have beenfold they would give up their rights for asylum, they would be reunified with their children and that sounds like extortion to me. >> don't forget on subscribe to our podcast. larry krasner taking radical steps. tell me what you think. that's it for this evening. >> that's the greatest thing you have invented. i am now going to found a podcast so when people misstep your hashtag they might land on me. >> thank you for joining me. it started just after 10:00 and only just wrapped up this hour. i told you it would be an all

day spectacle but even i had no idea it would be this much of an all day spectacle. the man of the day, peter strzok. he was the person in the u.s. government in charge of countering foreign countries' intelligence operations in the united states. like, say, let's say, for example, if the russians or someone mounted a massive actions network to swing our presidential election and buy themselves a u.s. president in the process. peter strzok would lead the counter intelligence division in the fbi in the effort within our government to find that out, to investigate it, and to stop it. part of the back lash is that his career has been dismantled

and the president and republican who's support the president have held peter strzok up for public scorn as a terrible person. that's one of the ways he'll go down in history when this is said and done. america was hit by a massive intelligence operation infected our democracy. right? that was designed to sway an election the way russia wanted it swayed. and to hurt our country in the process. the party responded by destroying and removing the top official in the u.s. government in charge of fighting russian intelligence operations on our soil. so that's one of the ways he'll go down in history. another is while the fbi was mounding this major counter intelligence operation into a presidential campaign and the question of where it was in

cahoots with a hostile foreign government in its intelligence operation, while that was happening the fbi investigation was never leaked to the public. ever. that, too, will go down in history. the counter intelligence and whether or not the trump campaign was in on it. that was only confirmed by director jim comey in march 2017, two full months after donald trump had been sworn in as president. the fbi kept that information secret for the entire campaign and then refused to confirm it until months after the trump presidency. despite media reports starting to get wind that there was something going on. they didn't confirm it until months after he was sworn in. they kept it mum because it was an ongoing investigation. that's a remarkable thing about

that investigation. on which peter strzok was a senior counter intelligence agent. i think it is also one of the first things he said. >> in the sum he of 2016 he was one of the few people who knew about the russian election interference and its possible connection with members of the trump campaign. this information had the potential to derail and quite possibly defeat mr. trump. but the thought of expressing that or exposing that information never crossed my mind. >> the republican case against peter strzok, them defining him as enemy number one. the way they have made him subject to public pillory. that it was motivated purely by his wish to hurt the presidential campaign of donald trump. if that's the case, honestly,

why didn't he or anybody else at the fbi tell public at any point before the election that donald trump's campaign was in fact subject of a very serious counter intelligence investigation? if the whole they know was motivated by this, it is a foundationally awkward thing. that's how the day started. then peter strzok went on to make the whole day quite awkward for republicans. today republicans have been salivating over the prospects for this hearing. and then peter strzok has filled them with glee. he were super excite to berate peter strzok over his texts to lisa page. the problem is it is easier to beat up on a guy who isn't there able to explain exactly what he

met. >> if i may, what is important is that these texts represent personal beliefs like would you find on my personal phone. what they donal represent is any act, any consideration that we need to do this or not do this. i forget who i said this to earlier this morning, you need to read the texts in the context of what was going on at the time. when i make the comment about trump having no idea how destabilizing his presidency would be, that came on the heels of a speech where candidate trump said he didn't know whether or not the united states should honor its commitment to mutual defense under nato. >> i appreciate that. thank you very much. that's not briefly. >> may the witness be permitted -- >> no, no, no. >> he should be per noticed answer his question. >> i told the gentleman he could answer briefly. >> he has not finished

