here at 10:00 p.m. eastern for "the last word" and tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. eastern and 3:00 p.m thanks for watching. "deadline white house with nicolle wallace" starts now. hi, everyone it's 4:00 in the new york. midnight in riyadh, saudi arabia, where donald trump has now effectively turned over u.s. national security considerations that's according to one former senior national security official this former official described the president's statement today, in which he ignores and denies the intelligence community's assessment that the crown prince of saudi arabia was responsible for the murder of a permanent resident of the u.s. and a "washington post" columnist, as displaying an ignorance of how the world works, and says that we are now on fundamentally new ground in terms of u.s. foreign policy here was the president moments ago. >> they didn't make a determination, and it's just like i said, i think it was -- maybe he did, maybe he didn't. they did not make that assessment the cia has looked at it

they've studied it a lot they have nothing definitive and the fact is, maybe he did, maybe he didn't. if you look at raup iran what, they've done, they've been a bad actor. you look at what's happening in syria with assad with runs of thousands of people killed we are with saudi arabia we're staying with saudi arabia. and by the way, just so everybody -- i have no business whatsoever with saudi arabia couldn't care less >> of course, that's not how intelligence works and that's according to former intelligence official who also said today that the combustibility of mbs, the crown prince of saudi arabia, will surely come back to bite us. because of donald trump's statement today, there's also a great chance that the white house just stumbled into a major intel scandal. hear the questions that the democratic-run house intel committee just might want answered when was the president briefed on the intelligence community's assessment regarding mbs' role in the murder of jamal khashoggi?

when the president floated the saudi line about rogue killers being behind the savage murder of a u.s. resident, did the president already know, had he already been briefed that mbs was responsible? did the intelligence community describe khashoggi as an enemy of the state and member of the muslim brotherhood as donald trump did today in his statement? what u.s. government agency signed off on today's statement from the white house did any u.s. government agency signal any concern about that white house statement today that contradicts the intelligence community assessment and finally, what happens next now that the united states has signaled to nations like saudi arabia, russia, china, and others, that the united states is so fundamentally weak and so scared that we will tolerate all manner of human rights abuses including russia's killing of dissidents with chemical weapons? saudi arabia's slaughter of a u.s. permanent resident? what happens next? shortly after that statement was published, secretary of state pompeo briefed reporters

listen to what he said when asked about the future of the relationship between the u.s. and saudi arabia >> so, it's a mean, nasty world out there. the middle east, in particular there are important american interests to keep the american people safe. to protect americans not only americans who are here, but americans who are traveling and working, doing business in the middle east. it is the president's obligation, and, indeed, the state department's duty as well to ensure we adopt policies that further america's national security >> it's a mean, nasty world. i'm getting you just made it meaner and nastier but here to help us answer those questions, some of our favorite reporters and friends. white house bureau chief for the "washington post," phil rucker kim atkins, washington bureau chief for the "boston herald." ben rhodes, former deputy national security adviser to president obama. and karin jean pierre, move-

move-on.org. i want to start with you your thought. >> this is a truly appalling behavior from the president, on a scale of the worst events in the trump presidency, helsinki summit with putin. let me point out a couple things first of all, the reporting is the intelligence community has a high confidence assessment that mbs was responsible for this murder which by the way is anybody who follows saudi arabia closely would think about a team of people flying to a third country to kill someone and render them back to saudi arabia number one, that's the highest level of confidence the intelligence community can et. if that's true, trump lied about that today number two, they don't pop up out of nowhere with that to your point, nicolle, they've had information for some time, probably weeks, that led to that conclusion so the question that needs to be answered is, what did donald trump know and when did he know it about mbs' responsibility was he lying to the american people to create a cover story for someone who just killed a u.s. resident, a journalist for the woe"washington post" in a td country?

i think if i was the chairman of the house intelligence committee, i would want information that the cia had, all the raw intelligence the cia had about this murder so we can get to the bottom, first of all, of why donald trump has been lying to us and covering for saudi arabia what are the facts of this and the second point, nicolle, he's basically subcontracted out all the policy to saudi arabia what he and pompeo says is very dangerous. he's basically saying we're for sale he defends his policy by saying -- >> let me hit pause because i want you to contextualize two things for our viewers intel -- >> yeah. >> -- isn't like a crime movie where you find a dead body or a smoking gun. but the closest you get to it is an assessment from the intelligence community that something happened, and they are able to make the assessment that mbs ordered the killing of khashoggi because of their understanding of the regime. explain this regime. this is not a democracy where, you know, you just go rogue and kill a guy >> yeah. >> this is not a country where

