are low, that's why why with you're seeing a bit of a selloff, half a precent, a mild reaction. that brings this hour to a close to me. look for me on social media. thanks for watching. "deadline: white house" with nicole wallace starts right now. hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in the new york. it was only a matter of time before donald trump's total and complete exoneration tour turned into a campaign against special counsel robert mueller. the very man who a short time ago donald trump believed totally and completely exonerated him. and as jim comey former fbi director wrote yesterday, donald trump has a way of eating the souls of the people who worked for him. it looks like the soul on today's menu belongs to emmet flood. he has slammed mueller, the

form former director of the fbi and former marine. flood's attack on mueller came in the form of a letter to attorney general william barr sent the day after the redacted mueller report was publically relea released. the letter accused mueller of playing politics when he concluded that his investigation did not exonerate trump on obstruction. he wrote in part, quote, what prosecutors are supposed to do is complete an investigation and then either ask the grand jury to return an indictment or decline to charge the case. as if mueller wouldn't know that. flood argued that mueller's conclusion that the president could not be exonerated went beyond that mandate and said mueller was making a political statement. flood writing, quote, the special counsel and his staff failed in their duty to act as prosecutors and only as prosecutors. the white house attack on mr. mueller comes as the fireworks continue on capitol hill over attorney general william barr standing up the

house judiciary committee today. he cancelled he said because he doesn't want to answer questions from lawyers. funny he's the ag. it comes as he faces new allegations that he lied under oath about his clash with mueller over the rollout of his report. here's house speaker nancy pelosi. >> deadly serious about it, as the attorney general of the united states of america was not telling the truth to the congress of the united states. that's a crime. nobody is above the law. not the president of the united states and not the attorney general. being attorney general does not give you a bath to say whatever you want. and it is the fact because you are the attorney general. >> here's the testimony she and other democrats say was a lie. >> reports have emerged recently, that members of the special counsel's team are frustrated at some level with the limited information included in your march 24th letter that

it does not adequately or accurately, necessarily, portray the report's findings. do you know what they're referencing with that? >> no, i don't. i think -- i think -- i suspect that they probably wanted, you know, more put out. >> and to pull together the twin developments of the day, the war on mueller with the clash with barr there's this from the "new york times," quote, barr who said at a senate judiciary committee hearing on wednesday that we have to stop using the criminal justice system as a political weapon now stands accused of doing just that. that's where we start with our favorite reporters and friends on set john hileman, as well as donny deustch, in washington national political reporter for "the washington post" robert costa. former federal prosecutor paul

butler and heidi prezbella. take me inside the aggressive posture emmet flood has taken against robert mueller. i imagine the two men know each other. i imagine don mcghan who's the star witness in the obstruction volume of the mueller report, work closely together. now emmet flood in another memo to file making clear today that he does not approve and finds himself at odds with the conduct and conclusion of robert s. mueller's investigation. >> remember who emmet flood is, he was brought into the white house by don mcghan. don mcghan believes in asserting executive privilege, even though he cooperated with the mueller investigation. he and emmet flood come out of the same legal school. they believe in protecting execty power. even with don mcghan on the outside he has an ally, someone

who sees it the same way, being the point person in negotiating with congress as they make their request. and emmet flood, more than anyone is drawing the line for president trump and how this is going to move forward. that's what the attorney general, william barr, was referencing yesterday in his testimony knowing how emmet flood is proceeding at this moment. >> mark karalo is another one in that circle, he quit donald trump's team. his red line was attacks on robert mueller, his character, the conduct and character of the investigation. do you think anyone pauses or stops or thinks about what jim comey wrote about how people who go to work for donald trump sell their souls. do you think emmet flood had any problem with attacking robert mueller's conduct? >> and carolo was uncomfortable with how the trump tower meeting

was explain bid the white house, the "air force one" story, others involved in that statement about donald trump jr., he left the legal team. but in terms of the bigger picture question. so many people in president trump's circle may not like president trump that much personally but they believe in executive power. i counter that with a lot of conservative lawyers. they're in on this argument not necessarily to protect the president in the same way someone out of the "breitbart" news or the gop would. >> this wasn't congress. this was robert mueller at the end not recommending charges against donald trump, not recommending tearing up the olc opinion that says you can't indict a sitting president. simply refusing to write a declination letter. do you get any sense being at war publically with robert mueller gives emmet flood any