answering. >> we will now turn to the gentle woman from washington, d.c. for her questions. >> you want to ask me what i meant when tipped trump presidency might be destabilizing? that was about nato. on the night before trump officially accepted the republican nomination, the day before the then candidate had publicly questioned america's commitment to defending our allies in nato. in an interview with "the new york times." this is a real thing that happened that peter strzok responded to as an american. quoting from that "new york times" article. asked about russia's threatening activities which have unnerved the small baltic stalts, mr. trump said if russia attacked them, he would decide whether to come to their aid only after reviewing if those nations have fulfilled their obligations to us. as the "times" wrote, the statement appeared to be the first time a major candidate for president had suggested

conditioning the united states defense of its major allies. all right. that's very familiar, right? the same dynamic we saw today where the president authenticed if fellow members of nato didn't commit to defense spending, he would, quote, do his own thing. so not only was peter strzok responding to a real thing in the world where the idea of having a destabilizing, it is this moment in our lives we're living through manifestation of that while he is president. that's why darrell issa didn't want to talk about it. okay. let's move on. under hostile questioning from oversight commissioner trey gowdy, peter strzok did get to explain the context of an august 8th text message. one of the ones that republicans really, really love quoting.

in the exchange, lisa page had written trump won't ever become president, right? to which he responded no, no he's not. we'll stop it. given the chance to explain the context of that men, peter strzok did so on tv out loud. and it was not what republicans wanted. also, check out the response in the room when he finishes up here. >> i think it is important, when you look at those texts, that you understand the context in which they were made and the things going on across manager. in terms of the text that, we will stop it. you need to understand that was written late at night off the cuff and it was in response to a series of events that included then candidate trump insulting the immigrant family of a fallen war hero. and my presumption based on that horrible disgusting behavior that the american population would not elect somebody

demonstrating that behavior to be president of the united states. it was in no way unequivocally any suggestion that me, the fbi, would take any action whatsoever to improperly impact the electoral process for any candidate. so i take great offense and i take great disagreement to your as, he to what that was or was not. as to the 100 million to one, that was using hyperbole. i of course recognize that millions of americans were likely to vote for candidate trump i acknowledge that is absolutely their right. that is what makes our democracy such a vibrant process that it is. but to suggest somehow that we can parse down the words of short hand, textural conversations like they're contract for a car is not consistent with my and most people's use of text messaging. i can assure you, mr. chairman, at no time in any of these texts did the personal beliefs ever

enter into the realm of any action i took. furthermore, this isn't just me sitting here telling me, you don't to have take my word for it. at every step, at every investigative decision, there are multiple layers above me, the assistant director, executive assistant director, multiare layers of people below me. section chiefs, unit chiefs, case agents and analysts, all of whom were involved in all of these decisions. they would not tolerate any improper behavior in me any more than i would tolerate it in them. that is who we are as the fbi. the suggestion that and i some dark chamber in the fbi would somehow cast aside all of these procedures, all of these safeguards and somehow be able to do this is astounding to me. it simply couldn't happen. the proposition that that is going on, that it might occur anywhere in the fbi, deeply kroeds what the fbi is and american society, the effectiveness of their mission and it is deeply destructive.

>> you can see from the reaction, from the democrats in the room this, how that landed. this is not what republicans were expecting or hoping for from their data. put peter strzok in the hot seat, right? they thought this would be beat the pinata day. it turns out the pinata is alive and it has its own bat. here's republican trey gowdy questioning peter strzok about a text. this was from after president trump was elected and he is explaining that, peter strzok is explaining that his we will stop him tweet means he thought the american people would stop him. because, for objection reasons. >> he wanted him to resign two months into his presidency? >> my sense was, personal belief that i was not pleased with the direction and things were being done with the presidency. >> i thought you trusted the american people.

i thought that's what you said in august of 2016. the american people would stop him and they didn't stop him. all of a sudden, you're not trusting the american people anymore. >> sir, what i utterly trust the american people, what i worry about is when the government of russia puts their finger on the scale. other than america -- >> i utterly trust the american people. what i worry about is when the government of russia puts their finger on the scale and causes the will of the american people to be something other than america electing our president. right, mr. gowdy? you agree that, congressman, don't you? we're changing the subject? okay. we also heard peter strzok explain in his own words what information he was working with in those frantic last few days of the campaign. the start of the investigation. the nature of the information that had come into the fbi about russia's actions and where that information had come from.

