hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in new york. the breaking news today, federal law enforcement officials arrested a florida man suspected of orchestrating the mail bomb campaign against critics of donald trump. the arrest comes as three additional explosive devices were found. the new targets included senator kamala harris, senator cory booker, and james clapper, the former director of national intelligence. the suspect, cesar sayoc, 56, is from aventura florida, just north of miami. he's a registered republican, and a van covered with pro-trump stickers was also seized this morning. the president responded to news of the arrest at an event earlier today. >> these terrorizing acts are despicable and have no place in our country. no place. i have instructed authorities to spare no resource or expense in finding those responsible and

bringing them to swift and certain justice. and we will prosecute them, him, her, whoever it may be, to the fullest extent of the law. we must never allow political violence to take root in america. cannot let it happen. and i'm committed to doing everything in my power as president to stop it. >> the scripted on-camera statement came after a series of early-morning tweets in which trump teed off on cnn, one of the recipients of a pipe bomb earlier this week, and bemoaned the impact of the attempted attacks on his political standing, tweeting, quote, funny how lowly rated cnn and others can criticize me at will, even blaming me for the current state of bombs and ridiculously comparing this to september 11th and the oklahoma city bombing. yet when i criticize them, they go wild and scream, it's just

not presidential. and this. republicans are doing so well in early voting, and at the polls, and now this bomb, in quotati quotations, stuff happens and the momentum greatly slows. news not talking politics. very unfortunate. what is going on? republicans go out and vote. also this afternoon, the senior leadership of the justice department and fbi briefed reporters on the arrest and took the rather extraordinary step of asserting that the bombs allegedly sent by sayoc were not hoaxes and made clear that the nation's premiere law enforcement agency is still standing strong today despite a near constant barrage of attacks from the president. >> we can confirm that 13 ieds were sent to various individuals across the country. each device consisted of roughly six inches of pvc pipe, a small clock, a battery, some wiring, and what is known as energetic

material, which is essentially potential explosives and material that give off heat and energy through a reaction to heat, shock, or friction. though we're still analyzing the devices in our laboratory, these are not hoax devices. i want to focus for a moment on the amazing work of our folks at the fbi lab. based on their initial analysis, they uncovered a latent fingerprint from one of the envelopes containing an ied that had been sent to congresswoman maxine waters. we have confirmed this fingerprint is that of cesar sayoc. there is also a possible dna connection between samples collected from pieces of two different ieds mailed in separate envelopes and a sample previously collected from sayoc in connection with an earlier arrest down in florida. >> here to take us through the latest developments, some of our

favorite reporters and friends, nbc news investigative reporter tom winter, frank figliuzzi, former federal prosecutor paul butler, and jonathan lemire, white house reporter for the associated press. tom, take us through the developments this afternoon. a very fast-moving process from the fbi from the time they found that fingerprint to when they made the arrest. >> nicolle, that's absolutely correct. i mean i think as we've been talking about for the past several days, every single device that did not explode. every single package that was additionally sent gave them another crack at it, if you will, another chance to see if there was something here that could tie a person to these packages. that's exactly what happened. you just heard fbi director christopher wray say it was a fingerprint. and in florida when you're booked and in most states when you're booked, you have to submit fingerprints. i actually have, if we want to be able to see it right now, the fingerprints that belong to the person that's arrested today. 24

this is from a misdemeanor case, but they would have been in law enforcement r0rds. in addition to that, since he was convicted of charges, his dna would have been put into the florida department of law enforcement's dna database. and according to the criminal complaint, that was also helpful. that's also what the fbi director said. here you had actual physical evidence that drew them directly to this person that you're looking at onscreen right now. in addition to that, they were able to look at his social media postings. >> they're unbelievable. >> the misspellings -- well, we could talk about that for the next three shows. but the social media postings had one particular bit of evidence in there that i think helped them. his misspellings of certain people that he mailed these packages to, when he referenced them in his social media postings, they were misspelled the exact same way. this actually draws back to something that was done when the unabomber was -- when they finally found out who that was. it was some of the things he said and the way he said them that led them to that. you read a tweet from the president regarding cnn. cnn is actually referenced in

the criminal complaint in graph 25 where they make a note that on the van that they recovered today, sayoc's van that they recovered today, they said that it was covered with images including images critical of cnn. so the fact that he mailed two packages to people at cnn, james clapper and john brennan, care of cnn, that was referenced in the complaint was one of the reasons why they told a federal judge that they wanted to be able to arrest this person, and they wanted to be able to charge him. they actually talked to the judge over facetime. they didn't even have time to see the judge in chambers. they swear in here that they actually used facetime to be able to say, hey, your honor, these were the facts of the case and this is what we're presenting here today, and we swear that this is true. so that should go to your initial question, which is just how fast this developed today. >> frank, can you speak to the juxtaposition of the professionalism as we've been talking about, the speed with which this i guess now arrested

