, global gary cohn, becomes the chief of staff for the once-populist president. and cohn, by the way, a registered democrat. would be a fascinating dynamic. let's be honest, the most important thing that came out yesterday in the senate intel briefing was the fact that there was a stern warning to the president, to this country that russia never went away and -- the meddling, warning about 2018. >> there should be no doubt that russia perceived that its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 u.s. midterm elections as a potential target for russian influence operations. >> how consequential is that sound byte, zach? >> i think it's a big deal. i think a lot of people need to pay attention to it. it shouldn't seem very new because they've said this kind of thing before repeatedly on capitol hill. it appears that the only person who doesn't believe it at this point is president trump, according to cnn's reporting. he has doubts that russia tried to meddle. then if you think about it, you know, if russia meddled, maybe the special investigation into -- into co

but i think we'll see a focus in on gary cohn, someone who donald trump has known for many years. somebody who might scare some real hard-core conservatives, because they feel as if gary cohn is more centrist, if i can say. but let's also keep an eye on mick mulvaney, as well, for some reason, if they decide to move out gary cohn is not the pick. and if you noticed, he's been one of his more effective spokespersons who go out there to defend the president in his policies. >> i have something that i want to say here. i'm actually texting with michael cohen now. i want to ask you this while i get this together. michael, i want you to talk to me about this off the record west wing meeting. you were there after the "daily mail" published a picture of rob porter's ex-wife. rob porter took questions to, what, deny the allegations? >> i don't want to interrupt your texting with michael cohen, but i'm not going to talk about the content of an off the record meeting. you know, i will say that this is a common occurrence at the who is and at capitol hill. you know, government officials want

we have a short list of successors, kef ven mccarthy, gary cohn, mick mulvaney as well. the white house is expressing confidence in the chief of staff john kelly as of today, john. >> kaitlan collins. i'm old enough to remember when there was speculation the president was going to fire gary cohn. it was like two months ago. sunlen, what are you hearing? >> reporter: it will be interesting today at that press conference that will take place in just a few minutes to see how republican leaders handle all of these questions. as you noted before, kevin mccarthy, the house majority leader up there at the podium in just a few minutes. his name has of course been banding about a potential successor to white house chief of staff john kelly. it will be interesting to see how he handles that question. obviously many republicans up here on capitol hill, this week has been peppered with questions about the white house handling of the scandal. and many of them have been outspoken, they handled it poorly, they've made some errors in their communication, that their response hasn't been

and gary cohn has reported in the same "washington post" article tonight as being a possible replacement for john kelly as white house chief of staff. and all the leaking about john kelly that is now pouring out of the white house these days makes it clear that no one, and i mean no one in that white house is afraid of john kelly. not anymore. the inmates are once again clearly openly running the asylum after what was only a brief period when john kelly was apparently pretending to run the asylum. two versions of what john kelly and the white house staff knew about rob porter were offered today in washington. one was offered under oath. >> what i can tell you is that the fbi submitted a partial report on the investigation in question in march. and then a completed background investigation in late july that soon thereafter we received requests for follow-up inquiry. and we did the follow-up and provided that information in november. and then we administratively closed the file in january. and then earlier this month we received some additional information. and we passed that on as well. >

they say names being floated if he does include chief economic adviser gary cohn, house majority leaderin mccarthy, and budget director mick mulvaney. mulvaney has denied he's under consideration. press secretary sarah huckabee sanders said yesterday the president has confidence in kelly. >> this coming as the white house struggles to control fallout over allegations porter, former white house staff secretary, physically abused his two ex-wives. porter denies the accusations. chief of staff kelly is defending his handling of the situation, telling the "wall street journal," "it was all done right." scrutiny only intensifying on tuesday after the director of the fbi up-ended the white house timeline of events. >>> a quick recap now. on monday, the white house said top officials learned the "extent of the allegations" last tuesday, and that porter's background check was still ongoing. then yesterday, fbi chief chris wray told the senate intel committee the bureau notified the white house of the allegations months ago. >> the fbi submitted a partial report on the investigation in question