>> during your june 2016 -- excuse me. june 2018 interview, i noticed some concern in your voice when recalling the 2016 campaign seens. specifically october 2016, and specifically as it relates to the state of the trump-russia investigation. why were you so concerned that what was happening at that time? >> well, trying to keep this at a level, not talking about open investigations -- >> only your -- >> yes, ma'am. the predicating information, the information we had which was alleging a russian offer of assistance, a member of trump campaign, it was of extraordinary significance. it was credible. from an incredibly sensitive source. as we looked at what that represented, the key time was coming into the election. so for us, there is absolutely a need on, one, this was a serious allegation. two, of extraordinary gravity. and three, given the fact the election was upon us, and that

if in fact candidate trump were elected, whether he or possibly members of his campaign, were actively working the russians, we needed to get to the bottom of it. it could be that none of them wrflt it could be that some, or on a far worse scale. the urgency for to us understand what was going on in advance of the election, certainly in advance of any inauguration. i can't overstate the importance of that. >> that was from an extraordinary incredible source. the information we had which was alleging a russian offer of assistance to a member of trump campaign, that was of extraordinary significance. it was incredible. from an extraordinarily credible source. this was a situation of extraordinary gravity. the urgency for us to understand what was going on in advance of the election and certainfully advance of the august, i can't overstate the importance of

that. we haven't heard that detail before about the status of the russia investigation and what the fbi had started investigating. we at least haven't heard that from the senior counter intelligence chief who was leading it at the time. another thing we learned came during some questioning by the top democrat on the committee. the congressman tried to get peter strzok to explain why he had prioritized the russia investigation over the clinton e-mail investigation in the last month of the 2016 campaign. that's of course one of the big criticisms republicans have leveled at peter strzok. that he was acting in a biased way when he prioritized the russia investigation over the clinton e-mail investigation in the final month of the campaign when new e-mails were discovered on the laptop of anthony weiner. the husband of hillary clinton's top aide. peter strzok's lawyer had already taken a swing of this ahead of the hearing. he had already put out a public

statement ahead of the hearing saying, of course he prioritized the russia investigation. anybody would. to require senior national security officials to profess fetally to this false egive excellence both short sided and dangerous. so that was peter strzok's line this question through his lawyer before today's hearing. when he finally got to sit down in front of a microphone today, he was able to give his own account in his own words of why he did that which included some

new information. >> the first reason is because the director told me. to he said it was a top priority. and the second thing was clearly when you look at the allocation of resources based on the threat to national security, the russian investigation is a greater impact than a classified information investigation. >> the first is that the director told you to. >> yes, sir. >> the director told you to. >> that's something new we learned today. then fbi director james comey ordered peter strzok to prioritize the russia investigation ahead of the clinton e-mail investigation at that point because of the far graver and more urgent threat it posed at that point. we did not expect to get that information today. when you spend ten hours questioning the country's senior counter intelligence official looking into russian matmatters you're going to learn some thing you might not expect. republicans have been waiting for this day. they've been so excited to dig their teeth into peter zprosk

make them into more of an enemy. they hoped would it result in all kinds of headlines. except what we saw today from the allies of the president didn't necessarily produce the headlines they were after. it was sort of clear today that they might have bitten off more than they could chew with peter strzok. ten hours where they didn't lay a finger on him proves that more than true. belly fat: the chili pepper sweat-out. not cool. freezing away fat cells with coolsculpting? now that's cool! coolsculpting safely freezes and removes fat cells with little or no downtime. and no surgery. results and patient experience may vary. some common side effects include temporary numbness, discomfort,and swelling. ask your doctor if coolsculpting is right for you and visit coolsculpting.com today for your chance to win a free treatment. looking for a hotel that fits... whoooo. ...your budget? tripadvisor now searches over...

