my colleagues from cnn are out there right now broadcasting a show from the sidewalk outside of their headquarters because of a bomb threat, stephanie. >> that's commitment. if you don't want to be called a liar every day, here's a suggestion. stop lying. ali velshi, thank you for giving me the opportunity to join you for this hour in our special coverage. >> always my pleasure, friend. >> ali, please, get yourself inside. he's been throughout for hours on this story. why? because he's committed to coverage. we'll be right back here tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. thank you for watching. i hand you off to my dear friend and colleague nicolle wallace. "deadline white house" starts right now. hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in washington, d.c. before today, the list simply read like a list of favorite targets of donald trump's political targets dispensed on twitter as applause lines. before today is read like an obvious list of office holders, political luminaries and one of the news organizations that the president rails against most frequently. it's also a list that includes

donald trump's critics. in the eyes of many of his supporters, his political enemies. fair game for vicious personal smears. one of the names on the list is someone donald trump stripped of his security clearance because he was too critical of the president's coziness with vladimir putin. another is a former rival about whom trump urges his crowds to chant "lock her up." another is the country's first black president who donald trump sought to delegitimize with the birther movement. but today, a former president, a former attorney general, a former cia director, a former secretary of state, a sitting member of congress, a news organization and a political activist closely associated with liberal causes all became potential victims of acts of terror. what we know right now, at least six explosive devices were sent by mail to political figures up and down the east coast starting monday when a suspicious package was sent to major democratic donor george soros.

then today, similar packages were addressed to the homes of barack obama and hillary clinton. they were intercepted by secret service. after that, another device was found in cnn's mailroom in the time warner building in new york city. that caused a massive evacuation. and just this afternoon, we've learned that former attorney general eric holder was also targeted. democratic congresswoman maxine waters was also sent a suspicious package, though it is not yet clear that that package is linked to the rest. of course, we don't yet know the motive of the person or persons behind all of this and, fortunately no one has been hurt in this spree of attempted attacks. all of the devices were discovered before they detonated. the president spoke out about the attacks at an event at the white house earlier today. >> ides li'd like to begin toda remarks by providing an update on the suspicious packages and devices mailed to current and former high-ranking government officials. the safety of the american

people is my highest and absolute priority. we have to come together and send one very clear, strong, unmistakable message that acts or threats of political violence of any kind have no place in the united states of america. it's a very bipartisan statement. i can tell you from both sides we both agree on that. this egregious conduct is abhorrent to everything we hold dear and sacred as americans. >> hillary clinton, one of the individuals targeted today, made her own kind of call for unity and civility. >> it is a troubling time, isn't it? and it's a time of deep divisions and we have to do everything we can to bring our country together. usually when people ask me how

am i doing, which happens quite often, i say, well, as a person, i'm great. as an american, i'm worried. >> here to update us on this fast-moving story, some of the best reporters and experts on the beat. nbc's peter alexander is at the white house for us. nbc news investigative reporter tom winter is standing by along with michael balboni, former new york state homeland security adviser. frank figliuzzi, former fbi assistant director for counterintelligence is here. michael leiter, former director of the national counterterrorism center. ashley parker, white house reporter for "the washington post," and eli stokols, white house reporter for the "los angeles times" all join us here in studio. let me start with you, tom winter. take us through the list of targets, the devices they were sent and where the investigation stands at this hour. >> sure. so the latest i can update you on, is it appears based upon the fact that, one, nobody has been transported from the time warner/cnn building by ambulance

for any sort of exposure and the fact that the time warner center and cnn has reopened, they are no longer evacuated, we can safely say the white powder found on the device sent to cnn has been deemed to be nonhazardous. we know the initial field test came back as negative as far as for any chemical or biological weapon. so that's a good bit of news that twe have here. as far as the targets, there were devices that were sent and in -- they're bombs because they have explosive powder in them, something to contain that powder in them. those bombs were sent to george soros back on monday. and then the other people targeted were hillary clinton, barack obama, john brennan, through cnn. the package sent to cnn was directed to the former cia director john brennan, and the other individual was a package sent to eric holder. apparently that package was returned and ended up at debbie

wasserman schultz's office. all the packages sent that are confirmed to be part of this group had debbie wasserman schultz's name and return address as the return address on those manila padded envelopes the devices were sent in. that's what we know for sure. we also know the components that were included in all of these mailings were very similar, if not exactly the same. so that was one of the big clues. the evidence that led investigators, and you're looking at one of them now, that led investigators to conclude that a certain group of these mailings were in fact all connected. the outlier, as we mentioned at the top of the show, is the package sent to congresswoman maxine waters. and at this point we're still waiting to hear whether or not that package is connected to the other ones we've been reporting on today. that's being looked at the this point but we don't have conclusive determination from the people that we're talking to that that is, in fact, connected. that's the latest at this hour.

