it just is somebody that was so unique. i don't know what really shaped him. i don't know if it was his father, i don't know if it was the time. you didn't want to spend a lot of time talking about being in the hanoi hilton. he didn't want to talk too much about that. he just had a very quiet pride and a great humility and great sense of humor. a great determination. and great strength. >> you may have read all of the statements coming from former presidents. but if that's any indication i've person that wwas boabove p statements from the clones, statements from barack obama as well as every george w. bush all of these folks not necessarily in the history of his relationships with them were always good necessarily. >> well, look the thing you've got to realize, this is something that is missing in today's politics.

being willing to stand up and take a principled position you know that was rational, something that made sense, it earns great respect. even among people that don't agree with you. the ability to be able to stand at all which is what john did all the time, the ability to clart your own course, not on any sort of personal advantage when people can see, when they can see that you are truly a person of conviction and courage, it doesn't matter what party or politics you are because we're all au searching, all of us as human beings. we try to find meaning in life. and i think all these accolades to him were nothing more than everybody trying to say john, we may not have always agreed with you but we love you and we know what you stood for. you're and i spir ration not just to us but really to our young generation. >> that is exactly if you had to

paraphrase it governor, despite whatever happened, we love you, that's been pretty consistent with everybody we've spoken with tonight. governor of ohio, john kasich. thank you for being on our broadcast today. that does it for me on our rolling breaking news coverage of the passing of john mccain. at the age of 81. andrea mitchell picks it up from here. >> thank you so much. and good evening as we look at the pictures of the hearse, the procession having left that ranch in sedona where john mccain has been since december. battling this illness. i'm andrea mitch in washington. we're following the sad news from arizona tonight. senator john mccain has passed away at the age of 81. he would have turned 82 this coming wednesday. he was diagnosed with brain cancer last summer. senator mccain's office released a statement earlier tonight saying senator john sidney mccain iii died at 4:28 p.m.

west coast time on august 25th, 2018. about the senator when he passed were his wife cindy and their family. at his death had he served the united states of america faithfully for 60 years. senator mccain's wife sin dil wrote on twitter tonight "my heart is broken. i am so lucky to have lived the adventure of loving this incredible man for 38 years. he passed the way he lived on his own terms surrounded by people he loved in the place he loved best." his daughter megan tweeted "i love you forever, my beloved father, senator john mccain." let's bring in nbc's kelly o'donnell in sedona arizona who covered john mccain for years on the hill and in his political campaigns. kelly, i know this is a difficult moment for everyone who covered him because we all felt that we knew him so well. he was so transparent. so authentic, so real.

>> reporter: and he gave you that sense as you were covering him. you did, i did, others following all of there of that character of being compelling and a celebrity and can tankrous, all those different things wrapped into the public life of john mccain. over the years, my relationship with him, he was always someone who could be accessible, who could be at times combative and yet he was a trusted voice on issues as we were covering important events over the decades. i'm struck tonight as his family leaves sa doanna, senator mccain has loved that ranch in this area. he has as you pointed out been convalescing will for a period of months. that's unusual in the life of this man who always seemed to be in a hurry because of his political life. he was always going back and forth between phoenix and washington, d.c. traveling the world, visiting afghanistan and iraq so many times. he had not been in one place for

a period of months liking there since he spent five and a half years as a p.o.w. during the vietnam war. this quiet time in the twilight of his life put him in a place he has loved for so many years. i am told this procession we're watching is headed to phoenix. where the mccains also have a home there and a home base and a political life that has inspired him from his time in the house and now six terms in the senate. there will be a series of events over the next days, part of that first farewell formally will be for the people of arizona. one of the things that has always struck me about covering john mccain, we see him as a national figure a place he earned. but when i would talk to him, he always talked about the people of arizona, their issues, their concerns, the way they have known him. in this state, we will feel it personally. he's been a controversial figure here in the party. he never shied away every that. in fact, he often embraced it said he enjoyed the fight.

at times wles i talked about his legacy, his career when he ran for re-election at age 80, i asked him about that to seek a six-year term one that sadly he is not able to complete at age 80. he said the people know me. i was filled with energy and i will fight for them every single day. the only thing i want to be known for he would describe to me is being someone who served his community and country well. that's what we're larrying from so many people as they think about the life of john mccain. and the different ways that he served and the other thing i'm struck by and you know it well, his humor, his sense of fun. he loved politics. he would always say it's not bean bag. it's a tough tough game. it has gotten harder and more harsh in the years since he was a presidential candidate. i'm also very struck today by the fact that this is august 25th. and nine years ago, we said good-bye to senator edward kennedy from the same kind of brain cancer.