there are a lot of people pushing gary cohn to the president. but i don't know directly that i'd be able to corroborate how the president himself feels to that idea. >> what he's talking about is the trump caveat, that affects everything until decisions are done, dusted and signed onto. so robert, having said that, we heard nicolle wallace quoting a source familiar with the president's thinking and familiar with the west wing, saying that kelly and his assistant now secretary of the department of homeland security were sanctimonious upon arrival. they forced a lot of people, some of them trump favorites out of the orbit. they broke some glassware in kind of bringing their regime and discipline to the west wing. and as i mentioned in our first segment when the long knives come out in washington, it is a sight to behold. they are sharp, and it can be gruesome. >> and some of those people wielding those knives tonight are some former trump advisers, the friends of president trump who have felt their access to this president limited in the past six

he was really impressed that he had been a rhodes scholar, and he said, joking around to gary cohn, that the white house. i thought he was this guy who just handed me papers, and then i realize td this guy was the smartest guy in the white house. even gorsuch wasn't the smartest guy, he wasn't a rhodes scholar. when john kelly learned his background was a real problem, he had some difficulty acting upon it. i think it's important to note that the fact rob porter was working on an interim security clearance was a real problem for john kelly, and he had told confidantes in recent days that he wanted to work on not only porter but everyone else in the white house continuing to work on security. >> we'll continue to talk about that in the days ahead, because rob porter deserves a top of the list in the spotlight, but there are a number of other aides who still don't have security clearance a year and a month in, and if they can't get one, the chief is right to think they can't get one. >>> next, omarosa turning on the president. >> should we be rude? >> don't say that. >> because we are worr

trump's economic advisor gary cohn down played this. i want to talk about it right now with the president of macromavens and an economist. i love getting your take on this. you have been so right about this economy. i have some concerns right now. >> absolutely. you and i talked about what's going on with the consumer in terms of diving into the spending numbers. a lot of things have been driven by non-discretionary things. the market action has brought into focus things that had gone to the back burner amid the talk about the tax cuts. that's what's happening on the monetary policy front in terms of tightening credit conditions. rerode off the quantitative tightening as a non-event and focused on fiscal policy. and people started to say maybe we should be focused more on what's happening on the interest rate side and monetary side. and how that will impact the consumers who are already stretching to make end meet. >> with economic growth comes higher inflation sometimes. some comes higher wages. we saw a wage number from the jobs repor

and while he is flanked by steve mnuchin and gary cohn, gary cohn has said we should look at overall trends. mnuchin talking down the dollar in davos. you don't see someone in that position suddenly doing things that would mess with the market. when you think about fed chairs, treasury secretaries, they're so careful with every single word they say because you know the tea leaves are red. this administration has been speaking act the markets like they're surrogates on a campaign trail cheering things on. that is dangerous territory. think about all the times in the last few months president trump has gotten on a podium and said you can thank me for your 401 k. you must love it. ivanka trump regularly tweets out touting the market performance. well, who is going to take the blame for it now? >> jonathan, last note to you. the tax bill has been when they separated out, a winner for this crowd, this administration, especially if you ask them. correct? >> yeah. i mean, they're encouraged by some of the polling they've seen. during the debate at the end of last year when the republicans w

people like gary cohn and mark meadows, chairman of the freedom caucus.ublicly, the white house is standing by the chief of staff, saying the reports are premature . it does not mean the chatter around it has quieted. julia: another name is mick mulvaney. my question is, who would want this job? kevin: [laughter] anytime there is a power vacuum in washington, folks come out of the woodwork to try to get it. i think what would be interesting is of the names are clear there policy differences between someone like gary cohn versus the director mulvaney or chairman meadows, particularly on economic finance. if you look at the teams and surrounding people, that influences who has the president's here. that is why i think there is great speculation about this. chief of staff kelly is famous or infamous for controlling what information gets to president trump. that would be a job for the chief of staff and his successor. julia: thank you. scarlet: not to mention the fact that mick mulvaney already has two jobs. he is the acting head of -- julia: he can do anothe

gary cohn has not been offered the job. the question is will they be offered the job and if so, will they take it? period of time alexander is at the white house. -- peter alexander is at the white house. peter, john kelly has not had a warm relationship with his staff for months. this is a guy who in weekly meetings tells the white house staff how lucky they are he's there leading the force. he then turns his own team into liars and changes his story. even rob porter, rob porter may not deserve to have a job at the white house, but's john kelly who has turned rob porter's situation into an international incident. >> reporter: yes , stephanie, they say john kelly would have earned that loyalty, rekindled that relationship with the people in the west wing, obviously that's not the tactic he chose to use. the latest contradiction that the chief of staff john kelly, when asked about whether the white house should have done anything differently in handling the porter situation, told "the wall street journal," "no, it was all do