as far as this person's motives, the exact manner n method of delivery for all the packages is something that's being looked into a little bit. the other thing that we need to pay attention to is, is this the last of the mailings? we haven't heard any of others today that have been linked to it. but that's something we'll have to watch over the next couple of days because, obviously, this has been going on since monday. >> frank figliuzzi, talk to me about this plot. what does this look like to the fbi and talk about what harm these devices could have done. i believe several of them were intercepted by the secret service because former presidents, former secretaries of state have secret service protection. but i understand that some of these devices were live. tell us what that means and tell us what you see when you look at this plot and today's news. >> my answer to that question might have been different ten minutes ago before the recent reporting that you just noted that the package delivered at cnn may have been live.

and if that reporting is accurate and if that term is being used accurately, meaning it was ready to detonate, then we're dealing with a bomber who is capable of delivering an explosive device that will go off and that, in fact, should have or could have gone off anywhere in the mail system or at any of these delivery places if it had been opened as the bomber intended. that changes things because ten minutes ooh i might have told you we're dealing with someone sending a message. we're dealing with someone sending warnings, or perhaps someone not even capable of delivering a successful device. it would appear now that's not true. it would appear we're dealing with a real live mail bomber. and motivation aside, law enforcement is in a race because when you're dealing with someone who can deliver an active dwi s device, you have to find this person before they hurt others, deliver devices to less protected people. as this unfolds, the packages and the science and forensics behind this becomes critically

important. the packages speak to the investigators. a postal inspector can look at the outside of any package and tell you where it's been in the mail system. the truck it was on, where it's set in the system. they can tell you where it sat next to packages and where those packages were in the system. so there will be a chronology of time -- a timeline will be developed of when the packages entered the mail system. when they happened -- what locations they went through. spokes and hubs in the postal system. then the inside of a package. the experts at fbi, postal, atf, they will look for a signature on this bomb and bombs. they'll look for similarities and/or differences. they may even recognize it. it's like reading someone's writing. your favorite author. and saying i've read this kind of writing before. i know who uses these phrases and terminology. same goes for bomb experts. they'll say we've seen this before. we haven't, or this person was taught by someone we've seen before. and it's a race against the

clock to catch the person before he hurts someone. >> michael, talk about the target list. the former president, president obama, the former secretary of state donald trump's former political rival, john brennan, i think he at one time might have registered as a republican but a critic of donald trump's foreign policy and one of the early people to sound the alarms about his coziness with russia and campaign's ties to russia. maxine waters, a loud critic if she's part of this plot, if you will. all of them, obviously, kritscr of this president. >> i don't think it takes an fbi agent, it doesn't take a third grader to see the links between these dots. it's always possible that someone has done this in order to make it look like someone with an agenda against that group. it's possible. i don't think it's the most likely explanation. i think whenever you have a situation like this, often the most likely explanation is the right explanation. as frank said, there's going to be forensic investigation.

there's going to be a lot of investigation now. and this is not going to remain a mystery. i think the fact that all these were sent at once will allow the postal service atf and fbi to conclude this investigation relatively quickly. you always have the unabomber situation where it can take years and years but that's quite different from what we have now. but if you look at this, again, the most obvious explanation is usually the right one but as an investigator, you also have to assume that someone wants you to think that and you look at the other side. not as likely, but possible. >> peter alexander, i saw you on television right after the president's remarks. and i was interested in your reaction. there's this version of the president that emerges at moments when things are so bad he has to suppress and override his circuitry which is usually to participate in the rough and tumble aspects of politics. this country has a long history of rough and tumble politics but donald trump is undeniably in a category of his own.

what we saw today is someone who seemed to be saying some of the right things at a moment when he is sort of lording over a climate that he has contributed to more than anybody else in american politics. >> yeah, those remarks from the president largery in the teleprompter. what i'll be watching, the president earlier saying that americans need to unify. they need to come together. what i and a lot of americans will be watching is what the president says just a few hours from now when he travels to another campaign rally. this one in wisconsin. these are the types of rallies where he basically has gone off on a lot of the names that we've indicated as targets of these packages today. nbc's reporting is that in each of the last five trump rallies, the president has attacked, by name, maxine waters. in 10 of the 12 that took place in the month of october. so the question is, if the president is calling on this to be a moment for americans to unify, to come together, will he lead by example? will he back off that rhetoric?

