g) don't settle for your first draft. or your 10th draft. ♪ ♪ you get to create the room where it happens. ♪ ♪ just don't think you have to do it alone. ♪ ♪ the powerful backing of american express. don't live life without it. good morning and welcome to "politics nation." in just a few minutes, i will be talking to senator kamala harris, democrat of california, about the upcoming midterms. the kavanaugh confirmation hearings. and her possible presidential run. and later, the tragedy in dallas that left another unarmed black man killed by police.

now with more questions remaining than answers. first, we're following some major developments as paul manafort has decided to flip and take a deal to cooperate with special counsel mueller. and a separate report by "vanity fair" that trump's former personal lawyer michael cohen is also talking to the mueller investigative team. joining me now is jonathan allen, national political reporter for nbc news.com and julia manchester, a reporter for the hill. julia, let me go to you first. it's been not such a great week for the president. his former campaign chair paul manafort pleading guilty and saying basically i will cooperate with the mueller

investigators. we see michael cohen, according to "vanity fair" saying that he is talking to the mueller investigators. i have met with him twice since his break with president trump. he never told me that, but "vanity fair" is now saying he is making that move. what do you make of this in terms of the real threats to the president or it's just this a lot of smoke and we still don't see fire? >> we'll really have to see how this all plays out, but you're right. not a good week at all for the president with all these developments. we have to remember that although the president and the white house and the trump campaign say that these charges against manafort have absolutely nothing to do with the trump campaign or when he was working on the trump campaign, manafort was still really tied to president trump at that time and was, you know, has ties to pro-russian, ukrainian politicians in his lobbying work

there. so his work to cooperate with mueller could potentially hurt the president because manafort could give quite a bit of information on a variety of issues regarding russian interference. he was really in the center of the trump campaign at that point. so that's a big story in itself. in terms of michael cohen, michael cohen was extremely close to the president for a while. he was his fixer. and he has signaled that he is going to essentially cooperate. he's cooperating with mueller at this point. so that "vanity affair" article was significant because it's signaled this is personal for michael cohen. he's willing to give as much information on him. he feels it's personal because he feels the president has turned on him. not a good week for the trump team. >> jonathan, i again say he's never explicitly said to me he

was cooperating, but he did say it was personal and felt abandoned. and manafort is probably the only one that we know for sure was supposedly in that infamous trump tower meeting with the russians. and he could, therefore, give critical testimony to what happened in the meeting. was it about adoptions, as the trump team originally said, or was it about trying to get information on the opponent which is hillary clinton, which is directly violating having foreign powers influence an election. and he could also shed light on whether president trump knew, authorized and was briefed on the meeting. >> that's right, reverend al. this is the first opportunity we know of for robert mueller to get inside the trump tower meeting from someone who is cooperating with the government. in addition to that, he can shed light on a number of other

issues with regard to the russia investigation, with regard to what russia was attempting to do. this has been a very bad moment for president trump and his orbit. you've got now both his former campaign manager and his fixer cooperating with the government. you know, president trump likes to use the term flipping. there's nothing to flip on if there is no shady business going on, and robert mueller isn't going to offer paul manafort an opportunity to have a reduced sentence or fewer charges against him if he doesn't think he's getting something of value from manafort. and if you're manafort and cohen, you look at president trump and make your calculation. and it appears they have. they'd rather have shorter prison sentences than stand up to mueller and refuse to give him anything. >> let me push on jonathan's point. they already had a conviction on

paul manafort in virginia. and they were going into a trial next week in washington, d.c. so one would have to think that jonathan is on to something. the only reason they would even negotiate a deal with manafort is if he gave them something that they did not have or that they needed corroboration. it would seem it would have to be a major piece. president trump, strangely, in his first tweet i want to put up, this is what -- the first tweet since the manafort news. no mention of manafort, but many references to the investigation calling it, quote, rigged russian witch hunt. highly conflicted bob mueller. this phony issue and no collusion. all in one tweet. so he appears, he being the president, rattled by this.