he sum coupled after business bat willing. nine years to the day his good friend john mccain passed on this same day nine years apart. mccain once said there was a time when he and ted kennedy were at different ends of the political spec frum on the political issue. there was a gallery full of tourists visiting the senate. of the rafters were filled with people who came to see the senate in action. he walked over 0 senator kennedy and said, let's give them a show. each man went to his deck and argued in great theater of public life. and they had fun doing it. so there are many memories of john mccain as the warrior, as the politician, as the public bent. and certainly as someone who would make you laugh. andrea? >> kelly, that he so captures it. joining us presidential historian, jon meacham. i've been reading, rereading restless wave, the last book

that, of course, john mccain wrote with his muse, mark salter. and just posted at "the washington post" is an op-ed, a tribute, eulogy if you will from mark salter who knew him better than any of us. he writes in part, he thought in a moral failure to accept injustice as the inescapable tragedy of our fallen nature. he calls him a romantic about his causes and cynic about the world. as you know well from reading the restless wave and from spending so much time with john mccain over the years, his inspiration was also ernest hemingway. >> yeah. senator mccain really saw himself from the time elves 12 years old as a kind of robert jordan figure. the protagonist of hemingway's "for whom the bell tolls." he was the -- in one of the books he did with mark salter,

mark salter by the way, as ted southernson was to jack kennedy, mark salter was to john mccain. it's one of the most vital literary and political partnerships of the 20th and 21st centuries. so our thoughts are with mark as well. but young john mccain was in the yard outside his parents' house in arlington. when he was 12 years old. and found not one but two four-leaf clovers. and ran in to his father's study, grabbed a book off the shelf, to press the four leaf clovers in. and it was for whom the bell tolls. his eyes fell on it, and you know, as you know, that's an age when books can really leave a deep imprint on a young mind. and he saw in robert jordan there doomed hero, a romantic someone who believed in the

cause in the spanish civil war. that figure resonated with the young mccain. and it stayed with him forever. the marvelous line toward the very end of that epical novel is jordan has been wounded, he's about to die. he's died for this cause he believes in. and he says the world is a very fine place worth the fighting for and i very much hate to leave it. but one of the things i've always loved and talked to senator mccain about it a couple of times is the novel ends not really with jordan's death. but with jordan's heart beating against account fore the forest floor as he prepares to fight one last battle before he slips away. i there that will so defined senator mccain for all those years. he always saw that there was one more battle, one more victory to win. >> that beating heart is such a

great metaphor for the beating heart of john mccain, his last vote in the senate, john, was december 7th. then he retreated to sedona and since december, he has been there at that beloved ranch. but issuing statements, speaking out most memorably after the helsinki putin-trump summit calling it the most zrat tremendous performance he had ever seen by an american president. really sharp criticism pointed and acerbic and that was who he was. he supported the president on some of his issues. he helped get the tax bill influenced others to vote for thetach bill. but he with that thumbs down had the enduring enmity of this president in recent days even weeks i should say at rallies speaking out against john mccain because of voting against the final attempt to repeal

obamacare. the political side of john mccain could be heroic and it could also be very, very tough. and we saw both those sides throughout his career. even as he was battling this cancer, jon. >> john mccain is really our generation's they'd door roosevelt. he was a plan in the arena. he was the dust of the battle got in his eyes. he thrived on the good fight. he could be wonderfully right and woefully wrong. there's a fascinating passage in a book that they published in 2002 right after the 2000 campaign that i recommend to people who particularly in this era where humility is in such varnishing supply. where mccain talks about the south carolina primary that we've mentioned a lot tonight in 2000. and we remember it for "hardball" from the bush camp. the way mccain talks about the

episode at the most length in a book called "worth the fighting for," actually the jordan line, is about his waffling and i'll use the word senator mccain used, his lying, he said that about himself about how he truly felt about the confederate battle flag in south carolina. it was an issue then. it's one of the flash points that continues to shape us in our cultural wars. but he tried to have it both ways. he in fact, what you say -- you were probably there, he had a he goes on i think it was "face the nation" and he says that he thinks that the flag should come down because it is a symbol of racism and slavery. and the staff gets to him. and he suddenly is handed a written statement to say a much more nuanced more traditionally political thing about oh, it's a complicated symbol and we should work on this and think about it.

