i always wish i had more time with these friend. my thanks to you. that does it for our hour. i'm nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now. i'm depressed about my warriors. >> me too. i don't like it either. america, outside of houston and boston does not want where we are going. >> i'm not happy. one more thing to drink over. >> here's what we need. game sevens. i would like to watch basketball on sunday night and monday night. >> okay. >> go cavs, go warriors. thank you nicole. >> i'm for that. >> if it is a friday, i spy some russia headlines. tonight, reality check on the russia investigation. are the president's laws of distraction really working for him? >> the president has asked for full and complete transparency. that's what we expect to get. >> plus, the we'll see strategy. >> we would like to do i.

we are going to see what happens. >> how to interpret president trump's paws on the north korean summit. and mind the store. financial filings expose a new realm of presidential profit. this is "mtp daily" "mtp daily," and it starts right now. ♪ good evening i'm chuck todd here in washington. welcome to "mtp daily" folks what on oath was this whole spygate conspiracy about? it's been more than 24 hours since congress was briefed on the hyped and hi documents that would prove that the justice department planted spies in donald trump's campaign. what have we heard, adam schiff said it rei firmed their view that there is no evidence to support any of those allegations. and mcconnell suggested it

reaffirmed his support for mueller's eggs investigation and he added the inspector general's investigation of the justice department. was the whole thing, the fights, the freakouts just a big fat distract so there would be less interest in this story, about a second trump tower meeting meaning russia wasn't the only ones wanting in on the action? that story is raising questions whether or not donald trump jr. gave false testimony to congress. or is the wholify spying conspiracy saga meant to distract from this story, trying to turn the trump campaign into a $1 billion pay day from the saudis and emirates. or meant to distract from this story about roger stone seeking dirt on hillary clinton from wikileak's julian assange. or was it meant to distract from

this story, michael cohen discussing ways to offimprove russian relations with a russian oligarch? you can see where i'm going here. because as the president and his allies look to undermine mueller's investigation with allegations of a deep state spirit looks as if mueller's investigation might be casting a net that is much wider than anyone could have imagined. jeremy dash is a former chief of staff at the cia and the pentagon. he is going to join for this block, tonight's panel of hugh hutd, thattia misha, and howard feynman. and they are all msnbc political analysts. welcome all. happy friday. mr. bash, welcome. so yesterday, i want to put up a david corn tweet because he put together a number of allegations the president has thrown out which have gotten us and investigators all a'tissy.

first it was unmasking is the real scandal. no. obama bug trump. that's the real scandal. no. fisa warrant. no. uranium one. no. fbi informant in the trump campaign is a real scandal? no. jeremy, what's going on in your view. >> distraction bingo. we have got deep state. we have witch-hunt. we have wires tapped. we have unmasking and now we have the word spygate. the president is really just trying to -- i don't know if the it's distract from those other headlines you referenced or just the underlying issue which is that his campaign, his inner circle is being investigated very prflbly, very expeditiously very aggressively by bob mueller. >> i want to bring up the donald trump jr. thing. this was a across coops letter today. hugh hewitt, chris coons is not alleging he lied to congress but he put out a transcript -- i want to read the transcript real quick. you are a legal guy. we've talked a lot about russia. did other foreign governments

offer or provide assistance to the trump campaign. trump jr., not that i am aware of. did you directly or indirectly seek foreign nationals assistance for the trump campaign trump jr. no. are you aware of anyone seeking assistance from foreign nationals for the trump campaign. trump jr., i'm not. the lawyer seemed it was vague. maybe he didn't technically lie to congress. >> i think senator coons is one of the most stable centrists in the senate. what he did by putting it out he said read this, it speaks for itself. there is an explanation that will have to be forthcoming between the distinction between what he said and what we know to have happened. it doesn't mean he was lying. it means it is a poorly chosen set of word. he ought to be move expansive as

jeff sessions should have been when he was talking about meeting russians. be more expansive at a sbler view, not less. >> . >> president trump has gotten really good at nicknaming things. the thing -- i think one of the reasons why he was probably successful on the campaign trail is because we can all tick off crooked hillary, lying ted, low energy jeb. the fact that he unders how to market things, he understands thousand market ideas, this goes into the idea that he is a victim of an overreaching justice department. he's been saying this over and over again. and there is some evidence with polls that republicans are starting to say, hey, all of this stuff adds up to something. i think in reality he is trying to say this report that robert mueller is going to come out with, you shouldn't listen to it. it's partisan. i think they are trying to get ahead of that. >> every one of his allegations gets debunked but it doesn't

