that's our broadcast for this monday night. thank you so much for being here with us. good night from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. good night from our nbc news headquarters here in new york. justice department issues a warning to mueller, stick to the report. telling himic t to limit his congressional testimony to his public findings. >> the white house and leaders struck a deal that would extend the debt limit until 2021. with tensions ramping up, president trump is hitting back afterit iran claims to have arrested 17 alleged cia spies. trump says it is totally false and there is zero truth to the claim.

>> good morning, everybody. it is tuesday, july 23. i'm yasmin vossoughian alongside ayman mohyeldin. >> a letter from the deputy general in response to a request from guidance from mueller earlier this month and implies he cannot discuss his disagreements with bill barr and must remain within the boundaries of our report because those discoveries were made by executive executive privilege. the letter adds this, it is the department's long-standing policy not to discuss the conduct of uncharged third parties. a spokesman for mueller said

monday that he will have a brief opening statement and will then offerd the entire report as hi full statement for the hearing record. mueller intends to abide by the staimt report, any testimony from his office would not go beyond hisno report. >> president trump said he will notru be watching any. yesterday, he said he might watch, quote, a little. >> i'm, not going to be watchi, probably, maybe i'll see a little bit of it. i'm not going to be watching mueller because you can't take all ofe those bites out of the apple. >> the president is expected to monitor the hearing much like he has done with similar events in the past. trump's schedule on wednesday only includes a routine lunch with the vice president and points to executive time as a

natural window for trump to take in snip ets of news coverage. we know he loves to do that. >> we remember the nine minutes that bob mueller spoke, the first time we heard from him after the investigation concluded. in that nine minutes, he basically said i'm not going to offer anything beyond this report. what are you going to be listening for? >> you really seized on significant moment. he came out and said, if i am made to testify, i will essentially read from my report. in the last day, he gets a letter saying, hey, you make sure youey stick to that report. if you are him, you are thinking, didn't i just say that?in that is what congress will be working very hard to try and get him to do is stray from his report. more specifically, you'll hear phrases like, in your own words.

and what can you tell us about the thinking behind that decision. with strict time constraints, the challenge will be asking open-ended questions and getting anything out of him who will be just saying, i'm going to be reading from my report. >> talk about that letter sent to him. he's made that clear. the doj reinforces it with this letter. could that backfire for the doj, could that have nudged him to say, i already said i was going to do this. now you are telling me what to do? >> if robert mueller wasn't so unflappable, i would say absolutely. >> but seize shown not to be. >> a lesser person might be more annoyed and actually retaliate against a doj that sends him such a ridiculous letter. >> was that more from the doj to

be on the record saying this ahead of had is testimony? again, he's now a private citizen, so he doesn't have to listen to what the doj is advising. >> exactly. the letter makes you wonder if it was directed by somebody, i don't know who but somebody very high may have sent the letter. going to the other part of your question, whatou are trump's te going to be looking for? that is the key. how much will he deviate and how much space will he admit to between himself and william barr. >> does william barr exert executive privilege? >> he can claim it, trump can claim it. it can be litigated. we don't know the extent of executive privilege. we know it exists but it isn't an absolute. >> i'm about to get yelled at.

what question would you ask? >> the number one question is this,es why did you not subpoen the president? >> danny, thank you. president trump is escalating his attacks on four progressive democratic congresswomen known as, quote, the squad. he tweeted yesterday, the squad is a racist group. tweeting as his motorcade made its way to the supreme court. >> on your tweets, why are you escalating your feud with the four congresswomen in racial tensions? >> i think they are very bad for our country. they are pulling the democrats way left. they are very bad for our

country, absolutely. >> you are stoking racial tension. >> no, no. there is no racial tension. >> the president criticized the "washington post" for running a story stating that he had talking points about the four congresswomen during a speak last week, he tweeted. the amazon washington post front page story yesterday was total fake news. they said advisors wrote new talking points. does that sound like me? photographers for the "washington post" and associated press captured notes from that speech with piece of paper with bulleter pointed notes for the president remarks showing just that. >>st interesting, you can see h he misspells al qaeda. >> we know he's briefed on them. he's not necessarily reading them. >> fairdi point. the white house is responding to