what he would do, every time he gak the statement is he would pull it out of his pocket so that everyone sort of knew i don't really believe this. i believe what i said in the first place. and he so regretted the attempt to clean up as political people say, the attempt to avoid the controversy and try to position himself with the base, that he went back after the campaign and gave a speech apologizing for having veered from his initial opposition. because he wanted in a way 0 clean up record. he knew that he had done something that by waffling on what he thought that he wasn't proud of. and he wanted to be honest about it. and that's just, there's not a whole lot of examples of that. there's the old joke that there's a reason profiles in courage was just one volume. there's not a whole lot of

examples. but senator mccain was. i want to read, i know you read from his most recent book. i want to read two sentences from the book i'm talking abouting from 2002. which i think resonates extraordinarily in our own time. mccain wrote "success wealth celebrity, gained and kept for private interest are small things. sacrifice for a cause greater than self-interest and you invest your with the imminence of that cause an your self-respect is assured. politics is personal. any americans' personal honor should be an earned share of the country's honor. that's all i know about public life. to the extent i have kept faith with that principle, i am proud of my service. to the extent i have not, i am ashamed. let me safely say from the perspective of somebody that spends a lot of time thinking about the american past, john

mccain had precious little to be ashamed of. indeed. that's so noteworthy. jon meacham, thank you so much. we want to bring in andy card, the former chief of staff to george w. bush, of course, and someone who understands very well the on again, off again relationship, the difficult relationship at times after that 2000 race. but how george w. bush and john mccain worked together on surge, on iraq. andy, your thoughts. >> well, first of all, i first met john mccain in 1983 when he was a new member of congress and i went to washington, d.c. to work for reagan. i didn't start till august of 1983. he was sworn in to be a member of the house of representatives. had a lot of the interaction with him over the years. most significantly as a result of george w. bush winning the presidency. when john mccain had campaigned against him. and mccain had a big victory in

new hampshire and it was south carolina that made the difference for george w. bush. it did strain the relationship but john mccain was someone who understood the importance of recognizing challenges and looking for opportunities to mend fences anton produce good. and so he did have the courage to take a step toward you rather than run away from you. even after he had been in a fight. he wasn't coming toward you to fight. he was coming forward to say, is there a way we can find common ground and work together. sometime he he was pretty an serb b serbic. whether he it came to the war in iraq, he was frustrated by some of the tactics. he was frustrated by some of the strategy. he was frustrated by the secretary of defense. and we all knew that. but he was candid about speaking about it to us but he was constructive in his criticism. he would offer solutions or

think about this or look for other wayses. i had privilege of seeing him a handful of times where did he offer a very candid and pretty darn good advice. and president bush was a very good listener, surprisingly good. and really paid a lot of attention to what john mccain said. and when the need for the summary wsurge was recognized and george w. bush had the foresight to say we need a surge, john mccain stepped up right away to say we need a change, the surge is right. i know he was a big fan of general petraeus and george w. bush, president bush came to recognize petraeus for the leadership that he ended up giving which was remarkable and it did make a difference. that relationship was important. but you know, john mccain didn't go to washington to make friends. he went to do good things. and so sometimes he had a hard time making friends and even some of his good friends had

their relationships strained over the years. i remember chuck hagel, very, very close to john mccain. then hel had a strained relationship and then they came back together again as friends. the same thing with lindsey graham and others in the senate. that was the way it was with george w. bush. but president george w. bush has great respect for the work that john mccain did and the leadership he gave. i know the whole bush clan and the entire bush political family really respects john mccain for weather did for this country. as a unable aviator, as a prisoner of war, as someone who defended democracy and worked pore democracy and served this country so well in the house and in the senate. but more than that, being a real conscience for the tough things that have to be considered when you're in government and he also had the courage to look for compromise. he was not a zero sum game

person. he would look for common ground and try to define it in such a way could you find a way to stand on it with him. that was important. >> that was so important that he worked across the aisle. teddy kennedy, joe biden and others could disagree on policy but they could come together and try to legislate. i'm also struck as i bring in robert costa, national political reporter for "the washington post" and, of course, moderator for washington week on pbs, i'm struck, robert, by how important getting something done was. that was his last big speech on the senate floor. back on july 25th, he had been diagnosed with there terrible brain cannes p brain cancer and it was three days before he did the thumbs down vote on the president's attempts toe repeal obamacare, account affordable care act. but he spoke on the senate floor beak excoriating his colleagues and himself for the fact that

they were listening to the bombast on television on cable, television on radio, on the internet and not trusting each other and not working across the aisle. you're thoughts about john mccain, the legislator. >> the legislator is someone who will -- his lack of presence in washington will be missed. my thoughts go to his family. when you think about the project that he focused on as a lawmaker in the chamber, he so loved, the u.s. senate, he stands in stark contrast to the republican party as it is today. he is someone who worried about the gop direction on taxes. though he was a traditional republican at his core, on issues like immigration, a decade ago in 2007, he worked soy hard to try to get his party to move toward the center on immigration on foreign policy, he was such a hawk, someone who valued international alliances.