discomfort? >> not that it gives mr. flood any discomfort. it's clear when you talk to white house officials they believe mr. mueller went by the book here and because of that, quiet across the board, it has enabled the attorney general, mr. flood, and others to walk into that void, into the legal and political vacuum and start to define the story and argue on their terms, rather than mr. mueller's who continues to communicate, quietly, privately by letter. paul butler, when robert mueller speaks, i think a lot of people will be made to look petty, political, partisan, and to have done exactly what jim comey have said they've done, fed their souls to donald trump. and i think emmet flood joins a long line of individuals in that category. what do you make of this new -- we know about william barr's conflict and confrontation with

robert s. mueller. he wrote two letters to william barr, someone described as his friend, expressing his discomfort, not with the media spin as barr tried to spin it but with the distorted view, distorted takes of the actual facts of the mueller report. now we have white house counsel, emmet flood writing another memo to file expressing his disapproval of mueller's final conclusions on obstruction. >> so with the attorney general there have been two different approaches to the mueller report. first there was the spin, the lie that the report exonerated the president. that's what we saw in that four-page summary and that performance, the morning before the redacted report was released, and now in spinning barr's been caught up in his own lies. with emmet flood, on the other hand, i think there's something different going on. i think emmet flood is actually concerned about a criminal case against the president.

emmet flood's letter talks about the fact that mueller went out of his way to say that a president can be indicted after he leaves office and that mueller was specifically preserving evidence in that event. so mueller says, it's a detailed report in part because recollections are fresh and i have access to the documents. so i think what flood is really concerned about is 2020 or 2024, if president trump leaves office, keeping him out of jail. >> so to your point, paul, preet bhar says there's a reasonable likelihood trump will get indicted after he leaves office, this is a quote, my former office endorses and believes the fact as michael cohen committed in open court that he engaged in conduct he pleaded guilty to at the direction of individual one. individual one is the president. depending on what the other circumstances are, i believe there's a reasonable likelihood

that they would follow through on that. is that what you're talking about? is that what you're getting about, paul? >> i think prosecutors are going to have a spore mas board. they could go with preet and campaign financing violations or go with one of the 10 obstruction of justice in the mueller report. >> let me jump to barr's standoff with congress. nancy pelosi we showed there, mincing no words. here now the three known complaints that came from robert mueller, who remained silent for 22 months as donald trump maligned him, smeared him, impugned his character and integrity of his investigators. march 25th, robert mueller wrote a letter to doj, march 27th mueller wrote a letter to barr. march 28th mueller phone call with barr. i forget which action it was that barr called him a snit or

the snitty, i forget which one it is. >> it's growing emotional, to use a word, nicole. if you saw nancy pelosi today, she looked shaken. she said she had lost sleep watching the attorney general's testimony and thinking about it all day after that. you have members now openly calling for him, barr, to be impeached or to step down. more immediately what's going to happen is jerry nadler, the chairman of the house judiciary committee has given barr one to two more days to comply with the subpoena he issued for the full mueller report and then at that point he faces some decisions here. are they going to try to sue to enforce that subpoena? are they going to hold barr in contempt? they may do both. but if history is a judge, these things take a while to play out, nicole. if you recall, it took congress years to get the documents

behind the fast and the furious investigation during the obama administration. so more immediately where we should be looking is exactly where you mentioned earlier, which is to mueller. and the word that i'm hearing is that mueller may appear voluntarily as early as the 14th of may. and that is when members will have a whole host of questions, including what was the nature of that conversation with barr since one of the things he refused to say was that he would even release the notes of his conversation with mueller during his testimony. >> heidi, there's a lot of muscle memory in terms of attention between congress and the justice department around a cover up. the cover up is always where politicians get in trouble. and if you go on a -- want to stretch that out and do this at the risk of possibly disstorying it. if the crime was they didn't find a criminal conspiracy between trump and the russians

to interfere, it looks like the cover up, not just around that, but barr's cover up of what mueller did find, which the president celebrated a few days ago, looks like they're digging themselves a hole. >> the question now, and it's clear for democrats, not so much republicans, but whether barr is now part of the obstruction narrative. one of the questions for mueller is, how much obstruction by the president may have affected the underlying findings when you consider that for instance the star witness, who is paul manafort, never complied. that the president himself never sat for sworn testimony, but now if you watched barr during his testimony the other day, he was performing a lot of gymnastics to not say that there was any evidence there of obstruction. and, in fact, went so far as to say, the president could go ahead and fire mueller and it wouldn't matter because they'd