the claim that it is detaining 17 cia agents. >> having had the chance to lead that great organization, the central intelligence agency, i would urge everyone reading that story to understand they have a long history of lying. i would take with significant grain of salt any iranian assertions about actions they've taken. >>he i read a report today abou the cia. it is another lie. they put out propaganda or lies. i don't think pakistan would ever do a thing like that. >> definitely not. >> pakistan doesn't lie but iran does. we are ready for the absolute worst. we are ready for sense too but we are very geared up. they are really the number one

statemb of terror in the world. i have to say they've pulled back because their money is running very low. >> iranians said some of those arrested will be sentenced to death. the president tweeted the story is totally false, no truth. just propaganda put out by a regime that has no idea what to do. >> t sitting along with the pakistan prime minister, said the reason american m forces ar still there is that he doesn't want to, quote, kill 10 million people and, wipe the country, quote, offhe the face of the earth. >> we are like policeman. if we wanted to fight a war in afghanistan and win it, i could win that war in a week. i don't want to kill 10 million

people. does that make sense to you? >> i have plans on afghanistan, if i wanted to win that war, afghanistan would be wiped off the face of the earth. it would be gone and over literally in ten days. i don't want to go that route. >> i don't think anybody would define winning a war as using a nuclear weapon to kill 10 million people. >> great to have you with us. a bizarre moment, the first time ath sitting president has talke about wiping an entire country off the face of the earth and bragging about it. whenbo iran has does that towar israel, people have been up in arms and when he does it, he is boasting. why are republicans so silent? why are we not seeing any outrage? >> that's a great question.

i'm not convinced we are not going to hear more out cry from folksry in afghanistan who wanto hear more details about this as they have foughtou alongside u. and nato partners for years. again, this is a president that usually fires from the hip. this is something we could see some press back on. >> let's talk about the attacks on the four democratic freshman congresswomen. it seems as if the president is digging in here. it is interesting. we have been say these are racist comments. the question is why? why is he continuing to dig in versus back off? is he trying to prove that they are note racist comments. now he's turning around and calling them racist. >> there is a strategic thing here, he's making these four progressive women of color,

members of congress, he's saying the comments they are making are unamerican, unacceptable. he's painting them as far left ers. he's using them as a place holderas in lue of the fact tha there isn't kind of a standard barer for democrats. >> we know the president spot tests this stuff. does he feel like this message is resonating with his base and is something he'll take all the way to november 2020? >> i'm not certain we'll hear him take this specific message all the way to 2020, we know we have heard this racist rhetoric. we've shown so far, he hasn't had to pay such a cost. this is sort of a preview of what we are likely to see in the

general election. still ahead, the trump administration expands power. what itds means for the future u.s. immigration. >> and al fraken regrets he redesigned over groping allegations. he's not the only one who has spoken up. we'll be right back.

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>> welcome back. let's get a check on the weather with janessa webb. >> that small cold front is on its way through. it is just not done yet. we have a flash flood warning for new york city. this torrential rain made its

way and is rapidly moving into boston as well. i cannot promise you sunshine for the northeast and mid-atlantic. so turntlcurrently 37 million a the northeast, hopefully going to see that die down by midafternoon. along this front, we have a system that has escalated. that front will make its way to the south and clash with the system and not allow it to form. that's really good news here but that front is causing wide-spread rain from new york to boston this morning. starting today, the trump administration is expected to begin using a fast track deportation process for immigrants.

the new process bypasses immigration judges and allows immigration authorities to deport those anywhere they encountered them. it targets those who sneaked into the country and do not have an asylum case pending. will be limited to migrants caught within 100 miles from the border and expects to alleviate the new backlog and free up space in i.c.e. jails. >> two weeks ago, msnbc broke the story about conditions at a yuma, arizona facility. from statements from children being held there including allegations of sexual assault and retaliation against kids who ask for clean water and food. sitting down with an exclusive interview of a boy held at the border in yuma for 11 days.

the 17-year-old describes in detail including being held in a cell that was so crowded, he was forced to sleep standing up not knowing what time of day it was because the lights were always on and not being able to properly even drink water. >> so abner spoke about seeing one boy around his age get assaulted by a guard.