the president sounding out possible replacements including gary cohn, mick mulvaney. and congressman mark meadows. we're joined by kellyanne conway. thanks for joins us. >> hi, george. >> a lot to get to this morning. just the end of the piece, i'm told you're on the short list of chief of staff. the president is very high on you. would you accept if he asked? >> that would be news to me. i spoke to the president last night and he wants everyone to know he has full confidence in john kelly and he's not looking for replacements. he also has full confidence in hope hicks as communication director and long-serving aid. there are unsourced stories out there. when it comes to those two individuals, the president has full confidence in their performance. i would also say i serve at the pleasure of the president. i think it's incredibly important to subvert your ego to the greater good. which is for the company. i consider myself one small molecule trying to push forward and agenda that makes us more prosperous and safe. >> i want to get to more on that. the president hasn't

we've heard gary cohn and nick mulvaney. those are the names you hear most often when this comes up, sometimes from the president. why those three? >> well, john, there's no question the president is trying to feel people out. they're trial balloons, if you will. float these names and see what the reaction is. house speaker, kevin mccarthy, without question has developed a close relationship with the president. he was asked this morning on capitol hill if he's up for the job. watch what he said. >> i understand you've had some conversations with the president recently. wondering if you can confirm that you've talked to him about exploring the opportunity for chief of staff. are you interested in that position at all if he offers it, and would you serve him if you are asked? >> he got called on just because of the jacket. >> first of all, i have not spoken to the president about anything about a job and i never have. there is no job opening. >> so making clear there is no job opening, saying he's not spoken to the president a

. >> this is gary cohn's plan. he's saying, oh, mr. president, we've got this infrastructure plan, we're going to put a little money here, but really it's going to go all to states and private investors because we got no money left. states can't run deficits. >> look, the way you got democrats on board for this budget and the spending bill -- >> they'll spend. >> right, they wanted to spend on stuff, and that is not something that democrats generally complain about, including the c.h.i.p. and community health programs and things like that. but for republicans, there's a little bit of hypocrisy here because the party has held the debt ceiling hostage back in 2011, they've been for massive spending cuts. they're the ones responsible for putting the sequestration in place which ended up being blown out because of this spending bill. >> remember, president trump and his policies, they claim to be all about growth. but the mandatory spending cuts under obama, many economists have said that is what slowed the economy. my issue is this. what

reports say he's looking at gary cohn, his former top economic adviser, also at an old friend from wall street who has resisted coming into the white house because he has a long sort of financial background that would be hard to vet. >> thomas barack, you're talking about? >> exactly. and he's looking at a couple of other candidates. the question is, are any of these candidates going to rise to the top and can they do the job that john kelly has done in imposing some semblance of discipline in this white house. >> jeremy, i'm curious, jay said it probably the best, that it was a casual offer, they denied any official offering of his resignation. >> right. >> do you get a sense that john kelly, the former multistar general, do you get a sense that he looks at the chaos around him and may be looking at a way out as well to maintain his reputation? >> one of the things that never really made a whole lot of sense until you started digging into the reasons why is, why would john kelly stand so strongly behind somebody accused of domestic violence, especially when these allegations were so cr

gary cohn said one month is a blip, the trend is what i'm focused on. well, mr. chairman, maybe listen to mr. cohn, if the trend concerns you, look when it began. >> african-american unemployment ticked up by a lot in january of 2018, but it's not our inclination to say that's donald trump's fault. it's been moving in it lockstep with unemployment for years. what the president never acknowledges is the market was going up even before he got into office. it has been smashing records, no question, despite this last week which has been the worst in a couple of years. but take a look at this. the blue line at the bottom is the s&p 500 which we like to talk about because it's 500 stocks as opposed to the dow. look at the top line. that's global markets. they've followed the same trends and in some cases have performed better than the united states with no donald trump at the helm. >> nikkei, hong kong, argentina. go around the world, we're actually seeing those markets outperform the u.s. stock market. this is an excellent picture. it's just baffling why the president