no direct reference to manafort, but when your former campaign chairman and your personal lawyer is cooperating, if they say anything near the same thing, that is powerful testimony against you. >> it absolutely is, and the president is certainly worried. but one thing i'd like to point out about that tweet is there's also references to poll numbers. the way i read it the first time i saw that tweet was him trying to reassure his base. a lot of members of president trump's base like to follow his rhetoric in that they say the investigation is a witch hunt. it's designed to politically harm the president. and this all comes right before the midterms. and i think president trump and many of his republican allies and candidates were hoping to focus on other issues ahead of the midterms and push this investigation aside. however, with these two major central figures that have been in trump's orbit in the past, now agreeing to cooperate with elements of this investigation,

you know, this doesn't play well for the president. so he's working to reassure his base at this point but this is going to play a major role in messaging for democrats ahead of the midterms, and i think republicans and the president have reason to be frightened at this point. >> jonathan, playing to your base is an interesting way to deal that is not at all new. but when you're playing to your base against people that you selected. let's remember, mueller didn't put manafort as chairman of the trump campaign. trump did. michael cohen was trump's personal lawyer by trump's choosing. so it's kind of hard on the long run to even have your base convinced that everybody is a creep or crook or flipper or whatever term he wants when these are the people you had around you by your selection. the prosecutors or the

investigators didn't choose them. and, clearly, the president going into the midterm elections would clearly want to be talking about the economy taking more credit than he deserves, in my opinion, but he clearly wants to be talking about that than talking about in of the people he chose to associate with have now become cooperating witnesses against him in an investigation, it appears. >> he's surrounded himself with criminals and told the american people he surrounded himself only with the best. so those two things are coming head on into collision with each other. he didn't just hire the best. he actually hired people who were conducting all kinds of crimes. and so now those chickens are coming home to roost for him. in terms of the political battlefield here, you've seen the president have some erosion of his approval numbers. last week, three polls out that had him between 36% and 40%

approval. if it's at 36%, the president is basically a base plus none right now. his base strategy of communicating only to his base makes it harder for him to persuade independents and swing voters and people who are outside that hard base. and i think we're seeing that right now. and that's really bad news for the republicans heading into the midterm elections. they'd much rather be talking about an economy that's doing really well than talking about the president's tweets, than talking about the woodward and omarosa books, about the chaos in the white house or talking about a russia investigation that is now bearing a lot of fruit for robert mueller. >> and julia, the woodward book also that came out this week on tuesday, the continued books, articles, omarosa among them, these kinds of things are the things that republican senatorial candidates, whether

incumdent or insurgent and congressional candidates are being asked about as they seek re-election or election. they're not being asked about things that they would rather be able to talk about. so it is a weight not only on the president. he's bringing unbelievable political weight on the republican ticket all over the country. >> right, right. these republican candidates and, you know, many very close uphill races don't want to be talking about a "new york times" op-ed by an anonymous official or woodward books or books by omarosa. they want to talk about the economy. issues that republicans feel they are strong on at this point. however, you know, it's not only that these books and these pieces of information keep coming out. the president really fuels this fire. he brings up these books, these articles at campaign rallies.

he tweets about them. he brings more attention to them. i think maybe his logic at this point, it's hard to tell, but is him trying to push back against it saying these are people trying to hurt me. this is the washington beltway establishment trying to hurt me. so, you know, he's bringing a lot of that attention -- >> but these are people he brought in his office. the washington establishment didn't bring in paul manafort or michael cohen. but i'm going to have to leave it there. but i will say this for my friends on the right. i do think we ought to talk about the economy and thank you, president obama, for turning it around. thank you jonathan allen and julia manchester. coming up, senator kamala harris on the continuing fight against the confirmation of supreme court nominee brett kavanaugh. also, almost two weeks after an unarmed black man is shot to death in his own dallas

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black, particularly in urban centers where the effects are compounded by population and often poverty. all week, science writers drew direct links between florence's size and the effects of climate change. but largely missing from that conversation was the extent to which those effects have already started to affect global communities of color from south carolina to south africa. what is unusual and what has become usual here is that the most vulnerable people are already slated to suffer the most. but what is unusual is the extent to which this white house deviates even from its republican predecessors in its contempt for the environment.

