democrat, don't bother. >> a little back and forth there, punctuated by the president urging americans not to vote. we highlight these things a lot. donald trump's ridiculous lies, his performance art, his lack of knowledge, his incitement of people's worst instincts. but today is different. this morning, america is different. why? because as axios points out, pipe bombs sent to prominent democrats were the worst terror by mail campaign of the post 9/11 era and a wired manifestation of the nation's toxic politics. why.? because as foreign policy analyst david rothca says so clearly, the most extensive plot to kill senior u.s. government officials and prominent americans in history took place. it targeted two former presidents, their families, cabinet officials, members of congress, and the free press.

the objective? apparently to snuff out the leading spokes people for the views of the democratic party. it was an attack on reporters and on democracy itself. people will say you can't blame the president for something a person did. that is true. the president didn't grind up the shards of glass to maim and can kill. but he did something else. you dehumanized those who dare to question his conduct. based on race and religion and political party. and it has the potential to lead from what we saw happen yesterday and we don't even know if it's over. so before we dive sdoo discussion and analysis, we want to set up exactly what went down yesterday. >> it was a chaotic day

yesterday. former president barack obama, hillary clinton, eric holder, former cia director john brennen at cnn, congresswoman maxine waters and billionaire philanthropist george soros targeted by bombs. debbie wasserman schultz was listed as a bogus return address. a pipe bomb like the one found in the mailbox of george soros on monday was found tuesday night near the home of bill and hillary clinton. it was discovered by screeners reviewing mail sent to the former secretary of state. yesterday morning, a routine screening of president obama's mail turned out another explosive device. it was intercepted before reaching his washington home. a device was addressed to former attorney general eric holder. that package, according to former law officials was incorrectly addressed and wound up sent back to wasserman

schultz's address where it was then intercepted by the secret service. the device addressed to brennen, an n bc analyst was sent to cnn's time warner building in the heart of new york city. it was discovered in the mail room, the aftermath playing identity live on television. >> these are no longer projected issues. that sounds like a fire alarm here. >> we're going to find out what the latest is here at cnn. we're going to be right back. >> this is cnn breaking news. >> and can good morning. i'm renee marsh in washington, d.c. we are following some developing, breaking news. at this hour, the time warner building in new york city has been evacuated. jim and poppy harlow who you saw

anchoring, they had to the evacuate the studio. >> so with the fire alarm going off in the background, the anchors continued reporting on the story out on the street until they could not any longer. >> they were forced out of the building. the anchors kept reporting on the street outside the time warner center. new york city mayor bill de blasio addressing reporters early yesterday afternoon. >> what we saw here today was an effort to terrorize. this clear is an act of terror attempting to undermine our free presentation and leaders of this country through acts of violence. i want to make very clear that the people of new york in, will not be intimidated. >> and it was confirmed last night that a second device addressed to maxine waters was found. earlier in the day, it was

discovered at a maryland facility. x-rays indicate the devices likely contained shrapnel, shards of glass inside. a senior law enforcement official tells nbc news the bomb addressed to john brennen included a parody of as isis flag and the words get er done. >> the packages are being inspected by top explosive experts and a major federal investigation is now under way. the full weight of our government is being deployed to conduct this investigation and bring those responsible for these despicable acts to justice.

we will spare no resources or expense in this effort. and i just want to tell you that in these times, we have to unify. we have to come together and send one very clear, unmistakable message that acts or threats of political violence of any kind have no place in the united states of america. >> with us we have john pedoritz, susan delpercio, john heilman and historian, author, msnbc contributor and rogers professor of the presidency at vanderbilt university, john meechul. john, we'll start with you. context, parallels and history, pull back to 20,000 feet. what are we looking at here? >> it's, i think, the most

widespread attempt of lives on american officials since -- and may, in fact, exceed the scope since the assassination plot against abraham lincoln in 1865. it's the potential for disaster was enormous. the scope of it is fascinating. and i think that what it tells us is that in every era of great political strife in this country, there has been some manifestation of that strife in terms of violence. whether it's the attempt on andrew jackson's line, the caning of a congressman, the terrible jostlings and protests of adelaid stephenson, the terrible cataclysmic violence of

1968. so this is a last not surprising and i think when you step back, one of the things we have to figure out is is the climate a symptom or a cause of an attack like this. and make no mistake, this was a terrorist attack on america in great scope. whether it was a foreign national or domestic, this was an act of terrorism and an attempt to assassinate a number of elected leaders. we have to figure out in moments like this, our greatest leaders have led with a steadying hand and not an incendiary one. there's the great question. >> in terms of the climate, we have to look at the timing as we are days away from these midterm elections and you wonder, steady leadership is something john meachum mentioned. did trump's rally speech show that he understood the gravity

of the situation and how does this impact the midterms? >> well, i don't know about the ladder question, mika. i don't know how it's going to affect the midterms. it's a very volatile situation out here. it's in georgia right now. it's a very volatile time in the country, for sure. and something like this, given it's not unprecedented nature as john meachum points out, there are precedents, but given the fact that it is as extreme as it is, i think it would be followish to predict what the political consequences of it are. i think it's obvious, given the nature of it, and given the fact that for two years now myself, you, others on this program and other programs have been predicting with horror and with dread, i should say, that given the kind of toxic environment in which we're in and given the fact that the president has seen for two years not interested in trying to detox about the environment but rather pour

gasoline on the fire at every opportunity, we've all, with dread, predicted that something like this would happen. and now it has happened. it did not succeed on its terms, but the thing we all feared, something like that that we predicted, is at our doorstep. he did not pour gasoline further on the fire yesterday. but if you watched him in his prepared remarks at the white house and his rally in wisconsin, you did not sense, i think, someone who grasped the gravity of it and certainly not someone who was taking extraordinary measures to try to calm the waters. it was someone who was performing in a way that didn't exacerbate the problem, but had a per functiontory appeal to it rather than to rise to the moment and have the passions that are creating this kind of

ugly moment in which we now re-side. >> the president right sizes a little bit, do you get a sense he's sticking to a script and then he goes back to his regular games. >> yeah. he toned down and didn't attack the people he usually attacks. i think we're on a sliding scale that that is viewed as a problem. >> let's state again, we don't know who did this. we don't know as we sit here this morning who did this and why. we also are only 16 months removed from an attempted mass political assassination at a baseball game of republican congressmen. steve scalise is here with us only by the grace of god and

because there was a former field medic serving in congress who saved his life. what would you have liked to have heard the president of the united states do the last night to heal the country and to bring up all these examples of how a red rick has brought us to this point? >> well, i think it's very clear that he should have deepened and made himself more serious. he tried to a little bit in the white house talk yesterday afternoon. he defaulted to kind of jokiness last night. and i think the jokiness is an issue here. trump came in as a reality show guy talking tough, right? doing this beat them up, all that stuff. and it's a little like -- i hate to sort of talk about the president like he's a toddler or a 4 yiel-year-old, b

it's like it's all fun and games until somebody gets hurt. so i doubt that he wishes to provoke violence in the united states. but that said, he thinks this is a game. presidents before him tie themselves into knots trying not to use words and say things and make phrases that will be misunderstood not only by their own people, but across the world. so they get briefed by their aids who say don't use this word, don't say that. so last night when he made that perfectly mild joke, it's like, everybody should vote. if you're a democrat, don't vote. but nonetheless, it conveys this unseriousness at a serious moment. that is his challenge in the next two weeks, particularly if, god forbid, more bombs emerge,

which is if he's going to act like this is just a tv show, then he will be complicit in what follows. >> i was going to say, he's not going to change the way he is. he doesn't have it in him. what i am particularly frustrated with right now, republicans have been saying -- who support the president, well, at least his policies are good. i don't like the twitter, i don't like the rhetoric, but his policies are good. well, this is a reflection of his policies. >> it is a reflection of his rhetoric, that is correct. >> and it is something this president has decided to do since he decided to the run for office and that is to dwooits divide us.

and the more he seeks to divide us, the more he creates the anger. this president is not directly responsible, but it's time to call out and say, hey, the president's words do matter. they matter in turkey, they matter around the world and they matter right here at home, mika. people listen to the president of the united states. they look for leadership and they find hate. and that's the problem. >> so i want to highlight what you just said. what happened may not be the president's doing, but it is a reflection of his rhetoric. that's important to note. and note to republicans, this is something you can't let go by any more. you can't. our country is at risk. we have been attacked. it is no longer okay to say i don't like his tweets but -- it's no longer to say i don't like his bullying, but -- it's

no longer okay to say i don't really support that, but. it's no longer okay to not answer questions, to not speak out when it is very clear that we have dangerous rhetoric resinating from the white house every day. i will have a really important call for democrats which is more my call coming up. but i am begging for republicans to step up, do the right thing. do not turn away and turn your back to it. please, don't. please don't. here is more of president trump last night at his rally kind of making fun of the fact that for a short time he's going to behave himself. >> the democrats are for higher taxes, more regulation, and more top down government control. and by the way, do you see how nice i'm behaving tonight?

have you ever seen this? the we're all behaving very well. hopefully we can keep it that way, right? we're going to keep it that way. >> leah's radical far left opponent is tammy baldwin. who wants a socialist takeover of health care. i'm saying to say that very nicely. i'm trying to be nice. >> so when the president was making fun of the fact that he was behaving himself, john kelly, sara sanders, maybe general mattis, whoever was trying to contain this president over the past 24 hours and get him to say something, quote, unifying with, that was him

making fun of you. that was him laughing at the fact that for a short period of time he's going to do what you say, but now ice going to the make vicious fun of it in the face of a terrorist attack on our democracy. he's not listening to you. he doesn't listen to you. you need to do more and you need to do it publicly and openly. i don't know if you all saw nikki haley finally speaking her mind the other day, but she made it very clear she doesn't support the way this president speaks. she made it very clear that something is very wrong with america right now. and i would love to hear from people inside the white house right now that are trying their best, but as a president, that flau flouts what they say, that laughs at what they say and doesn't do anything that they need him to do in america's time the of need. he's making fun of all of us.

willie. >> joining us now, patrick gasbar. yesterday the ambassador published a response to representative matt getz's conspiracy theory that soros is funding the migrant caravan heading to the u.s. this touches you in a lot of different ways. just your reaction, first of all, to the george soros planting of an explosive device which was the one that set all this off. what was mr. soros' reaction? >> first, let me thank you for inviting me on into this rather sober conversation. when i have a moment here i'd like to disagree by the points made by the two johns.

yes, this all did begin with a pipe bomb. george soros came to the united states. george soros regrettably is not surprised today by these attacks. he has been saying for quite some time now that language can be weaponized and that the chief executive of the united states has been spreading shrapnel with his words and with his tone. this is the same president who says before was applauding attacks on the media and who i think it was maybe 48 hours beforehand blamed george soros for the migrants who were making

their way through honduras and to mexico and to the u.s. border, blaming george soros and democrats. that is reprehensible and it's proven to be quite dangerous. >> so as you know, ambassador, the term george soros fundeds has become a buzz word for those who believe he's pulling the strings on a lot of things happen around the world. let's talk about the caravan. what's his response to being accused of funding the caravan. >> george soros and the foundation is playing no role in funding any caravan that is marching towards the united states. this is a foundation that respects and believes in sovereign boarders. but at the same time, honors the long held tradition of republicans and democrats in the

united states, of welcoming refugees from violence who have rightful claims to amnesty. we have procedures at our boarders for that and the president, who knows this and knows better, should not just be casting blame without evidence on americans like george soros. >> john has a question for you. john heilman. >> hey, john. >> patrick, good to hear you. i'm curious. i believe you pointed out that there were recent antecedants where your boss has been invoked in a negative way. i believe it is the case, and i'd like you to clarify this, i believe it's the case the republican party ran an ad attacking george soress even yesterday after this ad had taken place. is that correct? >> there was an ad run in a congressional district against a former government employee who is running for the house of

representatives who happened to work for a nonprofit organization that received two grants over the course of their history from the open society foundation. and that's been conflated into another grand right wing conspiracy theory. i'd also like to add, john, when you talk about ads, one of the closing ads donald trump had in his campaign was against george soros, janet yellen and blankfine. i understand those who disagree with his political opinions, but i applaud republican senators like rand paul who immediately after this attack stepped forward and said this is wrong, this is not who we are. i'd like to add, john, that george soros is the american who right after supporting barack obama for the presidency in 2008 against john mccain joined with john mccain in trying to open previously close canned societies in eastern europe.

