump is at walter reed national military medical center. first lady looks forward to a full recovery so she can continue her work on behalf of children everywhere. now, that last line, an interesting one, nicolle, because of course it was just last week that the first lady unveiled her "be best" initiative. that her initiative aimed at children, counter bullying campaign, also a counter opioid abuse campaign really aimed at instilling good values from a very early age. we saw a lot of the first lady last week. she was of course right by the president's side when he welcomed home those three american detainees from north korea. we didn't see her over the weekend, though, nicolle during

mother's day. this coming to a surprise for a lot of people, undoubtedly. chuck schumer tweeting about this, saying just heard news that flotus underwent surgery today. sincere wishes for her speedy recovery. this is one of those issues that is bipartisan. i anticipate we'll be hearing from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle who will be wishing her a speedy recovery, president trump expected to visit her sometime today, nicolle. >> kristen, is there any indication this was a planned procedure and that's why the president didn't accompany her? i would imagine if it was some sort of emergency they would have rushed in together, but it sounds like this was something that he is comfortable seeing her on the other side of what they are describing as a successful procedure. anything behind the timing? i know they conducted an entire briefing in that press office briefing and it didn't come up until after that had concluded. was this something they hoped would stay quiet?

>> well, a lot of good questions. i think to your first one, nicolle, that is my sense, that this was planned, something that the first lady, the president knew was coming. i asked specifically when did they find out, when did she first learn she was going to need this procedure. so far no response to that specific question. i expect they wanted to wait until the surgery was over until they put out the official statement so they knew exactly what her condition was, and that is what has happened here. they effectively put this statement out right after the completion of the surgery. so, we are still trying to drill down on some of those details. when did she find out? when did the president learn? how much concern was there within this white house? i spoke to one white house official and i said, you're using the term benign. this official said, yes, of course. and they are hoping that she has a very speedy recovery. but any surgery is surgery. so, everyone here just hoping she comes back to the white house soon. nicolle? >> okay, dr. torres, i don't know what this word means so maybe you can tell us what an

embolization procedure is to treat a benign kidney condition. what could that mean in non-medical lingo? >> an embolization procedure is a less invasive procedure. in a sense what 24e do instead of opening up the body to get to the kidney, what they do is thread a small catheter, usually an artery from the groin up toward the kidney. once it gets to the kidney they put something to cut off blood supply. it's usually used for a tumor or cyst. they starve the tumor or shicys and it ends up shrinking in size. it's less invasive than open procedure and it sounds lieke what she went through here. >> in terms of the first lady, is this a common procedure? is there any danger? is the week long hospitalization that the white house anticipates standard so that they can keep a close eye on the first lady? >> nicolle, it is a very common procedure. it's used a lot for other parts of the body as well, but including the kidney.

like i said, for tumors or cysts it's used often, a lot of times before any other kinds of surgery. there are three parts. one is the embolization. the other part is benign which means it's something they saw growing, they saw there and they wanted to take care of t. the confusing part is the week long stay. typically people stay a day or two after this. the fact she's a first lady might be lending towards the lengthy stay so i don't think we need to read anything bo that at this point. >> kristen, is the white house on the record with any explanation for the duration of the recovery period? >> no explanation yet, nicolle. i did speak with one white house official who said, yes, the anticipation is that the first lady will be there for a week, but perhaps she'll come home sooner. i think that is the hope that she'll be able to leave a little bit earlier. but again, we just won't know i think until the doctors make that final determination, nicolle. >> obviously we wish her well, a speedy recovery. kristen, if you learn anything, please come to the camera and

share it with us. dr. torres, same to you. thank you both. now block buster reporting from the washington post. the mueller operation like the former marine corps platoon commander who leads it is secretive and methodical. he scrambles for survival. he vents to associates about the fbi raids on his personal attorney michael cohen as often as 20 times a day. in the estimation of one confidant and they listen in silence knowing little they say will soothe him. also unlikely to soothe him new reporting about the special counsel's interest in the president's former fixer and personal attorney michael cohen. the "wall street journal" reporting today, quote, mr. cohen talked to associates about building a huge practice. he mused about approaching foreign governments and foreign firms. his work did have an impact in one way. it dragged some of the world's largest corporations and other

firms into special counsel robert mueller's investigation. and speaking of mr. cohen's interest in adding foreign governments to his client list, the attorney for porn star stormy daniels is playing a game of chicken with cohen on twitter with this threat for cohen intended to raise questions about cohen's client work. let's bring in our guests, one of the reporters with a by line in that remarkable washington post story, white house reporter ashley parker and msnbc analyst jeremy bash is here, former chief of staff for the cia and the pentagon, also an msnbc analyst. and with us on set, attorney michael avenatti. let me start with you and that tweet. what are you, what are you threatening? what are you insinuating? >> i don't think we threatened or insinuated anything. i think we followed it up with some statements that have yet to be refuted. it's clear that on december 12th of 2016 michael cohen who was not registered as a lobbyist and was not registered as a foreign agent is seen taking some very

