join me in offering a warm welcome to bill kristol. [applause] mr. kristol: thanks. it is great to be here. it is great to be back. i have only been at saint anselm in january. thewas headquarters here last couple primaries. i really loved coming here during the day and great hospitality. i congratulate the saint anselm's women's softball team. i see congratulate them. maybe i should run for office because i have artie learned how to suck up to everyone in new hampshire. -- already learned how to suck up to everyone in new hampshire. no offense to women's softball. it is funny. said, it is lovely and beautiful. my memories are -- of driving in new hampshire, i loved it but mostly december and january memories. a lot of them were pre-gps. driving on these back roads at 10:30 at night after some political rally without gps. i guess you do not believe in signs. these are excellent signs. times inen lost many new hampshire and of course in december and january, there is no snow or ice. maybe you should move the primary to the summer. i should not even joke about that. i

announcer: bill kristol is a limit of -- political commentator.e spoke in manchester, new hampshire previewing the 2020 presidential campaign and the possibility of a republican challenge to president trump. england council.

. >> bill kristol, you have a little more time because our other guests were so concise.round fr a long time. did you ever think you would see a day where three people as decorated with the kind of experience, the kind of rÉsumes that these three guys have, would speak out essentially in unison about a sitting american president of either party? >> it's remarkable, but this is why some of us were so intransigently against trump and remain against trump and hope that his tenure can be abbreviated as much as possible, at least whatever mueller finds, but then to one term. i do think the damage that's being done to democratic norms, to the rule of law, day after day, some people hoped it would get a little better. it hasn't gotten better, if anything, in the last few months it may have gotten worse. >> rudy giuliani the other die said that john brennan and jim clapper were clowns. i think the alternative way to describe them is as truth tellers. we'll be right back after this last final, quick break. it was here. i couldn't catch my breath. it was the last song of the night.

for me, it's not really a household name anymore but irving kristol who was bill kristol dad had a profoundinfluence on me. had disagreements with all of them.. those guys were big influences on me. the biggest influence was my dad. he reminded me a lot of my dad. my dad was a jewish intellectual whose idea vacation was going from one seller couch to another to read a different book or magazine or going to europe to look at museums. those guys for sure, i can come up with some other names pretty easily, but just since you brought up charles, i don't want to bring it up too much but the news about charles is just devastating. i know charles had a strange love persona on tv. a more decent and humane human being, i'm not sure you could name. he was amazing. it is a whole that i don't think never be filled without him in ourur public life. it breaks my heart that he's gone. >> you talk about people within the republican party not getting along very well. only have stuff like what happened with the ram deal where the burdenha of proof was inverted, isn't that the kind of thing that happens that

for me, a guy most people, not a household name anymore but irving kristol, who was bill kristol's dad and profound influence on me, deep and abiding influence. i might disagree with them. i have disagreements with all of them. but those guys -- the biggest influence was my dad. my dad was a very cerebral guy. one reason i loved irving kristol's he reminded me of my dad. a little jewish intellectual whose idea of vacation was going from one side of the couch to another to read a different book or magazine. or go to europe to look at museums. one of his only favorite hobbies was going on long walks with his sons to talk about how bad communism was. those guys for sure. i could come up with some other names pretty easily but you brought up charles. i don't want to talk too much because it is bad luck to cry on c-span. the news about charles krauthammer is devastating and i know charles had a dr. strangelove persona on tv, kind of fry and stern and all that kind of stuff. more decent and humane and mention like human being, i'm not sure you could name. he is an amazing man. it is a whole

to discuss that and more, let's bring in bill kristol, it toedir at large for the weekly standard thent suggests, i would say, i mean, apart from blaming the democrats for what is going on down in some of the border states, blames the democrats but says this is a matter of law others say that the enforcement that is taking place now under which people who are caught are sent to jail and their children are put into other facilities is a matter of choice, deriving directly from attorney general sessions' zero tolerance policy allowed last month is it a matter of law or is it a matter of choice >> i think it's a matter of discretion under the the law there will be some lawsuits. we'll see whether this is legal but it may well be legal but one can choose not to enforce the law in this way, obviously there are many areas where that's true and the president has directed and sessions has been very candid about this. that he wants a zero tolerance policy and he's going to treat everyone coming across the border as breaking the law, as committing a -- breaking the law in such a way that we're

bill kristol is a republican. it's a meaningless distinction. i would just say -- of course it is. look around sincerely. i know it is. i have been on the right my home whole life, it doesn't mean anything. what does mean something is when you have people who clearly have no self-control and an ax to grind and why is the left, which used to care about civil liberties, making excuses for this crap? i don't understand it. >> i don't think anyone on the left is. i think what the left is saying is that comey, which is the principle focus of the report, acted inappropriately in a way that hurt clinton and helps trump by making i the announcement in july of '16 and then october of '16 about things he shouldn't have been talking about. the decision whether or not to prosecute, things that were all above his pay grade in a way that inured against president trump and against hillary clinton. that's point one. point two -- >> tucker: by the way, i haveth attacked comey for doing that, i'm not partisan and i t don't think he should have done that to hillary. >> that's very fair-minded of you.