suspect was identified by the fbi, the high-tech lab that was put into place, the use of dna evidence, and then the tone and tenor of what we heard from the commander in chief this morning bemoaning his treatment from the media at a time when he had to have been getting briefed, i would assume. every other president in history gets briefed on a situation like this whether it's the d.c. sniper or any other situation like that, bemoaning the fact that the news isn't covering politics, something that i guess he assumes is more beneficial to him. just speak from the law enforcement perspective about how jarring that might be. >> i think all americans need to be grateful for the fact that we have law enforcement agencies that can maintain professionalism and a sense of mission and urgency even in the face of an administration that has denigrated them, derided them, and even today does not celebrate this victory for justice but, rather, puts it back on himself. that he is a victim.

he gets attacked, and it's everyone else's fault. so the men and women of the fbi, postal inspectors, secret service, law enforcement generally did their job, did it well for the american people, and we've got to keep that in mind every day we hear something to the contrary, nicolle. i'm struck by a couple of things today, though, what we didn't hear from the white house, which was the letters fbi never came out of the president's mouth. he should be thankful to that organization. but, again, we have a president who is fearful of what the fbi's investigating and can't come out and congratulate the premier law enforcement agency of our nation. >> joining us now by phone is former cia director john brennan, who as we've been reporting, was one of the targets of this now arrested suspected mail bomber. director brennan, your thoughts today on the news of the arrest and on mixed messages coming out of the executive branch of government? >> well, nicolle, i think like all other americans, i am very

happy, relieved, and admiring of the tremendous work of law enforcement and fbi, nypd and others. there's been such tremendous advancement in investigative techniques and tactics and tools over the years, that i was pretty confident that in light of all of the evidence that was being accumulated, that they were going to find out who did this. so as christopher wray and others have said, we need to make sure we maintain our vigilance. there could be some other packages out there. there could be other individuals who might try to do something like this. but i think it does really speak to a need to be able to have the type of discussions and engagements and debates in this country without resorting to this type of violent activity. and so, again, i hope that this has galvanized, i think, this country in a very good way. i'm also very, very thankful for the media for being able to share information with the

american public on a regular, ongoing basis that i think really was responsible for allowing individuals to remember seeing a package and calling authorities. that's one of the reasons why wwe have such an open and free press. >> director brennan, you were sent a pipe bomb. it was sent to you at the wrong network. it was sent to you at cnn. you were targeted. this wasn't the first attempt, though, to silence you. this was by a critic of the president. but the president's stripping of your security clearance was viewed by many of us as retribution for your criticism of the president. do you worry that people out there will become afraid of criticizing this president because of the climate, because of his inability to understand a potential linkage between the tone and tenor of the political debate in this country and the actions of people who may be mentally unwell or determined to

harm others? >> well, this country's history is full of examples of individuals who have given their lives and made supreme sacrifice as well as just dedicated their professional lives and responsibilities to ensure that those principles upon which this country was founded, you know, freedom of speech and liberty, are going to thrive. and we have to remember who we are as americans and what this country is all about. and i certainly hope that this instance is not going to deter individuals from engaging in, i think, a very important and necessary public debate about the future course of this country and what we do. and so these efforts to intimidate or to silence, i certainly do not believe that it is going to have its intended effect. and, indeed, we don't want to allow these individuals who

resort to these types of tactics to achieve their objectives. and i think it's important for americans from all different political backgrounds and affiliations to denounce these activities in no uncertain terms, that this is totally, totally unacceptable. i think with that type of condemnation, national condemnation, it will allow this freedom of expression, this freedom of speech to continue to thrive in this great country of ours. >> do you see a direct link between the fact -- we looked just at october. we looked at donald trump's political rallies, the speeches, the people he's targeted just this month. and every single person, i think, who received a bomb has been a target of either a harassing tweet, a critical tweet, or a shoutout from donald trump in his rallies. do you worry that there are more people out there who, again, may be unstable, may be unwell, may be prone to violence, that are

hearing the wrong thing from his kind of vitriolic political speech? >> well, with a public voice that is heard and has impact, he really needs to think about what the potential negative and dangerous implications are of the types of things they say and how they say it. so i think there's a time for everybody up to and including donald trump to maybe reassess what they say because it could have consequences that may be unintended by these individuals who speak out. i need to look at the things i say and how i say it, but i think everybody should reflect now. the nature of the discourse in this country has gotten to such a fever pitch, and it has now generated such emotional reaction from people that we need to be judicious in what we say and how we say it.

