now it's time for andrea mitchell and "andrea mitchell reports." coming up, a few good men join forces in rebuking president trump for stripping former cia director john brennan of his security clearance. sae >> i've gotten tremendous response from having done that because, uh, security clearances are very important to me, very, very important. and i've had a tremendous response for having done that. >> the use of a national security tool for political purposes is inappropriate, unprecedented, and dangerous in a democracy. tale of the tapes. omarosa manigault newman says she will not be silenced by the president's latest threat to have her arrested and will still release new recordings, she says to protect herself. >> i'm not going to be bullied. i'm going to go toe to toe with

him. believe me, michigy tapes are m better than theirs. the president cancels the military parade that he had planned for october, inspired by what he saw at the bastille day parade in paris last summer. >> it's hard to envision that this parade the way president trump wants it would be less than $50 million to american taxpayers. he and the administration have to decide if they want to extend the political capital for a parade that costs that much money. and good day, everyone, i'm andrea mitchell in washington, where president trump is staying silent about the unprecedented rebuke of the sitting commander in chief by the men and women who have served at the highest levels of america's intelligence agencies, instead turning his fire against john brennan. nearly every living former cia director and deputy director from both political parties have signed the letter denouncing the

president's decision to revoke brennan's security clearance after the white house showed no evidence that brennan, an nbc senior national security analyst, had been in any way violating national security by releasing classified data. they said in their statement, we all agree that the president's action regarding john brennan and the threats of similar action against other former officials has nothing to do with who should and should not hold security clearances, and everything to do with an attempt to stifle free speech. president trump defended that decision on the white house south lawn this morning. >> there's no silence. if anything, i'm giving him a bigger voice. many people don't even know who he is and now he has a bigger voice and that's okay with me because i like taking on voices like that. i've never respected him. i've never had a lot of respect. >> joining me now, nbc national correspondent peter alexander at the white house, harry litman, former u.s. attorney, deputy u.s. attorney general, and

correspondent jeff mason. welcome, all. peter, you were on the south lawn with the president. he seems to be reveling in going after john brennan, he said explicitly he likes having someone to go after. >> reporter: that's right, andrea. we've had a lot of opportunities, we've seen the president take these windows to speak to reporters, to speak to the american public. but for the last several weeks he's sort of shied away from that opportunity. today he did not, as you noted, he reveled in it, going after john brennan, the navy admiral william mcccraven who spoke out against the president, saying "i don't really know who he is." as i understand, based on conversations here and the president frankly said it for himself, he is looking to move forward with more announcements, specifically referring to bruce

ohr, saying he expects the revocation of his security clearance to happen, quote, quickly. will that happen today, as he goes off to his bedminster golf property for the weekend? if it were to happen, there are not a lot of buffers around the president right now. this is one of those unique powers like the presidential pardon power that he can do unchecked. it's obviously become one he's looking to take advantage of, andrea. >> we want to bring in harry litman to talk about all this, but just a traffic alert to all of our friends and any others who might be watching or listening on their way to the hamptons, the president is going to be heading to the hamptons on the air, the air is going to be cleared, and on the ground, on a friday no less. it's going to be a mess. harry, you're safely not in the hamptons, so let's talk first of all about mccraven. admiral mccraven is widely known. it would be very difficult for anybody who studied the bin laden takedown, which by the way

john brennan was overseeing from the situation room in that iconic photo, but very difficult, as we see that team, and you can see john brennan standing in the right hand corner overseeing it as that whole obama team is watching tensely while those choppers in real time are going into that compound, mccraven, was the long time leader of the jsoc, the special forces teams that went in. he is a celebrated, celebrated special forces commander. it's hard to believe that the commander in chief would not know that history. harry? >> it's really true, i mean, we're talking about american heroes. and in fact people who not only deserve their security clearances but who we really need to have them because of their ongoing help to the national security efforts of this country. and what's wrong with the

