that is our broadcast for this tuesday night. thank you for being here with us. good night from nbc news headquarters here in new york. top u.s. intel chiefs are challenging president trump's national security claims. their testimony appears to contradict what president trump has said about isis, russia, north korea and more. plus, long-time trump ally roger stone pleads not guilty to charges stemming from robert mueller's russia probe. and with another shutdown deadline looming, senate majority leader mitch mcconnell signals he is for legislation that would prevent the government from shutting down again. [ music playing ] good morning, everyone, it's wednesday, january 30th.

i'm amman mo ha deny alongside jas nine ver s.u.suvian. >> is russia still targeting the u.s., mr. president? >> we expect russia will continue to wage its information war against democracies. >> the whole russia thing. it's a hoax. it's a terrible hoax. >> not only are the russians continued to do it in 2018, but we've seen an indication that they're continuing to adapt their modem. >> the agreement says there will be total de-nuclearization. nobody wants to report that. >> north korea will seek to retain its wmd capabilities. >> we have made a lot of progress that has not been reported by the media. from it is unlikely to completely give up its nuclear weapons and production capabilities. >> i ended the horrible week iran nuclear deal.

>> is iran currently providing the jcpoa in terms of their nuclear activities. >> at the moment technically they are in compliance. >> we have won against isis. we've beaten them and beaten them badly. >> while isis is nearing territorial defeat, the group is returning to its gorilla roolths. >> it's working against isis. >> isis command throughs of fighters in iraq and syria. >> wow. so one issue was notably absent from the threat assessment as nbc news notes the intelligence chiefs did not once mention the need for a wall along the southern border, which president trump portrayed as the single most pressing need for this country. a week ago, he quoted this, build a wall and crime will fall, a resounding majority of american voters, they disagree. after the quinnipiac poll after

border wall with mexico significantly decrease violent crime. 33% said yes. 64% said no. the white house acknowledge that president trump and russian president vladimir putin met in buenes aires at the g20 summit. they say the conversation was longer and more substantive and included no american personnel. in november, trump pointedly cancelled his meeting with putin due to the capture of ukrainian ships and sailor at the time. trump tweeted this out saying i look forward to a meaningful summit again as soon as this situation is resolved. but according to financial times the leaders did, in fact, huddle for several minutes at the end of an evening event with no translator or note taker from the u.s. side to record what was actually said between the two leaders. the report not independently confirmed by nbc news cites people who had direct knowledge of the encounter or were briefed on it and claims the discussion occurred at theaters as world

leader and their spouses or guests were streaming out of the building. the financial times claims president trump was accompanied by his wife melania, but no staff while putin was flanked by his translator. the four sat at a table and were among the last to leave. a russian official tells the financial times, the two leaders spoke about 15 minutes about a number of foreign policy issues, including the azak sea incident with ukraine and the kconflict n syria. let's look to domestic politics. a new polling shows voters have more faith in democrats than the president and republicans.

and the democrats announced that stacy abrams, who narrowly lost the governor race will, in fact, deliver the party response to president trump's state of the union address scheduled for next week. senate majority leader, excuse me, senate minority leader chuck schumer says he invited abrams to deliver the response three weeks ago. she was very delighted when she agreed. she is weighing her next steps, including a possible run for u.s. senate in 2020 against republican david purdue of georgia. she responded to the announcement tweeting, at a moment when our nation needs leaders united for a purpose, i

am honored to deliver the state of the union response. roger stone due back in court this week after officially pleading not guilty to charges brought against him. stone was formally arraigned in washington, d.c. yesterday. now the former adviser to president trump faces seven charges, including obstruction, making false statements and witness tampering. the usually flamboyant stone did not say much during the 13-minute hearing as his lawyer and during his plea. outside the courthouse, it was a much more rowdy scene outside, protesters gathering both in support of and against roger stone held signs that read free stone, jail hillary and you pepped putin steam our democracy. the judge has ordered stone to return to court friday for a status hearing. with robert mueller's investigation possibly wrapping up soon, house democrats are reportedly plotting ways to ensure the special counsel's final report is made public and that the justice department doesn't interfere with its