high-ranking qatar is up the elevator. they exit about an hour 40 minutes or hour 30 minutes later. michael flynn is there at the same time. and we find it very suspicious that michael cohen appears to be assisting the qataris in access to the president this particular day. i don't think they were going up the elevator to have lunch or dinner. >> the white house had an incredibly antiqatar i posture until recently. i'm with you until the part where it seems you're alleging that the qatar is got anything out of this. >> at&t didn't get anything out of it either, right? they had a very anti-at&t stance as it relates to the merger and that didn't stop at&t from paying all those monies to michael cohen for access. so, we can't look back in time and look at what the ultimate result was and then say, well, they must not have been paying for it or they didn't get what

they paid for. that's not the test. the issue is you have michael cohen clearly in the weeks after the election selling access to the president, to the highest office of the land, when he's not registered as a lobbyist and he's not registered as a foreign algt. >> and you've seen mueller charge people -- paul manafort has been charged for the second, i guess is it an allege, are you alleging that's what michael cohen did or suggesting the questions be asked? i just want to be clear. >> i'm saying that's what happened. you have an affidavit filed in court by someone close to one of the individuals in the elevator. and that affidavit states the individual bragged to him that effectively bribed an administration official, namely michael flynn. >> let me just understand how this fits into the stormy daniels legal case. and let me understand if something has changed. you said to me earlier you're basically a repository for all

sorts of evidence now and data points for examples of corruption on the part of mr. cohen in the trump orbit. how does it fit into your larger role to bring these things to light? >> well, look, nicolle, and i think we've been really clear about this. we are in a position where we believe that people should have the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth and should have the facts and the evidence. >> about the car tarries? >> if necessary the qatar is and others. at&t and others, it doesn't matter at this point. the fact of the matter is if information comes into our possession we believe is credible and that we believe people should be asking questions about, we're going to release it publicly. and ultimately, people can decide whether it's credible or not or whether there should be follow-up investigation or not. it's just that simple. >> let me ask you about what you deem credible because obviously here as a news organization, we haven't been able to independently corroborate individuals in the picture. so, and i know you're protecting your sources. you and i had this conversation last week. what is your standard for information you deem credible? you said you're in receipt of mountains and volumes of information. >> we have a very high standard,

and no one has disputed the one identification that we have made of the individual in the picture. i think it's pretty clear that's who it is. no one has claimed otherwise. michael cohen and his attorney can very easily come forward and claim otherwise. others could come forward and dispute what we've said. they haven't disputed that just like they haven't disputed 99.35% of the information that we released last week. so, i think we have a pretty good track record. i stand behind the accuracy of what we've released. >> let me bring ashley parker in who has some unbelievable reporting about the impact of the cohen raid and of this growing body of evidence about how cohen was conducting his post-election business. actually this would be business conducted during the transition. it seems that this is a raw nerve for the president. revelations about how michael cohen was holding himself out to potential clients and the fact that now there are at least two avenues of the cohen investigation. there is the southern district of new york, there is all of the

questions that bob mueller has had. talk about what you reported in your piece about the president yelling about those cohen raids up to 20 times a day. >> sure. so, basically the cohen raids were sort of a psychic or cosmic turning point for the president in his thinking about this entire investigation. and to be clear, we all know from his tweets he was never happy about this probe. but there was a period at which the people in his orbit, the people in his white house, and the people on his legal team could kind of play to what he said and believed, which is that he had done nothing wrong, that there was no collusion, and to say, you know, the more you cooperate and the easier and the sooner you cooperate, the sooner this will all be wrapped up and you will be vindicated. and mueller is incredibly thorough, so when you are vindicated, it will be a true vindication and it will mean you really are cleared. there was a period, again, save for his angry rants and tweets where he was going along with

that plan, and then when the cohen raids happened, he just sort of felt like a couple things. he felt mueller's investigators were no longer operating in good faith. and it sort of crossed this red line for him where he felt like this probe had gone way too far afield. it was going into not quite his family, but people who were very close to him, people who hadn't even come to the white house with him. someone who didn't have an official role on the campaign, someone who handled his business in his family dealings, and that's when he really got furious. and as we mentioned, this is something that talks about nonstop. he mentioned one person told us up to 20 times a day and aides sort of stand there and don't quite know what to say because they know there is nothing that can calm the president down. >> jeremy, i want you to tie these pieces together. seemingly unrelated, the qatar is, the u.s./qatar i position which was viewed as pretty hostile to the gutery position on the blockade at the beginning of the administration.

