david gergen didn't get upset when sheldon whitehouse, a democrat senator, propose to people that disagreeith his views on climate change should be subject to criminal prosecution. he didn't worry about the authoritarian temptation when the democrats in the senate voted effectively to neuter the first amendment. he didn't bemoan the trend towards authoritarianism when the previous administration weaponized both the justice department and the irs to go after its ideological enemies. worst of all, he didn't bemoan the trend towards authoritarianism when dozens of democrat legislators, before trump had even set foot in the office, decided to boycott his inauguration, which is the very defining act of a free society, the peaceful transfer of power. david gergen didn't whimper a word when dozens of democrats decided they were going to boycott the inauguration. >> tucker: he seemed deeply unconcerned. i was thinking, what do all these issues have in common? gun control, mass immigration, tax on a nuclear family. they never let up with that. what is that about? it seems to me that the family is t

. >> david gergen -- my panel.he memo is the memo and the bigger issue might be what happens because of it. and the question stands is rod rosenstein's job in jeopardy and we heard it is no. >> this is how far something that the president was talking about with people last year. >> he just denied that. >> and that is fine. it was something the president was talking about last year. and how the number three of justice if she stepped up into rod rosenstein's job. i think he recognizes there is a danger in doing that and not looking to do that now. and i think he likes the we will see what happens or you figure it out as part of his tag line stay tuned to the next episode. i think it is something that is going to dominate the conversation for several days. a lot going on in this memo. this was not just a dossier that was paid for by the dnc. it began with the washington beacon. the memo does not mention the fact that carter page had been under fisa warrant prior to that. so what we have seen repeatedly from the presid

david gergen, first to you. is this unhinged? >> it reminds me very much of the last days of president nixon when he became deeply, deeply insecure, lashed out in all sorts of ways and didn't remain focused on the job at hand. and this i'm afraid has been president trump's pattern for some time. i don't know why he is so insecure. it certainly suggests as mueller closes in more that there is he very much does not want us to know, and he is very afraid that mueller is going to get there. but i also think, brian, and dan can speak to this as well, the way the white house runs and people and staff take their cues from the top, from the president. if he is deceptive, if he is dishonest with the public, then what you find in the white house is a culture of deceit and deception and they can't get their story straight, because there hasn't been a story of trying to be straight. >> is that what you see today? >> that's what i see today, yes. i think that we have an extraordinary situation where that tweet you just showed from mr. thompso

david gergen, former individual tore four presidents. you see sarah sanders trying to clean up the president's tweet, foremost his attempt to use the florida massacre to degrade the fbi's participation in the russia probe. any excuse, any valid explanation for that? >> no. none. none that we've heard of, anyway. i thought a cnn viewer put it well this weekend, anderson. our high schoolers are looking like leaders, and our leaders are looking like high schoolers. we're an increasing threat to our democracy because the president, the white house, and the congress have not tried to mobilize the forces of the u.s. government and state and local governments to stop this obvious threat to our new election, which is just seven months away. the lead story in the new york times today is how bots jumped on these stories over the weekend and put out a variety of stories drawing upon extreme views and trying to pit us against each other as a people. they are succeeding at that. this is a russian-led exercise. and there's no excuse that i can think o

david gergen, would you agree with that in. >> i think that's the argument. i don't think that's the truth. i think this is much more about trying to discredit the mueller investigation. the president has been telling people privately that he thinks it will discredit. and i think what is really important here to remember, the fisa court didn't act just once. wasn't as if they were led into a mysterious place where they were told untrue things. the government had to go back, the fbi had to go back on three different occasions after that. there were three different tests of whether it was appropriate to have this fisa ruling on carter page. and you have to show new information each time, new evidence that is worth continuing. so they had four times they convinced different judges that this was a good idea. seems to me that's pretty compelling. let's wait and see the democratic memo. >> to your point, wasn't one piece of information each of those four times. it is a lengthy process. david gergen, appreciate it. >>> still ahead, attorney jeff sessions is calling

i want to bring in our cnn presidential historian and and david gergen. ew a while. good to see you. i'm starting with tim. >> thank you, don. >> the president on a twitter streak this morning about the russia investigation. he says witch hunt. words he tweeted out over a dozen times. guess who else used the phrase? richard nixon about watergate. so, are either of these a witch hundred. >> well, i mean obviously the president is really unhappy today because of what happened to jared kushner. it's a big blow to him, not to be able to have a member of the family step in and help him with things he doesn't want to read. he can't get that help anymore. i think the president is losing control of his white house. and so when that happens he reacts the way nixon used to react when things didn't go his which by ranting. that was a rant. look, we already learned with the most recent -- the next to most recent indictment that if this is a witch hunt there are witches because in fact the russians were participating in an active measure attention campaign to influence

it's a job title that has been held by people like david gergen, george stephanopoulos, karen hughes, dan bartlett, nicolle wallace, dan pheiffer, general palmieri and anthony scaramucci. she is 29 years old from greenwich, connecticut. she did some modelling for ralph lauren and that's her as cover art on "the it girl." she graduated from smu and worked in pr here in new york and then for ivanka trump's fashion line. that got her into the trump orbit and she's been at donald trump's side going back the length of the campaign. those who have any questions about her loyalty should remember this statement she put out last year in response to an article about trump in the "washington post" and we quote, "president trump has a magnetic personality and exudes positive energy, which is infectious to those around him. he has an unparalleled ability to communicate with people, whether he is speaking to a room of three or an arena of 30,000. he has built great relationships throughout his life and treats everyone with respect. he is brilliant with a great sense of humor and an amazing ability

