lin sweet, do you agree with david chalian in saying for a white house complaining of leaks this was sort of a surprise how had he handled this? >> i think -- no. i'm not surprised. i don't mean to disagree with you david so much, we knew these gentlemen were in play and we know that trump likes to make announcements in the way he does, with these guys on the couch. here's what i think is interest. >> uh-huh. >> one, he said, doe there doesn't have to be a leak, that runner up john boulton is going to get another position. i don't know what it will be, but we know he's in play. what is interesting here is that however we got to this point with flynn out, that this appointment is probably more helpful to the trump white house overall than having flynn there. because if mcmaster has the same level of trust with president trump that flynn had, flynn was a controversial character, even without the controversy that led to his ouster. flynn had dealt in conspiracy theories and trafficked in them. you know, led political charges during the convention and in other speeches. he gets a second c

david chalian, this is unusual. usually just a paper statement the white house does when they issue some sort of nomination, but this is a much bigger deal right now. >> yes, and we've seen him roll out some of his nominees standing next to the person throughout the transition period. but not all of them, you're right. a lot of them were paper statements, despite the very public sort of dating process when he'd do the interviews of potential nominees. what i think is interesting to note is how quickly the white house is trying to move here. and, obviously, they have been battling a week of just terrible headlines from flynn to the reporting about the constant contacts of campaign associates with russians to puzder's nomination going down in flames and withdrawing that nomination. clearly trying to reverse course here, get back on track and get out. now i do think there's one question important here is how long is this person, since the puzder nomination went down yesterday, this person that's going to roll out, what

david chalian, how did you read that? was that a threat to the justices? >> i think donald trump is trying to walk a line here of vociferously defending what he believes is his administration's position, that he believes it's correct on the merits, that he has this wide berth of authority to put this policy in place for national security reasons and to not ignore the sort of separate, equal, coequal branches of the gocht. at times in his remarks he sort of fell on the wrong side of that line. he caught himself. he said, i don't like to call courts biased. i don't like to do that, but what we've seen so much is just a lot of political courts out there. he's trying to have it both ways. he's trying to pressure them, weigh in on this court case as it's on going which is not the common route you normally see necessarily from a president, and yet he wants to put out his vigorous defense. like i said, at times i think he fell on the wrong side of the line. other times he was making a very strong argument. >> jeff zeleny, as david points out, it's not typical for

david chalian, salina zito, norm eisen and alan derrish wits. that conversation before president trump took office, that, we understand, would violate the logan act of 1798 which we are told you are an expert in. how do you see this? >> one prosecution under the act for a farmer back in 1803. if the logan act were ever enforced, jimmy carter and jesse jackson would be sharing a jail cell today because they both engaged in so much activity in violation of the logan act. jimmy carter advised yasser arafat not to accept bill clinton's peace offer in 2000-2001. ronald reagan's people negotiated with the ayatollah's people. this is a dead letter. let's criticize him for what he said and what he did and maybe not telling the truth about it, but forgot about the logan act. >> george logan, the doctor who it was named after, became senator right after it was put into effect. obviously not much bite on him. isn't the law a distraction here, norm eisen? isn't this about this bigger question now about how the national security adviser could fail to recolle

we also have cnn political director david chalian. so david posner, to you first, no bombs have been found but there have been evacuations over and over and parents, of course, are reasonably alarmed. tells what the jewish community is going through right now at jewish community centers? >> well, we do see that there's an unprecedented number of these threats taking place. we've not seen this before. but on the other hand what we're seeing is the faith and resilience of our parents, of our members and participantto continue with their affiliations with the jccs. we've not seen any wide-scale departure from the jccs. >> what do you attribute the up tick in threats to? is there something about the climate that we're in right now? what do you think could help your community as they try to deal with this? >> we look forward to the apprehension of the perpetrators and all elements of government taking this and making this a strong priority for them. as to the reasons why we can talk about the general environment of what's going on in the co