among these, gary cohn, mick mulvaney, and mark meadows. and president trump of course, gauging the interest of some others. >> and the interest still out there. we know rob porter was working with a temporary security clearance. he is not the only one in the west wing who had not been granted full security clearance? >> reporter: the white house has declined to report a number on who is using a temporary path, but jarreed kushner, the president's own son-in-law, is among them. >> cecile yarks thank you. >>> we are following the major storm. just heading into the weekend, it's slamming chicago, detroit, and major travel hubs. nearly a foot of snow in chicago. one person was killed in a deadly highway pileup near flint, michigan. that system moving into the northeast tonight into the weekend and this evening, we are already watching another major storm right behind it. abc's alex perez in chicago tonight. >> reporter: tonight, danger on the highways. more than a dozen semis and more than three dozen vehicles in all involved in this chain-rea

doing that and did you say anything about that to gary cohn. >> so as i said, we are processing -- out of canada and the bulk is sent to the u.s., we are providing one-third of the aluminum consumption in the usa. i won't make any comment about -- but i'm confident people will take that the chain between canada and the u.s. is highly integrated and that at the end of the day we want the u.s. customer to be competitive and their best interest is to secure low cost aluminum and i think this oil integration between canada and the u.s. is the way forward. >> terrific. thanks for joining us. we appreciate it. >> thank you. >>> china has been a massive spending spree here in the united states. snapping up marquee rauft but now the insurance company that owns the waldorf astoria seized by the chinese government could have a impact here we'll go inside of the portfolio straight ahead ein the 2018 lexus es,y system plus, standard... and the es hybrid. take advantage of special president's day offers now through the 28th, on the 2018 es 350. experience amazing at your lexus dealer. thank you so

>> reporter: some big names being kicked around here, among these possible names, gary cohn, budget director, mick mulvaney, and north carolina congressman, mark meadows. and as we reported, president trump, of course, gauging the interest of some others. >> and the interest still out there. we know rob porter was working with a temporary security clearance. because of those accusations against him, and more than a year into this administration now, he is not the only one in the west wing who still had not been granted full security clearance? >> reporter: yeah, david, and the white house is refusing to provide a specific number on how many people are still using this temporary path, but our sources say that jared kushner, the president's own son-in-law, is among them. >> cecilia vega who has been covering the story all week long, thank you. >>> we are also following the major winter storm at this hour. slamming chicago, detroit, major travel hubs. nearly a foot of snow in chicago. police say at least one person was killed in a deadly highway pileup near flint, michigan. that system moving i

shery: gary cohn earlier today.ore update on the nuÑez memo, james coney says it is misleading -- it is inexcusably exposed classified information. this is james comey responding. live from you are, this is bloomberg -- live from new york. this is bloomberg. ♪ scarlet: it's 2:00 p.m. in new york, 11:00 in san fransisco, and 7:00 p.m. in london. i'm scarlet fu. .ulie: and i'm julia chatterley welcome to bloomberg markets. ♪ we are live and bloomberg world headquarters in new york over the next hour. here are the top stories we are covering on the bloomberg and from around the world. equities feeling pain. u.s. stocks on track for the first week in two years after jobs data increases the likelihood the fed raises rates next month. and the long-awaited memo drops. house republicans finally released the memorandum they es bias of the top of the justice department. john kline of deutsche bank says he still is hoping for a turnaround at germany's largest lender, but investors are running out of patience. we have a selloff

pick up on one gary cohn said, is that when you are seeing, that wage pressure really kicking in now?vantage goes to the employees. the cycle has been 10 years now. wage growth is about 3%. i would not be surprised if it is higher. it is a full employment market right now. david: how is that distributed among different classes of employers? perhaps, thes, non-supervisor and production employees are catching up with the fat cats, as it were. it is a bit of a barbell, it is a skills-based economy. the more skills you have the more money you will make. education determines a workers earnings for life. ,learly, at the entry-level there has certainly been a lot of activity in leisure and hospitality and the like that has helped wage growth. david: what are we seeing when you go down every month from the labor department, in terms of jobs, growth, and wait pressure? michael: wage pressure is starting to rise but is not filtered through to everyone. you see it mostly in the better paying jobs where it is hard to find workers. it appears to also affect the lower skill levels because so many o