but, again, i don't want this recent -- these recent developments to in any way suppress the voices, including the criticisms of policies from all different political quarters. this cannot happen. but i do think there's an inherent responsibility that we all have, including myself, about what we say and how we say it. >> director brennan, we're glad you're safe. we're glad you're one of our colleagues and we're grateful for you joining us this afternoon. thank you. paul butler, let me get you to weigh in. pick up on director brennan's real clear articulation of the importance of having critics not just of the president's policies, not just of the president's affinity for autocrats, but of the conduct. i mean i'm surprised by the timidity with which some people approach this idea. a president, if he does nothing else, he sets the tone for the political conversation in this

country for better and/or for worse, no? >> absolutely. so i like to join director brennan in giving the shoutout to the fbi that the president did not. you know, the last time the fbi was in the news was when it was badly misused by the president in the kavanaugh investigation. and today it demonstrated to the world why it remains the preeminent law enforcement agency in the world. and so, you know, one of the concerns is when it does investigations, whether people have confidence that something bad happened. and, you know, yesterday and today, there were all these conspiracy theories that this was something that the democrats had done or progressives had done, and the president put "bomb" in quotation marks when he tweeted about it this morning, which is why i think the justice department kind of clapped back today when they

said, this was not a hoax. this was real. and many american lives were in danger. >> i want to ask you about that. the attorney general, jeff sessions, took to the podium and said that the arrest -- the man who was arrested was a partisan. director wray took to the same podium and said this was not a hoax. that was hours after the president put "bomb" in quotations. why did the president put "bombs" in quotation? >> we had a tweet from lou dobbs from fox business network yesterday suggesting this was a fake. >> fake bhoombs. lou dobbs tweeted fake bombs. >> candace owens tweeted yesterday as well that she believed it was a democratic hoax. she was at the white house today at that event the president spoke at this afternoon. his own son favorited tweets that suggested it was a hoax. >> can we put up the president's

tweet where the board bombs is in quotes? >> this has been an evolution for the president. we have seen this before where he can stick to a script. he did the other day, suggesting this was a crisis and that the person needs to be brought to justice. >> that was wednesday. >> we saw him go off-script a little bit that night at the rally. he still was measured for him but while doing so kind of winked at the crowd and said look how good i'm being. >> why did we give him credit for what he read off a teleprompter six hours earlier? he basically negated it when he patted himself on the back. it's just ridiculous how low the bar is. thank god all of the bombs were either faulty or didn't go off, but this was an attempt to assassinate almost a dozen political leaders in this country. and we want to pat him on the back for reading a teleprompter? >> first of all he tweets at 3:00 in the morning suggesting that the coverage was unfair.

>> not sleeping well. >> apparently not. 3:14 a.m. suggesting that he wasn't being presidential. then we have this morning tweeting, not only did he put bomb in quotes, which seemed like a nod perhaps toward some of these people propagating these hoaxes. but also something like, hey, this national crisis is taking up too much media attention. it should be focused on my accomplishments, the republican accomplishments. we've got momentum going into the midterms. even today at the white house when he read scripted remarks and he said in those remarks the right things, praised law enforcement, said there's no place in this country for political violence, he did those things but then proceeded with what was a political event and in that event complained again that there was too much coverage towards the bombing scare ask not enough on his effort the other day to lower prescription drug prices. he is not a president, like so many of his predecessors, including your former boss, who would take times like this to really set aside politics, to call for national unity, to call for national healing. this president can do that

briefly in scripted remarks and then immediately sort of reveals his true self again, which is absolute a partisan warrior, one who is very concerned about the midterms less than two weeks away. >> who is totally unpresidential. the media doesn't describe him in any a other than the way he acts. i want to ask you your thoughts. you cover law enforcement. i thought that was a remarkable press conference from that briefing room. i thought it was remarkable that jeff sessions, a partisan conservative, but also someone trying to be faithful to that department that he leads, christopher wray, someone who has done a superb job trying to do some of donald trump's bidding, getting rid of the comey regime, made it abundantly clear that these were not bombs in quotes. these were bomb bombs. >> i spoke to someone and said, look, talk to me about these bombs. this is someone i've talked with a number of times over the years, really has expertise in

bombs. because this person is active in law enforcement currently, i'm not going to mention their name. but i said, what do you think here? you've looked at this. you've looked at the x-rays. this is your field. what do you say? he said, tom, it's a bomb. it has all the components to successfully detonate. the fact that it didn't go off doesn't necessarily mean it wasn't meant to go off. it doesn't necessarily -- it raises questions about motive, but it doesn't necessarily question the intent of this. all the components are there. and as these devices are analyzed, some may have been totally incapable of going off. others, we may have gotten lucky that they didn't go off. we're not sure. that's still ongoing. but the bottom line is as you heard the fbi director say today, this is the quote, these are not hoax devices. so you have pvc pipe. he said it was filled with a low explosive. he said it had a battery and it had a digital clock. so if this person wasn't capable of putting all that together, well, then that's on that person. but there's no doubt about it that if things had gone differently here, the potential