so we just need to pull back the lens, appreciate what's being done here, the lies that are being spread by congressman getz who hail from the same district that your joe scarborough used to represent. >> and john meachum, before we go to break, give us a sense of what a dictator, what a leader with un-american intentions would do at a moment like this with a story like this in the run up to an election. >> you would claim that your enemies somehow set you up. you would play the what's called a false flag card which you saw immediately happen in the corners of the make america great again movement yesterday.

one of the things that one would have to say back to those, and i pray it's vanishingly small, we know that every person matters because any person can do something irrational. and violent. is if you think or if you pretend to think that this is somehow a conspiracy theory, that this is a false flag operation, ask yourself why would someone think that such an operation would work? why would someone think that this would be a reasonable thing to launch? and that logic demands that you then realize that a rhetorical climate has been created and exacerbated and maintained that can lead to the worst kinds can of events.

not just to the those who talk but those who believe and want to believe have an extraordinary responsibility. because we often say this isn't who we are but often it is. but this really can't be who we are. >>. >> it can't be. we won't survive it. john. >> i think it's important at this moment to point out that in the united states right now, we have solid economic growth, we have low unemployment, we have all kinds of social peace that we haven't had in this -- we didn't have in this country in the post war era. low crime. recovery in a lot of places. we have some terrible things, the opioid epidemic and everything else. this is an unusual set of circumstances and that's one of the reasons that it is fair to blame, in some sense, the president's rhetoric. all sorts of irresponsible rhetoric, the sort of rhetoric that led holkenson to break

things up. >> the nypd is responding right now to another suspicious package and a device in lower man hattenan. as you can see, there's a large police presence there. we will bring you updates as soon as they come in. there's some early information about who this may be directed at, but we want to check it out before we report it. >> no word on who this is connected to. up next on "morning joe," we'll be following that story and a call to democrats. - [narrator] if you want serious cleaning with a cord-free vacuum, you need a shark. because only shark's cord-free lineup has duo-clean technology so you can deep clean carpets and give hard floors a polished look. and with two swappable batteries at maximum suction, our shark ion f80 gives you more run time than the dyson v10 absolute. and now shark takes cord-free beyond stick vacuums by introducing a full upright model. shark ion cord-free vacuums available in stick and upright. takes more than just investment advice.

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welcome back to "morning joe." we're following breaking news. the ny pd bomb squad is on the scene of another suspicious package. law enforcement sources telling wnbc here in new york that a suspicious package and device similar to top democrats yesterday was sent to a greenwich street restaurant

owned by robert deniro. the nypd says there's no need for an evacuation as the building was unoccupied. the package sent to de niro would be one in eight. >> we'll be following that. and joining us now, donny deutsch is with us. former partner and creative director of deutsch l.a., eric herschberg. and we are going to be looking at a new ad being unveiled by -- >> the dnc that we've been working closely with. very, very quickly, and it's a sad day to be launching this, but kind of i think almost relevant. we want to do it nationally. obviously this campaign and the midterms are hand to hand combat and local markets and it's all about health care. but the republicans have the national overlay. they have the guy you see on the

news every night. do you go low, do you go high.? we can't go lower. it's not about going high. we thought maybe we could go in a different direct and go to the heart and remind people about decently and what's at stake and get a bunch of spokes people together that he can't shout down. eric came.up with this campaign and he's going to tell you about it. >> the key that we wanted to do was bring emotional urgency to the democrats' message. what trump is so good at is creating a emotional issue. these very human issues at stake have been dehumanized and we wanted to try to rehumanize them in the run up to november 6th. whether you look at families being separated from their kids at the border or whether you look at people keeping their health care, these are incredibly emotional issues across the board for the

democrats. and we thought the best way to do that was to look at these issues through the eyes of kids. because kids stand the most to lose in this election on november 6th. and they can't vote. and people will do things forrer their kids that they won't do for themselves. kids are the only ones who can get us to stop smoking or stop texting while driving and we wanted to turn voting into one of those things. so. >> so let's take a look at it, especially in this climate. here it is. >> if i lost my medicine, i don't know what i would ever do. >> i don't understand why people would think to do that. >> when i see them taking kids away from their parents, it's scary. >> if you zigzag when you run, like the shooter is less likely to shoot you. i think about that on a dameily basis. >> did doctor gave my dad pain pills and he really got addicted to them. so he wasn't there for four of my birthdays. >> i think it is patriotic to

protest. >> i feel really bad about people taking quay my health care. >> i'm you one of those sick people that you're trying to take medicine away. >> oh, hello. my name is reuben and i am 11 areas old. >> we need politician that's are actually going to do something about it. >> i can't vote. >> i can't vote. >> i can't vote. >> so vote for me. >> so vote for me. so vote for me. >> so the climate has changed, even by the time you all made this ad. i think it's impactful. i wonder you how widely it will be seen and i wonder if in some ways, because the democratic message, it's often been argued is watered down, not there, not clear, even though there is one and this is part of it. fist question, too little too late or who is going to see this? >> well, this will be digitally all over the place. it's getting launched and i think you're going to see this many, many, many places. this is the best answer we have.

at the end of the day, we're talking women and it's got check time. are we decent, are we not decent? we want people to look at their kids. obviously the 37%, 40% were not turning. this is to galvanize our base and this is for some of the people in the middle to remind us what this is about. go home and look at your kids. we can scream, we can stand on our heads, we can howl at the moon or just do gut checks. >> and when you have a deal with the dnc, how quickly you have to react to the grave situation that has transpired over the past 24 hours. hasn't it moved from that's an important message, but wouldn't the other one be and wouldn't you turn something around really quickly about this being the election of a lifetime and if any doubt has been raised in your mind over the past 24 hours about the danger that the press is in, that former democratic

officials, former presidents are in, everybody who is in trump's scope, his focus, are in now danger, critical danger. their lives threatened. wouldn't this be the election of a lifetime? wouldn't you say at this point if you want to check this president, now is your chance. if this president might need checks, now is your chance. if you want to see some balance in washington so you're not scared any more, now is your chance. isn't that the message? this came out, you are putting this out, you created this yesterday, but what's the message today and do you follow up? do you go back to your client and say i have to do more? >> i think what we have to be careful right now, we were talking off break about the kavanaugh reaction. i think we have to let that play out so people see what it is. but, yes, i think tomorrow we put kids on and say this can't

happen. hopefully over the next 10 and 12 days, these are spokes people. it is not the democratic politicians. it is not a stupid ad. this is what is at stake. i am a dad. you are a mom. this is our country. it's no longer a joke. >> go ahead. >> and while you're talking, donnie willie has been following what's happening in lower manhattan and it's not looking good. >> yeah. this is the nypd investigating another suspicious package in lower manhattan. you can see a massive police presence now. taking the explosive device away from the scene in a bomb truck. we've reported a moment ago that it was a similar package to the one that we saw sent yesterday and revealed yesterday to many

prominent democrats and this one sent to the tribeca grill restaurant in lower manhattan, owned by robert de niro, obviously a prominent democrat. eric, i want to ask you, when you talk to the dnc, you got in the room with some of them. what did they view as their vulnerabilities? what were they worried about? what did they say? >> the way we looked add this the was by looking at their strengths. they have the more popular policies. chasing the news of the day sometimes is not the answer. these are generational issues. while today is a great example of the need for decency, the need for a return to decency, the entire message here is that we need to protect people. we need to protect people's health care, we need to keep families together. we need to protect women's rights. these are all issues that will

affect people for a generation which is how we got to these messages and to donny's point, the idea for turning the microphone over to unscripted kids. >> we're watching a scene in lower manhattan where another suspicious package appears to be in the restaurant owned by robert de niro. we are not making a connection, we're just seeing what we're seeing right now. which is more drama playing out as it pertains to our breaking news this morning. john, your thoughts as we try to cover politics but it's taken a very serious, threatening turn. >> i mean, you know, speaking of someone who does not share donnie and eric's predelections, i would be concerned if he were a democrat if there was something, shall we say, exploitive about having children speak and demand that adults

vote for them, that it is very -- can be very -- >> john, those are real kids with real situations. >> i'm aware of that. >> you talk to their parents or them about being exploited. you are doing what trump -- the those are children. >> no, donnie, i am not doing what trump does. it is unacceptable for you to put out a political ad and then you can't allow anyone to criticize the possibility that by attempting to focus people's emotions in a manner that, say, trump does, that maybe that is not exactly hearteninger or helpful to the american political dialogue.? >> i think this is the most high ended, high minded, less sewer ad that's -- i'm shocked. i respect you, john, and where you come from. this is exactly the way to do it as opposed to trump is a liar. in is reminding us what it's about. it's about our kids, dude. >> it may not be about my kids. it's not about everybody's kids.

and the simple fact of the matter is, sometimes ads boomerang and you can have a lot of people thinking don't tell me if i don't vote for trump that i'm hurting america's children. >> i'm telling people that -- basically, i am gut checking women and gut checking a lot of people that what is at stake here and the best way to do it is by thinking about tomorrow. >> looking through a political ad lens, this is mostly digital. is that -- >> yes. >> so this is a digital ad going national. >> yes. >> so i mean, this is the type of ad that you seek to kind of seek in the tone in an overall level. but with 12 days to go, if you really want to penetrate and do what you want to do -- >> this is going to go out there. you'll see this virally start to multiply. this is part of why we did what

we did. put something out there that people are going to start to share. >> but you know your research, and i do, too, from the political venue, but the people who you're trying to reach, digital is great, but it needs to be reinforce. >> a pause on this because we have to get back to the breaking news. go ahead, willie. >> with nbc says a similar pack to those reported yesterday was sent to robert de niro's restaurant. john heilman, robert de niro obviously has been very, very critical. i'm not drawing straight lines, but we have a list of targets of those who have been in conflict with donald trump. yeah. these people have been, willie,

among the most vocal critics of donald trump. everybody remembers robert de niro at the awards show standing up on stage and dropping an "f" bomb directly on the president's head. and that piece of video, the de niro video featured prominently in the propaganda film that steve bannon released at the beginning of the midterm elections back around labor day that robert de niro very much a man along with george soros, along with maxine waters and the kind of person who is a staple of far right anti-democratic rhetoric, someone who is called out frequently in republican ads, in republican rhetoric. i can't quite remember whether president trump has ever explicitly singled him out. but certainly he is the kind of person who has become a figure of hatred for many on the right who see him as a figure of

hatred on the left. the composite picture here, robert de niro fits right in with the other recipients of these packages in terms of the role that he has come to play and the position that he occupies in the political cultural firmament. this is not one that deviates from the pattern. it's one that reinforces the pattern of where these bombs have been sent out over the course of the last 24 hours. >> in fact, john, to answer your question, you'll remember at the tony awards in june as robert de niro was introducing spring stooe sateepringsteen, he did s "f" trump. the president did respond in a tweet, robert de niro has received too many shots to the head by real boxers in movies. i watched him last night. truly believe he may be punch drunk. employment is at an all-time high and many countries are pouring back into our country. wake up punchy wrote the president of the united states. john, again, we want to see what

we've said a couple of times this hour and i'll say it again. we do not know who was sending these packages. the nypd does not know yet. that's a account if a. but up to eight people now have received the packager or they have been intercepted and fit the profile of democrats and people who have been in conflict with donald trump in public view. >> yes. and, again, not just people who have been in conflict with donald trump. they have been the marquis names of the resistance of the anti-trump critics and they have also been not just that, but they have the also been the most high profile targets in many cases of the president's rhetoric when he has aof tacktt the left. these are people who have been fierce critics of the presidents and who have become whipping