get a new special counsel. and as long as the president has that statutory authority it can't be obstruction. so i think at one point he used the words, well, i think the president's lawyers would say, which then opens him up from the attacks he's getting from democrats that he was seeking to make a case as the president's personal attorney instead of laying out what the facts of the report were. >> it is such a contamination of the justice department. you'd expect it from an individual like emmet flood who adheres to this ideology -- a legal ideology of executive privilege. i would think there might be sort of a pause at the human level in maligning the investigation run by robert mueller. robert mueller was the fbi director at a time when emmet flood was working in the bush white house. but apparently no one has the capacity to pump the brakes in service of donald trump. jim comey goes a long way in

explaining that. but the twin sort of downward spirals that are happening in full view of barr and of flood are really stunning today. >> they are. and i think, you know, you read the flood letter and it's sort of stunning in that respect. it's not just an attack on mueller. it's an attack that's filled with purple pros and -- it's insults and kind of invective that is unusual in the context that you're describing. this notion that bob mueller is someone who -- two years ago when he was appointed into this job as special counsel, universally praised, revered, beloved and spoken of in hushed tones by republicans, including people of the stripe of emmet flood. now you see this document that's not just designed to argue with him on the legal merriits. we could spend all day and

people better qualified than me would point out the oddness of the argument he's making. he's taking mueller to task for not sticking to the letter, which is he should indict the president or decline to indict the president even though there's this olc opinion that prescribes mueller or any special counsel from indicting the sitting president, right? that logical defect is not what's most striking it's the personal attack. if anything in the world right now, if you're bob mueller, you're watching barr and now emmet flood, although this letter is predated somewhat, and thinking anything is driving his incentive to not just give a bare bones testimony before congress but to really uncork his genuine views, this kind of thing must fuel the fire for bob mueller and therefore cannot be good in the long run for donald trump. >> that's where i want to sort of land here.

robert mueller is someone who for 22 months was the target of donald trump's attacks. i remember the day that sean hannity made a graphic showing him the head of a crime family. >> yeah. >> robert mueller's friends said he wasn't talking to them about anything about this experience. he said not one word. it's difficult to articulate what a blockbuster it is as someone who worked in the bush administration when he was the fbi director. the first person in the history of the fbi to have that ten year term extended by president obama to serve three more years before jim comey took over. he had three communications with william barr about his discomfort, not with the media spin as the justice department would have you believe, but with the distortion, that suggests there's somebody brewing. and democrats have the opportunity to not use robert mueller as a political weapon, he will not be used that way, but use him as an arbiter of truth. >> you read that letter, it's so

clear if you understand the time line and look at the language of the letter, not what barr said yesterday, not the characterization of it but what he's saying in it. he is in an uncharacteristic way, you know mueller better than i do, banging down the door saying stop lying about my report. and the anger, in a controlled way, there's no forward language in that letter, what it represents is so powerful. and you have people who do know mueller well, who said in the last couple weeks, if he's called to congress it will be a disappointment he's so restrained. we've seen him before congress before, when he was the fbi director. he's not going to say anything colorful, he's going to be boring. that was the last two weeks. now in the last 24 hours, he's going to give up the restraint

and speak his mind. that will be a moment in our history. >> he won't be boring if he sticks to the mueller report. we were able to proof check william barr with the footnotes in the report. the problem is he won't be blockbuster television, his brand is the truth. and the truth is donald trump's conduct was so egregious, robert mueller who may have wanted to issue a deckly nation letter, like the one emmet flood whined about, screamed about, he couldn't. >> the main gift that barr gave the democrats, as far as saying the president is above the law, perjurying himself, the democrats have struggled how do we stay on mueller, obstruction, collusion, and yet make it relevant to voters. what barr did yesterday, he took

it all out of that and basically is about the law. are we a land of law? two systems of law, a law for the president, the attorney general, and the rich and powerful. i think the others in this nation understand that. we are a nation of laws and that's something you can start to work with voters on. as far as mueller to your point, the fact that mueller has been restrained so far and the fact we've been so critical -- i've been so critical, and others vis-a-vis, him staying within the doj guide lines and not pushing the ball over the goal line, he can do that now in a way he couldn't. he has already established -- not that he had to establish his credibility, but his restraint. if he wants to step in a way he previously wouldn't have, i think there's a new permission that wasn't there before. the big news is barr has given the dems a gift to take this to