did exist for these bombs to go off. >> paul, let me give you the last word. what is the climate like for law enforcement as they now have to go try to root out and prevent any sort of copycat conduct from anyone else so inspired by the tone and tenor of the political discourse? >> yeah, you know, law enforcement in some ways, i think, feels it's working at odds with the commander in chief, with the nation's chief executive officer, who supports it when they're going after young, black, and latino men, but when they're going after him or investigating even national security, he doesn't seem to have the same concern. and, nicolle, how high the stakes are, are revealed by what's going on right now, which is that the fbi is treating this like a terrorist case. and in a domestic terrorist case, they have a somewhat controversial policy that when they interrogate suspects, they don't read the miranda warnings. so right now they are surrounding this man, trying to find out are there other bombs? are you working with other people?

this is very real. this is not a hoax. >> tom and paul, thank you very much. when we come back, just how far from normal is donald trump's conduct in the wake of a serial bombing campaign targeting his political rivals and critics? we'll show you. and a white house room so sacred, it's where president john f. kennedy and six other american presidents' bodies lay in repose when they died. today that room heard a chant most closely associated with donald trump's political rallies. also ahead, the president acknowledged today that the bombings are hurting him politically. we'll look at the hail mary passes the white house has thrown this week to rally his most fervent supporters. all those stories still coming up.

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our political opponents, though, are not our enemies. the press is not the enemy of the people. before we're democrats or republicans or independents, it sounds corny, but before that, we're americans. and here's what i hope. i hope that this craziness that's going on about these pipe bombs -- i hope and pray that our leaders are going to work to lower the temperature and our public dialogue. and i have faith the vast majority will do that because, folks, we're a lot better than this. we just have to remember who we are, what we stand for as a nation. >> two of the 13 suspicious packages found in recent days were addressed to that man, former vice president joe biden, and that was his unifying message this afternoon hours after federal authorities first identified a suspect. it was a call for unity and a cooling of tensions, a stark contrast to what's appeared on

donald trump's twitter feed in the last few days. in fact, trump's social media conduct is a far cry from the strategies past presidents have used in times like these, where trump attacked the media for negative stories and attacked twitter for his follower count today. listen to how his predecessors handled moments of crisis. >> when our citizens are abused or attacked anywhere in the world, on the direct orders of a hostile regime, we will respond so long as i'm in this oval office. >> it was an act of cowardice, and it was evil. the united states will not tolerate it, and i will not allow the people of this country to be intimidated by evil cowards. >> the object of terrorism is to try to force us to change our way of life. it's to force us to retreat. it's to force us to be what we're not, and they're going to fail. they're simply going to fail. >> but as americans and as a nation, we will not be

terrorized. we will not cower in fear. we will not be intimidated. i've updated leaders in congress and both parties and we've reaffirmed on days like this, there are no republicans or democrats. we are americans united in concern for our fellow citizens. >> joining us now is a.b. stoddard, columnist for real clear politics, jason johnson, politics editor for the root, and the rev al sharpton, president of the national action network and host of politics nation here on msnbc. we were together wednesday when the suspect hadn't been identified. three more persons targeted, three more devices uncovered this morning. fbi making clear they don't know how many more could be out there. but your thoughts on both the day's developments and the president's conduct? >> well, one, it's good to see that the fbi and national security agencies continue to do their job with vigilance despite

the fact that they've been bludgeoned by this president for the last year for supposed incompetence and corruption. our lives, as much as i may have criticisms of how law enforcement operates in this country, they are still our line of defense against maniacs and terrorists out there. but i have to say, nicolle, and this has always been a problem with this president. he has always shown a sympathy or dismissiveness towards trim. he is a terrorist sympathizer, i mean given the way he responded to what happened in charlottesville, give how he responded to khashoggi, given how he puts what happened today in context of how it affects the midterm elections, we don't have leadership in this country when it comes to domestic terrorism. this president foments it as much as he is occasionally forced to speak against it. unfortunately it's going to take men and women like ourselves and people in the media and day to day americans to fight against this because we will not get the kind of verbal or moral leadership we get from anyone in this administration. >> frank, i want you to jump in

on that point and talk about whether or not it impedes the efforts of law enforcement. i know domestic terrorism doesn't get the kind of attention and fanfare that terrorist attacks hatched and plots from overseas do. but talk about how law enforcement fights that threat and if they see the president as somewhat indifferent or not as agitated by domestic terror as he is by, you know, potential actions from a caravan of what appear to be asylum seekers to me coming toward this country from central america. >> yeah. so first, look, there's two aspects to this. whether or not the president is impeding the work of law enforcement and intelligence, and then even more important question, is he actually contributing to the problem by generating the problem itself? if you're a secret service agent tonight, an fbi agent tonight, i think you're probably thinking this was waiting to happen. this was a crisis waiting to happen, and that our nation experienced a near miss this