conte contents. jer my nadler said, quote, if the report is not released, we will certainly subpoena for it. he adds the problem with a subpoena is they can contest it in court for a while. at the same time, republican senator chuck grassley and senator richard plumeenle that have introduced bipartisan legislation that would require mueller to submit a report to congress and the congress once his investigation has wrapped up. the legislation would also require a report within two weeks if the special counsel is, in fact, fired, transferred or resigns. all right, joining us from washington is politico's daniel litman, co-author of the politico playbook. thank you so much for joining us. democrats were not the only ones that are wanting to make sure that mueller's findings are made public. talk to us about what we're hearing from some republicans with this regard, especially senate majority leader mitch

mcconnell. >> yes, it's a little surprise mcconnell has weighed in on this. he has said he wants as much of this report that's not classified to be released to the public and i think he is responding to, in a public demand, that we actually see the results of this investigation. we have been paying for and that's occupied the national conversation. it's unclear if he's actually going to support that bill you talked about, about releasing the whole report. but -- and trump, he might try to block it if it is damage for him. >> so, let me ask you about the intel chiefs and their threat assessments that we saw play out yesterday on capitol hill, completely contrasting president trump's rhetoric, especially over some of the key signature issues, whether it be north korea, isis or iran, how do you think the white house is likely to respond when you've had this kind of public rebuke from the country's top intel chiefs?

>> yeah. i think it's quite striking that you have the intel chiefs and the republican foreign policy establishment really come, you know, against trump and what he stands for in the foreign policy realm. and so basically, they were under oath and they were saying what is in this annual report that's required. this is not a huge surprise that we found iran to be in compliance, but trump never actually mentioned that fact. and north korea, trump liked to show off those letters that kim jong-un sends him. he calls at this time love letters. he really likes the guy. yet, he has shown very few signs of actually complying with his promise to de-nuclearize the intel chief said that having nuclear weapons is critical to the regime's survival in north korea. and there are plans for a second

summit potentially next month. >> yeah. >> but we really have not seen evidence that they are making much progress on trump's demand. >> and the big question is, is the president going to take some of this into account when he plans on meeting kim jong-un in the next month or so. >> neighbor his public statements. my gut says no, he probably hasn't. >> i will go with your gut on that daniel litman. we will talk to you in a bit. thank you. former city michael plume berg attacks elizabeth warren's plan on attacking wealth instead of the income, comparing the plan to socialism. >> we need a healthy commitment we shouldn't be embarrassed about our system. if you want to look at a system that's no non-examistic. just make the a look at what was perhaps the wealthiest country in the world and today the people are starving to death. it's called venezuela. >> former starbucks ceo howard schultz weighed in on warren's wealth tax, calling it

unrealistic. >> when i see elizabeth warren come out with you know a ridiculous plan of taxing wealthy people, a surtax of 2% because it makes a good headline or sends out a tweet when she knows that, for, in a fact, that is not something that's ever going to be passed. this is what's wrong. you can't attack these things in a punitive way by punishing people. >> of course, warren responded to these criticisms, tweeting this. what is ridiculous is billionaires who this i that they can buy the presidency to keep the system rigged for themselves while opportunity since away from everyone else. it is time for change. schultz will join "morning joe" leader this morning to discuss his potential 2020 presidential run. all right, still ahead, president trump tweets about global warming and then gets

fact checked by a federal agency. how about that? >> yeah, this is freezing temperatures, sweep across the country, reaching some dangerously cold levels in certain areas. the reason why aymon is not in the country. bill kierans will have a full check of your forecast ween we co -- when we come back. een we cm -- when we come back (burke) parking splat. and we covered it.