people for the president on the stump and, again, fought just in the president's rhetoric, but also in the rhetoric of a lot of conservative media, whether it's in the form of advertising, whether it's in the form of online commentary, whether it's social media, these are people who hear cited again and again and again in conservative rhetoric as the people who, quote, hate donald trump or hate america that this list is pretty much the rogue's gallery that the right has decided to target. >> you know, john, some would argue that this is an effort to put fear and intimidation in the minds of those who have questioned this president. and his views on immigration or his views on whether or not he may have racist tendencies or anything else. anybody who was questioned or criticized this president is looking at this and thinking all these people have done just

that. and i just wonder at this.point, moving forward, when you look at the events that have transpired over the past 24 hours, you look at jeff zucker's reaction. he he called out the white house directly. it is an interesting time in defining exactly what our role is in covering this because this is a president who has called the media the enemy of the people. and right now, for whatever reason, the media is a part of this and is being treated as an enemy and is being attacked. our lives. >> honestly, that is true. >> which john are you talking to? >> i was talking to john heilman. >> yes, it's obviously true and it's obviously problematic and complicated in a variety of ways. you know, i think that, again, i just want to go back to what

willie said a second ago. we can do pattern recognition in terms of, like, we can say who these people are and what kind of a group they comprise. what's knowing who sent these packages, it's impossible to determine what the motivation is. it's reasonable, not crazy, not implausible to infer there is an attempt here to silence the president's critics. it's reasonable. but we don't know that until we know exactly who is the perpetrator and we find that person or persons and find out what it is that motivated. but we don't know that. but it's not an unreasonable inference. i think it's incumbent on people, who are critics from either side, from the right or the left, it's incumbent on them to not be cowed and not be silenced, but to maintain their posture in a reasonable way. and i think, again, to go back to where we started this

conversation, in the end, the one person in this conversation who st doing something unlike any of his predecessors ever did is president trump and president trump is the person who rather than seeking and in many presid in the past have sought in flawed ways but their goal has been to unify, pull the country together as opposed to driving the country apart. president trump has never done that. his attitude it's in his political interest to divide people and stoke these fires. it's most incumbent upon him to maintain our sense of courage but most incumbents upon him to stop that and to try to be a little bit more like his predecessors. we have no expectation he will but this is a moment in which it's incumbents upon him for him to say divisiveness, anger is not the order of the day because it's become too dangerous. if you're just joining us,

it's 6:50 on the east coast we're following breaking news. willie geist has been telling bus the latest target, apparently in a string of attacks. we don't know if it's connected. at the restaurant of robert deniro in lower mants. >> a commercial building owned by robert deniro. includes his offices and the tribeca grill that robert d denegative-interest-rate -- de niro. a building worker saw the news overnight and saw the visual, the pictures of packages that were scents around yesterday and said wait a minute i saw a package like that at this address a couple of days prior. he then called police. the package was addressed to roberts

d as you see in live pictures nypd bomb squad removed the device and driving it away from lower manhattan to a security location. this is a case of a package apparently that had been sitting there for a while according to this building worker. the building worker identified it to being almost identical save for a different address. >> it reminds me to go on a little detour that after 9/11 when the anthrax envelopes were circulating, we had one at the "new york post" assisting about five feet from my desk that was opened by my colleague and she got dosed with anthrax and

famously she lifted her middle finger, anthrax middle finger on the cover of the "new york post". basically we don't know where these letters are. i want to say one thing about the president and his rhetoric and what happens now and how events like this can backfire on the people who promulgate them because this will subdue the president. we saw him subdued last night. he believes that the next 12 days it would be best for him to polarize the electorate and push the republican base or his base out as far as it could go. he will be restrained in his ability or comfort level in doing that, which presumably if, as john heilemann says if we can sort of speculate that this was done by somebody who was attempting to help him and harm democrats this may have the opposite effect on trump and the rhetoric that he uses in the

closing days of the run up to the mid-terms. >> all right. we're following breaking news in lower manhattan. another target possibly in a string of attacks, unconfirmed if there's a connection but this is happening on property owned by robert de niro who is a vocal critic of president trump. >> i want to be careful with my words but the type of leadership this president has shown has mirrored more like leaders that don't lead the united states of america, some would say.

and i wonder what your concern is moving forward. if you have someone who thinks more like a dictator, or who thinks more as a fascist or doesn't think in the best interest of the united states of america what they might do in a situation like this to sow doubt in the american people and make this bad situation worse? >> i think the most important thing to recognize this is a true crisis we're facing right now and during a crisis what a normal leadership challenge would be is to stop everything else they are doing, bring everybody together, and make people feel that he's on top of the crisis. think of what he could have done. every now and then imagine what another president would have done. he would have called in president obama and president clinton and people at cnn brought them iran, to solve this together. when he went out he could have said imagine what would have happened if we attacked those

information presidents, george washington. we're attacking the house of representatives. we're attacking the cia. and most importantly he could have said, he could have thought we're attacking the free press. can you imagine the president said that? these are the moments when the president comes out from behind. you see the president sitting behind the desk -- we have to remember yes he was subdued. but he didn't make that moment. this was one of his moments. he had it at the inauguration. he could have brought us together. he had with the kavanaugh hearings. he didn't do it then either. he talked about democrats as these horrible people. we keep waiting for that fever to break. yesterday morning when i heard about the bombs it did not break. >> what he did last night at his rally he undermine the moment and made fun ever it. he said look what i'm doing i am

listening to my people. we'll behave just for a second. we know that this president likes to sow doubt. we know this president likes to take a situation and turn it around and perhaps sow even more doubt in the american people and divide us and he did that with kavanaugh. i would argue democrats completely misplayed their hand on that situation and fell into his trap and his trap is quite challenging at this time. we have to be really careful with our words. but he did undermine the very moment that he was being told by his aides to unify because i at this point have lost trust that has t those were his words. i think of john mccain right now in his moment on the campaign trail, where somebody spoke ill of barack obama and he knew exactly what to say from his gut, from his heart, as an american patriot. that we don't have in this president and that's why this

moment is so serious. >> that's because senator mccain loved this country and stood for the values of this country where president trump just doesn't even understand where we came from. and, you know, typically in history you have these times where someone steps into the oval office and realize the importance, they take it offer themselves and put country first. we don't see this. we see a president that's not able to step up to the challenge. steve, how does this affect everything else? it could be -- one could argue this is as great as the great depression. does it affect our economy, the faith people have in leadership when there's a lack of it right now >> we have to see how it unfolds. depends what else happens. if this is the end of it that's one scenario. if this continues it could undermine the country.

we've had these kinds of incidents and problems before if you go back to the '60s, the a unabomber. what we have now is we don't have a leader. we don't have somebody like george bush standing on top of the ruins of the world trade center and say you'll hear us coming. we have a guy who doesn't know how to lead, who is absorbed in himself. for the viewers who are on now let's not forget who caused this. when you have rhetoric, of the kind of rhetoric we've had from this guy over and over again and most recently in this series ever rallies he's been doing in the last few weeks for his campaign where he talks about beating up reporters and this and that what do you expect will happen? >> as susan said earlier refl t reflection of this rhetoric. it's hard not to see this as a reflection of the type of things

he's been pushing from the day he stepped into office or even before. it's the top of the hour. we're 20 seconds away. we bring in chief white house correspondent for the "new york times," peter baker and washington bureau chief. we're following breaking news down in lower manhattan. >> the nypd bomb squad which you're looking at here, on the scene of another suspicious package this one in lower mants the tribeca neighborhood. law enforcement sources telling wnbc our affiliate in new york a suspicious package and device similar to others scents to top democrats was scents to a greenwich street restaurant owned by robert de niro. the device was received early thursday. the nypd said there's no need for an evacuation as the building is unoccupied. the package sent to robert de

niro if linked is the eighth in a series of targeted mailings. what you're seeing here is the containments vessel for the nypd. they are moving up north to the bronx to a facility where they can dispose of this bomb, detonate it, get rid of it effectively. that's what you're seeing and that's where the suspected explosive device mailed to robert de niro was delivered. a call came in to nypd at 4:00 this morning. a worker at the building watched the television coverage yesterday and seen the outside of those other envelopes addressed to president obama, to the clinton, to erik holder, to john been unanimous, to maxine waters and said wait a minute i saw a package that looked like that. he called the nypd. they found the packaging was identical to what we saw yesterday including with the bogus return address from debbie

wasserman-schultz. the explosive device found inside does, in fact, match and similar to other ones we've been talking about for the last 24 hours or so. peter baker, the president right now at last check is tweeting about a "new york times" story. he's shooting down a "new york times" story that gets into his cell phone usage and the facts that the russians and chinese listen in on his phone calls because he uses his iphone. he said that story is not true but no word about this latest apparent explosive device sent to a prominent democrat. >> this is not a subject he wants to focus on. he had comments yesterday in the afternoon. he did mention and as you said this morning at his rally last night but he rather pull attention to other things. it's a corrosive moment. the trump family feel that they

themselves have been besieged. you got that in his comments at the rally last night. a package was scents to president trump that was suspected of having ricin in it. his family members had white powder scents to their homes by somebody who apparently was trying to instill fear in them. you expect at a moment like this, a president to rise above to be our healer, to be our, you know, national leader, to get beyond the anger of the moment. but it's an angry time and he's an angry figure in our moment. he's both an instigator, and a representation of our period in american history where we are polarized and we are full of, you know, beyond vigorous debate we should have about important issues like health care, defers, taxes and so forth. it's not his strength, obviously, to go out and to pull

people together. that's not how he got to office and not where he feels most comfortable. so, you know, he's going to move on to other issues as much as he can. i think he'll probably say something at some point today. my guess if these things continues. it's not his favorite topic. >> elizabeth, as we stay in the moment and follow this breaking news of another suspicious package found at a property owned by another trump critic, robert de niro, let's also move forward and talk to us, if you could, about what we'll be looking for, what we'll be watching politically because we are approaching the mid-term elections. >> i think we're looking for -- i don't think we're going to get too much of it, some unifying words from the president. we got a bit yesterday at the white house. he was on script. he talked about how this is time to unify the country. there were comments to his

critics were laughable because he's the one who has gone so harshly after these people and talked about violence against journalists and encouraged it. i think we'll look for the president to say that again. however, last night we saw he was making fun of himself and saying oh, yeah i'm going to behave, see how i'm behaefg. he was belitt he's belittling the whole process. trump is reading from the script and saying it's time to you night and then a number of rallies between now and election day and he'll be off script once again and go back to the trump rally trump. i would also like to say about the cell phone story. i just would like to say that i noticed he didn't actually deny it and he said he still uses one government cell phone.

officials at the white house say you shouldn't be talking on a cell phone at all. >> okay. i just want to go to john heilemann now on the politics of this as we exercise a little bit of pattern recognition. i wonder if we can at some point get the map up to where these suspicious packages were found and the names that they were addressed to because it does show a pattern of people who were critical to trump and former government official, former presidents. these are threats on their lives. this is a very different level that we're at right now when you look at where these explosive devices were targeting. and i think at this point, as we move forward and look at the politics of this, john heilemann, you have heard some on the right speculating that this could be some sort of trick. is that even possible at this point? and do you expect this president

to sow that type of doubt? is that something we have to look at as a potential reality here? >> mika, willie has been emphasizing all morning and important to say again we do not know who is responsible for this. therefore, we do not know what the motivations are. if you look at, as you suggested a second ago, if you look at the target, the people that received these packages, they are obviously, many of them, all of them fierce critics of president trump and also conversely also become fierce targets of president trump, fiercest rhetoric in response to their criticism of president trump. they are the rogue's gallery of president trump's rhetoric and not president trump's recognize but of much of the rhetoric on the right in conservative media eco system, on the conspiracy driven right, on the far kind of

fringe elements, people like george soros are staple far-right thoroueorizing. it's people who president trump talks about constantly at his rallies. is it possible that there's some kind of a false flag operation here? again, without knowing who the person was that did this, i don't think we can rule out anything. but a much more reasonable and a much more plausible suggestion of potential motive here is the more straightforward one which is this is an attempt by someone out there who having dwelled in the atmosphere of president trump's excitement over the last two years that someone has decided to target critics of president trump and tried to harm them and tried to intimidate -- at a maximum harm them physically. these pipe bombs were

functional. try to harm them. not just harm them but intimidate and silence president trump's critics. that's the most reasonable assumption. not the only possibility but the most plausible one on the table. >> we'll be joined by the mayor of new york city, bill de blasio. he'll be joining us on september as we follow the breaking news here, another suspicious device found on property owned by robert de niro. anything new coming in? >> mika, to underline what john was saying these being foils of the president. if you go down the list there's a pattern, robert de niro put out an ad in the days and weeks ahead of the 2016 election where he said if donald trump quote i would like to punch him in the face, he had a long list of insults from president trump. as i mentioned earlier at the tony awards he said f trump a couple of triems prompting a response from president trump. these two have been at each other a little bit.

