republicans were going to face in upcoming midterm elections should be somewhat reduced now. that's important for them. >> ian, good to see you as always. good luck on the new show. we're looking forward to watching. ian bremer, president of the eurasia group. "deadline white house" with nicolle wallace starts right now. >> hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york with republican senator jeff flake saying that lying to congress would be reason to dump the kavanaugh nomination and a new witness to judge kavanaugh's drinking habits in college emerging to tell a different story to the fbi than what kavanaugh described in his congressional testimony. the stakes could not be any higher for the fbi background investigation called for by flake on friday and reluctantly greenlit by the president. new this afternoon, we learn the white house has widened the probe into judge kavanaugh's background and authorized the fbi to interview anyone it wants as long as the investigation is

done by the end of this week. "the new york times" was first to report on the expanded scope of the investigation, and nbc news has confirmed the development as well. from that "times" report, quote, the new directive came in the past 24 hours after a backlash from democrats who criticized the white house for limiting the scope of the bureau's investigation into president trump's nominee for the supreme court. the times also confirms the fbi has already completed interviews with the four witnesses its agents were originally asked to talk to. one of those, p.j. smyth, confirmed to nbc news he has fully cooperated and provided no evidence corroborating accusations against kavanaugh. the announcement followed a rose garden statement from the president who appeared to break with the white house position that all three of kavanaugh's accusers shouldn't be interviewed. >> so just to be clear, should the fbi interview all three of brett kavanaugh's accusers? >> it wouldn't bother me at all. now i don't know all three of

the accusers. certainly, i imagine they're going to interview two. the third one i don't know much about, but it wouldn't bother me at all. i mean, i have heard that the third one has -- i have no idea if this is true, has very little credibility. if there is any credibility, interview the third one. >> should brett kavanaugh be interviewed by the fbi? >> i think so. i think it's fine if they do. >> here to join us with the latest on these developments from "the washington post," phil rucker, former democratic congressman donna edwards. shawn henry, a former fbi executive assistant director, tim o'brien for bloomberg opinion and charlie sikes, contributing editor for the weekly standard and host of the daily standard podcast. phil rucker, donald trump today, i don't know if he was shooting from the hip or getting ahead of his counsel's office and the directives your paper and colleagues have reported over the weekend had been given to the fbi to be narrow in that

expanded background check. but what do you make of the president's statements this morning and reports now that the probe itself will be expanded as democrats had been clamoring for since word first broke that it was so narrow in its focus. >> yeah, nicolle, it seems to be a significant development. you not only have the president publicly saying he wants the fbi to pursue any and all of these leads, but you have word out of the white house that the actual directive that's been given to the fbi is to pursue these leads and do a more thorough investigation than we thought there initially would be. that's in part because of political pressure from the democrats and from the public at large, but it also seems to be a gamble by the white house, by the kavanaugh team that if the fbi investigates these claims if they conduct interviews and follow the leads where they -- where it leads them, that they'll not find anything wrong. that they're not going to find information that contradicts or

conflicts with what kavanaugh testified under oath before the senate judiciary committee last week because if he's found to have perjured himself in that hearing, that could be a very serious problem for his confirmation. >> phil rucker, everything i'm picking up is that the concern at this hour is around what you just described. some inconsistencieses in testimony. let me play republican senator jeff flake. i guess we have to call him the man of the hour. he and senator chris coons. let me play him talking about what he would do if it is learned through this background investigation that judge kavanaugh lied. let's watch. >> you're aware of the jury instruction, falsus in unibus, falsus in omnibus, are you not? you're aware of that jury instruction? >> i am. >> you know what it means. >> you can translate it for me, senator. >> false in one thing, false in everything.

>> so that was a marker laid down by democratic senator blumenthal. but let me play for you from "60 minutes" jeff flake talking about what he'd do with this nomination if he learns judge kavanaugh lied in that testimony. do we have that? >> if judge kavanaugh is shown to have lied to the committee, nomination is over? >> oh, yes. >> phil rucker? >> that's the problem because remember, it's not a criminal investigation but this is a job interview to be on the supreme court where you are deciding things about values and truth. if you are found to have lied in this -- lied before the senate, it's not only violating that oath, committing perjury, but it, in some ways, would seem to disqualify you from the job of serving on the supreme court. there's a lot of anxiety in trump circles this week that this fbi investigation could uncover some sort of misstatement or mistruth in what

