other agencies. to the president. hi, everyone. and the president was the and we've seen it, whether it driver, as fiona hill testified was the firing of comey where it's 4:00 in new york, and there to administration responds they went along with it, whether is blockbuster reporting in the it was the attempted firing of mueller where they didn't. "new york times" on the part of the one constant in all of it is the president and his closest aides and the withholding of the president and these incredible demands that he puts on the people around him. there are fewer guardrails there ko congressionally approved now. military aid. it's the kind of reporting that there are fewer don mcgahns. forces a conversation about the there are fewer, you know, chief target-rich environment that trump's most senior advisers of staff -- >> kelly. could represent as witnesses in [ laughter ] >> kelly. those folks are gone, and they an impeachment trial of donald get a lot of credit, you know, j. trump. the heavy sourced new report through the lens of history for relies on dozens of interviews being people that stood in the with current and former way. now, there were a lot of things administration officials, plus, that went on that didn't turn out so well. previously undisclosed documents but i think you're seeing what and email exchanges that reveal happens when the president feels even more emboldened, even more in the starkest terms yet the behind the scenes skraccramblin. comfortable in office, has even more confidence and is able to do the things he wants to. >> mike pompeo, betsy, is back in the room, as folks here have said. his response has been almost

quote, in late august defense secretary mark esper joined purely political and not really smooth. let's watch his first -- i think secretary of state mike pompeo and john bolton, the national security adviser at the time, george stephanopoulos was the for a previously undisclosed oval office meeting with the first to question him on president where they tried but television. >> i saw transpiring in how failed to convince him that president trump was working to releasing the aid was in the make the evaluation about interest of the u.s. the article whether it was appropriate to provide this assistance. >> that's what i'm asking is also clobbers mick mulvaney for would it be appropriate -- >> george, i'm not going to get his role in orchestrating the into hypotheticals and secondary hold on the aid. brand-new email exchanges like things based on what someone else has said. this one between mulvaney and you would have never done it when you were the spokesman. robert blair are sure to further >> it's not a hypothetical. scrutiny of their knowledge of we saw the chief of staff -- the questionable legal grounds >> it is, george. on which they withheld the aid. you just said if this happened, whul veiny writes i am just that is by definition, a trying to tie up some loose hypothetical. >> and the chief of staff said ends. did we ever find out about the it did. money from ukraine and whether we can hold it back? >> george, you asked me if this blair says it would be possible happened. but not pretty. it's a hypothetical. i've told you what i observed, expect congress to become what i saw the process related unhinged if the white house to this very funding. tried to countermand spending. >> now, i think when i saw that, betsy, it's the worst i've ever to blame the entire episode on seen by an administration official. i stand by that. but what's amazing now is how

the pentagon, an effort much more we know about what undertaken after the president was briefed and made aware of the whistle-blower against him. pompeo knew. on september 10th, "the times" he was the only cabinet secretary on the call. he was standing in front of the writes, a political appointee at president's desk in front of the resolute against alongside mark the budget office, michael esper and john bolton pleading duffey, wrote a lengthy email to with the president to release the pentagon's top budget the military aid for ukraine official with whom he had been saying it was in u.s. interest. at odds throughout the summer and he obviously knew what the about how long the agency could holdup was because everyone that was sounding the alarms via text withhold the aid. he asserted that the defense department had the authority to to each other and up the chain do more to ensure that the aid of command worked for him. could be released to ukraine by >> that's right. administration officials knew the congressionally mandated pretty early on that the only deadline at the end of the reason the aid wasn't getting month, suggesting that responsibility for any failure should not rest with the white sent to ukraine, at least from house. folks with visibility into the 43 minutes later, pentagon inner agency conversations was official elaine mccusker hit that omb was holding it up. that's made clear from multiple people's testimony. and it's obvious and indisputable that the entire send on a brief. trump national security team that's where we start today with thought that sending the aid some of our favorite reporters over was absolutely vital. and friends. joining us from washington, pompeo is one of the longest-serving members of trump's cabinet, first obviously betsy woodruff swan, here at the table elise jordan, a former aid is cia director before becoming