pete williams is joining us, nbc's senior justice correspondent. pete, what more can you tell us about these pictures we're seeing out of lower mants as the bomb looks like or apparent explosive device made its way up to the bronx where the nypd will dispose of it. >> apparently the call came from a person who worked in that building who sees the incoming mail. and my understanding is that this person was not at the building this morning. but remembered after seeing the news reports and seeing all the pictures that were out there of what the packages looked like, thought, you know, i think we got one like that. so he called the police department in new york and they respond. so this package was delivered perhaps a day, maybe two days ago. so it's not -- it's not quote-unquote a new one in the system. it's been sitting there for a while. this raises a couple of questions. one is, obviously, a question you have to ask is why haven't

these devices gone off? is there a timer what we're told is on them. what was the timer set for? what we're told is that at threat of ones they've looked at so far and that's a very slow process but at least the ones they've looked at so far they think these device were fortunately poorly made. that there are a number of potential flaws, obviously we won't say what those are because this is not a program on how to make bombs. they appear to have some flaws that inhibited the ability, fortunately for them to go off. that's an important point. we don't know if there are other packages in the system. nobody knew about this one until this morning. we didn't know about the one to l.a. to maxine waters yesterday until it was discovered. so what we're told by the secret service is they know of no other packages scents to the people that they protect but that's only a part of this universe of

people that were sent these packages. >> what is the fbi doing this morning in terms of tracking down the person or persons who scents these packages out, scents through the u.s. postal service for the most part although we hear george soros' was dropped in his mail box by hand. what can the fbi do at this hour in tracking, finding the source. >> there are indications that one sent to cnn was dropped not scents through the mail. the post mark contains a lot of information. not just the city but the last main post office through which the packages went before they started to go around the country. so they will work back through that. they've been through this before. they can potentially track where the packages were actually mailed. once they figure that out and when they entered the system then they can get surveillance

video and try to figure out if they can get pictures of whoever delivered these packages. that's the backward looking, try to go back in time and try to figure out where these packages started and how they got in the system. the second part is analyzing the packages themselves. they have now nine. one to soros was disrupted, it's not intact. the rest of them are indakotas, at least devices that were intact and that's a lot of information. looking for dna, fibers, hair. they will start to figure out maybe what kind of powder was in them, where it could have come from. all of these are potential forensic highways for them to follow. >> pete, given the history of this type of investigation, is it possible we'll know much more before the mid-terms? >> possible, certainly. sometimes bombing investigations resolve themselves very quickly, but unhappily sometimes they do not depending on the skill of

the bomber. all indications so far is that this is not terribly skillful, fortunately, but we'll see. you know, i think a quick resolution is, you know, it's possible but maybe not likely. >> pete, the "new york times" reports this morning that law enforcement is looking into the possibility that these were quote hoax devices, in other words constructed to look like bombs but actually not able to explode, not actually what they appear to be. do you have any more information on what these are or are not? >> well, i mean that has been a big question all along. as i said at the beginning why didn't they go off? were they made to look convincing? i will tell the initial analysis and, remember, i want to be cautious here because it's going to be a long time before they examine the one this morning but it's a slow process to take these things apart and save the evidence and begin to analyze why didn't they go off.

but it may be they were hoax devices. as i say i won't detail what the problems are with them but one question s-was that intentional? did the person make them so that they were not quite fully functional and almost or was that an error on the bomb maker's part. it's certainly a possibility. >> we'll be joined shortly -- pete williams thank you very much. we'll be joined shortly by the mayor of new york city, bill de blasio who will join us on set. he has his hands full with another device discovered in lower manhattan. but let's reframe what's going on here. i want to take a look at exactly what has happened here in the past 24 hours. who has been a targeted. who has been threatened. we can put up the map. these are former government official, former presidents, all people who are critical of

president trump. being careful with my words, i think it is fair that some might say that these events are a reflection of the president's rhetoric. a president who has called the press an enemy of the people. praised people who commits acts ever violence against the press or others. used the power of the presidency to bully people, to dehumanize and devalue the truth. who does not tell the truth on a daily basis. historically what have democrats and republicans and american presidents done in situations like this in the face of terror, in the face of a threat to our republic and give some context to how this moment is different with this president? >> no question whether or not it's a false florida, whether or not it's a hoax, at the moment last night people thought that these people could be killed and we have to remember that. we can't take it away if the emotion is less this morning or

tomorrow than then. historically that's when a president is asked to be president not just a power holder. somebody can be in position of power and they can being a leader when their ambition becomes larger. >> doris, that's not going to happen. >> i know. >> it's the pattern of this president's behavior and conduct is to hold true -- that won't happen. i take it further. what is required of republicans right now? the republicans who have repeatedly bypassed talking about this president's conduct, this president's rhetoric, or they have gotten around it by saying i don't like that stuff but i like this. or paul ryan i'm not going to talk about that but i like this. or complete silence. or even a reflection of his rhetoric for some of the younger

ones who perhaps have weaker systems. matt gates in florida who don't know how to think for themselves and follow him blindly. the republicans who do know the difference between right and wrong, republicans who love this country, republicans who respected people like john mccain, the republicans who are patriots, what is their responsibility today? >> here's what abigail adams said. greatness creates great virtues. this is the time you demand great leadership. it's not just demanded of the president. he did some things last night. he was still talking about those engaged in that kind of rhetoric. that's not shouldering responsibility and then went after the media. the leadership has to come from the congress. it's got to come from all of us. at some points in these moments citizens have to awaken. is this the president's rhetoric i want to have?

there are things we can do. a collective mirror on us right now what we do in those elections that are coming up, who to vote for. every leadership is a two way street. not just a leader. we can't just look at him. it's us, ourselves. a campaigner has to become a leader. one reason why abraham lincoln didn't speak -- if he wanted to be tough and mean he knew his words mattered and once you're president you can't speak the way you are as a campaigner. no president hasn'ted wanted to unify the country. crisis crates opportunities. >> it's not the opportunity. >> his strengths have to be there to use it and that's what peter bake certificate saying. some presidents adapt and mold

in such a moment like that. >> it's 7:19 here on the east coast. 7:19 in new york city. that's a live picture over the bronx where an explosive devierks pipe bomb matching the ones found by nypd yesterday and addressed to two former presidents, a form attorney general and a sitting congresswoman now one addressed to actor robert de niro. device was found in lower manhattan. a call came into the nypd about 4:00 this morning from a worker at the building who says he saw the packages on tv yesterday and immediately recognized the look, the outside of the package as being similar to a package that he had seen a couple of days priorer and called the nypd. that device now has been taken away to the facility you're looking at in the bronx right now by the nypd where they will dispose and study that explosive device. peter baker, the president of

the united states as this is playing out on national twice, he's tweeting. he's tweeting first about the "new york times" piece about the president using personal cell phone to make calls and being listened toby russians and chinese when he does so. then he's watching "fox & friends," apparently, he's tweeting about immigration saying democrat inspired laws making it tough for us to stop people at the border. a new one here, a very big part of the anger we see today in our society is caused by the purposely false and inaccurate reporting of the mainstream media that i refer to as fake news. it has gotten so bad and hateful it's beyond description, mainstream media must clean up its act fast writes the president of the united states. this, peter baker, coming less than 24 hours after our friends at cnn received one of these packages containing an explosive device. >> yeah. this is a very telling tweet.

this is what he thinks. this is what he wants to tell his supporters. he wants to tell them what's happening in this country right now is the fault of his enemies, fault of the left, fault of the media. not his fault. he has nothing to do with it as far as he's concerned. look, there's no question that our dialogue, our discourse, we can all reflect more on that in this day and age on all sides of this conversation. what we look for, again, what doris is saying, what we look for in these moments is a president to lead the way. and to lead the way by taking responsibility, of course, for his own actions and own conduct and words and lead by example. if he think, in fact, there are other parts of our conversation right now that are not civil then he himself -- it's incumbents on him to show the way and he's not. that's not the way he conducts himself. not the way he operates.

he doesn't see that as a path to success. for him the very rhetoric, the body slamming reporter, the celebration of violence at rallies is part and parcel of his appeal. parts of the country that are angry at the establishment, angry at the media, angry at the coastal elites they feel have in some way taken advantage ever them. he doesn't see any reason to go forward in any different way. he's using this episode to fault his opponents. >> i want to get to elizabeth really quickly, though, doris to back up the point we were talking about. as you can see we're not going to get what you think an american president should be doing at this point. >> let me see what an american president once do. there was a series of bombing at the turn of the 20th century. president mckinley was killed. we cannot appeal to the dark and evil spirits in this country.

the wind is sowed by men who preach such doctrines. american people are slow to wrath but when their wrath is kindled it burns like a consuming flame. maybe this is the moment that fever break. when something happens that we have to say whether this was meant to be, could it have killed a series of people in this country. this is a real crisis moment. how we respond not just how the president respond, how we take responsibility for changing our attitude to what this leader is critical for us right now. >> elizabeth, we have questions, parallel, a clear pattern we can lay out. which have our own personal reaction as members of the press. what will you be asking of your reporters today as they head out to work, as they head out to ask questions and what do you want to hear from republicans? what's the question? >> i would like to see republicans condemn these attacks. i also would like -- reporters will try to find out what's

happened, who is responsible for this. we have to tell reporters these days in a different way than before to be careful. i want to remind people that our publisher saw the president this summer in the oval office and said to him you can criticize the press and new york times all you want but when you call us the enemy of the people that's too far and somebody is going to get hurt. i think we're all sitting here waiting for the other shoe to drop. it's a completely different landscape than what we're used to in the united states and a different landscape for journalists working in the united states than it's ever been. >> the mayor is walking into the studio. john heilemann as we get him into place. the question for republicans today and do you expect something different from what we've heard before? >> i would be naive to expect something different from president trump. i mean i don't think i had high

hopes for him rising to this moment on the basis of the perfunctory things he did yesterday. the tweet that willie read a few moments ago suggests that we're likely to see him back potent l potentially in the same mode again as soon as now. so i don't have high hopes the president rises to the moment. frankly on the basis of what we've seen in the republican party in the last two years, excused president trump's strategies of incitement that have taken on a dangerous cast i don't expect very much from them either. it was said earlier where it was thought president trump would be more restrained in the next 12 days before the mid-terms and this campaigning, attempted bombing campaign might restrain the president in some way. i hope that that is true. i do not expect it to be the case. >> all right. willie.

