tonight a new story just out in "the washington post" as russian ambassador sergey kislyak told his kremlin bosses that he did in fact talk about campaign matters with then senator jeff sessions. current and former u.s. officials telling "the washington post" they know from american intelligence intercepts. if true, it's also possible that the russian ambassador was boasting to his bosses. but if it wasn't a boast and the information bears out, it casts serious doubt on the credibility of jeff sessions, the highest law enforcement official in the land, who denied having any contacts with russians during the campaign about the campaign. this is what attorney general sessions said during his confirmation hearing back in january. >> if there is any evidence that anyone affiliated with the trump campaign communicated with the russian government in the course of this campaign, what will you do? >> senator franken, i'm not aware of any of those activities. i have been called a surrogate at...

expressing his anger that sessions did recuse himself, i mean i also want to bring in some other voices for a reaction. cnn political analyst carl bernstein, cnn contributor john dean, former federal prosecutor matthew whitaker. dana bash is here. and former senior obama adviser david axelrod. david, this is just one more -- again, i hate to use that cliched term, but drip in this russia story. how big is this? >> well, it's obviously big for jeff sessions. it impugns him in a way at a time, as you point out, that is very, very inconvenient because he seems to be on the rocks as it is. i think he will argue what he has, which is these are uncorroborated and there's no verification of them other than the representation of kislyak in these cables. it is interesting, as you point out, that he has moved the goal posts. so he's now saying, we didn't talk about interference in the campaign. but if he was having conversations with kislyak as a representative of the trump campaign, giving him...