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on this. >> reporter: jussie smollett on "empire" police say he was brutally beaten on this chicago street in a possible hate crime. at 2:00 a.m., investigators say two men approached him and may have recognized the actor yelling racial and homophobic slurs. after the assault the police say the attackers threw an unknown chemical on his face and tied a noose around his neck. he took himself to a hospital, where he is recovering. >> that man is doing nothing but minding his own business and you feel it's necessary to go after him like that. why? >> in a statement, chicago police say they have not identified any suspects and are looking for under surveillance video of the assault. an advocate for the gay communities smollett came out to ellen in 2015. >> we cannot allow people to just spew hate. >> reporter: outrage on social media, including a post from lee

daniels, creator of "empire" who shared and delete this picture of smollett. >> you didn't deserve, to have a noose thrown around your neck, having bleach thrown on you. we have to love each other. no matter who we are. >> reporter: now the victim of a heinous crime, miguel almaguer, nbc news. >> president trump tweeted some thoughts on the record, the cold spell in the mid-west. in the beautiful mid-west, wind chill temperatures are reaching minus 60 degrees, the coldest ever recorded. in coming days,ic mi expected t even colder. what is going on with misspeeld global warming. come back fast. we feed i. that's not how climate change or global warming spelled works.

the national oceanic report tweeted out, it contributes to more moisture in the air, which leads to more extreme rain and snowfall, depending on the season. with that let's switch gears to the weather. >> global whaming. >> you do this all day about the tweets from the president. i'm opinion is he is like poking the bear. he knows the difference and he's just giggling as he types this stuff. am i wrong? >> i mean -- >> do i give him too much credit? >> i think you are giving too much credit. i would like to say my new year's resolution was to not read so many trump tweets. it's not working out for me. >> you don't give him time to respond. i think he knows. >> listen even if he is joking and that's what he intends to be, he still has the responsibility as a president not to put that stuff out there where people will not necessarily know he is joking.

there is that concern and if there is somebody out there influenced. it's not up to us, it was his own agency, the national oceanic agency. the people. >> complaining what is going on in our atmosphere. >> all right. >> go ahead, bill, give us the good news. >> exactly what he wanted. now let's get into the forecast. 100 million people are under warni warnings and advisories, into the northern plains and now the northeast. this is the coldest weather map. i may stand in front of my career. i never have been in one in 20 years. yesterday we made it to neg 66. that was the lowest i saw in minnesota. this morning the lowest i seen is negative 54 in duluth. we're at negative 51 in davenport. minneapolis is negative 52. it's not like you watch outside in minneapolis, negative 22.

either. this is the peak of it. i don't think it will get any colder. this is at 8:00 a.m. left fast forward to when people will be coming home. at 5:00 p.m., temperatures are falling throughout the day. chicago negative 27. notice we get rid of those negative 45s and 50s. tomorrow morning, negative 18 is better. it will be cold in the northeast. nothing compared to what we are dealing with now. here's the best news of all. i mean, i think in chicago come super bowl sunday, you will see more than one person wearing shorts. that's how quickly we will have a huge warm-up. >> wow. >> there is chicago right now. chicago will warm up by about 70 degrees between now and sunday. >> wow. >> so our winter whiplash continues. >> how long -- zblo. >> global whaming. that's exactly what that is. >> in those types of temperatures, how long you can actually be outside? >> i mean, if you are protected, longer, obviously, any expoemsed

skin, negative 50, five, ten minutes and are you in trouble. >> so basically stay inside. >> all of those areas have no school today. most of them. >> all right. thanks, guys. still ahead, james harden continues his hot streak and anthony davis' trade demand is costing him millions of dollars, we'll talk about that next in sport sports. sports

