a.m. with stephanie ruhle and then on twitter, facebook, snan senate chap. thank you for watching. "deadline: white house" with nicolle wallace starts right now. hi, everyone, it's 4:00 in new york. donald trump's former fixer and personal lawyer is back on capitol hill today answering questions about donald trump and russia in a closed-door hearing of the house intel committee. that committee likely interested in his testimony about negotiations between the president and russia over building a tower in moscow, and the lies told about those negotiations by cohen, trump and others in the president's inner circle. the house committee also possibly picking up on other lines of questioning exposed in yesterday's explosive hearing. from "the washington post," quote -- during bombshell testimony wednesday before the house oversight committee, cohen told lawmakers that trump knew in advance that the anti-secrecy organization wikileaks would release e-mails damaging to former secretary of state hillary clinton.

cohen also displayed copy u.s. of financial statements he said trump used to inflate his assets and procure a loan from deutsche bank. he also produced copies of checks the president and his family wrote to him after trump took office. checks th checks cohen said were reimbursement for $130,000 he paid adult film actress stormy daniels to keep her from discussing an alleged sexual encounter with trump. the public defense of trump amounted to this, liar, liar, pants on fire. really, i'm not kidding. that's how the gop defend the trump. but that's not where the bad news for the president ends. cohen testified yesterday he's in constant contact with prosecutors from the southern district of new york, raising new questions about what ongoing investigations he's assisting with in casting his suspicions around reports in "the new york times" and "the wall street journal" in just the last two weeks about donald trump's allege efforts to have his political appointee, jeff

berman, u.s. attorney in the southern district of new york, unrecused and put back in charge of certain investigations stemming from cohen's cases. and that is where we start with somebody who knows a little bit about federal prosecutions, southern district of new york, and more importantly what keeps donald trump up at night. chris christie's back along with some of our favorite reporters and friends, chuck rosenberg, former u.s. attorney and former fbi official, former assistant director for counterintelligence at the fbi, frank fa bluzy at the table, emily jane fox, who had a front row seat to yesterday's testimony and for a moment became part of the story she was covering. let me start with you. you said something that pierced through the den of everything that went on yesterday -- i guess i reveal myself in watching you yesterday after and during his testimony, that what would send a chill down your spine if you were this white house was cohen's testify he's in constant contact with sdny. >> yeah, sure, the fact is

there's a few things here. the southern district of new york i have been saying for months now is the more dangerous one for the president and his team because they have no restrictions on them. mueller has a restriction, it's russia. russia-related items and that's it. the southern district has no restrictions at all, in fact. the u.s. attorney used to call them the sovereign district all the time. they thought they could investigate anything. i always said the two problems for him there are michael cohen and rick gates. now the southern district has two tour guides, a tour guide for the inaugural and the campaign rick gates. the tour guy through his business and personal life in michael cohen. you don't want prosecutors having your lawyer and your former dep dpan manager and executive director of your inaugural as tour guides looking for criminality. i think that's the big problem for the president from yesterday. and i think there were other things happening that i thought were good for him yesterday. but those were the ones that if i were there, i would be saying this is the stuff we have to

worry about. >> we know so much about donald trump's efforts to obstruct the mueller probe. he tweets a lot of those for all of us to see in full view. it's also been reported that when certain witnesses came back to the white house, he peppered them with questions about what they were asked about. we know he tried to -- he asked his white house counsel to fire robert mueller. that didn't happen. we know -- and i'm sure you have firsthand knowledge, about his -- it's been described to me as rage, anger, frustration about sessions' recusal. you and i talked about that on the air. we don't know quite as much about his efforts to interfere with or slow down or take control of the investigations, but there are two reports in last week. i want to go through them with you. >> sure. >> "the new york times" reported last wednesday as federal prosecutors in manhattan gathered evidence late last year about president trump's role in silencing women with hush payments during the 2016 campaign, mr. trump called matthew whitaker he's newly installed attorney general with a question. he asked whether geoffrey berman, united states attorney for the southern district of new

york and trump ally, can be put in charge of the widening investigation, according to several american officials with direct knowledge of the call. would you advise the president to do something like that? >> no. and also i would say to you, i have known geoff berman 20 years, wouldn't help him. >> you don't think geoff berman would try to unrecuse? >> he definitely would not try to unrecuse. >> do you know he didn't try to unrecuse? >> i don't know but that i know geoff. geoff made an ethical decision to recuse. i've known geoff 20 years. if geoff decided ethically he needed to recuse, he wasn't going to unrecuse for any reason. i actually think for a guy who's taken a lot of criticism, and some rightfully over a course of time, matt whitaker told the story well, i can't ask him to unrecruise. that would be inappropriate. i'm not going to do it. that should give people some faith in the fact, and now with bill barr in charge, the justice department will be on the right being here. they trust mueller, they know