joining me now is dr. jay marshall sheppard, a university of georgia professor of atmospheric sciences and past president of the american meteorological society. doctor, let me go right to the heart of this issue i raised. a lot of people are going to say there's reverend al talking about race again. is it a fact, supported by data, that people of color are most affected by these kinds of natural disasters such as hurricanes and such as the things that we're seeing, not only in the united states but globally? is that not a fact, and if so, why is that the case? >> reverend al, you're spot on with that fact. the data suggests that. you can look at any peer-reviewed study on this

topic and you'll find that marginalized populations, people of color, even the elderly are always the most vulnerable. just rewind back to hurricane katrina and look who was staring at you from the superdome after hurricane katrina. look at hurricane harvey in houston. a report came out noting the marginalized populations, the poorest, largely african-american communities still have not recovered from hurricane harvey. and i suspect we will see similar data when we look back at the aftermath of hurricane florence in south carolina and north carolina. >> what is the cause for the race gap in terms of who is impacted the most? and let me say, we don't want anyone impacted. we're not comparing pain. but what is the reason that people of color and poor people are most impacted? is it infrastructure in terms of how we decide who gets what as we rebuild the infrastructure or

in many ways deal with certain choices that government may give priority to one area or another? what is the reason? >> yeah, no, it's actually a really simple answer. it comes down to the wealth gap. if you look at the distribution of income across races and various groups, those that have ample insurance policies, those that have the ability to be resilient to these extreme events. everybody is equally affected, and we have our thoughts and prayers offered to anybody, no matter what color they are, but if we look across the spectrum of society, some groups have lower income, have less resiliency in terms of infrastructure and actually even some studies we've done in my own research group suggest that some groups tend to live in more vulnerable, more flood-prone parts of a city. more vulnerability to flooding, more vulnerability to environmental hazards that you know this to be environmental

justice. so this is not a figment. it's not playing any kind of cards. it's just what the data shows. >> now this administration, as i said, seems more insensitive, if not outright hostile to the climate change reality that even republican predecessors dealt with. how does that endanger all citizens of all races and, of course, particularly as we're talking in this segment about those that are poor and those of color. how does this denial, how does this withdrawal from confronting climate change give us even more of a problem in these areas? >> first of all, climate change is definitely real. humans are contributing to it. and what i am at least most sort of encouraged about is that in congress right now, there is a climate caucus of both democrats and republicans. and in order to join that

caucus, a democrat has to bring in a republican or a republican has to bring in a democrat. so i think that effort right there in congress is sort of shattering this myth that climate change is a left issue or a right issue. the ice doesn't care what party you are. it just melts. and so i think we need to see that and move forward in all branches of our government because it's critical. it's a human issue. there's no plan "b" planet. >> and then when you deal with the whole question of politics in this, the president denying the amount of people that died in puerto rico, i mean, we're talking about people's lives. we're talking about death here. we're talking about families that are torn apart. and at what point do we get beyond the politics, as you said, republicans and democrats are on this climate committee. that ice melts whether you're right winger or left winger or

an undecided. when do we push the argument past the politics of the matter with this white house that will look at blatant facts, dead bodies and say, oh, no, that's not the number. that's just my enemies making up numbers. i mean, this is unbelievable in the middle of a hurricane. >> yeah, thousands of people died in hurricane maria, no doubt about it. we've counted the numbers of deaths in natural disasters for decades. no one is making anything up. we've always counted direct and indirect. we count when a tree falls on someone, god forbid that happened, but that's a direct death from a storm. but if someone is in a snow storm and shoveling storm and have a heart attack, that's incorrect. we've always counted those. what's going to move us forward and it's already starting to happen is when people understand these climate issues are not about some polar bear. we love polar bears. but it's about their kitchen