let's get the bottom line with cnn political director david chalian. , walk us through his big campaign promises and where he is. >> this is the 18th day. we took a look at his biggest campaign promises. you see the extreme vetting promise. that started initially as a muslim ban, then it moved into extreme vetting. we've seen the controversies around that, the executive action caught up in courts. right now it is on hold. it has majority opposition in our latest poll, 53% opposed. the border wall, still claiming mexico will pay for it. the mexican government says no. also in our poll, 60% of americans are opposed to that wall. an uphill climb on those two promises. then obamacare repeal and replace. he said he would get congress to repeal this on day one. now we're hearing that he's resetting expectations. it's going to be all this year, maybe into next year before replacement can be fully formed. you hear different language coming from hill republicans as well. it is going to be tricky since it is the number one promise over a series of six years now f

david chalian, i want to get your thoughts. >> for those throughout the whole campaign season i think this is vintage trump. especially the primary season, it reminded me a lot of his endless interviews he would do and talk until he would sweep away things he didn't like. as jake said, wolf, there was something untethered about him from the job at hand. he was a president who seemed far more consumed by his reviews than by the business of the nation. and if indeed as i said going into this press conference i thought maybe this was going to be an attempt to try to reset, but it seems more that it was a frustration expression because he couldn't deal with the swirl of bad headlines anymore and he just wanted to fix this. i can't wait to find out two things, how republicans on the hill observed this press conference today separate from his own base of support in the country, because i think that will tell us a lot about how challenging it may be for him to govern and i can't wait to learn the back story of how this emerged. this does not seem to me to be a well-thought out strategy, this

. >>> david chalian, lynn sweet, and a reporter from "the washington post" who co-wrote an article about all of this, "flynn falls under growing pressure over russia contacts, trump remains silent." adam, you say, "privately some administration officials say flynn's position has weakened and support for him has eroded largely because of that relief. he was disingenuous about russia and could not be fully trusted going forward. the knives are out for flynn." wow. how do you read that? what does that mean? weeks, months, or is he secure? >> frankly i don't think we know. the issue is whether he misled the vice president and others in the administration about the nature of his communications with the russian ambassador. and that's something obviously that he now is talking to vice president pence, and they're trying to see whether there was a misrepresentation here and what the president himself decides to do about that in the end. >> it's clear that the white house at least internally is none too supportive publicly of general flynn, because they had a chance to defend him publicly this we

david chalian, to me you have the substance, the headlines then the tone. let's go substance irs if. we just hit on some of the helis from sara, saying nobody talked to russia, contrary to our reporting in the last 24 hours, he mentioned executive action, announced next week, taylor ordered to the court decision, one other note on daca, he did say he will deal with daca with his heart it's tough especially with kids. >> let's add obamacare with that list. we learned he's going to submit his replace and repeal in march and tax reform will follow that and said he needed to do that for budgetary reasons. also on russia, there also seemed to be a full understanding from donald trump despite his desire perhaps to have better relations with russia that the cloud of the russia controversy over his administration at the moment might make that impossible that the politics of this, couldn't believe he was calling himself the politician at the moment, but that the politics may prove difficult and putin may see that and be aware that donald trump with this cloud over h

. >> i want to talk to cnn political director david chalian, does he have the ability to thread a needle that has escaped many presidents. you're going to have republicans staying the legal status is amnesty. is that something he would be able to do if he has a border wall? >> you have identified the contradictory thoughts here. let's put it in context to what one of the president's main goal is to emerge when he leaves capitol hill back to white house with a completely unified republican party which we have been told time and again is the first major legislative issue up is obamacare, he sounds completely different than he did in the campaign where the pup party is completely divided on it. we saw that throughout the entire primary process in 2015 and 2016 how real that division is. how is now sort of shoehorning this major piece of legislation into obamacare and tax reform which were supposed to be the big pieces this year. i think that becomes a very crowded legislative calendar without a clear path how he's going to accomplish it. >> some would say well, donald trump is a different t