you freelance. explain why the intelligence community has such confidence in the assessment that the crown prince ordered the killing of a u.s. permanent resident and "washington post" columnist? >> first of all, as pompeo said, we have a lot of interest in saudi arabia let's say without getting into secrets, we spend a lot of resources trying to know what's going on in saudi arabia, so we have lots of different forms of intelligence we can gather about what's going on there. okay without getting into sources and methods, let's just say they can piece together a pretty thorough picture of what is happening in the saudi leadership and who makes certain decisions. they would not arrive at this conclusion lightly the second thing is what's been going on there for the last couple of years is mohhammad bin salman has been destabilizing the kingdom trying to take a consens consensus-based family rule of saudi arabia and turn it into a total one-man/one-rule dictatorship at the same time, you saw in trump's statement today, for instance, he absolved mbs and saudi arabia any responsibility for a wa r in yemen they

initiated and escalated that risks millions of people with famine the callousness of putting all our chips on this guy, his own intelligence community has determined who was responsible for this murder, destabilized his own kingdom and put millions of lives at risk in yemen, i mean, it's an astonishing abdication of american leadership. >> there's something, phil rucker, maore stunning about thi move than even the helsinki response standing next to vladimir putin, he said i believe him, not my intelligence community because this is known. i mean, this -- the intelligence community got to the bottom -- this is an assessment that's been briefed to congress and surely it was briefed to the president before they went to capitol hill and briefed congress so how does the tick tock -- you're not going to need a special counsel to investigate this one congress is going to be able to subpoena the heads of american intelligence agencies, dan coats should pack his briefcase and his phone charger because he's heading up to capitol hill gina haspel is right behind him, i am sure. the heads of american

intelligence agencies are going to have to testify before congress as they did after 9/11 about what he knew and when we knew it about bin laden and they're going to have to -- i mean, congress will have all the answers in short order. >> yeah. nicolle, with all respect to our intelligence agencies, this has been painfully obvious to laypeople like us that the saudis orchestrated this brutal murder of the journalist and our reporting has shown that from day one, president trump has looked for reasons to excuse the saudi regime he was ignoring sort of the information that was out in plain view in the press every day. he was looking for holes in the cia's arguments as they began their own investigation. >> how deranged is that, looking for holes in the cia -- >> he's been looking for reasons to believe mbs to believe the crown prince. to stay friends with the saudis. he remembers that first trip he did abroad in may of 2017. the very first country he visited was saudi arabia riyadh the red carpet the flyover of jets leaving the trail of red, white and blue

smoke. that was a magical moment for him. and he holds this friendship with the saudis in high regard and he's very protective of it and been looking in private conversations with his advisers in the last two months 23ig y sg out how to deal with, responds to this murder he's been looking for ways to excuse mbs and ways to point the finger somewhere else even though his intelligence agencies have been arriving at a very different conclusion >> former national security official said to me the relationship, and even the relationship between the u.s. and saudi arabia is controversial and polarizing in this country after 9/11 and certainly the move toward saudi arabia and away from iran viewed by a lot of people as a reaction to the president's distaste for president obama's foreign policy but the relationship, no relationship in this country has ever before involved turning over our national interests to another. and the idea that the peace process runs through riyadh, these are just historically inane national security and foreign policy assessments

middle east peace does not run through riyadh. >> right. >> the idea that we can't exert any sort of control over iran or do what this president ran on which is ripping up the -- i mean, those are all in violation of our sort of against the intelligence community's advice. >> yes and this is a brand-new world when it comes to foreign policy in the trump administration. i mean, at the beginning, you said -- >> a kind of world is it >> you said it's evidence of the president's ignorance about how the world works. i don't think it it's so much ignorance as his own view. his trump view of how the world works. it falls directly in line with that there are a multitude of reasons. we can see why the president is defending saudi arabia one of it is this personal relationship he likes these strong-armed authoritarian figures. there's the relationship between the crown prince and jared kushner. there is the alliance between israel and saudi arabia and trump's very close relationship with benjamin netanyahu. >> yeah. >> there's his own personal financial dealings with saudi

arabia which he's spent a great deal of time today denying which only makes it seem pretty clear that that has something to do with this. there are multiple, a multitude of reasons, and, you know, gross i'm rights violations, if that's on the other side of trump's own reasoning, that side is going to lose we see that time and time again. we've seen that with vladimir putin. we've seen that with others. none of this, sadly, is a surprise. >> the other side of it is the human tragedy. and i want to just -- i think your publisher has a statement out. i want to read it to you, get your thoughts on what this is like at the paper. this was a colleague this was an american resident who was not just murdered, but brutally murdered. savagely dismembered and there's evidence there's a tape in the possession of the united states government of that savagery and the secretary of state, we played that tape, the president of the united states, stood up today in front of the world and said, ah, we're with mbs, we're with the saudis. what does that do to the hopes and the aspirations of sort of

anyone hoping that america is still that shining city on a hill for victims of human rights abuses >> it really puts a big hole in that hope. look, i'm going to quote a tweet that you put out last week which is really great, which is there is no bottom, we just keep falling. and when you say thad, i was like, that is exactly where we are. look, we used to be a country, there used to be a time where we were the ones trying to get other countries. we were the leaders in getting other countries to stand up against bad actors and in the last two years, under this administration, under trump, we are no longer the beacon of democracy and human rights across the country. he loves to embrace our adversaries and shun away our allies and this is where we are and he -- what we're seeing today, he did this with russia and we do need -- russia in the sense that he picked russia against our intelligence community. and we really, like, ben said, we need to do a deep dive to figure out what are his financial connections with not just with russia, now with mbs