and in the last few years, you've seen him struggle when i've been covering him in the senate, reporters that we've confided in each other how mccain seemed out of step with his own party. defiant as ever, stubborn, committed to his own causes but his causes really drifted away from the republican party in a way that they were not drifting away under president reagan and president bush. >> robert costa, moderator of "washington week" on pbs and "the washington post" correspondent. thank you. michael beschloss, nbc presidential historian, has known john mccain well and for long and michael, earlier you were pointing out how in september of 2008, before the lamin crash before the meeting in roosevelt room where john mccain came and the white house was bringing in both obama and mccain and he didn't seem to

have policies for the economic crisis. that seemed to be whether he his campaign went -- took a downturn frankly. but you were pointing out before the lehman crash at the beginning of september in 2008, he was ahead of barack obama in the polls. >> that's exactly right. and that would have been a very close race and i think john mccain later on said that his own reaction to the economic collapse of september of 2008 was not his finest hour but in retrospect, i think you would probably agree, andrea, that there were very few republicanss who could have won presidency that year after the, the twin difficulties of timberwolf or one or two very unpopular wars, plus a very big economic collapse, plus a two-term republican president, very lard as you know for any president nominee in history to win the presidency for one party three terms in a row. but the thing back john mccain

is that this is not someone who depended on being president to be a great figure of american history. and look at how much we're talking about tonight that has nothing to do with the presidency but we're talking about john mccain with the same degree of intensity and interest that i think we would almost if he had been president himself. >> and i'm also thinking about his role in trying to legislate and change the guidelines that the bush white house were following through vice president cheney, president bush, donald rumsfeld regarding detainees. because he had been a prisoner of war was passionate about passing that legislation against what he said was torture. >> he never wanted to forget what he had been through. and although the preponderance of the republican party and the incumbent president and vice president just as you're saying felt very strongly about those

policies and zwjohn mccain had made a big effort to try to get along with george w. bush after the fierce fight you talked about in the primaries of 2000, that ended things like torture and what he saw as an american attempt to use he thought some of the things that had been used against him as a p.o.w. in north vietnam. >> thank you so much. michael beschloss. joining us now su nicolle wallace, host of deadline white house. was a senior adviser for john mccain's presidential campaign in 2008. nicolle, our condolences to you and all of the close advisers and aides who travelled with him, who fought for him and knew him so well and loved him so much. >> yeah, i mean you and i started this conversation friday, andrea at 4:00 when we were talking about his brave decision to end treatment. and so i think what you think about on days liking this is even when you know it's coming,

even when you have had in his case almost a year to grapple with the news that he had this horrible diagnosis, there's nothing that really prepares you for a world without john mccain in it. and we talked to him friday about that, the clarity of his voice after the helsinki summit, the clarity of his convictions about what america is, when it's at her best, about what the republican party has been whether he it's been at its best. and about what the senate is when it's at its best. if you look at sort of his body of public statements in the year since his diagnosis, they really touch all those these touchstones. and you think about his speech where i believe senator -- or vice president biden introduced him where he talked about this ideology of america first will end up in the ash heap of history, an i strong clear indictment of isolationism.

you look at the written statement he released after helsinki. it was a strong and clear indictment of what he viewed as giving too much to vladimir putin, someone he views as a murderer and a thug. and you look at sort of the sadness with which he gave the first speech after the diagnosis about how the senate hud rereturn to regular order which probably doesn't mean much to people who don't cover washington or live in washington. but those were institutions that meant the world to him and after his family probably the most to him. his country, our country's national security. the republican party and sort of the prestige and power of the american presidency. >> and when you speak about john mccain, the fact that he is receiving these tributes from all the former presidents in both political parties from senators, but also i have one here from madeleine albright. it's not self-evident but you and i know that john mccain was responsible for the

international republican institute which he chaired and she chaired the national democratic institute traveling around the world, working together. this is one of the things that he legislated. he was very proud of it. and he was very active till his illness in it chairing it. and she also an octojen flairian traveling around the world as he did, he was never home during congressional recesses. he was always finding someone in the world, mark salter wrote about this in the west just now in something he posted finding refugees, prisoners in myanmar who said to him we remember your voice. you called out our names how much it meant to us that you resighed our names on radio free europe. the voice of america or one of those brafs. >> yeah, it's such an important piece of his legacy and probably not one that gets enough attention but i think the reason he was as comfortable with democrats as with republicans,