>> steven mnuchin and gary cohn and i remain in contact with financial regulators.ep the conversations to ourselves. we want to make sure markets are functioning smoothly and if there is a circuit breaker, it is working. the fact is that markets have function smoothly through this volatility. the fundamentals of the economy are strong. you have to, in a situation like this, monitor the situation closely. that is the normal course of business. if you want to ask the conversations, get austan goolsbee and say when there are volvo days, who did -- volatile days, who did he talk to, he can now speak frankly about the conversations. david: good suggestion. >> he will be funnier and better looking than me. mark: thank you. the chairman of the council of economic advisers. vonnie: fantastic interview, david westin, thank you. that is david westin and kevin hassett. coming up, bain capital jonathan lavine will talk volatility and spain's recent real estate deal. this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪ mark: live from london, i am mark barton. vonnie: i am vonnie quinn and this is the europe

gary cohn said that markets are just consolidating after a big bull run. look to be shifting a little bit, a pullback, it is unreasonable to expect indiscriminate gains every day, or new record highs for the s&p every day. it is time for a pause. mark: some investors waiting to put cash on the sidelines, how stocks overcome? is on company fundamentals and that is where earnings come into play. that it isitous earnings season and investors will get a closer look on company balance sheets, perspectives for value going forward, where investors can see more games. -- gains. that does not look bad, the u.s. earnings seasons halfway into the season with 81% of companies beating the european session. only 1/5 of the way but more than half of the companies beating. that is promising on that front. this fullback if nothing else will give investors -- this pullback if nothing else will give investors mark: -- worst week for the stoxx 600 for a long time. how does fx play into it on both sides of the electric? weakerhe u.s., the dollar could not hurt but not so much

coming up is gary cohn, national economic council director.im about. david: a great day to have gary. like to know what he thinks about rates that are important to the president. they are not moving. alix: the bloomberg market open is up next with jon ferro. ♪ jon: from new york city, i am jonathan ferro. this is the countdown for the opening. ♪ ♪ jon: coming up, it is payrolls friday. treasuries declined. the dollar jumped. at the fastest pace since the end of the recession. bond weakness returns for u.s. stocks. and groundhog day for deutsche bank. revenue falls to a seven-year low. pressure building again on ceo john prime. -- john cryan. into negative territory, down 17 on the s&p 500. the fx market in the g10 space, a strong dollar story against everything. 1.2440.lar back to in the treasury market, yields climbing higher. some of it from the payrolls affect in the last 30 minutes or so. with a big

that's the problem. >> with the possible exception of gary cohn. >>> other news, the house intelligenceee voted unanimously to release the democrats' classified memo. it responds to the one republicans released last week accusing the justice department and fbi of misconduct and their warrant applications to spy on former trump campaign adviser carter page. the white house says it has received the memo. press secretary sarah huckabee sanders says that the administration will follow the same process and procedure with this memo from the minority as it did last week when it received the memo from the majority. if president trump octobers to its release, it could still be made public but only if the house votes to allow it, a move that would require at least two dozen republicans to side with democrats against the president. >> so let's bring a member of the house intelligence committee, congressman eric swalwell of california. heidi has the first question for you. good morning. >> hi, congressman. the president now has five days to review this memo to decide what to do. adam schiff last ni

eastern and gary cohn is on today with stuart, top economic adviser joining varney & company at 9:45,tay tune to that as well. lauren: remember when futures were flat before the job's report, we are not seeing that today, we have -- we haven't seen that in the last couple of reports. >> other things that are going on in the markets but she'll -- lauren: cheryl casone will be coming up. we are taking a look at her now. cold in minneapolis. it's still early in minneapolis. all the buzz for the game on sunday. no one is excited around here because everybody hate it is patriots. >> well, yes. the whole boston-philadelphia doesn't go down to well in new york so whatever. record profits for amazon and the to be is soaring ahead of the opening bell this morning. we will talk more about that. >> alexa show me a recipe for grill cheese sandwich. >> you're 38 year's old of age and you don't know how to make a grill cheese sandwich. the name is the recipe. >> got it. >> warning of netflix users about new e-mail scan and will stay on the markets with the dow futures now down 242 points ahead of t

do you subscribe to a viewpoint of charlie gasper in a gary cohn the lower corporate taxes will go right to the balance sheets. they will buy back stock we won't have this sort of spike in inflation and deficits. he was a former at ubs. pretty smart market. there are some bad signs that we might get the growth we may make it much higher deficits and interest rates in trump is talking about trade war. and one other thing he talked down the dollar which is never good for the markets. it's not good for investment in our country. there is a legitimate scenario the people have to digest. with massive fiscal stimulus coming our way. some people will get on the personal side. it's not as much as the big ones. for small businesses are getting a break here too. in this type of world we don't have a massive amount of inflation. and while i don't think that fred is running on with her had cut off i think they are concerned about this. something happened here fundamental to the market it has been violent and fast. how they give an interview to bloomberg we want to do a quick reset here. look at this