>> already not true. the mayor of new york city bill de blasio joining us now. what mother can you tell us about what happened downtown? we know that the disposal unit has taken that bomb away up to the bronx. the target, apparently, robert de niro, his restaurant, his offices, his complex down there in tribeca. >> thank god nobody got hurt. the devisit of a removed successfully. it looks exactly consistent with what we've seen with the other device. someone is trying to intimidate, quash voices in the country using violence or some group of people. and what's very important to be, while we're getting to the root cause in this whole discussion of why we have an atmosphere of hatred in this country is to look at something very positive yesterday which is the reaction of the people of this city who

were not intimidated, not thrown off their game did not allow this to undermine their faith in their society. they saw first responders address this immediately. we got a lot of information out there so people knew what was going on. but it's something that always gives me hope. people are good. it does not mean every act jorn the public stage is good or positive but people are good and respond in a very noble way yesterday in my view. >> the new york police department the best in the world, bar none, they showed us again this morning. any sense, mr. mayor, of who may have perpetrated this crime? we know the fbi, nypd, secret service working together on this. a lot of these packages came through the u.s. postal service. do you have any sense of where this is coming from? >> we don't. i'm confident we'll find the perpetrator or perpetrators. there's a lot of information here, obviously. the pattern of these devices is

very clear, very consistent. that will ultimately help the investigators. we need to recognize there could be more coming and that's -- if people are vigilant is crucial. our first responders do an extraordinary job and this city amazing job of fighting terrorism addressing terrorism over the years. what you'll always hear from the nypd they do an even better job if people work with them and provide information and being the eyes and ears. if anybody today in this country receives a package that looks suspicious, don't open it. immediately alert the authorities. people have to be part of addressing this problem and also have to be careful in this moment. it's not over until we find the people who did it. >> in fact, susan, that's exactly what happened this morning. this person work at the building owned by robert de niro saw the packages on tv and said to him several wait a minute i saw one that looked exactly like that in our mail a couple of days ago

and called the new york police department about 4:00 this morning. >> what's also interesting is amazing and what the nypd has done cities in 9/11 and create certain networks. if you can explain why people can feel safe in the city because we are refrpg -- the nypd is reaching out to business leaders and building owners and that there are protocols in place. i think that would be very helpful. >> absolutely. there's two pieces of the equation. one is nypd, we put a lot of very substantial anti-terrorism capacity in place. we added more officers to that work including the very vivid overt work of being in front of media locations today. being in front of the offices of elected officials, to send a message that extra protection is there. the other piece is what you point to which is building a whole network of people involved in providing information and insight to the nypd. that's the force multiplier.

deep connections with the community. not just businesses. right down to grassroots of every day people. the phrase you see something say something is very real and alive. there was an attempt a couple of years ago in the chelsea neighborhood and one of the reasons why no one, thank god, was hurt was there was a pressure cooker bomb left on a sidewalk in a bag and a passer by, an every day new yorker saw it, literally awkward by and said wait a minute something looks funny. took time to call the police. that deviefrs taken away safely. no one was hurt because the message is everybody has to be participating in fighting terror, and that if the relationship between police and communities and this goes beyond the fights of terror, the relationship between community and police is one of mutual respect allows the police to keep us safe in more profound ways. we found every day neighborhood policing, every day dialogue

contributes to fighting terror. >> this was an attack on our democracy. >> yes. >> this was an attack on former presidents, on government officials, on democrats, on trump critics. there's a pattern there that's hard not to see. it's clear. having said that, how quickly given the history and knowledge of investigations like this will we know more about exactly where this came from, who this came from, what group, what person? and especially given that how many days away from the mid-term elections. >> 12. >> 12 days away from the mid-terms what are your concerns about political implications, copy cats, or this actually heating up before it cools down? >> okay. two parts i would like to get into this. one is first response people need to have to this is to not only be involved but get more

involved in the electoral process, in civic involvement in their communities. this is the response. trifrm, we don't know if this is foreign or domestic. one individual or an organized group. the response is the same. we'll not let our democracy be undermine. one thing i'm proud of new yorkers for the way they handle these situations is the resiliency. even the attack we had a year ago own halloween day people immediately responded to that by coming out in droves that night. we have a big annual event in the city. people participated rather than sli shrinking and going away from their normal routine. they came out in droves to say we won't let anyone change us or intimidate us. 12 days before election. do everything you would have done or even more to be involved and reinvigorate our democracy. second point this investigation could be days, weeks, could be

longer. we can't assume an easy tidy resolution. we have to assume, unfortunately, that this could take a while to unrafrl. we might see more of these. we need everyone to participate in solving this problem with our law enforcement officials but even if it goes on today, even if it goes on for weeks we can't let it change us. >> at the same time we should also say there's a responsibility on part of those who are not trump supporters, not part of that eco system to just not participate in the elections but to do our best to make sure we don't respond, nobody on our side responds in an equally violent or inappropriate way and we need to make sure our folks stay calm and vote and paint but not retaliate. >> exactly right. this resultly going to be one of those moments, i believe, where people look at an atmosphere hatred that's been created over the last two or three years and they reject it. this goes beyond any partisan

question. i don't think american people don't like turning on their television or going online and seeing anger and hatred. they want healing, across partisan spectrum. clearly, it doesn't matter what you consider yourself ideologically, there's no place for violence. it's time to turn this entire situation. so i think what this is going cause is a lot of revulsion and a lot of people who are conservative say this is not the america i signed up. we have to move to a place of civility and respect, of course with the media. you don't have to agree with what people in the media say. you do have to respect the press. i think you're going to see people creasie i increasingly r anger and extremism. sfwhooits the democratic reaction and a reset on the

approach on the part of democrats which i want to talk about. but, if you look at the president's tweet this morning, he's not -- he's not focused on this breaking news story and what's happening in lower manhattan on another suspicious device found at a trump critic's property. he doesn't appear to be focused on what some would see as the monumental events of the past 24 hours. he's still focused on dividing, and on attacking the press. what do we need to hear from your republican counterparts at this point in lieu of a president who seems to be averse to unity. >> first i would say, i think we understand who donald trump is at this point and he's not changing. so the yearning which is legitimate, everyone is yearning for a leader who is going to be unifying and respectful, it's not who search-and-rescue not

who he has been for his entire adult life. the other thing let's stop focusing on donald trump. you're making a key points. how about everyone else in the republican party speak up now, step up and talk about respectful civil political discourse. and i think this is about modelling the behavior. it's not going to come from the president. we all grew up, i think, a quaint notion, every child should look up to the president of the united states. that's not viable at this point. what is viable is what the rest of us do. elected officials on both sides of the divide but every day people as well. in a lot of ways this calls upon americans to solve the problem locally which is something americans are very good at to solve it at the grassroots, to do some healing locally, to work with people who don't necessarily agree with you on common interests for the goofed your own community to get involved politically. one thing i would say despite this last couple of horrible days what we're seeing with

early voting, another reminder of strength and resiliency of people. they are coming out to make a difference. >> if you want to check on trump whether you like him or not this, is your chance to get it at these mid-terms. >> another development this morning the fbi and local police are now responding to a postal facility in new castle, delaware in connection with this ongoing bombing investigation. they haven't said yet why but there were reports yesterday that there was one of these packages addressed to former vice president joe biden. as we all know he lives in the state of delaware. the fbi and local police responding to a povertial facility in new castle, delaware, perhaps tracking yet another package. mr. mayor as you said we don't know where the end of this is. we may find more packages somewhere in the povertial system, maybe left in post offices. how does the nypd handle that? what do you do with the prospect

of there could be many more of these floating out there? >> i think first thing is not to allow a culture of fear. we want to educate people. this is happening, they can be part of protecting themselves and everyone around them. we want everyone to participate. we're not going to allow a culture of fear. this can be handled. what these individuals or individual has done is created a clear pattern. not a lot of subterfuge here. we know what they are doing. people can see it, address it and be ready for it. it may go on for days or weeks. we can't be scared of that. we have to recognize that one thing very clear. nypd and our federal and state partners overwhelmingly, overwhelming percentage of the time find the perpetrators and usually pretty quickly. that track record is clear. people need have that confidence. that doesn't mean we get it instantly.

if we have to weather a storm here i can say on behalf of the people in this city they know how to weather that storm. they've don't before. and won't let the acts of someone who is trying to intimidate undermine us. so if it's days or weeks we'll handle it but i'm certain we'll find out who did it. >> mr. mayor, identify spoken what we need from republicans in this, and we need them to speak out. we are concerned the president will not. we don't know where the end of this is and we're seeing that we may not be at the end with the breaking news in lower mants and n -- lower manhattan and new cartel delaware. as democrats i would speak to you and say we need to immediately press reset. i want to be honest. i've been highly reactive in my emotions and fears about this president and i've shown that this morning. we don't know who scents the packages. i do know in my heart president

trump bears a lot of responsibility for rhetoric that made it almost inevitable that top democrats and the media would be targeted. we know what trump wants before the mid-terms is a brawl, a battle of conspiracy theories, unhinged accusations and violent rude behavior. democrats don't do it. pull back. don't try to intimidate republicans when they are at public places like restaurants. don't do it. a tactic explicitly encouraged by maxine waters. don't do it. don't say it, maxine. don't say we can't be civil in dealing with republicans like hillary clinton said. don't kick republicans as another government official said. don't get in the gutter with this man and this rhetoric. that's what he wants. that's what he wanted during the brett kavanaugh hearings and he got exactly what he wanted and we gave it to him to an extent. these bombs sow chaos.

trump thrives on chaos. democrats can win by doing the right thing. we may have to lose badly for a while before we win in the right way but we can't win in the wrong way. mayor de blasio and i'm worried that we have reacted so emotionally, and with so much shock and horror that we can be pulled in and that false flag can be raised right on the democrats if we're not careful moving towards the mid-terms. would you concede this is possible. >> mika, very powerful point you make. and i'm with you, that there's no contko contradiction between strong passion views and going after them politically and creating an atmosphere respect. it's not a contradiction. i feel folks in my own party look at this horrifying moment

in history it calls for desperate times desperate measures that's a misunderstanding. i agree with your points. you can strike a note of civility and note of mutual respect and mutual love for our country while simultaneously saying in the political arena, in elections or on the floor of congress we'll fight toot and nail for what we believe in. there's no contradiction. you can be involved in civil disobedience which helped to change the world. that does not have to turn into violence and hatred. one thing that dr. king talked about is not answering hatred with hatred. how corrosive that was. somehow you had to find the love, whether it's a matter of faith or ideology, find the love for your fellow human between you disagree with them. that's what wins at the end of the day. if you want instant gratification on november 6th you're bark up the wrong tree.

november 6th the outcome will be a mixed bag. some areas from the points of democrats and progressives real progress, some areas setback. that doesn't change the fundamental work ahead which is to go to grassroots and move people and educate them and motivate them to get more people involved. one of the good things that's happening despite this painful last 24 hours is this moment of crisis over the last couple of years is ringing our democracy. people are participating, feeling ownership, feeling it's no longer they can stand back from. they have to literally to the points ever running for office themselves if that's what it takes, maybe that's a course correction we needed. i wish it didn't come in this form but we needed that wake up call anyway to recognize that if you're not participating in democracy, it will atrophy and that's the ultimate thing. >> it's so precious and so easily broken. i don't think we really

understood what is it that we had that was so precious here when president trump was elected as president. i don't blame or fault anybody for believing in him but we have a precious democracy and it is in jeopardy this morning. mayor binghampton de blasio, thank you so much for being on. we have much more on this breaking story after a three minute break. we'll be right back.

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by a worker at the building who called at 4:00 this morning down the nypd. he watched the news coverage yesterday and saw the outside of

the packages as they appeared on the news yesterday and said i saw a package yesterday in our mail a koichl days ago. called the nypd. the nypd came downtown. they tell us it is almost identical to the tell us it is almost identity cam to the devices found across new york city, in l.a., in washington, d.c. targets, two former u.s. presidents a former secretary of state a former attorney general. a former cia director a sitting congress woman and the return address the bogus return address belonging to debbie cong wasserman schultz. along side this down in delaware, pete williams is with a post am facility there. what's happening there? >> reporter: this is at new castle, definitely, this apparently ends the hunt for what authorities thought was a package sent to joe biden. they have now found that at this postal facility.

you are looking at pictures from where the local police and fbi have responded. we are told it is similar in appearance to others, addressed to former vice president and former senator joe biden. the authorities had thought this package was out there. because someone in the postal system thought they remembered seeing this package. as of last night, the supposition walls that it was undeliverable and was back in florida because of the -- of a bogus return address on these packages of congressman debbie wasserman schultz. we know that happened with eric holder, it found its way back to her. now we are told it was in new cast castle, definitely. so authorities are responding there. so this brings to nine the number of package, you country the two to maxine water himself. add the one to deniro this morning.