and that is as true of a thing as you will hear uttered today. he was as comfortable with his democratic colleagues in the senate as he was and in a lot of the cases more comfortable with his democratic colleagues. he had a deep love for ted kennedy. i remember during that campaign r campaign, ted kennedy calling him, one of the earliest endo e endorsers and someone who really celebrated and boosted the candidacy of then senator obama. and you know that, friendship survived all those things because it was built on something more than a single presidential election cycle even one with john mccain in it. i think the reason he view himself not as sort of a hostage to the pulverized politics that we are sadly living in right now is because he traveled the world with people like hillary clinton, with senator klobuchar, with democrats and republicans where when you land in georgia or you land in you know, myanmar, land in afghanistan or

iraq, you don't land as a democrat or republican. you land as an american delegation. you land as lawmakers and policymakers that can help the lives of the kinds of people you just described. >> and some of his closest colleagues in this generation were jack reed and chris coons on the armed services and -- there is poignantly a statement from victoria vickie kennedy. today is the ninth anniversary of teddy kennedy as a death from gio blastoma, from the same brain cancer. she brights we lost and you compromising patriot and a man of immeasurable courage. sxweting to know john mccain was one of the great privileges of my life. i no ted felt the same way. he loved the united states senate and believes in its power to impact lives in a positive way. he declared from the floor of the u.s. senate the proudest and most satisfying moments of his career were when he worked with

colleagues on both sides of the aisle to address our greatist challenges. in that brings home exactly what you were saying. thanks so much. >> thank you, thanks for doing this tonight. >> i know this is going to be a very difficult number of days and michael beschloss, your thoughts, as well? >> well, you know, it's a day that we have known for some time would come, but the man was so absolutely full of life that it's almost impossible to imagine that it's here. and i think something we probably should talk about is that one way that he has spoken truth to power over the last year and a half is that he stood up to the incumbent president of the united states donald trump. you were talking a little bit earlier, andrea, about what john mccain said about president trump's performance in helsinki. this is a time among republican senators there are not a lot of people who will have that role. we're going to be living in a

very different political world. >> indeed we are. one of his closest friends from all of his past campaigns lindsey graham, has differed with john mccain in this period by maintaining that close roim with president. and that has probably caused some pain at various times during these many months. let's bring in chris matthews, host of "hardball." chris, on days like today, nights like tonight, we think of the greatness of this man. we've lost a great american patriot. a great public bent. a senator. a warrior. a politician. imperfect he would be the first to admit and as i was just saying, on the ninth anniversary of teddy kennedy's diego from the same terrible brain cancer. >> well, well, i said this earlier tonight. i still think it's what the reason people love the gladiatorial aspect of politics

where it's one against the other and there's a real combat to it and you look for guts, spiritual guts. you look for people that stick to what they believe in, and be their own person. john mccain was always his own person. he wasn't a knee jerk lefty or righty. he didn't fit the mold which was there for so many of these other politicians to sort of slip into. he was always john mccain and he could be disconcerting. you could love him one day and mad at him the next day because he wasn't there to like him. you may not like him on being hawkish but he was always john mccain. when i found him to be a character out of the murphys in the sense that if you were to write a romantic movie about american politics and the u.s. senate especially and you wanted to have heroes in it people that stood out and had guts profiles in courage if you will, he he would be the perfect candidate in real life for that romantic

role. he was the classic u.s. senator. if you ever want to grow up to be a senator, you would want to grow up to be john mccain. you wouldn't grow up to be just one of the votes for either party. you wanted to be someone who how are they going to vote. i liked the fact that he was a statesman. even he could can be tough on upon adds bitter at times, he did stand up for his opponent barack obama at a couple of critical moments. one was when that woman in the crowd said he was a arab and meant that in the worst possible way. he could he have gone along with that slur to her. and instead he said no, he's a decent man. that is so rare in politics today. he also gave a most wonderful testimonial to barack obama whether he they were going head to head bay couple weeks before election in 2008. he was at the al smith dinner. i was there and i remember i

went back and dug it up. i hope everybody gets to see it again. it was the most grand endorseme endorsement -- that's not the right word, testimonial to his opponent that you don't hear today. it was wonderful. he did it knowing that he was much the underdog as you fellow in two and a half weeks before the election, the market was dropping and everything was going hairway and he was paying the brunt of it. i thought that was the best of john mccain. >> and chris, the fact that he has still been a force in this last year, even while he's suffering from this brain cancer, fighting cancer, certainly in his vote against the repeal of obamacare last july 28th, but also a year ago july 28th, 2017, but in his speech that speech in july in his statement after helsinki, he has tried to hold the white house to account for things that

he, mccain believes in. >> well, you know, i don't want to say what everybody else is saying about life these days but there was a quoesht of deency in politics till recently where you didn't make fwun of your opponent's appearance especially maybe if you're a male and making fun of a woman's appearance or something as lowdown as that. you didn't make up nicknames about your opponents or drive them into the mud. you out argued them. you made your case. you didn't commiminish their be. mccain was that old school. he was beaten up in that 2000 election they went after his family, they said he had had an illegitimate daughter. turned out it was someone everyone south asia he had adopted. they had adopted but they spread the rumors in south carolina in that primary that it was his illegitimate daughter.