it seems to have shifted a little bit. but this ensnares two individuals in ashley's piece who were of concern watching the mueller's probe closely, don junior and jared kushner. nbc reported the qatar is opted not to give information on kushner and secret meetings to mueller. i guess deciding they didn't have an obligation to cooperate. but can you try to pull together all of these threads? michael avenatti talking about cohen's pay to play business. we see more and more data points on that. ashley's report, raids being turned over to the fbi, causing a trigger for the president, 20 times a day. people close to him, family by any definition, very much under scrutiny by mueller and perhaps other investigations for their contacts with foreign governments. >> yeah, the government of qatar is very close to the government of iran, and in some ways qatar had split from its other gulf

sunni countries, saudi arabia and the emirates and has really adopted a line of foreign policy that's been antithetical to u.s. interests. qatar had a lot of ground to make up. as you know, nicolle, qatar found itself on the wrong side of trump's perceived foreign policy approach at the beginning of the administration. i don't know it's a fact they got nothing for -- hired michael cohen or using him as a conduit. maybe it's worse for qatar. maybe they sanded off some edges. i don't think we understand fully unless michael knows or has evidence, what was the relationship, did they hire michael cohen, did they pay him, get us a meeting and we'll pay you later? what were they specifically asking and requesting? who were those people in the elevator, who were they meeting with and what were they seeking. these are all legitimate, very significant questions and i think we have to understand before we can make any judgments about whether or not this was merely swampy or actually

illegal. >> any thoughts? >> i think that's right. we haven't disclosed everything we know yet. again, i don't think those gentleman are in the elevator with michael cohen at that time in trump tower because they're picking up christmas gifts or for lunch or dinner. let's call it like we see it. you can see it on the video. you can see it on the pictures. we have already identified one of the individuals. we think we're close to identifying the second individual. and, look, if we're wrong about this and there is some innocuous reason for this meeting like they wanted mr. trump's autograph, something like that's correct let them come dpaforwar and talk about it. >> michael, do you know, for example, whether or not they engaged michael cohen to actually represent them? or was it possible that they were having a meeting along with dozens of other foreign delegations during the transition to sit down with trump and his inner circle, including people he had worked with, including people he might have hired in the administration? i mean, what do we know and what do we not know? >> i'll tell you what we do know is that this was not just a

standard foreign dignitary visit in order to introduce themselves to mr. trump. i'm going to leave it at that. >> let me throw some some other reporting we have, jeremy bash, and let me get you in, ashley, on this. "the new york times" in february reported bob mueller was probing qatar payments, investigators working for robert s. mueller was asking about kushner's investments overseas. kushner's firm sought investments from the chinese insurer from the former of qatar. ashley parker, you have that poignant paragraph that i talked about, but it is the worst kept secret in washington that people are watching jared kushner very closely. his trip today was one of -- he's not seen in public all that much. he's been stripped of his security clearances for not being forthcoming, among other things, his contacts with foreign governments. just on the alarm meter, how loud is it in terms of kushner's legal exposure at this hour? >> well, as you put it, no one

knows for sure. people have been watching with interest that jared is kind of putting his head back up again. after he lost his security clearance, he really disappeared from public view. he went from being sort of the shadow secretary of state, the shadow secretary of everything, to really being under the radar. it's notable that he's in israel and he gave that speech. he's also taken a more public role in prison reform. but in terms of again, what we don't know, in report thing piece when we talked to people, a number of people in the . president's orbit in the white house, at the end of the day the president himself will be exonerated. they have more concern -- and again, they don't know what mueller's team knows, so this is speculation. i want to be clear. but they have more concern that as this sort of wraps up and gets to the top, it will not touch the president. the people who could be in more risk are jared kushner, his son-in-law, and don junior. but again, that's speculation from people in that world, some

of whom have talked to mueller, some of whom haven't. >> jeremy, let me understand the kinds of questions you had for michael. it seems like you're getting at the mueller probe looking at crimes big and small, potential collusion, put the finger on the scale, the southern district raid, they may be looking at more garden have right crimes like bribery, failure to disclose on behalf of a foreign government. what do you think the questions are around the cohen raid and around cohen's book of business, things that are sort of popping up every day in the headlines, "wall street journal" out with another story today about mr. mueller's interest in him soliciting foreign governments for business, what legal exposure do you think michael cohen has after today's headlines? >> to zoom back the lens, mueller is a national security probe in addition to a criminal probe. he is trying to understand how a foreign adversary could have possibly interfered in our election. it is not just about whether the