in the george w. bush white secretary of state. not that many individuals have house and state department been part of the trump administration since jumpstreet for -- white house reporter from and part of the reason he's been the "associated press." able to pull it off is that he's both of you have already had a been so close to the president long day, jonathan lemire, and in terms of what he's willing to say publicly. something really important to mike schmidt. keep an eye on is this meeting mike, the bombshell in here he's going to be attending in kiev in a couple days. seems to be not just knitting he will be heading over there, he is expected to meet with the together the congressional president of ukraine. testimony, which we all heard, of course, bill taylor, who but these new emails which seem currently is the u.s. top diplomat in kiev is going to be particularly incriminating in terms of knowledge of really leaving just very shortly before shaky legal ground for pompeo gets there. withholding the aid. >> the story shows just how much and whether or not the secretary of state stays as close to the more information is out there president as he has been in that trip is going to say a lot about that was not uncovered by the the direction and the future of house intelligence committee. the u.s./ukraine relationship. there is a reason why in federal investigations you don't put an >> just tie this together with the latest developments. end date on an investigation, betsy mentioned one that pompeo that you take all the time is heading to ukraine. possible to develop as strong a i would guess that the mission case as you can have to give to is to try to repair the u.s. the jury. you try and get all the relationship there. witnesses to testify, you go to but trump took another call with court to get as much of that putin and the first readout came testimony, if they're not willing to talk to get from the russians, not the white documents. house. >> and that's become standard

procedure. but here it is. in fact, the readout from moscow three reporters, three of my colleagues who went out and were able to learn new things about came almost a full 24 hours new events that give even more before we learned that the white house put out its own accounting insight into what was going on of the call and 12 hours before and actually bring you inside the white house could confirm the room with the president in the call happened. and it was based over russia, ways that we had not seen before. and it's just remarkable that putin, thanking trump for help, here we are, the impeachment details of which have not fully investigation is apparently been released. >> did ukraine come up? >> not that we've heard, but over, they've sent it to the that doesn't mean it didn't. senate, but these are facts that are not in that. and let's remember the hallmarks >> if you talk to sources on the of these putin/trump calls is house intel committee's side, how much we don't know. in the hours before the infamous they would tell you that they news conference in helsinki, were in a jam, that no legal remember, putin and trump met effort has succeeded yet, and for nearly two hours with no notes taken. and we don't know what was said >> well, they dropped the there. >> five calls. "the washington post" has reported on five calls with no subpoena on the former deputy known notes. national security adviser >> and back in hamburg in 2017 with a similar setup. kupperman. they asked basically for a judge to throw out the legal questions house speaker pelosi often said on that. all roads lead to russia. and we certainly know in this and three months or four months case that part of the president's animosity towards or whatever they've done since ukraine is because he's been

september, that's not enough time for things to play themselves out in court to learn citing president putin's talking and to try and get these facts. points, that ukraine is corrupt and they shouldn't be getting now, i think what the democrats that military aid. would say is they'd say, look, >> i want to come back to you on rob portman. we believe that this case is i have been perplexed. strong enough as it is, and rob portman was an omb director. that's why we sent it, it wasn't that was his job in the bush worth waiting. administration. but i think that all things he was one of the last being equal, looking at this republican senators, as current politically, they know that there will not be enough votes reporting suggests, there may in the senate based on this have been others. why wouldn't the house committee case. >> you know, betsy, that is the have called him and said what reality. i think what mike's saying is would you say to trump? right, they had enough evidence >> and he also had met with to impeach him to, in their view, prove that the aid was president zelensky. withheld because the president wasn't he in the meeting with i wanted these investigations into believe senator johnson was also on the congressional delegation the bidens and into 2016, he to kiev, and it is odd that he only released the aid when he hasn't been -- we haven't heard his side of the story. got caught. if anything, this reporting affirms the case they presented >> but he knows exactly what the laws are. to the full house. but the politics are unchanged. >> exactly. and he doesn't have any kind of executive privilege. not a single republican has he has an obligation to the united states and the taxpayers expressed really that much enthusiasm for even listening to and his stents constituents. the facts as presented in a after the break the ukraine