they said his wife had drug problems throwing everything at him. he still stuck with politics. he came back again after he almost got knocked off in 2008 and kept going and going and wouldn't quit. i think that endurance that he show over the hanoi hilton all those years where he was getting beat up and tortured and basically crippled babove his waist, he stuck with it and had a sense of humor. he was a tough guy. i think had he some bitterness but didn't let it drive him. i think he resented people like w and people that didn't be in vietnam the way did he but seemed to come out on top. i'm sure he did. but as the public man was a hero and a grabbed hero as our colleagues said earlier tonight. he had a grandness to him, something out of the movies. >> you referenced that al smith dinner 2008. of course, a campaign year you were there. we've got some of that tape. let's play that testimonial to

barack obama by his competitor, john mccain. >> i don't want it getting out of this room that my opponent is an impressive fellow in many ways. political opponents have a little trouble seeing the best in each other, but i've had a few grimses of this man at his best and i admire his great skill, energy and determination. it's not for nothing that he's inspired so many folks in his own party and beyond. senator obama talking about making history. and he's made quite a bist of it already. there was a time when the mere invitation of an african-american citizen to dine at the white house was taken as an outrage and an insult. in many corridors. today, is a world away from the cruel and prideful bigotry of that time and good riddance. i can't wish my opponent luck,

but i do wish him well. >> chris, that i'm glad you brought tlaup because that is quite a speech. and the dignity and the honor that he brings to that kind of that he brought to that kind of occasion was clack john mccain. >> that's why we care. it's why people like you and i are spend our lives covering these guys. at their best, they are something else. something else. >> chris matthews thanks so much for being there for us tonight. >> i'm glad you're doing this tonight. >> thank you. >> you're the right person to be doing there tonight. thank you. you're the right person to be calling in. thank you, chris matthews. and at the white house tonight, our correspondent nbc news white house correspondent geoff benne bennett. this is an awkward moment. no way around it. there was a tweet from the president but it would be hypocritical for anyone to suggest that the mccains would

want the president'sologis u u jis. the tweet we saw from you president trump earlier tonight is likely all we'll get parking the passing of senator john mccain. i would just point out though that this is a night that belongs to senator mccain. as we've seen the president attack the news media tore conch he doesn't like referring to us as the fake news, contrast that with what john mccain did whether he ran for president back in 2000 on straight talk express. filled that bus was reporters. i can tell you having encounters him earlier in my career as a hill reporter he never flinched at questions. he was often on the receiving ends of tough questions. he was always smart, civil, certain, direct, cordial. he was irascible. he was accessible. it's one of the reasons why you've heard so many people say he left the nation a better

place. that perhaps is the greatest thing you can say about any politician. yes, we have the tweet from president trump but dmar to the lengthy nearly lyrical tributes we've seen from all of the former presidents tonight. >> and geoff, we don't know all of the arrangements. we understand there is going to be -- there will be several days in arizona with the family. we expect that joe biden i've been told will be speaking there. and then there will be a tribute here a memorial at the national cathedral. we know from his book he wants to be buried in annapolis near lis great friend chuck larson, a fellow grad from his class where john mccain famously was near the bottom of the class and chuck larson was one of the star of the class. i also wanted to share with all of us there's a rec we yem that he read at his father's funeral and also at the funeral of his

biographer a friend and colleague of mine from the reagan years, bob tin berg was a fellow veet flam veteran who was wounded in vietnam. he was the biographer of john mccain in knighton gail song. when bob was buried, he read the same lines in john mccain's book as a closing poem. called rec question eem. under the wide and starry sky, dig the grave and let my lai. graddy live and gladly die and i laid me down with a will. there be the verse you grave for me. here he lies where he long to be. home is the sailor home from sea and the hunter home the hill. those are the last words in the restless waiver and also as kelly o'donnell rejoins me from arizona, it's also what john mccain read at his own father's funeral. kelly, he was the say sailor.