mean it doesn't have an impact? >> it has a political impact n the world he cares about, among his supporters. this is a perfect explanation or why he is wear he is. but the difference between the campaign trail and now is that he wanted some support for the next step he wanted to take against the justice step here on this line of inquiry, the spygate line of inquiry. he didn't get it. the thundering silence from all the republicans immediately after that means that this avenue is effectively blocked, it seems like to me. >> this isn't going to be the excuse to fire rod rosenstein. >> this is not -- he is probing along the wall here looking for one way in to get that done. this is not going to be it, i don't think. >> jeremy bash i want to go back to trump tower two meeting. i'm curious how you think the intelligence community would have rooud viewed this. a group gathered at trump tower

to meet with donald trump jr. the meeting was convened primarily to offer help to the trump team. what that help was, you know, it's not fully -- is it about the campaign itself? was it a quid pro quo for the iran nuclear deal? there is a lot of speculation about the avenues where this could go. how likely would it have been that a meeting like this would have suddenly hit the radar of the intelligence community before the election? >> unclear. i actually think the fact that the intelligence committee turned its sights on russian aggression and potential efforts by the russians to interfere in the election and ties to u.s. persons, meaning people in the trump campaign means it had to cross a significant threshold. if the campaign as just meeting with foreigners, you know, inside a lot of back and forth between emissaries of foreign governments who come and say i want to educate you about this issue or that policy issue or

hey when you get into office we would like to talk to you about your situation. that's different than we want to come help the campaign. that's clearly what the russia did had the first set of trump tower meeting. you will put this second set of trump tower meetings at other level of concern unless the intelligence community collected specific information that it was directed by a government to influence the election. >> i'm curious, and for the panel here that's with me, do any of you think it could be a quid pro quo for pulling out iran deal? >> that's a huge jump. >> there is a whiff of it in there. >> it says come together, like a beit-els song to come against iran. if someone paid for that that would be a huge problem. i think it was donald trump's intuition and he campaigned against the iran deal from day

one. >> the big picture here -- we keep having to stan back farther and farther to see the whole big picture. i think it would have been intelligence community malpractice for people in our organizations not to have worried about the trump campaign, what it would reach out to do, and what it might attract by way of interesting donors. >> sure. >> from the very beginning. everybody knew that the banks in new york wouldn't lend him money. other people in the construction industry wouldn't lend him money. that after his bankruptcies in atlantic city he was scouring the world for cash. they had to have known about that even before that. so yeah, did he put the whole campaign up for sale? that's the question. >> you know, yammish, bob mueller may find this network and what howard is alleging is there, it snels and it looks like this or that was for sale and all this stuff. but it isn't connected.

it didn't russian collusion. it isn't that. is that survivable for president trump? >> it depends because it depends on who goes down. if it's -- if it becomes jared kushner and his son and some of the people that are more close because we already have 19 people indicted that could be problematic for the president. if he has to then start giving out pardons to his children i think that that becomes a political problem that this president will have that will be unlike what the president has faced in the past. i think that the idea is that robert mueller and i think why president trump hates this investigation, yes there is a collusion issue but all these people complex financial issues means that robert mueller, if he goes digging is going to find something, and obviously he has already found something because five people already pleaded guilty. >> it feels like he found a lot more, hugh, but it's not all on the initial mission. that's the confusion here. >> president trump going to carry around the inspector general's report, read this one, not that one. >> he hopes.

