♪ ♪ the more you live between life and business, the more you need someone at your back. the powerful backing of american express. don't live life without it. morning glory, america. i'm hugh hewitt. i hope you enjoyed the royal wedding as much as my wife did. you should know, though they won't tell you, the weekend crew here at msnbc worked around the clock to make that happen. it isn't easy to pull off coverage of an institution used to making its own rules since merlin and arthur were running things. now, though, it's back to the big stories of the week. after the break, the number two republican in the united states senate john cornyn will join me to talk about the long, hot summer ahead inside the beltway. but first, to discuss the reasons for that weather and political predictions, our trio of the capital's best analysts,

franchesca chambers, white house correspondent of the daily mail.com, courtney kube of msnbc, where she covers the pentagon and national security, josh crashauer of the "national journal." welcome, you three. franchesca, i'll start with you, with the korea summit, on and off, off on thursday, on on friday. what was the reaction to the pentagon on thursday? >> surprise. a tremendous surprise. thursday, after the letter came out, it was scrambling to figure out what exactly it meant. did it mean it was actually off? did it mean there would be a practical change to the tremendous military presence in the region? the answer, of course, so far, has been no. that they've already been at this heightened state of readiness throughout all of this diplomatic overtures and the potential summit and what not. then we had secretary mattis on friday, surprising everyone and saying, oh, well, we have the possibility of some the good news on the summit. and the diplomats are talking and they're working and it may actually work out. so, it's really been just this like head-snapping back and forth. and even if you look back to

wednesday -- or, yeah, to wednesday, when the white house was saying, oh, it's probably going to happen, there's a good chance it's going to happen. thursday, no, it's not going to happen. friday, president trump and secretary mattis both seeming more optimistic. president trump saying that the north koreans put out a very nice statement in response to his letter. >> i think it was franchesca, in fact, on wednesday who got the president to respond to a question about the summit. >> that's right, on wednesday as the president was leaving the white house, i ask him, when would he know or be 100% sure if he was going to the summit, and he said, by next week. then, of course, the very next day, he said, it's off. but i agree with you that there seems to be this sense, potentially, that he took the summit off the table in order to force north korea back to the table. and now they're willing to move forward. but the way things stood on friday morning at the white house was that joe hagan, who has been running point on advance for this, he's a deputy chief of staff for operations there, was no longer going this

weekend to singapore for the summit. so, it is off, as far as we know, but they're leaving open the possibility that it could be back on. >> josh crashauer, on friday morning, i had senator lindsey graham on my radio show. an absolutely chilling exchange. he said, president trump is going to resolve the korea north nuclear weapons program, one way or another, and he talked explicitly about war. is that the alternative to what's going on here? >> lindsey graham is being very stark and i think that's the fear from a lot of folk who experienced in north korea in diplomacy. they don't think that the north koreans are ready to play ball. and what we're seeing in the white house is sort of a -- by the seat of your pants diplomacy, where i think you're seeing a team of rivals emerging within the administration. john bolton, ever since he made that comment about libya, i think that was a red flag for a lot of people who are hawkish on the issue of north korea. that was a message sent to the north koreans that we're not going to be given a whole lot of concessions and we're going to be playing "hardball." and pompeo, who has been a hawk throughout his career, especially in congress, he's come in a more diplomatic manner. and i think you saw his

testimony this week. i think he was pretty bummed that the summit, at least for now, has been called off. so pompeo and bolton are shaping up as the two poles on diplomacy. >> courtney kube, it's usually the national security saying everybody calming down, and the secretary of defense is rattling the saber. and the dependents in south korea have gotten in. the military men, the civilians, they've got to be on edge. >> yes, you would be surprised. when you talk to them, all of them kind of act like, this is just steady state, this is where we've been. and we forget, it's a confusing time right now. nobody knows if the summit is going to happen, and if it doesn't happen, what's the next step? but look back to a year ago or even a little bit more than a year ago, april of 2017, up until about september of 2017, when there were people who are very openly talking about how conflict with north korea was inevitable. it seems like the tensions are down from there. and i would say, you know, i was last in korea about six months

