>> i apologized to andrew brightbart to the many other members of the media i misled. i apologized first and foremost to my wife and my family. >> some of those misled media members are right here at cnn. you may remember this exchange with my colleague, wolf blitzer, just days ago. >> this is the picture, i'm sure you've seen it by now. is this you? is. >> i can tell you this. we have a firm that we have hired -- i've seen it. it's -- i've seen it. we have a firm that we have hired to get to the bottom of it. it certainly doesn't look familiar to me. but i don't want to say with certitude. >> well, we just want to resolve it, once and for all. you would know if this is your underpants, for example. >> the question is -- i appreciate you continuing to flash that at me. look, i have said the best i can that we're going to try to get to the bottom of what happened here. >> "daily show" host jon stewart has known weiner for years. for him, the pain of what happened is personal. >> you know what is perhaps the most upsetting thing -- [ laughter ] >> the most upsetting thin

but before he could get to the microphone of his own press conference, andrew brightbart himself showed up and seized the microphone as the congressman's staff looked on in helpless shock. the blogger clarified some aspects of how this story has emerged and explained just how difficult it can be to try to have family fun on a vacation in palm springs while you're trying to destroy a congressman. >> i want to hear the truth from congressman weiner. quite frankly i'd like an apology for him being complicit in a blame the messenger strategy. that was clear what happened. 72 hours in palm springs with your family is excruciating when you are being challenged. why aren't you on vacation? why won't you get off the phone? because i'm being accused of being the hacker against the congressman. he said nothing. he allowed that to go. his minions perpetuated that false, malicious mean and then he went on cnn to attack me. i feel he was complicit. >> brightbart also announced that he has a much more graphic photograph of congressman weiner than any we have seen and he explained why he has not relea

andrew brightbart broke the story.end, he tweeted this -- >> the new york congressman seemed to be making light of the situation but has now hired a lawyer. his office said -- >> bring you up to speed, the college student the tweet was addressed to was jeanette, who tweeted this in the past -- in a statement, she admitted she's a fan of the congressman and said he began following her on twitter a month or so ago. but as for her being her boyfriend, not so much. >> so she says she wasn't being literal. but you can understand why reporters would want answers from the congressman himself. listen to this. >> you say that you were hacked, which is potentially a crime. why haven't you asked the capitol police for any law enforcement to investigate? >> look, this was a prank that i've now been talking about for a couple of days. i'm not going to allow it to decide what i talk about for the next week or two weeks. and so i'm not going to be giving anything more about that today. >> but with respect, you're here, which we appre

andrew brightbart broke the story. and the next day wiener's office released this statement saying he had been hacked. over the weekend, he tweeted this -- >> the new york congressman seemed to be making light of the situation but has now hired a lawyer. his office said -- >>> to brick you up to speed on 2 details, the college student the tweet was addressed to was jeanette who in the past tweeted this -- in a statement, she admitted she's a fan of the congressman and said he began following her on twitter a month or so ago. but as for her being her boyfriend, not so much. according to her statement, which also said, i've never met congressman wiener, though i am a fan. i am not his girlfriend nor am i the wife, girlfriend or mistress of barack obama, ray allen or cristiano rinaldo. so she says she wasn't being literal. but you can understand why reporters would want answers from the congressman himself. listen to this. >> you say that you were hacked, which is potentially a crime. why haven't you asked the capitol pol

the pictures of a shirtless weiner were released by andrew brightbart. he claims they were sent to a woman. and he has an x-ray photo of weiner that he won't release. >> i've the one to chosen not to do the salacious thing, the thing to get a billion hits on my website. i have no intention to rub salt in his wounds. all i wanted to do was tell the truth all along. >> brightbart said he's not releasing the photos you heard there to protect weiner's family. >> now to the weather and the tornadoes that touched down last night in montana. it spun last night near the billings airport. it was one of several that struck the billings area. no injuries are reported and the extent of the damage was not yet clear. >>> in southwestern iowa, residents worked overnight to protect hamburg from the swollen missouri river. they're trying to reinforce one faltering levee. but the river will crest at record levels leaving the town under eight feet of water. most residents are evacuated. >>> now to eastern arizona where a huge wild fire has forced more than 3,000 people to

with that said, i'm told that andrew brightbart may have hijacked the anthony weiner conference and he speaking about anthony and his penis while we deal with the massive unemployment, lack of energy alternatives -- >> but anyway, i think there is something almost owe pet ek in the contrast of the nature of this conversation while wef got a feed of andrew and anthony weiner. i want to bring this back. here's how. clearly there is a valid debate to be had. we were just engaging in it. clearly neither the democraticed leader -- there are plenty of democrats and republicans who where wo love this conversation. clearly republican leadership does not want to have this conversation, is avoiding this conversation and has been avoiding the conversation. not just for the obama presidency but for decades. media follows, the media is an indictment for another day. take a look at brightbart and wiener. the question is, how do we get ourselves. how do we use our power, not just as media people or as journalists, but as americans. how do human beings manifest themselves in rejecting both bad choices