, he said algorithmic's trading is a significant threat to our country's well-being, he calls on gary cohn steven mnuchin to conduct a market stress test to see if we can handle that. what do you say about that? >> i think mark is an extremely astute observer of today's modern market structure. he's on that. and the firm is doing great things and proprietary traders. liz: they're not breaking the law. >> when you're a proprietary trader, you're going to trade what's available. the problems started at the stock exchange level. they were the once, the new york stock exchange, nasdaq, that gave out the ability for speed trading. in other words, co location, proprieta proprietary data feeds and rebates aid the in the fragmented market that we have. there are things we can do to get diversity into the limit order books why do we plunge down so fast? there are no limit orders, no retail or institutional bias because they are afraid they're going to get picked off all day. bring the guys back in. liz: can you do that and deal with proprietary experience? really quick? >> i think we should bring m

that was offhand comment, gary cohn said same thing, says you have been suggesting that for weeks. >>es, gives people something to look forward to. they're beginning to experience things of this tax cut, keeping more, most people of the pay. the economy has a little bit of drive. you never know from the market today. the economy had a good jobs report. you more to come. if you like the meal, we'll have more for you. smart politics. david: we're saying with the problem with the tax reform there wasn't enough kick for individuals, bringing down the top marginal rate, so affects startup of businesses in america. it was so successful in the 190s, to make tax cuts permanent on individual side but more importantly bring the top rate down even more. >> bring the top rate down an end confusion about so-called partnerships, pass-throughs, what businesses are organized as. very complicated. simplify it. slash the rate, make it simple, be done with it. do something for more individuals. how about social security, taking away first two or three points of that tax. keep more what we earn. even if

have him confused with gary cohn steve mnuchin was on capitol hill on topic i've been pretty passionate about. you know this this is how i was referencing i wasn't thrilled with everything in the tax plan. because there's one little loophole in there that makes it so that, well, you steve cohen and his buddies, you know, these private equity investors, can get away with paying a whole lot less than you or me in taxes, percentagewise. why is that? how did steve mnuchin respond? we'll have that for you next. jj, will you break it down for this gentleman? hey, ian. you know, at td ameritrade, we can walk you through your options trades step by step until you're comfortable. i could be up for that. that's taking options trading from wall st. to main st. hey guys, wanna play some pool? eh, i'm not really a pool guy. what's the hesitation? it's just complicated. step-by-step options trading support from td ameritrade how's it going? - alright, how ya doing? - welcome! so, this is the all-new chevy traverse. what do ya think? this looks better than 99% of the suvs out there. it's very modern..

there were a few other officials including people like gary cohn, the top economic adviser at the whiteme from a complex financial background who were able to get clearances. there are questions here about what is going on with the clearance process here at the white house. it seems very much a lot of top aides to the president still had not gotten the clearance that they needed to see top secret information here at the white house, erica. >> abby phillip with the latest, thank you. >>> at this hour va secretary david shill kin is facing tough questions about his taxpayer funded travel. this comes after a blistering report from the inspector general who said his chief of staff altered an e-mail that led to the va paying more than $4,000 for his wife to fly to europe with him last year. our cnn senior politics writer wanna summers joining us from washington. >> secretary shulkin on capitol hill speaking with the house veterans affairs committee. he tells lawmakers the optics of the situation are not great, he regrets decisions made that take away from his focus of serving american vetera

john kelli's management of this and other issues and asking about possible replacements including gary cohnmccarthy, but this word from mike pence today very deliberately setting the tone that john kelly is here for now, if not permanently getting that endorsement from the vice president of the united states. and that does it for this e edition. a busy valentine's day. remember the show online, facebook and twitter. peter alexander is here. you have a lot on your plate. >> thank you, andrea. good afternoon to you. it's afternoon already. what a day it's been so far. i'm in washington. it's peter alexander in for craig melvin. follow the money. the six had-digit payment made weeks before the election and now the president's long had-time lawyer telling nbc news he used his own money to facilitate a payment to the porn star who report ed to have claimed she had a sexual encounter with president trump. >>> and blame and isolation for john kelly inside the white house in the wake of a domestic abuse scandal involving two aids. >>> also today, a new deal. a group of bipartisan senators say that