and david gergen. you see sarah sanders trying to clean up the tweets this weekend.s there any excuse, any valid explanation for that? >> no. none. none that we have heard of anyway. i thought a cnn viewer put it well this weekend, our high schoolers are looking like leaders and our high schoolers are looking like high schoolers. the president, the white house, and the congress indeed have not tried to mobilize the enforces of u.s. government to stop this obvious threat of a new election which is seven months away. the lead story in the new york times today. trying to pit us against each other as a people. this is russian led exercise and there is no excuse that i can think of that would discourage the u.s. government from doing more. every government that i have been involved in which goes back a long way, this would have been a huge warning. and put every resource possible to stop the russians from dividing us as a people and essentially, eroding the trust in the country in each other and in our institutions. >> the president his intelligence briefers don't want to

david gergen said today that president trump's tweet storm resembles richard nixon when he became unpluggedaranoid. you said nixon at least kept his unraveling private. do you see any resemblance? >> absolutely. richard nixon, after the pentagon papers were released, initially he was pretty calm about it. then he got incensed when he couldn't stop "the washington post" and "new york times" from publishing. he lost it. you can hear it on the tapes. you can only hear it on the tapes, he didn't lose it publicly. this is when he went -- wanted a list of all the jewish-americans working in the federal government. this is when he put together the plumbers, an investigative unit run out of the white house that ultimately would break into daniel ellsberg's psychiatrist's office. he lost it. the thing that we have to watch now is we're seeing the tip of the iceberg with trump. is he doing nixonian things underwater? because what we didn't know in 1971, what richard nixon was doing, how he expressed his anger and frustration. if donald trump is doing what nixon was doing, he's misusing the agencies o

joining us now is chief correspondent dana bash, david gergen and jack kingston. davis, is this an important strategy? >> it is bad for the country. when you are on the brink of shutting down the government, they get into the process and they are constructive. they work behind the scenes or in front of the process. but he is threatening them and in effect he is throwing down. giving me what i want, no changes or we are going to shut down the government. >> part of what donald trump is about is shaking up the town and going about things in an unconventional way and david is right, most presidents have gone in there and said okay, guys, i am going to be the mature adult. instead he is saying you guys don't get it done, and i am not afraid of the shutdown. that puts more pressure on them saying he really means it. let's get this done. the legislative branch is the lead on this thing. >> except what the president said today doesn't reflect the reality of what happened on capitol hill today. and will probably happen again tomorrow which is the whole notion of immigrati

so three people now, david gergen, close to the president, with the association's, communications, travels with the president. the others being michael flynn, george papadopoulos lower level. should the president be concerned? >> absolutely. everyone in the white house should be concerned. no longer talking about people can be dismissed as coffee boys. these people were actually held important positions chairman and deputy chairman tft campaign t went all the way into the transition into the white house. what we are seeing here is that mueller has piling up multiple charges against people and basically telling them you have a choice, you can spend ts rest of your life in jail, or you can tell me the truth. and gates decided, you know, i'd rather not spend the rest of my time in the slammer and he's going to spends sometime but not as much time as he would have. and that puts pressure on manafort. manafort is i think playing a risky game. i think he's playing for a pardon. and if he hold it is out long enough maybe the president will pardon him. but when you have this many claims by the spe

david gergen said yesterday that the leaders in the country are acting like high schoolers and the highers in the country are asktsicting like le. >> amen. that is right. and wong poione point they are if they don't have the fortitude to act, they need to be replaced and that is absolutely correct. this is a tipping point moment. we have been here before. and this time we have to do something about it. and stop making excuses about why this cannot be done. the second amendment is not absolute above all over amendments in the constitution. yet in this country, we run around and act as though that is the case. and if our children being died, if sandy hook didn't move folks, those were elementary schoolchildren and then in this city, if this didn't move us, what will? what kind of civilized society can we call ourselves? >> and it depends on the measure. there is a lot of discussion. there was a measure in the florida legislature yesterday that died to ban semi automatic weapons. ar-15 type weapons. the governor was asked about what he supported. if not that. take a listen. >> my goal is t

joining us, dana bash, storm adviser to several presidents david gergen, former republican congressmanston. david? >> unfortunate strategy, it's bad fare the country. presidents normally at this time, when you're on the brink of possibly shutting down the government, they get into the process and they're constructive. they work behind the scenes or in front of the process. but they are very constructive. this makes it harder to get there. he's threatening them. in effect, he's throwing down a dictate. give me the immigration bill that i want, no changes, or we're going to shut down the government. that's what he's saying. >> is this, jack, do you see this as an opening salvo in a deal? >> i really do. part of what donald trump is about is shaking up the town and going about things in an unconventional way. and i think david's right, i think most presidents traditi traditionally have said, i'm going to be the mature adult. but instead he's playing a different card. he's saying, look, you guys don't get it done, i'm not afraid of a shutdown. and i think that puts more pressure on a bipar

. >> david gergen, you were in the nixon white house during the saturday night massacre, and that's the democrats are preemptively citing here that could happen if the president forced out rod rosenstein. do you get the sense based on what you're hearing from maggie, from what you're hearing from the white house and based on just your sense of things that the deputy attorney general's job is safe? >> i don't think we can assume that. remember the white house told us almost a dozen times that no one in the white house has -- the president never talked about firing mueller, and now -- we now have verified reports the president has been talking about it, and that was a pack of lies that there were no conversations. so when we heard tonight repeated claims that no one has been talking about rosenstein going, why should we believe that? so i don't believe that. and i do think there are some differences now that are emerging from the nixon time, which are troubling. nixon tried to use the powers of the existing law enforcement agencies to protect himself. trump, by contrast, is trying to dest