>> from all indications i think it's going to be good. >> i'm not as convinced the ig report is going to be helpful to just one side. put it that way. >> interesting. >> for what it's worth. jeremy, one final question, this goes to the roger stone wikileaks situation. it is the speaks fcificity of h denial. he says i had no advance notice of the content source or the exact same of the wikileaks disclosure. assange said so, in his own tweets, roger stone never predicted anything that i hadn't already said in public. when you read that what is missing in the denial in your view. >> wikileaks is an agency of the russian federation. it's clear to the u.s. intelligence committee that wikileaks is controlled by the russian federation and they are

put into the u.s. to do russia's bidding. it wasn't did he have advance notice, it was did he reach out and say look we are interested, we want to know what you are doing, we welcome it. if he welcomed it and there was connectivity then it is another one of the meetings between russian intelligence and trump officials. and the question is, did the president know about it. the simple solution, if he sits with bob mueller he will give an answer. >> philip bump wrote this today, if there was all this collusion why did they have to keep asking julian assange about the hillary clinton e-mails? >> silence. it doesn't add up. >> that is a question. >> there is no collusion proven thus far. >> somebody organized those mails for julian assange and it had to be an earn ma. they knew which reporters, which days. it was well organized.

it wasn't a typical wikileaks stun. i always wonder who help. i think that's what they are asking roger stone about. thank you. i love the way hugh is looking at me. i don't buy that they know the american media landscape as those releases did. >> it depends who is driving around in the car. boris or natasha. >> something smells there. will they or won't they? after president trump put the kibosh on the north korean summit now he says maybe it will happen of we'll see. sfx: muffled whistle text alert.

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but today both he and his defense secretary suggested it may happen afterall. >> it could even be the 12th. we are talking to them now. they very much want to do it. we would like to did it. we're going the see what happens. >> we have got some possibly some good news on the korea summit, where it may, if our diplomats can pull it off may have it become on even. >> their comments came after a measured statement from a top north korean official saying quote we are making it clear that we are willing to sit down at any time in any way to solve this problem. one big reason the summit may still happen, president trump may want this summit amid the cloud of the russia investigation. and the north korean summit is the only thing you could argue that has truly marked mueller off of the headlines recently. joining me now, chris hill. and our panel is still here, hugh, wram iyammish, and howard.

ambassador, who goss this delay? the u.s. side or the chinese? >> i can't buy this argument that the chinese somehow put the kibosh on this. i think the chinese have wanted this to go forward. they would like to be sort of a part of the process but i can't believe they would have told kim not to do this. i think it is a combination of kim getting kind of nervous about the idea that he is supposed to give away everything for essentially a promise. >> yeah. >> and init was the president getting nervous that maybe the north koreans weren't going to do this. but at the end of the day they have got to project a kind of smoother team than they have got. and this idea of the president, you know, dictating something to john bolton, sending it out without mentioning it to mike pompeo, who has been the point guy on all of this -- it just is beginning to look a little ragged and frankly embarrassing to the rest of the world. >> yammish, the whole reason

that mcmaster and tillerson were out was to smooth out this issue. finally, the president is going to have a secretary of state and a national security adviser at least that he gets along with. they may -- but once again it is an old-fashioned it looks like the nsa is in one place, secretary of state is in another. we have seen this in previous white houses. >> think about all the different personnel changes, but the person at the center is donald trump. i talked to so many whyte whout officials yesterday. i was asking all sorts of questions, did he do this because he thought kim was going to cancel? what else is going on? why would you dictate it in this way? what the north korean nuclear threat that was in the middle of the letter that we pray we don't have to use your nuclear weapons. at the end of the day president trump made this decision and he is going to continue to be the person that decides using his gut how he does foreign poll see. this is the way he does it. it's kind of an "art of the

deal" style. everyone at the white house said this was at the enof the day president trump's decision and that he was the one led to do this. yeah there might be people around him who are arguing but he wants to do. >> president trump was setting up china as the fall guy as early arizona tuesday. listen. >> i will say i'm a little disappointed because when kim jong-un had the meeting with president xi in china -- the second meeting. the first meeting we knew about. the second meeting, i think there was a little change in attitude from kim jong-un. so i don't like that. i don't like that. >> well, look, i don't think that anything that the president has done yet has risen to the level that the chinese need to deploy their master strategy. i mean, donald trump is playing jacks and marbles on the street. the chinese have been doing this for 5,000 years. the koreans have been doing it for 5,000 years. this is not the city council on a real estate deal. it's not the zoning commission. these are people in a region of the world where they move in