judge kavanaugh had to testify last week. and we're already hearing that some of his former classmates at yale disagree with his characterization of his drinking habits. remember, kavanaugh said he never blacked out, meaning he never drunk alcohol to excess where he couldn't remember something that occurred. but some of his classmates in media interviews have contested that. we'll see what the fbi finds in their investigation. >> donna edwards, take us inside democratic thinking at this hour that they've been on the receiving end of vicious attacks from judge kavanaugh himself and mitch mcconnell just a few moments ago on the senate floor really lambasting democrats for how they handled ford's accusations. but they seem to be picking up -- i don't want to call it momentum, but making their points known. senator coons helping to reach this agreement with senator flake, to hit pause and to allow what is now a full and expanded background check and drawing attention to the question we watched senator bloumenthal thee

of inconsistencies in the testimony. >> it is true there was a lot of outrage over the course of the weekend about the limiting of the investigation, but i think that rather than hearing from democrats, i think that the president and the white house began to hear from republicans and particularly from jeff flake about this limited scope. and that is what -- i mean, after all, they'll still need the 50-plus votes. and i think, for democrats, i mean, a lot of democrats have been saying, you know what, we sdwrouc just want to see the results of the investigation because there have been multiple occasions, i think, during the course of judge kavanaugh's testimony that he offered things that seemed like little lies but then when you collect them, it's a really big deal. and whether you're talking about, you know, the challenges around his role in the white house in judicial nominations or you're talking about things like what was the drinking age? well, it turns out he was 17 and

the drinking age was 18 or 21. so he wasn't legal in any case. the amount of his drinking, which is relevant because he's mischaracterized it. we may have all been able to throw that aside if he had just told the truth about it, but, clearly, he has not. so at the end of the day, democrats are saying, yeah, open it all up. investigate and let's see what the fbi comes up with. >> i've been investigated by the fbi to work in the white house. every time i received a higher clear athey inve clearance, they investigated me again. i was told because i went to berkeley it wasn't about how many times i spoked pot at berkeley it was about whether or not the answer i gave the fbi about how many times i smoked pot at berkeley matched the answers they got when they interviewed dozens of my contemporaries. tell me about the kavanaugh testimony. >> credibility is very important for anybody working in the white house or anywhere in the u.s. government.

sitting on the supreme court, it's pretty important to ensure there's credibility. so the public has an understanding and sense of confidence about this. this is not, i don't think now, an investigation about the sexual allegations. i think it really has moved towards credibility. and i don't think there were too many people who want to be judged based on how much they drank in high school or even in college. but if they then subsequently lied about that or if there were additional patterns of activity that occurred over the course of the next 30 years, those are things that the fbi is going to want to focus on. when you're doing a suitability inquiry, the original one, there were general questions asked about someone's reputation. at this point now, there are very clear allegations. and subsequent on the judge's allegation, people have come out who appear to be credible that say they were classmates at school and it appears they are contradicting his testimony, sworn before the united states

senate. i think that this is going to turn on that and as the agents go forward, with their investigation, they will be looking at the veracity of the statements and collecting an awful lot of information that's going to point them in that direction. >> charlie sikes, i don't know that we could have predicted 72 hours ago that the greatest threat to brett kavanaugh wouldn't be the incredibly compelling, really wrenching testimony of professor ford. but testimony like this. this is kavanaugh testifying about what kind of gatherings he attended in high school. >> let's turn to specifics. i categorically and unequivocally deny the allegation against me by dr. ford. i never attended a gathering like the one dr. ford describes in her allegation. >> and here's judge. and here's p.j. here are all those three named boys and others at a house together just as she said.

she said kavanaugh and judge were drunk and that she had a beer. skies is brewskies, beer. they were drinking. just as she said. >> let me show you one more piece of tape. this is donald trump talking about skis, brewskies. >> well, i've watched him. i was surprised at how vocal he was about the fact that he likes beer. and he's had a little bit of difficulty. i mean, he talked about things that happened when he drank. i mean, this is not a man that said that alcohol was -- that he was perfect with respect to alcohol. no, i thought he was actually going back so many years, i thought he was excellent. the interesting thing is, though, nobody asked him about what's happened in the last 25,