revocation or attempted revocation, this is just like the pardon power, i agree with peter, but like the pardon power, it is not unchecked. this is exactly of a piece with what the president's lawyers have said about pardon or discharge, you can do it for any reason at all. and that's just not right. the supreme court has said it's not right. the example the supreme court gave is if you fire someone because of their religious views, that would be a constitutional violation. obviously the letter from the 12 former directors is dead-on. this is about the retaliation for what they have set out in public. it's a straightforward first amendment and due process violation. >> and what started as the letter from the 12, today one more, bob gates, the celebrated former cia and pentagon chief, pentagon chief twice. so you had really the leaders for generations in republican and democratic administrations,

military and civilian, all coming out. mccraven separately. let's talk about what he wrote. he wrote, through your actions -- this was an open letter in "the washington post" to the president. "through your actions you have embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and worst of all divided us as a nation. if you think for a moment that your mccarthy-era tactics will suppress the voices of criticism, you are sadly mistaken." blistering criticism. >> blistering is right. and following that with this other op-ed or letter from the other individuals. and i think one of the key points that you made is bipartisan. it's both republicans and democrats who have worked in these types of roles, cia directors and in the intelligence world, who are criticizing this, including david petraeus who by the way was somebody who president trump had considered as a potential secretary of state. >> and you've got porter goss, the former house intel chief who was short-lived at cia, but he

was a republican member of congress. so there are republicans on this list as well, bob gates as well, and also he was a career intelligence officer. let's show you what michael hayden, another former republican who was certainly at cia and before that, nsa, was speaking this morning on this subject. >> it wasn't all that difficult to make a decision to sign. and as we were working this process, this other letter comes out from bill mccraven which was just breathtaking in its focus and in its strength in supporting the same principles. in case of emergency, break glass. i think mill mccraven broke the glass yesterday and we might see other folks like him more willing to comment. >> and interestingly, peter, what they were saying in this letter, it was very carefully crafted, was we don't all agree

with everything that john brennan has said, he's been very outspoken, more political than some, for the taste of some of those members, but they all thought it was a crisis, that the president's actions violated every procedure by bypassing the cia, which is the agency that conferred the security clearance on mr. brennan, a former cia director, by not consulting the intelligence agencies and by not checking any of the 13 statutory boxes for violations. they never accused him, in sarah sanders' presidestatement or th president's statement, of like an -- of a leak of classified information. the only person who did was senator burr, mistakenly, by misreading what he said. >> they've been taking the words of richard burr, chairman of the

senate intelligence committee, as effectively saying, john brennan's said the president's claims of no collusion were hogwash, but he wasn't indicating he had any classified information or unique understanding. he appeared to be referring to what he had read in published reports and the indictment released by the department of justice indicating based on all apparent information, there was a collusion, there was a collaboration between members of the president's campaign and russians, specifically likely noting the fact that donald trump jr. took that meeting where he was to receive dirt on hillary clinton. what brennan says he doesn't know for certain is whether this meets the bar of criminal conspiracy here, which of course is what robert mueller and his team are investigating right now. >> that's exactly the point, peter. an important point to make. i wanted to play a little bit more of the exchanges between you and the other correspondents out on the south lawn and the president about bob mueller and ask harry about it on the other side. >> mr. mueller has a lot of

conflicts also, directly yourself, so you know that. mr. mueller is highly conflicted. in fact comey is like his best friend. i could go into conflict after conflict. but sadly mr. mueller is conflicted. but let him write his report. we did nothing, there's no collusion. but if he was doing an honest report he would write it on the other side. >> harry, can you make any sense out of that? >> no. i mean, yes, the short answer is no. but, you know, i see this all as sort of sloganeering. the "no collusion" mantra i think has kind of gone by the wayside in the last few weeks, but it doesn't matter for the president. you just think he's not speaking to anyone but his base that is revved up by the repetition of

these points. if there is any threat in the background, though, to strip mueller of his security clearance, that would be the equivalent of, you know, nixon's actions on steroids. that would prompt i think the immediate constitutional crisis and impeachment that we've been potentially pointing towards. but i think it's telling that at the end of the manafort trial and at all these points, he keeps coming back to the mueller probe. it reinforces people when they say this is a lie that it's about national security. it's all about his anxiety and outrage at the mueller probe. >> that's the president arriving in the hamptons in long island for a fundraiser, private fundraiser before he goes to bedminster for the rest of the weekend. interestingly, ben wittes, our