>> yeah. >> what is -- >> conflicts. >> -- happening here there is a conflict. we need answers. >> do you think the house, i mean, the democrats control the house, they have the ability through the intel community. you think they'll get some -- >> i hope so i think they're going to try there is going to be an oversight, going to be subpoenas as we were talking about we have to figure out was the president lying like ben was saying that is really important to know >> and the criticism now is coming even from the president's own allies a statement just out from senator rand paul, i think fair to call him a trump apologist, goes after his decision not to punish saudi arabia and the crown prince he writes on twitter, "the president indicates that saudi arabia is the lesser of two evils compared to iran and so the u.s. won't punish saudi arabia for the brutal killing and dismemberment of a dissident journalist in their consulate. i disagree i'm pretty sure this statement is saudi arabia first, not america first. i'm also pretty sure john bolton wrote it

i know john bolton the explanation points are the childlike prose of donald j. trump. your thoughts? >> we're in a world that's much more dangerous for journalists because the message -- we're the country that used to stand up for the right of journalists to report and against this kind of behavior he just sent a green light to any dictator around the world who wants to literally chop up a journalist in a third country because they don't like what they wrote the world is much less safe for those children in yemen who are suffering under some u.s.-made bombs that are falling -- >> he green lit the saudi effort in that war. >> he green lit the effort in that war the world is much less safe because as your official told you, impunity, so what we learned about this man's personality in the last several months is truly chilling and so what happens if he gets into a war you know, all this rhetoric against iran do we want to go to war in a saudi versus iran regional conflict that could be a true

c -- we're in a world where the united states no longer promotes democratic values. people can no longer count on us where the president of the united states stood up in front of the world and said i'm not disputing that he might have done this, but they're giving us a lot of money, so it's okay america first. so he's basically saying, american foreign policy is for sale can you imagine any -- >> no. >> -- u.s. president -- >> no. >> -- ever from either party standing up and saying these people did something awful, but they're giving us tens of billions of dollars so i don't care >> he does such a volume business of scandal, of moral tress passion, and of lies he doesn't have his facts right on the business analysis, either i want to read this statement from the "post." "post" publisher and ceo fred ryan put out a statement saying, "president trump's response to the brutal murder of journalist jamal khashoggi is a betrayal of long-established american values and respect for human rights and the expectation of trust and honesty in our strategic relationships. he is placing personal relationships and commercial interests above american interests in his desire to

continue to do business as usual with the crown prince of saudi arab arabia president trump is correct in saying the world is a very dangerous place. his surrender to this state-ordered murder will only make it more so. an innocent man brutally slain deserves better as does the cost of truth and justice and human rights." this feels like a moment in this presidency. >> it is you know, and that was a really strong statement from fred ryan, and this whole incident over the last few months has been, i think, a really important moment for american journalism and for journalists around the world to fight for free press and to ask questions and to demand answers that we're not getting necessarily from the white house. and it's a challenge, i think, for president trump to figure out how to deal with this. he's not only at odds with his own intelligence agencies, with this assessment, but he's at odds with people in his administration including his own vice president who for years championed the freedom of the press, not only in the united states, but abroad pence was in asia just last week and fought for the freedom of a

couple of journalists there and then to see the boss doing this at home, it's just a complete 180 from what happened to the american values. >> how -- tell me how this -- so i was told by a former intelligence official that this kind of statement is a policy statement. it would not have gone out for interagency review how does a statement like this with eight exclamation points go out? >> well, i've never known john bolton to be a fan of explanation points. >> me, either. >> that statement was dictated if not completely at least in part by the president. >> by whom take me inside he rifted on what he believes, he dissed the intelligence community, said maybe they do, maybe they don't and someone just took it down like dictation and the press office puts it out >> i don't know who did the dictation and when you're putting that out a national security statement, there's a different press office that deals with that than sarah sanders and bill shine but i assume this was -- this is the president's view