trial. scandal revealed the dirty >> it's really showed a underbelly of the rogue formidable effort by the white operation run by rudy giuliani. house to keep congressional and today it would appear that republicans in line, even in the "the washington post" adds to house in the early days of the the disturbing picture, the new reporting about rudy's efforts impeachment inquiry, there were some hill republicans who in another country in crisis. indicated that they felt pretty also ahead, is donald trump darn uncomfortable with the way doing enough to combat a terrifying wave of anti-semitic the ukraine story had played violence in new york? out. and one of the most prominent and the president's national security adviser covering for ones was a former ambassador the president's pardon of a simpson rooney who was on one of the committees who was looking military leader whose fellow into this whole situation. soldiers called him toxic. he said publicly multiple times all those stories coming up. that he thought there was ing, c'mon c'mon... activity that happened that did not go the way it should've gone and that he voiced concerns that here we go... many other repubcans held ♪ privately. but, ultimately, of course, he voted against the impeach every (little santa) somali...alika? (little santa) where's kiara? single house republican voted against impeaching the president (little santa) i got this for you. indicates pretty strongly that (vo) when you grant a child's wish, you change lives. (vo) you can choose make-a-wish to get two hundred and fifty it's quite unlikely any senate dollars from subaru when you get a new subaru. republicans are going to peel (vo 2) get 0.9% during the subaru share the love event. off. as mike highlighted which is just the timing, they have been

up against the clock, they have wanted to get this done quickly, but at the same time in the interest of moving fast, they haven't been able to talk to some of the witnesses like john bolton and mick mulvaney who would have the potential to be the most important. >> so, mick mulvaney, let's watch again. he's confessed to what the president was impeached for. let's watch. >> that he also mentioned to me in the past the corruption related to the dnc server, absolutely, no question about that. but that's it, and that's why we held up the money -- >> so the demand for an investigation into the democrats was part of the reason that he wanted to withhold funding to ukraine? >> the look-back to what happened in 2016 certainly was part of the thing that he was worried about in corruption with that nation. that is absolutely appropriate. >> withholding the funding? >> yeah. >> you just described as a quid pro quo. it is funding will not flow unless the investigation into the democratic server happened as well? >> we do that all the time with

foreign policy. and i have news for everybody. get over it. >> that'll never not shock me. but here's the thing. i think now that standing there he must've known that he had emails that were responded to by pentagon officials who simply wrote back i am speechless. he was the president's sort of in-house agent. if rudy was his outside channel, mick mulvaney was his inside channel. >> here's what i think is important to remember about mick mulvaney. in his heart he is a deficit hall. that might not have been in practice during his time in the trump administration. but he likes the idea of ending foreign aid that he thinks is counterproductive. he likes cutting funding. so in theory he liked thisic itt congre but his conduct, and it' true, we haven't seen him, he's not a witness, he doesn't have any intention to appear before

congress. but he was careful. he was watching out for someone's legal equities. he left -- "this time's report. mick mulvaney has said by associates to have stepped out of the room whenever trump would talk to mr. giuliani to preserve mr. trump's attorney/client privilege leaving him with limited knowledge about their efforts regarding. and in what capacity was rudy acting as his private lawyer? >> right. you don't step out of the room if you don't think there's something you don't want to hear. and if he's cognisant of the attorney/client privilege, he certainly had at least some awareness of what was going on. certainly with esper and pompeo and bolton trying to get in there and urge the president to reconsider. i mean, we talk often how this ambassador bolton had president really doesn't have any guardrails around him. basically indicated with body

i think for the most part that language that there was nothing much that we could do about it. is true. there was some effort in the and then in the course of that administration to get him back on track. discussion said that rudy it was his staff refusing to giuliani was a hand grenade that carry out his orders that was going to blow everyone up. basically probably led to him for not first being impeached what he meant by this was pretty that time around. clear to me in all the statements that mr. giuliani was but it's also -- let's remember making publicly that the this was the president, as the investigations he was promoting, that the story line he was story points out, who is urging executive branch lawyers to promoting, the narrative he was promoting was going to backfire. work -- you know, to override the congressional funding i think it has backfired. mechanism, to sort of disregard >> so we already know that that congress has the power of former national security adviser the purse, simply because he was john bolton wanted nothing to do with rudy giuliani's efforts in the president, and therefore he ukraine, that he was so alarmed he send aides to the white house could decide what is done with counsel's office to report. the aid, flies in the face of but it turns out that wasn't the checks and balances. this is again a president who's really testing the absolute only foreign shadow policy effort that bolton was boundaries of executive power here. uncomfortable with. >> this is also from the piece. new reporting in "the washington by late summer top lawyers of post" details that his efforts the office of management and to make a deal with venezuela's budget who had spoken to lawyers at the white house and the president nicolas maduro justice department in the weeks beforehand were developing an including a phone call that took argument not previously divulged place in september 2018. "the post" writes this, on one end of the line was venezuela's