colleague at lawfair, said it would be the bombshell equivalent of the saturday night massacre from the nixon years, but by doing it one at a time, stretching it out, it sort of normalizes it. the president acknowledges they've canceled plans for the bastille-like parade he had wanted after july 14th last year and he loved the paris parade and wanted one in washington at considerable cost. and then finally deciding that -- i mean, the pentagon didn't want it. finally deciding today they're not going to do it. jeff mason, he blamed local officials for inflating the costs. and the president wrote, the local politicians who run washington, poorly, know a windfall when they see it, when asked to give us a price for holding a great celebratory

military parade, they wanted a number so ridiculously high that i canceled it, never let someone hold you up. in a real takedown on twitter, mayor bowser of washington, d.c., said, yup, i'm muriel bowser, mayor of washington, d.c., the local politician who finally got through to the reality star in the white house with the realities, $21.6 million, of a parade in trump america, sad. >> it's interesting that the president went straight to blaming local authorities. and it is a setback for this president. he was very excited about that parade in france and it's something that he wanted to replicate here. >> and the fact that the pentagon didn't want it, but again, blaming local officials, i don't want to bring a racial component into this, but again it is an african-american woman he's going after, the mayor of washington, d.c., who is popular, she is up for reelection, we should say. >> and a democrat.

washington, d.c. is largely democratic in terms of its electoral population. but yeah, he went straight there instead of, you know, criticizing his own -- >> and even though washington traditionally has been democratic and has been majority african-american and lead by african-american politicians, this is really noteworthy, that this white house of republican or democratic administrations has done no outreach that i can see to local political leaders. >> well, and it comes during a week when the issue of race continues to be an issue for the white house, with omarosa's book and tapes and continued questions about the number of african-american staff in the administration and in particular in the west wing. >> and as we see, the president is shaking some hands there at the airport on long island. the drive out there on these roads are notoriously, famously,

i should say, clogged, especially on fridays. this is going to add something to it with the motorcade, the presidential motorcade. and they also of course canceled a lot of the air traffic in the area because there is a lot of commercial air traffic. well, jeff mason, thank you so much. i know you were on the south lawn for this departure. >> with peter. >> with peter, you rushed over here, we thank you for that. peter, we thank you for everything you do. harry litman, have a great weekend. we'll all be standing by, all of our legal eagles like harry and watching what's going to happen, we'll talk about that later, with the manafort jury. an important announcement to make. tonight, in his very first appearance on television since the president revoked his security clearance, former director of the cia john brennan sits down with rachel maddow for a one on one interview, her first interview with him, tonight live at 9:00 eastern, only on msnbc. coming up next, america's longest war. president trump growing

increasingly irritated with the lack of progress in afghanistan. now being pressed to privatize the war. i'll talk to the founder of that controversial blackwater firm, now out of business. he wants his new security operation to take on the job in afghanistan. is that a great idea, or not? we'll talk about it, next on "andrea mitchell reports." stay with us on msnbc. i've always looked forward to what's next.

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since president trump reluctantly agreed to send more troops to afghanistan. but now according to nbc's exclusive reporting, the president is so frustrated by the lack of progress in that war, his military advisers are worried he may decide to withdraw u.s. troops from the conflict, or agree to a plan by the founder of a private security operation to privatize the war. this after a week of some of the worst suicide bombings in the long war, america's longest war. joining me now, nbc national political reporter carol lee who is reporting on the president's growing frustration with the pentagon's afghanistan policy. what is the president saying to his advisers about afghanistan? >> well, what we've learned is that almost a year to the day, the year anniversary is on tuesday of his announcement of this strategy, that as you noted, he did not want to embrace, but he was convinced to do so by a number of his military and national security

advisers. now he is in various briefings where he'll get updates on afghanistan and venting frustration with the lack of progress in the strategy, why the u.s. doesn't appear to be winning, and a year after he authorized the strategy that sent additional troops to afghanistan, and then you have his advisers who are trying to kind of contain him and get him to stay the course by, you know, pointing to anything that is positive about the situation in afghanistan, the fact that they're working on perhaps having some fruitful talks with the taliban and there may be a political resolution. they're very worried that the president, who has at times wanted to just completely withdraw from if not afghanistan, also syria, who gets very frustrated about these things, that he'll just abruptly say, okay, we're out, or he'll turn to an alternative like erik prince's idea. and erik prince is seeing an opportunity in all this to reintroduce his plan that was in