this is what he wanted to say and it's what went out under the white house letterhead. >> i just want to -- public service announcement, anyone who saw it before it went out is also probably going to end up before the house intel committee. >> and another thing -- >> because this is a statement where you would need to know if those individuals, maybe they were junior staffers without clearances if they were senior staffers with access to any intel, it's been in the newspaper now. your paper covered it. that the intel community assessment is that mbs ordered the killing of khashoggi. >> that's correct. >> anyone who knew that and put the statement out better get ready -- >> the statement went against that assessment. the other thing the president did in that statement is maligned jamal khashoggi he advanced baseless theories about him, conspiracies about him that have been pushed by the saudi government there's no evidence that he's a member of the muslim brotherhood, there's no evidence that he's enemy of the state as the president advanced in that statement. >> it's a great point. your colleague, robert costa, wrote a story about that about how the bizarre alignment of

saudi arabia and conservative media was also advancing and advocating a whisper campaign. that also is a smear and a lie about cakhashoggi. is that also going to be of interest to noanyone with oversight responsibilities over the intelligence community, anyone that advanced those smears against khashoggi that called him an enemy of the state, i'm certain that is not the u.s. intelligence community's description of khashoggi. >> well, first of all, what's truly chilling about that is it's the same language that donald trump uses to describe the american journalists so he just described a journalist who was literally chopped into pieces in a third country as in the same way that he describes people who sit in the briefing room and ask him questions. i think the second point, nicolle, is what's really chilling also about that statement is, it kind of blends together the saudi narrative and the trump narrative. right? the saudi narrative has been this guy is a dangerous member of the muslim brotherhood. the trump narrative, we don't care what happened, let's move on it looks like it was coordinated.

i think one of the things we have to look at was jared kushner cooking this up with mbs? how did this -- >> and were they -- if it didn't come from the intelligence community, how did they learn that the line on khashoggi was that he was an enemy -- where'd they hear that and i would -- whoever typed up this statement, i would like to know where that line came from and i'm guessing the house intel committee will, too. here's john brennan, our colleague and former cia director's, reaction he tweeted, "since mr. trump excels in dishonesty, it's up to members of congress to obtain and declassify the cia findings on jamal khashoggi's death no one in saudi arabia, most especially the crown prince, should escape accountability for such a heinous act." i heard this from two other former national security officials thats, you know, if you thought the questions around wmd and in the administration in which i worked, the questions about yellow cake, a line inserted in the president's state of the union address, if you thought questions aroundscaw how else to talk about them, were important, you thought

congress dug in, this is just like those >> yeah. >> and congress will seek to declassify all of the intel around this incident and they will assemble a tick tock, little papers on a wall. they will learn all the facts. >> yeah. and they will ask these intelligence officials under oath, right? why would gina haspel or dan quotes want to lie, themselves, and put themselves at risk to serve a narrative that they -- >> they won't. >> -- didn't get to participate in, right? is they won't do it. as you said, i don't know where he thinks this is going. it shows he's truly going to dig in these next two years and test whether or not he can be subject to any accountability. he seems to only be getting worse with the knowledge that the democrats are about to have subpoena power, the democrats are about to control the house so it's setting up, we talked about the mueller investigation, there are going to be multiple constitutional crises where they're probably going to not try to turn over documents, they're going to try to withhold witnesses. it's going to be messy, but we have to stay focused on the core issue here, which is just the astonishing departure from american history and traditions. >> it's unbelievable.

>> to have him literally acknowledging that this took place and saying he doesn't care about it, it is a chilling, chilling thing. >> it is i think the most stunning departure from everything that was before donald trump was president after the break, she rubbed shoulders with world leaders, traveled around the world as part of her job on behalf of the president and her husband has a foreign policy portfolio all of his own. and now, news that she used her personal e-mail account while working in government. we know what happened to hillary clinton when that description applied to her what happens to ivanka trump now that she did the exact same thing? n, let's check it out! nice. he's pretty good at this. hm! it's like a game! (gasps) woo-hoo! got it! which car should we get? all of 'em! ooh, yeah! that one! this one looks nice. yes, and yes. i like this game. i think we're winning! delivery? where? (doorbell rings) (man) it's here! what? (announcer) save $1,000 from carvana black friday through cyber monday. then go see "ralph breaks the internet,"

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i guarantee you one thing, we're going to be talking about those e-mails every moment of every day. crooked hillary's e-mails. unless hillary gets indicted, which in if all fairness, she should be. how can hillary manage this country when she can't even manage her e-mails this is the biggest scandal since watergate. how about if she's running the country? she can't even run an e-mail she lied like a dog on her e-mails. she should be in prison. so we're going to get a special prosecutor and we're going to look into it >> it's just awfully good that someone with the temperament of donald trump is not in charge of the law in our country >> because you'd be in jail. >> so, in if politics, karma kicks in more quickly than in other walks of life, and it turns out that "lock her up" chant for hillary clinton's use of a personal e-mail account just might backfire on the trump family specifically on ivanka the "washington post" reports,