mueller and like him. and the first southern district of new york, geoff berlin made a decision to recuse himself. i don't know the basis, you don't have to announce it. but i know geoff. two things, he would not recuse once he's recused but even if he did or had not recused in the first place, it wouldn't help. geoff could wall it straight. yeah, geoff is a republican but geoff is going to call it straight. he's a very good, honest lawyer and good steward for that office. i think it was ill-advised on any number of levels and he didn't call and ask if he could do that or not. if he had, i would have told him no. >> let me tell you reporting from last friday on "the wall street journal" on the same topic. the house judiciary committee believes they have evidence that president trump asked matthew whitaker at the time the acting attorney general whether u.s. attorney geoffrey berman could regain control over his office's investigation into trump's former lawyer and his real estate business according to people familiar with the matter. so building on "the times" reporting that the committee now

has evidence of the president's conduct. do you think the president is facing another front where he will be scrutinized by the house committee for obstruction of justice? >> he will be scrutinized by every house committee, oversight committee, every house committee. the fact of the matter is him asking for berman to take back over i don't see as obstruction of justice. he's frustrated by the fact -- he's not a lawyer so he doesn't understand this stuff innately, these people recusing. sessions recused. he appoints berman. berman recuses. i have spoken to him about this. this is very frustrating for him. in part because he doesn't understand the ethical restrictions that are placed on lawyers. we understand them as lawyers. and that's why the department of justice is independent and makes their own judgments on these issues and without subject to presidential interference. >> let me ask you to look at some of the evidence cohen had yesterday. so he brought a check. i think we have a picture of that, canceled check from the president. this is a check from the president to cohen from the

reimbursement for the hush money payment that he dispersed, we learned from rudy. even sean hannity learned at the same moment as the rest of us, it was funneled through cohen and this was a hush money payment. we also heard donald trump and michael cohen on tape talking about the arrangement. let's listen to that. we don't have it yet but we have -- >> i remember it. >> the president saying, you know -- >> it's going to be cash, not cash. >> write him a check. and then we had some of cohen's testimony yesterday describing what that operation looked like. if you were still u.s. attorney and donald trump wasn't the president and couldn't be indicted, would that be enough evidence for you to pursue a case some. >> pursue a case, sure, you would investigate. i don't know if it's enough to bring a case. i would say from that stuff yesterday, i would say a few things. one, michael cohen left a trail of future witnesses in his wake. that are going to come before the house. allen weisselberg being number one on the list.

each one of the president's children as well after that given some of the check that's were signed and some of the other things that he said. but i also say that michael cohen did give some testimony yesterday that's helpful to the president in this regard. he said not only was the president concerned about the election but the president did not want melania to know, and in fact got me to lie to melania about the payment. that's not a crime. >> does that make it legal? >> it's not a crime. it's not a crime to pay somebody off, to keep a secret from your spouse. it would be -- see, remember, the illegality of this is not the payment of the money, it's the failure to disclose it. it's a contribution that's too high and you have never disclosed it. >> let me say, the southern district of new york certainly would have same legal capacities that you have and i don't, but they found he was still individual number one, they name him as individual one in a criminal conspiracy. so they obviously have that evidence as well. >> sure, sure, but the question is when you have to decide -- let's fast forward this. he's out of the white house.

whether that's in two years or six years. and you have to make a decision as a prosecutor. your star witness says that you've got two different motives for doing this. one, the election. two, hiding it from your spouse. the defendant, if he were at that time donald trump, would say no, no, no, one motive, my wife. if you're going to bring a case like that -- i used to say to my prosecutors all the time, take on a high-profile person, you better come through with a head shot. we do not shoot and miss with high-profile people. and i think it would be a real question, a tough call for a prosecutor to decide whether michael cohen if that's all we have -- and we don't know everything they have, but all they have is michael cohen saying two things and donald trump saying one thing, that's a hard case to bring. i felt that testimony from cohen yesterday was actually helpful, as was the testimony where he said the president never directed him to lie. he said, i had a sense that's