i've been to several of these rallies in recent weeks. they still chant "lock her up" and "cnn sucks." will the president encourage that or encourage people to cut it out when he's standing at the stage. i think that image will be far more powerful and potentially far more significant than what we've heard from him. it's worth noting that just a week ago, the president was in montana and was praising a sitting republican congressman for bodyslamming a reporter. we heard from the president today saying there was no place for acts or threats of political violence in america, but it was the president who was effectively participating in that. his son eric trump would follow up and say the president is allowed to have his fun. at the end of the day, words matter and certainly this president's words matter. we'll have a chance to hear from him potentially within the next 30 minutes or so when he boards marine one. i'll be out there on the south lawn to see if he says anything this evening. i've been reaching out to the white house to get a sense of

what they are telling him he needs to do tonight. the bottom line is, he always follows his gut and can be intoxicated by the room. it's important to see what happens this evening. >> let's deal with the elephant in the room. there's a dead, dismembered "washington post" columnist who died in the saudi consulate in turkey. there were seven pipe bombs sent to what basically amounts to an enemies list of donald trump. he's not just chanted "lock her up" about hillary. he's call her corrupt. he ran a campaign to delegitimize barack obama with the birther movement. eric holder is someone he's targeted with vicious attacks. these are some of the recipients of his most brutal political attacks. today they were targeted by someone. your said we don't know who. what we are we to do. words don't matter to the commander in chief. eli? >> i think trump has minimized what a president's words actually mean because he contra dicts himself so much. he says things that are

outlandish and they say he's just joking. a lot of the vitriol he's directed at people who received these packages, there are people out there who don't think that's a joke. i've been to rallies like peter and ashley. there are signs where people hold the signs that say cnn is isis. there's a fundamental sort of -- we're just through the looking glass when it comes to what people are willing to believe and how deeply tribal people's reactions to things are. and the country feels like in some ways it's lost its sense of the things that bind people together because everything is seen through these political lenses and people are willing to view people. the president is out there saying democrats are a mob. that's his closing argument. he's trying to motivate republican voters to turn out at any cost. he's not going to be shamed by fact-checkers. and we'll see if he is shamed at all or feels any responsibility and demonstrates that he may feel any responsibility. he won't admit it but maybe

he'll change his rhetoric tonight and maybe that can be a sense that he recognizes some responsibility here. but he has tried no matter what to get his voters out. he has said in interviews we won. on kavanaugh, we won. so the other things don't matter. at some point you have to step back and say when we're talking about public safety, if your words are going to matter, if public safety and national security really are that important, then what are you going to do about it and what message are you going to send to the country and how are you going to be believable when you stand up and say things like he tried to say today after you've gone on stage at your rally four nights a week and said something that contradicts it. >> there are moments when a president wants to speak for more than their tribe. there are moments -- 9/11 was one of them. anthrax in the mail was another one. where you wanted people to open their mail. newtown was another one i'm sure for president obama. is there any -- i have talked to half a dozen former intelligence officials since the khashoggi -- brutal khashoggi murder.

not a single one of them has a hard time drawing a direct line between donald trump's rhetoric about journalists. and he's been doing it since he was 1 of 17. he's called out katie tur, chuck todd. our colleagues, your colleagues. is there anyone in the president's circle who sees any relationship between the things that come out of his mouth or fingers and the things that happen in the world, or are they all oblivious? >> they talk about the things he says to a certain extent not mattering. but i think you have to separate they absolutely do matter in terms of real world ramifications and results. the way the khashoggi situation has been handled has sent a message. and not just that but his behavior abroad on the world stage. it's sent a message the president is not like his predecessors, both democratic and republican going to go abroad and press human rights the way the american president traditionally does. when they talk about things not mattering they're not necessarily meaning his rhetoric doesn't not contribute to