"ivanka trump sent hundreds of e-mails last year to white house aides, cabinet officials and her assistants using a personal account. many many in violation of feder records rules according to people familiar with the white house examination of her correspondence the discovery alarmed some advisers to president trump who feared his daughter's practices bore similarities to personal e-mail use of hillary clinton. some aides were startled by the volume of ivanka trump's personal e-mails and taken aback by her response when questioned about the practice she said she was not familiar with some details of the rules, according to people with knowledge of her reaction. did she watch her dad's campaign dad to the rescue, though. just within the last hour, president trump objecting to comparisons between his daughter and one-time political foe >> you're talking about all fake news so what ivanka did, it's all in the presidential records everything is there. there was no deletion. there was no nothing what it is is a false story. hillary clinton deleted 33,000

e-mails. she had a server in the basement that's the real story. >> joining us now, mike schmidt from "the new york times," mike schmidt, you cover the clinton e-mail story how did the republicans on the intel committee, how did they latch on to this issue and unearth what turned out to be some -- some, you know, controversial and classified material on her e-mail server, and is it possible that e vauiva with her foreign policy portfolio, presence on the world stage, donald trump left her in a chair at a summit and she poke in saudi arabia, she's been to the wall in israel she certainlyhas a lot of foreign policy in her portfolio as well. >> what tripped up clinton, sent a letter to the inspector ge eor general for the intelligence community and said, hey, go look at clinton's server and see if it there's any classified information there. the thing about the intelligence community, it's not hard for

them to find classified information. a lot of things are classified and they got under the hood and saw classified information and they told the fbi and that's where the problem started. so the question will be here, what will the house democrats do that now have power? will they ask the intelligence community to go in and look at the e-mails? and then what will they find will they find this similar problematic things and will that lead to the same series of events that we saw where the fbi has to go in and look at it and make a conclusion about whether the information was classified and whether it was purposefully put there and there should be charges. we're not there yet. we have no indication of that. but that is the path that happened to clinton. >> phil rucker, your colleague's great reporting that brought us this story talk about where -- how easily and how quickly we can get from what you reported last night, what we read in the introduction and a sticky situation for the who u.s. >> it will get really sticky if there's an immediate house

investigation in january which i assume there will be when democrats take over the majority inside the white house as well as outside of it, there are already bad feelings in the west wing about her as somebody who's entitled as somebody who wants to be on the staff and have the luxuries of being on the staff but also wants to be family and treated differently and the rules don't always apply to her. she can breeze in and out of the meetings when she wants to and talk to the president when she wants to and have special benefits in the office and that rubbed people the wrong way from day one and this e-mail use is another example of it and the fact that the explanation that she somehow didn't know the rules is sort of laughable to a lot of people who work in the white house because they all lived through the 2016 campaign. >> right. >> they are so familiar with the rules of that e-mail >> here's the deal maybe her dad wrote her a note, she didn't go to her ethics briefing that's possible. that's not snark that's possible. i mean, there are things you have to do when you go to the white house to, and i believe

hope hicks, the president, other staffers went. your paper and mike's paper reported on that but push a little farther on what you're talking about. i mean, john kelly, the white house chief of staff, is famously the other side of the power axis from jivanka and there have been a lot of reports, i think donald trump does the best leaking on television, with chris wallace, said kelly iscertainly is a bety for the kelly axis of power than the jivanka power. they look not only foolish, the same way people were critical of hillary clinton, thought the rules didn't apply to her and may have done what donald trump described in all the sound she may have just jeopardized national security. >> yeah, i don't know anything about the jeopardizing national security. >> i mean, if it turns out there's anything there she certainly will be guilty of everything donald trump accused hillary clinton of >> to the extent that there's a war internally between ivanka and jared and john kelly, this is a win today for john kelly.

clearly. and kelly, by the way, whose days may potentially be numbered, we hear all sorts of mixed reporting in the last few weeks from inside the white house. but there's been a feeling that he may not sort of last beyond the end of this year, that trump may be looking to a new chief of staff and he has his eyes on someone named nick ayers who's the v.p.'s chief of staff who's also a close ally of jared and ivanka >> can we dig into this national security point a little bit more yes, we don't know what, if anything, sensitive was in any e-mail that she sent but there's a reason that you have rules like this at the white house. it's not just for fun. it's for national security it's important and we are seeing this administration, whether it's president trump's refusal to give up his own phone, the use of this private e-mail address, which was set up after the election, the use of e-mails by ivanka who was sending e-mails to government officials, even before she had a defined role within the white house it's just a complete disregard