30 years during his professional career because there were no bad reports. >> so this seems to be the president sort of acknowledging and accepting senator whitehouse's analysis of what was on that calendar. parties with lots of beer that were precisely like the ones dr. ford described in her testimony. >> no question about some of the inconsistencies are troubling. some of the claims made about what is a devil's triangle, completely not credible. but i do think it's unlikely to be that he's lying about drinking in high school or which parties he went to. yes it will raise questions about his credibility. you put that on. but at the end of the day, i can't see that that's going to be a deal breaker. what might be more troubling to senators right now was the hyperpartisan tone of his testimony. you know, the fact he went full sean hannity in talking about revenge from the clintons and things like that. but again, there are legitimate points you can make that, yes, maybe he would engage in

underage drinking, but it's hard for me to imagine the united states senate turning him down based on even inconsistencies about those kinds of things. >> isn't the other side of that that the republicans, especially the swing voters, collins, murkowski and flake, have already been asked to stomach so much. they've been asked to give the benefit of the doubt to a man accused credibly of sexual assault. and now they're going to be asked to do one more thing, forgive his lying? what do you think? >> right before we get to that, i want to return to what the president said in the rose garden. this is one of the reasons his lawyers won't let him go in a deposition. what he said is kavanaugh said -- acknowledged that he drank and that he was a big drinker. and actually what kavanaugh said under testimony was he wasn't much of a drinker. he essentially said i drank responsibly. and the president mischaracterized what kavanaugh said. and i think the larger issue here is if the fbi investigation has been opened up, what has it been opened up to? this is a pandora's box. is it going to include issues like whether he was truthful

about his drinking. will it go back to his original senate testimony when he wasn't aware that documents he got from a democratic operative during the judicial nomination process were stolen. is it going to be about the testimony of women? there's all sorts of things they could go to here. and the president didn't help him today. i think in terms of flake, murkowski and collins, you know, i think -- i think this is going to be troubling for them. this issue about whether or not he was truthful about where he was. whether he's been truthful about being a drinker. some of his supporters have said it's not fair for the media to go after a little bit of college drinking. it's not about college drinking. was he a blackout drunk, belligerent drunk, predatory drunk? that goes to his character and whether or not someone who is going to get a lifetime appointment to the supreme court has the emotional and intellectual discipline to hold that office. >> that's why his presentation raised more questions about that than maybe some of these questions. when you saw this -- and i get the anger. if he feels that he's been unfairly accused, but there's

appropriate anger and inappropriate anger. and i do think it was not a good look. so, yeah, all these might have cumulative weight but let's remember. the only reason we're having this conversation today right now is about the credible allegations of sexual assault. and, frankly, i don't think -- >> i don't think it's just that, charlie. the exploration of that issue. >> right. >> it opened up a number of other issues. >> but he either did that or did not do that. the senators are going to believe it's credible or not. and i don't think your accused of being -- of engaging in sexual assault but we're going to vote against you because of the drinking. i'm skeptical. >> whether or not you're truthful which matters -- >> i get that. >> let me come back to my question for you. you're talking about -- i don't think anyone is going to vote against him for drinking. i'm sure there are people in the senate that drink like that. i would, if i worked there. but i think the question and the purpose of an fbi background check is not to answer how many beers you have every night.

it's to ask you, and if your answer is nine and you go interview your wife and kids and they tell you the answer is actually 39, then you don't get hired. if your wife says it's 9 and your kids say it's 9 and neighbors say it's 9 and the bar d bartender says 9, you may still get hired because he's not lying. >> it's about veracity. nobody wants to be judged on how much beer you had in high school or college. we all go through that. it's a maturation process, you go through it. is there a continuing pattern and did a federal judge, a sitting federal judge perjure himself in front of the united states senate? and is that person suitable then to hold the highest judgeship in the land? that's the issue here now. and i think that that -- the investigation is going to go towards that. the judge made some very definitive statements, very a assertively. he wasn't ambiguous. he was very clear. this never happened. >> will the fbi be able to impeach that testimony between

now and friday? beyond any doubt? >> the fbi is going to turn in 302s which oar we'll go back to -- the analogy is, if whatever he answered is different from what 13 people they interview say he did, you have caught him in an inconsistency, otherwise known as a big fat lie. that's the question that -- >> and jeff flake said the standard will be, did he lie. not what did he lie about. >> jeff flake said that would cost him the nomination. we're not moving the goal post. jeff flake said if he's found to have lied, he will not vote for him. i guess he can still be confirmed if collins and murkowski and corker make a different calculation and if democrats care less than flake does. >> comey said there was one pungent little sentence in there where he said when you have someone testifying who lies about the small things, it's a red flag to fbi investigators. >> and that was the point of the jury instructions from blumenthal. phil rucker, right now on the