i have david chalian, has he been confirmed. >> reporter: he has. rex tillerson will become donald trump's next secretary of state i believe the vote was 46-53. i'm not sure which democrats those were, we'll be looking into see who crossed party lines to support him on the floor. but remember this is a big big win for donald trump. when rex tillerson was first put out there you remember the very public dating with mitt romney and rudy giuliani, and when he landed on the former exxonmobil. you heard a lot of concerns about the russian president, hawkish folks when it comes to russia, and all of that has been assuaged to get what looks like unanimous republican support on the floor and get him to start running donald trump's diplomacy. >> watching the numbers 56-43, manu. >> that's right. >> reporter: as david was saying we're seeing unanimous support behind this nominee an effort to lockdown the nominee. to actually get to it after the views on russia, after marco rubio said he was going to be supportive, john mccain said he was going to be supportiv

david chalian, thank you very much.resting to see what the president takes away from this, and what he talks to the rest of us about, and the world. >>> cnn "newsroom" with poppy harlow will pick up after the break. thank you for spending your morning with us. >> see you tomorrow. i wanti did my ancestrydna and where i came from. and i couldn't wait to get my pie chart. the most shocking result was that i'm 26% native american. i had no idea. just to know this is what i'm made of, this is where my ancestors came from. and i absolutely want to know more about my native american heritage. it's opened up a whole new world for me. discover the story only your dna can tell. order your kit now at ancestrydna.com. >>> good morning, everyone. i am poppy harlow, and john berman has the day off. you are looking at live pictures of the president visiting the national museum of african-american history and culture. this is his visit. next to him you see ben carson along with his wife, candy. we are also told senator tim scott is wi

let's get "the bottom line" with cnn political director david chalian.e in point, is that fef farious? is that wrong? is that illegal? we don't know the box to check on all three of those. the way the white house has handled it makes it a bigger deal, sloppy answers, not on the same page, fake answers. what's the take? >> you're exactly right, chris. we should stress there's been no evidence put forward in any of these stories about these communications between trump associates and russian officials suggesting it was coordination about the dnc hack or russia's clear desire to impact the american election. but then that begs the question that the white house and the president has to answer is why? why were trump associates in constant communication with russian officials during the campaign? if it's not the worst case scenario, then answer the question to explain to the american people why that was the case. we know from our own reporting, you had jim sciutto on, that president trump was briefed on these communications. so answer the question as to why, b

. >> i want to bring in cnn's political director david chalian.ain, a lot of questions for the administration. when will we know and how will we know that this white house is in serious trouble? what signs are you looking for? >> well, define serious trouble. i would argue they are already in some sort of trouble because they haven't been able to drive through their agenda items, the things that they want to tick through and accomplish, because it's clearly consuming all the oxygen, the distractions are, for them. so there's that kind of trouble. but serious trouble? the one thing you'll look for is when the bottom starts falling out, if it starts falling out, among their core supporters. that's usually politically the place where presidents get hurt in a way that they have a very hard time returning. if republicans, core base trump supporters, all of a sudden start abandoning him, republicans on capitol hill are going to be running for the doors from the administration real quickly as well. and that complicates those agenda items that i was talki

. >> david chalian, to me, let's put flynn aside for a second. the big angle is the vice president that he is troubled by this. >> reporter: yes. >> that he may have been mislead or even lied to if this is all true, straight up how much longer is flynn at the white house, david? >> reporter: i don't know if you saw them taking the seats today they were both in the front row and there was a little quick exchange between pence and flynn there as they were getting settled, but you're right to note this that this really does come down to mike pence's credibility and not something he plays with often. the guy really has developed a brand to try to be a straight shooter as best he can. and flynn now obviously still to this moment has the confidence of the president, but you're right i don't know how long that will last if in deed pence's operation is mislead. he changed his story so that alone would have to be addressed but when you have your vice president sort of as your validater you have to try to make that a more palatable situation for him. >> ye