to rules that are in place to protect national security at a time where we have adversaries who most likely have, you know, bugged everything they can possibly bug to find out this is really important it's not just, oh, well, hillary did it, too. you can't forget the reason why these rules exist. >> i'm thinking that our adversaries might not need to bug us for much longer trump gave the russians classified information in the oval just said to saudi arabia, no big whoop, you know, the dismembered journalist, putin -- i'm not sure it's worth their time and tact anymore. >> fair point. fair point. >> this does kind of connect to what we were talking about last segment which is that, you know, jared and ivanka have had a lot of relationships with foreign leaders. including saudis and emiratis, right? and i'd want to know were they conducting some of that relationship on personal e-mail? you know, because that is a national security issue. not only is that vulnerable to hacking, it's also voiding, despite what trump says, it's avoiding the presidential

record right? >> right. >> again, it needs to be looked at as this love fest was developing between mohammad bin salman, jared, ivanka may have been involved in that relationship as well were they conducting some of the conversations with the saudis or emiratis or other people in the region on personal e-mail accounts and if i was a democrat, i'd want to know the answer to that question. >> and mike schmidt, one of the things, the closest parallel to me, seems to be the response the response from the white house was almost textbook, everything you think you'd learn not to do from the hillary clinton response the sort of saying, having a lawyer do it, the very defensive -- and donald trump who sometimes has a couple-day delay to your stories or phil rucker's story seemed very briefed on this issue when he went out to the south lawn today. if you could sort of project forward based on the response today what you think might happen next? >> i mean, basically, it will all come down to the question of classified and that was the issue with clinton and they never really anticipated that problem coming up. they didn't think it would be the issue that it was.

then when it came, it really came and was vicious the -- what will need to be seen here, is there a way the intelligence community gets into the e-mails? is there, like, a way, an avenue in where they start to go through in the same way they did on hillary's and look line by line for different things? you know, remember things like the drone program are classified even references that are in newspaper articles can be seen by the intelligence community as classified and this sort of gets back to this larger point about trump that i think we sometimes, like, miss, is that he came down to washington and he never really seemed to want to change to the sensibilities of washington. he sort of wanted to continue to sort of have the new york sensibilities that he had before whatever he was doing up there and he never appreciated those nuances. this seems like an example of that, where clearly post-2016 election, e-mails like this would be a problem >> mike schmidt, thank you for spending some time with us we're grateful. up next, political projection takes on new meaning in the trump white house so does political incompetence

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ivanka trump's personal e-mail scandal isn't the first humiliating act of hypocrisy to take place in the trump white house. it's not even this administration's first scandal over a private e-mail server ivanka's husband, jared kushner, the one who's in charge of middle east last year came under fire for the very same thing and the president, himself, just recently made headlines as we've been discussing for using a personal phone to discuss government business. with the chinese and the russians listening in. for an administration that ran and won on the refrain, "lock her up," the litany of potential security breaches isn't laughable. it's a sign of real incompetence as aaron blake writes in the woest wo "washington post" "if this was an enormous betrayal of the public trust for clinton, how is

it not a massive point of emphasis for the trump white house? aaron blake wrote that line in a piece entitled "ivanka trump's e-mails and the many things trump attacked obama and clinton for and then did." the article, needless to say, is very, very long. this is, you know, for a white house that does such a volume business of scandal and outrage, this, to me, is sort of the low-hanging fruit, the kind of stuff they could have avoided. hey, we ran and won by screaming "lock her up," maybe, just maybe if we do one thing right, it should be not using personal e-mail. >> i think this family, the trumps, they feel like they're above the law. they feel like the law does not apply to them. and you see this in every kind of scenario that comes up about this family. whether it's profiting off of the white house. let's not forget that ivanka trump got trademarks because of her relationships, right, in the white house. because she's a senior adviser and for her shoes. >> kellyanne conway sold her dresses on tv. >> exactly it just goes on and on and on. and we have don junior may have lied to both the fbi and

congress i mean, it goes on then eric trump flies across the country trying -- making deals and we have to pay for his secret service there, the secret service protection yeah so it just goes on with this white house. it just doesn't stop and i -- >> it's like comey said they were like a mob family. >> day really are a mob family they basically took what they were doing in the business, the trump organization, and brought it to the white house and didn't care at all with what the rules were, and what they can and cannot do. and now it is humiliating. it is embarrassing for them. and especially after running on e-mails, e-mails, e-mails, unsecure e-mails and the misuse of e-mails. >> so when i worked in politics, the one narrative that -- and listen, every white house has a lot of political challenges, so you sort of pick the -- the problems or bigger problems. the one thing we were afraid of and rightfully so, i think critics of the bush years would say, was the incompetence