ago. and i was shocked by how the military there, they were still bringing their dependents. >> you're the only one at the table who's been to the dmz. those people are always on alert, but is seoul always on alert like they are? >> yes, and i hate to use the word complacent, but you almost become complacent when there's this constant threat. the peninsula has been at war for decades now. it obviously does ratchet up when you have times like last april, when there was tremendous rhetoric that really continued through until the icbm launch in late november of 2017. >> franchesca, were you going to go singapore? >> yes. >> were you planning on that? >> yes. and i haven't canceled my plane ticket yet either. >> interesting. >> and i know other reporters haven't yet either, because we are within the convinced this is actually off yet. it costs you the same amount of money to cancel it at the last moment, so you might as well hold off on something like this. but what really stands out to me just how much president trump absolutely does want this summit. we found out yesterday from a

u.s. official that joe hagen, going back to him, and other officials went to singapore and were stood up, as this official said. and the u.s. was still planning to go forward with talks with north korea. it was only after those insults that were hurled aa -- at the vice president and what president trump called a nuclear showdown threat that they had to walk away. >> my theory is that the north koreans had no idea how to engage with anyone other than china, and even not that well. and they don't know how to calibrate this. and someone may be dead because they botched this summit up. many people may be dead inside of north korea. i want to switch to the politics of the week, because the nfl story will dominate talks all weekend long when we're not talking about north korea. and josh, how much did the president intend to reignite nfl 2.0? and how much of that was an offhanded comment? >> look, president trump loves the culture wars. republicans in congress want to talk about tax cuts, but president trump understands his base and understands the broader

republican party and his voters a lot better, and they get animated about this issue. the missouri senate candidate, josh hauolly put out a statemen trying to amp up the issue. and "the washington post" put out a poll, the elites are at odds with the majority of the country. "the post" poll was really interesting, it found a big divide between younger voters and older voters. and found 53% of americans basically support wad the nfl did in essentially requiring the players to stand if they're on the field. even 30% of democrats said they were for that. so it's as much a socioeconomic and cultural divide as it is a partisan divide. >> my own chuck todd and i were on my radio show this week and neither of us can believe that the nfl introduced this. were you surprised to see this issue -- it's the off season, "hard knocks" has just arrived, everyone has forgotten it, and boom, the nfl puts it back on

the table. >> not especially, because if they hadn't, you could expect president trump to push this issue again in the fall. he had been pretty aggressive about it. he had been calling or at least had conversations on the phone with some of the team owners in the past. so i think they knew they could expect the president to keep pushing on this issue if they department do something. >> so i want to circle back to john bolton. courtney kube, the ambassador is an old friend of mine. i stay in touch with him, but i have not talked to him in person since this has begun. what is his role and what does the pentagon think of his role and what does the state department think of his role? >> so he is serving as more like a chief of staff than a national security adviser at this point. it's -- and i don't mean that in any way to denigrate john kelly's role. but john bolton right now is the shiny new guy who president trump is listening to. he's the one who has his ear and he's got the proximity. secretary mattis, he says, he had never met john bolton prior to him becoming the national security adviser. now he's really trying to court him. mattis is trying to create this alliance with bolton and pompeo and mattis.

he has them over to the pentagon once a week or so for breakfast. he's trying to put them all on the same page, then to be able to present an alliance to president trump as he did with secretary tillerson. it does not appear that that's working out with john bolton so far. it seems like mattis and pompeo really are more on the same page, specifically about north korea. it seems like they were on the same page on the summit, but it's not really working out with bolton yet. >> does the national security adviser come into the press room, at all, ever, does he talk to you focus? >> sometimes. and certainly, he does -- if he does hits from the north lawn, there are opportunities, like with every white house official, to stop him and get him to answer questions. but not, i would say, especially frequently, but neither does john kelly. john kelly also doesn't come out and talk to press in public settings. but often, if those sorts of folks are talking to us, they're talking to us in private settings and they're referred to as senior administration officials. >> josh crashauer, last question, the generic ballot has the republicans ahead for the first time in the congressional election. first time. and the president's approval rating for the first time in one

poll at 50%. do they feel the wind at their back now? >> here's the big story. the democratic base is energized, but trump is winning over some of these independent voters that were very much against him early on in his presidency. so you're still seeing a really big field of house races with, but right now the senate, the republicans could pick up a seat in the senate because they're being fought in states that trump did very well in, and the house map is starting to look less like a wave and maybe a ripple. republicans still have to be worried about holding the house, but it's not as bad as it looks. >> they might pick up five, six seats. thank you for coming, all of you. i'll be right back with the aforementioned senate's john cornyn. he's the senate's second in kmap comman command, after the break.