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how many americans conspired -- >> none that i know of. yet. >> that was the voice of jerry nadler who was the top democrat in the committee in the house which hosted this mammoth hearing today. reminding everybody today with that yet that special counsel robert mueller is still working. there may yet be more indictments. that moment came after our congressman nadler's colleague

reminded everyone visually the work that has been done when he held up giant more than life size photos of the trump campaign people who have already pled guilty in the special counsel investigation. so that's what ricky pinedo looks like. the top democrat in the room, crank nadler spent time trying to get people to abide by their own rules. at one point he tried to get it ajournaled after the republicans threatened to hold him in contempt. thank you very much. it is a pleasure to have you here. you must be tired. >> a pleasure to be here. >> what is your bottom line takeaway from today? i was struck by your opening

statement in which one of your closing lines was, leave the special counsel alone. you were critical of this hearing. critical of republicans' intentions bringing this witness out in the way that you did. how do you think it went? >> i think it went very well. this whole hearing, and the hearing with the deputy attorney general rosenstein a couple weeks ago, they're shows. they're shows intended to help donald trump as the walls seem to be closing in on him. they're intended to use people who turned out to be fairly minor characters, strzok and page, in the investigation. remember, strzok was let go from the investigation as soon as, just about as soon as mueller came in. and they're trying to show that because he was clearly, his personal political opinion and his girlfriend page were very

anti-trump, this somehow biased his decisions and therefore biased the investigation. where as the inspector general found there was no evidence that there was any bias in any of the decisions. and his answer that he and others, a lot of people participated in all those decisions, all of this was intended to throw mud to undermine the integrity of the investigation. and to undermine the integrity and its credibility. and of course, it is headed by demanding that he answer questions and a few weeks ago, the deputy attorney general answered questions that they cannot answer. it goes to the heart of the ongoing criminal investigation which they may not answer, according to longstanding department of justice policy. it puts him in the position, if he answers, he's violating the proper policy not to interfere with the investigation. if he doesn't, he risks contempt

of congress which they're deliberately threatening. and they're trying to do all this to disfact are the investigation and to poison the jury pool. as mayor giuliani said. all of this is propaganda to undermine the investigation so when it comes without the report, people won't believe it. the facts are very clear. several. one, in a year, a little over a year, they have come, the investigation has resulted in 20 indictments. many of them people close to the trump campaign or administration. five close to the administration, high up in the campaign, and we know the best evidence that the investigation is not a witch hunt and is in fact being fairly conducted is that there's been no leak. a one-sided campaign by the president. a witch hundred. by the republicans, his republican hench men in congress to discredit the investigation but there have been no leaks.

all we really know about the investigation are what the charging documents and the indictments say. what the guilty pleas say and the various court filings say. it is remark panel there are no leaks and that tells me, the investigation is being fairly conducted. and the fact there have been so many indicts and guilty pleas in a year and a quarter is remarkable for an investigation in this breadth. you consider the investigation with mr. gowdy, for example, it is remarkable. one other thing. you looked at the hearing today and half the republicans would not permit the witness to anxious questions. they just cast dispersions on the characters. they kept coming back to the same expressions of political opinion in his texts to his girlfriend. but again, the inspector general found that there was no evidence whatsoever that their political opinions influence the decisions

in the investigation in any way. and remember that mr. strzok was removed from the investigation very early on. not because he did anything terribly wrong but because i assume, because mueller, mr. mueller being wise in the ways of washington, knew that his investigation, if it went anywhere, would be subject to unfair accusations and besmirching and wanted to remove a possible target. and he did. but they're using that any way. >> one of the controversies that arose was whether or not the previous testimony by mr. strzok, he testified behind closed doors for 11 hours. not that long ago. there was some discussion among members from your side of the aisle that maybe the transcript from that 11 hours of testimony should be released as well. even a suggestion that the democrats might release it over the objections of the