long-term, long-horizon fashion. that's -- i mean the chinese are looking i'm sure at donald trump saying how do we stand away far enough that we don't push him into a corner? >> hugh, do you see this whole zte issue that the trump administration is desperately trying to fix for china as part of this. >> i don't. i think it's overstated that the secretary of state did not know what was goingan. i think the secretary of defense did and they were all coordinated. donald trump's muscle memory is to go into and lead negotiations. when he reorganized his debt in 1990 he left the meetings twice, threw down even though he was in default. this is what he does. by the way i think it could have worked out very, very well. >> ambassador, another oddity about in whole thing had to do with the curious way that mike pompeo when he was -- he was reading the letter to congress and they were asked about, well, they seemed to notify the

japanese. but it was pretty clear they didn't notify the south koreans. what do you make of that? what did the south koreans make of this? >> i think the south koreans put a lot of conspiracy into this. they think that president trump has soured on president moon. i think it's just kind of chaos in the white house and not knowing how to got your paperwork done. john bolton is a lot of things, but i don't think he's a good note taker or stenographer. so i think there is kind of a sense that everything is being done in a kind of chaotic way. and i wouldn't be surprised that they, quote, forgot to tell people. i think they just have trouble doing things normally. >> you think it might have been an accident that they didn't tell the south koreans. gosh we forgot to call them, too. >> i think at the end of the day the president wants it to happen and i suspects it's going to happen in some way, shape, or form.

i think he ought to have a look at john bolton and say are you with me or are you not? if you are not with me i'm not sure how we are going to work together of the i would give that a couple of weeks to play out. but i mean you have got to be able to kind manage some things, whether various staffers don't want to do it or not they need to be able to manage thing. >> before i get the panel to weigh in, i want to ask you about a conspiracy theory. do you think bolton and pence sbepgs ally dangled the libya model the try to kill it, to try to can i will this summit, ambassador hill? >> john bolton is a lot of things. but he's not dumb. i think he knows precisely what it meant to talk about a libya model where the dictator ends up dead in the street and the the idea that partnerships brings it up again i think really concerned the north koreans in the sense that they believed john bolton's views were spreading through the

administration. >> is it bolton and pence versus pompeo? >> he is a very good note taker. i don't believe anything was unintentional or uncoordinated. >> mentioning libya. >> it's actually kind of a master stroke. >> you talked about muscle memory. having been in the trump tower offices with the candidate trump and watching the way that thing flowed. careful note taking is not one of the things -- >> it's bolton. not the president. >> it's not one of the things that goes on in there. and i think the president is feeling this out moment by moment. it's the ultimate culture clash in an attempt at diplomacy in that trump operates in a way that i think the china and the koreans and the japanese find almost utterly come precomprehensible but it could work. >> it has been the trump's -- hey, you never know. >> it could work.

everyone that i talked to no one said this is completely not going to happen. everyone said the president will probably end up sitting down with him. it will probably look like president trump packed out then he is going to claim victory, i alone will be the one who puts it back on the table. and when he goes to singapore it's going to be pop of and circumstance and it's going to be able to say it was near the edge and i pulled it back. >> the second part of his muscle memory is being able to turn the smallest project into the greatest thing that ever happened. if he gets in there he is going to tear victory about something. >> there are three americans home who otherwise wouldn't have been home. and there are patterns from north koreans that we have never witnessed before. >> what should be on the table when they actually meet? i think that's been part of the problem here. they don't know what they are negotiating. >> you got it. i don't think the north koreans

are anywhere close to wheeling up some winnebago and saying here is all of our nuclear stuff, take it away. i think there is a problem there. and i think the administration might consider doing a little less public posturing on it, get some teams, sit down with the north koreans, put a draft communique. say look this is what we want as an outcome and then try to negotiate something. maybe they won't get 100% but they will at least get some idea of what the north koreans are prepared to do. don't foreget just meeting the president is a big deal for kim jong-un. his dad never did it. his grandfather never did it. it is a very big deal for him. we need the get an idea of what it is he is willing to do. so far i don't think we have that. >> a great point to enon. ambassador hill as always i appreciate you coming on and sharing your expertise with us and the viewers. panel, you are not going anywhere. up ahead, did the envelope handle the decision on the anthem protests properly? why are so many people including