>> so customs and border protection released a statement saying the claims are inconsistent with the customs and border protection records. it is important to note they take all reports of employee misconduct seriously.

the juvenile's comments have been referred to the office of professional responsibility. we'll have more coming up for details on this exclusive story. still ahead, after numerous injuries, major league baseball is taking steps to make sure fans stay protected. changes coming up at ballparks. that's next. every day, visionaries are creating the future. so, every day, we put our latest technology and unrivaled network to work. the united states postal service makes more e-commerce deliveries to homes

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died. christopher kraft died yesterday in houston two days after the 50th anniversary of the apollo 11 moon landing. he served as the flight director and helped design the missions that took 12 americans to the moon and later served as director of the johnson space center until 1982 over seeing the beginning of the era of the space shuttle. >> what a story. such inkred ilk contributions. >> there are new calls for protection at major league ballparks after another child was hit in the stands. this time, a three-year-old sent to the hospital after being struck by a line drive.

ron mott has the details. >> the hits keep coming and so do the injuries. a fateful moment in the line of fire of foul balls. the latest example on sunday when a line drive was hit sending the boy to the hospital. he told the boy was fine and recovering at the hospital. >> it sucks. >> the white sox are doing that. extending netting all the way down the line. washington nationals also doing the same. they are working with teams for safety upgrades. last month, a woman left bloodied in chicago. in may, a cub's player was visibly distraught after his foul ball struck a two-year-old girl in the head.

and a woman died of injuries at dodger stadium. >> at the end of the day, we want to make sure everybody comes out of these games healthy. >> to ensure a day at the ballpark doesn't end with a trip to the hospital. >> disturbing story there. you hear about all of these cases, especially young children. >> who knows the reasons as to why or why not they don't want to put the netting there but i think the precautions need to be put in place. >> absolutely. thank you for that report. still ahead, hundreds of thousands of protesters hit the streets in puerto rico and what the governor is saying about calls for him to resign. >> and house congressional leaders reach a budget deal. we'll explain what is in the new budget deal coming up. l your wife to meet you at the doctor. because you didn't have another dvt. not today.

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>> welcome back, the bottom of the hour. white house congressional leaders have reached a deal and dramatically raise spending levels to avoid the show down and government shut down. the two-year agreement was reached following days of intense negotiations between pelosi and mnuchin. it is expected to clear the house and senate before lawmakers leave for the august recess.

though, it's likely to face considerably push back from conservatives and budget hawks. under the plan, the debt limit will be suspended until july 21, 2021. t pentagon budget will increase to $22 billion to $738 billion next fiscal year. the plan will boost nondefense spending by $27 billion to $632 billion. a victory for democrats. that money will also have to cover extra census costs and a short fall in veteran affairs funding. >> the deal could be a major blow to the acting chief white house staff. according to reports, he has been largely sidelined by the talks of those who don't like the spening caps.

it will mean more red ink for an already ballooning deficit. before the deal, trump was facing a $1 trillion deficit. trump brags he would payoff the debt. as of friday, the debt stands at more than $22 trillion. a new polling shows americans are taking a position on trump's performance. 44% approve of the job, while 52% disapprove. the number say they will definitely reelect president trump has climbed up three points and those who will definitely vote against trump has grown as well. there has been a big swing among democrats with the kind of candidate they want to have.

42% now say they want someone who shares their position on issues. down five points from june. 54% say they want someone who can beat the president jumping 8 points. that is a reversal from the first debates. when someone sharing their positions jumped. congresswoman tlaib take the stage to massive applause. she told the audience she is here to stay. >> yeah, i'm not going nowhere. not until i impeach this president. it is beyond the four of us. the squad is all of you. you are all the squad. trust me. if you support justice, you are

one of us. >> working with other senior white house officials to discuss a possible replacement for dan coats as a director of national intelligence. the pace of trump's discussions with other officials has ramped up as a sign of coats' tenure may soon be over. some of trumps allies have nominated multiple replacements. trump may be considering nunes as a replacement. >> noining us this morning a reporter from the national press, interesting that nunes could be a replacement. one of the issues in a lead up to 2020 is combatting election interference. what would this mean if there on the midst of replacing dan coats and ramping up, which we can

already assume people are already active overseas trying to deal with? is. >> absolutely. something that dan coats has discussed and in that way could be significant. it is important to keep in mind, we've been talking about whether or not dan coats would be ousted by this president. this is a relationship that has had tensions. he is not among the closest advisors. they've not really gelled. possibly likely because coats has felt comfortable coming out and challenging the president's views. this could be fairly significant as we head towards the election. >> interesting that coats appointed an official to oversee elections. what do you make of president trump's recent up tick. it seems he's gotten a little

bump that coincides the race baiting or rhetoric against these four women. how do you explain that? >> it is tough to say. one thing i see, this is happening at a time where the president can take a lot of credit for gains in the economy. he has the advantages of an incouple ban si. there is no standard barer on the other side. folks are tuning in to the political race. i'm not sure we know yet whether or not these racist attacks are what is driving that approval rating. i'll be looking to see particularly whether he makes more gains amid independents. >> this other poll, which is 42% now saying they want someone who shares their issue.