. welcome back. it's also time for sports. we begin in the nba. let's go to houston, reigning

mvp james harden extended his peak. 34 consecutive games, reaching the bar with two minutes left to play. harden finished with 37 on the night. the rockets fell to the pelicans 131-116. last night's win is a bit of small news for the city of new orleans, after the afc controversial championship loss, who wants to play the super bowl more than the saints? they next learned pelican star anthony davis' desire to be trade fareed the team. public demand now earned davis a $50,000 fine. he makes 25 million. the league says it was an intentional effort to undermine the contracttual relationship between davis and the pelicans. stay tuned. we'll have a lot more on that story in the next year-and-a-half. finally we go to the floor in san antonio with the sun and spurs, we are tied in the last

second of regulation. 21-foot jumper at the buzzer earned san antonio the victory over phoenix, but despite the win head coach pop vip not plearich -- popovich not happy with his team. >> it was a pathetic performance. and phoenix got robbed. >> wow. really going in there. >> popovich says, you know, he speaks his mind. >> he doesn't mess around, bill. >> yeah. >> what do you think about that $50,000 fine for a player that makes 25 million? >> exactly. that's like pennies to him. okay. here you go, moving on. >> i was wondering why they fined him, not the act. unless the agent was speaking exclusively on his behalf. the agents don't work for the

nba like the players do? >> maybe the player will fine the agent. >> get 50 grand off him. >> exactly. >> thanks, bill. still ahead, form you are new jersey governor chris christie weighing in on robert mueller's probe and suggests there is something else president trump should be more concerned about. plus, what mitch mcconnell is saying about the possibility of another government shutdown and what lawmakers are doing to avoid the government from closing again next month. we'll be right back. vernment fr closing again next month we'll be right back. i'm 53, but in my mind i'm still 35.

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. welcome back, everybody, i'm jasmine versuvians, along with ayman al zawahii aim amman ma ojayeldin. nbc news' chief justice correspondent pete williams has more on this. ronl. >> reporter: roger stone was low key in washington. pushing his way against demonstrators for and against him. his laurenne terred a not guilty plea in lying to congress and intimidating a witness. in a radio interview, he blasted stoep's case. >> they know, they have to take me down in order to take donald trump down. >> reporter: meantime, senate democrats had acting attorney general matt whitaker. >> right now the investigation is i think close to being

completed. >> it puts a cloud over the investigation and again yesterday's comments were exactly the reason why he should have recuse himself. >> reporter: even if mueller finishes, other work goes on. >> prosecutors have work to do and congress has work to do. >> our thanks to pete williams for that report. speaking of the mueller probe, with msnbc yesterday, former prosecutor and head of the trump transition team chris christie says the mueller probe is actually not the biggest legal threat the president faces. >> i think that the mueller investigation is not the mr. president's biggest problem and the southern district of new york's investigation has always been much more dangerous and had much more hazard than does the mueller investigation. >> the senate vote on william barr's nomination has been delayed after some people raised concerns over the pick for the

justice department. the vote was postponed after democratic members of the committee expressed their worries over how barr will handle special counsel robert mueller's probe. diane feinstein says she remains troubled over a memo he wrote last year to deputy attorney general rosenstein. in it he criticized the investigation of president trump. the judiciary committee will vote next thursday on barr's tom nation, which is expected to clear the panel. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell says he will support whatever to stop the shutdown again. >> i don't like shutdowns. i don't think they work for anybody. and i hope they will be avoided. i'd be opened to anything that we can agree on, on a bipartisan basis, that would make them

pretty hard to occur again. there are some differences about how to craft that, but i'm certainly opened to it. i think this is an example of government dysfunction, which is, should be embarrassing to everyone on a bipartisan basis. >> as lawmakers work on a security deal to avoid another shutdown the number two democrat in the house says citizenship for dreamers will not be on the table. in an interview with reuters, house majority leader steny hoyer said he did not think democrats would consider the issue in exchange for funding for the wall on the southern border. he told reporters this, he added that he expected to bring a separate bill to the floor in the near future on the daca program to protect dreamers from deportation. former senator from arizona jeff flake announced he would