the mix for the president, at least, and some of his team, a year ago. and we know that the president has, according to officials, seen a video that erik prince has made and his interest in this is piqued again. >> what do we know might be supporting this inside the white house? >> that's a very interesting question, because we don't exactly know who, because steve bannon, the president's former strategist, he had supported this plan, and he's no longer in the white house. jared kushner was interested in the plan, if not supportive. and now, you know, you have the secretary of defense who is against it. officials tell us the secretary of state is against it. and it's not just clear where the support would come from within the white house except for maybe the president. >> he is the decider, isn't he? >> exactly. >> carol, you can see her reporting on nbc.com. joining me is erik prince, founder of blackwater, a firm

that faced years of investigations for its role in iraq, it no longer exists. he now heads a new organization and is pushing for privatization of the war in afghanistan. thank you for being here. >> thanks for having me. >> what would be the advantages of privatizing, given all the objections from the pakistan, from the state department, from the rest of the military? >> first of all, privatization is a loaded term. right now there's 15,000 u.s. troops and another 30,000 contractors. all i need, my plan would say, 2,000 u.s. special forces remain, and about 6,000 contractors. so by any stretch, that is a severe reduction in manpower and certainly in spending. right now america, this year, 2019, will spend $62 billion just in afghanistan. that's more than the entire uk defense budget. so if it peoppeople are concernt domestic spending or budget deficits or the fact that we have americans fighting and dying there as recently as last week who were infants when the twin towers came down, we now

have our first multigenerational war. i'm trying to get a rationalization of it. what worked after 9/11 were a few cia officers, a few special forces, and some air support, and they devastated the taliban in a matter of weeks. when we shifted, six months after 9/11, to a very conventional battle plan effectively repeating what the soviet battle plan was in the 1980s, we've been losing ever since. we've been losing blood and treasure and just as recently as this week, when you had four simultaneous attacks across the country killing 350 afghans and flowing up 50 kids in kabul that were studying for examines, thas not what winning looks like. >> secretary pompeo was there last week saying they're making good progress. there are arguments from the pentagon that they are making progress. in politico magazine, sean mcfate, in a piece he says, i was a mercenary, erik prince's

plan is garbage, tough words. prince is an amateur who makes rookie mistakes which is why the generals laugh at him. he thinks he can solve afghanistan's problems. this is magical thinking. nato could not succeed with 140,000 troops eight years ago when the taliban was in retreat. i'll give you a chance to respond. >> sure. easy. in the days after 9/11, if we can remember back that far, 17 years ago, you had the national security cabinet huddled at camp david and the best that the pentagon came up with was missiles, bombing, and a convention invasion of afghanistan and they didn't want to do it for another six months. again, a conventional plan that didn't work then and still hasn't worked versus a small unconventional plan that does work. every special forces officer i talk to, if you ask them honestly, they'll say that is the approach that works. they may not like my plan specifically, but small and unconventional, and living and

working with the afghans, is the only way to do it. the united states, we've been sending troops there for 17 years. they send them for six, seven, eight months, maybe a year. those troops spend the first few months getting to learn the area, a few months very productive, the last months making sure everybody comes home. then we lift that unit out, send them home, send a new one in with no continuity. >> well, we have been sending people back for recurring tours, which is another whole issue. >> sure, that's like working in miami versus work in columbus, ohio. totally different areas. >> some of them stay in the same area. but what about over the, the chain of command? right now you do have one company for private security that is licensed in hong kong, you train in a rented facility in beijing, you've graduated at least 5,000 from there already. >> oh, no. not the company that i have anything to do with has not done anything like that. >> according to --