white house's list of things that annoy them or make them mad, where do these things fall? do the allegations from ms. ramirez, professor ford and the other accuser, have they now descended to number two after this question of the veracity of his sworn testimony? >> well, it's all there in a bucket, and it's the big crisis facing the white house at the moment. i'll point out one other thing that has supporters of kavanaugh a little bit concerned. remember on thursday during the hearing, the emotional power of dr. ford's testimony. there was a sense of fatalism in the kavanaugh camp that this would not end well. then brett kavanaugh had a lot of emotional power in his comments, in his testimony, and that really revved up the republican base. it united the conservative forces behind him. now we've had four or five days since then. and as this week draws on, we're -- there's creating more and more distance from that powerful emotional moment on

thursday and there's some concern that without the punch from kavanaugh's testimony, fresh in everybody's minds, that there won't be the same united force in the republican movement in the conservative movement behind him. and at the end of the day these are political decisions the senators are going to be making. >> let me press you. does that mean we should be prepared to see him in primetime on another network? >> he very well could do that again. he did the interview with fox news. it did not go well. but that -- he could get out there again. he could -- i don't know what he's going to do or what the plan is, but there's a plan that kavanaugh is his best defender and what he did last week before the senate was highly effective in galvanizing republican supporters behind him so they may try to do something else this week. >> we'll stay tuned. phil rucker, thank you for spending time with us. after the break -- jim comey says the kavanaugh investigation is deja vu all over again with the fbi right back in the middle of an untenable political

moment. also, how the kavanaugh nomination fight may cost republicans the house. we'll bring you the latest reporting on how last week's dramatic testimony is shaping the election landscape. in today's "this really happened" news, donald trump is in love with a dictator. stay with us. t. with more farm-fresh taste, more vitamins, and 25% less saturated fat? only eggland's best. better taste, better nutrition, better eggs.

former fbi director jim comey took to the continue pages of "the new york times" this weekend to warn republicans that rushing the fbi's investigation into kavanaugh won't prevent investigators from getting to the truth. he writes, although the process

is deeply flawed, and apparently designed to thwart the fact-gathering process, the fbi is up for this. it's not as hard as republicans hope it will be. yes, the alleged incident occurred 36 years ago, but fbi agents know time has very little to do with memory. they also know that little lies point to bigger lies. they know that obvious lies by the nominee about the meaning of words in a yearbook are flashing signal to dig deeper. agents can just do their work, find facts, speak truth to power, despite all the lies and all the attacks, there really are people who just want to figure out what's true. the fbi is full of them. joining the conversation, msnbc legal analyst and former federal prosecutor paul butler. let me start with you. your reaction to jim comey's words. >> you know, the fbi has 35,000 employees. if they are allowed to do their job, they can get this done in a week. this is a background investigation, not a criminal investigation. and so president trump is the fbi's client. he gets to dictate the terms.

but i've never heard of an investigation being micromanaged in this way. originally four witnesses. one week. it creates the unsettling impression that the republicans in the senate and president trump don't want an objective investigation. they want one that will clear judge kavanaugh's name. it kind of sounds like the fix is in, unless the bureau is allowed to do its job. >> and so it sounds like there was an understanding at the white house today that that was the impression that set in over the weekend. do you think the correction to expand it and say the fbi can talk to whoever they want, is that enough or is this still under the microscope. >> i think it's still not clear. what's been said publicly is not necessarily what the supervision in the fbi is hearing from the department of justice, which is coming through from the white house. one thing i think that's important to know is that the expectation is not that the fbi is going to spend a week, do all these interviews and bundle it

up into a nice report and send it over. they'll be providing results of interviews contemporaneous as they occur. >> the white house already has these four. the fbi confirmed "the new york times" has reported and we believe the fbi has confirmed a couple of these. they've interviewed the four names which were the second accuser, ms. ramirez, they have interviewed p.j., who was one of the witnesses, fbi announced that, leland, another one of the witnesses at the party. and i believe mr. judge. is that right? do i have that right? so you think that the white house is already in possession of these four accounts? >> the information is coming back and there's direction going back the other way. it's by direction, i'm sure, about who to go and follow up on. there will be some management from outside the fbi in my opinion based on my experience here. >> and what is the impact of that for an fbi agent? >> well, look, they want to be able to follow theological leads because they are collecting facts. so they can present the facts.