what he wanted me to do from listening to the code. here's where michael cohen's history of lying is a problem. i thought yesterday i was very critical, as you know, of the republicans' actions in the committee. liar, liar, pants on fire as you called it at the beginning. >> that was a quote. i didn't call it that. >> whoever called it. you read it. >> that was one of the republicans. >> i agree with you, by the way, that was a really ineffective way of going about it. everybody knows michael cohen is a liar. that's not a news flash, right? what they should have been doing yesterday on those two points was defending hip substantively and nobody did. i can imagine when he was sitting in vietnam -- >> that presumes there's a defense. he's committing crimes in office. what's the defense? >> as i just went through with you, there are two defenses. the first one is there were two motives for the payment of the hush money, not one. trump would say there's only one motive, to protect my wife and my family. on the lying, directing him to lie, cohen will not be able to testify that trump told a lie.

the best he will be able to do is say -- >> let me just say -- >> you need more than that to prosecute somebody. >> you and i came on a campaign. if you're the candidate and your position is i hugged barack obama because nothing was more important to me than recovery for my state and i'm your press secretary and all of the republicans are banging the hell out of you for hugging barack obama, i don't need to ask you why did you hug barack obama. i go on "morning joe" and i say i hugged barack obama because nothing was more important to the recovery of this state than hurricane recovery. if your principle is saying no collusion, whether it's public or private, that's being as good as told the message? >> that's public messaging. that's not telling somebody to commit perjury. that's a much different thing. >> you never prosecuted a criminal conspiracy or mob family where the messages came from a mob boss? everyone has compared donald trump to a mob boss. you think all of the instructions were written. >> i understand the comparison but usually in those cases we

have significantly more evidence than just one person saying they got a signal and read a code. >> jeff sessions lied, michael cohen lied, michael flynn lied, george popolopodus lied. >> but none of them said -- none of them that i know of at this point, has said the president directed them to lie. >> he was told to lie. >> that's the only way to be involved in a criminal conspiracy is conspire to direct someone to lie in this regard. that's all i'm saying to you is there were ways to defend the president yesterday sub stan live. the republicans chose not to do it. i think it was a mistake. i think they were juvenile. do it a few times. establish he's a liar. get your best couple questioners and there were a few that were okay. >> hour five. >> by the time we got well into this, okay, michael cohen is a liar, he was convicted of perjury, bank fraud too. by the way, shocking. who cares at this point? the republicans should have been defending the president

substantively. i guarantee you -- i haven't spoken to him but i guarantee you he was fuming last night in vietnam none of them were standing up saying, hold on a second. why are we assuming. and if that's the truth, nicolle, the president has bigger problems. he has bigger political problems if his own party in the congress doesn't believe him anymore, that's a bigger problem. i don't think it's true but if it is, it's a bigger problem. >> let me show what turned out to be a lie. >> you suggested the president sometimes communicates his wishes indirectly. for example, you said, quote, mr. trump did not directly tell me to lie to congress. that's not how he operates, end quote. can you explain how he does this? >> sure. it would be no different if i said that's the nicest looking tie i have ever seen, isn't it? what are you going to do, fight with him? the answer is no. you say yeah, nicest looking tie

i've ever seen. that's how he speaks. he doesn't give you questions. he didn't give you orders. he speaks in a code, and i understand the code because i've been around him for a decade. >> and it's your impression others who work for him understand the code as well? >> most people, yes. >> do you dispute any of that? >> what i would say as a pros r prosecutor that's not enough to convict somebody beyond a reasonable doubt. sorry. >> the president isn't on trial. >> the end game here, isn't it, nicolle? >> you tell me. >> nobody cares, nobody cares what michael cohen says from a criminality perspective unless ultimately the president will be prosecuted and/or impeached based on that testimony. what i'm telling you is, i wouldn't bring that case based upon that testimony. from that guy. he has credibility problems. now, i'll use a guy like that, but i have to have corroboration. we don't appear at this time to

have independent crabration of what he said. so i would be very careful about that because people are presumed innocent and we do have a very high standard of convicting people in this country. >> my only pushback would be the president's message now isn't that he's innocent, his surrogates are not saying he's innocent. your friend rudy giuliani's whole reason for being alive is talk about the fact a president cannot be indicted, a president cannot obstruct justice. no that he didn't engage in this criminal conduct. >> by the way, that's what i way saying yesterday and to you earlier, i think it's a flawed approach. by the way, would this be the first time the president's legal team took a flawed approach? >> fair enough. frank figliuzzi, i'm guessing what michael cohen said yesterday was old news to robert mueller. i understand them being in communication with him at least since the summer. so if they wanted to corroborate any of what he said with other documents and e-mail and witnesses, they had plenty of time to do that. and we don't know what we don't know about what avenues were