incivility and public discourse but they mean when he went out and mocked dr. christine blasey ford. it did not matter in the sense that he did not pay a political penalty. when he's mentioned journalists by name, called them out, encouraged chants of "cnn sucks," he -- it doesn't matter in the sense he's not paid a political penalty with their base but it absolutely matters if you are one of those cnn reporters, for instance, getting heckled on your way in or out of those rallies. >> chuck, let me read you something that jeff zucker, the president of cnn released today. i'm having a hard time finding it on my desk. here it is. there's a total and complete lack of understanding at the white house about the seriousness of their continued attacks on the media. the president and especially the white house press secretary should understand their words matter. thus far, they've shown no comprehension of that. that's from jeff zucker, the president of cnn. chuck rosenberg, can you just pick up the thread of this conversation about a president who either believes his words

don't matter or wants his words, he calls for -- he calls journalists the enemies of the people. if you really are an enemy of the people, you are prosecuted by people like you and thrown in jail. he embraces the world's most brutal dictators, kim jong-un, someone he's having a love affair with. vladimir putin putin is someone he believes. the justice department is rotten and rigged. talk about the words of this president and the ramifications of those words almost two years in. >> we've talked about this before on your show. how much words indeed matter. the words we use, the words other people use. when the president speaks, any president, people listen to his words. and his words have been corrosive and dangerous. now i'm not going to draw a direct line between the loser creep who is doing this and what the president said. time will tell about that. but i can tell you, from my own experience, and maybe this will make folks feel a little better,

i had the privilege of working for director mueller at the fbi during two horrific attacks. the anthrax attacks and the dc sniper attacks. i've never been with atf. i've never been with postal inspection service but i know the men and women there are working every bit as hard as the men and women of the fbi to track this down. i think frank is right. i think mike leiter is right. there's lots and lots of clues left behind. there are extraordinary investigators combing through it. and i would be surprised if we didn't have this person in custody in relatively short order. >> michael balboni, let me ask you to jump in here and just speak to the capacity, the acumen of new york city law enforcement. the best in the world. people come from all over the world. country comes from all over the world to study under people doing just what frank described in new york city. they responded to the time warner center today. >> so the joint terrorism task force as mike is very well aware

of, is very effective at putting together the right teams. the nypd has great forensic capabilities. they have taken the device. they are examining it, looking for all sorts of similarities and trying to find the one clue that says, yes, it's an individual or group. but here's where they were. here's where they sent it. i am not as certain that there will be a very, very fast arrest like today. i've heard some say within 24 to 48 hours we're going to find someone. i night do that to investigative officials. they're already under enough pressure. this is a political attack, whoever did it. they targeted political individuals. less than two weeks before an election. and so the pressure is on them to come and find who did this, find out the motivation and make sure it can never happen again. that's incredible pressure on us. so the new york city police department deals with these types of crisis issues almost monthly if not daily.

and so they are very, very well equipped. a lot of resources. but here's also a coordinated approach with all the federal agencies as well. secret service and fbi principally. >> let me put up how new york city's mayor responded today and what he thinks would be helpful. not encouraging violence was the top of his list. let's watch. >> what we saw here today was an effort to terrorize. this clearly is an act of terror. attempting to undermine our free press and leaders of this country through acts of violence. i want to make very clear that the people of new york city will not be intimidated, that we're going to go about our lives undeterred because the very concept of terrorism is to change us, and we will not allow that to happen. you cannot be terrorized if you refuse to allow the terrorist to win. >> he also said don't encourage

violence. don't encourage hatred to show respect for people and air your disagreements peacefully. that's what we should be saying. that's what we should be doing. but we are so far from that. >> we're so far from it, and i think we've all been careful to say the president is not directly responsible for this. but we would be absolutely foolish to say that the political rhetoric being used does not contribute towards some individuals feeling that this sort of radicalization -- that's what this is. and this mobilization towards violence is okay. it's what we've seen in other terrorism circumstances. it's what we've seen in law enforcement circles, why we try to keep low level crimes down because low level crimes make other people who are already inclined to do crimes commit more serious crimes. and the political discourse coming from the president, from his allies at times, is absolutely creating an environment where people who

might otherwise pursue violence but not sure, feel emboldened to do that. and that's unbelievably dangerous for society. >> frank figliuzzi, we talk about the war on justice in almost a theoretical way. we talk about it as being motivated by donald trump's fears about the mueller probe. we talk about it in terms of rod rosenstein's job security or robert mueller's job security. we don't even talk about jeff sessions job security anymore. we talk about when, not if he's going to go. can you talk about the more sort of insidious impacts of a president being at war against justice? >> well, it's for the very reason we're talking today that this erodes our society. look, we're hearing praise today for who? the secret service. for actually stopping most of these devices from being opened. the fbi. the nypd. the atf. and others for doing their job, which is to protect this nation. so every time there is an effort to undermine justice, to undermine law enforcement, to