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i spent most of my week in washington, d.c., for the congressional black caucus annual legislative conference. and earlier this week, i sat down with democrat of california senator kamala harris. ahead of the cbc dinner, she co-chaired last night. one week after leading senate democrats interrogation of supreme court nominee brett

kavanaugh. the senator is now pivoting to how democrats will react to kavanaugh's likely confirmation and what that confirmation means for the mueller investigation. i'm happy to be joined this morning by senator kamala harris. senator harris, let me start with, i want to get to the midterms and, of course, the storm but let me start by asking you about the kavanaugh hearings and the nominations. you came on very strongly questioning judge kavanaugh. tell us where we are now because i know the democrats have stalled. we're told senator feinstein has raised some undisclosed concerns to the fbi. where are we now? >> so where we are now in terms of the schedule is that this upcoming thursday, there will be a vote by the committee. the judiciary committee, which i

sit on. and the question is going to be what happens between today and thursday. and that will be, frankly, what should happen is that there should be a robust discussion with the american public about who this nominee is. and then that conversation needs to elevate to the american public talking to their representatives in the united states senate about whether this individual reflects what is best about our country or not. my questions for him during that hearing were focused on a number of issues, but the overall theme, rev, was that i strongly believe that based on every type of work he has done that his -- the issue with him is not only that he's a political ideologue. it's not about only his beliefs, it's about the fact that he's been an operative. a political operative. and so you look at that on a

number of issues. for example, i brought up dog whistling. and you know dog whistling is a term for basically people who are speaking in code to touch certain people who recognize the language as being representative of how they think. >> pushing certain buttons. you know exactly which buttons you're trying to push. >> right. for example, he used the term in a "wall street journal" opinion piece that he wrote. this is a lawyer who is a judge who talks about how he uses his words very carefully. twice in a published opinion he used the word racial spoil system. one of the witnesses during the hearing was the chairman of the congressional black caucus cedric richmond. i asked him when he was a witness, what does that term mean? >> racial spoils system? >> yes. >> and he said that's a dog whistle. that speaks to people who believe because this was the

question i asked kavanaugh when he was before us. that speaks to the belief that somebody is taking something from them that nobody else should have. >> right. >> so that's the term that has been used when people talk about affirmative action or when people talk about how we have looked at the disadvantage and the historical disadvantage the government has created for minorities, in particular, black people. and he uses the word racial spoils systems. he used the word abortion on demand. there are specific cases that -- one in particular, the garza case, where there was a young woman, immigrant woman, 17 years old who went through every step that the law required her to go through to obtain an abortion. and yet he called it abortion on demand because those who would deprive women of their ability to make decisions about their own body are trying to suggest it's just like tv on demand. you just click a button and you

get it, which is mislead, and it is wrong. >> and there are cases in the pipeline that are headed toward the supreme court. >> yes. >> from roe vs. wade or what states can do about roe versus wade. affirmative action, voting rights. there are cases in the pipeline he'd have direct voting ability to. >> and on the voting rights act, i asked him, the section 2 of the voting rights act basically gives folks the power to sue if a state is interfering with or suppressing people's rights to vote. i asked him, is it constitutional? he would not answer that question. how can you not answer that question? >> wow. >> how can you not answer the question that i ask which is, is it constitutional for people to be denied entry into our country based on their race? >> couldn't answer? >> could not answer. so here's the thing folks have to also understand about this.

there are nine members of the supreme court. majority always rules. so if there's not a unanimous ruling, the majority, and it's been that way for a long time. a lot of 5-4 decisions. five votes, you win. so five votes could overturn roe v. wade. >> right. right. >> five votes could make decisions about all kinds of civil rights issues that relate to equality and fairness. and that's the significance of also understanding each person on that court will determine the outcome in a way that will have generational impact. and the example i use is this. had earl warren, a former attorney general of california, not sat on that supreme court, brown versus board of education would not have been decided which would have meant i would never have been a united states senator to question a nominee to sit on the united states supreme court. >> that's how important each nominee is. >> each one. >> let me ask you this. the whole country has watched

over the last several days the hurricane florence approaching the carolinas. >> right. >> in the carolinas now. you have dealt with natural disasters in california. >> yes. >> what are the concerns that you are not seeing being done because when the cameras are gone and people are left, then what? >> so california has experienced historic damage from historic level of fires just this last year alone. and the devastation is profound. whole communities lose their homes. and one of the things that i've realized is that when we think about, first of all, climate change is real. climate change is exasperating a lot of these disasters. they are natural disasters. we have to think about it both in terms of what we need to resource fema with to deal with the emergency, as it is occurring and immediately after, but we also, if we're going to