prubl socialist president of a pru publicly. i don't know if he googles these disintegrating economy. things, but says, oh, i can do anything as president. on the other end president trump this is another sweeping interpretation of his powers as and pete sessions both were part president. >> one of the odd byproducts of of a shadow diplomatic effort the trump era is the president's unusual view of the law and the aimed at engineering and different things he has tried to do. i know that unrecusals, they negotiating exits in opening actually do exist, but the idea venezuela to business, according to people familiar with the of early on in his presidency endeavor. asking the attorney general to "the post" adds this, quote, giuliani's willingness to talk with maduro in late 2018 flew in unrecuse himself. the face of the official policy the president's mind works differently -- of the white house, which, under >> i don't think it's his mind. national security adviser john i think it's his guilty bolton, was then racheting up sanctions and taking a harder conscience. i think if you stand back and look at this, it also puts rob line against the venezuelan portman as one of the last government. not long after the call, giuliani told some of his republican senators on the phone before the aid was reported. associates that he had taken the you and your colleagues i think idea of a soft landing for have reported that trump was briefed on the whistle-blower maduro to bolton. complaint against him. but he said the meeting hadn't another revelation uncovered by a news organization, not this gone well. betsy and the table are back. house committee investigating betsy, it is stunning. the president. i have known rudy giuliani for

what is the broader picture look most of my political career. like? >> the broader picture of g to and this idea of him working against u.s. interests, and not interests laid out by the obama administration or even the bush administration but the trump administration policy, as set by john bolton and the national security team, was not the policy that giuliani and pete sessions were trying to execute with maduro. >> it's super, super weird, especially because the very hawkish venezuela policy isn't just something that trump's national security team supports. it's something that trump himself has been very enthusiastic about, and it's really been one of the only foreign policy issues where trump is very much almost by disposition aligned with the hawks and his administration. so for giuliani kind of to peel off and participate in this talk is extremely striking. it also comes as u.s. policy toward venezuela is increasingly

showing no success whatsoever. in fact, since the u.s. racheted up punishing sanctions on the maduro regime, what we've seen is that country grow more closely aligned with china and russia. and it's generated concerns in some corners that venezuela is essentially going to reinvent itself with much more economic closely to those countries that are america's adversaries. this issue is complicated and dealing with maduro's regimes who have created immense human suffering and pain on their own people. it's a difficult policy issue. that's why it's so weird that the president's personal lawyer, somebody whose clients are unnamed and are private, was participating in a direct conversation with this head of state. >> so, it is everything that betsy said. it is weird. but i'm wondering how weird it is that once again in today's "washington post" is a bolton headline.

this one in nbc. bolton suggests that some of trump's foreign policy decisions are guided by personal interest. it was a great story and he suggested that trump's -- hits trump for bluffing on north korea nukes. what do you think john bolton's up to? >> that is the question. what is the play of bolton and his lawyer chuck cooper who's been managing the legal questions. what is the end goal? is it to get him the political cover to testify? does he indeed want to testify? are these things, these discussions that he's had with the president that there have been hints about in the press? are these things that he wants to put in the book? i think it would be difficult for him to put them in the book and not testify to congress. does he not want to testify? does he not want to go up against the president in such a