opened up by keecohen, is that right? >> you're correct. i would be surprised if mueller or even the southern district, especially the southern district, learned anything new and in fact didn't actually clear everything cohen was going to say. in taking with governor christie said and the point you just made, what we're looking at is an attempt for corroboration. we're going to see the equivalent of an entire fbi squad probably in the new york field office devoted to following up the leads that come out of cohen. and they're already working because as we've just said, the southern district and mueller likely already have all of this information and people are either working diligently to corroborate or working diligently in determining that it's just not there and as governor christie said, your probably not going to make the case. but let's talk about obstruction. let's talk about some of the other issues. let's talk about talking in code and how you approach a mob

informant in terms of that and prosecution, you've got to get multiple witnesses saying the same thing. you've got to say yes, that's how he gives direction. it happened to me. if you get enough of that, you've got circumstantial evidence. is it a tough call to bring? you bet. we will see where they go with it. >> you want to jump in? >> i agree with frank. it's a very tough call. >> do you think this is where they are, trying to decide whether or not to charge the president? >> i don't think they're there yet. what frank said is right, there's a whole squad of fbi agents in the new york district ochs who are out there now trying to talk to everybody. >> you gave me a chill. >> you should get a chill when that happens. the guy who runs the new york office and fbi was the corruption investigator for me in the 2000s in the fbi nerc office and agent sweeney was in new york. i know he knows how to make a corruption case. he made a whole bunk of them for

me when i was u.s. attorney. that's the fact they're out there doing that now. the good thing is the fbi will approach this with just the attitude of saying i want to gather the facts. and ultimately they will hand it over to the prosecutors in the southern district and say what do you want to do? and that's going to be the decision. >> the southern district already has a lot of this information. boxes of documents cohen got from his steerj last week and combed through in order to find a lot of the evidence he brought to the hearing, came back to him from the southern district of new york. so they already knew this when they rated his house and apartment and office in april. >> that was one of the insane questions, why was it in your box? this box -- >> that was not a shining moment yesterday. >> no, no. i want to bring chuck rosenberg back. maybe he will take that committee to school. it would be a gift. i want to ask you about the ground we've covered about the governor's focus on the southern district of new york being what should keep donald trump up at night, and the efforts reported

in recent weeks on behalf of the president that appear to be efforts to obstruct or slow or interfere with those investigations. >> first, nicolle, i completely agree with the governor. i have said for a long time that the mueller bucket and southern district of new york bucket are both important, but they're separate in the following way. mueller's remit was narrow. it's a russian interference in the election, whether anyone on the trump campaign conspired with them. as the governor also said, the southern district of new york's remit is much broader. it's the financial investigation of the trump organization, trump foundation, inaugural committee, and anything else that they care to cast their eyes upon. and so i do think that's where the trouble lies for mr. trump potentially, and for those around him. and emily jane fox made an important point, the southern district of new york and the fbi in new york has had this for a long time. so nothing that mr. cohen said yesterday was a surprise to them. i should tell you as a former

federal prosecutor, we approach cooperating witnesses like cohen with great sir couple inspection. they have an incentive to tell the truth now but they spent a lot of time before now lying. he's a liar. he's a cheater. he's a thief. now he has incentive to tell the truth. he has a great incentive to tell the truth both to congress and the prosecutors but you have to corroborate it. that's absolutely the key to this going forward. i imagine there will be a lot of ways to do it. but they have to corroborate him. >> all right. after the break, trump's reaction to what he heard yesterday in that scathing testimony from his former fixer and what we're learning from cohen's ongoing testimony today. also ahead, the stunning defense of the brutal north korean dictator by donald trump on the savage treatment of otto warmbier. an epic failure. next time donald trump wipes out on the world stage, maybe he can do it closer to home. we'll go inside the diplomatic meltdown. meltdown

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also wiesel beralan weiss elbur the chief financial officer of the trump organization. the bottom signature i believe is allen weisselberg's. allen weisselberg. allen weisselberg. that's signed by allen weisselberg. >> are there other people we should be meeting with? >> so allen weisselberg. >> chuck rosenberg, kaiser sosa the cohen hearings of the perhaps investigations out of the sdny.