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welcome back. "tonight, i'm obsessed with" an old eggs preks, don't pee on my leg and tell me it's raining. u.s.a. today investigated a mysterious corporation listed on the president's financial disclosure statement from which he personally earned $100,000 last year. t retail llc is a new on line

business that's tied to a new trump store.com that sells guess what, trump stuff. okay control room, cue the selling music. do you want to smell like president trump? these are real items. act now and spray on trump deodorant. one easy payment of $14. want to look spiffy after you have shower asked deodorized slip into this comfy trump bath robe for the low low price of $125. want to put away those pennies you saved on the tax cut? how about a gold bar coin bank? just $25. in all seriousness those are real items. we are not making that up. is president trump trying to profit off the presidency? obviously. is it illegal? nope. is it unethical? that's up to you to decide many people will believe it is. the trump organization was not eager to talk about the president's new revenue stream but it didn't deny it either.

speaking of streams that brings us back to our old expression about peeing on legs. i guess they never denied they were going to profit off the presidency but in this case when it comes to profiting off the presidency president trump is peeing on our leg and admitting that yes he is doing just that. we'll be right back. i'm dianne feinstein and i approve this message.

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wlap. welcome back. upon further review, could the until's new penalties for kneeling during the national anthem be overturned confuse seems like it the league said it was unanimous that all players must stand during the national anthem or their team will be fined. but two team owners tell espn they abstained from what they are now saying was an informal vote. and jeff johnson said his team would not discourage players from taking a knee during the anthem at all. i'll bring the panel back. it is interesting the watch the owners suddenly run. i have a feeling this new policy

could be dead in a week. >> this nfl rule change or attempted rule chang was nfl owners capitulating to donald trump changing the meaning of a protest that began and is about police brutality and changing it into a protest about patriotism. the white owners looked at the league that's 70% black and said we can tell you what to do. and now they are realizing that the public isn't behind them. now, i think they will have to change something. right now, african-american players are being told all the people this your family, including the people around you, their lives shouldn't be protested about. you should hang on to your million dollar check and don't think about the other people deal with the brutality issues, which are proven. >> howie long's son, a white player. it's important to point this out.

i think it's going to be key, what do the white players -- are they the ones that push back at the owner. he says this is a fear of a diminished bottom line, this is not patriotism. don't get it confused. these players don't love america more than the players demonstrating and taking real action to improve it. i have a question here howard, did they make a decision to worry about white fans' business, money coming into the league? do they not want black consumers? >> i see everything through the eyes of my hometown pittsburgh steelers and the rooney family. they pushed for the rooney rule to make sure that african-americans were considered for coaching position. they are as right as rain on most of this stuff. people outside of pittsburgh were taken aback a little bit by the reaction of the fans. and by the way, the steelers are a religion in that part of the world as you know. if those people were shocked and angered by what happened by way

of the protests that's going to make the rooney family pause. i can tell you they are not particularly happy with this rule either. they and other conscious-driven owners are going to be dealing with this more rather than less as a result of this decision. >> hugh, i have noticed on the right there is not a lot of support for this decision either. i have had some true principled conservatives make the argument that i have been asking, this question, which is boy, conservatives fight against the ability to shut down debate on publicly -- on taxpayer funded lands that are called universities but apparently on taxpayer funded lands called nfl stadiums you can't. >> my reaction was, it wasn't racial at all. it was as though the cleveland browns front office of the last 15 years had risen up and taken over the nfl. it's stupid as ever. and roger goodell got a contract extension last year. he is -- has there ever been a worse commissioner of a major

sport. >> the word if he canless. i think at this point it's roger goodell's ping. how did he blow this? >> the way he blew it is because there is this idea yes it might not be about race for some people but for african-americans and for people who understand racism in this country you are dealing with story after story of people, regular citizens calling the cops on black people for living their lives, for napping -- >> we had an nba player in milwaukee. >> millimilwaukee. >> tazed over a parking ticket. >> you can't say we don't want to talk about all that stuff going on. we just want to play the game. >> love the cleveland browns thing as a steelers fan. >> you would. >> i know. as symbolism, saying okay, you stay out of sight -- you know, you stay in the locker room. >> keep your protest where we can't see it. >> keep your protest where we can't see it. what's the point if you can't see it.