also 54% say they want someone who could actually beat the president. this is a conversation we've been having some time now, which are democrats are voting for someone that they believe in or can beat the president and can they make one candidate be both of those things? >> absolutely. i spent a lot of time on the road, i biggest thing i hear is they view the left-leaning voters as the next essential threat and they want to see trump out of the white house. i don't think they have it settled yet on who is best to do that or what type of person is best. they want to see big change and this comes out on the heels of the first debate. we'll start to see voters ideas crystallize. it is quite early. >> we'll see those debates begin to shape the field a little bit.

hundreds of thousands of people flooded san juan's biggest highway. puerto rico's largest demonstration comes a day after he announced he would not step down as governor despite days of rupgs and the leak of a profanity laced on line chat between him and officials and associates. the governor appears on fox news where he was pressed on his lost support. >> i was elected by the people. >> those people are on the streets saying we want you out. that's the headline. the politicians are saying the same thing. you are a man on an island by yourself. how long can you stay there? >> my effort and my commitment is to follow through on some of the efforts that i established for the people of puerto rico. former senatorial fraken

steps down over accusations of unwanted kissing or touching. >> and new details about the reason mike pence's recent trip to new hampshire was interrupted. your first look on "morning joe" is back in a moment. my experience with usaa has been excellent. they really appreciate the military family and it really shows. with all that usaa offers why go with anybody else? we know their rates are good, we know that they're

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crest. healthy, beautiful smiles for life. depend® fit-flex underwear for all day fun... features maximum absorbency, ultra soft fabric and new beautiful designs for your best comfort and protection guaranteed. life's better when you're in it. be there with depend®. >> welcome back. former democratic senator of minnesota says he absolutely regrets of resigning after several women accused him of unwanted touching or kissing. he says he wishes he had appeared before the senate ethics committee to marshal the facts. fraken announced his intention to resign in december 2017 following the allegations of the seventh and eighth woman. he maintains that the

allegations were false. at least seven democratic senators regret pressuring him to resign. however, gris continue gill brand was among the first to call for his resignation. >> what do you say to those who changed their mind? >> you have the right to change your mind. it is what happens in the military. the constant refrain is, he's so good at his day job or whatever he's doing that they won't hold him accountable. it is very hard to hold someone accountable who is gifted or talented in what they do. we are learning more details around vice president's abrupt change. he was pulled from his visit

after aids were told about a drug probe involving a person he would have met on the trip. jeff hatch, a former nfl player who worked in an opioid treatment sent that pence was set to visit was under investigation at the time for trafficking more than $100,000 of fentanyl between multiple states. he pled guilty to a lesser charge and faces up to four years in prison. the vice president's office declined to comment on the report. >> let's switch gears and look at the weather now. relief in sight. >> temperature wise, we'll split these temperatures in half compared to over the weekend. highs today in the 70s, we have a slight issue this morning. we have amounts of rain, bands of rain across the northeast.

impacting washington, philadelphia, new york. that will continue throughout your afternoon. this front is not making its way off shore. that's causing a flash flood warning for new york city that will impact your morning commute for 37 million. these bands of rain are torrential here. one to two inches per hour. causing this enhancement of a tropical depression. it will split apart here. we don't think this will be a tropical storm. wide-spread rain once again for the southeast to florida up to two to three inches. this will remain on coastal areas from raleigh to charlton as well. causing that major cool down. this afternoon, highs only going

to be in the 80s. after we see the front make its way through, i can promise you sunshine. >> thank you. ahead, apple reportedly eyes a deal with one tech dealer ahead of 5g technology. >> and equifax to pay for a breach. more coming up. this is the couple who wanted to get away

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. >> welcome back. equifax agreed to pay $700 million to deal with the major data breach. we'll go live to london for this. thank you for joining us on this. how can consumers claim their portion of the compensation? >> so as you said, to emphasize the scale of this breach, more than 50% of americans were affected. if you are listening, this could well pertain to you. consumers who had their private information compromised in this breach can claim up to $20,000. also any out of pocket expenses. and for any time they had to spend dealing with the breach and the rate they can claim is