>> no. >> we've graduated 20 or 30 employees. >> the school's promotion materials claims that. >> prior to our involvement, sure. >> in november, when you were giving them a commencement message on skype? >> correct. >> those same -- >> those are the first 20 company employees. that's it. anyway, going back to afghanistan, the problem is, we have no continuity of troops. so we have -- again, they deploy and they -- >> but there is a chain of command. >> of course there is a chain of command. if we believe in empowering the afghans, putting contractors that live with, train, and fight with their afghan counterparts under afghan rules of engaged. if we really want, as the united states, to stand up the afghans, supporting them from the field, not from the headquarters, but if the field where the headquarters, are just this week you had multiple afghan units

that were run over and in some cases didn't get air support for three or four days until they were finally surrendered or slaughtered. this approach fictioxes that. it is not a private army. it's a clear delineation of who is in charge, okay, afghan government working for a u.s. government officials, funded by the united states at a fraction of a fraction of what we're spending now. >> what would it cost? >> this is a $3.5 billion packaging savoring more than -- saving more than $52 billion for the u.s. >> is don junior involved? >> the president was right to campaign against endless wars. >> how do you get your message to him? because he's going to have to overrule jim mattis for this to happen. >> if we leave decisions on warfare solely to the pentagon, we will be at war forever. we'll be here 17 years. you'll long since be retired. and we'll still be fighting in it afghanistan.

then we'll have our grandchildren going to afghanist afghanistan. enough is enough. let's rationalize it. the president's original instincts were correct, he should have gone with him. now we're another $62 billion spent, $62 billion that we have to create and sell in debt because we don't have it in a country. >> let me ask you about your own record. we know about blackwater. you've been questioned by the mueller team, testified to the house intelligence committee about this meeting that -- the issue being raised is whether or not you during the transition, just before the inaugural, were meeting in the seychelles islands in the indian on or about with a prominent russian connected to vladimir putin, whether this was a back channel. i want to just get you to respond to -- >> no. >> to that whole -- >> i think the transcript -- >> what was the meeting about? >> the house transcript was released and people can read it if they want to. it was an incidental meeting and i had no follow up with them since then, not before or after. >> is your sister, who is the

education secretary in the cabinet, and you were a big campaign contributor, is she helping you with this entree? >> no. >> how offended by the way the president, according to omarosa's book, talks about people like your sister with nicknames, ditsy devos, is that dismissive of a woman? >> i've been traveling abroad and don't follow the day-to-day political comings and goings in america. i worry about bigger things. >> well, thank you very much. >> you bet. >> erik prince, thanks for being with us today. we'll be right back. the fact is, there are over ninety-six hundred roads named "park" in the u.s. it's america's most popular street name. but allstate agents know that's where the similarity stops. if you're on park street in reno, nevada, the high winds of the washoe zephyr could damage your siding.

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the judge said that at 2:00 today he's going to hear from both sides over a motions filed by news organizations to unseal some of the conversations that he had with the defense earlier this week and last week. andrea, to remind you, that's when we doing these long releases last friday and they had discussions under seal on monday that we didn't know what was going on, we didn't know if there was a jury problem, there could be a mistrial. we knew the judge was meeting with the jurors. it now seems there may have been a medical issue with one of the jurors, because judge ellis said today if he does unseal, and he does plan to unseal the majority of this at the trial's end, that he wants to keep medical information redacted. that's suggesting there may be a medical issue different from what we might have thought, which is that a juror had been talking about the case or got information from the outside. so we'll stay tuned on that. but we are all still just waiting to see if we might get a verdict today. based on those questions yesterday that you just went over, it seems this is a very

deliberative jury who wants to go over each count. it's a complicated case. they have very complicated financial 18 counts here, and they have to reach a certain legal bar to find him guilty on each one. >> and in fact, because the judge did not let them see most of the exhibits, most of the documents along the way as the trial progressed, they have to start reading from scratch and figure out how to map out which documents relate to which count, because he would not help them make that decision in one of their questions yesterday. we understand from lawyers that reasonable doubt, the definition of reasonable doubt is a frequent question to ask. our colleague chuck rosenberg has made that point, and it doesn't really indicate one thing or another. i want to play a tape of peter alexander asking the president today would he pardon paul manafort. >> reporter: will you pardon paul manafort? >> i don't talk about that now. i don't talk about that. i think the whole manafort trial is very sad, when you look at

what's going on there, i think it's a very sad day for our country. he worked for me for a very short period of time. but you know what, he happens to be a very good person. >> so that at least is some good news, if anyone's reading tea leaves in the manafort camp. julia, we know you'll get back to us if anything happens over there, thank you so much, on jury watch. >> reporter: absolutely. coming up next, family ties. omarosa releasing a secret recording of a trump family member to msnbc's craig melvin. the fallout from that, coming up. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. so you have, your headphones,