russians favored a democrat -- favored a republic and tried to denigrate a democrat, it's how did they denigrate our democracy. it is a large issue. it turns out when bob mueller weighs into this, he can't swing a subpoena without running into criminality in other areas. he finds out that paul manafort has numerous financial transactions that also happen to violate the law in money laundering and tax evasion, et cetera. i think he found out in addition to that, michael cohen had numerous criminal liabilities, criminal exposures he turned that over to the southern district, prosecutor in new york. he's not i don't think going after michael cohen is part of a broad fishing expedition. i think the mueller probe has been speedy, it's been efficient shall it's been leak proof, narrowly focused. with regards to what michael cohen may be liable for, that is a whole raft of criminality that some other prosecutor will be looking at. >> let me ask you a two-part question then i want to give you a respond to something jeremy

asked. it's no secret a lot of people who are detractors of the president pinned their hopes on bob mueller getting to the bottom of it. it has attached to you. do you see yourself as part of the resistance or part of the effort to reveal the president and the people around him, or if all of this is somehow related to the cases you have in which you're representing stormy daniels? >> well, i don't think we're a member of the resistance, nicolle. i think we're a member of -- i think professor butler put it best on saturday, the justice league, aimed at truth and disclosure. wherever the chips fall that's where they fall. whether it results in the president staying in office or not, that's going to be up to people that are far more intelligent and far more powerful than me and my client. that's really what it's all about. it's about disclosure and getting the facts and the truth out there. there is one thing i wanted to go back and state in response to what jeremy said. we have to remember what michael cohen's role was and was what it was not during the transition period and the months in the

administration. michael cohen doesn't have a security clearance. michael cohen doesn't have a role whereby he entertains diplomats as it pertains to the new administration. michael cohen didn't have a role i know of interface ing with foreign governments so what is michael cohen doing on that elevator with two qatar is. >> and i'm guessing between you and bob mueller and the southern district we're eventually going to learn all the answers. all right. thank you so much for spending some time with you. >> thank you. >> and for never getting us good board with any of this. when question come back the west wing, the plan to take on a combat veteran who enjoys far greater trust with the public than he does. also to catch a leaker, the lengths this white house will go to catch staffers who leak to the press. one report suggests that aides considered sophisticated technology to trace communications with reporters. and guess who is often the last person to talk to donald trump before he drifts off to sleep? a new report details the near nightly gab fest between donald trump and sean hannity. stay with us. ♪[upbeat music]

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let's go back to the two pillars of brand audit, authenticity and consistency and he gets an a-plus. until he's ready to say the facts, what would he say, i know what i'm doing, or you won't believe what's coming. it would also hurt his brand. you have to believe when he speaks, it's going to be a boom. >> that was our friend donny deutsche on what awaits us when special counsel robert mueller in last night's episode of the circus. as we've been discussing, the washington post out with the most detailed look yet inside the investigation rooms. the grand jury witnesses arrive one by one at the windowless

room in the federal court house on constitution avenue in downtown washington. they are struck first by how commonplace the setting feels. more classroom than courtroom, two witnesses said. one of special counsel robert mueller's prosecutors stands at the lectern. the jurors diverse by age and ethnicity are attentive and take notes. the questioning is polite yet aggressive, surprising witnesses with his precision and often accompanied by evidence including text messages and e-mails, displayed on a large old-fashioned overhead projector. and this description of the man at the helm. mueller the 73-year-old former fbi director with the hang dog massage and rigid bearing looms over the investigation but is an intermittent presence in the windowless room in the courthouse. robert mueller's investigation has been described to me not as an iceberg with most hidden under the surface but as an underground village where everything is concealed and we have very little idea of what is happening aside from the legal filings and leaks from attorneys

for witnesses. the post adds this on the probe's scope. quote, the range of witnesses mueller has called in has been breath taking from white house counsel don mcgahn, at least twice, to avi berkowitz, the 29-year-old personal assistant to kushner. joining tuesday tea table, jason johnson politics editor the root, msnbc contributor, john heilman, co-host and effecttive produce irof the circus, paul butler former federal prosecutor, georgetown law professor, and david jolly, former republican congressman. your description of mueller is pretty spot on. >> yeah, i was struck by donny. he went through, he talks about personal brand audits. the reason i asked him, sounds like a cheesy thing. i said look, what happens in court matters a lot clearly in the legal realm is super important. but the reality is we saw with clinton and other cases,