week. but it could have been so much worse. and the issue of leadership during a time like this cannot be overstated. the leadership is either going to come from the white house as examples that you just played in video clips, or it's going to come from congress refusing to weigh in with this and stepping up and calling the president out, saying, that's not right. we're going to do this differently. neither one of those is happening right now. so if you're among the men and women of law enforcement, you're knowing that the next one is coming. we may have escaped this one, but the next one is coming. nicolle, we had a man driving around in a van in the greater miami year with politicians in the crosshairs plastered all over his van, and no one called and said, i'm worried about this guy? this guy scares me? has this become our new normal where we're accepting of people with crosshairs of politicians on their cars? >> it's a terrifying thought,

but you want to take a stab at answering that question. >> i think that he's right. i think that, yes, we need to be glad tonight that law enforcement has done what they did, and i think that when you look at the fact that, yes, there's no moral leadership shown by this president, but he doesn't even have political instincts. if a man is running around the van with "make america great" all of this trump stuff and then those opposed to trump, he's got their photos all over the van, including some of us, me and two other colleagues here, you would think the president 11 days before midterms would say, and i don't want any supporting me to identify with any violence. it would be the political thing to do. if i was a republican candidate, i would want him to denounce it personally just like on the other sides he said, a vote for republican is a vote for me. he should reprimand them. when we've had situations in

civil rights and people become unhinged, we'd say, wait a minute. we denounce that. that doesn't represent us. when the congressman was shot when they were doing the congressional baseball game. >> congressman scalise. >> all of us came out and said, this is wrong. we denounce it. he has not even denounced someone who identified with his politics, less known given law enforcement the credit that they should have or even picked up the phone and called any of those that were targeted with these pipe bombs, which would have been the presidential thing to do. >> you're absolutely right. we've just reported that president trump and first lady melania trump at the time we came on here have not reached out to their predecessors concerning the pipe bombs addressed to this this week. a.b stoddard, the president this week announced that the pentagon would send 800 troops to the border, ostensibly to protect this country from a slow moving group of families, children, women, who are under the camera coverage of another network

24/7, moving very slowly. i think they're about 1,200 miles away from the southern border. that decision was made to send those resources to the southern border, which already has a wall and drones and several law enforcement agencies protecting it. and i'm not aware of any actions he took personally to help catch a serial mail bomber targeting his political rivals. are you? >> i mean, nicolle, the tweet this morning said it all. i know that he has really been outrageous on his twitter feed for three years running, or even before he was a candidate. but i do think this morning's one that you've had up onscreen is really one of the lowest of his entire candidacy and presidency. he was basically saying boo-hoo, the focus is off of the scary caravan that i keep trying to spotlight and highlight and is all i want to talk about. and i can't believe we have to deal with this bomb stuff in quotes when people -- when the lives of former presidents, not to mention people in mailrooms

and security details across the country's lives were at risk these last few days. they probably couldn't sleep. god forbid something happened to them. and he -- he's never going to take this with the seriousness with which his job requires. he's held to a higher threshold. the burden on him is bigger. he refuses to accept it. we've seen that again and again. i think the problem for me this week is really watching republicans who continue to abdicate their own responsibility at these moments and people in your party, nicolle, who could have stood up and said, you know what? actually, i mean they tweeted about, we don't want violence, this and that. but what about something today after this tweet? why is lindsey graham, you know, always trying to calm the president down and then pleading with him in his twitter feed for moral leadership to stand up to the saudi government, but he couldn't say today, that's not what we're talking about. we're not trying to use this for political gain and scare people about the caravan just to juice

the early voting totals for republicans. i'm just stunned that they would read that and watch the way he's comported himself the last 72 hours and continue to be quiet. >> it's galling. it's galling. it's nothing short of galling. do you have an answer to why they sent 800 troops to the southern border to ostensibly protect this country from a slow-moving human tragedy, and they didn't do anything that we know, jonathan? do you have any reporting on why the priority was on what is obviously to the president a fake news media event? he wants us to go back to covering -- we shouldn't call it a caravan. it's a slow-moving human tragedy. >> that's right. i think there are two things at once here. you'd like to think that general mattis and the pentagon would not be involved in something that is specifically for political purpose. >> but they are. >> but the timing of this is such, just less than two weeks from the midterms, where it's hard to read anything other than politics. >> they were involved in putting babies in cages. that happened on military bases, and now they're involved in sending 800 troops to the border to protect us from a slow-moving

human tragedy full of families and children. >> they're taking their orders from the commander in chief, who wants certain issues to be at the forefront in the final stretch here. the republicans, people in the white house, people close to trump have been feeling really good the last couple weeks about where things were. they do feel like they got a burst of energy after the kavanaugh hearings. they do think as cynical as it may be, i talked to someone close in the white house who said the caravan is the best thing for us. but the more fox news shows that overhead view of those people walking 1,000 miles from the bird, it looks menacing. and you're seeing that today. i mean you're seeing that frustration from the president in the tweet today. that's what he wants to be talking about, not this mail bomber. >> frank figliuzzi, thank you for spending some time with us. when we come back, even as donald trump condemned the quote, terrorizing acts of the suspected mail bomber, his effect on the political discourse was on full display from the crowd. we'll show you what we're talking about. r and totals it.