and the conservative blogger andrew brightbart says he has an x-rated photo of wiener and claims it wouldnd his career. >>> over the counter pain medicines like tylenol and aleve are part of some's everyday lives. but do you know how it can affect your body? and more importantly your long-term health? we show you what's at risk. >> reporter: thank goodness they do what they do. >> gets rid of my headache. >> reporter: while millions of americans take over the counter painkillers every day, many have no idea what they're taking. do you know what the active ingredient is? >> i do not. i've tried a couple different things and it works the best. >> reporter: the fda says asi aside,mennifin poisoning. >> i've taken a lot of tylenol and i never knew taking too much could cause liver damage. >> reporter: just look at the dizzying array of consumer choices. you find the ingredient in tylenol and products like alkaselzer and certain painkillers, which can lead to what's called double dipping. even if you read all of this fine print, would you know that apec stands for acedemennifin? >> you're in p

reporter: in a bizarre twist, before he spoke, the podium was taking over by the conservative andrew brightbart who broke the story and followed up with the accuracy of his post. >> congressman weiner said he welcomes and will fully cooperateera cooperate with an investigation by the committee. >>> kelly, thanks. >>> now to an urge nlt situation in the southwest tonight. a big chunk of the state of arizona is burning out of control. more than 300 square miles already burned. that's an area the size of new york city. it's a fire so large, nasa photos clearly show the smoke flume visible from space. on the ground, thick smoke blanketing a wide area. haze is being reported in the sky as far away as the state of iowa. nbc' george lewis reports tonight from a fire staging area in eager, arizona. >> reporter: the largest fire in arizona, known as the wallow fire, has been burning for over a week now with zero containment. >> huge flames on the south side. >> reporter: that's because it's in rugged terrain with plenty of dry wood and brush to fuel t driven by high winds and hot temperatures. >> we hav

and the blogger with questionable credibility, andrew brightbart, has run with the story.of the questions and most of the talk with being fueled by congressman wiener himself and how he's been handling this. here's part two of his interview with wolf blitzer. >> back on march 13th, a woman named ginger lee, a stripper apparently, tweeted this, and i'll put it on the screen -- >> do you have any idea who this woman is? >> this is another person who i have gotten dragged into this for no reason other than she was following me, and asked to be followed by me. she was following, i think what this is about is a pro-forma thing that i send out. thank you for following me. i don't know who the woman is. i followed her for a moment, and then someone started tweeting and not wanting to cause trouble for her -- >> did you send her a direct message? >> as a pro-forma thing, i sent thank you for following me. please stay tuned to anthonywiener.com for other things. i want to ask you, does this person, what did she do beyond tweet something that she's a follower of mine? you can probab

. >> reporter: andrew brightbart has broke the story and has more photos he claims are weiner. nbc have not verified them. >> only after a sitting congressman had claimed that his computer system was invaded by a hack. >> reporter: how damaging is this to democrats? >> an embarrassment level that is hard for him to maintain public trust. >> are yif you are a donor, are jumping to write him a check. >> reporter: weiner says he will cooperate, but won't step down. >>> the conservative blogger who broke the story about congressman weiner says he has an x-rated picture of the lawmaker. he was accused of hacking weiner's twitter account, he spoke on "today" show just hours ago. >> if anthony weiner decides to make this a jihad against me for his interpretation for him putting me into the situation, you know what, i'll take that as, you said an insurance policy. i don't think i want to put his family through that type of thing. i certainly have it in my possession and i guarantee you he would use this against me and the people on the left side of the blogosphere would use this agains

the person who reported it, andrew brightbart has a history of smearing people. >> that was not the case here. >> the person who discovered the tweet -- but that was a reason people were going slow on the story. >> you were wary? >> we were wary? >> what is the tipping point? >> the tipping point on wednesday when he came out and did interviews about this. on tuesday he grew increasingly testy with the press and that raised some alertness about, well, why is he so defensive? on wednesday he did interviews with us and we went in and did the interview. we were not necessarily intending to do the story on the cbs evening news but it was in the mix. when he gave that series of interviews where he couldn't answer that basic question, that became news. >> in your view, he helped catapult it by not being able to answer the questions? >> absolutely. >> maureen, do you see a serious side of this, outside the world of gawker or is this story kind of shear entertainment? >> one thing i do take issue with is, as nancy mentioned, at first people people didn't i take the story seriously because it sho