allen weisselberg i understand had narrow limited immunity around certain questions but not a cooperating witness. will he become one? why is he so important? >> he's important nicolle because he's been around the trump organization and mr. trump for a long time. these are the types of people who are important witnesses because they see stuff, they read stuff, they hear stuff, they just hang around. so weisselberg couldn't be having a good day yesterday. he's probably not having a particularly good day today either. and i imagine -- i should say there's a problem with him testifying before congress, which is that he very well may have a fifth amendment issue, meaning that a truthful answer to questions may tend to incriminate him. he would only want to testify with immunity. and this gets a little complicated, i won't go too deep into it, but if congress wants to hear from him and they immunize him in order to get his testimony, that could make it tough on prosecutors down the road. i'm guessing prosecutors will go

first though, get everything they need and want from mr. weisselberg and then maybe only then will congress hear from him. >> chuck, can you just explain what sorts of crimes he would have witnessed? he was talking in the context, or at least some of the questions of the hush money scheme, that we know the southern district of new york, found to be a criminal undertaking and cohen's part, they also rernsferenced individ one, the president. what would weisselberg's role have been? what crimes could he have witnessed or committed himself? >> three come to mind. the first is the push money payments. if helped facilitate those payments and knew that the purpose was to conceal from federal election commission officials, from the american public, the purpose of those payments, and it was their goal to influence the election, sure, he could have a criminal liability for that. two other things come to mind, as the money guy, as the cfo of the trump organization, if he

helped trump prepare false financial statements that were submitted to banks to get loans, or if he devalued assets for purposes of tax reporting, that could give rise to liability either for financial fraud, bank fraud and the like or for tax fraud. again, i want to be very careful here. i don't know mr. weisselberg, although i heard his name a lot yesterday. but that all depends on what he knew, not simply whether he was used as a pawn perhaps to create inflated financial statements, but whether he knew that in so doing, he was helping someone else commit a fraud. that intent piece is really important. >> sort of the layman's perspective, if he saw that inflated wealth or inflated assets on a loan application or on the forbes 100 list, wouldn't it be obvious the fraud was being publicized and used? >> if he knew it was wrong, right, if he knew what the real numbers were and he let the fake numbers go forth and let them go to a bank, for instance, to help

obtain a loan, absolutely. he's in the soup. but if he's just being used -- for instance, nicolle, if you want to cheat on your taxes and you conceal from your tax preparer the fact you had a foreign bank account, she would not have criminal liability because you didn't tell her the truth. if she knew you had a foreign bank account and she helped you conceal it, then she would. it will turn on what mr. weisselberg knew, because he's so deep in that organization for so many years, i suspect he knows quite a bit. >> frank figliuzzi, i want to ask you about some of the other people the governor mentioned, the president's kids. michael cohen testified he briefed the family members about negotiations around trump tower moscow. we talked about how that's likely a subject today in front of the house intel committee. one of the sort of known lies that's out there is michael cohen, he's now confessed to and pleaded guilty to lying to congress about the time period around trump tower moscow. the president certainly lied to the public. we don't know what he said. rudy giuliani seems to suggest that the written responses gave

the president through election day, they've been having those conversations with the russians. but where do you think the other pressure points are for the other individuals the governor mentioned? the president's kids and other people at the trump organization? >> i found it interesting, nicolle, that robert mueller's been essentially hands off with the kids, with the family members. and so my imagination runs wild about whether or not that kind of hands-off approach has been done in coordination with the southern district or other districts because maybe the southern district is going to handle that. and that's where i think this is going. we're also headed for quite a show if indeed congress and various communities start slapping family members with subpoenas. but don jr. is at the top of the family list as someone who is totally exposed criminally. jared kushner has issues that are likely beyond the remit of mueller. and i think this is going to be a pressure point, as it has been

in even garden variety public corruption cases that i have been experienced with, where you start getting that official worried about exposure of his family and you start entering into negotiations based on whether or not family members are criminally exposed. and then you start learning about whether or not that official really is a loving family man or whether he's got only his self-interest at heart. we may be headed to a point where we see what trump is made of in terms of these kinds of decisions. >> let me play in that vain for two people who know the family what michael cohen said the president thinks of his son, donald trump jr. >> mr. trump had frequently told me and others that his son don jr. had the worst judgment of anyone in the world. and also that don jr. would never set up any meeting of significance alone. and certainly not without