>> that brings the total to nine, of course, we don't know if there is more out there. >> to underline, the packets at that postal facility if delaware was, in fact, addressed to joe biden and had the same look and feel to the other packages from yesterday in. >> reporter: correct. >> so we can go down this list now, president obama, vice president biden, president clinton, former secretary of state clinton, attorney general eric holder, former cia director under president obama, john brennan, ma i would to cnn. congress woman maxine waters, george soros, prominent democrat robert deniro, also a prominent critic of donald trump. as pete williams will remind us, we have been saying all morning, we don't know who the source of these packages is, the fbi will find out in time. but there certainly is a pattern here. >> yes, everybody has been vrn cautious, admirably so attributing guilt and blame, it's hard not to draw a

difference when they share a party affiliation. i was not very circumspect when james hodgkinson tried to assassinate a number of the republican conference. i believe this was over heated rhetoric radicalized in somebody very disturbed. it is probably the same thing. it is incumbent on the president to take the temperature down it's incumbent on us in we think that's the case. the president's tweet this morning gives me a lot of pause, his suggestion that this is the result of media bias attacking him is bizarre, unhinged. it is an election year. we can't forget that unfortunately. there is politics involved in all of this i think that will reflect poorly on him and his party. >> here's the tweet, he tweeted a couple of times, one about immigration one about a "new york times" story. here's the latest.

with new reports of vice president biden and robert deniro being targeted. here's the president. quote. let's point out that we're in the midlet of an act of terrorism against our democracy, that there are now one, possibly two more live scenes, police scenes where packages have been discovered. one at another property of a trump critic and you have the president of the united states tweeting about hate, tweeting against media, whom he has called the enemy of the people. when the media was one of the targets yesterday, where people could have been killed. this is a whole new level of where we're at.

and it is very hard to understand the mind 'set set ofn who would say that this morning. as we heard from the two historians who take care of "morning i don't" in terms of context the job of a president at a moment like this is to unify. a job of a president at a moment like this might have been to bring in the clinton and obahamas and the head of cnn and maxine waters, bring them into the white house and unify together against terrorism, against threats of violence, against threats of death, which is what happened over the past 24 hours. and what this president is doing at this moment is sewing more doubt in the media. is blasting the media in a 2003. and that at his rally last night, while he didn't lash out at the media. while he didn't lash out too much at his democratic counterparts, he actually made

fun of his earlier comments where he, as if per funk torely was reading a script by his staff. the president mocked his staff that urged him to plead for calm and plead for unity the president mocked everybody who is a citizen of this country, when he made fun of the fact that he was behaving just for a moment. look how well we're behaving. let's see how long it lasts. this president sews doubt. he encites rhetoric. we are at a moment where lives are in jeopardy, lives of the media, democrats, lice of people who have used their voice who have used their voices in a country we are supposed to be free to speak our mind. we are supposed to be safe. right now, we're at a moment where if you want to check this

president, you might want to consider early voting. you might want to consider voting open election day. this isn't an anti-trump die lock that i'm putting out here. this is anti-violence. this is pro america. this is for our safety. because at this point what we have in our president, steve kornacki, is someone who is not thinking about that right now. so we need. that's all i ask at this point. because things are at a whole new level. steve kornacki, how many days are we from the mid-terms? and how do you think this impacts the dialogue from democrats and republicans as they run for office in the mid-terms in. >> well, we're totally with me, i don't have an answer to that question. i'm watching along with everybody else, as the media does, which is what the media does, which is report this story. i think it's clear from what we're learning in the last hour,

the scope of this, we don't fully understand. as pete williams was saying, we don't understand where this came from. in some ways here, it's being in this building yesterday, obviously, i think all of us felt as the story started to come into focus, there was that moment there where you had to pause and like, am i safe in this building? everybody had that thought in here yesterday at some point. there is also in this, there is a chance here for the media to do and journalists to do what they're best at. in a very tense and in some ways unnerveing situation to report this. i think we are seeing that, too. >> maybe you seen the right word, from is terrorism, ap act of terrorism, at the very least, it was intended to terrorize or silence people, at the worst, it was intend as an act of mass murder, as steve says, we don't know where this ends, we want to go to the phone for our chief investigative reporter, he has been all over this story since

the very beginning, picking it up with a phone call to the nypd, jonathan, i guess, from a worker at robert defir ro's restaurant in tribeca, film us in from there. >> reporter: yes, so that worker saw the -- sorry irhad a little feedback on my phone here. that worker saw the news reports, saw that envelope, recalled seeing that similar envelope about a day or two ago. he called police. they responded and they found the envelope that had all the same markings of all the other packages that were out there. the return address to debbie wasserman schultz. the stamps. then they did an x-ray the x-ray appears to show a similar device that appears to be contained. and it was taken to the bronx, where police are rendering it safe, making sure it's safe. then it will be sent to the fbi lab in quantico, virginia. it's really the work in that lab

that they hope provides them two a key break. is there a hair arc fiber, a finger print, dna evidence, something, that will help them track the bomber so they can get a quick resolution to this again the question remains, are they actual working devases or are they constructed to look real in they have real components, but were they operational? that question remains out there. none of them have exploded. no one has been injured. but the concern is there are still more devices out there. we are hearing again this morning, as pete williams was just reporting, the package sent to joe biden, i think they're looking for for the last 24 to 48 hours has been found now in delaware. and that is being removed now by the bomb squad in delaware. so the investigation moving on many fronts. fbi, atf, nypd, others, state and federal agencies doing all

they can to try to track this suspect after the this hour. >> so i don't know a than what will the fbi be doing this morning? i think a lot of us are learning about the postal service and how they scan pail very quickly through photograph as it passes through their centers. how will the fbi begin to trace these? as you said, we have a series of unexploded device, which leaves a large trail we hope of evidence on each one of those. but what is the fbi doing this morning to track down this person or these people in. >> well, the joint terrific task force in new york and across the country, los angeles, washington, are fully mobileized, are working around the clock, taking in tips from the public. again, it's the lab work, the forensic work going on, is there a serial number or indication where the parts were purchased from? perhaps tracked to a hardware store where they can find out who purchased them and when and

that will provide a break. but sometimes these investigations take time. i mean, go back to the unabomber case and how long it took the person that was mailing those devices way back when this case, obviously, much different and technology has improved and the hope is that there is a break sooner rather than later that perhaps even someone out there just knows something, saw something, and provides that tip that leads them to their suspect? we are talking to wnbc the investigative reporter on the phone. he has been on top of this story from the beginning. jonathan, stay with us, if you can. we want to reach that as we hit the top of the hour. >> we are just past 8:00 on the east coast. we continue to follow breaking news, pipe bomb package eight and nine the latest is being investigated at new castle

county, delaware. pete williams reports it was addressed to former vice president joe biden and is similar to those sent to top democrats. the eighth package was discovered this morning at the lower property of actor and trump critic robert deniro. >> that device is at the bronx facility being investigated the call came around 4:00 this morning, someone remembered seeing a package arrive a day or so before. we are told it was addressed to deniro. the source says the official assessment was assessed to top democrats and sent to cnn the president is tweeting, lashing out at the media, calming it fake news, using the word hate. in the light right now of terrorism after an attack on our democracy, our president is acting very much unlike any other american president we have ever seen in history.

willie. >> we are joined again by john a on that deanst. the nypd had to unfortunately handle situation like this, programs not as broad as this over the last 17 years since 9/11. what is the nypd doing to assist the fbi in tracking down the source of these packages? >> reporter: well, their bomb technicians have been very active. their detectives, they have detectives on the join terrorism task force, they're literally working side-by-side with the fbi out of a command post, out of the joint task force offices and the politician headquarters in an attempt to track this down. one other step they are take secretary going to the news stations and briefing those security officials in real time along with other political leaders so they've fully breached and prepared in case a

package, additional packages are sent and wind up arriving at these offices, they want to make sure those individuals in the private sector or in government are fully briefed, so they know what to look for, that is, in part, why you are seeing a lot of the picture of these devices and envelopes being put out publicly. they're being very transparent. they want people if you see something, say something. they need the public's help on this as of early this morning, there was no hard break, harold le hard lead -- hard lead as to who was sending these and hoping for a break out of that lab. >> governor bill deblasio was on saying we don't know when this ends. to what extent is the new york police department and the fbi concerned about that element of the story, there is no telling whether there are more packages out there? and if so, how many more?

>> withhen we first started cou having this story at george soros' home. he voiceed that concern from the get-go, from the, after this first incident, he hoped that it was an isolated incident, but he instantly recognized that there could be and likely will be more devices ahead and it turns out he was correct, given the, what are we at, nine now? packages that have been discovered and there is, of course, concern and ongoing concern that if nine have been sent, how many more are out there? and how long will this continue to go on? and it doesn't necessarily mean that, hey, if more don't show up today, what about tomorrow? what about next week? until they get this guy, that threat, that concern will always be out there. so there is a real push on to track this guy and find him.

>> all right, wnbc jonathan deanst. we appreciate your time. we will let you get back to your reporting. we will talk to you soon. that's the concern, almost everyone voiced. you heard him talk about his nypd sources to the mayor of new york saying we got one at robert deniro, now to vice president joe biden. who else is next in. >> i want to bring in bill crystal to the conversation. we are looking at rolling coverage of a very developing story. now we are looking at two more packages that have been found, one addressed to i don't biden, a potential candidate for president in 2020. give us your thoughts about what is required politically from both parties moving forward if you agree that we're not going to get what is needed to perhaps tamp this down, dime it back, calm this down, prevent copycats

from the president of the united states? >> yeah, first of all, i would sigh the president, obviously, you made this point this morning is in a unique position and, therefore, his failure is unique. i keep reading online, this commentator said this thing or so and so said six months ago. it's ludicrous. he's the president. he is utterly failing in his responsibilities at this moment. this is an attack on our country and democracy and of course dangers individuals who have been targeted. for him not to reach out to presidents obama and clinton and vice president biden and others, to make clear the media are not enemies of the people, it's really terrible. having said that she who he is. she a dem godemagogue. there was a statement from nancy pelosi and schumer, wouldn't it

be better to have a statement from all four leaders, ripe, pelosi, mcconnell and schumer? incident ally there are people in the cabinet confirmed by the senate, they swear to the constitution, that i can speak out. they don't have to wait for the president. i think there are a lot of people that could step up and do good in this moment. i am struck by the pelosi-schumer statement. i believe 15 years ago the automatic impulse would have been to have the leaders of both parties make a joint statement, not to have the two democrats. i'm not blaming the democrats. they're kind of responding to trump. others have to step up if the president doesn't. >> especially if you talk about two former united states presidents along a long list of targets. sit tight. i want to go to manhattan, we find nbc news correspondent miguel almaguer. what are you seeing? what are you hearing about the package sent to the restaurant complex owned by actor robert deniro? >> reporter: i can tell you for

the most part the scene is very quiet. crew versus cleared it. it was chaotic. they arrived and for the most part this area does seem to be secure. they are letting folks pass behind me, this is where robert deniro's office is behind me. >> that package has since been transported. it will likely end up going to quantico in virginia, the fbi will look at to figure out who sent the device, how it was made. they will obviously piece together where the bomb-making ingredients in that package, where they were purchased. of course, who sent them. >> all right, miguel, we'll check back in with you shortly. i want to bic pick up, bill the responsibility of a president. yes, is the rhetoric ugly as mika pointed out? of course it has. as noah pointed out, i said earlier, we are only 16 months removed from an attempted mass