undermine intelligence, we're undermining ourselves. these are the people that get out of bed every day and protect us from just this kind of attack. the insidious language may come to play. as chuck said, it's too early to draw a direct line. when this person or persons are caught, there's going to be a forensic exam of their computer systems and their devices. and we're going to see what they consumed. what were they consuming on social media? what were they consuming in terms of news feed. on my way to the studio today, nicolle, i saw postings on twitter that are likely russian bot postings and, boy, i hope they are. i hope they're not american citizens that are blaming this on everybody from obama to democrats themselves, that this is some kind of a plot. and this is the kind of thing we're consuming every day and it gets inside mentally unstable persons' heads and causes them to act out like this. we've got to be more informed consumers and our white house and our congress need to step up

and come out against who is doing this to us. in the case of russia, it's happening right now as this event unfolds. >> we looked high and low for a round-up of condemnations to the conversations that we have in our politics from congress. we had a hard time finding any. if anyone wants to call in, you can call in. they thanks. after the break, the bomb sent to critics of the president today were another volt in what can only be described as a jarring political season. new reporting from "the washington post" about how the administration tries to make trump's lies half truths after the fact. oh, look... another anti-wrinkle cream in no hurry to make anything happen. neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair® works in just one week. with the fastest retinol formula available. it's clinically proven to work on fine lines and wrinkles. one week? that definitely works!

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we condemn those actions of the person or persons who sent those devices in the strongest possible terms. and we are determined that justice will be done. in the meantime, as we proceed to carry out our duties, we will not be intimidated by any threats. >> that was deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. joiningous set, sam stein, politics editor for the daily beast and jason johnson, politics editor for the root. i want both of your thoughts on what happened today. let me just play a little bit of what trump has been saying about democrats on the stump lately. >> they want to turn america, these democrats, and that's what they want, into a giant sanctuary for criminal aliens and the ms-13 killers. democrats want to abolish america's borders and allow

drugs and gangs to pour into our country. as we speak, the democrat party is openly encouraging millions of illegals to break our laws, violate our borders and overwhelm our nation. that's what's happening. the democrats have launched an assault on the sovereignty of our country, the security of our nation and the safety of every single american. >> here's the thing. we don't know what happened today fully. we know that thesis boe bomb th were made to liberal boogiemen -- i should say conservative boogiemen. we've had a ramping up of this type of rhetoric. and instances of violence. and after those instances, nothing has changed.

trump went silent for a few days after that shooting but he has now since returned very much so to the press being the enemy of the people. it's as if nothing happened. the nrcc, the house republican campaign apparatus today put out another ad in which george soros is depicted as a puppeteer of a democratic candidate for the house. this happened two days after george soros' own house was targeted with a bomb. so nothing seems to actually change the rhetoric. we go through a pausing period where we reflect and condemn it and say we're going to get to the bottom of it. >> we don't all. we do. trump doesn't. >> nothing changes. so i am very curious to see what happens at his rally in wisconsin. >> are you? you really think he's going to say we've got to tone it down? >> no, i think the opposite. >> democrats are not creating giant sanctuary -- i mean they're not in bed with -- >> what i expect is he'll either avoid it entirely, which is my expectation or he will just plow

through it. and that to me is the big problem here. we don't know who did this but we do know that we have our own ability to control the rhetoric, to change the rhetoric and oftentimes trump especially we don't take that opportunity. >> i think this is about more than the rhetoric. the rhetoric has been going on. it's been present at his rally since he was a candidate. what is new. what is new is the toxic mix. the toxic mix of two years of embracing dictators and giving our allies the shaft. what is new is the combination of the attacks on the media as enemies of our people plus the policies that are totally favorable to autocrats and dictators. he wants to show his love letters. telling josh dossier about love letters from kim jong-un. one of the most brutal dictators in the world. it was required reading in the bush white house about the brutal treatment of -- this guy is, in his words, in love with him. vladimir putin is more

trustworthy. what's new isn't the attacks on the media. we all try to tone it down for a day after something happens. he doesn't. but what's different is this layer upon layer of disparaging law enforcement, disparaging intelligence and embracing autocracy. >> also the recognition on behalf of the people that engage in these attacks that nothing will happen. nothing is going to happen. they can kill themselves. they can get away with it. they can hide. >> here and there. here it's the candidate who beat up a reporter -- >> with jamal khashoggi. this administration will do nothing and continue to embrace those people. and what's key, look, all of us are in a fortunate, blessed position. we're on the air. what happened in maryland is 20 minutes from my campus. i have a colleague at the root whose phone number was doxed a week and a half ago. she got death threats. another colleague here got death threats at her home on monday. this is not just something that happens to high-level people. this is men and women going to work every single day.