they want to be alf able to resolve the allegations. if agents feel like they're being micromanaged and not able to do that with people who are two or three or four levels away from the investigation, that's somewhat frustrating. they are professionals. they'll do this in a nonpartisan way. they'll follow the facts where they lead. they're going to do the best that they can with the time constrantss placed upon them. one thing i will add, i believe it needs to be done quickly. i've worked investigations of public officials. and judge kavanaugh has a right. he's innocent until proven guilty to ensure that his reputation is not besmirched. so you want it to happen quickly. you just want to ensure it's done thoroughly so there's always going to be a balance. >> so another individual came forward and said that the way judge kavanaugh described his drinking habits in college is not how i remember them. the fbi -- someone that calls the fbi, they'll take down his report and that will be part of the information turned over to the white house? >> well, you would expect that that person would be interviewed. if it's inconsistent with what

judge kavanaugh has said. that they would follow that lead and -- because i think that part of that investigation, his character, his association, associates, his reputation, those are all part of the original background investigation, the suitability for employment we keep talking about. it's now focused on the allegations of sexual improprie impropriety. if this is opened, they'll be looking at things like excessive use of alcohol over many years and inconsistent statements he may have made before the senate. >> paul butler, same question to you, but i want to add two more. could you weigh in, the prosecutor that they use, ms. mitchell, put out a report to the republicans saying that this was a he said/she said and there wasn't a case that any prosecutor would bring. do you agree with that? >> not at all. first of all, she should have insisted that mark judge be part of that hearing. we have something in this case that you almost never have in a sexual assault case.

you have an eyewitness. moreover, she only examined dr. ford when she started to get close to judge kavanaugh, asking questions about the calendar entries, the republicans summarily cut her off. so she only has half of the evidence. frankly, she was used because she was a woman. they called her the republican assistant or the female assistant. she should not have allowed her to be used that way. you know, with regard to credibility, i think it's essential that the republicans, or that the fbi go into questions like the drinking, the yearbook entries, his familiarity with dr. ford because -- well two reasons. first of all, when you take an oath to testify before the senate, you say you're going to tell the whole truth, not just partial truth. not just about the big things but about everything. so is the senate really okay with judge kavanaugh lying. and second, again, if you lie about little things, and i don't

think those misogynist comments were little things. but if you lie about little things, why wouldn't you lie about whether you sexually assaulted other women? >> charlie sikes, you want to take a stab at that? >> i don't disagree with anything, but if truth really mattered in america politics, donald trump wouldn't be the fleft united states. we're living in a post-truth environment. keep that in a political context here. the report from the prosecutor is ludicrous because that whole process really was a kabuki dance. this is the question i had over the weekend. is there any sincere attempt to find the truth or are we just wanting to pretend to look like we're going for the truth? and the fact she did not insist on talking to mark judge, that she did not actually talk about her questioning of judge kavanaugh is just ludicrous and embarrassing. even "saturday night live" really caught how ridiculous and absurd that whole process was. but, it gives republican senators something to hang their

hats on if they need some justification to vote yes later this week. >> donna, let me get you in on this. >> i think what's happened, first of all, mitchell was not acting as a prosecutor. she was acting as defense counsel for the republicans. and i think in that context, she wasn't really getting to the questions that would lead to the truth. and i do believe that if you are telling little lies about little things, there's something bigger there. and it's important for the fbi to investigate that. and, look, there are fbi field offices all across the country. if you are a yale alum, a georgetown prep alum if you hung out at one of those girl schools and those parties you can walk into an fbi field office, call an fbi field office if you have something to contribute. and i think that people will do that because i think the drinking is directly connected to the alleged sexual assault of ramirez, of swetnick and ford.

so you have to investigate the drinking because that is connected to the allegations of sexual assault. and getting to these little lies, and i think if republicans want to go out and say we're going to jam somebody onto the supreme court who tells little lies, then they're going to have to be okay with that because that is a great damage to the institution. >> paul butler and shawn henry, thank you for spending some of the hour with us. hell hath no fury. a brand-new political reality in the aftermath of the kavanaugh. my, how things have changed. that's next. highest in investor satisfaction with full service brokerage firms...again. and online equity trades are only $4.95... i mean you can't have low cost and be full service. it's impossible. it's like having your cake and eating it too. ask your broker if they offer award-winning full service and low costs.