political attack on republicans on a baseball field. that's all true. but the president has a voice unlike any other in the world. >> yes. absolutely. that's what so distressing. you know, someone said to me the other day, i was saying, i hope the republican party can be safe from trump. i hope we can get beyond trump, i hope the democrats don't go too crazy and soft the person i was having this conversation, they said, how much damage is done? can we recover in two years or ten years? io enthe answer to that, i think we are a strong country. obviously, trump the a symptom and a cause of the problem. but the dee to which he has been over his presidency and as a candidate is now legitimizing things, the presidents used to deplore. of course, these things always existed xh america. but they were kept in check when the president and other leaders tried to keep them in check. we have a president that doesn't

keep them in check and, indeed, fosters the recklessness, the toying with violence. he does it in a way that seems lightheard and his crowd cheers. it's unbelievably responsible for a president to do that. >> when you think about it, willie, we have been asking, why would saudi arabia think they can get away with killing a washington post reporter and sending him a hit team and dismembering him? what -- why did they think the u.s. would be silent? well, we see today's tweet, that this president does not respect the media. it does not respect the first amendment and we, our values are just fading away in the world stage and i just find that so disturbing because when you start look even at the coverup that the crown prince used, now we have these right wing conspiracies, maybe it was the democrats. republicans have to call this

out, this tweet, right now. because their souls are on the line. >> yeah. i think everybody has to ask for unity and peace in that time like the. i was texting jared and ivanka, begging, if they sister to leave the white house, do it. if anybody knows what you are trying to do to restore some ord in this president is not working, walk out. make a statement. if you are scared at this point about what has transperiod, what is transpireing right now, write your elected official. calm, ask for a check on this presidency if you think that is needed. but don't do nothing. don't do nothing. at this moment in time, i think we're on the precipice of something really big and i don't think that's i don't have stating things. we have had our democracy

attacked. we have had two former president's lives threatened. we had a former vice president's life threatened. they have been targeted. a former attorney general, top democrats leading trump critics, they have been targeted. their lives have been threatened. we are at a whole new level. we need a whole new level of engagement that is peaceful, civil and within the parameters of being a patriotic american, do your part. let's hold on to what we have. because there are some in this equation who are not financial to do that for us and when can't get it. i don't think, naia, if i'm wrong from this presidency. >> no, i don't think so. we have been on the precipice for two years. donald trump's rally the 2016, he called for rallies, he said i will reimburse you if you are arrested, resulted in violence. we saw offices fire bombed in north carolina.

we saw street violence in chicago, portland, san jose. in 2017, we had a massive attempt on republicans followed by another attempt obviously to incite serious violence and social unrest in charlottesville, which we know resulted in the death of heather hire, this years ago we had the ricin letters at the trump administration a couple weeks ago. now this. there has been a return of something more than incismity. it is violent. and it is a result of people i think who don't understand that the stakes are not existential. >> yeah. >> when we talk about politics as though this bill or this event this executive order is going to result in the end of democracy as we know it, as children being thrown into the streets, really existential stuff, some people think obviously that's political r rhetoric.

the person that is willing to do something dangerous as a result is the result of rhetoric. we should all recognize what we say matters. >> let's go to the white house, peter alexander is standing by there. peter a series of questions for you, but first of all, we saw the president's tweet, lashing out this morning as he watches this news unfold with new packages we've learned sent to robert deniro and the former vice president of the united states, joe biden. his reaction has been to lash out to the main stream media and the fake news, saying the main stream media must clean up his act fast. we saw the comment. we saw him at his rally saying out loud to the audience, quote, do you see how nice i am behafk tonight as the he had been ordered not to be aggressive and lash out at opponents targeted by these explosive devices? anything more from the white house? anything talking about what's happening across television screens in this country right now? >> reporter: yeah, womanly, i've reached out to the white house

in the last few minutes to try to figure out if the president is being briefed on the fact that even as we speak, as he tweets, federal law enforcement officials are wrapping their heads around the entire scope of these suspicious divice sent around the country. as the president was tweeting, we are watching live screens of split screens, investigators put their own lievens at risk, try to gather up the explosive devices. we doe know by his tweets he likely received what is often his morning briefing on "fox and friends." he was tweeting about some of what he was seeing on television. note as you talk about that tweet, where the president says among other things the main stream media must clean up its fast. fast. >> that comes less than 12 hours off a teleprompter last night. he's called out to americans to come together in peace and harmony. this doesn't certainly seem to

be following that tone and i this i there is a sense when you speak to people around the president, they recognize this is not the way the man works. so i don't think they think this would occur. but as one said to me, what if the president got up there and said you know what this all has to stop? it's going to stop and it's going to been here, everyone should follow our lead. imagine if a president, if this president did that. last night he appeared to not be laughle it off, doing it as a part of this act. the trump show, saying, look i'm behaving so well right now as he criticized his political opponents. not by name. did talk about the media. had veiled reference, they were directed at the democrats in general. i think it's something we will unlikely see as we have not seen it at any time in the past. >> just for the record, there was a lock her up chant before the president arrived on stage at that rally. just hours after we learned the

former secretary of state hillary clinton had been targeted by these explosive devices, sorry, i have to ask you this question, i think what has to be asked here, has president trump reached out to president obama or president clinton? >> reporter: so, i don't have anyupdated reporting this morning. but as a result of the conversations i had last night, i can say as of last evening, there had been no contact as i understand it between the president or white house staff and the clintons and it was our understanding there had been no contact between the president or white house staff and the obamas. if that happened i don't have night since those calls, i will let you know as soon as i know differently. willie, again to reiterate it here, we hear the president placing blame on anybody else, what struck me at that rally and what he said on twitter is the president has taken no personal responsibility. not said in any form, you know what, i can do better here. his own daughter ivanka trump wrote on twitter as she condemned these acts of terrorism against a former

political officials and ago begins the media organization. she said america is better than this. i think there are a lot of people that feel like the president needs to be better than this as well? >> yeah. noah, win point out, republicans go through this too, we had a situation with steve scalise, obviously. but the reaction is democrats condemned it. the president condemns it. there is a stark difference here. is there not in. >> i've seen republicans condemn these acts, too. what they're not saying is the president is responsible for them. i don't think i recall seeing democrats in 2017 saying, this is our fault. you can't expect. that i don't think that's reasonable to expect politicians to say this act of violence is my fault. you can, however, expect these politicians to come together and demonstrate bipartisan unity and patriotism and put aside partisan differences in these moments. i think that's a reasonable request. it's not reasonal for them to

assume blame for an act of violence committed by someone else. >> but you are completely avoiding the fact that the president is inciting more hatred at this moment that this violence reflects his rhetoric, when he targets the press and the democrats in a violent way and he promotes and supports violence against them. you really can't make the parallel here. i reject it completely. i want to stick to the facts. i don't want to get highly emotional about this. but you can't look at me in the face and say this president has done absolutely nothing to set the scene for something like this to happen with his words. >> no, i don't. >> and his reaction. >> certainly not. >> which has been void of anything that might be helpful. >> yep. i agreement and i've said as much. i said if township want 16, he incited violence, in 2017, eg

excused violence, this morning he is excusing it by not directly confronting it. >> the argument can be the republicans have been in this before. they haven't. there has been a unified response on the part of democrats and republicans, we're not seeing it here because of this president and i hope we hear from republicans today. i hope we hear thafr ht his rhec is rejected. they can no longer stand by it. >> i think it's unreasonable to hear republicans in an election year to say we divorce ourselves from the president. >> it is unreasonable in the face of terrorism to attack violent rhetoric? that's incredible. that's where we are. >> we are not saying we don't know what the picture is for this problem. we all have to be there for these problems. >> it's unreasonable in the face of terrorism to reject violent rhetoric. >> no, that is not unreasonable at all. >> that is something we all

should do. we can't lay the bombs that we've seen targeting democrats at the president's feet just yet. we don't have this information. >> has anyone on this set said that in. >> no. >> it would be irresponsible to say. that so i don't think anyof us are going to say that, right? >> peter alexander has a point at the white house. >> reporter: i don't think we need to know what the motivation was specifically. it appears clear to people. obviously, it's too soon to say with certainty. it's not too soon for these officials on all sides, certainly republicans, certainly this white house to say we don't know what happened here, but we will do our part to make sure this stops. if it had anything to do with any of the vulgar, toxic language we heard, some from our side, some from the others, we will begin by stop using that language. >> correct. >> reporter: the only other point i would note about the president did this morning attacking the main stream media saying they need to clean up fear e their act fast, referring to communicating in a false and

inaccurate reporting is this is a time when the media and law enforcement trust in both media and law enforcement is as crucial as ever when there is a national crisis like this, when it's still unclear how many lives are in jeopardy, how many potential explosive devices are out there. the fact the commander-in-chief, is under cutting our trust in both of those institutions, the media and law enforcement as he has over the course of many months. who knows what the next 24 hours or 72 hours will look like when there is a moment, we need to listen to the president. we need to trust his words the words community indicated privately by white house officials to us to share with you. whether people's whose lives could be affected by that, they won't pay attention because they buy what they hear from the administration. >> steve kornacki, your thoughts, given the book you have out rye now, what do we see happening here in. >> it's clear listening to the

conversation around the table, there is room from the president on down for everybody to say, let's take a step back. >> exactly. >> and gather facts. because we don't even know exactly what we're discussing or arguing. i'm seeing arguments take shape already in the media. we see a set of facts that's emerging sort of one by one right now that looks like it might be pointing in one direction. but we also know we don't know the full scope of this story yes. we don't know who did it. there are all sorts of things that will come out through an investigation, through reporting on this, i think there is room there, yes, you are absolutely right the president has the bigger bully pulpit than anybody else, from the president on down to say let's at least know what we're talking about here first. >> i would think there is no room for rhetoric am attacks on the media right now. none from the president. and yet they keep coming. >> i still think, peter, thanks for being with us. i think still just on a human level, the fact that the president of the united states

maybe has this morning as of late last night hadn't reached out to president obama, talking about the president's club, hadn't reached out to president clinton and said we're dock everything we can to figure out what happened with you and have a conversation is telling. i will say for the tenth time this morning, we don't know who did this. the fbi doesn't know the nypd the best in the world don't know who did this. they will find out in due time. what we can expect from a president of any party is calm the waters in a moment like this and say let's get to the bottom of what happened. and i think when this president thinks about that, he views that as some admission of guilt that if he said, okay this terrible thing happened, we're going no find out how it happened, why it happened, he views himself as sort of implicating himself in that, which is not the calls. i think it would be a welcome statement from the president of the united states, one we are not holding our breath for. >> challenging times.