we have an administration that acts like an abusive husband that continually says, oh, my gosh, i'll never do this again and then it happens and then they're quiet for two days and they do the same thing. the only solution that we can have is to hold every single politician accountable. i don't care if it's your mayor or city council or member of the senate and say, what will you do to protect the fourth estate because that's the only thing we have to keep this country on track. and if they're unwilling to do it or incapable of doing it, vote them out because we can't trust the white house to protect us. >> you guys aware of anybody that feels more uncomfortable now than they did in these jobs before, just on the beat? >> it's worth -- to answer that question, it's worth mentioning that another wrinkled layer of this is that the president and republicans have decided on an intentional closing strategy for the midterms of painting an apocalyptic world. the president was specifically told and agreed with this assessment. don't run on your achievements or tout your achievements. but paint an apocalyptic picture

of the world with democrats as an angry liberal mob run amok with yourself and republicans as the soothing bome ining balm. this is worth noting and fear mongering is a common tactic to close campaigns. that's not unique to this administration or this white house but this was an intentional decision. so everything the president says and he's going to be ramping up that campaign between now and the midterms, is a very deliberate, strategic decision to try to turn out his base of supporters. >> the pathology of projection is so amazing to me. "lock her up," a chant i believe started by mike flynn who is now a felon who has pleaded guilty. donald trump talking about an apocalypse that he's largely created. you've got -- they've tried to label the other side with all their own sins, eli. >> you can hear projection at almost everything that he says

from that rally stage many a night and i think it's not without some grounding in actual fact to interpret it that way. but i think ashley is right. the conversations i've had with people, they don't view this through a moral lens. they view this as their job. and they're not really worried about the consequences. and when uncomfortable situations come up like today, when they have to take questions about, are you complicit, inciting some of these behaviors, are you responsible for this, they don't want to answer those questions. but you -- what you see from republicans, what you see from people who work around the administration, you don't see a lot of hand wringing. you see people either acknowledging things that are -- that they know are wrong and saying he's just joking or don't take him seriously when he's making fun of the body-slam and re-enacting it on stage. he's just joking. he's not actually condoning violence against reporters. you're supposed to believe after the fact he's just joking even though they want people to take this rhetoric seriously. you're also seeing from some

republicans on the campaign trail that they're imitating trump's own message. a candidate in pennsylvania a week or so ago making a video where he was threatening to step on his opponent's neck with golf spikes. it was ridiculous but that doesn't happen if the president is not out there every night, you know -- >> two things to that. one thing is they don't take questions. this is important because they don't ever get their feet held to the fire. there is no press briefing today from sarah huckabee sanders. >> do they still -- is that still a thing? >> one two weeks ago was the last thing. >> not even once a week? >> so there's the pin point for them to have to be addressing this issue. secondar secondarily, they've created an echo chamber. they're either rewarded for this or it is sort of pushed to the side or glossed over with conspiracy theorys. so today if you went on any pro-trump forum on the internet, the primary point that they were pushing was this was a false

flag. ridiculous. that this was something the democrats did so they could engender empathy for democratic candidates. people are like, why are you covering this? it's all conspiracy theorys. that's true. it's ludicrous. but it's created this ecosystem in which you can basically justify and rationalize any major news break by saying you know what? it's not us. it's them that's doing it. and i think that's having a pernicious effect this to administration, on politicians in general. >> let me bring frank and chuck back into this conversation. everything i know about false flags i learned on "homeland" last season but here we are. n let me ask you, just based on, i think the national security division at doj was the last law enforcement entity to charge a russian for meddling in the midterms. but this is an effort -- the work of donald trump at his rallies, as amplified the way sam stein says by the internet is precisely the work that was done at -- we believe, vladimir

putin's direction or with his permission in 2016. has donald trump -- have trump and hannity picked up where vlad left off? >> you know, that's a painful analogy. you'd hope that americans weren't doing what russians are doing to us. but i take your point, nicolle. if i can make another one, there's a very tangible, crorosive effect of what's going on right now. the solution to this particular crime does not fall into the lap of federal agents. part of the work is done in labs, but part of the work is done on the streets. and so you're going to have agents and cops, men and women knocking on doors and asking questions. that's what they do and they need responses. honest responses. if the person opening the door and seeing an fbi agent standing in front of them doesn't trust the fbi, the president of the united states says you can't trust these folks, it makes it that much harder to resolve these cases. that is the true corrosive effect of these words.