not run. it puts to months the speculation of one of trump's most ard ent critics. >> i've always said that i do hope that there is a republican who challenges the president in the primary. i still hope that somebody does. >> that somebody won't be me. i will not be a candidate. >> los angeles mayor eric garcetti has bowed out of a potential 2020 run after nearly two years of entertaining the idea. garcetti instead opted to finish out his tenure as the city's mayor. >> it may be out of vote today, i believe whenever possible, you should finish the job you set out to do. and finally, i also know the two thing i love the most, my family and my city are right here in l.a. so i have decided not to throw my hat into the ring to run for president in 2020. >> all right, less than three weeks after announcing her bid for president, democratic tulsi

gabbard's complain is in flux. her reporting manager and consulting firm revolution messaging are calling it quits after the congresswoman's official kickoff in hawaii this weekend. ranya bertrees who worked for bernie sanders campaign and other staffers were apparently blindsided when gabbard decided to announce her candidacy on cnn earlier this month. the campaign site was fought set to be launched nor were social media posts to follow up gabbard's surprise announcement. a spokesperson has downplayed the imminent departures, alleging the consultants were only hired for the campaign rollout. >> joining us once again from washington is politico's daniel litman, co-author of the politico playbook. great to have you back with us. >> thank you. >> let's talk a little about this news of congresswoman tulsi

gabbard, not that she decided to launch the campaign, is there a chance she could lose her house seat in 2020? >> yeah. she already faces a democratic primary challenger. she's picked a fight with mazy horono, the democratic senator from hawaii. she is getting criticism from local hawaiian democrats who say she has not focused on her district. her focus is on her ambitions. her national you know platform and traveling to, in different states to get her name out there. not that many americans know who tulsi gabbard is. so it would be pretty ironic that a person launches their presidential run and then they don't get anything and they lose their district. >> all right. let's talk a little bit about the immigration debate and whether or not they can sort of come to some sort of understanding here the republicans and the democrats only this and the president as well. we do remember that the president is offering daca

protections in exchange for the democrat's funding his border earlier this month. it was something like three years or so of protections for daca recipients, but no path to citizenship at the time, which the a lot of democrats were not happy about either way. it seems as if, that the shutdown as we know is very much on pause, at least for three weeks or so who knows what will happen now. >> thank god. >> thank god for now. but it seems like daca is out of the picture and the democrats don't want to discuss daca in exchange for border wall funding. why is that? >> they view president trump as an unreliable negotiator. this daca deal has been in the offing for the last year or so. but trump has really never followed up and shown that he was serious about actually doing this. and so, democrats are trying to limit it to a very narrow deal to extend government funding and provide some border security

money. but if everything is about daca, they don't think that trump will pull the trigger because they believe that he has already gotten so much flack from his base that this deal would only hurt him more and so they don't think he would actually put his pen to actually sign this deal. >> hmm. >> all right. daniel litman. thanks, good to talk to you. >> still ahead, president trump's push for a space force appears to be in jeopardy. the administration officials down playing the president's plan. plus, bill kierans is back with the latest on that dangerous cold gripping parts of the nation. stay with us. the nation stay with us ♪

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before leaving. the bill was inspired by a former congressman who spent $84,000 in taxpayer money to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit. however, instead of paying the money back. farentholds lobbied congress and they plan to introduce the bad law maker's accountability in the key amends act, also known as the blake act today. since it cannot be applied retroactively, he is expected to send a leader to nancy pelosi and kevin mccore think asking them not to meet with lawmakers the bill would be applied to. the president's space force is not shaping up as he originally delivered it. pat shanahan said he is recommending the space force be established in the air force and not a separate branch of the military as the president