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i'm trying to calmly drive home

the point i make and i fully respect noah rothman's review, i think we were speaking past each other. he was making good points as well. but pull up the president's tweet. okay. i will read at this time way i see it. sense i got a voice in media and politics. i'd like you to look at the last line of the president's tweet. in light of the climate that we are enduring right now, in light of the fact that cnn headquarters had a bomb placed in it, that former presidents and former democratic government officials have been threatened with bombs and their lives were put at risk, that now we're look at joe biden being threatened, a potential candidate for 2020, and now we're looking at a potential pattern of threats of violence against our democracy and us, i see that last line as a threat. i don't see it as anything else right now. to put a tweet out like that,

right now, in the face of these bomb threats with active police scenes right now at the property of robert deniro, a trump critic and vice president joe biden's address on the other one, in new castle, delaware, this is not a presidential response to a threat of terrorism to an attack on our democracy. this is a response that is fueled with hatred and veiled with a threat. this is not what nancy pelosi did when steve scalise was shot a republican during a bipartisan baseball game if washington, d.c. this is not what democrats and republicans did after the scalise shooting. they unified. we unified, a threat against one of us is a threat against all of us. we came together. this is completely different. and i call on republicans today to finally, finally, finally and

don't do it for me because you don't like me, but do it for your country. step up. and say what is wrong with this president's threats and his violent rhetoric. paul ryan, mitch mcconnell, if you can't do the today, are you no use to this country. you are not caring about our safety, about our democracy, and you're supporting a president who is enciting violence and is threatening the media. right now. during this time, you have to look at facts for what they are. and you have to act in a way that makes you a leader. we feed leaders right now. we're not getting it from the president of the occupation. that's all i have to say, jim messina, in terms of the reaction to what's going on right now and the difference to past threats, whether it was

democrats, republicans, we always had a president that called for unity. we always had parties, no that's which one was in power that at times like this stepped up and came together. >> yeah, the last president of the united states, the last day, george bush said to me, i was going to be deputy chief of staff when obama took office, he said to me when you walk into the white house, you are not a democrat or a republican, you are an american, part of the 200 year in defending this country. that's what presidents do. this is a political aup. the president pulls etch together. as we have done in the past and unifies people and instead he's making it worse and the reason is, he's a football team willie who has two plays, run to the base and attack the media. those are his two plays. this morning, when he gets nervous, he goes back to the two plays. it doesn't bring us together. it's a major political stupid move and incredibly sad at this moment in time to have a

president physically and mentally unable to bring us towing. >> tom, nobody has been killed yet. thank god for that. and we don't know the source of these packages or these bombs, but the targets were two former presidents of the occupation, a secretary of state, attorney general, a cia director a sitting congress woman maxine waters. are we asking too much of the president? just for a moment, for today to put it aside and to come out and give some sort of unifying message or for god's sake to call barack obama or bill clinton? well, he may yet do that. the fact that he hasn't done it. that's who trump is i think. anybody who thinks that you know trump will rise to the occasion, he doesn't always do. that so right now, look, i think we're still learning about facts, learning who did this. but there is certainly the fact that the people who have been sent these bombs are all democrats is unnerveing.

it's unnerveing to everybody, it should be unnerveing to everybody. i think the president, his tweet the tweet that mika was references was ill advised. he condemned him yesterday. republicans across the spectrum, marco rubio, all of them did. they should have left it at that. we know trump can't leave it at that. he never does. >> i think it's a dangerous time to not see the pattern. i think everybody needs to be extra vigilant, especially if you have been an outspoken critic of this president. if the intention of this was to instill fear in his critics, or to incite a higher state of alert. that's definitely happened. but for democrats, i would suggest a massive reset in our reaction to every move this president makes i would also ask that democrats reach out to the

republicans counterparts and see if they would like to come together with a joint statement denouncing this violence and denouncing violent rhetoric. >> that would be a really productive act at a time like this. it's not going to come from the presidency, but maybe it can come from leaders in congress. and perhaps that would be a helpful step forward. >> john brennan the former cia director, the target of one of the packages sen to the cnn tweeted in reaction to the president's tweet, director brennan wrote this to the president. stop blaming others, look in the mirror, your inin a minute rhetoric, insults, like and encouragement of physical violence odisgraceful. clean up your act. try to act presidential. the american people deserve much better. by the way, your critics will not be intimidated into silence. jim, it's depressing i think is the kindest word that i can say, this is immediately treated as politics and not for the terrorist attack that it is.

so far unsuccessful, thank god, but as mayor de blasio pointed out a few moments ago, we don't know where this ends. there may be more packages out there. it go es to politics, whether you talk about the president or the media, steld of being treated as-- instead of being d as a national emergency. >> this is where the president pulls us about that. let's go to 30,000 feet as a country. how do we join bipartisanry and say this is not enough? we cannot have this anymore the fact that the president can't look in his own heart here and say i'm a part of the problem. he can't admit it is a startling indictment on who he is. it's why we're unlike lip to get 18 leadership. i think tom is right. they will say something today. they will have him say something. but when it's just him with a twitter machine in the morning.

>> we're at a rally of which he has many in the near future. >> we talked about this in the past, there is no one in the white house that can tell him no anymore. so there is no process someone comes in and says, don't send that tweet, what are you doing? he is by himself having a great old time. >> you can see in his statement yesterday, for those who studied this presidency and know donald trump the person as i do, his page was written for him and he read it. much like we saw after school shootings. remember, he had his little visual where he brought people in and made a statement that was somewhat almost presidential remember that was the president listening during a moment of crisis, in my opinion knowing him, in my analysis, listening to the people around him for a short moment of time. he can reign it in for one moment in time for one speech, for one you know opportunity to

do what he is told and then he doesn't like doing what he is told. then he goes back and goes rogue and his true, the essence of who he is comes out. and that's what we're seeing this morning. we're looking at devices being removed from two locations of former vice president and this is the scene in new castle, delaware, where a device addressed to vice president joe biden was zochltd there discove another device at a property owned by robert deniro, a critic of president trump's. we're looking at these two live scenes in the face of self others that played out yesterday. former presidents, former government officials, former democratic officials and we have a president blasting the media and somewhat argue each threatening the media, yesterday as well, a device was found at cnn.

so the media is a part of this pattern of attacks, which appears to be playing out as a pattern against either democrats or those critical of president trump. we don't know who did it. but we can see a pattern. and we can feel the fear. and we can feel the terror and we can see a president sewing even more doubt and putting even more hatred and divisiveness into this very, very precarious situation. it's disturbing at the very least, tom bevin. >> well, look, the other thing, you know, you know trump. we've all seep how trump operates. he certainly does and not unjustifiably always feels like he is under assault from etch, including the media. i saw the reaction to his tweet yesterday condemning the violence. a bunch of folks came out and said he didn't say this. he wasn't good enough n. trump's mind, he's never going to be

good enough. so that's what leads him to spin around. he feels like he's not getting a fair shake. he feels like he's unresolved. >> that leads to the tweet this morning. >> i'm more interested about the mindset of the president in the white house. i don't understand -- i don't understand not hearing more from them, either step out and speak like nikki haley just did and she spoke quite clearly in the past week, about violent rhetoric and divisiveness and hatred and spoke pointedly. but why stay in, if the president flouts and makes fun of what you are trying to get him to do, which you know at this point has very high stakes and people's lives are at risk. the president last night at his rally actually made fun of the fact that everyone was behaving and being nice, which was clearly making fun of the jim messina in the white house of

today. or john kelly. or anyone else who helped make the statement of unity that he made in light of this news burst breaking out. what's going on in the mindset there? why stay in at this point? why stay silent? >> i agree they are aiding and abetting this guy and sameing i'm making him better. he was in my home state of montana last week. >> if this is better, we are in bad shape. >> we are in trouble. he was in montana and celebrated the person that body slammed a reporter and talked about how great a guy. that is violence. >> that member of congress was investigated for violence. you don't celebrate that. you walk away from it and condemn it. he can't do it. it goes back the white house is under other president has operated very bipartisanly, very clearly about getting normal things done, running the government. you don't have anyone who is actually doing that anymore.

even his daughter who people think is the real power there. she sends out a tweet this morning condemning it. she doesn't get her father to do it. she has no ability to get her to do anything the white house chief of staff has a tenuous relationship at best. you and i couldn't name one of the deputy chiefs of staff or what they do all day. there is no process. they have half the positions in the government. they're not running a real government. they're running a twitter feed, it's a wildly successful one. it's one in the past two weeks, you seen the poll numbers close and his base get excited. that's what donald trump is good at. >> jim messina, tom bevin, thank you both. >> keep it on "morning joe." we'll be right back with more developments on the breaking news, two more suspicious devices found, one addressed to joe biden and the other at a property owned by robert deniro, a critic of president trump. we'll be right back.

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. we have breaking news, two explosive devices one mailed to actor robert deniro, another no former vice president located today at a postal office in delaware. let's bring back in nbc news justice correspondent pete williams. what more can you tell us? >> the assumption is the package addressed to de niro was, in fact, mailed. we know for sure the one to joe biden was mailed. yesterday authorities thought they knew that the biden one was in the system, even though they hadn't placed their hands on it. because a postal worker had said that he or she remembered seeing it. and so they were trying to find out where it was in the system and this morning it was found at a postal facility in new castle, delaware. looks just like the others. i don't believe they've opened it up. but they believe it's sufficiently like the others. that it's being sent to the fbi lab for analysis. this brings to nine, really, the

number of nine pockages that are all pretty much the same, and of course we can't rule out there may be others in the system. now, the one that biden was known about yesterday. the one to de niro was probably delivered yesterday. and what we believe is a worker at the facility remembered seeing it and saw the pictures last night, like the ones we just showed, of what these devices looked like and called the nypd. they went there this morning and found it and took it away. so those were all delivered. none of these that were found today were -- they were probably all mailed at the same time as the supposition. we can't rule out the possibility that others may be in the system. one other note here, we know that most of them were mailed because some of them were found -- most of them were found in the mail system and disrupted before they got to the recipients. but we believe at least two of

them were not mailed but delivered. the investigators believe the one to george sorros, the first one, that was found monday, was placed in his mailbox. not mailed. and some law enforcement officials continue to say that the package and cnn is saying this as well that the package to them was delivered, not mailed. so that raises an additional question. and obviously an additional line of inquiry for the investigators to look at to try to figure out if on surveillance cameras or witness identification they can figure out who was delivering these by hand and if that's the case, then someone in the new york area is either doing these bombings or assisting the bomber if, in fact, they were delivered. >> extraordinary, that both of the packages we're talking about this morning, sent to de niro and biden, identified by a sharp-eyed witness, a worker at de niro's building in that case and the postal worker in the case of biden's package. you mentioned, pete, and mayor

de blasio was here, he raised the same possibility there are more packages. from your law enforcement sources, is that just an open-ended possibility or do they have specific information there are, in fact, more packages floating around? >> no specific information. the mayor has said as much. it's just simply the idea that why should we think it's over yet. >> right. >> when they keep trickling in. so they don't know it. they're obviously looking for it. their hope is, you know, some of these packages were delivered or received in the mail without anybody knowing what to look for. now that the pictures have been out there, the hope is that before they ever get delivered, before they ever get put in anybody's hands, they will be stopped in the system as the one to biden was. although the biden was they were looking for because they believe they saw it go through. >> thank goodness none of these packages reached their intended targets and exploded or took any lives or caused any injuries. pete williams, thank you very

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discourse, and certainly the president is calling on everyone to come together. if you have a problem with one another, let's voice that, but let's do so peacefully and let's do that at the ballot box. >> that was sarah huckabee sanders on fox responding to a question about the president's tweet this morning, which you can see right there, and is struggling to most people who are concerned about the state of our democracy at this point. there's so much there i think it's almost too dangerous for me to respond directly to. so i'll close by saying this. republicans and voters, this is in your hands. it's on you at this point. we're not going to get much from the presidency at this very difficult moment in our history. noah, final thoughts? >> yes, it's completely irresponsible for the white house to get out in front of this investigation, for republicans to get out in front of this investigation, or to assume blame for the actions of one deranged individual when we

don't know what motivated them. what we do know is we're in a dng russ political moment. everyone needs to put the brakes on it. by everyone, i mean everyone. and civility is fine but incivility is dangerous if it radicalizes people who are subject to radicalization. we all need to be conscious of our -- of our responsibility in this moment. >> susan. >> to every republican running, this is your john mccain moment. this is your time to call out this president, specifically on this tweet. go and show leadership, show courage and simply do the right thing. >> and willie geist, wrap up the show. >> this is not a political food fight. this is an ongoing act of widespread terrorism that's taking place. we're watching it happen on television. we had seven yesterday. we have two more today. one to biden, one addressed to robert de niro. let the fbi perform its investigation. find out who's behind this and why this person or these people did this.

and, again, thank law enforcement and security at this building, at the time warner center and all across the country who are in -- and the postal offices who are intercepted these packages because thank god no one has been injured and killed in what is a widespread act of terrorism. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up our coverage right now. >> i'm stephanie ruhle and we begin today with this breaking news on the apparent serial bomber. the targets, all of them prominent democrats and all of them singled out for criticism by president trump. just this morning, two more suspicious packages were found. one addressed to former vice president joe biden and the other addressed to actor robert de niro. this brings the number of packages to nine. all appears to share similar characteristics. we can now report that all nine contain pipe bombs like the one on your screen. i have a fantastic panel to help