be smart as government, need to focus on prevention. so i've been looking at some folks talking about, for example, how we can work with the actuaries who make decisions about the insurance companies and how much they're going to charge you based on the risk they think you present. and looking at where are the higher risk areas based on their calculations, and then going in to those areas on the front end and on a prevention side and looking at where we can put the resources into building up the infrastructure in those communities so they are not vulnerable to those natural disasters. can you imagine, for example, during katrina if we had, ahead of time, known, one, predictable those levees are going to broadcast. let's figure out what is the structure of the noehomes in th area. can we reinforce those homes structurally in advance so people aren't left homeless for

what could be years, even generations that can't go back to their home. those are some of the thoughts i have when i'm waking up in the middle of the night. >> it's congressional black caucus weekend. and people are talking a lot about the year of the woman. >> yeah. >> unprecedented amount of women running. stacey abrams in georgia, et cetera. we just had -- >> lucy mcbath. lauren underwood. joanna hayes. extraordinary. extraordinary women running. >> but the buzz around also is -- the attorney general nomination we're proud of out of brooklyn. but there's a lot of buzz about will kamala harris run in '20. >> i've heard that. >> i'm not going to put you on the spot but if you want to announce, i'll take it. there's a fervor there. forgetting '20, what is going to

be the difference in '18. you're all over the country campaigning. >> yes, i am. >> what are you feeling from people and what do the democrats need to do to make this blue wave a reality? >> so what i am seeing and feeling is that, first of all, folks are fed up and are realizing that they are willing to make the sacrifice and have the courage to put themselves out there. if they don't see leaders in their community, they are prepared to lead. and that's exciting. >> right. >> that's exciting. the other thing i'm seeing is that there is an energy that is out there of people who know this is not about fighting against something. it's about fighting for something. and it's about fighting for the best of who we are as a country. i think that there is a lot of energy that is also around knowing that we are better than this. and so let us aspire and fight toward that instead of going low. and it's exciting because it's

also about recognizing that when we all turn out, we make a difference. right? you know, i think about it sometimes when you look at, for example, in the south. oh, certain communities just don't go out to vote. it's because there's been a tradition in those states of suppressing that vote. when you have people in positions of leadership who actively engage the community, folks turn out. that's what happened in alabama. so that's what i see happening in the country right now. as people are saying, i'm not going to have my vote suppressed. i'm going to get out there and be involved because when i vote, i make a difference, and that's exciting. >> very exciting. well, thank you for being with me, senator harris. >> thank you for having me. thank you. up next -- the one essential truth about the shooting in dallas that left one young promising african-american dead. be right back.

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we vehemently reject any attempts to make this senseless shooting about our brother, the victim, and not the negligence

and actions of the officer who committed this crime. >> on thursday, the family of dallas police shooting victim botham jean laid him to rest. one week after officer amber guyger shot and killed jean, claiming that she mistook his apartment for her own. despite conflicting accounts from guyger over what happened that night, she is currently out on bail facing controversial manslaughter charges. also adding to the family's grief and the public's outrage is the news that multiple search warrants were served not at guyger's residence but at jean's, allegedly turning up marijuana in his apartment. critics contend this is just another attempt to turn the victim into the villain. a familiar tactic often used to

justify the unlawful murder of unarmed black men by police. joining me now is mark thompson, host of "make it plain" on sirius xm radio. mark, you and i have been involved for many years fighting a lot of these cases, raising the question to just get a fair trial and a fair outcome once the facts are heard. and here we are again, young, unarmed black man in his house. the police officer saying she mistook his apartment for her own, which begs to question what kind of training do you have where you have policemen that don't even know their own apartment unless there's something else here we don't know about why she didn't know the difference. and they come with search warrants after charging her with manslaughter, not in terms of

searching her apartment but in searching the apartment of the victim. like there's some reason he might have had someone come into his house and allegedly mistaking him for their own and kill mistaken it for their own and killed him. what does the marijuana that they found, we don't know, or the fact that anything else to but this woman in his apartment have to do with shooting him? >> i'm grateful as many of us are for your role over the decades as an intercessor for so many families that have faced this type of tragedy, how many more times will this happen? how many more times will you have to be called upon to do such an indecessor. and countless times we saw this marijuana charge and so many other cases.