forum? i think we'll get more clarity on this when this judge in washington rules on the case of the deputy national security adviser who's been subpoenaed by the house. but i don't know. >> he confirms some of that in an interview right before the christmas holiday. let's listen. >> well, you know, there's obviously a lot swirling around in that department, including some litigation that could affect my status. so i think, although i have a lot to say on the subject, the prudent course for me is just to decline to comment at this point. >> why not testify? people ask, i want you to have an opportunity to answer that. >> well, i appreciate that. but, as i say, dr. kupperman, a former deputy is in litigation now. when the house issues a subpoena, and in his case, and i think it would be true in mine, the president tells him not to testify, which authority controls, dr. kupperman went to

court to seek the third branch's opinion in this conflict between the first. >> elise, i have bird dog's pointers. john bolton is pointg at t in c. although i have a lot to say on the subject, the prudent course for me is to decline to comment. he's not saying everything i know has already been testified to by my deputies. there's nothing i did that -- i mean, if you don't want to show up, you say -- because i worked for people who didn't want to show up, everything i know is already in the public record, that's the answer of someone who doesn't want to tell their story leans on. >> no, you're totally right. that is one big tease, as is floating the book and, oh, john bolton has been accused of trying to keep all of the goods for his book. but i tend to lean toward one of the theories that you put out there, that bolton is biding his team and he's building up political cover so that when he finally goes to testify, he

looks as though he's been forced. so he's sure if trump is the party forevermore in their political existence, in their lifetimes, or if there is going to be a shift away from it. so he is covering his bases. >> i know reporters hate when you sort of stand back or try to figure out where a story came from. but this maduro reporting just has an undeniable sort of repeat of the pattern of the axios reporting from jonathan swan, john bolton's indictment of trump's policy, john bolton's indictment of the turkey policy. it sort of leaves you wondering where they did line up. >> right. and without speculating as to where this story came from, john bolton seems to be leaving some bread crumbs. it is a tease, as elise said, that there is stuff out there he wants to know, and certainly he has not been shy in asserting that he does not approve of this parallel foreign policy run by rudy giuliani.

remember he called it a drug deal, what rudy and the president and others were trying to do in ukraine. >> so he calls it the ukraine policy was a drug deal. north korea, i think he said to jonathan swan, says trump's bluffing on turkey, called him compromised by personal and financial interests. what was he doing there? >> in venezuela? >> no, in the trump administration? >> one foreign policy decision that bolton agrees with donald trump on? i really honesty don't know. >> there haven't been many. i mean, certainly some of the hawkish approaches on the china stuff perhaps, but they disagree on russia, too. i guess we would assume bolton is doing it for the good of the country. he feels like he is serving his country in trying to move the president towards, in his mind, acceptable positions. but they were opposed on a number of issues, and eventually their personalities really clashed as well. there were hallmarks of loud shouting matches in the oval

office that could be heard elsewhere in the building. and there was no love lost. the president really bashed him on the way out the door. >> so this is sort of back to your earlier point. it may be that he was more of an adviser in the mold of don mcgahn, that he didn't agree with him idealogically, but he was there to save him from what would have been catastrophic. >> it's the phenomenon of the trump administration. it's better to be sitting in the passenger seat with the hopes of grabbing the wheel than be not even in the car. it's just time and time again, it's not a new story to this administration. i think that if you even go even further back on all of this, venezuela, ukraine, obviously important countries to the united states, some very odd things going on with the president's lawyer and phone calls. so what happened on the russia calls? what happened with the calls with saudi arabia? what's happened with north korea? what other involvement does rudy

giuliani have? i just find it hard to believe that if it's happening with venezuela and ukraine, it wasn't happening on countries where country. >> and some person close to the president said there's a reason he keeps calling it a perfect call, suggests that he's had that c newspapers. betsy woodruff swan, mike schmidt, thank you for spending time with us. as federal prosecutors file charges, democrats ask if the president is doing enough to fight the rising tide of anti-semitism in america. that story next. t. whatever happens out there today, remember,