a new place. >> robert, you reported in the days and weeks up to the release of the mueller report that the big thing was the obstruction report. was it they knew the president was found not to be exonerated and they knew about this mixed verdict or was it they feared it or was it they knew what the president had done to thwart the investigation. >> they knew the list of every witness who had gone into robert mueller's investigative room with these prosecutors and agents and talking through all of these instances of obstruction. because if if you talk to a witness or you talk to a lawyer for a witness, it was clear that robert mueller was probing obstruction at length. and they knew about this. and they knew this report was going to be an extensive second volume. they did not know if mueller would choose to prosecute or not and finally conclude legally how to move forward. but the obstruction side, what has always animated the white

house more than anything because those inside believe there was never going to be enough evidence on the conspiracy front that would make the country uneasy on the foreign interactions. but they knew the president, especially with his relationship with don mcghan, would fly into fits of rage, and be unhappy and whether it would cross to legal obstruction, they were unsure inside the west wing. paul butler, let me ask you to wrap this up. robert costa has done great reporting as he just went through, that don mcghan spent 30 hours detailing the events of obobstructing the investigation. we have reporting that rod rosenstein promised the white house in september of 2018 that he would land the plane because he was on the team. do you think this letter is expressing a deal that was broken? this letter is really puzzling.

if they have confidence that their client has no exposure, why are they screaming at the top of their lungs? >> they're screaming because the mueller report is out, which even in the redacting form is one of the most damning investigations of a president ever. the congress is finally exercising its role of checks and balances. the result is that the trump team is running scared. and the trump team we now know includes the attorney general of the united states. the deputy attorney general of the united states, and the white house counsel. it's not their job but trump has found his roy cohn. the thing to remember about roy cohn is he lost his law license ultimately. he was disbarred for lying and cheating. >> that sounds like a deep tease. thank you for spending time with us. i'm grateful. after the break, did kamala harris' moment reshape the 2020

primary. how one 2020 candidate stole the show yesterday. also ahead joe biden's new life under donald trump's skin. we'll go into the unsuccessfully efforts to play it cool. the donald trump child separation story coming up. e dod separation story coming up just listen. (vo) there's so much we want to show her. we needed a car that would last long enough to see it all. (avo) subaru outback. ninety eight percent are still on the road after 10 years. come on mom, let's go! (coughing) need a change of scenery? kayak searches hundreds of travel sites and filters by cabin class, wi-fi and more. so you can be confident you're getting the right flight at the best price.

kayak. search one and done. ♪ corey is living with metastatic breast cancer, which is breast cancer that has spread to other parts of her body. she's also taking prescription ibrance with an aromatase inhibitor, which is for postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive her2- metastatic breast cancer as the first hormonal based therapy. ibrance plus letrozole was significantly more effective at delaying disease progression versus letrozole. patients taking ibrance can develop low white blood cell counts, which may cause serious infections that can lead to death. before taking ibrance, tell your doctor if you have fever, chills, or other signs of infection, liver or kidney problems, are pregnant, breastfeeding, or plan to become pregnant. common side effects include low red blood cell and low platelet counts, infections, tiredness, nausea, sore mouth, abnormalities in liver blood tests,

diarrhea, hair thinning or loss, vomiting, rash, and loss of appetite. corey calls it her new normal because a lot has changed, but a lot hasn't. ask your doctor about ibrance. the #1 prescribed fda-approved oral combination treatment for hr+/her2- mbc. oral combination treatment mno kidding.rd. but moving your internet and tv? that's easy. easy?! easy? easy. because now xfinity lets you transfer your service online in just about a minute with a few simple steps.

really? really. that was easy. yup. plus, with two-hour appointment windows, it's all on your schedule. awesome. now all you have to do is move...that thing. [ sigh ] introducing an easier way to move with xfinity. it's just another way we're working to make your life simple, easy, awesome. go to xfinity.com/moving to get started. you inspired us to create internet that puts you in charge. that handles anything. that protects what's important. and reaches everywhere. this is beyond wifi. this is xfi. simple, easy, awesome. this attorney general lacks all credibility, and has, i think, compromised the american public's ability to believe that he is a per vaer of justice. >> should he resign?