i believe they said it about trayvon. and the interesting thing is that marijuana is not the type of substance that brings about aggression in the first place. so you're right. whether it was even found there or not, it's unlikely that it was. but even if it was that has nothing to do with this. we've gone from driving while black, to walking while black to now -- you and i both were at the congressional black caucus last night, and i'm going to say this. as we were on the precipice of another historical season. we may get the first governors in georgia, florida, maryland,

black lieutenant governors in michigan and wisconsin. it reminds me of the first congressional black caucus. that brought about the era of lynchings. lynchings that went on for decades. and so a lot of what we see happening as we know is a backlash to that. and particularly as i was on twitter a lot of comments in support of this officer -- >> it's a backlash i think of the eight years of first black president. >> amen. >> when you look now at the case in dallas where many of us say manslaughter is not the appropriate charge here when someone has done apparently what she's done, she has a right to be defended in court and we want a fair trial. but to try to make the victim a villain is a pattern we see too often. we have an 11-year-old tasered

by police in cincinnati saying they were shoplifting. an 11-year-old tasered. i mean, we're seeing the trial start on the police shooting in chicago. and this administration came in immediately saying they were going to stop the consent to -- stop criminal justice reform that many in the obama administration are working to get. and we've seen an administration that has turned back from dealing how we correct these kind of police community tensions and situations that always end up with the black or the latino being the victim if not dead. >> right. and then being somehow blamed for their own victimization, as is the case where brother john. a lot of people are concerned

about that charge of manslaughter, and i think the statement has been made, the grand jury will have an opportunity to look at that see if there's a more serious charge. it's sunday morning, reverend al, and in churches all over the world including in brother john's church, people are going to be kneeling. this is a worship leader, a man of god who was killed sitting in his own home. and it also justifies, vindicates what colin kaepernick and other nfl players have been doing. what better time than on a sunday to kneel on behalf of a christian killed by a police officer just like the original christian killed by the roman police. so we pray for his family and we really play for the truth to come out about this case. >> i'm going to leave it there. i think people ought to know you're also reverend mark

thompson. >> thank you. >> up next my final thoughts. stay with us. -fridge, weather. -clear skies and 75. -trash can, turn on the tv. -my pleasure. -ice dispenser, find me a dog sitter. -okay. -and make ice. -pizza delivered. -what's happened to my son? -i think that's just what people are like now. i mean, with progressive, you can quote your insurance on just about any device. even on social media. he'll be fine. -[ laughs ] -will he? -i don't know. discover.o. -will he? i like your card, but i'm absolutely not paying an annual fee. discover has no annual fees. really? yeah. we just don't believe in them. oh nice. you would not believe how long i've been rehearsing that. no annual fee on any card. only from discover.

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four years ago the nation watched in horror as we looked at flint, michigan, where lead was found in the water and the contamination was causing the affected citizens there could

not even drink or bathe or use the water for their children or themselves. all the result of the governor appointing a district masker who changed those pipelines and companies that would service that community. and four years later the water is still contaminated. it still cannot be used for drinking. and even in nearby detroit there's been lead found in the water in public schools. this afternoon i'll join reverend charles williams of michigan and others at new jerusalem baptist church in flint to raise again the attention that activism is not being there for the new cycle four years ago. it's until you correct what has happened and compensate the victims who've got to try to work their way out of a situation they didn't cause. we must not forget flint and the

flints all over this country. i'll be in flint to make sure of that this afternoon, hat i do my part. that does it for me. thanks for watching. now to my colleague. safe travels. thank you. i appreciate it. at world headquarters in new york, alex witt is off today. it's 9:00 in the east, 6:00 outwest, and here's what's happening, in the carolinas an epic weather event. >> just absolute total destruction. >> it was horrifying. just wondering how high it's going to go and how we're going to get out. >> the latest in live reports. manafort fal out. is the one time trump campaign chairman's plea the time piece of robert mueller's puzzle, and what would that mean for the president and his family. and balance of power.