i think bill kristol had it right. he is comfortable going into the election with it and other republicans will be very reluctant to break with him now that he's made that decision. i think it is interesting. if you have a defensible policy, then defend the policy. don't obfuscate, lie about it and conceal it. which is what we've been having the last week or so. blaming it on the democrats, pretending it is not taking place. that indicates you have a tremendous amount of confusion about this. this has been squint the way the president has dealt with it. the muslim ban, juvenile daca. not well thought out and also not designed to treat people as individuals, rather than members of groups and we're seeing the downside of that policy right now. >> and will heard yesterday on msnbc making it clear, this is a policy that is completely discretionary. let's watchful. >> of course. this is a policy that could be changed by this administration. this could be changed by the white house, by the people implementing this policy at

conservative editor bill kristol tweeted -- "trump's statement that immigrants will "infest our country" probably sounds better in the original german." this his trump speaking tuesday. pres. trump: countries abuse us by sending their people up, not theieir best. we're n not going to gigive any more aid to o those countri. why should we?e? as many are accusing trump of holdiding the refugee children hostage to find his border wall, he met o on capitol hill. votes this week on two different sweeping anti-immigrant bills. president trump has indicated he will stop the family separating practice in exchange for $25 billion for trump's border wall, a crackdown on asylum seekers, and a reduction on visas to the united states. not a single republican lawmaker reportedly raised the issuee of family y separation with trtp during the meeting tuesday. democrats are demanding the passage of stand-alone legislation to stop the separation of families or that president trump simply stop the practice himself, as it was his administration that enacted the zero tolerance policy that began the widespread

>>> my thanks to bill kristol, mara gay, mimi rocah, and the reverend al sharpton. you did a tremendous job today. i'm john heilemann. >>> the road to singapore. let's play "hardball." >>> good evening, i'm chris matthews in washington. here's where things are headed this friday night. we've got the latest of course, but who knows how long this latest is going to hold? trump is headed to singapore and now he says he never wasn't headed to singapore. samantha bee is getting lined up with roseanne barr before a right-wing firing squad. and there are new reasons to ask questions about the other far east meeting, the one in the seychelles. it looks like mueller is still hot on the collusion trail. finally is donald trump planning to pardon himself out of all of his russian business. let's talk about trump's bromance for despotic north korea. was henry kissinger, is power the greatest aphrodisiac? there was a remarkable scene at the white house as senior north korean official spent about an hour and 20 minutes inside the oval office. there he is meeting with trump. kim y

joining us, it tore for the weekly standard, bill kristol and former special assistant to president bush. first it was daca, now this practice of separating children from their parents. how can the president keep blaming this on democrats? >> well, the president is not wrong. i do think the democrats have been obstinate to some degree in willingness to work with republicans on a comprehensive strategy to secure the border, fix the outdated laws and get this right. this was a key issue in the 2016 election, and these laws do need to be fixed and we do need to get border security. >> that's different. that's different. >> however, i think the president and the white house are going to regret using this family separation policy as leverage to drive the democrats to the table. i mean, this is a little bit like trying to mow your yard with dynamite. yeah, you're going to cut the grass but you're probably not going to be happy with the results of it and the aftermath. the best thing that can happen here is for the president to realize he can be the hero. he can end this child separation policy

this is in some ways the bill kristol, the folks within the party that believe that donald trump is areat to democracy and aren't afraid to say it and they themselves have some institutions and apparatus behind them. the fourth group i jokingly call the remnant. i name it after a podcast by jonah goldberg at "national review" he says it's for people who feel like they're constantly losing their minds or like everyone around them has lost their minds. they don't dislike everything trump does. they dislike a lot of it and they're not afraid to say it when they do but they try to take things issue by issue but that faction doesn't have infrastructure to it. people fit into that category but there's no meetings, there's no super pac. this remnant group doesn't have any organization to it. i'm curious as the weeks unfold if the story gets grimmer for republicans in terms of the midterms, if this family separation issue takes its toll at the polls do more republicans shift from that establishment we fall in line group to begin becoming a little more sfloeg a it wi -- rogue? >> so along thes

i think he ranks with bill buckley, irving kristol among the top conservative intellectuals of the lastars. he was one of the great defenders of our civilization and he represented what was best about it and his voice will be missed and never replaced. >> chris: is there one story from your days as a college graduate dealing with him? >> i once inserted a typo into his column late when it was almost going to the printer at "the washington post" and i have to go tell him this the next day. i didn't realize -- he wasn't mean about it or nasty about it but i remember he said why did you do it? like i killed my mother and we came to joke about this over the years. >> chris: you were on the other side fencing with charles often and it always struck me that whether you agreed with him or not, and charles wasn't always right, i think we would agree, if you ignored him you missed out on an important part of the national conversation. >> without a doubt. it comes to mind because i was on the opposite side that people talk about wayne gretzky or michael jordan as knowing where the park or ball is