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welcome back. i'm hugh hewitt. monday through friday, you hear me on the salem radio network from 6:00 to 9:00 a.m. eastern time, driving many of you to work. but most saturdays, i'm right here on msnbc. senator john cornyn is the senior senator from the state of texas and the second in command of the most unwieldy institution that sprang from the framers' mind, the united states senate. senator cornyn took office in 2002, the senate whip working alongside mitch mcconnell, to make these past 17 months the most productive of the body's history. with the passage of the massive tax cut and tax reform bill, the repeal of the sequestration of the defense department, the partial repeal of dodd/frank this week, a baker's dozen of congressional review act repeals of obama-era regulations and reform of the v.a. and near and dear to any originalists heart, the confirmation of not just of neil gorsuch, but also 21 appeals courts judges in the court of appeals in the united states, with another 20 lined up behind them in a landing

pattern, which has already set a record for a new president. and which is already one-eighth of the sitting federal appeals judges, on its way soon to be one quarter. senator cornyn, welcome. a good memorial day weekend to you. >> thanks, hugh. that's a great summary of the last 17 months. >> it's been busy. before we go to that and the courts in particular, though. i want to look back at the last few days. president trump has begun to use the woterm "spygate," #spygate. is it appropriate for the president to use that term, senator? >> well, i know the president's using this generically to talk about an fbi informant that was part of this investigation. you know, i don't remember circumstances under which both presidential candidates of the major political parties were the subject of fbi investigations, up to and including election day. and it's very troubling, what we've seen at the top echelon of

the department of justice and the fbi under the obama administration and it's going to take a long time to recover. so we need to find out exactly what happened. make sure the fbi didn't use its awesome power for inappropriate political purposes and just was conducting what should be an orthodox counterintelligence investigation. >> now, senator, you've been a trial judge. you've been a texas supreme court justice, you've been the texas attorney general. can you explain for us the difference between a, quote, confidential informant, closed quote, and a spy? >> well, a -- you really can't. pa s a spy is typically, i think of in terms of foreign powers. but here, the fbi was involved in a counterintelligence investigation, i presume and used somebody who had contacted various subjects of their investigation to communicate back to the fbi what they found

out. i guess for all practical purposes, for most people, it wouldn't be any different. >> all right. now, it's a time of great controversy for the fbi, which i have always held in the highest esteem. i worked at them when i was at doj. and you have director comey, his reputation is in tatters in the eyes of many people. you have andrew mccabe referred to the doj for prosecution. he's got his admirers, as well. you've got page and strzok and their texts, bruce ohr over at the doj. you'll remember about the dark days of j. edgar hoover. are we back in those dark days? >> unfortunately, i think director comey helped create a culture at the fbi that they were accountable to no one. and unfortunately, that created, i believe, this situation we find ourselves with. director wray, i have to tell you, i think is doing an outstanding job, but it's going to be a long time before the reputation regains -- the fbi regains its reputation as a law

enforcement organization that has integrity and is above politics. >> now, you have been -- you've done all of these different things in the law. any message from you to special counsel mueller? >> well, i think director mueller is an honorable man, but i think he needs to get his work done and keep focused on what rod rosenstein asked him to do, which is to look at russian meddling with the election. it's very clear to me that russia did attempt to meddle in the election. it's also clear that no one has found any evidence of collusion, but as we know, independent counsel, special counsels can get off the rails and go down paths that nobody ever contemplated. i think he needs to get this wrapped up well before the midterm elections, to help maintain the department of justice's reputation, particularly his reputation, as a professional and independent law enforcement officer. >> now, senator cornyn, let's turn to judges. i wrote in "the washington post" this week about the amazing record that you and leader mcconnell and chairman grassley

and the other members of the republican caucus have achieved on the appeals court, but the supreme court took up gambling this week and that opened the door to national gambling. if you were a betting man, what would you put the odds at of there being a vacancy to fill in the supreme court this summer? >> well, i don't have any inside knowledge, hugh, but i think it could go any better than 50/50. but if justice kennedy does decide to hang it up this summer, that, of course, will occupy most of washington, d.c. up there and including the election. because, obviously, this is a pivotal seat on the supreme court. this will be the first one that will actually tip the balance of the court. obviously, neil gorsuch for justice scalia, basically maintained the status quo in terms of the ideological leanings of the members. so this will be a big one. >> now, white house director of legislative affairs, marc short was on my radio show this thursday and he said, they will be expanding the list that president trump has put out of people being eligible.