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senator flake, you've announced that you're not running for re-election. i wonder, could you have done this if you were running for re-election? >> no, not a chance. >> not a chance? >> no. no. >> an inconvenient truth. jeff flake providing an honest assessment of the political

realities surrounding the kavanaugh ordeal. and as the fbi conducts its search for answers, the rest of us are left to examine the profound effects the situation may have on the midterm elections, now just fuf weeive away. pew asked registered voters last week perfect tbefore the hearin issues were very important. here we are at the million-dollar question. how the house and senate races will shake out. it threatens to further erode support for house republicans struggling to survive in central suburban districts while in senate races giving gop challengers and pro-trump states a chance to inspire previously unenthusiastic conservatives. in other words, standing by kavanaugh might have republicans waving the white flag in the house but could help them in the senate. how is the president feeling about gop chances in november? >> but i think we're going to do

well. >> joining us now, betsy woodruff for the daily beast. he thinks they're going to do well. what do you think? how do other people feel? >> look, there is scant evidence that the kavanaugh debacle has done anything positive for republicans going into the midterm elections. one piece of information that's interesting that we received recently is a new poll from cbs which shows that roughly half of democratic voters say they will be angry if kavanaugh gets confirmed. and at the same time, roughly half of republican voters say they also will be angry if kavanaugh doesn't get confirmed. this entire process has only heightened the long-existing rancor and anger that exists in this country. the big question is, what does that mean when it comes to nuts and boellts and numbers going io the midterms. we can't be sure, looking back at 2016. pollsters continuously underestimated the intensity that republican voters had. at the same time, democrats have

shown over the last year the democratic voters are extraordinarily mobilized. that's important because historically in midterm elections, republicans just turn out in larger numbers. if democrats are able to shift the balance there, it could absolutely be a game changer. >> tim, this is not scientific. this is not based on anything i read or have seen but just my experience on campaigns. republicans who are likely to be highly motivated by kavanaugh's treatment or fired up by his testimony as we've discussed, are already voting in the midterms. that is who votes, the very person who pays attention to and cares about the kavanaugh nomination process. on the other hand, for democrats, it may be young women who can't believe that someone like professor ford can offer her credible testimony and not have that be dispositive. it may be people who are not regular voters in midterms that come out and vote. it seems the upside for republicans is it brings out the people they need to turn out but

they're already habitual voters. for the democrats, they may not be regular voters in off presidential years. >> and where that will matter is in the senate. by all indications, the democrats already look to be in the driver's seat in the house. and to the extent that kavanaugh is irrelevant or not a factor in the house, but he is in the senate, that's where this battle is being waged. that's why you see mitch mcconnell still going all in behind kavanaugh. if kavanaugh is appealing to republicans who are going to vote in senate races, the republicans can't afford to lose the senate for a number of obvious reasons. but i think the other x-factor is whether or not democratic voters are going to come out in unforeseen numbers in these same senate races because of kavanaugh. i think particularly women. i think the republicans are in danger of having a generational shift here among female voters. not only because of kavanaugh, but because of trump. i think those two men are really wedded at the hip right now for

female voters. >> you made that point earlier that this is running for the senate. not something you're supposed to run for. you're supposed to simply be presented to the senate. you talk about kavanaugh running like trump ran for president. >> and that's one of the most interesting things last week was watching the republican party which we've talked about a lot, enabling donald trump, following donald trump, acquiescing to donald trump. last week seesaw a republican party that was becoming donald trump. a judicial candidate who basically is channeling trumpism and then you see what, you know, has happened to a lindsey graham out there. in terms of the effect of this, there's a narrative on social media you see a lot which is that republicans are really being fired up and unified in support of brett kavanaugh. the question that you raised is the key one. are they regular voters? i have a kind of gut sense that whoever loses this fight is going to be the most charged up. they're going to feel the most motivated. there will be so much anger on the other side that there will

be a slight tipping effect. >> donna, i want to read you something in "the new york times." fury is a political weapon n women need to wield it. this political moment has provoked a period in which more and more women have been in no mood to dress their fury up as anything other than raw and burning rage. many women are yelling, shouting, using sharpies, making furious phone calls to representatives. is that your impression? >> well, i mean, it's not just that. you saw that, for example, in the two women who confronted jeff flake in the elevator on thursday. there's a fury throughout. what i look at are the numbers for example that show that 71% of women oppose the kavanaugh nomination. i mean, this is astounding. and even among men, that opposition number is somewhere around 59%. and for the first time i'm really seeing democrats talk about the supreme court as a motivating factor which we haven't done in a very long time. and so i think it adds to the

motivation that was already there. and i expect to see huge voter turnout. there have already been increased in moteer registration and huge voter turnout that's going to turn the tables for democrats, certainly in the house. but i think there's that opportunity in the senate, too, when you look at what the polling in some of these key states. >> stale ill to come -- donald trump shares with the world a love story for the ages. hi i'm joan lunden.