david chalian, it's like head spinning all these bit of news that the correspondence needed to ask of sean spicer but did you find him a bit more subdued in the wake of the melissa mccarthy snl skit or no? >> i'm not too surprised they decided not to stick to it but we know that image making matters a lot to sean spicer's boss, so i certainly think there was a more subdued toned down sh sean spicer at the podium, whether or not he did that conscio consciously, i don't know, but after it coming after melissa mccarthy, we don't know. >> there are still all kind of questions at the ecenter of the legal battle being waged in court. is it constitutional did that judge in washington state over reach when he halted the ban? tonight's oral arguments are whether the suspension should remain. i have a constitutional lawyer who served under president reagan and george h. bush and karen tomlin, she litigates federal anti-immigration policies. let's get straight to it. david, beginning with you, just even on how this is happening this evening, so how i understand each side presents its case with t

. >> welcome to everyone, david chalian out of the gate first to you before i get into statements and this and that how you charact characterized, senators and gorsuch and the white house was brilliant. tell me how sean spicer would have had to pull off some jedi -- >> he's trying to square what his fellow leader as to the white house for gorsuch to let this be known, he had to square that with the boss the president how it was mischaracterized. that's an impossible situation for sean spicer to be in and didn't serve him well to try to perform all those contortions. that being said i really thought this was a very smart strategy on the part of the white house to send gorsuch up there with this separation, i think it is very welcome words for democratic senators to hear as they're trying to build 62 democrats, it just reminds of the undermining of it. >> as i've been told with the people working on it it was meant to be a clarification. >> this is senator ayotte saying judge gorsuch has made it clear with all his discussions with the senators that he could not comment on any cases and

. >> let me bring in cnn political director david chalian and manu raju. manu, you talked to senator warren on the hill a little while ago what did she say? >> reporter: she defended the move. she was talking about senator session's record and it was the basis of martin luther king's widow, raising objection when he was put up for a federal judgeship and in the letter saying that sessions unfairly disenfranchised and targeted elderly black voters, to intimidate them -- a senator who should be respected and invoked a seldom used rule that says that senators cannot impugn the integrity of a fellow senator, so elizabeth warren in my conversation with her strongly defended the move and even suggested that jeff sessions as the attorney general could unfairly target black voters. >> do you really believe what that letter says that he could unfairly intimidate and disenfranchise elderly black voters? >> yes, i believe the facts show that is exactly what he did. >> you believe he would do that as attorney general. >> let me read to you what she says he did. >> but

. >> david chalian is there any other way to read it? >> i want to make clear about the tweet he thinks is clear. >> just cannot believe a judge would put our country in peril. if something happens, blame him and our court system. bad. it's crystal clear that donald trump is setting up potential blame on this judge in washington if some terrorist attack happens here. >> how extraordinary is this the comments, the tweets the other comments that the president personally has made about this judge? >> reporter: no president in my memory has spoken for this sort of contempt for federal judges. it's often the case that judges rule against what presidents would prefer. it happens to every president and none of them like it, but you never hear the kind of rhetoric that you heard from president trump. you didn't hear president obama or either president bush refer to so-called judges. i don't even know what that means; a so-called judge. i mean, he is a judge whether you agree or disagree with what he said, but i think we're now used to how donald

jeffrey toobin, gloria brown marshall, and david chalian. david, to you, first, on the politics entering the legal realm element of this, the president weighing in in front of a group of sheriffs, association of sheriffs he was speaking before, weighing in on this case, reading the statute that he believes basically is his defense, and states that the law is on his side. but the fact that he's even weighing in so publicly while these judges are still deciding what to do with this case, how to rule in this case, is wild. >> yes. wild and trumpian i think in many ways. this is behavior that we've seen, sort of how he deals with the courts in his private business, when he would be in legal battles. kate, you are right to note, though, he is making the case that he believes he's right on the merits. as we saw with president obama, as obamacare was making its way through the courts and being adjudicated, but president obama would sort of stick to the merits of the laws and why he thinks he'll be successful. that is different from donald trump who