>> yes. >> he thinks of himself as the attorney of the president instead of the people's attorney. i think that's disqualifying. >> this is one of the reasons why people are failing to trust the integrity of our government when they see displays like this. >> we have a president of the united states whose primary interest i think has been clear as a result of what we know from the mueller report, his primary interest has been to obstruct justice. my primary interest is to pursue justice. >> senator kamala harris cross-examihaving a moment. her questioning earned praise among democrats and fear among republicans. here fear triggered the president who last night recycled a hillary clinton insult, nasty. wasn't even original. the at tan lick, the crucible of

presidential politics is mostly performative. more to the point it's a series of performances over many months where candidates handle pressure. there will be plenty more of them before democrats make their choice next here and barr's testimony will turn out to be a blip on the road. but harris had seven minutes to show what she could do and she seemed to make the most of it. joining us the rev al sharpton and emily fox. the boys and heidi are still here. rob, let me start with you. i don't buy, when you have 20 people the road to the nomination is made up of moments and they endure, they are cumulative, they do not evaporate. this will forever be part of the story she'll tell as the a candidate in the field. >> it's one thing to have a moment, it's another to seize

the moment. she seized the moment and she distinguished herself in a way that will not be forgeten. i think the thing you must remember is you're not going to have many minutes where the whole nation is watching. where you have the attorney general in front of you. she was not the only 2020 candidate that was in the senate judiciary committee. she was the only one that surgically took him down and did it with dignity, but did it emphatically. and i think she helped her candidacy a lot. those of us that have known her, know that's the kamala harris we wanted to show up, and she showed up and really i think delivered not only for her campaign, for the country. but the nonsense he was saying, she so disarmed him in front of everyone it really changed the whole tone of the entire proceeding. so i think she did herself a service but she did the country a service and i think she showed that's what you want in somebody that's going to be in this presidential contest.

she was totally on point yesterday. >> you're so right. i mean, this is the animating volume craving quality of trump-ism that he lies and gets away with it. this is the central thing that makes his detractors on both sides of the aisle crazy. and what she did is in a very -- she is just unfazed by the lying. she was unfazed by the stone walling. and he said, i don't understand the meaning of your question. did you talk to them and ask them to prosecute any of your enemy? i think she was getting at some of the reporting, have you talked to them -- >> she didn't do it screaming, calling him a liar. she took leaf by leaf and disarmed him and disrobed him about the lies. and i think the way she did it, if i was counselling her, that's how you want a presidential

candidate to behave. she was not at all extreme, she was not shrill but she was very effective. and those that were a little more shrill won't be remembered. people remember how kamala harris acted yesterday. >> i think what's important is the question as we go into the primary and get deeper into that is who can take part president trump. who's going to be the candidate who can take apart his lies. seeing how she acted yesterday is a precursor in how she make on stage in a debate next to president trump. i think as of this morning, there are 21 people running. if you give them two minutes, that's 45 minutes. so to have seven minutes and execute them flawlessly -- >> let me bring heidi back this in. i want to be careful when i ask this question -- i got this advice from a producer early in

my career path and spending more time on television. there are so many nonverbal things as a woman that you have to bake into the cake in terms of how you communicate. and i mean, we all know what they are. you know, no offense, no one is going to tweet about hair -- >> there's nothing to tweet about. you'd be surprised how often -- >> the point i'm making we are judged for better or worse, this doesn't always show up in polls because respondents and voters aren't always honest about it. but kamala harris nailed every aspect of being a strong woman, a professional woman and tough as bleep. and if you want to measure these candidates you have to watch them in the ring with the most similar to trump kind of politician. there's no one more similar to trump than william barr in terms of his absolute ease with which he lies, his absolute faith in

sort of the trump delusions that he was spied on. asylum seekers can be permanently detained. there was no grounds to investigate this president. so to see her take him on was as good as a trial run as you can get. >> you're talking to the woman reporter who covered the woman candidate in 2016. since you took me there, i will say 100%, a take away from covering hillary clinton, was there there was a different standard in terms of the woman candidate not being able to ever absolute lose her cool. she has to remain very calm and collected and the word you used is surgical. that's exactly what we saw from kamala harris. it really reminded me of that moment that also vaulted amy klobuchar onto the national stage during the brett kavanaugh hearings when she was very calm and surgical in the way that she interacted with him.