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we get these poll numbers, and a lot of them are fake polls. i call them fake polls. >> cnn sucks! >> come to think of it, who gets attacked more than me? ben? does anybody -- i am -- i get attacked. i get attacked. maybe more. maybe. maybe more than anybody. i can do the greatest thing for our country, and on the networks and on different things, it will show bad. they will take it back. >> fake news. >> he goes fake news. they said america first, that could be racist. i said racist? racist? why is that racist? here we are, i think does everybody in this room agree? you're living in america. america first, right? >> usa!

usa! >> quite a sight in the white house earlier today. the president delivering remarks to the young black leadership summit in what sounded to the ear more like a maga rally than an east room gathering. the crowd at times chanting usa, build the wall, lock them up and fake news. joining the conversation, peter baker. a.j., jason, the rev and jonathan are all still here. peter baker, you have covered and i have worked many events in the east room. the east room is where president john f. kennedy's body lay in repose along with the bodies six other american presidents after they died. i have never seen it house a crowd chanting "fake news," chanting "cnn sucks." i wonder if there is a string to be drawn between the political discourse and the conduct of groups that go to the white house. >> well, every president, as you know, tries to draw at least some distinction between a political event and a policy event or a white house event, a presidential event.

in theory you're spot supposed to use the white house as a prop for a campaign although some some ways obviously it's unavoidable. but the appearance of this particular event made it look like, as you said, another rally before the midterm elections. and at a time when the country is clearly rattled, at a time when clearly some people in the country are rattled by these pipe bombs, rather than give reassurance, rather than, you know, preach a different kind of message, he read the script earlier that he was given, said the things that a president is supposed to say, and then moved on back to the normal, you know, divisive kind of rhetoric that he prefers. he's not somebody who wants to be a unifier. that's not his political approach. it's not his style. it's not what got him to where he is today, and he resents the people who have been criticizing him. he resents cnn. he resents msnbc. he resents in the critics in the press and on the left who said he's responsible for this atmosphere that might have, you know, encouraged this kind of action. >> jason johnson, i'm not

someone who has become numb to any of this. i'm shocked and rattled by all of it. but one of the most jarring things i've seen having worked in that building every single day for 6 1/2 years was to hear the chants in this room, this room that is so sacred. i think wars have been ended in that room. and to hear it sound like a maga rally on the day that a trump-aligned suspect, someone suspected of orchestrating a serial bombing campaign to mete out domestic terror to donald trump's political rivals was beyond jarring. >> nicolle, i'm like you. i won't allow myself to get numb to the way that this president basically bespoils efrverythingn the room. but i'm going to speak at an even deeper level about what was going on there. this is a young black republican group. turning point usa. this is a testament to sort of overall authoritarianism and

violence this president encourages. one, they blocked all black press from being able to come to the event. i snow several reporters. we were initially given passes to go to this event and then they took them back because they didn't want anyone there who might possibly see the kind of violence this president was encouraging. furthermore, it is absolutely disgusting that in the wake of political opponents and people who are helping him to do his job, other people who supposedly care about america being threatened by life or death bombs, that he's concerned about attacks on himself. this president is a narcissist. this president is a terrorist sympathi sympathizer. we know these things. but more importantly, he is encouraging a generation of incredibly foolish young people -- and i want this to be clear. this isn't about republicans or democrats. this is about the trump personality cult. we know republicans. i know robert trainham. i know michael zeal. we all know african-american republicans. these are lost, disturbed, self-loathing people, who are part of a personality cult for a president who calls for domestic terrorism and a destruction of every norm that makes this

country great. and any opportunity he has to speak is an opportunity for us to be reminded of what an actual danger he is to everything we hold dear in this country. >> rev? >> every time we say that you cannot go lower than what donald trump has done, he proves us wrong. this was among the lowest things that he could ever do. to go in the east room, which is sacred, have a staged rally -- notice that all of those youngsters had caps on. it was almost like, we're going to dress you for the photo. and to call it a young black leaders summit, he raves about the violence in chicago, which he should. why weren't they discussing that? why weren't they discussing student loans? why weren't they discussing issues of young blacks? they just had kanye in there at least talking about criminal justice. none of that. they're in there talking about cnn sucks. they're in there talking about build a wall. why do you need a young black summit to do it because it was not a summit.