ultimately this can be a political process, impeachment is a political process, not a quasi-legal process, but not fully legal process. what the court of public opinion thinks matters a lot and what donald trump is trying to do right now when you think about his strategy is to try to say, i'm talking all this stuff out of the legal realm and i'm going to throw it all to the body politic and say, witch hunt, hoax, conspiracy, no collusion, and try to get enough public support that when the day comes, the day of reckoning comes he'll have enough of the public behind him that that will trump the law. and so donny's points i think are that really trump and mueller are the same in one respect. that in his view, they are public images. they both have authenticity and they both have consistency. and within their different ways, you might hate trump, but he's the same all the time and he is really himself. and that's also true with mueller which makes them kind of well matched opponents in some respects, again from donny's point of view. >> and this is exactly their strategy. i talked to two sources close to the president, giuliani, this is

the end game for them, a political solution. they believe the worst case scenario ends up in a report to congress, the worst case scenario is a threat of impeachment in the house and the team around the president and rudy giuliani feel confident they won't get to two-thirds of the senate convicting them. this is where we are. what john describes is very important. >> yeah, i've always said this, nicolle, this is always about how people perceive the importance of this process to be. i've always thought that if mueller was going to do anything, if he was going to have some big names, if he was go to make anybody do a perp walk it would be before the election. why put pearls before swine? he's not going to deliver this report to a republican congress that's not going to do anything. he's probably going to wait until 2019 and see what happens in the midterm. all of this has been political. i will say this. the fact that he has stayed quiet, the fact that mueller is not all up on the tv shows all the time, the fact he looks like law and order, make his hair a little bit dark he looks just like him.

he presents himself as this sober trustable guy. as long as the public feels like we may not trust the democrats, we may think some of the republicans don't like trump, this mueller guy seems like he's doing his job. as long as he seems like that person, the investigation continues. >> they're both old school and trump very much old school kind of queens, new york real estate, a little bit slimy, right? and mueller, old school, law and order, exactly right. 60-day rule, that's the department of justice policy. you don't do anything 60 days before in this case the midterm election. >> comey. >> right, exactly. >> again, that's why he's in trouble. ambitious things to do list for bob mueller, i don't know if he can get everything done in 60 days, decide whether to indict kushner, trump junior, decide what to do about michael cohen if you want to hone in on the new york investigation of that. if mr. trump does not agree to an interview, which he will not do, are you going to subpoena? so lots to do. i don't think he can do it in

660 days. >> i want to ask ashley to take us inside her incredible reporting. it's incredible to me, three things. one, you don't list bob mueller as a source or anyone on his team, so all of these anecdotes seem to be pieced together from the witnesses or their attorneys. but what they're presented with is just so detailed and an overhead projection is like out of what paul is describing, so old school. can you take us inside that room and tell us what witnesses see and experience? >> absolutely. one thing that was so striking to us was actually a couple of witnesses used almost the exact same language, saying it reminded them -- two witnesses said -- of a classroom. although one said it was a badly funded classroom from the 1970s. but you sort of -- you know, it is bob mueller's grand jury. you expect something grand and the portrait that was painted

for us is of a government building, a windowless government building where people are sort of struck by house utterly average it seems. it's cramped, it's kind of old. that's for the atmospherics. people are also struck by how thorough and meticulous and detailed mueller's team is in their questions and what they know. they did describe, again, this is out of the '70s classroom, but that sort of old -- imagine one of those old overhead projectors that's kind of rickety. when witnesses were asked questions, relative details from texts and e-mails were put up on the large screen. as far as being thorough and meticulous and detailed, these witnesses we spoke to were also impressed by how polite and solicitous mueller's investigators were. they often said, feel free to ask us for a bathroom break. feel free if you need to confer with your lawyers. the witnesses we talked to,

mueller was not there. this was conducted by someone on his team. although i have to caution it doesn't mean he's never there or will never be there, he just was not there in these instances. >> jeremy bash, what does bob mueller's grand vision look like? when you go back to what you described in the last block which was to understand russia's role in our election, and to, you know, bring to light any crimes committed in the process of that. >> and to be guided by the facts, nicolle. i know this is hard to believe in the era of trump, but the setting that ashley described is not meant to impress anybody. there are no guilded chandeliers, no gold wallpaper. this is about the facts. it's not about the technology, not about the setting, it's about only where the facts will lead the investigators and conduct of certain individuals and national security in efforts to obstruct and under meyer our justice system. those are paramount. i want to comment on something