mindless. >> actually their policy encourages protest. that's the irony. it incentive eyeses it by getting people to crowd source. didn't mind when the kids took the knee. before this all happened. trump did not tweet this. this was an unforced error. i understand it's about race but i'm saying the president didn't ask them to do this. this is roggic goodell convening a meeting and saying let's shoot our feet together. >> the president poured fire on it. >> mike pence showed up and made sure to make a public statement to walk away from a game when he knew people were going to be taking a knee. he walked in and inserted politics. >> #winning. >> there are institutions in the state that could take on the cloutd of president of the united states, it's the nfl. they could have stood toe to toe with the president. >> it's not even toe to toe.

all goodell had to say mr. president, we appreciate your opinion, you worry about the kpun and we will worry about the league. >> does goodell have to go? >> i don't see a single player that is going to be able to take him seriously. i have to go. up ahead, george costanza double dips. why is jason alexander starring in a new political tv ad? not that there is anything wrong with that.

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welcome back. today in meet the mid terms. the democrats path to winning back the house includes three districts in california that hillary clinton won in 2016. to get a chance to flip those key districts democrats have to make sure they get into the general election. remember, in california the state's top two advance to the general regardless of party ask. that system could actually shut out the democrats in a couple of these districts. in these three key districts there are so many democrats on the ballot that the idea is you may get republicans finishing one two because there are so many democrats it will split the vote up. one of those are dany rohrabacher. harley rudee is hoping to unseat him. he is hoping to get help from a former seinfeld star. >> tonight's debate is between

tech entrepreneur harley ruda and incumbent dana rom backer who is joining us from a secured camera in moscow. can you hear us. >> if you are not going to let me say anything it's good-bye. >> sir. >> i am the chairman of the europe and yourationan subcommittee, including emerging threats. >> alrighty. >> one of the reasons the democrats are having to do that is there is a republican challenger to rohrabacher, too, who is outspending hip. now you know the weird politics of california's top two system we will find out if that works coming up on june 5th. more proof that politics is a snake infested pit. we are not kidding. de a mess until exxonmobil scientists put it to the test.

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the first survivor of ais out there.sease and the alzheimer's association is going to make it happen. but we won't get there without you. visit alz.org to join the fight. welcome back. it's infrastructure week, again.

actually, i'm kidding of it's actually not. but last week was. you didn't notice, did you? that's probably because it practically feels like every other week gets labelled infrastructure week at least during the weekend. and they say wait until monday. and then all of a sudden something comes up. recently i satdown with the chairman of j.p. morgan. and josh bolton. do you know what we talked a lot about? infrastructure including the toxic climate in twash and whether ceo's make good politicians. but we started with infrastructure. i asked jamie bolton who went wrong and why wasn't it a priority in the first year of the trump administration. >> we are going to push this non-stop until it gets done. some of the things take a long time. we did competitive taxes. it took a long time of we to the it done. we shouldn't stop the evident. no matter what goes on in washington we have got to get this fixed. >> he is giving the non-politician answer.

i get that. this seemed like the one easy thing trump should have been able to pull off. instead it hasn't happened. >> if it was easy it would have happened a long time ago. people said the same thing about tax reform. it took ten years to lay the ground work, build the public support for the right kind of policies. we are hoping this doesn't take ten years. we are hoping it takes just another year or so. but we are working very hard to lay the groundwork for public and political support for policies that will promote the kind of infrastructure investment this country needs. >> can i make another point. this is hurting growth, jobs, wages, american competitiveness. that's what it's doing. we have got to do something about it. democrats and republicans want to get it fixed. we need to get it fixed. >> i don't get why -- this is not -- everybody agrees on this problem. this is not -- someone said maybe if a bridge collapses that will somehow -- we had a bridge

collapse in minneapolis. that didn't seem to fire things up. what is it going to take? change the word, infrastructure? i don't mean to be facetious. what it is going to take to get washington about what a serious problem this is. >> realistically, josh, one of the things that i thought the initial mistake that president trump made coming into office was, do something quickly that can get bipartisan support. the infrastructure plan would have been something we could have done quickly with bipartisan support. the longer you wait, the harder it is to get anything bipartisan done, correct? >> my experience tells me the early part of the term are the right time, but it's not the only time. big things happen in the third year of a presidency. and i'm not pessimistic that big things can't happen now. it is not just about the money, it's about the way we approach it. the red tape involved. and the enormous burden of