it was a make america great rally. the use of young blacks as props, which really is an insult to them. there are black republicans that have some dignity and have some issues they want to discuss. they're nothing wrong with those young blacks wanting to be republican, but it is something wrong with them being used as props so that he could take his shots against the media on a day that we watched cnn and others have to deal with bomb squads out in front of their door. >> i want to ask you, jonathan lemire, about the white house staff. does anyone try to coach the president? we know what his instincts are, and you've spoken to that, what we see laid bare at rallies and in his 2:00 a.m. tweets. what does the white house think or say or do in defense of this conduct? obviously when you work on the white house staff, you have an opportunity to shape the conduct or the public events. there's a lot of stagecraft. just pull back the curtain. i've staged a lot of these events. they're exactly as peter baker

described them and they're as you describe them. sometimes the people are props. small business events are the best. you go and find small business owners from battleground states and bring them in and talk about giving loans. every white house does it. but like all things with this president, they seem to debase what is a pretty, you know, cookie cutter process, bringing in a group and trying to make a point that advances your legislative or political agenda. what goes on at the staff level when a group of young supporters, i guess, of the president starts chanting cnn sucks, and the president's like a pig in you know what, reveling in it. >> the aides i talk to consistently say they feel like they can control the president to a point. they believe that, yes, they can feed him some remarks in a teleprompter, and he will read them, sometimes begrudgingly, but he will do that. we saw that today. but also the decision frankly that just to have him deliver those remarks in that setting at all is striking. i think most presidents perhaps, he would have gone to like the diplomatic room and read, this

is the update on the shooting and then an hour later, you have this event. again, young black republicans, that's fine, but that he combined the two. therefore you have this odd image when you had when he was doing the serious mood, you had cheers from the crowd. then when he -- >> you know what you'd do? you'd close it. you'd open up to the press the serious statement about the news of the day. >> then you go behind closed doors. >> then you say, we're going to close this event. >> but instead they left it open. he basqued in the cheers. we did hear the cnn sucks chants. >> and he never rep remandriman them. we just got the president on the south lawn. let's listen. >> -- law enforcement for having done an incredible job. the fbi, secret service, so many. i mean they just got together and did a fantastic job, like finding a needle in a haystack. so i want to congratulate them. as you know, i think everybody

wants to congratulate them. but they did a fantastic job. i'm going to north carolina right now. it's raining, so if you don't mind, i'll step out of the rain. but i really -- we're very proud of law enforcement. [ inaudible question ] >> i did not see my face on the van. i heard he was a person that preferred me over others, but i did not see that. there is no blame. there is no anything. you look at what happened to steve scalise, that was from a supporter of a different party. you look at what happened -- these incidents, they were supporters of others. i am just really proud of law enforcement. i think they ask did an incredi job and i will see you in north carolina.

[ inaudible question ] >> no, i don't think so. i think they were running a great campaign. people love what we are doing, love what we are saying. the republicans had tremendous momentum and then of course this happened where all that you people talk about was that, and rightfully so, it was a big thing, rightfully so. now we have to start the momentum again. i think the republicans have tremendous momentum. when you think of judge kavanaugh, when you think of all the things that have happened, and hopefully we are going to go on to a great victory. we have a lot of senate races where we're leading. races that, frankly, were going to be uncontested. it looks like we are leading a lot of those races. the houses, there are a lot of people in the house. we will see how that goes. i think we are doing very well in the house. [ inaudible question ] >> if they wanted me to. i think we will probably pass. thank you very much.

well, i think i have been toned down, if you want to know the truth. i could tone it up because, as you know, the media has been extremely unfair to me and the republican party. >> reporter: how? >> i think the media has been very, very unfair in terms of the republican party and the way it's been covered. and they understand that. they write articles about that. many of them admit that. but the media has been unbelievably unfair to republicans, conservatives, and certainly to me. but with all of that being said, we're winning. so i like that. thank you very much. thank you. >> i'm often rendered speechless these days. peter baker, i thought he was asked if he called the past presidents who received pipe bombs, and he said i'll pass unless they want me to. anything else stand out to you as we have been talking about all afternoon, conduct so far outside the range of what we normally see from a president of

a country in the throes of a domestic terror crisis? >> well, it's a president who feels grievance, right? he feels under attack himself. he doesn't feel any responsibility to help lead the country in a different path. he said he is not going to tone down, he might tone up because he has been restrained, in effect, is what he is saying. he doesn't see any connection. maybe there is not a connection. but you do normally see in situations like this a president rise above partisanship for a moment to talk about the national, you know, solidarity, national purpose, and this should not be a situation of us versus them when violence is threatened against major public figures, particularly the ones who are identified as his adversaries. but that doesn't seem to be his method here. he doesn't offer any kind of reflection or thoughtfulness in terms of how he sees this in