so even before this moment, nicole, there were polls telling us, even though biden and sanders are at the top, the two candidates who most american voters want to hear more from are pete buttigieg and kamala harris. since you used a "vanity fair" headline, there's another headline that sums up the press she's getting, kamala harris guts barr like a fish, leaves him flopping on the deck. that's the takeaway and headlines she's getting from this moment. there's so much crowding going on now it's hard to say how long and how much of a bounce she'll get out of this, but people are interested in learning more about her. >> i visualize, to pick up where emily and the rev -- i go right to the stage. there are four candidates for different reasons. there's a gravitas there. my entire company was run by women. so i watched over the last 30

years how ceo women perform. it's unfortunate but there has to be an iron fist in a velvet glove. this is not fair for elizabeth warren. her demeanor which is bern knee like does not work for a lot of women. that's just a fact. i'm not saying this as a -- i'm the ultimate feminist in the world and you and heidi were dancing around it. but she has that quiet, powerful strength that is served up in a way that is more easily digestible still even in the year 2020 for both men and women, and i love her side by side with trump. >> really quick. >> two things about moments because moments really do matter as you said at the beginning of this. i think one thing about a moment is they work when they reinforce something that's really true about the candidate. in her case because of her pros c prosecutorial background, it kind of illuminated a thing part

of her character profile and her narrative, number one. and number two, on this broader issue of the gender thing, moments also timing really matters. in the larger narrative arc in the democratic race. there's a lot of people, many women and some men, looking and saying why is pete buttigieg getting so much attention, buttigieg, beto o'rourke, bernie, all these guys getting attention. and it's a moment that's right for the lens to shift towards the women candidates and it's at that moment she stepped forward with a genuine national moment that reinforces her brand, at a moment when people are looking, who want to turn away from the men and give all the women a closer look. she has to seize that moment right now. i think it's really important for her. >> heidi thank you for keeping it real with me. appreciate it. to be continued.

after the break donald trump is obsessed with joe biden, and it's showing. inside the unsuccessful efforts to get donald trump to stop letting his inferiority complex show. s inferiority complex show ♪

♪ applebee's bigger, bolder grill combos. now that's eatin good in the neighborhood. for adults with moderately to severely active crohn's disease, stelara® works differently. studies showed relief and remission, with dosing every 8 weeks. stelara® may lower your ability to fight infections and may increase your risk of infections and cancer. some serious infections require hospitalization. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you have an infection or flu-like symptoms or sores, have had cancer, or develop new skin growths, or if anyone in your house needs or recently had a vaccine. alert your doctor of new or worsening problems, including headaches, seizures, confusion and vision problems. these may be signs of a rare, potentially fatal brain condition. some serious allergic reactions and lung inflammation can occur.

talk to your doctor today, and learn how janssen can help you explore cost support options. remission can start with stelara®.

folks, you know, i understand that the president has been tweeting a lot about me this morning and for a while. i wonder why the hell he's doing on that. so i'm going to be the object of his attention for a while, folks, i imagine. joe biden has taken up residence in donald trump's mind and joe biden knows it. the atlantic reports, quote, the trump campaign's internal polling shows biden to be trump's more dangerous general election opponent. but the question how to deal with joe biden and others is up in the air. politico says jared kushner said

not to meddle in the primaries, it could backfire. but it doesn't appear trump got the memo. we've asked him, i've personally asked him to stop. it's not helping us, it's helping biden. we don't think biden can make it out of the woke democratic primary. but he can if the president helps him. jump ball. >> the interesting thing about biden, going back to eisenhower, the only democrats taken a house is fresh new faces. the reason i think the unfresh face plays in biden's favor at this point, it's an advertising tale i'm going to tell. we used to do out there campaigns for a car client. whenever they get nervous after the fact, a solid campaign. biden is a car running down the road. he's comfort food, a safe place to go. so i think the unfreshness in the face works for him, beyond the gravitas, size i'm going to

beat up trump on stage. the face is there. >> you have to remember, trump is a branding guy. when you have 20 people in a race, the branded guy is a threat. and the branded guy is joe biden. everybody knows him. and his strength is exactly where trump does not need him strong. it'd be already if he was strong in areas that trump would never win anyway. he's strong in pennsylvania, strong in kentucky, strong in these kind of rust belt states. so you've got the branded guy, because you got to think trump like, which is branding. you have the branded guy, strong in my area, yeah, he's going to live in his head until the election is over because he's a real threat to him. >> this is why the president is so self-destructive because he knows that and he can't help himself but tweet about him and add to biden's brand anyway.