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there's news today from federal prosecutors in new york about the brutal attack at a rabbi's home in monsey, new york. "new york times" reports this afternoon, quote, federal prosecutors on monday filed hate crimes charges against the man accused of bursting into a

hasidic rabbi's home and stabbing five people at a hanukkah celebration. police stationed officers in front of synagogues. the president expressed his sympathy on twitter writing, quote, we must all come together to fight, confront, and eradicate the evil scourge of anti-semitism. but for many democrats, trump is part of the problem in the rise of anti-semitism. "the washington post" reports, some house democrats singled out the president for criticism, arguing that he has been insufficiently clear in denouncing anti-semitism and has frequently perpetrated offensive stereotypes about jewish people. representative eric swalwell writes this isn't happening in a vacuum. from refusing to unconditionally condemn the 2017 neo-nazi rally

in charlottesville to accusing american-jewish democrats. let's add to our conversation joel payne, a democratic strategist, plus phil rucker. your story stopped me in my tracks. it's almost akin to the reactions of a tragedy of a shooting where the politics used to wait for a federal investigation or any sort of reasonable time before people point fingers. but the democrats speaking out to your colleagues in today's "washington post" pointing fingers at this president. >> yeah, that's right, nicole. and that's because there have been so many of these anti-semitic attacks over the last year and really over the last three years since president trump took office. this has been rising on his watch, and he's been very inconsistent about how and even

whether he's confronted anti-semitism. there have been a number of moments over the course of his presidency, most notably the charlottesville attack where he has stopped short of fully condemning white supremacists, neo-nazis and other hate groups, in part, based on reporting that seems to be because the president is afraid of getting crosswise with certain members of his political coalition and constituencies on which he's counting for political support. now, the attack in new york the other day over the weekend, the president did condemn in a statement, but there is certainly more he could do as the president of the united states he could direct the justice department to take more formal action. he could also use his bully pulpit as the president to convene more of a national discussion about what is happening in this country. and i think that's what democrats expect him to do. but he has not done so yet. >> and let me just put up a few statistics to underscore what you're saying, phil rucker.

this is a statement from the president's hand-picked fbi director christopher wray. he says a majority of the domestic terrorism cases we investigated are motivated by some version of what you might call white supremacist version. they suggested those were some of the belief systems shared or adhered to by the suspect in the stabbing. this is also a statistic that bolsters what you're saying. there is a 17% increase this year compared to just last year of anti-semitic incidents in new york city. a normal president of either party of any faith, any leader of this country, would, as you said, sort of use his power and use his office to call for an end to violence against any americans, whether they voted for him or not. >> that's exactly right. that's been the role of the president throughout history to be a moral leader, to confront these crises and the violence that divides our country. it's something, you know, that

president bush confronted in his time, as you remember, nicole. and this president, trump, has just been very cautious and unwilling to use his moral platform as the president to take on hate. and it's not just anti-semitism, but he has been inconsistent in how he's confronted the spate of gun violence around the country. he's been inconsistent in how he's confronted other examples of racism and hate here. and it's something you hear from democrats a lot, especially the democrats who are out in iowa right now trying to campaign to unseat him in 2020, who want to have a different kind of moral leadership in the oval office. >> you know, it's not a secret that the quid pro quo is how trump rolls. it's unclear to me why we ever debated that in the context of the impeachment investigation. i mean, here's trump talking about what he expects from jewish americans. >> i think that if you vote for

a democrat, you're very, very disloyal to israel and to the jewish people. >> i say so, yeah. it's only in your head. it's only anti-semitic in your head. >> so it's anti-semitic in your head if you think that calling jews disloyal for voting for democrats that there's something wrong with that? he's incapable of even pretending that politics isn't behind all of his foreign policy, vis-a-vis israel. >> and i think you are smart to bring this up in the context of how the president views his support of the state of israel. he thinks that his, you know, kind of his get out of jail free card when it comes to moral leadership from the white house in terms of pushing back on anti-semitism. so this president has always been a transactional president. he thinks that if you vote for me, if you say nice things to me, that means that you're in good standing with me. and if you don't that means to hell with you.