checking with his father. >> you agree with that testimony? >> you know, listen, i don't agree that he would not do a meeting without getting his father's permission. that's not my experience with him. >> with russia to get dirt on hillary? >> let's assume you agree he has bad judgment. then, yeah, i think that just reinforces the idea he might do something like that without talking to his father first because only someone with bad judgment would do that. listen, everybody in that meeting had bad judgment. jared kushner, donald trump jr., all had bad judgment. they didn't run it by the lawyers first. they didn't run it by tom mcgann. they didn't seemingly talk to anybody else about it and to be in that room was awful judgment. we do have some stark evidence of really bad judgment on all three of them. >> do you believe cohen's raising the possibility that the president was aware of that meeting? >> the president said he wasn't. >> do you believe him? >> do i believe him? yes, i'm going to believe him

until i have a reason not to. >> he's told 9,576 lies. you're waiting for 10,000? >> i violate each statement on its merits. >> he reviewed all 10,000? >> i don't think i reviewed all 10,000. >> you talked about raising kids together. did he say some were smart? he never said anything negative about his children. >> did he think his son had good judgment? >> he never said that toe me one way or another. what he talked to me about and i detailed in the book he was concerned about going to the presidency and being there every day to help guide the business and guide them. so draw from that whatever you want, but that was the context within which he spoke to me about his concern, how am i going to deal with this if i wind up having this all-consuming job and they're off in new york doing this on their own? >> i heard from sources close to the president that he thought donald trump jr. was an idiot.

>> that's a strong word but i will say in my reporting, it is not my understanding the president thinks don jr. is his smartest child. that's how i understand how he thinks of don jr. and the way -- >> ivanka is and eric is steady. >> eric is the guy who looked out for his father, who kind of keep his head down and actually does the work, when you think about who's out publicly doing interviews and on the campaign trail and currently in the white house. there are people who are in it for show. there are people who are in it for their own ambition. and then there's one son who's just back at home doing the work. >> i agee with emily on that. my interaction with eric trump over time made me laugh about "saturday night live" that portrays eric as this dim wit. they got it dead wrong. it's funny stuff but it's dead wrong. eric trump's a really bright, young man and is a hard worker. >> notable you didn't jump in and say that about don jr. but we will keep going to emily. you were there, you talked to

michael cohen. you covered michael cohen. what is he talking about today? >> outside of the committee, i don't know what he's talking about inside the committee room, i think he felt really good last night. he came home and he was exhausted and felt like i went there and did what i had to do. was it grueling? yes. was it after a day of 9 1/2 hours behind closed doors? yes. did i get beaten up by republicans who asked me the same question over and over again? yes. but he felt like he stood his ground and did what he came down there to do and stayed on message as he possibly could, kept his composure. >> what did you learn? >> i thought the most poignant line that he said to me was, i did the dirty work for ten years. i'm feeling the consequences right now. if you guys keep doing the dirty work, you're going to learn what those consequences are. i thought that was just line in the room there felt like there was an exhale a little bit where people kind of connected to the story in a different way. and i heard cohen talk a lot

about this investigation. i have heard him talk a lot about his relationship with the president. and i never heard him articulate it in that way. that was an interesting thing to me. i think that he is continuing to have these conversations with the southern district of new york as a chilling thing to learn and it's something that i would imagine is causing great deal of shock. >> let me give you the last word and we will mention your book because you're here because your book is on the best-seller list for how many weeks? >> three weeks. >> heading for a fourth, i'm sure. i want to get your thoughts because one of your jobs on the campaign is deal with foreign leaders and try to help translate trump to them, if you will. one of the things that clearly needs to be translate sd how and why he so easily manipulated murderous dictators and believed them over the u.s. intelligence service. he did it against yesterday. he believes putin on election interference. he believes mbs on khashoggi's kidnapping and slaughter, and he believes kim jong-un on the savage treatment of otto

warmbier. what are your thoughts? >> i think this is fairly typical of the way the president thinks. >> that's sad. >> you know, if you're saddened already, let me finish it and make it even sadder when i finish the answer. this is the way he thinks he should be conducting diplomacy. he believes that saying nice things publicly, even some things he may not necessarily completely believe -- and i don't think he completely believes the otto warmbier situation. >> which site, he doesn't believe otto warm beer or kim jong-un? >> i don't think he believes kim jong-un. but i think he want the to develop a relationship with kim jong-un that would permit him to get a bigger deal. and i think he thinks this is one of the ways to do that. i don't necessarily agree. i don't agree. but i think that's what motivates it. i don't think that with the kim jong-un situation, it is a distrust of american intelligence. i think it is the way he conducted personal diplomacy. and you know, i don't necessarily think that kim

jong-un, they all walked away yesterday with nothing. so if that was the play, it's going to be a longer-term play because it didn't work yesterday. >> god help us all. chris christie's book is called "let me finish: trump, kushners, bannon, new jersey and the power of in-your-face politics." if you haven't read it yet, read it. it's great. thank you for coming back. i wish you were on permanent book tour. thank you to frank rosenburg, frank figliuzzi, emily jane fox. my friends and steadies. after the break, the search for rock bottom continues. we previewed it for you. donald trump once again taking the side of murderous dictators over his own people.