larger societal terms. >> kelly o'donnell joins us from the white house. he is a well known and i believe admitted consumer of cable news. i am going to go out on the limb and saw the criticism of not praising the fbi in his event with young black supporters earlier this afternoon, so he crossed that off his to-do list in this appearance. anything else stand out to you. >> reporter: i was struck, there was light rain coming down and he stood there and took questions from us. i asked if he intended to call former president obama or any others who had been targeted, and his response was, i've been asked to do so but i think we will pass. i asked if there was something more he could do to change how he is engaging politically, and his answer went into the issue of more midterm politics, not really dealing with this. the first question that he seemed to catch with respect to the suspect being in the supporter group was he was asked

if he had seen his own face on the van of the man taken into custody today. you heard him say, no, he had not seen it. that seems kind of surprising given how much coverage this has gotten today. he wanted to make a clear point that someone who supports him politically does not make him, the president, culpable for that. could the president do more, say more, change things in some way to affect how the political discourse is playing out, and he engaged a bit on that, said he thinks he has toned down but could tone up and is eager to get back into campaign mode. i think it will be critical to watch how he conducts himself tonight now that there has been an arrest and ongoing investigation happening. i thought about asking about had he contacted former president obama today or the others, who are named in this. once there is an arrest, that would be a reason to call given the fact that they have not been

in touch. so what used to be the normal sort of former presidents club of shared communication at the time of big events, that apparently does not exist anymore because this certainly would be a reason to place a phone call. perhaps others at the department of justice or fbi are reaching out to those who have been targeted. the president was clear he is going to take a pass, in his words. >> thank you, kelly. if you could stick around to the top of the hour. it is a remarkable reminder from kelly o'donnell that minute to minute the reporters covering this white house uncover the obliteration of new norms in a simple, he was standing, fielding questions on his way in the rain to the helicopter, and yet again another extraordinary deviation from the normal practice. not a law, not a requirement, the practice, the habit of calling a former president. we haven't had that many, only 45, who was targeted by an act of domestic terror this week. >> right. and that's what i expected him to say in wisconsin the other

night, was that he was stunned to hear that the lives of former presidents and their families could be threatened by this and this was -- you know, again, the perfunctory script he read from the teleprompter was nicely written by someone on his staff, but we expected more of a reference to this sort of wider threat that would include people who have served before him in that small group, exclusive group of people. the seriousness which that threat represented that it wasn't just sort of people at a rally being threatened or, you know, like shot down at a concert in las vegas. this was a seriously dangerous situation, and at least that's what we were led to believe. it was considered that way by law enforcement and it was confirmed today these were not hoax devices. instead of coming out he does a wink and nod and reads the

scripts but let's his supporters know this is something he is doing for a few minutes. the idea he turned to kelly and said, i'll take pass on calling former presidents under threat from pipe bombs is just extraordinary. >> and it also, jonathan lamire, speaks to the weakness of the people around him. no one can make him do the easiest and most functions of the presidency. >> they can control him to a point. >> what point? he puts pants on every day. what else are they getting done? >> one place they can't control him is the rally stage. that is where he is heading right now. he is off to north carolina to do another one of these rallies. >> did they talk about canceling it? >> no, there was no suggestion of canceling it. he had one the other day when the crisis was unfolding. now it's coming to a conclusion unless this individual had accomplices. no, there is no consideration of that. i think he would have rejected it anyway. he wants to get back to campaigning.

there are ten days to the midterms. that's his priority, particularly in the senate. you heard him say that reading between the lines. not much talk about the lines. it's keeping the senate. >> and we don't have to dig around to try to figure out how he feels about his political fate. he is scared. he tweeted it, rev? >> yeah, he tweeted it. he is focused on the senate. he knows if the house goes democrat and there is impeachment proceedings, they have to convict him in the senate. he is focused on donald trump. but we keep saying this is not our president's act. this is not how people act. it's not a common december is i. anybody would say the least he could have said to the question of whether he was going to call former president obama, well, i haven't, but i want him to know of my concern. nothing. there was no overture at all. any human being would say something because of the terror that their families are going through. it was sent to people's home.

your fbi director said this was no hoax. he doesn't have that in him, and i hope the american people see that. you don't have to hand somebody a script to tell them to sympathize with people who have kids in the house and somebody just sent a pipe bomb to the house. >> as good a place to stop as any. thanks to kelly, jason, peter, a.b., jonathan. that does it for us. hi, chuck. >> that's kwiquite the lead-in there. thank you. good evening. i am chuck todd in washington. breaking news amid chilling new developments in a case that now involves at least 13 explosive devices targeting democrats and trump critics. a press conference at the justice department in washington wrapped up just a short time ago. officially announcing that cesar sayoc, a 56-year-old from aventura, florida, basically north of miami, with a criminal history dating back to 1992, has been arrested and