and i think this president has prove that that's how he rolls. he's certainly demonstrated that with his handling of this crisis. that's really what it is. it's a crisis of anti-semitism that we've seen in the trump presidency. >> you know, barry weiss texted me a couple months ago and said people aren't paying enough attention to this. there's more than an uptick in violence. it's a 17% increase over last year. why do you think it isn't getting more attention? >> everyone is numb because there is so much hate going around just in so many different corridors. i think there was a statistic i saw that a lot of the hate crimes that had been directed towards muslim-americans, that that went to being directed towards latino americans, horrible. just the vitriol, the rhetoric that's coming out of donald trump. in focus groups that i've sat

in, in the past couple of years with african-americans, with hispanic voters, hearing how they feel more threatened because of the rhetoric that is coming from the bully pulpit. we see this now with our jewish brothers and sisters. and no one is going to be exempt when hate is flowing freely from the white house. >> and hate crimes are up across the board since this president took office. but there's certainly been a disturbing rise among anti-semitic acts in the new york area, of course the shooting in pittsburg, that synagogue the worst of all. and i think to piggy-back on your point, the president has sort of tried to inoculate himself because of his steadfast support for israel but also jared kushner and his daughter ivanka trump who converted to. it's not just his lackluster response, but during the campaign they dove into anti-semitic imagery with

hillary clinton and the star of david. and against globalism, had a very obvious anti-semitic overdone. and let's remember who else works in the white house. stephen miller and some of the reporting last month revealing his support of white supremacist groups, or at least white nationalist groups. so i think he has surrounded himself with that, and people close to the president have said to me that part of the reason that he's been so reluctant to condemn these sort of acts is because he knows that people who extend commit them tend to vote for him. who defended trump's pardon of a navy seal whose fellow soldiers called, quote, freaking evil. evil

i am totally blind. and non-24 can throw my days and nights out of sync, keeping me from the things i love to do. talk to your doctor, and call 844-214-2424. it's very troubling that we send folks out that have to make split-second decisions dealing with terrorists, dealing with bombmakers, and very, very difficult situations overseas. and what the president has said is we're going to stand behind

our warriors, we are going to have their backs, there was an investigation. and, by the way, that's a selective group of seals. there are many, many seals and many folks in the special warfare community that support chief gallagher, that appealed to the president and asked him for this clemency. >> that was national security adviser robert o'brien defending donald trump's reversal of the navy's decision to oust chief officer eddie gallagher from the navy seals after he had been charged with war crimes. his comments come after the "new york times" reported that many men on gallagher's own team were alarmed by his behavior. >> i heard more rumors and stuff like that of him targeting civilians. >> i saw eddie take a shot at probably a 12-year-old kid. >> you can tell that he was perfectly okay with killing anybody. >> i see eddie playing with a knife. >> this is a case where some seals who are not supposed to take things outside the family turned in their own chief. >> the guy was toxic. >> we can't let this continue.

>> "the washington post" editorial board laid out how courageous those men were to speak out. quote, these men broke the customary code of silence maintained by the seals because they thought chief gallagher's behavior violated something more sacred, the duty of the men and women to fight for the united states to fight for it honorably. it's the sacred duty that the president ridicules by allowing fox and friends and other media. those who tried to hold chief gallagher to account are suffering insults on national television, while the petty officer now retired with full honors is palling around with the president at mar-a-lago. the idea that you could go go on tv and say that this president -- every american president, as commander in chief, has the backs of their soldiers. this isn't just a soldier. this was someone accused of war crimes.

>> right. and whose conduct was so abhorrent and disturbing. >> turned in by his own unit. >> and turned him in and spoke about how he didn't seem to react when he was killing innocent civilians, even minors. you know, people -- some of the video clips of his colleagues there, they were fighting back tears describing what gallagher did. and it's not just them. according to reporting, some of those defense department leadership at the pentagon was also disturbed by the president's decisions here to reverse these judgments to restore them to full honors thinking he had -- the code of conduct and chain of command. in fact, he has wrapped his arms around gallagher. he was -- there was instagram photos. gallagher was at mar-a-lago over the holidays with the president and first lady. >> let me show some video of what you're talking about. this is former navy secretary richard spencer. oh. so former -- >> secretary of the navy. go to order and discipline of

the united states navy. that's a prime tenant. >> what message does it send? >> that you can get away with things. we have to have good order and discipline. it's the backbone of what we do. >> so i -- i guess we're forced -- i mean, both things can't be true. if good order and discipline is the backbone of what the military does -- >> this is troubling. one, what o'brien said suggests that the men and women who fight under the american flag don't have self-control on the battlefield. many -- not many of them, a supermajority of them do. eddie gallagher is an exception to the rule. >> they all do except the ones that end up in the justice system. >> eddie gallagher is an exception to the rule. and it also reflects how donald trump views bravery. which is, he doesn't understand it whatsoever. he has no concept of what courage on a battlefield would be because he thinks that the caveman approach that someone like eddie gallagher. that his own people in his unit reported out, you know, that he