$25 an hour up to 20 hours. this is still a proposed settlement, so in the finalized. those are the numbers we are looking at and the reasons you can cite to make your claim. another story i want to bring your attention to is apple. a company near and dear to your hearts, says they are in talks to buy the intel's chip. you remember apple was long tied up in dispute with qualcomm. they would be able to do a lot more internally. so this could be a huge move for apple and its independence moving forward. >> not just apple making big

move easy, microsoft said it would vest $1 billion in a artificial intelligence start up. what more can you tell us about that? >> yes. so much going on in the tech space. we heard from microsoft in their earnings release, the cloud computing and azure doing a huge amount of heavy lifting. they are planning to vest $1 billion in what is touted as the holy gral of artificial intelligence. >> as a way of resolve the director of ai by big tech companies. what open ai plans to do is to develop the technology in a way that benefits all of humanity. they are working to build this super computing foundation on

which they can build out the platform interesting space and quite a big move. >> elon musk saying something where humans can make that artificial intelligence with their brain. what is the name of that company azure? >> coming up, a look at this morning's one big thing. ing. the department of justice tells mueller to stick to the record. >> and joining the conversation to preview the testimony. discussing the recent trips to the southern border amid the outrage over migrant detention

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welcome back, everyone. joining us from washington with a look at axios and the cofounder of axios, mike allen. good morning. what is the "1 big thing" for us? >> the axios "1 big thing" is big brands blasted on campaign trail. so the 2020 democratic candidates have discovered that if they mention specific brands, if they attack big companies, that their social media engagement soars. so axios' sarah fisher got some data that showed any company that's under attack on minimum wage, on fairness questions, on taxes, on tariffs that those are companies that are ripe to be targeted and of course competition where you get big tech. >> so which of these -- of the 2020 candidates have been the most vocal in bashing some of these brands? >> yeah, well senators bernie

sanders and elizabeth warren have found they have had the most social engagement they had on anything in the last four months when they name a specific company. bernie sanders by going after walmart got his most engagement in four months. at least four of the candidates have gone after mcdonald's on minimum wage. cory booker finding that his social engagement soared when he joins a union protest against mcdonald's on the campaign trail in south carolina. and of course the tech companies, google, facebook, amazon, senator warren launched her campaign by saying she was going to break them up. at least three of the candidates used amazon prime day to go after amazon. >> let me switch gears for a moment and talk about the other big story this week that is the robert mueller testimony. i know you over at axios are previewing it a little bit and how democrats will measure success with the hearings and what possible reactions may come out of the 2020 candidates.

what do you expect to see tomorrow in terms of that? >> yeah. axios has a great behind the scenes look at what democrats are planning because they have a big problem. robert mueller said he won't say anything new so if he sticks to that, how do they get the maximum bang for the buck? well, axios elena treene found the one thing they'll be looking at is tv rating, how many people are tuned in. even though this information isn't new in the report, it is new to most of the people watching it. i have said here on msnbc what democrats basically want is a dramatic reading of the report. well, sure enough, one of the members on the intelligence committee says she's going to use her time just to ask robert mueller to do his own almost like an audio book reading of the key passage from his own report. >> that would be an incredibly long testimony if he read every single page of 480 pages of the

mueller testimony. there are so many details -- well, yeah. there was a dramatic reading with jonathan lithgow i think on broadway a couple of weeks ago of the mueller report. but that was a different thing there. >> one more -- excuse me, one more sneak peek for you. elena treene has details on axios just after 6:00 a.m. on how the democrats plan to make it live on. after the mueller report, after that testimony, they're hoping to extend the fight into the fall. you can look for house speaker nancy pelosi to push to pass a package of bills that would target money in politics, that would increase government accountability. look for house democrats to increase their house -- their accountability over the executive branch. those are all tactics that are being revived from democrats in the post watergate years and one more thing to extend your broadway recollection, there's

going to be a democratic social media campaign #retweet the report where democrats are going to urge celebs and others to retweet the key quotes from the report. >> all right, my friend, we'll be reading axios a.m. in a little bit. and you too can sign up for the newsletter by going to sign-up.axios.com. >> that does it for us. i'm yasmin vossoughian with ayman mohyeldin. "morning joe" starts right now. several months ago a foreign policy expert on the international level went to advise donald trump and three times he asked about the use of nuclear weapons. three times he asked at one point if we have them, why can't we use them. >> trump asked three times -- >> three