he was the naval aviator. that's where he will end. >> that will be a very fitting and appropriate final place for john mccain because navy blue and gold was certainly in his blood. he talked to me so many times about his love of the nav of course, his son who bears his name jack mccain also a naval aviator. there is another john mccain, his grandson who is just a toddler. one might expect he might wear a uniform some day. his elder son doug was an aviator, as well about the navy is something that has been beyond formative for who john mccain was. it was his dna to carry the name of his father and his grandfather to hope to become an admiral as they were. but the grievious wounds and injuries of his time as a prisoner of war prevented him

from going onto the kind of level of command that would have permitted him to get to the admiral level. instead he became the lee and son to the senate, one of the places where he learned about the political arena, taking senators around the world as they visited hot spots and allies as a representative of the navy. so so many times when i would be with john mccain, he had the navy hat on. that's really how i think of him with a big smile. that's always what he enjoyed most. and as you pointed out, not a perfect person. he was quite willing to talk about his foibles, his mistakes, regrets. there were times when he would acknowledge he made decisions for political expedience that he came to regret. whether he geoff was talking about being a reporter on the bus, i can recall being on the straight talk express knee to neil with senator mccain from one stop to the next talking and talking. at times we would get down to things like favorite color, most

recent movie that he watched telling about his as a contestant on jeopardy at one point. i said can we pick this up again late silver he loved engaging. always with a cup of coffee in his hand. and he would always tease me about being irish, of course. and it is so out of context if you want quite hear it, but he would call reporters had affection for jess. i was often a jerk. i suspect you might have been a jerk yourself. because he would say it with a smile. oh, you jerk and it was his way of communicating. he had the sparring in the hallways. what i find fascinating about the way he's remember sds someone as flawed and human as anyone but with a level of courage and commitment that is not even every day and that's why there be days of remembrance. there are many people who have done great things in public life. who deserve to be honored and remembered and he has earned his

place there and that's something that i think is it reflected. he also would say to me from time to time there are many things that i've done in my life. most importantly, i just wanted to be, i wanted to engage. i wanted to be a good representative for the lineage of public service that he represents. i remember during his campaign going to mccain airfield in mississippi named for either his father or his grandfather. his name was added to the ship that bears the john sidney mccain know men clay tour. he's added to that piece of history. there's already talk that senator schumer and others are saying perhaps the russell senate office building where had he an office for so many years, a fixture of life on capitol hill could perhaps be renamed in his honor. that's something being offered tonight for consideration. we don't know if it will happen. it shows you the kind of esteem

his colleagues have held him in, someone who would fight with them fiercely, make them laugh and also at times con found them with the complex character of john mccain, also as i don't know if we pointed out, i'm also thinking of roberta mccain who is 106 years old. and lost her son and i spent some time with her during 2008 and i remember her saying when johnny as she called him came home from vietnam, she and not at the time senator mccain but senator mccain never discussed his time in captivity. she said as a mother she had worried day in, day out about his the simple things, did he have a toothbrush, was he getting enough food. but whether he came home, they never discussed it. she said that was the navy way. andrea? >> roberta mccain having lost her son. she at the age of 106. thank you so much. as kelly was recounting john

mccain liked reporters. he liked to mix it up with reporters. he had affectionate names and some names that were not so affectionate. joining me phil rucker, white house bureau chief for the "washington post." phil, john mccain is one of those old fashioned politician who's didn't mind talking to the president. >> he sure is. and what a night and what a man. there's nobody else like him frankly in the united states senate or in washington and there may never be. kelly and her tribute touched on so many things. one word that stands out is courage. that's what he's been in this three-year period when donald trump has become the leader of his party and now the president of the united states. he's had that courage to step out and speak out and stand up in a way that no other republican of his prominence has been willing or able to do that vote on health care, when he came in in the middle of the night and did a thumbs down

because he didn't think that bill was good enough. all the way to the helsinkira, which were i think important for mccain and one lils last final acts as a senator. >> and phil, this is awkward for the white house as we've been reporting because. >> very awkward. >> there's no way that this president after every terrible thing he said about john mccain including last week at fort drum not reciting the name of the bill he was signing, the john k. mccain defense authorization act, he called it the national defense authorization act. he didn't want to say john mccain's name. so it would be difficult now for him to be part of those paying tribute. >> that's right. these last few months as john mccain has been at home in arizona, dying of cancer, you know, president trump has been at campaign rallies. i've been covering them.