have you heard about any other new people being added to that list, senator cornyn? >> i have not. i have not. but i have to say, looking at the circuit court nominees, looking at the district court nominees and of course, neil gorsuch, i think the white house council and the president have done a terrific job of identifying nominees and this will have a long-lasting impact far beyond president trump's term of office or my term of office. >> senator, it will be a very contentious proceeding if there is a supreme court vacancy, i mean, extremely contentious. you might be one of the only few people who could sail through the senate. would you be willing to be considered if the president called? >> i think there are other good people who could serve. i love my job, believe it or not. maybe i need to have my head examined. but i love my job and i think the president can come up with other people in the model of neil gorsuch, who will be handily confirmed. >> now, if you were a judge, you

wouldn't let that go by, senator. if he called, would you say yes? >> i would no, i would tell the president, you have better choices, mr. president. >> let's go to the august recess. i'm a little stunned by that. i don't know if donald trump would care if you said no, he'd probably try again. but will have to stay in august to get these nominees done? >> i think we have to get the job done. we've experienced this unprecedented foot-dragging and obstructionism when it comes to these noncontroversial nominees, on noncontroversial nominees that get confirmed almost 100-0. i think we need to put the pressure on democrats, senator schumer. they're the ones, frankly, who are most exposed in the midterm elections. they have a lot of incumbents running in states that president trump carried. and who are very worried that they need to get home and tend

to their business there, so they can get re-elected. so i think we're in a good position to use this leverage to get these nominees cleared. >> if they don't, qulwill you s all summer long if need to be to get those 20 appeals court judges nominated, confirmed, and put on the bench, senator cornyn, even if it's through the long, hot days of august inside the beltway? >> we will stay as long as it takes, including the month of august. >> that is what i hoped to hear. senator john cornyn, i appreciate very much your taking the time to be with me here this weekend and i'll be right back with my thoughts on this memorial day weekend. stay with us. what might seem like a small cough to you...

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you get another day in paradise. get a sunset on a sunday. get more stories to share. get more from your summer getaway with exclusive hilton offers. book yours, only at hilton.com uhp. i didn't believe it. again. ♪ ooh, baby, do you know what that's worth? ♪ i want to believe it. [ claps hands ] ♪ ooh i'm not hearing the confidence. okay, hold the name your price tool. power of options based on your budget! and! ♪ we'll make heaven a place on earth ♪ yeah! oh, my angels! ♪ ooh, heaven is a place on earth ♪ [ sobs quietly ] thank you for watching today. about john cornyn, he's one of the great gentlemen in the united states senate. he would be a terrific supreme court justice, so don't be surprised if you do see his name on that expanded list that marc

short told me on the radio this week that would be forthcoming. don't be surprised as well to see the name of paul clement, the former solicitor general of the united states under president george w. bush. he's an inside the beltway figure, but probably the best supreme court litigator at work in the land today who's a conservative, so when that expanded list comes forward, look for cornyn and clement. it is memorial day weekend, and so, i thought we'd leave with this montage of arlington national cemetery and the old guard that watches over the most hallowed place inside the beltway. perhaps i'll see you there this weekend. if this memorial day is like others in recent decades, grieving friends and families will gather around the resting places of their spouses, sons, daughters, mothers and fathers. all of us here at msnbc join the audience in saying thank you for the sacrifice you have borne for all of us. a peace-filled, a respect-filled memorial day to you all. keep the conversation going on msnbc.com/hugh-hewitt and i'll see you next week on saturday morning right here on msnbc. (vo) what if this didn't

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i'll keep our budget balanced. invest in affordable housing. fight for universal healthcare. and stand up to donald trump. as governor, you can trust me to do what's right- because i always have. hey, there. good morning, everyone. i'm alex witt here at msnbc world headquarters in new york. at the half hour, we have some breaking news to share. there's new video here of a surprise meeting between south korean president moon jae-in and north korean leader kim jong-un. let's go out to msnbc news correspondent janice mackey freher who's joining us from seoul with the very latest. all right, janice, this was certainly a surprise. what can you tell us about this meeting? >> reporter: well, the whiplash continues. this surprise summit happened today at the demilitarized zone on the north korean side, just 48 hours after president trump, of course, scrapped the singapore summit that he was supposed to have next month with kim jong-un. th