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and thn we fell in love. okay? no, really. he wrote me beautiful letters. and they're great letters. we fell in love. >> let that sink in. from little rocket man and mentally deranged dodard to in love in a year. his affection for brutal dictators isn't new. he's publicly supported vladimir putin, president duterte of the philippines, president erdogan and president asisi. >> what's really going on? >> when it comes to the president's overtures to the north korean regime it doesn't seem to be -- >> overtures? that was like, "say anything." >> maybe more explicit noun there. what's weird about this, though, is it doesn't seem to be reciprocal. at the u.n. general assembly last week, the foreign minister of north korea gave a speech where he complained about trump, complained about the united states and said that the fact the u.s. still has sanctions in

place is evidence that their relationship has not reached some new level of love and tenderness and romance. so it's weird there's such a significant disjointedness and points to the fact that trump and the rest of his administration seem to be very much on different pages when it comes to how to handle the north korea question. that's the case with a host of foreign policy issues. it's certainly not limited to north korea. but in this particular instance, it's especially jarring. >> betty, you elevated us from "say anything" to the u.n. the perception that sanctions can bring us on our knees is a pipe dream of the people who are ignorant of us, north korean minister ri said. it's deepening our mistrust and deadlocking the current diplomacy. without any trust in the u.s. there will be no trust in our national security and no way we'll unilaterally disarm ourselves. nothing is happening. this goes to the woodward reporting that on foreign policy he's being schooled by people like secretary mattis who think

he's a fifth or sixth grader. long gone rex tillerson talked about calling him an idiot. locked in the tank which was a secure room at the pentagon to be briefed on the world. he trashed nato, wanted to pull out of -- over and over again examples of his ignorance on the world stage. do you think there's a breaking point over that declaration of love? >> i can tell you that in the national security and intelligence communities, this is something that people find on a moral level to be repulsive. let's remember who the president is talking about loving here. kim jong-un presides over what's arguably the single greatest humanitarian crisis of our time. mass starvation, prison camps, torture. it's an appalling situation. we don't have the vocabulary to characterize the level of human suffering that exists under his regime. and so if you are someone in the united states national security space, if you are a career pentagon official, someone who

has dedicated his or her life in working in the ic, hearing our president characterize this man who is essentially trying to engage the united states in a game of nuclear chicken as someone he loves is deeply jarring and deep lly disconcerting. it's also weirdly enough in character with the way that trump has approached so many other authoritarians as you pointed out. so i don't know. i think it's troebl tprobably t to say this particular comment is a tipping point. it undergirds a lot of the deep seeded n widely held concerns within the broader american security community. >> where the hell are the republicans that used to care about things that betty woodruff just described. lindsey graham is busy attacking the democrats for their treatment of brett kavanaugh but does he not have five minutes to remember what john mccain taught him about democracy and freedom and people at the opposite end of that spectrum?

>> imagine what john mccain would say about this. >> called him a short thug. >> you know, two things. say what you want about neville chamberlain. he never said he loved adolf hitler. and you're right to ignorance, s point about the amorality of this, this is the -- problem the most evil regime in the world, committing every imaginable human rights violation. so, once again, you're kind of seeing donald trump's moral universe, and how easy it is, apparently, to get on his right side by simply flattering him. >> can you imagine this guy on an online dating site? >> can you imagine if barack obama had said anything remotely like that? i mean, take that down to one-tenth, what the reaction of republicans would be. >> republicans like lindsey graham would have gone berserk. news just in with the mueller investigation. we have to sneak in a break. don't go anywhere. we'll bring that to you. don't go anywhere. we'll bring that to you.