republicans. is that likely to happen? >> well, chairman, the ranking congressman from the investigations committee and i sent a letter to gowdy and to chairman gowdy and chairman, a number of days ago requesting precisely that. we've been demanding that. there has to be some scrubbing of personal information. those transcripts should be made public. and the fact they have refused to make it public tells me that they know that that would detract from all the accusations they're making. because he handled himself as well in that 11-hour interrogation as he did in today's ten-hour interrogation. >> today was a reminder that one of the underappreciated qualities you need is stamina. the top democrat on the judiciary committee. this was a very, very long day and a fascinating one. thank you for your time.

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december 10, 2013, the government of the nation of ukraine decided they would clear out demonstrators who had been protesting for ten days against the ukrainian president's decision to move ukraine away from western europe and toward russia instead. this was the guy paul manafort worked for for all those years. demonstrators have taken over

independence square in kiev. the u.s. government has been trying to for days to broker peace between two sides but after the violent government crackdown organization december 10th, u.s. secretary of state john kerry put out a statement expressing disgust with that government's decision to send riot police armed with batons and bulldozers into the protesters. he said the united states stands with the people of ukraine. this is victoria newland. at the time she was america's top diplomat in europe. she had been in kiev as part of the effort to try to broker a peaceful end to that stand-off. the day after john kerry's statement criticizing the government, saying the united states stands with the people of ukraine, victoria newland herself, one of the top officials in the u.s. state department, went down herself to independence square. into the middle of that ongoing

stand-off and started handing out snacks. snacks and good will all around to the protesters, police, everybody got something to eat. she is one of manager's most experienced career diplomats. in the last generation or two, she has been america's top democrat in europe, a spokesperson, america's ambassador to nato. she is a nonpartisan career diplomat who has worked everyone from dick cheney to hillary clinton of she is a heavyweight and she has been for a long time. and it turns out, she is not averse to getting down on to the street herself if that's what the diplomatic situation demands. dome let the bulldozers and the live ammunition bother you for an instant. one of the top officials in the u.s. government is here in person with snacks. the u.s. government is here. we see what you are doing. victoria nuland was willing to

go there and that made her a target. a few weeks after her 50s to kiev in that incredibly tense moment, audio from her private phone calls got sxhakd stolen. it's not unusual for a u.s. diplomat to have her phone tapped overseas. that presumably happens all the time. what was not a thing, a high level diplomat having her phone tapped and then the content of that phone call getting extracted and leaked out of context on to the internet to try to create an international incident and specificly to try to embarrass her. at the time that happened, that was new. it was no real mystery as to who had done it. the obama administration noted the first clip of that tweet of victoria swearing in a private phone call, that was tweeted out by the russian government. it turned out that was our first big preview of what would go on

a couple years later in the 2016 elections. then it was russia again. but what happened to victoria nuland, not just hacking into systems and stealing information from u.s. government officials. it was with thatizing information and putting it back out through social media. what happened to the democratic party and the clinton campaign with their servers in 2016 happened to victoria in 2014 in the middle of her work in ukraine when she and the u.s. government were trying to push putin back and shore up western alliances. russia is still on the other side. still working to break up all western alliances. confrontation over that was fraught back then when victoria nuland was in that square. it is fraught in a whole different way now.

this former diplomat, there top diplomat in europe for the united states, the former u.s. ambassador to europe, joins us here next. live and in person for the interview. stay with us. crabfest is back at red lobster! discover our largest variety of crab and crab dishes all year! like new crabfest combo. your one chance to have new jumbo snow crab with tender dungeness crab. or try crab lover's dream. sweet, juicy king crab and jumbo snow crab cozied up with crab linguini alfredo. even our shrimp is crab-topped! so hurry in and get your butter-dunkin' game on! 'cause crabfest will be gone in a snap.