justin noted about maybe mueller is holding this all back and wants to deliver this to a democratic congress. i don't think so at all. i don't think he thinks in those terms. i think he thinks he's going to take the investigation where it goes. he'll write his report or deliver his summation at the appropriate time. it is not tethered to a political calendar. it is not whether democrats or republicans are in charge. he's outside of the political machineations. that's the way we want him to be. >> in all the circumstances, all these people are political, that's part of why they do their job. it would be ridiculous to pretend he can put all this effort and deliver it to a congress that wouldn't come to the conclusions or at least be open to the conclusions he wants to make. >> you're wrong. >> that wouldn't make any sense for someone who put this much effort into it. >> i know bob mueller. i know a lot of people that know bob mueller. i'm not even sure bob mueller

knows when the mid terms are. we can agree -- i'm going to read you something that lit my hair on fire. i'm guessing you felt the save way. on sunday, donald trump and sean hannity speak multiple times with one calling the other to inform of the latest developments. white house staff are aware the calls happen thanks to the president entering the room and announcing, i just hung up with hannity or referring to what he said, bringing it up in their presence. i said on this show, fox is not state-run media. the state is fox and hannity-run state. i think it's interesting this is just coming out, but this has been my understanding since the beginning, that hannity calls in trump. the outputs of that would be the tremendous air cover trump gave nunes over the objections, the grave concerns of his own appointee, the man running the fbi. this seems like very welcome reporting, but something that's been going on since the beginning. >> and of concern, right. >> grave concern to borrow a

word from ray. >> donald trump and sean hannity would be that perfect match we see on commercial television on late night tv. bromance rooted in alternative facts. but unfortunately this is the president of the united states who, if he is seeking wise and fair counsel, there are others he should be seeking it from, not from a television news host who has already said he's not even a journalist, right, he's an entertainment news host is what sean hannity has said about himself. this reflects the shallowness of the counsel that donald trump gets. he does not rely on the preimminent secretaries within his administration. he relies on a television entertainment host. >> everyone is so tired -- can you imagine if obama did this line? can you imagine if obama called you or rachel or joy -- >> or oprah. >> let me push back. we operate within the standards. the scripts don't make it to the legal or standards office. >> absolutely not.

listen, fox news is an echo chamber for the very rabid base donald trump high jacked to win the republican nomination. they go hand in hand. without fox news there is no donald trump and without donald trump there is no fox news today. >> last word. >> dave is onto something here. i say this, i want to be clear to everyone at this table and everyone listening, i am not defending donald trump talking to sean hannity all the time, okay. but if you go back to the beginning of our conversation and you think that what donald trump is trying to do is win a political argument where he thinks the existence of his presidency is on the line and the thing he's going to need is to have that base be rock solid and not abandon him no matter how bad the findings of bob mueller is, he needs that base. hannity channels that base better than anyone. i don't think it's good for him to take advice from hannity, i wish he'd take advice from other people, but if trump sees his survival in being in touch with those people, there aren't a lot of better people to talk to than sean hannity because he reaches more of them than anyone. >> ashley, let me give you the last word and tie this hannity reporting to what you're

reporting about the president's state of mind over the probe. it seems like sean hannity has likened bob mueller to a mob boss running a mob family operation. you think that's what's around the corner in terms of their defense against the investigation? >> well, the risk is, it was sort of a pick your own poison. at the beginning of the administration, the president was also sort of hate watching a lot of msnbc and a lot of cnn and that created one set of headach headaches for this white house. he's hearing what he wants to hear. he's hearing what his base hears. but then you see him sort of engaging in some conspiracy theories, getting advice his lawyers might not want him to have. and obviously not governing towards the center. >> all right. none of those helpful. ashley parker, bob, thank you very much. when we come back my favorite headline of the day. white house leakers leak about leaking. don't go anywhere. today, there are more sensors on our planet than people. we're putting ai into everything,

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are there any concerns that this white house seems more concerned about the fact that there was a leak than about the content of what was said? >> well, i think, you know, we're concerned about all sorts of matters, but this is an internal matter. it's being addressed internally and i don't have anything further to add. >> can you explain how it is being addressed internally? >> obviously if i explain all that, then it won't remain internal. she is still an employee at the white house. she came to work today. >> why hasn't she publicly apologized as she told meghan mccain she would? >> she has addressed it with the family directly and i don't have anything further. >> raj, you look so close to going rogue and saying, i hate myself, we're sorry. he's a hero. so close. but not quite. >> just a little short. >> it's day five of the kelly sadler controversy. still no public apology from her or raj or the white house or

anyone over the comment about senator john mccain dying anyway. the relative silence on that issue standing in stark contrast to their all-out hunt for the leakers, who would spread the word about it. jonathan swan of axios spoke to his sources, leakers, about why people in the administration talk to reporters. it seems to center around the man at the top. bad managers breed an unhappy workplace which results in pervasive leaking, the former official added, and there has been plenty of all those things inside this white house. some people use leaking to settle personal scores or worse to attack the president. for me it was always to make a point about something i felt was being unjustly ignored by others. joining us at the table jennifer ruben opinion writer for the washington post. let me add something, jonathan swan was on this all weekend. he included in one of his pieces, my colleague mike allen who spent nearly 20 years covering the white house we learn more about the trump white house in a week than a year in the bush presidency.