narrative. this administration does an equally robust volume business of incompetence that it's hard to sort of settle in on a single line of attack do you think that -- serious question, does that provide extra challenges for democrats >> i think that the challenge is he doesn't care. >> right. >> so you and i probably used to live in fear of if we said something wrong and then, you know, in the style of tim russert, somebody said, well, you said this, but actually, you know, it turned out this was -- you know, we felt bad about that we got a big problem. >> or four pinocchios and fact check. >> worried about pinocchios. it seemed -- but like, his great political -- part of his political genius is he just doesn't care like, this is a guy, to your point about projection, who could literally stand in front of marine one before leaving on a foreign trip the other day and say obama disrespected the military, fly all the way to paris and disrespect the military by not showing up at a world war i ceremony, fly all the way back and disrespect the

military by not going to arlington national cemetery on veterans day and disrespect the military by attacking, like, arguably the greatest hero of the u.s. -- >> alive. >> -- the post 9/11 u.s. military, bill mcraven, for not getting bin laden earlier and being kind of a political hack which he's not, right? so what makes it challenging, i think, is when he gets caught, he doesn't care that he's caught and i think what presented a challenge, washington, media and politics, is that we keep thinking that one of these times, they're going to feel bad when they're caught. >> yeah. >> right but look what we just talked about today. he doesn't care that jamal khashoggi was murdered by mbs. he doesn't care that his daughter used a personal e-mail server he doesn't care that the woman in mississippi made this horrific comment about attending a public hanging he just doesn't care, right? and so i think for democrats in congress, though, the challenge is going to be you have to set the agenda, yourselfing rig, ri? you have to ignore what trump says and relentlessly inform the public of the incompetence

it's not just the lying. it's also the incompetence and not count on him somehow coming out with his hands up saying, oh you got me. >> let me read a couple of aaron blake's examples because they're great. he attacked obama, in fact, obama does not read his intelligence briefings november does he get briefed in if person by the cia or dod. too busy, i guess. that was not true. he read them on his ipad yeah, and when he traveled -- some presidents have a different formula for when they travel, an ipad or president bush traveled with briefers. but we know that trump doesn't -- doesn't read his pdb. he likes pictures. when they give him something and you can't say the "r" word for russia he also tweeted, "republicans must not allow president obama to subvert the constitution of the u.s. for his own benefit and because he's unable to negotiate with congress. that was him on obama's executive orders i am pretty sure that he's broken a record for this term in a presidency of executive orders and if he hasn't, we know he wants to >> yeah. i mean, he puts it out

repeatedly sometimes the court strikes them down >> he complained about that mightily today >> he did. >> even when pardoning turkeys, he's showing his anger that the courts are a check on -- >> our independence. >> on this white house yeah and i think one of the big differences, i mean, to the point you were making about in the past how things would be a scandal scandal, you tried to avoid them, is now the republican party increasingly is behind him in this. >> yeah. >> whereas in the beginning, he would say or do things and folks like us would, you know, ask paul ryan or other republican leaders are you going to stand up to it, put them in sort of an uncomfortable position after the comments that the president made, the mcrave n comments, the gop put out a statement calling him a political hack it was pretty extraordinary that now when the president attacks military heroes, the gop is behind him and so it makes it even more difficult for democrats to stand up and say, you know, this is really wrong and that's changing over the past two years.

>> harsher on mcraven than mbs >> yes >> yeah. and this is a week, to kimberly's point, when you really feel the loss of john mccain in the senate because he's the one who would have put out a really strong statement about mcraven at the beginning of the week and he's also the senator who would have -- >> it's not the end of the week. it's only tuesday. >> no, but he would have done that and there's nobody in the senate who has stepped up and done what mccain had did to stand up to trump. >> it's such a good point. and the two reasons for that, what we're talking about at the beginning of the show, that above all else, he believed that america was an idea. he believed that it stood for -- that it was that shining city on the hill that stood for standing -- >> and the world listened when he spoke and they knew that there was another power center in washington in john mccain and that's a vacuum right now. >> so sad. when we come back, thousands of american -- john mccain would have cared about this story, too -- thousands of american troops are going to be spending their thanksgivings at the border thanks to a political stunt.

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now that's eatin good in the neighborhood. this was an obama judge, and i'll tell you what, it's not this was an obama judge. i will tell you what, this is not going to happen like that anymore. everyone who sued the united states, they file -- almost, they file their case in the ninth circuit and it means an automatic loss no matter what you do, no matter how good your case is and the ninth circuit is really something we have to take a look at >> if someone loved them, there wouldn't be as many of those donald trump making excuses after another loss if federal court, this time on immigration. a judge in california has temporarily blocked a proclamation trump issued earlier this month, one who stated anyone who crossed the southern border illegally would be ineligible for asylum here's the ruling, quote, whatever the skoeb of the president's authority, he may not rewrite immigration laws to