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omarosa manigault newman has released another secret recording as she tries to prove that the trump family offered her a basically no-show campaign job, the equivalent of hush money, after she was fired by the white house, if she agreed not to criticize the president, the vice president, or their political organization. in the first omarosa secret recording involving a member of the trump family, released exclusively to msnbc's craig melvin yesterday, laura trump can be heard offering omarosa $15,000 a month, she claims, to stay quiet. nbc news has listened to the tape in full and the clip you are about to hear is in its proper context. >> it sounds like a little like obviously that there are some things you've got in the back pocket to pull out.

clearly, if you come on board the campaign, like, we can't have -- we've got to -- >> oh, god, no. >> everybody positive, right? so the only thing we have to consider where we're talking salary as far as the campaign is concerned, is that as you know, everything is public, umm, and all the money we raise and that pays salaries is directly from donors, small dollar donors for the most part. so i know you were making 179 at the white house, and i think we can work something out where we keep you right along those lines. >> well, let's get the inside scoop from a "new york times" politics reporter and betsy woodruff, politics reporter for the daily beast and msnbc contributor. a statement from laura trump in rebuttal to what you just heard, ms. trump says in part, the discussions about a position with the campaign took place in numerous phone calls over the

course of several weeks. woman to woman, i shared a connection with omarosa, as a friend and a campaign sister, and i am absolutely shocked and saddened by her betrayal and violation on a deeply personal level. betsy, your response to that. >> it's interesting that the story of these tapes that i think has been the most significant is the potential for the rnc and the trump campaign to essentially operate as a holding cell for these former white house employees. this is something that people have been sort of pointing out to me for a while but that we didn't have as much firm evidence of, until this tape came out, which is that a number of former white house employees have gone on to be quite gainfully employed, getting cushy, well paid jobs, getting funding either from the rnc or the trump campaign. johnny mcentee, who left in a cloud of scandal. that's keith schiller, the president's former security guard, who is paid by the rnc and gotten a significant amount of money that way. these types of payments are unusual. they aren't the way white houses

tend to operate. omarosa's allegations that this is sort of glorified hush money is the kind of thing that you think donors might pause about, if that's the way their money is being spent. >> it is within the m.o. of the way we know donald trump ran his company, certainly michael cohen and those payments that we know were made, that they've already acknowledged, right? >> right, exactly. this is something that's out of the norm when we think of politics, but something very much in the norm for donald trump. you mentioned michael cohen, keeping people like that close with the expectation of loyalty. when you read about lara's statement, it talks about the betrayal of omarosa but doesn't talk about the allegations at the center of this, that she was acting on the behalf of the white house and their interests, trying to keep omarosas, quote unquote, quiet, as she claimed. this is something that, you know, is a surprising, it certainly raises a number of

ethics alarms based on how white houses have worked previously. it's very much in the norm when you think of,000 th how this pr has operated his entire life. >> here is a little bit of omarosa talking to craig melvin yesterday. >> she was very specific that it was, as we call him, djt, that it was donald trump who wanted her to make this offer to me. >> it came from the president? >> that's according to lara trump, yes. >> betsy, what is the fear factor or the nervous factor in the white house staff? because they worked alongside her. they have no idea where she was taping or when. if she could tape in the situation room, she could record almost anything. >> it's really hot. this is a campaign, of course, this is a group of people that is still dealing with the aftershocks of the "access hollywood" tape. these people are acutely familiar with the way that secret recordings can dog you for your entire career, even if they don't have the political consequences that the political

releasing those recordings would want to be made. and that's part of the reason omarosa has really ruined this week for so many white house officials, because even though she wasn't viewed as a particularly effective or productive member of the white house, she certainly was involved in a lot of meetings, was in the room for plenty of interesting conversations. people are racking their brains to think, what did i say in front of omarosa that might potentially end up blasted out to the country? >> we'll have to leave it there. it's an ongoing saga. astead and betsy, thank you so much. tonight we've got john brennan with rachel at 9:00, and former white house chief strategist steve bannon speaking out in an exclusive interview with ari melber, i believe in his first television interview since leaving the white house, or his first, i should say, on msnbc. that's tonight at 10:00 eastern. stay right with us here on