initially wanted. shanahan said, of course the force will be small. as maul as possible. >> all right. with that, let's switch gears. bill kierans. >> good morning, obviously, the big headline is it's one of the coldest days we've seen in the northern plains, great lakes, ohio valley and roughly 20 to 30 years. that's a lot of people's lifetimes. so we have 100 million people under warnthings or advisories. back up through the northern plains. the worst of it now is arriving. detroit dropped a negative 30. indianapolis negative 36 as we have been watching. chicago hasn't gotten to the negative 50 yet. there is a couple negative 50s throughout minnesota. the coldest i saw yesterday was negative 66 in northern minnesota. so we're see figure we will go for the record here. right now we're at negative 19 in chicago. that's the actual temperature. the all time coldest was

negative 27. we will end somewhere around negative 22 or 23 this morning. tomorrow we will have another chance around negative 24 or negative 25. i don't know if we will get to that all time record. these are the actual temperatures, not even including the winds at all. you are still at negative 31 in fargo, bismark. negative numbers arriving, indianapolis, to ft. wayne to detroit. as we mentioned, as cold as it gets. there is also snow left over. we had a couple areas in massachusetts,ing new hampshire and vermont. it's snowing from portland to augusta maine up to bangor. a high of negative 14. that's your high temperature today in chicago. minneapolis also there at negative 14. notice it doesn't really get any further south than oklahoma city or atlanta. it's really north of there. we could see snow squalls in the

east. here's friday, here comes the building warmth in the plains. we will see temperatures up to 53 in denver. springfield 48. look what happens on saturday. minneapolis goes from now, it's negative 30 to 39 degrees. finally our friends in chicago get up to 50 by sunday. look at oklahoma city, 71. these temperatures, this is like weather whiplash throughout areas in the middle of the country. >> we are dreaming of july. is all i can say. >> we'll get it soon enough. thanks, bill. still ahead, president trump's tariffs take a toll on the bottom line for one american icon. >> apple shares take a major hit. details on those stories and the other driving your business day coming up. ries and the other driving your business day coming up. ♪

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. welcome back, everybody. after recent speculation, one of this country's largest power companies has officially filed for brumankruptcy. pg & e made the move yesterday after massive wildfires. >> reporter: feeling the heat, pg & e has officially declared bankruptcy. the move allows california's largest utility to keep operating as it faces lawsuits over deadly wildfires over the past two years. investigators say some fires were sparked by their equipment, while the company is not

acknowledging responsibility says potential liables could exceed $30 billion. >> every one of us should be good and mad. >> reporter: couldn't p consumer advocate erin brockovich has been fighting along fire survivors who worry chapter 11 will mean less money for victims. >> they have nowhere to go. there is no options for them. >> reporter: pg & e says we are actually committed to rest rakes efforts across the committees impacted for the 16 million customers, experts warn rates could go up in the wake of disruptive fires, now bankruptcy. >> now, shares of apple jumped in after hours trading after the company announced its earnings for the first quarter. >> that included a 15% drop in sales of the flagship iphone. c n cnbc reporter joins us now. tils why this stock was actually up despite the fact there were

fallen iphone sales if december or the last quarter of last year? >> reporter: exactly. if you remember, back at the beginning of this year, they actually did issue it, a warning to that effect. a peging of the year, they issued a warping. when the report came out, revenues, everything came in terms of the estimates. earnings were 15% lower but wearables like the iphone watch grew more than 30% and itunes and apple pay saw a big growth of 30% as well. the big question for apple is whether they can make the rotation away from smartphones reliance into other higher profits. i do want to tell you the u.s. motorcycle maker, harley davidson said tariffs wiped out profits last year and expected

to cost up to $100 million this year and expected to reduce the impact by producing the motorcycle in thailand when they're destined to go to the eu in china when they face them and they have definitely backfired when it comes to harley davidson. >> i have to tell you, talking to bill karins, the u.s. postal service suspended service in several states because of that extreme cold. what states are being impacted by this and more important, what does this mean for the united states postal service already struggling. >> reporter: that's right. it's unprecedented action because they announced they will not be delivering mail because of the extreme cold. and chicago, where i was reading some temperatures are expected to be colder than the base camp