andrew brightbart, and it was his government that started leaking the photos that are of weiner, a series of photos they claim show him shirtless and bare chested and three women have received these sexually suggested tweets and beside the 21-year-old who started it, and another website is saying a middle-age woman received 200 sexually explicit messages and as well as engaging in sex with the congressman and the photographs have exploded across the new york political landscape. he is a six term congressman and ascened to schumer's seat after serving four schumer in the natural as a staff members and city council member before that. and he is married to his wife, a top aide to secretary of state hillary clinton and some of the photographs, some show he is showing the photos to someone in the world saying it's me, and another one with sexually suggestive type of phrases in the photos and the last ones have a shirtless, bare chested congressman but no confirmation on that he says the account has been hacked and he has not called for an official investigation but he has a lawyer. in what is

describe the room and what went on when andrew brightbart took the podium. >> he took the podium in fairness at request of reporters who wanted him to be able to address everyone in unison and freely. he was surrounded by cameras after a few of us noticed him. there was really an astonishing warmup act for anthony weiner who came in and gave what was also an amazing performance. i don't mean that critically. he was very genuine in his tears and he was sorry. it was quite something to see someone stand there and take questions this way. that was not something eliot spitzer did. >> in fact, i should point out eliot spitzer did resign. >> yes. >> and the fact is that weiner is saying he's going to fight and he won't quit. >> that's right. >> so you've covered him a long time, since he was a member of council. you've seen him over the years, 13 member years in congress. how astonishing was it? how -- you thought it was genuine. a lot of people from the outside who may not know anthony weiner as well as you do in covering him politically didn't know whether he was faking it. you thought it was re

. >> andrew brightbart who broke the story brought broussard's name to abc. why? >> because he trusted us. and when i say "us," i mean my senior producer. >> but breitbart hates the mainstream media. >> but not my producer. he trusts people that he knows he can depend on. he wanted mainstream media legitimacy on this story. he knew probably that he needed it not to reach into andrew's head. but he came to us because he knew that if abc news got involved, specifically vlasto and cuomo, it would have the legitimacy of the case. >> if, look, breitbart was right on this show but he has a controversial background, making the agricultural department look like a racist, did any of that bother you? >> it makes you cautious. howie, you still talk to me, right? you have much better sources than i. every source can be 100% wrong or 100% right. everyone falls somewhere in between. when andrew breitbart took this, we took the name we could and we did everything we could to make sure this was right. >> was it difficult to talk megan broussard into sitting in front of a camera w

. >> andrew brightbart took over the first part of the press conference yesterday saying he was encouraged by media inside the room to go to the podium and speak taking over roughly the first 30 minutes, kind of odd for everybody watching to see how this was all going to transpir. some people were even saying was this brightbart setting this all up at some point, everyone confirming no weiner's office said this was going to take place. listen to what he had to say on the today show this morning. >> i disagree everything except for israel with congressman weiner and i'm telling you in the room i felt so unbelievably sad for this guy. it was pathetic but also a sad moment. >> so with breitbart and there are people on the left and people on the right that are looking for these types of things to be able to go after politicians and bring them down, do you think that there needs to be a common sense is symposium washington, d.c., you know what, everybody is fallible but let's avoid these mistakes. >> i wouldn't call breitbart gracious. he was running several victory laps around weiner. democrat

levels, including this one, before anthony weiner even got to the podium, conservative blogger andrew brightbart grabbed a microphone and telling the crowd he felt vindicated. he said he was looking for an apology from weiner for his blame the messenger strategy. >> i can't imagine a more humiliating thing to have to do than that press conference. he made his bed, he's going to have to lie in it. alisyn: and breitbart got that apology which he says he accepts. he thinks there should be an investigation saying there are ramifications or should be for falsely claiming that other people are doing something illegal or wrong. bill: the irony of his presence, he was in new york selling a book and got a message weiner was going to have this press conference, he walks into the room and all the reporters started asking him question. then they requested him to go to the microphone because they could not hear him. breitbart later said he had no idea that was being broadcast on television at the time but several networks took it and his reaction there and there's more reaction from weiner's friend and mento

andrew brightbart took to the podium. >> i would like an apology. this was his strategy was to blame me. >> reporter: when he spoke, weiner did apologize to breitbart, one of many apologies he offered, sometimes fighting back tears. >> i made terrible mistakes that hurt the people i care about the most. i'm deeply sorry. i have not been honest with myself, my family my constituents, my friends and supporters and the media. >> reporter: and, matt, whether or not congressman weiner can pull through remains to be seen. an interesting caveat is it played out over social networking. despite twitter and facebook being a harm to the congressman's career he said, there is nothing wrong with social media. what i did was the mistake. matt? >> all right, luke russert, thank you very much. andrew breitbart is the conservative blogger who broke the story. good morning. >> good morning. >> 30 years i have been watching news conferences. that was one of the most bizarre i have seen. what was it like in the room? >> electric. it was completely packed. i walked in c