this case does not resolve itself. people resolve this case. and they need to be believed when they're in the communities asking questions and seeking answers. >> frank figliuzzi, same question to you. are we seeing -- has it just taken us two years to get to the point where work that donald trump maybe didn't feel comfortable doing brazenly two years ago, sowing these divisions, putting out false flags, if that's the right term, is now just being done out in the open by donald trump and his allies? >> yeah, i think there's a comfort level now. and i think the epitome of it was coming out and saying i am a nationalist, right? and just jetsonning any concern about the baggage and history of that terminology. and we have fox news echoing that theme. it's become the mantra. it's not something on the periphery anymore. this is the theme. and so as a law enforcement -- former law enforcement official what i'm struck by is, in juxtaposition with the bomb'iin

that we're looking at, we're our worst enemy. this becomes an internal threat. we're talking about russia, the situation with saudi and china and trade wars. but the reality is that we act within our country to hurt ourselves. i harken back to the oklahoma city bombing and timothy mcveigh. we were quick to start talking about this is an external threat, international terrorism. look what they've done to us. it was us that did it to us. i fear with this mail bomber, it's quite possible that it's us hurting us. and it's because our administration is enabling and facilitating that mind-set. >> chuck rosenberg and frank figliuzzi, we're lucky to have you any day, but especially on a day like today. when we come back, we've been talking about the impact of trump's words. what about his lies. new reporting about how the white house is scrambling to keep up.

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"washington post" reports on the administration's scramble to

reverse engineer policies to meet trump's public statements. ashley parker and her colleague phil rucker reporting, the pentagon leaped into action to hold a military parade and launch a space force on the president's whims. the commerce department moved to -- this reads like seth meyers -- to create a plan for auto tariffs after trump threatened to impose them. and vice president pence, the department of homeland security and the white house all rushed to back up trump's unsupported claim that unknown middle easterners were part of a migrant caravan in central america. here's the punchline. only to have the president admit later tuesday that there was absolutely no proof at all that there were middle easterners inside the caravan. the spaniel still here. ashley, this is one of your favorite stories you've written. this reads like a satire so jarring next to the thought of people receiving pipe bombs in the mail today. >> well, it's an interesting way to run a white house. and i think you have to sort of -- i think -- no.

the one thing in our story we tried to do is there were two separate categories. one is to reverse engineer evidence for the president's claims that are not rooted in any tangible evidence. that's what we saw with the caravan claim. he claims there's middle easterners in there. everyone in his white house go out and put their credibility on the line. >> how pathetic is pence. oh, yes, yes, there are middle easterners in the caravan and trump goes, i was only joking. >> only to have the president -- this is a challenge for people in this white house that you show loyalty to him by backing up some of these dubious claims only to have him say, guess what, there is no proof but there could be proof. the other side is reverse engineering his whims which it's worth noting when you're the president you can have a whim. you can wake up and say something in a tweet, make a public statement and because you're the president, you can cause people to rush around and try to make that a reality. we do now have a space force. we very briefly had several months of plans for a military parade. that was something the pentagon

actually spent time working on. even though it was called off. so it's important to sort of separate the categories but also to notice how unusual this is. normally when the president announces attacks planned or space force or tariffs, it's because he has worked through the various government agencies and then he announces it. here you have him announce it and then the government agencies work to make it true. >> obama didn't have any whims that i ever read about. obama never announced something they had to go and make true. >> if anything, that was a criticism of him. he was too deliberative. >> the white house is the head and the federal government is the body and agencies of the tail and it's more than affect people's lives and they have the pentagon -- we still have men and women serving in dangerous places. i hope it was like romper room and they put a bunch of interns in charge of a fake parade. i hope there's a scam going on over there. >> it's stress philadelphia yfuo