that's true. they call, i often wonder what their motives are. they call when there is a scandal to tell you what side of the scandal they're on. when there is something really serio serious like the statement crafted aboard air force one, people let you know what side they're on, press people argued they were for more transparency, believing the truth would ultimately get out. why do they seem more upset about the leak than the insult to john mccain? >> these are soulless people working for a soulless president. >> wow. >> the president of the united states doesn't have a purpose higher than himself and therefore the people who work for him do not have a higher purpose. they don see themselves as custodians of the public good. they are there to advance their own careers to, as you say, settle scores. it's all about a me-me-me philosophy. so the notion you should rise above the day to day requirements of this president who never apologizes for anything because he can never be wrong is something completely alien to them.

they do not think you apologize for anything no matter how egregious. in any other white house, this would never have occurred. george bush would have never hired someone of such low character. secondly, they would have been profusely apologizing, falling all over themselves. but this white house is unlike any other white house. it does not have a public purpose. it has a private agenda. and trump is loyal to trump and so his aides and advisors are loyal to no one but themselves. >> i want to do something here with you, okay. we were on this television show on friday, right? >> yeah. >> and we had an exchange about sarah huckabee sanders' press briefings in which you made a comment to kristen welker whether she might want to go wring sarah huckabee sanders's neck. i then made a comment how if i had to sit in the press briefing more than a couple days in a row i'd slit my throat. first on friday, you got called on your thing, what you said.

and you apologized in about five minutes. so, i'm going to apologize now. i obviously wasn't really saying i was going to slit my throat under any circumstance. i was never going to commit suicide. secondly, no one -- there is no circumstance in which although some people said i said i'd kill myself if i had to interact with sarah huckabee sanders. what i was trying to make a point about, overstated, the futility of the briefings when they lie and obscure the facts. nevertheless to the extent anybody thought i was making light of suicide, to anybody that thought i was being disrespectful to sarah sanders and the job she had to do, i'm sorry. it's not that hard. it's not that hard. the white house could have solved this problem in the same way people who make misstatements, they say inappropriate things, they say things that are overdrawn or misinterpreted, just apologize. it's not that hard. >> i don't want to put myself back into this story. i obviously never meant -- it was a turn of phrase. >> as was mine. >> it was careless in this

climate and i should have known better and i made that clear as soon as i got off the air, before i got any gut for it. i think the larger argument is one about the guy at the top. i think that's what you were trying to say. and i think that what -- i watched that whole briefing. i bet my last dollar that raj definitely -- he doesn't have as good as a poker face. he looked like he believed what we're saying. it would be so much easier. >> and he was told not to apologize. >> kelly sadler is sorry. if you believe she told meghan mccain the truth, she is sorry and she's already apologized so why won't this white house say publicly what the staffer? question has already said privately? >> this is important. we all make mistakes, we apologize for them. it is fair to judge someone who doesn't apologize. it is important for her children to see what she does in a personal failing. president trump should apologize

when he says something like this. the president has a cardinal rule, which is we protect trump at all costs. we never apologize. it has infected legions of career staffers in washington, d.c., whose careers will never be the same and should never be the same. >> it's an interesting point. if she apologizes, what would then the president have to do who also insulted john mccain at the very on set of his campaign? you can't really take these people to task because trump, in almost every instance, has said something equally bad if not worse. so, it is a white house in which character is a handicap, not an asset. and people eventually either lose their minds and lose their jobs, or they sublimate it. they lose any semblance of personal integrity. they'll miss it when they get older. >> there is no optimism because what they're saying is when this comes crashing down, i want history to look at me better. that's how these people work in

their office every day. >> we understand the president to be tweeting. here it is. the so-called leaks coming out of the white house are massive. we're glad you're watching. we're your romance with hannity. but we are glad you are tuned in. the with that being said, leak remembers traitors and cowards and we will find out who they are. is jeremy bash still with us. a former national national security official now working with jeff sessions explored. i'm on season one of the americans. but this is how you hunt out a mole leaking missile defense secrets to a foreign adversary not how you track down who says