and again and again and again trump invokes mccain in a way to mock him. he doesn't call him by name but he'll say we will could he have passed that obamacare repeal bill if it if it wasn't for the one guy that voted thumbs down and he had the crowd turn against mccain and it is a ugly sentiment out there for many months now. president trump viewed mccain with a level of d-- disdain and not standing behind the presidency and agreeing with everything that president trump has done and it goes back to the beginning of the trump campaign. i was there in iowa in 2015 when trump was the gathering of social conservatives and said i like heroes who weren't captured and it is just an incredible comment to make and he never did really apologize for that and it just set off what is now a real -- a three-year feud between these men where mccain

will speak out when he feels it is appropriate and the president just refused to say a positive word about him. >> phil rucker, i'm sure it is going to be an interesting couple of days as we go through the tributes for john mccain and the white house figures out the choreography. i assume mike pence will represent the white house at the service in washington. >> that would make sense. >> thank you for calling in. >> thank you. >> and joining us now is reporter mike manly who covered his 2008 presidential campaign for us. and of course has known him for so long and knows about the unique relationship with someone else you could have, which is joe biden. >> that is right, andrea. i can't help but smile listen to colleagues talk about memories covering john mccain. i'm one of those jerks who he would like to mix it up with in the hall. but i was struck tonight reading some of the statements from democrats at the passing of john

mccain. ryan shot of hawaii saying we lost a hero at the time the country needs one. and bob menendez from new jersey talking about how he learned from john mccain the importance in the senate of putting patriotism above partisanship and from joe biden, a statement and i'll read some of it where he said his impact on america hasn't ended. not even close. those two -- it was interesting covering the fall in the 2008 campaign, joe biden was the vice presidential running mate. he was the attack dog. that is the role you're supposed to play and it was something of a running joke among us who were covering joe biden and day in anddy ought in the fall of 2008 how often he would speak fondly of john mccain on the campaign trail before he would light into him on policy but always in a friendly way but i'm struck now in the political -- we're about to begin a week of memorials for

senator mccain in arizona and here in washington and i was told again tonight that senator john mccain met with biden personally in arizona in april and at that time he asked him personally if he would deliver a eulogy for him in arizona. that is one of the first major speeches, major eulogies from a political figure in the country this weekend and it is from a democrat. somebody on the ticket he ran against in 2008 and we know when we come to washington and the services move here, we'll hear from president obama who ran against him and from george w. bush who became president after running against mccain as well. this week is the arizona senate primary. jeff flake senate seat. he did not run for re-election as somebody critical of president trump, he saw it was too difficult to win a republican primary. and i think this week as joe biden's statement points out is an opportunity for perhaps his

legacy, this moment in time, to -- for republicans to take stock of what they're role is of putting party above -- of country above party and that will be one of the many themes of the week as this day plays out. >> thank you, mike. that '08 campaign was a great snapshot of the two men, biden and mccain on opposite sides but still preserving that friendship and that civility in politics. michael, when you think about that, the roles that they played and how mccain could have become president but still carved out this unique legislative role and leader of human rights around the world which perhaps is larger than anything he might have accomplished at that point. even from the white house given the economic wreckage and all of the difficulties that anyone elected in '08 was going to

inherit. >> i think that is exactly right, andrea. and he showed something and that is that oftentimes a senator or member of congress for -- in his case about four decades -- could have almost as much impact on the american and the world as they might have had they been elektded president. and you were talking about civility. john mccain knew smg -- something that went kback to th beginning and they wanted us to duke it out over political issuesba they felt unlike the dictatorship and monarchy, conflict leads to the best kind of policy but they also wanted there to be compromise and members of congress to fight with each other, debate the policies, come up with the best kind of laws, but at the end of the day, they wanted members of congress to have a tanker of ale together and john mccain was so much in that spirit.

and andrea, one thing that i think shows that so well, go back to 2004 when john kerry was the soon to be nominee of the democratic party. he was thinking of vice presidential candidates. you and i have talked about this. for a period he seriously thought of asking the democratic party to nominate john mccain, although a republican, as the democratic candidate for vice president. for a while that looked as if it might happen. then you get to 2008 and john mccain is nominated by the republicans, who does he want for his vice president. joe lieberman who is a democrat. so much in the spirit, i think of the founders, but life has changed so much. even just in the last ten years, could you imagine a nominee of either party today proposing that his or her running mate be a member of the opposition party? >> absolutely impossible. michael besh, thank you so much for your thoughts. and we'll be right back with

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♪ >> and good evening, i'm andrea mitchell from washington. we're still following sad news from arizona tonight. senator john mccain has passed away at the age of 81 after battling brain cancer for more than a year. he would have turned 82 just this coming wednesday. the owe office of the senator releasing a statement that reads, senator john sidney mccain iii died at 4:28 p.m. on august 25th, 2018. with the senator