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if you need help lowering your a1c, ask your doctor about once-weekly trulicity. the good news is the president didn't unilaterally announce today that the oougts is leaving nato. the bad news is that that is actually news because there was a realistic possibility that he might have tried to do that today. nato is a 69-year-old alliance that was founded in 1949 while the planet was still reeling from world war ii. so the union, of course, lost millions in world war ii but they also emerged aggressive and expansionist with a goal to oppose soviet style communism all over the world. so nato, an lings of countries that agreed to stick together behind one key pledge. anyone attacks any one of us,

then they attack all of us. that's the basic idea of nato. all members of nato are obliged to respond if any one member is attacked. that's the idea. that mutual defense pledge has ols only been invoked once in the history of the alliance. once. after 9/11 when we invoked it after that attack and our nato allies came to our aid. nato was initially set up in 1949 as a dozen nations, including us. over the years it has expanded to include 29 countries. whether it is because it has expanded to 29 countries or whether it is just because the thing still exists, nato, you should know, is the bane of russia's existence. if you want to dig down to the spinal column of russia in what we used to call the free world, it is nato. if you give vladimir putin a magic wand and one wish, he would wish for the dissolution

of nato. or that he was taller. one of the two. so today, president trump did not blow up the nato alliance. congratulations! he did use the nato meeting as an occasion to publicly insult and lie about these countries, our fellow alliance members who used to be our closest allies in the world. then having arrived late, he proceeded to walk out early so he could reassert his feelings about vladimir putin. so here's my question. actually, i have a bunch of questions. here's the first one. if, say, you find yourself in the middle of what you think might be a fundamental reshaping of the international order, one that appears to be happening quickly and it appears to be wildly to the debt rilt of your beloved country and the west, and you think that might be happening for the worst possible reasons, what is a girl to do with that? what is a citizen to do with that information? joining us now for the

interview, one of the most experienced american diplomats walking the earth. former ambassador and former assistant secretary of state, victoria nuland. thank you for being here. i've looked for to talk to you for a long time. what would change in the world if nato did go away? nato has sthamd world since world war ii kfrl we imagine what would happen if president trump decided to act on his plainly hostile feelings toward nato? >> first and foremost, the united states would be all alone when it faced any strategic challenge out there in the world. as up, the only time nato invoked its mutual protection was after we got hit in afghanistan from forces in afghanistan, and wasn't even our idea to invoke it. it was our nato allies who said you've been hit. we want to come and help you. we would be all alone in any sirg. president trump himself put out

a national security strategy that said, we've got to wake up because we have a strategic competitor in russia, in china. he could have used these two days to pull the family together and say how are we going to deal with that? and instead he spent the time attack the family. >> do you think that president trump actually had anything to do with that national security strategy? doesn't it seem like h.r. mcmaster, the then national security adviser, got fired and president trump probably has no idea what was in it? >> it is pretty bizarre as a 32-year veteran of the government, that we now have governance where not only is the president issuing and signing documents that he then publicly takes positions opposed to, every member of his cabinet is in 180-degree different place than he is. we now have pompeo, we have bolten, all of them warning about russia. but president trump believes

this is going to be the easiest meeting for him to do this week. >> what could go wrong? what is the worst case scenario for trump's meeting with putin? you have spend time with vladimir putin. >> i have been support staff in meetings with president putin. he is a very wily guy. he will have studied president trump and what makes him happy and what makes him move. he will have watched very carefully singapore summit with kim jong-un where that was also supposed to be a summit where they just got to know each other and then hard work would get done. instead our president comes out and announces the suspension of a major military exercise and it is not really clear what we get back from the dprk. so i think clearly, putin is thinking about all the things that he wants. he wants president trump to make good on his pledge, or his belief that crimea ought to be a