these agencies and staffers who are taxed with trying to make some of these whims real. when the president announced his transgender ban in a tweet, he did that -- he was waiting for a rigorous briefing, laying out several different options. he was to go through the options the pentagon worked through considering their needs and logistics and realities. and then choose a version. instead, he tweets something out and it sends the pentagon and the military scrambling to try to figure out how to reconcile something that the president wants and demands with something that may not necessarily be how they would choose to handle things in their best interest as how the military they want to run it. >> eli, this feels like the kind of story, this idea of the white house staff having to reverse engineer the things the president says. this feels like the kind of thing you guys who cover him have known to be true for a while. but what's -- it was jarring the juxtaposition of this lunacy against the world getting more dangerous and spiraling out of

control in some ways. we now see two years in the impact of having a president that does all the things we've been talking about. embrace autocrats, disparage our allies and you still, two years in, have a white house who has to two years inside the white house, you still have to learn from the president's twitter feed what he wants to do. >> we have used the term reverse engineering, that's one of ten trump stories, where you write about behavioral patterns from the beginning. those who work in the west wing and throughout all the branches of government, it's tiring to the entire country, that you're talking about one thing one day and the next day the president is on to the next thing. you never knew that a military ban was on the table. it creates that atmosphere where the public has a hard time

focusing on things and trump seems to be the one that's energized by this thing, because he's exercising control over the media, and over the entire country and that makes him empowered and it think that makes tmake s t it for the public to determine how important things are and what matters to the general public, versus what's shocking or salacious about trump. television news only presents some of it. when you're just following the bouncing ball of trump's whim every day, i think that's a thing we're all learning to live with, which may help trump, but may hurt -- >> i think there's a michael scott quality to it. he's this sort of funny weird boss that's kind of riffing. when you stand back, there's actual real world implications to this.

you come with a trans military ban, you concoct this idea that unknown middle easterner. not that's a middle easterner is bad, it's not, and then you reverse engineer, and have your department of homeland security and your own white house try to legitimize the lie. you ruin the person's reputation for telling the truth for however long. >> fly by the seat of their pants is letting them off too easy. making the caravan a political issue is a strategy. i don't get a lot of calls from

agency talk to me about the caravan, they're using the federal government, as a front and center political issue for the midterms. >> the economic advisors did a press call on the dangers of socialism, using the federal government for political purposes, that was astounding. >> when president trump was saying oh, i saw middle easterners cheering during 9/11. remember the man said he was a nationalist this week. but we can reverse engineer, it's people that are stepping and fetching from whatever they want. it's kind of like that twilight zone kid that thought he had powers and everyone had to pretend he had powers. it takes me back to that mystery letter that showed up on the "new york times." if there's some sort of internal

c c cabal, they should be saying we're not going to waste time with this, we're going to put you out on the campaign trail. still allow this administration to use all of its resources to demonize groups of people and waste our time, we don't have a functioning government, we have a child who has imagine kwl powers who are only emboldened by the weak people around him. >> we have to sneak in a break, don't go anywhere, be right back. the first account that we opened was with bank of america. since then, we have grown exponentially. to me, food is love. and i think food brings people together. everything in life is about giving back. you're only as good as what you leave behind, when you leave this world. ♪

♪ (electronic dance music)♪ ♪ ♪ we're back. we have been discussing the

attempted pipe bombing of several high profile democrats, many of them happened to be frequent targets for criticism and attacks from this president, contributing to a climate of animosity and hostility toward them. about barack obama, obama has tweeted about 2694 times about hillary clinton, who also received and the secret service intercepted a pipe bomb today, about eric holder, he said on fox and friends, he better be careful what he's wishing for, if he runs, i think he gets gobbled up before he even gets to the election. john brennan, our colleague at nbc news, the president has stripped him of his current clearance, tweeted about him almost 11 times, he will go down

as easily the worst in history and since getting out, he has become nothing less than a loud mouth partisan political hack who cannot be trusted with the secrets of our country. >> i'm not surprised. this is the kind of comments the president's still making, we can talk about gabrielle giffords, we can talk about bricks being thrown into mark warren's campaign headquarters. you can allow this man to remain unfettered or you can go out and vo vote. >> i just think, you know, trump has been granted time and again an opportunity to turn somewhat of a page and he's never taken it. and people who are hoping against all expectations and reality that he will somehow

tonight step up and said, no longer the fake news media, or no longer lock her up, are really kidding himselves. it is who he is. >> a all the individuals we named and had pictures up received suspicious packages. not all of them received live explosive devices. mtp daily begins right now from dallas. >> hi, nicole, i wish we were here under different circumstances and a different mood that we could be broadcasting from, but thank you for your coverage as always. >> we're a bit subdued here from the katie trail ice house. this has been a rough day for the democracy, rough day