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>> they said they think it's russia. i have vladimir putin. he just said it's not russia. i will say this, i don't see any reason why it would be. i have great confidence in my intelligence people, but i will

tell you that president putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today. i spoke with the crown prince yesterday, and he strongly said that he had nothing to do with this, this was at a lower level. and some really bad things happened to otto. some really, really bad things. he tells me that he didn't know about it, and i will take him at his word. >> why? do that once, it could be happenstance. twice a possible coincidence. three times, we've got a pattern. murderous dictators around the globe, there seems to be a foolproof strategy for convincing donald trump you didn't do the hornl thing of which you were accused, even when the u.s. intelligence community says you did. just tell the president you're innocent. this time it was trump taking the word of kim jong-un, the north korean vespa, who ruins his country with an iron fist, anti-aircraft guns, ravenous dogs and chemical weapons, and knows everything happening there. except, if you believe trump,

about the murder african-american in his custody. but the question of why trump is siding with kim jong-un is second to more important questions, why does this keep happening? joining our conversation, robert costa, national political reporter with "the washington post," with us at the table rick stengel, former undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, senior adviser to moveon.org and political reporter from "the new york times." of course, lucky for us, all msnbc contributors. start with you, rick. >> well, his big misconception is countries are not their leaders. he doesn't understand countries have interests apart from who is governing and apart from their whole history. he thinks if he flatters the leader the way he's susceptible to flattery, the leader will be able to do things he wants the leader to do. but he overestimates not only personality but he overestimates the power of the leader, the same way he overestimates his power. the final thing i will say what they don't understand is the

secret of diplomacy. the secret of diplomacy is preparation, preparation, preparation. they were completely unprepared for this summit, right? usually as you know, 99% of the stuff is negotiated in advance. you don't need much room for kind of unconventional spontaneity. they did 98% responsibility nay it and that's why it was a bust. >> i guess the difference here though is that he knows the otto warmbier story. the first read it in the first state of the union address. he at one moment accepted the assessment of the intelligence community anding people who work for him and understood who did it and he either yesterday forgot or changed his story or doesn't mean anything he says or all of the above. >> i think all of the above. look, he likes to also curry favor with these dictators because i think he wants to be them. we see time and time again evidence of someone, this is donald trump, who wants to have kind of athor tarrism in this country. he fearmongers. he attacks the media. he politicizes his intelligence

community. he does things over and over again that's pretty scary, that's bordering that line what is happening here, what is the commander in chief doing? lastly, he's putting us in danger, our national security in danger. when you looked up and you put on the pedestal dictators but then you shun our allies. he plays nicer with dictators than he does with democrats in the house or in washington, d.c. >> nicer than republicans. ' tacked paul ryan last week then he attacked kim jong-un for not building his damn wall. what do you think is behind -- what is happening behind the scenes when the american -- guess what's troubling is, i know there are no red lines. i know nothing is sacred. but with khashoggi, you could see the president in the oval office one day, he wasn't from here, right? he wasn't one of us. but warmbier, an innocent young american, savagely beaten by the north koreans. nobody thinks that anything happens in north korea without kim jong-un's knowledge and calling in the code red or

whatever he want to call it. what happened there? how does that happen? >> let's say for the sake of argument that the president's praise and kissing up here to kim is insincere. >> let's say for the time, it already failed. the summit had already been blown up. there was nothing more to get. they were already walking away from the summit. we had our e-mails from reporters over there the summit had been blown up before he said that. >> the problem is admitting that he's being lied to is a sign he's impotent and can't do anything about it. and there's some truth in that american presidents have been locked in a box on north korea for 15, 20 years. but what the president -- >> but they never excused the murderous actions of the dictator. >> but for him it's one to one or one on one. he feels that he can't admit weakness. if he admits he's being lied to with all of the reporters, it makes him look like a fool. what he hasn't grasped though is what rick was alluding to, countries like north korea don't have permanent friendships, they