he can't help himself in giving the other guy red meat. this is the best thing for joe biden at this point. i'm sure they're praying it continues. >> he's providing an in-kind campaign contribution to biden. the argument about electability general don't work. the reason people vote for people, they believe in them, embody their hopes and dreams. not calculations about who can win a swing state. trump is obviously a different animal. there are so many democrats so focussed on how they feel it's so essential to be able to beat him they're inclined to weigh that more heavily. and trump is enforcing it. as trump is acting scared, he's making his argument for biden. which is obviously good for biden as everyone said. you couldn't be more self-destructive than this. it is the right advice, his

campaign's advice, like let him -- leave him alone. >> go after firefighters that's how you're more destructive. >> he's going to find a fire engine to ride this weekend, put on a hat and pull the siren. he's so freaked out -- >> wasn't there a fire truck in the driveway? >> we'll google it. he's so freaked out -- he's such a stay off my lawn guy. and the assurance that he's not interested in growing the republican party to include any women or anyone other than an angry white man fine with his charlottesville comments. he's been tweeting biden out -- >> he sees firemen as his constituency. >> those are my people. >> he went ballistic, which shows it hit him where he lives.

and biden has the capacity to drive him crazy, just be cool, don't overplay it, joe, just be joe and that will drive him crazy. >> when we come back, new reporting from jacob soboroff about the entangled web of donald trump's policies. stay with us. stay with us

if you have postmenopausal osteoporosis and a high risk for fracture now might not be the best time to ask yourself are my bones strong? life is full of make or break moments. that's why it's so important to help reduce your risk of fracture with prolia®. only prolia® is proven to help strengthen and protect bones from fracture with 1 shot every 6 months. do not take prolia® if you have low blood calcium, are pregnant, are allergic to it or take xgeva® serious allergic reactions, like low blood pressure

trouble breathing; throat tightness; face, lip, or tongue swelling rash; itching; or hives have happened. tell your doctor about dental problems as severe jaw bone problems may happen or new or unusual pain in your hip groin, or thigh, as unusual thigh bone fractures have occurred. speak to your doctor before stopping prolia® as spine and other bone fractures have occurred. prolia® can cause serious side effects, like low blood calcium; serious infections which could need hospitalization; skin problems; and severe bone joint, or muscle pain. are you ready? ask your doctor how prolia® can help strengthen your bones. like.. pnc easy lock, so you can easily lock your credit card when its maximum limit differs from its vertical limit.

and clover flex, for when you need to take credit cards when no one carries cash. or requesting a call to help get a new credit card- one that hasn't followed the family goldfish. pnc - make today the day. donald trump's family separation policy was one of the lowest points, if not the lowest point of his presidency so far. near 3,000 children ripped from their parents and kept in cages. it took the administration weeks to put an end to it with trump finally signing an executive order and now in an email exchange that took place three days after that order was signed obstained exclusively by nbc news we find the administration

was never equipped to reunite the families. a health and human service official told a top i.c.e. official no we do not have any say for a handful. we have a list of parent alien numbers but no way to link them to children." additionally a third child has died in federal custody, hhs reporting yesterday that a 16-year-old died after falling ill shortly after he arrived at a migrant shelter in texas. msnbc award-winning reporter jacob soboroff joins us now with his exclusive reporting. i want to get to the award that you so, so, so richly deserve, but take us inside these latest -- >> well, thank you nicolle. i was thinking back to this time period, june 23rd is when the fact sheet went out for the department of homeland security

that said they have a central database that is tracking the parents and the children and the same day the emails were being exchanged between hhs and i.c.e. two days before on 21st i was sitting with you on your show and i said i cannot stop thinking about these kids and where delay athey are today. officials from i.c.e. and hhs were emailing each other essentially saying the same thing. they were talking about the parents, but the point remains the same. they had no idea how to reunite the parents and the children, and when hhs basically asked i.c.e. to fill out the spreadsheet with 2,000 different parents in order to start reuniting these families, they were puzzled. they started to scramble for the data and information and at the end of the day they couldn't find and the only way they were able to find it is when the judge here in southern california ultimately ordered them to come up with a new way to put them back together.