behaved. he thinks that's bravery. and that's how this president views the world. that's how he's led. and that's certainly why he's decided to tie himself to mr. gallagher, who's going to become a very valuable piece on the campaign trail from what reporting has told us, as well. he's been at mar-a-lago and he's going to be someone active on the campaign trail as well. >> phil rucker, that's the piece of this. it's not just the conduct of overruling and overriding. what has, for decades, been a system i'm sure while not perfect, works. i mean, the military justice system is -- is -- is sort of handled within. it's sort of respects and honors those codes among fellow soldiers. the president reached in, mucked it up, threw it in the garbage. and now, he's taking someone whose peers thought he should be punished and putting him under his arm and trotting him out as campaign prop. >> nicolle, it does fit a pattern of president trump's behavior in other realms, which is that he likes to be the decider. he likes to intervene in sort of

our -- our system of government. and the way our military and national security and intelligence apparatuses are set up to make those decisions himself. to reject the advice of the people below him. and that's what he's done in this case. but we should also keep in mind how gallagher got on his radar. he's somebody who was talked up extensively on fox news channel for months. and, you know, president trump watches those shows carefully. he pays close attention to what some of those commentators have to say. and some of them were very forcefully advocating on behalf of gallagher. so for trump, this is a way to further connect him to his perceived sort of base of support. his -- the conservative hosts and others on that network who he's going to be counting on for his re-election next year. >> another point in my career, i spent a lot of time on that network. what i remember from those men and women there, those broadcasters, reporters, and the anchor is they actually had a decent understanding of the

military. this seems to be an f-u straight from fox news to the military. >> and i believe jack keen, is he still on fox news anymore? i can't see jack keen embracing this approach of military discipli discipline injustice. that someone who behaves in the way described by eddie gallagher's fellow s.e.a.l.s., which is nothing short of sociopathic. planning, in detail and early on, to kill civilians. garner up kills. targeting innocent, young women. it's just sociopathic. and it's wrong. and the fact that this is what donald trump sees as an ally that he can relate to that, he's not cozying up to -- he's cozying up to someone who has been accused of the very worst of war crimes. >> you know, it does -- it's just -- i'm a student of patterns. and his pattern with the military isn't to honor its own traditions. it's to make up his own rules for them.

his pattern as someone on the world stage isn't to align himself with traditional u.s. allies, who fight side by side against america -- i mean, you know, his whole thing with nato is they don't give enough. they fight alongside our soldiers when we go to war. i mean, what is it about him that so rejects everything that has always been in the national interest? >> it's -- it's his own ideas of what he thinks bravery or heroism are. let's remember what he described about senator jon mccain. he preferred war heroes who weren't captured. he didn't serve in the military himself. that's all right. a lot of presidents haven't. but he seems to have no real sense of conduct. of duty and honor that -- that the u.s. military and all of its branches, the vast, vast majority, supermajority as you said, behave in that way. and he doesn't. he sort of -- he sees them as serving himself. not the nation but himself. and he rewards acts of bravery or those that are touted on fox and friends. >> unbelievable. phil rucker, thank you for spending some time with us.

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today, i want to thank my friend and colleague elisia. she is a superstar and i've been a fan of hers even longer than i've been a friend of hers. thank you for sitting here for me last week. my thanks today to joel, elise, and jonathan. most of all, to you for watching. that does it for this hour. "mtp daily" with katy tur in for chuck starts now. welcome to monday.

it is "meet the press daily." i'm katy tur in new york in for chuck todd and we begin tonight with some disturbing incidents and a toxic political environment. a man burst into a new york rabbi's home during a hanukkah celebration this weekend and stabbed five people. and in the wake of that incident, we're left grappling with a range of uncomfortable questions. as the nation confronts a rise in hate crime violence. questions ranging from why did this man in particular do it? to what are police doing to prevent similar attacks in the future? and why has there beepi