nbc news reports today that gary cohn in a late january discussion with the president believed he finally convinced trump lease no room for a masstive infrastructure spending bill. that can make trump's long awaited plan a tougher sell than he thought. >> we're going to get infrastructure. infrastructure is the easiest of all. we're very well on our way. infrastructure is by far the easiest. people want it, republicans and democrats. i could have started with infrastructure. i actually wanted to save the easy one for the one down the road. so we'll be having that done pretty quickly. olay regenerist shatters the competition. hydrating skin better than prestige creams costing over $100, $200, and even $400. for skin that looks younger than it should. fact check this ad in good housekeeping. olay regenerist. ageless. >>> one of the leaders of the effort to keep tyson out of prison is donald trump. the casino owner who could lose millions if tyson is unable to fight at his resorts. >> it's my opinion that to a large extent mike tyson was railroaded in this case. you have a young women in his

. >> gabe sherman saying white spread chatter trump is nearing a decision to name gary cohn as replacement that would be a remarkable comeback. >> you're never out and never completely in. asawin, cnn reporting porter was up for a motion for deputy chief of staff after all this stuff is coming back into the white house. what do you think of that. >> that's not surprising because based on our reporting and at several outlets for months the trump white house had been expanding rob porter's portfolio. he wasn't just a staff secretary. he was becoming more involved with policy and policy making. and back to what you were talking earlier about how the narratives from the white house keep changing and then there are multiple narratives and they keep clark both on the record and off the record and on background, when sarah huckabee sanders came out today and tried to clarify things and trying to throw, quote unquote, career officials at that personnel office under the bus in the white house, what she didn't mentionings to reporters and viewers of that briefing is that the office she was talking a

gary cohn earlier today said it is a one-month number. trends are what we follow. are what you follow, when you speak to the president and advise him -- >> let him know that. >> -- if he speaks about trends, they began long before last year. >> dom, thank you for joining us. dominic chu. >>> the spotlight of the russia investigation is now shining on one of the president's closest aides. white house communications director hope hicks. she's typically stayed out of the headlines, but she popped up in a "new york times" report this week. who is this young woman, and what a former member of trump's legal team is saying about her next. >>> we are watching the white house, expecting to hear the president okayed the release of the controversial memo come pied by intel house chair devin nunes. we'll bring it to you as soon as we have it. ere sitting there and we decided that, you know what? something needed to be done about what was going on in our inner-city. instead of buying a house, we decided to form this youth league. what is he doing wrong? he should shed the block.

gary cohn has told the president there is no money. to say we'll have states pay for it? states can't run deficits. and if you think it will come from private funding? they want 10% 15% returns. >> what if china says we want our hone back? does it benefit them? >> they won't do that. but the demand for u.s. dollars could change. we know longer will be the safest haven around. right now sure we are the prettiest girl in the ugly class, whatever those phrases are. but things ain't looking good. >> stephanie ruhle, prettiest girl in the ugliest class. >> not sure if that is how you say it. >> i feel like dan rather. thank you very much. jake, appreciate it. nice sly reference. >> tremendous living in this tube. >>> and be sure to catch stephanie at 9:00 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. each weekday and on saturday, she does it all. you can't miss her at 12:30 eastern on msnbc saturday. she promises she will do it in spanish. and jake sherman not to forget about him. from the outside looking in, moving on to another story, this white house can look and feel like a reality show at times, u

gary cohn, congressman kevin mccarthy who is house majority leader and star bursts color. >> only the reds and the pinks. >> if that isn't a credential for chief of staff, i don't know what is. and mick mulvaney, who already has two jobs, but okay. he can take on a third. >> in this white house in particular, being of chief of staff makes you incredibly vulnerable to controversy, to being undermined because of the president you're working for. whatever people think about john kelly, mistakes he may have made, controversial statements he's made, working for this president is incredibly difficult. because you're working for a president who, among other things, is going to undermine you by putting toxins in the water and spreading information about you. he is so transparent that way. you know, if you take a step back on this, any organization dealing with something like this would benefit from being both fair and more transparent than they have been. i think it's fair to say people in the white house had awe blind spot for rob porter just like a lot of people who know him do. who know hi