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we're back. it turns out the president's former campaign chairman paul manafort sat down with robert mueller's investigators today. politico is reporting, quote, paul manafort met monday with special counsel robert mueller's office as part of his cooperation agreement in the special counsel's investigation into russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. the sitdown at the downtown washington, d.c. office stems from manafort's guilty plea last month.

you're here and i'm glad that you're here because i made a quick list, i'm sure you can make a longer one, of things that manafort could tell mr. mueller and his team about. the trump tower meet egg, the platform change, where it became pro putin, for the first time in gop platform change history. an offer to brief a russian oligar oligarch. he's been convicted of -- he was convicted of eight felonies. how useful do you think manafort could be to mueller's team? >> i think narrowly useful. i think there's been a lot of hope from trump critics that manafort owns some keys to the kingdom in unlocking, you know, secrets or problems in trump's past. i think a lot of that probably isn't problematic for the president. but there two things, the trump tower meeting, because that gets at whether or not in june of 2016 members of trump's campaign met with people who had compromising information on hillary clinton in an effort to

tilt voters against her campaign. that gets to things like fraud against the united states, et cetera. there's a real problem. >> it's the conspiracy. >> it is. i think the president on some of the collusion and conspiracy stuff has less vulnerability than some people thought. >> because his friends say he was too stupid to collude? >> i think all of the people in the campaign at that point didn't think he was going to get elected, so, they were reckless. trump is going to be protective of his son. he was the architect of that meeting. i think the second thing with the policy change on the rue yan is very significant. i think one of the things looming over the mystery of trump's affection for vladimir putin and vladimir putin's desire to play trump is were the russians going to get concrete policy changes out of owning the trump campaign and the trump administration in some way? one thing was lifting economic sanctions against russia. the second thick thng was a chan

u.s. policy stemming from opposition to his invasion of ukraine. and to the extent that manafort knows that and knows what people like michael flynn, donald trump, et cetera, et cetera, were doing in terms of bargaining and making promises to the russians during the campaign and during the transition, they're going to be in some trouble around that. >> betsy, i'm glad you're here, too, especially on this story from politico. if you look at manafort and flynn and book ends to questions about conspiracy to do the russians' bidding, you have mike flynn talking about lifting sanctions, you have paul manafort, the other end of the book end, promising or facilitating or greasing the wheels for a platform change. just talk about the manafort interview, manafort cooperating with mueller in terms of that time space continuum. >> the no brainer question that we can say with 100% level of confidence, muellered a his team will ask manafort if they haven't asked him about yet is

going to be the trump tower meeting. i would add one slight word of caution when it comes to trying to make sense of the significance of some of the cooperation that mueller is getting from flynn, as you said, and now from manafort, who collectively have visibility over almost the entire trump campaign and some of the earliest, most consequential days of his presidency. what's important to understand is that the mueller probe essentially has two silos. the criminal investigation, this is what, by far, we know the most about, these are the investigation that result in grand jury subpoenas and court appearances, but then at the same time, there's a second silo, the counterintelligence silo. this is the information that mueller and his team are gathering that's never going to be public, that's going to go to the intelligence community and that america's intelligence community is going to use to prevent russians from meddling even more and try to shore up defenses against this type of activity. it's very likely that people will been giving mueller information over the last year and a half that's been quite

useful behind the scenes, quite useful from a counter intelligence perspective. and it's totally plausible that manafort and flynn have that kind of information and just publicly we aren't going to be able to assess how valuable it is. >> manafort has been a big trigger for donald trump. when things have happened in his legal travails, the president has reacted with outbursts. what do you think this news is going to do to him? >> we don't know. we don't know where he's going, we don't know what he has, we don't know what the full strategy is. and that's something to -- a little bit of humility office helps here, but paul manafort unlocks what was going on in the campaign, but also perhaps all of the activities of the oligarchs and the ties between donald trump and the olli jar can i, the financial arrangements and where the money flowed. don't get ahead of ourselves on this particular story, but this is not going to be received as good news in the white house.

>> another bit of bad news. thank you, betsy, don, tim. i'm nicolle wallace. "mtp daily" starts right now with the fabulous katy tur. thank you, nicole. the search expands in the truth in the kavanaugh investigation. good evening, i'm katy tur in new york in for chuck todd and welcome to "mtp daily." and welcome to another day of fast-moving developments surrounding brett kavanaugh's confirmation fight. with nbc news confirming that the white house has authorized the fbi to expand its supplemental investigation into the president's supreme court nominee. that decision came shortly after the president defended the scope of that investigation, as well as kavanaugh himself. >> what i said is, let the senate decide whatever they want