at mt. everest there, extreme temperatures and pickups at residences and collection boxes will cease as well and have an impact on trading volume, coming at an interesting time for the u.s. economy in terms of the overall delivery of consumer consumption this time of the year as well. back to you guys. >> and comes at the time they increased the forever stamp for five cents. thanks. colder than the base camp at mt. everest. that puts things in perspective. >> coming up, "morning joe," finding himself at odds on the most global threats, contradicting a number of things used by trump to justify key pillars of his key policy. former secretary of state, madeleine albright will weigh in on the chairman's official

assessment and adam shift and howard schultz joins the conversation to discuss his new book and plans for a 2020 white house run. take your razor, yup. alright, up and down, never side to side, shaquem. you got it? come on, get back. quem, you a second behind your brother, stay focused. can't nobody beat you, can't nobody beat you. hard work baby, it gonna pay off. you got this. with the one hundred and forty-first pick, the seattle seahawks select. alright, you got it, shaquem. alright, let me see.

all right. joining us now from washington, d.c. with a look at axios. the cofounder, jim vandehi. >> looking at hosts on "morning joe," liberals are trying to bully schultz out of the race. harassing him on twitter and staff that might want to go work for him, talking to family members and friends, trying to get them to pressure schultz to get out of the race because they're worried he could help hand the race to donald trump. this is unusual. usually no one pays attention to third party candidates because they don't rank that high on the

polls. democrats are worried. jim messina has to get out of there with his life and hillary's hatchet man, calling him the pg version of a donkey, saying he has to get out of the race as well. >> would they be more excited about a schultz run if in fact he had decided to run as a democrat? >> i think they would just shrug if he ran as a democrat. one of the reasons schultz ran as a centrist independent, he knows if he was on stage with 18 other liberal democrats he would get pounded because he's not a lock-step where the passion is in the party and trying to knock out this centrist pack. and democrats believe they have to solidify the centrist independents. they may or may not be right.

maybe some of those centrists would go with howard schultz. that is not the calculation for liberals. >> after being on and off and on and off we have the state of the union next week. the interesting part is who democrats selected to give their response. stacey abrams. talk us to about that selection. what is the selection of stacey abrams who lost that seat in georgia say about the future of the democratic party and what they're trying to achieve in the response. >> great question and great point. right? the idea somebody who lost a race is going to be the face of the democratic party in opposition on state of the union night of trump is very unusual. what it speaks to, these brands in politics, even if you lose, are now bigger than the establishment, even bigger than elected officials. look at the people, beta o'rourke in texas, looking to

see if he will run for president. he lost to ted cruz. look at ocasio-cortez, look how big she is and somebody who beat an established member of the democratic party. keep an eye on that. it's where the energy for the party is, not for insiders, for outsiders. we saw the same dynamic give you donald trump on the right. i wouldn't make predictions, boy, if joe biden gets in or somebody a more conventional candidate will have an easier time than others. they might not. it seems like the democratic party is looking for somebody outside of washington and maybe outside of conventional politics. >> as you mentioned, jim, howard schultz is going to be appearing on "morning joe" in a little bit. interesting to hear from him. don't go anywhere. see you in a little bit in "morning joe" and reading axios a.m. in a little bit. you can sign up at

sign-up.axios.com. >> that does us this morning. "morning joe," everyone, starts right now. >> is russia still targeting the u.s., mr. president. we expect russia will continue to wage its information war against democracies. >> the whole russia thing is a hoax, a terrible hoax. >> not only have the russians continued to do it in 2018, they have continued to adapt their model. >> the agreement says there will be total denuclearization. >> we agree north korea will sees their wmd capabilities. >> we have a lot of progress not reported by the media. >> and unlikely to give up their production and nuclear production capabilities. >> i ended a horrible week, iran nuclear deal. >> and is iran -- >> at