permitting that has to be done one step after the other. a lot of those things can be fixed without a big legislative maneuver. and we're pushing the administration to work with states and localities to reduce that huge burden preventing us from building the infrastructure we need. >> i want to lift up big pictures today of the economy when i had you in the room. a lot of people are curious in your view. it feels like it's good. is there a point that it overheats? what is your concern six months to 12 months to 2 years? >> what's the chance -- 100%. but it is good. household formation is going up, wages are going up, jobs are going up. we'll have all-time low soon. capital expenditures up 25% last quarter? it's not a bubble. it's broad-based rain. it is hard to forecast the future. if i was going to, we could be

healthy for a year or maybe a little longer. >> you seem to vacillate between washington and the political officials saying, business needs to -- they need to concentrate. but then you come back. you keep getting sort of drawn back, it sucks you into the business roundtable. what is the state of washington like? >> first of all, i'm always optimistic and will keep on doing this job and try to get the right thing done. so every night you get a little depressed, but so what? go back and roll up the sleeves and do it again. >> the toxicity of washington. >> it doesn't matter, it's your job. >> that's your advice? come back, figure it out? >> if business doesn't get involved, it's a huge vacuum. if business collaborates, all these things can be fixed. >> what is the conversation like? in some ways, both parties have a revolt against you guys. the populist movements, they are just -- there's anger out there and the right translated to

trump and the left translating to sanders. they both can't stand big corporate business, big government. what is your case to push back against this rising populist tide? >> you know, jaime dimon is the case. in other words, it's kind of like you can be against big business but in the abstract, you have to like what jpmorgan chase is doing in your community. and that is what we're encouraging all of our members to do. all our members are stepping up and doing it. they are deeply involved in education and workforce developments in their community. they are deeply involved in charitable undertakings. they are creating jobs, you know, good jobs in each of their communities. that's how we have to win this argument. >> if a fellow suggest zen came to you and said, i'm thinking about jumping into the political frame. would you tell him to be careful or go ahead and do it? >> i'm not an expert in politics. i applaud people who want to get involved with something like

that. i don't think ceos are naturally suited to politics. so my view is that just because you run a company -- >> stop that. i'm glad to hear you say that. i've had the same view. and actually a ceo is worst type of potential politician because you don't get to run your own show in politics. >> right. >> is that fair? >> i think that's true. you have to compromise a lot. you have to. it's not a natural thing to be a ceo and then a politician. >> you look at these guys and say, politics is a tougher business. >> politics is a different business. now, some ceos are actually turn out to be pretty well suited for it. but being a ceo in my experience isn't in and of itself good preparation to serve in government. so i urge caution to the ceos interested in public service. but i also urge many of them to go into it because the ceos that i work with at the business roundtable are --

>> you can watch my full conversation on mtp.com. is washington ready for a swap? why don't you ask the poisonous copperhead snakes. [phone ringing]

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in case you missed it, maybe the white house is a sinkhole like some say it is. oh, the rich irony. there's something under that hole. but that just gets me caution tape, pylons, everything is good, right? wrong! now the sinkhole is getting bigger. there it is. the national park service says it has been monitoring the situation. so good news, the white house sinkhole is now officially graduated to a situation. believe me, it gets worse because of the sinkholes, if they don't get you, the poisonous copperhead snakes might. one was spotted on the national mall wednesday. we got a lot of rain, maybe that's done it. but you'll be happy to know copperhead snakes are the only thing found in the district. but their bite is rare ly going

to cause get. if you spot one, remain calm and move away slowly. but lordy, watch your step. that's all for tonight. we'll be back with monday orange "mtp daily." have a great weekend. "the beat with ari melber" starts now. good evening, ari. good evening. we begin with breaking news. new heat on michael cohen as he's busted for a trump tower meeting that has never been disclosed before. michael cohen secretly met with a sanctioned russian billionaire just 11 days before the inauguration meeting. it is now under investigative scrutiny. and there's video. cohen met with victor vexleberg. he's the same oligarch behind the company that funneled half a million dollars to michael