oppose a condition congress successfully forbidden failure to apply with entry requirements such as arriving at a designated port of entry should bear little f. any, weight in the asylum process and on top of that, sending troops to stop the caravan was a political stunt, some of them are going home from politico, quote, the general overseeing the deployment told politico on monday the first troops will start heading home in the coming days, as some are already unneeded, having completed the missions for which they were sent the returning service members include engineering and logistics unit which jobs included placing wire and other barriers to limit access to ports of entry at the u.s./mexico border here's what trump told reporters about troops at the border last hour. >> don't worry about thanksgiving these are tough people they know what they're doing and great great. they've done a great job you're so worried about the

thanksgiving holiday for them, they are so proud to be representing our country on the border where if you look at what's happening, mexico, the people from tijuana are saying, wow, these are tough people. they're fighting us. they're in fistfights all over the place. these are tough people that are coming in. >> yes, we're so worried about them why aren't you let's bring in nbc news national security and military reporter courtney kube. what's going on at the border? >> that's a great question, nickol we kn nicolle we know one other thing, he previewed the fact they might be home, some of them before thanksgiving he said some of the jobs dhs requested them to do would be done in somewhere between five to ten days which put it at potentially this week some of them would leave that would include some ed engineering, maybe some logistics. but at the same time dhs still can request more help in other

areas this would require troops to either shift, bring in others, maybe not engineers, but other kinds of forces that they would need for different missions so no one is really talking about the total number of u.s. troops along the border to decrease rapidly at this point. and we saw one of those things play out in the last day or so when dhs requested help from the u.s. military for security for customs and border patrol. now according to a new authority that was just approved today, u.s. troops who were along the border will have the authority to protect cdp officials who are there should they come under some kind of attack from migrants across the border. >> you know more about all of this than all of us combined but let me ask you to step back from how the military is processing the seemingly capricious orders from their commander in chief and let me ask you if anyone at the pentagon saw a need for

active duty military at the border to protect the border from a slow-moving, never reported to have been armed or dangerous humanitarian crisis, branded the caravan by donald trump now admittedly for midterm election political purposes? >> so whenever you ask that question, the on-the-record response you always get is it's a legal order. they found at the pentagon president trump, the commander in chief, made this request and military troops and leadership are carrying it out. whether their personal opinions are it was a good idea or political stunt or whatever, they're not going talk about that i think going forward, the more we ask this question, even if in fact the troop deployment ends december 15th, which it's due to right now, we will continue, i suspect, to hear that same refrain going forward, that it was a legal order. i will say having covered the military for 13 years, it's not the first time i have seen u.s.

troops used when they don't necessarily have a lot to do on the mission. it seems there might be another better use of their time but will you have a hard time finding anyone to pin it on the pentagon who will go on the record and openly say that. >> that's because of the rules that govern the chain of command. i wonder if secretary mattis were asked to testify on capitol hill in front of the house services committee, what he would say if pressed by members of congress, i understand there was a legal order since donald trump has the title of commander in chief but was there a need for active troops on the border, if your judgment and analysis of mattis' view. >> he was asked that question when he was on the border last week, or when he was traveling to the border. he said, it's not the first time troops have been used for this he talked about when they were sent to the border with national guard troops, of course, sent to the border under president obama. so secretary mattis, he's really good at answering these

questions in a way where he doesn't get cross wise with the president on record or certainly on camera if he were in front of congress, where he's going to stick to the very clear talking point, it's not the fist time troops have been on the border, and it was a legal order, so they're bound by law to carry out the orders of the commander in chief that are legal. >> you're clinging to that which is legal, you're usually in trouble. we're going to sneak in a break. (man) ah! (girl) nooooooooooooo! (man) nooooo! (girl) nooooo... (vo) quick, the quicker picker upper! bounty picks up messes quicker, and is two times more absorbent than the leading ordinary brand. (man and pirate girl) ahoy! (laughing) (vo) bounty, the quicker picker upper. in chief that are legal.

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♪ ♪ breaking news from "the new york times," they are reporting president trump told the white house counsel that he wanted to order the justice department to prosecute hillary clinton and jim comey. according to "the times," he rebuffed the president saying he had no authority to order that prosecution. the piece goes on to say it's one of the latest example how

mr. trump used the typically independent justice department as a tool to be wielded against his political enemies. that department now in the hands of a staunch political ally, matt whitaker. >> what could go wrong it's a paradigm we see today he basically went out and said we're not going to let this happen at the ninth district anymore. he wanted to investigate his enemies. >> totally unqualified lackey. he does not recognize the independence of the rule of law in this country. and there's ample evidence for this both of how he wants to abuse the use of the justice department and how he wants to shut down any justice department implications that might implicate him or his associates. this is the biggest story of the trump presidency across the board. it's his disregard for democratic norms. >> it's a great story. i'm sure you will get more on the other programs that follow that does it for our hour. i'