have permanent interests. and kim's interest is staying on top of the chernle house he's built in his country, not making friends with the president and having a nice press conference. >> your colleagues phil rucker and josh dossier had written incredible stories and reporting about the complete meltdown on this trip. talk about some of the that great reporting in your paper the last 24 hours. >> my colleagues have captured the transactional prism in which this president operates his foreign policy, whether it's russian interference in the elections and his own assurances from vladimir putin and he's accepted them. president trump as you detailed with mbs and saudi arabia and now with kim jong-un and north korea has seen gains possible in foreign policy as a way to excuse behavior that his own intelligence communities and many of his own advisers have seen at abhorrent. we've seen this president navigating on his own, isolated often, as he moves forward and tries to use almost a real estate perspective on foreign policy, about leverage, meeting

personalities as a way to make some type of foreign policy accomplishment but he struggled each step of the way, as they documented. >> you just said the most important thing said so far in this broadcast. we're going to snieak in a brea and pick this up right rwhere yu left it. this up right rwhere yo left it. with all that usaa offers why go with anybody else? we know their rates are good, we know that they're always going to take care of us. it was an instant savings and i should have changed a long time ago. we're the tenney's and we're usaa members for life. call usaa to start saving on insurance today.

>> you just said the most >> you just said the most i switched to miralax for my constipation.

stimulant laxatives forcefully stimulate the nerves in your colon. miralax works with the water in your body to unblock your system naturally. and it doesn't cause bloating, cramping, gas, or sudden urgency. miralax. look for the pink cap. it was a very interesting two days and a very productive two days. sometimes you have the to walk and this was just one of those times. >> i want to pick up with you, robert, this transactional prism. all of the trepidation among the national security officials, appointees and career folks bore out and they were right. they moved the goal posts to say well nothing bad did either, is

that where we are. >> you can always draw a comparison to domestic policy. divided government struggled to reach for a national emergency declaration. you can't come up with a deal to find the funds for his border wall. and you see the president also was surrounded by forng policy. they, too, struggled to try to connect with this president that runs on gut instinct and doesn't think about human rights and american values the same way that others have. >> he needs, again, he has a over reliance on personal relations, right? he thinks that somehow tra transactions between two people will produce something that otherwise would not be produced.

you can go over there, hold up that big check, have a handshake, a glass of champagne and it will be done. he puts a over reliance on his personal diplomacy and he doesn't do that. as our colleagues have said, bolton wants to do that, it makes them look good, and kim walks out of this. what a fantastic leader he is and what great economic -- >> they say it is tricks. there are things that are just gut wrenching. every time i think this feels like the second category. to flatter a dictator that is responsible for the death of

ot otto, and to draw the lines that robert acosta just did. >> you hit it on the head. it is like this president has no heart, right? and my heart goes out to otto's family, to go through, watch the commander in chief say those things, say that believes kim jong un. that has to be very devastating. there is a lack of empathy and hart and we have to go back to what it was all about in the gipping, this was a vanity project for donald trump, he was using our national security to go produce something. he was thinking this could be like the last one. >> he wants a peace prize. >> right, it is all about him, what he can do and then he knew michael cohen would be testifying at the hearing, the house oversight hearing, and it is about producing, what can he

do, how can he distract. >> but to be fair, no thousand, it was better that he walks away than made a ball dead. >> yeah, so we also saw the obliteration of norms for the treatment of u.s. reporters. when a president travels to a foreign country no matter what you think of the headlines you protect your press corps. >> it is a demonstration for how we do it. we have the most free press of anyone in the world and a grand st tradition of it. there is no president that likes questions shouted out at n non-press conferences. don't ever answer the question. and he often answers them and that is why we ask them. i'm big enough, strong enough, and secure snuff to take this

heat. when he does this, it is a sign of fear and a compromise of our national values. >> we're going to sneak in a break, robert acosta gets the last word on the other side. s t last word on the other side. i'm a fighter. always have been. when i found out i had age-related macular degeneration,

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robert, i want your thoughts on what awaits the president here at home. >> he is continues to try to on the way to come.

the real challenges at home. they're not going away any time soon. >> my thanks to my panel. "mtp daily" starts now. >> missed the governor, i know he is always looking for me. thank you nicolle. if it is thursday, is today's episode being brought to you by the letter i? good evening, i'm chuck todd here in washington. after yesterday's testimony, michael cohen is back on capitol hill for a third straight day. this is the committee that michael cohen lied to and got charged for