part of russia. >> exactly. and watch out for alaska next. they might want that back, right? that would be one piece. we know that the russians are now violating the intermediate nuclear forces treaty. we had banned nuclear weapons at that range and now the russians are cheating. so he may say to president trump, hey, he with don't need this treaty at all. why don't we both break out of it. and that rewards him very much. he may say you've done your job in syria. why don't you get out now and i'll take care of iran and we'll keep assad in power. and we know president trump has been talking about it. and the russians will say, we'll keep iran to a dull roar in syria. but this is the same country that has used iran as its foot soldiers in this campaign to strengthen assad and keep him in power. the so there are a lot of things

putin wants. he may want sanctions relieved. >> speaking hypothetically. if vladimir putin for some reason hypothetically was in a position to be able to give orders to the u.s. president. we're told that president trump has tried to arrange the summit so that at one point in the summit, it will be him and president putin in a room with no other americans. as far as we understand, maybe not even an american translator there. if vladimir putin were in some sort of position where co-givers to an american president behind closed doors no, other american would ever know, if he had that sort of magic wand, what would be the thing he would want most? what kind of order would he give? >> well, first of all, we know the summit will start with an extended 101 between these two presidents. the thing he wants most is money. russia is not in good financial shape. putin is not in good financial

shape. he wants sanctions relief. he wants relief from the sanctions we put on with ukraine and syria. >> and the u.s. president could deliver that. >> they were worried he would give this away for free. so they put this in legislation. it is more difficult than it might have been. but there are lots of things a president could do by executive order. he certainly wants his occupation of crimea legit mi legitimized. >> and he'd want the u.s. to pull the rug out from under nato and continue to destabilize the european union. >> he'd want more trouble between the u.s. and germany. he may want the u.s. exercises in

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she was a former u.s. ambassador to nato, former assistant secretary of state for european affairs. a long-time high level experienced diplomat.

thank you for being here. >> thank you. >> i want to ask you about the russian interference in the 2016 election. you were a very senior state official at the time that was happening. also at the start of the counter intelligence investigation into what was going on. that was the subject of ten hours of testimony today by the director, former director of counter intelligence of the fbi. do you know of anything improper or anything that doesn't sit right with you about the way the investigation into that matter was handled? >> well, i have to say that because of the way the fbi does its work, i wasn't privy to anything with regard to the investigation, and that was absolutely appropriate. i frankly didn't even know that there was an investigation until it was made public. i did know that the fbi was very concerned about what the russians were up to in the summer of 2016. in fact, they came to us and were concerned about the number of russians who were coming on temporary duty that summer to the embassy who seemed to have extreme technical skills. so we

had some conversation about that and about whether, you know, visas could be slowed for those people. >> was the implication that those people who were coming from russia under diplomatic cover to be part of the active measures campaign on site in the united states? >> right. that was in the context of the august concern that we knew the russians were into some of the voting roles and whether they could actually technically get their hands on votes and switch machines, which was the concern in august of 2016 when cia director brennan and homeland security chief jay january made their warnings public. >> you were actually shown parts of christopher steel's dossile? >> what happened was that during the ukraine crisis, he had been

working for a number of private clients, and he was doing a lot of work on the relationship between russia and ukraine and reporting on the back channels between them to settle the ukraine crisis. so i got to know his work because he offered it to us as an information source. so i was reading his stuff in 2014, 2015. so then when he got this information in 2016, a friend of his who was at the state department brought a piece of it to us and my immediate reaction at that time was this goes to u.s. politics. this is not our business at the state department. this is the fbi's business. so we notified secretary kerry. he had the same view and our advice was this needed to be handled by the fbi, not by us. >> former nato ambassador, top american ambassador and diplomat in europe, please come back.

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the president now in the uk. he did an interview with the british press that was published basically upon him landing in the uk which he essentially tries to shove the british prime minister out of office, criticizing her and praising her rivals. this is all heading into the president's meeting with vladimir putin early on monday. the news feels a little overwhelming right now. it is going to be like this in high gear for the next few days. hold tight. now it is time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell. >> thanks for ruining all of our weekends with that announcement. so the interview that he gave