this was a systematic policy to rips thousands of children away from their parents in a way that had never been done before, and all the credit goes to donald trump. >> i want to slow this down. take me back in time to june of last summer and bring me up to speed. at the time the public outcry commenced, in part because of your reporting, reporting in propublica, for the rest of my days i will never forget, the child wailing in one of those cages with the blanket. we saw donald trump and his wife ivanka, we were l have no idea how to end it. take me inside that and then where are we now? >> the system was never designed to separate every parent and child that came across the southern border, and that was the stated goal, the deterrence goal because they figured it

would stop migrants from coming to this country. ultimately it certainly didn't. it did the exact opposite if you look at the numbers rue it no uh. they never had a way to put all of these family together. when the pressure built to a boiling point and donald trump realized he didn't like the images that he was seeing on television or hearing from propublica, he signed the executive order on june 20th of last summer. so the next day, that's the day that i came up to see you in new york, and we were talking about how we still have no idea where all these children are. we know that there are thousands of them. we didn't know where the parents were either. and as the federal government, as president trump and his administration basically promised we're going to be putting everybody back together. that's what kevin macaleenan's been saying. even in an interview with lester holt, the intent was to reunite them. the emails we've obtained through the house judiciary committee show it was anything but that. in fact, it was the opposite and

it was a mad scramble behind the scenes in order to take two separate lists -- and dhs keeps pushing back on me today saying we always had a database. that's really nice you had a database, but a database without data is not a database. there are still children today not back together. >> how many, jacob? >> 55 in government custody as of the last court filing from the zero tolerance policy, nicconic nicolle. if this system was in place that these emails reveal they were absolutely flabbergasted they couldn't find all this information and put it back together. we wouldn't be needing to have this conversation because they would have put them back together like that. >> i don't like writing one of the lowest points because it creates this un-godly,

unthinkable debate of what's lower, but in terms of human collateral, human carnage that donald trump promised in his own inaugural address, i don't know that there is any policy that's brought this much. >> i don't know either. when you listen to jacob's report and you realize there was no plan in advance, that if we're going to separate the families we have to keep data, we have to keep records to reunite them, i mean, how ruthless can you be that you didn't even plan to unite them? >> it's the smoking gun that you didn't, right? >> the smoking gun is that you didn't, and you didn't intend to -- >> correct. >> because if you did -- it's one thing to say that what we had in place failed. it's another thing to admit we had nothing in place. >> right. >> in the beginning. that's as immoral as you could be. children. i don't care what you think of immigration. i don't care what you think about the wall. to take children from their parents, take them out of their mothers' arms and you have no process set up on how you were going to reunite them one day,

even if it was longer than i would have thought, but none at all shows a complete disregard for the value of their human lives. >> we're out of time. i'm going to quote john heilemann on the way out of here. the cruelty is not a bug it's a feature of policies like this. jacob, congratulations on winning awards for this coverage. congratulations on staying on this beat. and let's spend some more time holding them accountable. this is really important stuff. thank you for spending some time with us and for your reporting. >> thank you, my friend. >> we're going to take a break. we'll be right back. we'll be right back. mutual custs your car insurance, so you only pay for what you need. nice! but uh, what's up with your partner? oh! we just spend all day telling everyone how we customize car insurance because no two people are alike, so... limu gets a little confused when he sees another bird that looks exactly like him. ya... he'll figure it out. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪

♪ through the at&t network, edge-to-edge intelligence gives you the power to see every corner of your growing business. from managing inventory... to detecting and preventing threats... to scaling up your production. giving you a nice big edge over your competition. that's the power of edge-to-edge intelligence.

(boy) got it. nooooooo... (dad) nooooooo... (vo) quick, the quicker picker upper! bounty picks up messes quicker and is two times more absorbent. bounty, the quicker picker upper.

all right. before we go, donny's got news. >> yeah. new show. what's it called?

"saturday night politics." this saturday at 8:00 p.m. with donny deutsch. we've got mayor pete buttigieg on. a lot of strategy for what the dems need to do to beat trump. we're going to count it down to the election. a lot of interesting, fun guests. >> can i just say that everyone loves you? when you're on this show, everyone is like more donny. if everyone thinks i've gone to a commercial, i actually have to go now -- >> let's stay with it. >> why did you stop donny? >> everyone wants more of you. >> i'm so glad. >> more of you on saturday. congratulations, my friend. >> everyone wants more of you. >> 8:00 p.m. saturday. this saturday. >> we report. you decide. i stole that. my thanks to heilemann, the rev, emily and donny. that does it for our hour. thank you so much for watching. "mtp daily" starts right now. how, chuck. >> try going to the polo club with donny, you just can't. >> i know donny. >> it's the donny club now. that's for sure. congrats, donny. thank you,