david chalian, what is it because the other day sean spicer said he was fired because of the presidentust and confidence. today the president said he blames the news media, intelligence community for doing this to the wonderful man. >> i think we got real insight into the president's thinking today than yesterday from sean spicer who clearly was trying to clear up a problem for the administration, saying that he lost the trust, resignation asked for and accepted. today we learned this really wasn't a problem for donald trump. he didn't think the flynn thing was a problem. he thought the reporting of it, the exposure to the public became a political party but he didn't think what he did by lying to the vice-president was a problem. >> david swerdlick, he tweeted the fake news media is -- msnbc are h and cnn are unwatchable. intelligence like candy. very un-american. does he have a coherent strategy right now with dealing with this very, very sensitive issue. >> the through line for trump is that always as he says counterpunches. i'm glad to be associated with two news organizations cnn

david chalian, mark preston and carl bernstein. the gang is all here.et's listen and discuss. >> standing here in a house of history, and acutely aware of my own imperfections, i pledge if i am confirmed, i will do all my powers permit to be a faithful servant of the constitution and laws of this great country. for the last decade worked as federal judge in court that spans -- continental united states and 18 million people. men and women i've worked with are inspiration to me. >> gloria, what is your reaction to this appointment? >> i think that donald trump promised he would appoint a conservative judge and he did. for the people, conservatives worried about donald trump and whether it was a candidate they could trust, with the appointment of gorsuch they trust him. thing about gorsuch that made it such a smart decision on donald trump's point is he was appointing someone to replace justice scalia, and in gorsuch appointed somebody who channels scalia. clerked for kennedy and white but admires scalia as role model. rid originalist, defender of religio

. ♪ we've got the beer ♪ miller beer >>> all right back with me now, jamie gangel, david chalian andlizza. finish up the russian stuff before we move on to the one state, two state solution. someone sent me a note, can someone just ask the question. president trump did you authorize anyone in your campaign staff to contact the russians about the obama administration sanction, yes or no. >> they've been trying to ask a lot of questions. the one point we have to make in all of this, i think what david said about serving the president to have this come out is all well and good. except the one thing that every republican has said they can't wrap their head around is donald trump, his position on russia. he has never backed down on russia is good and putin is good. it's not as if he feels badly about this or he has a concern. and throughout the republican party, people are mystified by this. >> is this just as simple as he didn't have as much knowledge about russia as people -- as he should have. backed into corner and feels he has to dig in when it comes to russia? >> well you know -- >>

with his wife melania at home in new york -- let me bring in david chalian, our cnn political directorgloria borger, our chief political analyst. gloria reported on much of these details hype the closed doors of the oval office. you wrote in your piece today it is a staff searching for defined roles in a deliberative policy process in a president that likes to freelance. likes to freelance. and reince priebus is trying to get control of policy. what are you finding out? >>, et cetera a tough situation. they are trying to figure out chains of command and there are oodlogicalcal differences inside the white house. and you will have a president who will tweet at will in the evenings when he is alone or very early in the morning before he heads into the oval office. and i had one close ally to trump who said look this is how he manages. he manages by conflict. and the reason he manages by conflict is that -- and this source says is that in the enif there is conflict he likes it because that way he can steer his own point of view. so he brings in a lot of people, likes differing opinions an

. >> david chalian it looks like the investigations are not being promoted by democrats, of course that's understandable, but even some top republicans are now raise upping serious questions they want answers, more answers, when you have someone like missouri senator roy blunt for example saying he wants more answers from flynn for example. that's a big deal. >> yeah, and some are going to want answers inside the regular committee process. some you hear like john mccain calling for an independent investigation, we need the under score what dana just said, that's the most important news that has come out of the entire news conference today. the president of the united states learned on january 26th that mike flynn had lied to his vice president of the united states. the vice president was out shows out on 15th of january, 11 days later the president of the united states learned that the information pence put out to public that the information he got from flynn was false because flynn lied about it. 18 days later that flynn gets his resignation accepted. this is critical because there's no

i have david chalian, has he been confirmed. >> reporter: he has. rex tillerson will