msnbc. next, six months after the parkland, florida school shooting tragedy, are our nation's schools safe enough? i'll ask one parkland father who was just at the white house for a meeting on this subject. you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc. are excited about the potential of once-weekly ozempic®. in a study with ozempic®, a majority of adults lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than seven and maintained it. oh! under seven? (vo) and you may lose weight. in the same one-year study, adults lost on average up to 12 pounds. oh! up to 12 pounds? (vo) a two-year study showed that ozempic® does not increase the risk of major cardiovascular events like heart attack, stroke, or death. oh! no increased risk? ♪ ozempic®! ♪ ozempic® should not be the first medicine for treating diabetes, or for people with type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis. do not share needles or pens. don't reuse needles. do not take ozempic® if you have a personal or family history of medullary thyroid cancer,

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my little boy alex was one of the first victims of the stoneman douglas massacre in parkland this past valentine's day. my valentine's day was perfect, i was out separacelebrating wit wife and at 2:21 afternoon, my day began in hell. it was hectic to find alex. those were the worst hours of hi life. after the tragedy, i was determined to make marjorie stoneman douglas safe. >> and that emotional testimony just yesterday before top officials at a federal commission on schools safety. he decided to make it his life's worth to protect schools

children tragically in schools shooting. students return on wednesday to a different campus of 6.5 million upgrades of security and more than a dozen security staff. mr. shekter is joining me back home in florida. thank you for your testimony and obviously there is no way to express our condolences for what you have lost but you are trying to transform this tragedy into at least something that can protect other families. tell me about your mission. >> absolutely. >> after alex passed away, i realized that this monster would never would have been able to kill alex if he would not be able to shoot through the glass. i set on a mission to find out what we can do to make schools safe, i realized that after

september 11th, we harden the cockpits and the airports and after the city bombing, we harden the federal buildings. for the last 19 years of columbine, we have been focusing on mental health and preventions and hardening have been at the bottom of the list. we need to harden our schools like your airports and federal buildings when we go to sporting events or concerts we are safe. we need to make sure schools safe as well. >> what more if anything would you loo i cike to see at parkla other schools. >> so much. there are so many great things that's being done around this country and little pockets of this country. so much to be done but the problem is most school districts do not know. you leave it to santa fe or parkland and we on our own have to go out and become experts. myself, i was the one that's responsible for vetting companies that wanted to come in

and donate their products. i should not have to come out there and become a ballistic expert or door expert. you got the expert in the federal government, you got six different federal agencies that are all focusing on schools safety. we need to have one central figure, we need to have a repository and a clearinghouse of best practices, these people know how to do it and the department of homeland of security does it with airports and federal buildings. we need to create a school safe safety. president trump appointed jim carol to be a drug czar. we had a car czar in 2009 and those worked. this is a national crisis to help save and protect our schools and children. >> what about the response from

the homeland secretary nelson that you addressed her yesterday. >> i had meetings with all four of these, they were receptive and they understand that we have got all of these different agencies and all of these tremendous men and women doing a great job but there is duplications, everybody is working and they're silos, we need to create best practices and on june 27th, all the federal law enforcement organizations committed to collectively producing best practices focusing on target hardening and emergency response. once we have these best practices, we need to implement them and we need to let all the schools know that these are available, we need one point person after this commission is over, the problems that we had with others in the past of sandy hook and columbine and virginia

tech, we don't have to have another commission to have a commission. we want to have progress here. >> thank you so much mr. schachter. we'll be right back. >> thank you. more? got a company i can trust. that's a heck of a lot more. over 75 years of great savings and service. you can't argue with more. why would ya? geico. expect great savings and a whole lot more. you always get the lowest price on our rooms, guaranteed? let's say it in a really low voice. carl? lowest price, guaranteed. just stick with badda book. badda boom. book now at choicehotels.com

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craig melvin, craig, it is your hour. >> that's okay, have a good weekend. >> you too. >> good afternoon, craig melvin