donald trump called african nations bleep holes. >> and beware of any anybody who tries to employ security measures to settle political scores. that's what cat knick has been doing. what is shocking he has been rehired to work in national security, it's surprising considering he engaged in this activity to rat out or try to fine leakers. apparently one of the people he had it out for was one of the most senior counter-terrorism officials in our government who also happened to be the most senior ranking muslim american in our government. one final thing, in my experience in government the anti-dote to leaks is not investigations, the anti-dote to leaks is loyalty. when there is not loyalty you are going to have an avalanche of leaks. >> and morale, organizations

where the morale is high tend to not leak. >> that's right. >> when we come back. in jerusalem, jared kushner celebrates the return of american leadership on the same day turkey is recalling its ambassadors to washington from tel aviv. i've been making blades here at gillette for 20 years. i bet i'm the first blade maker you've ever met. there's a lot of innovation that goes into making our thinnest longest lasting blades on the market. precision machinery and high-quality materials from around the world. nobody else even comes close. it's about delivering a more comfortable shave every time.

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you get a strong repair that you can trust. plus, with most insurance a safelite repair is no cost to you. >> customer: really?! >> singers: safelite repair, safelite replace. jared kushner and the u.s. delegation toasted american leadership in the opening of the american embassy in jerusalem. 50 miles away protesters clashes with israelis. 52 palestinians were killed today. and 2,000 injured. israeli forces accused hamas of leading a terrorist organization. they say some of the people threw rocks firebombs and explosives at the barrier. jeremy bash your thoughts. >> i washed the ceremony unfoaling this morning. obviously an historic day.

as with anything in the middle east it all seems to be zero sum one side gets what they want and spasms result on the other side of the spectrum. >> when harry truman recognized jerusalem in 1948 and sent his ambassador to the hole land he couldn't get there. and he took up residence in tel aviv. that became the de facto embassy. that's sort the historical accident that resulted in the u.s. embassy being in tel aviv. today america did right a historical wrong and put the embassy in the proper cap of israel, jerusalem. palestinians may have a capital in east jerusalem but as you know, nicole there is also the broader issue of israeli and palestinian peace. i don't think we are closer to that today. >> let me put you on the spot. >> yeah. >> would the obama administration consider doing this? >> it was considered because it

was american law since 1995 a bipartisan fwhal required the embassy moving to jerusalem but gave the president the ability to wave that in the interests of pursuing the peace process. i'm sure it came up in the obama administration but honestly i don't think anybody gave it serious consideration because they that the it would derail any peace process. today there is no peace process to derail. >> do you support the addition decision. >> skts of of course. in fact, the democratic national committees and the republican national committees statements at conventions, the platforms always called for this. it's been part of the american foreign policy for nearly a generation. >> i interviewed the israeli ambassador when the announcement was made that they would do this. and he said this is long overdue and whatnot. and i said well why do you think it took donald trump? do you think he knows more about the middle east?

you certainly had a good friend in the bush administration. i know there were mixed results and mixed feelings during the obama administration. but eng do you think it was donald trump's commitment to israel, his ignorance of the region or what jeremy bash just said, there is no peace process? >> there is no peace process. but this always concerns me from a domestic standpoint, who does it help? maybe it increases and improves our relationship between donald trump and benjamin netanyahu. and yes there is a history to it. but if it needs to instability and increased violence i don't know why we need to do it now. again, there is historical precedence to it but if it leads to an inability to initiate the policies we want in other parts of the middle east i don't see the need to do it. >> there wasn't a peace process before and there is not going to be a peace process now. i will say this president and this white house does not understand the difference

between having a gesture, having a bone to throw to their domestic base and creating a viable policy. whoopie they got us out of the iran deal. what is the deal now? they don't have one. what's the policy on reducing the tension with the palestinians? >> they don't have one. it's the absence of coherrin vision. when you hear john bolton talking in circles trying to explain how we are better off now with no iran deal you get dizzy and they haven't figured it out. it's one thing to be a fox pundit, another to be a national security adviser. >> 30 seconds. >> i think what happened today is the right thing, but i think the innate tension we are seeing and feeling is there is no next plan in iran, with north korea, with cuba, with syria. there is a volatility that creates a restlessness on the world stage. >> i cover a lot of decades of

the israeli and palestinian peace process. and one thin that the democrats and republicans agreed about was that the status of jerusalem was something you put of to the very end. the reason was this could be the thing that could blow it all up. we have to solve everything else and then we will get to this at the end. they were smart people, they were right, and this is wrong. >> we are long. i'm sorry katy tur. >> you said 30 second each at 4:59 and 20 second. >> i'm sorry. >> i'm bad with math. >> it's okay. you know, i love your conversation -- >> we are not math people. >> i love your conversations, and you know what, if want to keep talking just take out away. >> i'll send them offer. >> nicolle wallace, tou