. >> i'm here with gloria borger, rick santorum, christine quinn and david chalian. senator, a voice of opposition from senator ron widen of oregon who is opposed to gorsuch or expressing disapproval of the pick because he has written extensively against assisted suicide. >> pro-life people should be happy with neil gorsuch. he is sclal in maalia in many r. he's an easier pick to fill in for scalia than he is to fill a swing seat on the court. hard mapp has little paper trail. pro-life phone afolks attacked because he doesn't have a paper trail. the trump administration gets criticism for being neanderthals playing marbles. this was a great chess move. they're getting a great justice and maybe usher the way for kennedy to step down and fill in with someone who is a little more of a stealth candidate. >> christine, the idea gorsuch as a former clerk for kennedy might be able to persuade him to come to the conservative side perhaps even an issue like abortion and abortion rights that must be of concern to democrats. >> every member of the supreme court is an amazing mi

>> david chalian, great to talk to you.is not expected to charge former national security adviser michael flynn for any of his conversations with the russian ambassador. is he now off the hook? we discuss that next. look closely. hidden in every swing, every chip, and every putt, is data that can make the difference between winning and losing. the microsoft cloud helps the pga tour turn countless points of data into insights that transform their business and will enhance the game for players and fans. the microsoft cloud turns information into insight. won't replace the full value of your totaled new car. the guy says you picked the wrong insurance plan. no, i picked the wrong insurance company. with liberty mutual new car replacement™, you won't have to worry about replacing your car because you'll get the full value back including depreciation. and if you have more than one liberty mutual policy, you qualify for a multi-policy discount, saving you money on your car and home coverage. call for a free quote today. liberty s

. >> david chalian is with us as well. major setback for the president of the united states and his proposed travel ban, not happening right now, based on the unanimous decision of the ninth circuit court of appeals. these three judges, very defiant response. see you in court, the security of our nation is at stake. he said even a bad high school student would have to rule in his favor. these three judges are more than bad high school students. >> look at that tweet all in caps. he's adamant about this ruling. you're right this is a setback. sean spicer has been in the briefing room -- you talked about the legal realm. he's been in the briefing room, this is all just -- the substances underlying all of this, they're trying to act like this is not something to adjudicate and obviously the process will continue. the actual executive order, the content of the executive order. but to say it's not a setback would just misread the entire thing. out of the gate, one week after in the administration he issues in executive order. h

and cnn political director david chalian as well. gentlemen, happy monday. as sara was laying out, the president is speaking to governors and health care ceos today. but when it comes to this meeting between republican leaders and the president, it sounds like something of a come to jesus moment over the future of obamacare. what do they want to, need to convince the president of right now? >> i think it's more that they need to draw something out of the president, not necessarily convince him of something. i think these leaders, paul ryan and mitch mcconnell, need to leave that meeting with a clear understanding of how the president wants to point congress in what direction on repeal and replace. they clearly, as sara, was just telling you, draw out of him a commitment to selling wherever they land. most importantly, for now it's been the house and the senate each in their own corners, doing their own thing, some conversations with white house staff, but we haven't had that sort of presidential leadership moment yet. tomorrow night, obviously the big opport

. >> david chalian is our political director. what are you looking for? >> you know, this is now you mentioned the abe meeting on friday. -- >> the japanese prime minister. >> the japanese prime minister. >> we have the canadian prime minister and then we have benjamin netanyahu coming from it reel later this week. donald trump is sort of on the world stage with his counter-parts while his own turmoil inside the white house is going on. that we've been wreath reading about in headline after headline. this is not yet a buttoned down west wing operation. clearly those foreign leaders are reading that as well. the president has to play at two levels at the same time as he is hosting all the foreign dignitaries. that's what i'm looking for, how he handles if he gets questions about mike flynn, reince priebus, about the inner workings of the west wing and whether whether or not there is going to be a course correction just three and a half weeks into the administration. >> whether or not he answers that question. he could very well get it, any of those questio